On Sweating

It is mostly very hot here in the south. In April it gets hot. In October it is still hot. But here now in July, boy: words cannot express. New York can get pretty miserable in the summer. But I do not recall it being this hot, this consistently. When I first moved here it was summer (two years ago) - the end of June. There wasn't a soul on the streets. I would walk around the neighborhood (sans sidewalks) and listen to all the a.c. units running and SUVs whizzing by. And I would sweat. Now I go for regular morning and evening walks with gas fils and I still sweat. That's just about all there is to do here in the summer; and there's no getting used to heat like this (at least not for me, reared in northern climes - Canada, practically). But we cannot sit inside all day. And despite the heat and overall lack of rain thus far this summer the neighborhood is remarkably green and pretty.

Even Gas Fils sweats. The little ends of his hairs on the back of his head start to lay flat against his neck, weighted down by the moisture. Given that sweating is one of my few occupations this summer (while mlle. gass-y is working all day), I thought I might start a list of occasions when I sweat and sort these occasions into categories: times when it is okay to sweat and times when it is not okay to sweat.

Times when it is okay to sweat:

• When I am doing yardwork. Sweating makes me feel like I'm accomplishing something even when I look down and see how much more I need to do.
• When I am jogging. Ditto.
• When I am about to jump into water.
• Sex (depending on partner)
• When I have a flu.
• When I'm dancing (after 2 a.m.).
• When for whatever reason I want to drink a beer in the middle of the afternoon.
• When I'm writing.

Times when it is not okay to sweat:

• When I am teaching. No matter how comfortable I feel with my class, no matter how cool the building is kept, no matter what: I sweat when I teach. Hence the dark clothing. It's not because I'm cool or wanna-be-cool. Dark clothes hide sweat.
• When I'm dancing (before 2 a.m.).
• After showering, with fresh work clothes on.
• When I'm getting a haircut. Bad enough under all the hair. But it's so embarassing when the cape comes off.
• When I'm in an interview.
• Dinner out.
• Sex (depending on partner).
• While reading the newspaper. Cheap paper, runny ink.
• When giving a conference paper. It's like teaching, except that I never get comfortable giving a conference paper.

There are many other occasions, I guess, pro-sweat and con-sweat. But these are the ones that come to mind at present. Now I have to set out on my mid-morning walk - before the temperature hits the 90s. I will still sweat, no doubt. But since nobody goes outside here and since nobody walks anywhere, nobody will be there to notice me sweating. It will almost be like I am not sweating. But will I feel a heightened sense of accomplishment?

The Sweaty-Man

One must [now] have a mind of summer / ...and have been hot a long time / To behold the [wisteria vines] shagged with [pollen dust] / ...and not to think / Of any misery in the sound of the [lack of] wind, / In the sound of [...] few leaves....

Damn. I was holding open my book of Stevens poems to recall these lines from "The Snow Man". But when I pulled away from the book my sweaty hand stuck to the page and ripped it clean out.

On Confidence

Sometimes I cannot write. By this I do not mean that sometimes I cannot write well (that would be often). What I mean is that sometimes I cannot write words. Maybe this is just what is called writer's block. But I've had that before and I usually think of that as involving a lack of ideas or beginnings, etc.: in other words, as not knowing what I want to say. But my not being able to write now (that is, lately) is not exactly that. I've got a lot to say, actually. I've got big ideas. For one thing I know exactly why the book I'm reviewing is good (and I have a pretty good idea about its flaws). But I'm not writing why it's good - even though the review is late. Also, I've got this great idea for a new article - something that connects the contemporary political situation with a figure / genre from my period of interest. At least I think I do. I haven't actually written it out yet. I'm part of an exciting panel at a conference later in the year. It's one of those big-question panels: a give us your thoughts on the discipline, the profession, the state of the world kind of thing. I even have a research assistant to help me collect the necessary data for the presentation. But while I have a great title for the talk (it has a colon and all) I have little else. I've never had a research assistant before and I'm not really sure what to tell him. I mostly try to avoid him. Fortunately, he gets paid with or without my directions. Then there's my tenure folder. I've given it a lot of thought and I'm pretty sure my institution should tenure me. I know how I meet the requirements of the criteria. But have I drafted my statement?

And then there is this blog. I started this on the recommendation of a friend. I thought it could be a place for me to write about more up-to-date things (my period is way in the past). But the horrible headlines pile up like the wreckage facing Paul Klee's Angel (and this is just the news that's actually reported. Progress?). So never-ceasing crappy news is a problem. Laziness is also a problem. Once I get so far behind I just freeze and wait for some new thing to raise my critical ire. But then it's as if I've ignored history. I no longer know what to say about the recent supreme court ruling on segration in schools, for example. Actually I do know but for whatever reason I didn't say it and now there are many great editorial pieces and blog posts that get right to the point. Unfortunately I haven't even linked them yet (I'm stull reading). And let's not forget the "bong-hits for-Jesus" kid. That was no field trip, Roberts, you fuck. I freeze. At any rate, I'm dead keen to write this blog-series on liberalism in the academy. I don't see the whole "all professors are leftists" argument we sometimes get from students or the press. I see something more akin to all professors are wishy-washy liberals who want students to think critically but still think the Democratic party is "progressive." I don't mean we should be teaching this stuff in our classes. Not necessarily. But I think it's odd that so many professors are culturally radical (postmodern transgression and all that shit) but politically as far from radical as can be (compare and contrast the NYTimes coverage of, say, the Tom Stoppard cycle and Hugo Chavez. I've got nothing agaist Stoppard (though drama is a dying, if not dead, medium) but boy do I love to see liberals frothing at the mouth over Chavez's land-redistribution schemes). So why am I writing this instead - on not writing?

I could just as well be doing the dishes or reading some book totally irrelevant to my field or weeding. These are all things I enjoy doing when I'm not writing. I think one consistent problem across the different writing registers that affect me at present (review, conference presentation, article, tenure report, blog) is confidence. I am at present lacking in confidence. If one of these things would actually come through (an article, a successful presentation, tenure, a blog reader)...well, that would give me confidence. Then I might be able to write. But I need to write first for one of these things to come through. Fuck.

I was asked by a journal to write a review of a book that was published as part of a series that includes my own book. I like this writer's previous book a lot and I like the new book too (though less). But for some reason I cannot say how or why, even though I know - or think I know - how and why. I have this sudden loss of confidence. They sent along a sample review for style, length, etc. That review is not very good, in fact. But it's better than the one I'm writing. At least that's how I see it. I have to see it differently. Not as "not very good" or "good" or whatever, but as "a review," which I too have to write. An article, which I too have to write. Tenure, which I too have to win. A blog, which, well. O.K. Next up (maybe): liberalism and the academy. Confidence makes for good writing. It makes for writing period. Words. To write confidently is to write better. Where does it come from, though?

...the 4th of July

The last few weeks / months / years / of headlines leading up to today's holiday celebration must surely by now speak for themselves. If not, there is a host of good commentary collected on news sites like commondreams.org, papers and magazines like the NYRB, the Nation, etc., and especially across the blog world. I offer in addition to all of this a thought - a reflection, really - by the essayist, translator, and critic, Walter Benjamin. The reflection comes from Benjamin's "Theses on the Philosophy of History," in which he critiques the liberal-progressive view of history (under which banner he includes a dominant strand of Marxism) that has proven impotent in the face of fascism. The "Theses" were completed in the spring of 1940, just before Benjamin took his own life rather than risk falling into the hands of fascists.

They have much to say to us still.

# VIII: The tradition of the oppressed teaches us that the ‘state of emergency’ in which we live is not the exception but the rule. We must attain to a conception of history that is in keeping with this insight. Then we shall clearly realize that it is our task to bring about a real state of emergency, and this will improve our position in the struggle against Fascism. One reason why Fascism has a chance is that in the name of progress its opponents treat it as a historical norm. The current amazement that the things we are experiencing are ‘still’ possible in the twentieth century is not philosophical. This amazement is not the beginning of knowledge—unless it is the knowledge that the view of history which gives rise to it is untenable.

...David Denby

I do not like the New Yorker film critic David Denby. At the same time, I can't stop reading him. When the latest issue of the magazine appears in my mailbox (usually a week later than it should!) I immediately look to see whether Denby or the magazine's other film critic, Anthony Lane (annoying for other reasons), is featured. If it's Lane I'll look to the other stories first and eventually find my way to the back pages to see what sort of cutsey turn of phrase the movie under review has inspired Lane to write. But if it's Denby writing, I have to see what he says right away. Even though I know it will make me mad.

I have mixed feelings about the New Yorker as a whole. On the one hand you have the still- great-after-all-these-years investigative reporting of Seymour Hersh. On the other you have the smug liberalism of writers like David Remnick, George Packer, and Denby. Remnick and Packer do the bigger stories: on war, say (which Packer was for, though now he's not), or politics, or profiles. They both write beautifully as I suppose one must when writing for the New Yorker. But where Hersh's dry, list-like style serves to keep his assumptions in the background (minus the assumption that governments are corrupt) - indeed, it is difficult to glean a solid political position or perspective from Hersh's writing: is he a Democrat, Republican, left or right-winger - the same cannot be said for Remnick or Packer. Their liberalist assumptions are precisely what is foregrounded in their writing: thoroughly Democrat-leaning, never will you find a statement or even a sense that there might be a perspective beyond or other than their own (even when Democrats are being criticized). The intolerant conservatism of the Bush administration is scoffed at regularly and often for good reason. But positions and perspectives to the left of the Democrats (which is to say, to the left period) do not even come in for scoffing. They don't come in for anything at all. Is it possible that free markets and privatization schemes might be a bad idea in some instances? Not to these guys.

And not to Denby either. Denby's writing is nowhere near as compelling as Packer's. And his intellectual rigor...well let's just say there isn't much of that in his approach to movies. Maybe there shouldn't be? Who is to say. But Denby shares with other writers at the magazine that smug sense of moral righteousness that cannot stand to see the vaunted principles of liberalism (some vaunted for good reason) questioned. Sometimes, in fact, Denby cannot even see that they are being questioned. Take for example his review of Michael Winterbottom's "The Road to Guantanamo". Like several other critics, Denby saw this film as being a straightforward piece of propaganda. For Denby, movies, maybe art generally, should not be biased (unless it is an implicit bias confirming Denby / the New Yorker's world view). I get the sense that popular culture (for Denby) is meant to bolster and perhaps better our national sense of self - not challenge it. But in his rush to condemn Winterbottom's film as pro-terrorist propaganda, Denby misses the major question posed by the film (a question that to my mind makes the film something other than "propaganda"). The film chronicles the experiences of three young men from Tipton, England, in Pakistan (where they go for a wedding in the weeks after 9/11) and Afghanistan (where they go, they say, to help the people, now under attack by American forces). The three are eventually caught by Northern Alliance troops and handed over to the Americans (who bring them to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba). At Guantanamo, the three men are accused of being members of Al Queda. A pre-9/11 videotape shows them (they are told) at a rally held by / for Osama bin Laden. They are subjected to all the torture, violence and depradation that have become synonymous with "America" for many in the world. And they are eventually released (they were actually in and out of prison back in the UK at the time of the rally in Pakistan). Statistics at the end of the movie (corroborated by Human Rights Watch) suggest their experiences were not unique. At the time of the movie only 10 prisoners at Guantanamo Bay had ever been charged with a crime (out of a possible 700 plus). Not one was convicted.

What Denby cannot get over is what these three men were doing in Afghanistan in the first place. What do they mean by "help out"? And why does everybody they are with have automatic weapons? The movie doesn't explain this. It highlights this awkward aspect of their account. What were they doing indeed? But here's what Denby misses in his fixation on this detail: does the eventual treatment of these three men become justifiable if they were in Afganistan to fight for and with the Taliban? That is, can we only condemn the systematic abuses at Guantanamo Bay (and elsewhere) if we can establish with absolute certainty that these men are innocent? This question is entirely lost in Denby's moralizing critique. And yet not only is it the point (should torture ever be justified), it is one of the most pressing moral questions of our age. As Zizek argued in the LRB a couple of years ago, once torture is even admitted to the table (for true enemies of the country), admitted to the discussion, we (the people) have already lost.

Simple propaganda. Hardly. Still over Denby's head? Seems like it to me.

I was hoping that Denby would get to review Winterbottom's newest film ("A Mighty Heart," about the slain journalist, Daniel Pearl). But it went to Lane.

Denby's latest piece is on Michael Moore's "Sicko" (more propaganda!). You can read it at http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/cinema/2007/07/02/070702crci_cinema_denby/
I have not seen the movie yet so I cannot comment on it (I have mixed feelings about the Moore movies I have seen, but this is a subject for another post). For Denby, "Sicko" is Moore's worst movie yet. As with his review of "Road to Guantanamo," (and nearly every other review he's written), Denby says nothing about the craft of filmmaking: the setting up of shots, pacing, camera work, palette, etc. But boy is he mad about Moore's pranks! Bringing 9/11 workers to Guantanamo Bay and then to Cuba for care? How silly. Except that Denby doesn't get the joke (he is annoyed with the way Moore acts like he didn't already know that Cuba had universal health care; he expresses wonder and surprise). Nor does he (again) get the point. "In the actual political world," he writes, "the major Democratic Presidential candidates have already offered, or will soon offer, plans for reform". A few lines later he says that "Changes in political consciousness that Moore himself has helped produce have rendered his latest film almost superfluous". Does Denby know something the rest of us don't? Every Democratic candidate has offered or will offer a plan for health-care reform? He cannot be serious. Moore's argument is for a single-payer system that renders the health care industry itself superfluous. Are the Democrats offering such a system? Nothing even close. Democratic-party health care reform, if it is ever even pursued, will very likely follow recent reforms in medicaid, the EPA, and energy: that is, industry lobbyists themselves will write the legislation. That's the American way. Health-care companies know more about health care than public officials. It's their business, after all. No Democrat that I know of is challenging this basic principle. If you want confirmation look at campaign contributions.

There are already lots of high profile think-tank intellectuals at the Cato Institute and elsewhere writing to discredit the political and economic arguments of Moore's film. Fair enough. Let's have a debate where an end to the private health care industry is on the table. Denby's smug dismissal of Moore's arguments (and his ignorance about where the debate stands currently in the Democratic party) will add nothing to such a debate, however. And if you take away these dismissals there is little left in the review to qualify as content. Perhaps, then, it is Denby himself who is superfluous.

Except that people like me keep reading him.