This covers the week of 11/3/19 - 11/9/19.
displayed
It's a bright, vivid street, even at dusk. The windows glow with everything I won't or can't buy.
ethical
She's trying to do something ethical with her data science work, conscious as she is of how data can be used to manipulate people, deprive them of privacy, or deny them favorable decisions in unfair ways that are difficult or even impossible to appeal.
gnawed
The fog has feasted on the skyscraper, eating away the steel.
jet lag
Night after night, waking up in the middle of the night, to the flat, dark hours.
outdated
He tries to hook up old speakers to an old computer. "Houston, we have a problem," I say, and we make crackling static noises and laugh.
pinning
She makes claims that force you into a defensive mode. For example, her questions already contain what she considers the true answer. She doesn't ask to genuinely inquire.
rubble
I think of what needs to be rebuilt, and I shiver at what it will take.
Showing posts with label struggle. Show all posts
Showing posts with label struggle. Show all posts
Tuesday, June 9, 2020
Friday, July 27, 2018
The Upheavals of Elizabeth Gaskell's North and South
North and South is full of upheaval. The main character, Margaret Hale, is the teenaged daughter of a vicar who decides he can’t be a vicar anymore and leaves the church. The family moves from a lovely, sleepy village in the south of England to a polluted industrial town in the north, where Mr. Hale starts working as a tutor, meaning that he and his family slide down in social rank. In the coming months, Margaret struggles to understand a new culture, suffers the deaths of people close to her, and meets John Thornton, a young industrialist who initially inspires distaste. By the time he stops being so distasteful, there are enough misunderstandings and intervening events to keep them apart for a while.
The novel’s upheavals also come from the cotton mills of England’s Industrial Revolution. Margaret is horrified to witness workers living in grinding poverty and dying from the cotton fluff they’ve inhaled. Hunger, rage, strikes, fluctuations in trade, wild speculations, and shifting, uncertain social positions are all a part of this northern town the Hales now live in.
Along with portraying some of these societal changes, the author, Elizabeth Gaskell, explores the personal changes as well. What does it mean to live well and be a good person within this brutal system? Mr. Thornton, for instance, seems to have two sides to him: the cold and calculating manufacturer, and the man who brings fruit to Margaret’s ill mother. By the end of the novel, he has taken some initial steps to forging a relationship with his workers that’s more cooperative and less antagonistic. The book isn’t sentimental about these changes – it’s not like they all become the best of friends and eliminate poverty and disease from the town. But the adjustments in perception and attitude are there, in part because of Margaret’s influence (some of his words later in the book echo hers from earlier on), and possibly because Thornton has been taking lessons from the gentle Mr. Hale. Also, because Thornton has the potential to change in these ways. He’s disposed to it, susceptible to these influences by virtue of his own character.
The nature of change, the influences that work on people’s character, aren’t always straightforward in this book. Margaret tries to do good and be dutiful, not always with success or consistency (which I like, because it’s more realistic than if she were a spotless angel free of all biases or lapses). At the start of the novel, both she and Thornton are, in their own ways, quite sure of themselves. Their presence in each other’s lives and the upheavals they go through work certain influences on them.
Thornton becomes more inclined to flexibility and compromise. He handles a devastating failure with great dignity (not that he’s free of turmoil, or frustration and dejection). He’s also utterly overcome with love, struck and possessed by love to an overwhelming extent. For much of the book, he has no hope that this love will give him happiness, only that by experiencing it he will become enriched.
Margaret has been a pillar to her family from the start. What primarily changes is her understanding of herself and her relation to others. Change for her doesn’t form a smooth path with clear epiphanies. She struggles. She sorts out her thoughts in solitude, something that isn’t easy for her to do, as she generally puts her family’s feelings before her own. The book shows her embracing hours of reflection and grief as a necessary way to order her thoughts and find peace (not necessarily happiness, just peace). Passivity and despondency become quiet resolve, with time, with effort. So much of that essential effort is unobserved by the world. Failure would mean an attempt to go back in time to previous conditions that are no longer recoverable. There is no going back. Those who try will stagnate; they might die.
Gaskell starkly portrays the psychological effects of change: hopelessness, loneliness, aimlessness, displacement, and fear, along with the possible delights of discovery and curiosity and receptivity to love. One of the reasons I enjoyed this novel is the way Gaskell lets each upheaval truly be an upheaval. It’s not that the characters are entirely helpless. But they are tossed around a lot. They form promising plans, only to find themselves suddenly short on time or opportunity to implement them. They may not know who to turn to for guidance (Margaret is often so alone in this respect). Sometimes they make momentous choices in a rush, under pressure; in a matter of seconds, they change the course of their lives, and may find plenty of time afterwards to regret and repent. Wisdom develops after the circumstances in which it was sorely needed, and there may be only a small chance of applying it in the future to similar situations.
I keep thinking about Margaret’s hours of solitude, when the soul is wrestling with life and with itself, and the outcome is uncertain. I like how the characters aren’t allowed to become complacent. Even the final lines, playful and loving as they are, point to a challenge Margaret and John will soon face: uncomprehending or disapproving relatives. The ‘happily ever after’ isn’t a promise of an untroubled life; it’s a life where they have a strong chance of facing the upheavals together, with mutual love and support.
I read this for the Classics Club Challenge.
The novel’s upheavals also come from the cotton mills of England’s Industrial Revolution. Margaret is horrified to witness workers living in grinding poverty and dying from the cotton fluff they’ve inhaled. Hunger, rage, strikes, fluctuations in trade, wild speculations, and shifting, uncertain social positions are all a part of this northern town the Hales now live in.
Along with portraying some of these societal changes, the author, Elizabeth Gaskell, explores the personal changes as well. What does it mean to live well and be a good person within this brutal system? Mr. Thornton, for instance, seems to have two sides to him: the cold and calculating manufacturer, and the man who brings fruit to Margaret’s ill mother. By the end of the novel, he has taken some initial steps to forging a relationship with his workers that’s more cooperative and less antagonistic. The book isn’t sentimental about these changes – it’s not like they all become the best of friends and eliminate poverty and disease from the town. But the adjustments in perception and attitude are there, in part because of Margaret’s influence (some of his words later in the book echo hers from earlier on), and possibly because Thornton has been taking lessons from the gentle Mr. Hale. Also, because Thornton has the potential to change in these ways. He’s disposed to it, susceptible to these influences by virtue of his own character.
The nature of change, the influences that work on people’s character, aren’t always straightforward in this book. Margaret tries to do good and be dutiful, not always with success or consistency (which I like, because it’s more realistic than if she were a spotless angel free of all biases or lapses). At the start of the novel, both she and Thornton are, in their own ways, quite sure of themselves. Their presence in each other’s lives and the upheavals they go through work certain influences on them.
Thornton becomes more inclined to flexibility and compromise. He handles a devastating failure with great dignity (not that he’s free of turmoil, or frustration and dejection). He’s also utterly overcome with love, struck and possessed by love to an overwhelming extent. For much of the book, he has no hope that this love will give him happiness, only that by experiencing it he will become enriched.
Margaret has been a pillar to her family from the start. What primarily changes is her understanding of herself and her relation to others. Change for her doesn’t form a smooth path with clear epiphanies. She struggles. She sorts out her thoughts in solitude, something that isn’t easy for her to do, as she generally puts her family’s feelings before her own. The book shows her embracing hours of reflection and grief as a necessary way to order her thoughts and find peace (not necessarily happiness, just peace). Passivity and despondency become quiet resolve, with time, with effort. So much of that essential effort is unobserved by the world. Failure would mean an attempt to go back in time to previous conditions that are no longer recoverable. There is no going back. Those who try will stagnate; they might die.
Gaskell starkly portrays the psychological effects of change: hopelessness, loneliness, aimlessness, displacement, and fear, along with the possible delights of discovery and curiosity and receptivity to love. One of the reasons I enjoyed this novel is the way Gaskell lets each upheaval truly be an upheaval. It’s not that the characters are entirely helpless. But they are tossed around a lot. They form promising plans, only to find themselves suddenly short on time or opportunity to implement them. They may not know who to turn to for guidance (Margaret is often so alone in this respect). Sometimes they make momentous choices in a rush, under pressure; in a matter of seconds, they change the course of their lives, and may find plenty of time afterwards to regret and repent. Wisdom develops after the circumstances in which it was sorely needed, and there may be only a small chance of applying it in the future to similar situations.
I keep thinking about Margaret’s hours of solitude, when the soul is wrestling with life and with itself, and the outcome is uncertain. I like how the characters aren’t allowed to become complacent. Even the final lines, playful and loving as they are, point to a challenge Margaret and John will soon face: uncomprehending or disapproving relatives. The ‘happily ever after’ isn’t a promise of an untroubled life; it’s a life where they have a strong chance of facing the upheavals together, with mutual love and support.
I read this for the Classics Club Challenge.
Monday, January 25, 2016
Four Short Stories Featuring Trees
Title: Joshua Tree
Author: Emma Bull
Where I Read It: The Green Man: Tales from the Mythic Forest
One night she's lost in the desert and in danger of dying. However, the night also becomes an opportunity for her to rediscover the weight and meaning of her life.
Author: Emma Bull
Where I Read It: The Green Man: Tales from the Mythic Forest
"My point is, sometimes truly crappy experiences have a crowbar effect on the rest of your life. Everything shakes loose. Then you can let it go back to the way it was, or you can step in and make something happen, something that might be permanent."Tabetha Sikorsky is a teenager growing up in a desert town attached to a military base. It's a dead town, full of dead-end jobs and people who feel their lives have gone nowhere. Tabetha knows she might become one of them. Then a new girl shows up, and some interesting possibilities open up for Tabetha.
One night she's lost in the desert and in danger of dying. However, the night also becomes an opportunity for her to rediscover the weight and meaning of her life.
"But sometimes I can still have these moments of total happiness. And I feel as if every time I pretend to be happy, I'm scaring that real happiness off."I like how she finds new vitality, taps into the wellspring of life, in a desert. And specifically, among the spiny, twisty, miraculous Joshua Trees.
Friday, August 10, 2012
Week in Seven Words #131
appreciated
As welcoming gifts they present me with a chocolate-frosted cupcake, a card with a blue cave troll on it, and a paper bracelet with a pink shiny heart.
bladed
At the moment there's only anger, a razor sharp focus that admits no sense or compassion.
enough
"Never enough" are the words I use to bludgeon all my efforts.
multipurpose
The dog, when she isn't curled up on my lap, makes for a good armrest.
renitency
When I sense that I'm being pressured to conform I resist on instinct, even before I'm able to articulate why.
resound
Music blooms out of the dusty speakers.
well-met
Four branches bearing different leaves (star shaped yellow, oval green) meet across a light blue sky.
As welcoming gifts they present me with a chocolate-frosted cupcake, a card with a blue cave troll on it, and a paper bracelet with a pink shiny heart.
bladed
At the moment there's only anger, a razor sharp focus that admits no sense or compassion.
enough
"Never enough" are the words I use to bludgeon all my efforts.
multipurpose
The dog, when she isn't curled up on my lap, makes for a good armrest.
renitency
When I sense that I'm being pressured to conform I resist on instinct, even before I'm able to articulate why.
resound
Music blooms out of the dusty speakers.
well-met
Four branches bearing different leaves (star shaped yellow, oval green) meet across a light blue sky.
Sunday, February 19, 2012
Week in Seven Words #106
bewilderment
Of all the emotions I read in the puppy's eyes (or read into them), bewilderment is most prominent. Why doesn't she get to piddle on the floor and run around wherever she wants and chew on the DVD player? Why do her keepers alternate between belly rubs and scoldings?
chafing
Some of them yield to a lack of responsibility, the close of their life where they can be tended to and spend their time drawing, watching videos, or staring out of windows. Others bristle, even gently, against the activities suggested to them. They shrink away or turn stony when someone addresses them in a patronizing babying voice. Their body or mind might be turning on them, and there might be no one left who bothers to visit, but they aren't going to settle happily before a pile of coloring pages and play with crayons.
chirography
I don't know what he's writing about, as he sits in the subway car with a notebook propped on his knee, but his hand-writing is beautiful. I hope the words are beautiful too. I think he could make art of a grocery list with his languid looping script.
heartfelt
Because she can't see so well, she dictates the Valentine to me, a week before Valentine's Day. I write her words out on a red, purple and pink construction paper heart, and I wonder if the person she's writing to is real, or still alive and living at the address she remembers. She has a great memory for addresses. Her words are straightforward - "thank you for visiting me, I'm sorry I couldn't see you at the time" - and I hope this person is real and that the Valentine arrives at the right place.
landmarks
An empty bandshell, the grand avenue of elms, an angel in a dead fountain. The bridge I cross shows up in sharp reflection on cloudy water.
promise
I hope to be worthy of the risks I'm taking.
ruction
Geese and ducks struggle over crumbs from bread and muffins. Two of the ducks whirl in a circle of combat on the water, a taut coil of movement, until one of them breaks free and skips away like a stone across the surface of the lake.
Of all the emotions I read in the puppy's eyes (or read into them), bewilderment is most prominent. Why doesn't she get to piddle on the floor and run around wherever she wants and chew on the DVD player? Why do her keepers alternate between belly rubs and scoldings?
chafing
Some of them yield to a lack of responsibility, the close of their life where they can be tended to and spend their time drawing, watching videos, or staring out of windows. Others bristle, even gently, against the activities suggested to them. They shrink away or turn stony when someone addresses them in a patronizing babying voice. Their body or mind might be turning on them, and there might be no one left who bothers to visit, but they aren't going to settle happily before a pile of coloring pages and play with crayons.
chirography
I don't know what he's writing about, as he sits in the subway car with a notebook propped on his knee, but his hand-writing is beautiful. I hope the words are beautiful too. I think he could make art of a grocery list with his languid looping script.
heartfelt
Because she can't see so well, she dictates the Valentine to me, a week before Valentine's Day. I write her words out on a red, purple and pink construction paper heart, and I wonder if the person she's writing to is real, or still alive and living at the address she remembers. She has a great memory for addresses. Her words are straightforward - "thank you for visiting me, I'm sorry I couldn't see you at the time" - and I hope this person is real and that the Valentine arrives at the right place.
landmarks
An empty bandshell, the grand avenue of elms, an angel in a dead fountain. The bridge I cross shows up in sharp reflection on cloudy water.
promise
I hope to be worthy of the risks I'm taking.
ruction
Geese and ducks struggle over crumbs from bread and muffins. Two of the ducks whirl in a circle of combat on the water, a taut coil of movement, until one of them breaks free and skips away like a stone across the surface of the lake.
Sunday, November 20, 2011
Week in Seven Words #93
cradled
I'm walking on the open palm of a beautiful day. There's water, gold and orange trees, blue skies holding rain clouds at bay. I feel raw and tired inside but the day is gentle.
cultivation
School is giving him a certain knowingness. He's starting to pick up spelling and reading, the ways of the world, the lingo of kindergarten (awesome!).
lane
Taking the long way home I find a lovely street, quiet and shaded with trees. I'm glad I chose to walk off some of my restlessness and map out a new neighborhood on foot.
locus
Two branches of the public library within a block of each other. A prime piece of real estate.
persistence
In the room where I've been run through a proofreading test I see a motivational poster on the wall depicting a pencil stub and the word Persistence, followed by this line: We've exhausted all possibilities... let's get started.
subway
In a strange way I've missed this: the stale breath of the station, the rumble of approaching trains, the clatter of trains pulling into or speeding past the platform.
treasured
Dusk settles in the afternoon. Buildings and statues catch the last light and hold it close for as long as they can.
I'm walking on the open palm of a beautiful day. There's water, gold and orange trees, blue skies holding rain clouds at bay. I feel raw and tired inside but the day is gentle.
cultivation
School is giving him a certain knowingness. He's starting to pick up spelling and reading, the ways of the world, the lingo of kindergarten (awesome!).
lane
Taking the long way home I find a lovely street, quiet and shaded with trees. I'm glad I chose to walk off some of my restlessness and map out a new neighborhood on foot.
locus
Two branches of the public library within a block of each other. A prime piece of real estate.
persistence
In the room where I've been run through a proofreading test I see a motivational poster on the wall depicting a pencil stub and the word Persistence, followed by this line: We've exhausted all possibilities... let's get started.
subway
In a strange way I've missed this: the stale breath of the station, the rumble of approaching trains, the clatter of trains pulling into or speeding past the platform.
treasured
Dusk settles in the afternoon. Buildings and statues catch the last light and hold it close for as long as they can.
Monday, October 31, 2011
Worth Watching: The King's Speech (2010)
Title: The King's Speech
Director: Tom Hooper
Language: English
Rating: R (because His Royal Highness doesn't stammer when he's cursing a blue streak)
Synopsis
The Duke of York (Colin Firth), known as "Bertie" to his family, is second in line to the throne after his older brother. Bertie prefers to stay out of the public eye; the few speeches required of him are disastrous on account of his stammer. At the arrangement of his wife, Elizabeth (Helena Bonham Carter), he undergoes speech therapy with Lionel Logue (Geoffrey Rush), who demands great effort and openness from him. In spite of some progress, Bertie still stumbles during moments of nerves and high emotion. After his father, George V (Michael Gambon), dies and his brother, Edward VIII (Guy Pearce), abdicates the throne, Bertie becomes King George VI. On the eve of WWII he's required to broadcast an important speech with a strength and eloquence he's convinced he'll never possess.
Characters
Lionel Logue is passionate, wry, and just a little bit bonkers (in a manner unique to Geoffrey Rush). His character is also deepened by personal disappointments and struggles, such as his inability to start up a career as a Shakespearean actor.
From Colin Firth's Bertie you get a sense of a decent man who's fun to be around when he can relax, which isn't often. The few people who make him feel at ease are his wife and daughters (the elder of the two became Queen Elizabeth II in 1952). As his wife, Helena Bonham Carter is good at mixing upper-class restraint and properness with the sense of fun and play that she's brought to other very different movie roles.
I got a kick out of the fact that they made Winston Churchill a character, though I laughed too because I recognized the actor who plays him (Timothy Spall) from only one other role: Peter Pettigrew in the Harry Potter films. He doesn't look sufficiently different from Peter here and doesn't have a large enough part to make himself a distinct character, so I kept thinking of him as an animagus politician. Another "cross-over" moment that briefly threw me out of the film was the scene where Lionel Logue's wife, Myrtle (Elizabeth Ehle), meets Bertie for the first time. Ehle starred as Elizabeth Bennet in the BBC's grand 1995 production of Pride and Prejudice, which also made Colin Firth famous as Mr. Darcy; it's probably still the role that Firth is most strongly associated with. So to have the two of them meet in a quiet room tipped the movie back into the Regency era for a few seconds, and I expected him to launch into a pompous marriage proposal. But then I was tilted right back to the 1930s, because Myrtle Logue treated the king with a nervous deference that Elizabeth Bennet would never have felt in the presence of Mr. Darcy.
Relationships and conflicts
Bertie and Lionel become friends, though it's a struggle, and they fight along the way. Bertie hates appearing vulnerable, and he's had to deal with so many quacks that it takes him time to trust someone; he's also conscious of the difference in station between him and Lionel, and it isn't easy for him to get used to Lionel's informality. Add to that the pressure of his public duties and the fact that he had thought, with great relief, that he'd never be king, and friction between the two men is inevitable. With the exception of his wife and daughters, Bertie tends to be reserved around everyone, in part as a defense mechanism against the mocking he's endured over his stuttering.
Bertie is sweet to his daughters and has a steady source of warm support and companionship from his wife, who consoles him, cheers him up, banters with him, and occasionally sits on him or stuffs things into his mouth. Firth and Bonham Carter play well off each other.
Memorable sights and sounds
Lionel runs Bertie through various exercises that lend themselves to interesting visuals (like Bertie rolling around on the floor) and sounds (vowels belted out with mixed dignity and silliness). At a few points in the movie, Bertie also speaks in song; if he couches his sentences in the melody of a familiar song, he stutters much less or not at all. This use of song sometimes has a comic effect but at other times is used to highlight a personal melancholy.
I also loved Bertie's expression as he hears himself deliver a soliloquy from Hamlet. Lionel had him record it while being drowned out by music so that he couldn't actually hear himself speak. Later on, after breaking off in disgust from Lionel Logue and his unconventional methods, Bertie listens to his own voice speaking steadily, and it's a wonderful moment of revelation. Shakespeare in general is woven nicely into the movie (including Lionel's audition for the part of Richard III).
Stand-out scenes
The King Edward's Chair scene. Bertie's confidence initially lapses, and it seems that he's going to give up again on working with Lionel. But after Lionel insolently drapes himself over King Edward's Chair, which is the throne used during a monarch's coronation, Bertie's anger at Lionel's presumption prompts him to eventually shout out that he has a voice! Bertie also shows himself to have a feeling and respect for tradition that contrasts with his older brother's depicted carelessness in abdicating the throne to be with Mrs. Wallis Simpson.
Another great scene is the climactic delivery of the speech on the eve of WWII ("In this grave hour, perhaps the most fateful in our history..."). The movie cuts back and forth between Bertie picking his way through it word by word, with Lionel standing opposite him, gesturing and coaching, and the king's large audience including various people in their homes, Bertie's family in the palace, and his older brother and Mrs. Simpson.
Further thoughts
Though the movie isn't a documentary and was made to show a man overcoming challenges to rise to the occasion, it still interests me to think about how the filmmakers played around with history and with the characters. For the sake of drama, the relationship between Lionel and Bertie was compressed to a shorter period of time, when in fact they had been working together since the 1920s; and who knows if they ever got to be this informal with one another by the end. I haven't read enough about the characters in general to venture a guess as to what they were like with each other. The movie also omits the whole issue of Neville Chamberlain and appeasement (along with George VI's public show of support for Chamberlain after the Munich Pact) and depicts Churchill and George VI as being friendly and supportive of one another from the very beginning. The filmmakers shape it so that everyone seems more or less united at the war's start, with George VI hoping that his speech impediment won't prevent him from being a resolute figurehead, a symbol of strength and resistance. And it's true that during the war, he and his wife appeared often in public, and visited various places in the UK and abroad, to boost morale.
Here's an actual recording of George VI, delivering the speech on September 3rd, 1939:
The text of the speech is here.
*All images link back to their source (Flixster community).
Director: Tom Hooper
Language: English
Rating: R (because His Royal Highness doesn't stammer when he's cursing a blue streak)
Synopsis
The Duke of York (Colin Firth), known as "Bertie" to his family, is second in line to the throne after his older brother. Bertie prefers to stay out of the public eye; the few speeches required of him are disastrous on account of his stammer. At the arrangement of his wife, Elizabeth (Helena Bonham Carter), he undergoes speech therapy with Lionel Logue (Geoffrey Rush), who demands great effort and openness from him. In spite of some progress, Bertie still stumbles during moments of nerves and high emotion. After his father, George V (Michael Gambon), dies and his brother, Edward VIII (Guy Pearce), abdicates the throne, Bertie becomes King George VI. On the eve of WWII he's required to broadcast an important speech with a strength and eloquence he's convinced he'll never possess.
Characters
Lionel Logue is passionate, wry, and just a little bit bonkers (in a manner unique to Geoffrey Rush). His character is also deepened by personal disappointments and struggles, such as his inability to start up a career as a Shakespearean actor.
From Colin Firth's Bertie you get a sense of a decent man who's fun to be around when he can relax, which isn't often. The few people who make him feel at ease are his wife and daughters (the elder of the two became Queen Elizabeth II in 1952). As his wife, Helena Bonham Carter is good at mixing upper-class restraint and properness with the sense of fun and play that she's brought to other very different movie roles.
I got a kick out of the fact that they made Winston Churchill a character, though I laughed too because I recognized the actor who plays him (Timothy Spall) from only one other role: Peter Pettigrew in the Harry Potter films. He doesn't look sufficiently different from Peter here and doesn't have a large enough part to make himself a distinct character, so I kept thinking of him as an animagus politician. Another "cross-over" moment that briefly threw me out of the film was the scene where Lionel Logue's wife, Myrtle (Elizabeth Ehle), meets Bertie for the first time. Ehle starred as Elizabeth Bennet in the BBC's grand 1995 production of Pride and Prejudice, which also made Colin Firth famous as Mr. Darcy; it's probably still the role that Firth is most strongly associated with. So to have the two of them meet in a quiet room tipped the movie back into the Regency era for a few seconds, and I expected him to launch into a pompous marriage proposal. But then I was tilted right back to the 1930s, because Myrtle Logue treated the king with a nervous deference that Elizabeth Bennet would never have felt in the presence of Mr. Darcy.
Relationships and conflicts
Bertie and Lionel become friends, though it's a struggle, and they fight along the way. Bertie hates appearing vulnerable, and he's had to deal with so many quacks that it takes him time to trust someone; he's also conscious of the difference in station between him and Lionel, and it isn't easy for him to get used to Lionel's informality. Add to that the pressure of his public duties and the fact that he had thought, with great relief, that he'd never be king, and friction between the two men is inevitable. With the exception of his wife and daughters, Bertie tends to be reserved around everyone, in part as a defense mechanism against the mocking he's endured over his stuttering.
Bertie is sweet to his daughters and has a steady source of warm support and companionship from his wife, who consoles him, cheers him up, banters with him, and occasionally sits on him or stuffs things into his mouth. Firth and Bonham Carter play well off each other.
Memorable sights and sounds
Lionel runs Bertie through various exercises that lend themselves to interesting visuals (like Bertie rolling around on the floor) and sounds (vowels belted out with mixed dignity and silliness). At a few points in the movie, Bertie also speaks in song; if he couches his sentences in the melody of a familiar song, he stutters much less or not at all. This use of song sometimes has a comic effect but at other times is used to highlight a personal melancholy.
I also loved Bertie's expression as he hears himself deliver a soliloquy from Hamlet. Lionel had him record it while being drowned out by music so that he couldn't actually hear himself speak. Later on, after breaking off in disgust from Lionel Logue and his unconventional methods, Bertie listens to his own voice speaking steadily, and it's a wonderful moment of revelation. Shakespeare in general is woven nicely into the movie (including Lionel's audition for the part of Richard III).
Stand-out scenes
The King Edward's Chair scene. Bertie's confidence initially lapses, and it seems that he's going to give up again on working with Lionel. But after Lionel insolently drapes himself over King Edward's Chair, which is the throne used during a monarch's coronation, Bertie's anger at Lionel's presumption prompts him to eventually shout out that he has a voice! Bertie also shows himself to have a feeling and respect for tradition that contrasts with his older brother's depicted carelessness in abdicating the throne to be with Mrs. Wallis Simpson.
Another great scene is the climactic delivery of the speech on the eve of WWII ("In this grave hour, perhaps the most fateful in our history..."). The movie cuts back and forth between Bertie picking his way through it word by word, with Lionel standing opposite him, gesturing and coaching, and the king's large audience including various people in their homes, Bertie's family in the palace, and his older brother and Mrs. Simpson.
Further thoughts
Though the movie isn't a documentary and was made to show a man overcoming challenges to rise to the occasion, it still interests me to think about how the filmmakers played around with history and with the characters. For the sake of drama, the relationship between Lionel and Bertie was compressed to a shorter period of time, when in fact they had been working together since the 1920s; and who knows if they ever got to be this informal with one another by the end. I haven't read enough about the characters in general to venture a guess as to what they were like with each other. The movie also omits the whole issue of Neville Chamberlain and appeasement (along with George VI's public show of support for Chamberlain after the Munich Pact) and depicts Churchill and George VI as being friendly and supportive of one another from the very beginning. The filmmakers shape it so that everyone seems more or less united at the war's start, with George VI hoping that his speech impediment won't prevent him from being a resolute figurehead, a symbol of strength and resistance. And it's true that during the war, he and his wife appeared often in public, and visited various places in the UK and abroad, to boost morale.
Here's an actual recording of George VI, delivering the speech on September 3rd, 1939:
The text of the speech is here.
*All images link back to their source (Flixster community).
Wednesday, September 7, 2011
Worth Watching: Autumn Sonata (1978)
Title: Autumn Sonata
Director: Ingmar Bergman
Language: Swedish (and some English)
Rating: PG
Synopsis
Eva (Liv Ullmann) and her mother, Charlotte (Ingrid Bergman), haven't seen each other in seven years. Charlotte is a brilliant and celebrated pianist, touring around the world. Eva lives a quiet life in a parsonage with her husband, Viktor (Halvar Björk); she also cares for her sister, Helena (Lena Nyman), who suffers from a progressive illness. After Charlotte's longtime companion and lover passes away, Eva invites her to visit the parsonage. Eva hopes for some sort of reconciliation with her mother, a closeness they've never shared. When Charlotte arrives tension mounts between them, and in the course of the night years of pent-up anger, bitterness, and hurt boil over.
Characters
Liv Ullmann's magnificent performance as Eva bares layers of emotion, whether she's flying into a rage or quietly sitting beside her mother as Charlotte animates the room. There are a couple of scenes where Eva is observing her mother silently; no words are necessary because Ullmann's face expresses everything: sadness, admiration, resentment, longing and wonder. This especially comes out in the scene where Charlotte is at the piano explaining and then playing a Chopin prelude that Eva plodded through earlier.
Ingrid Bergman's performance is also powerful. She handles Charlotte's complexity beautifully, the shifts in her mood - she can be lively and coquettish, then stalk around a room looking anxious and lost. Charlotte is a passionate artist, living in her own world, loving the fame and admiration that isolates her from others even as she laments her difficulty connecting with people. She has also been a distant mother; her treatment of Eva is fond but superficial. In the company of both her daughters, Charlotte feels guilt-ridden and suffocated. She's probably ashamed of them too; she can make brilliant music but was unable to produce a brilliant daughter. Eva lives as a shadow, and Helena's illness is so unbearable to Charlotte that Charlotte avoids her.
Eva's husband, Viktor, observes the mother-daughter drama with resignation. Viktor is kind and perceptive but also passive. At the film's start he addresses the viewer directly and reads from a book that Eva has written: "One must learn to live. I practice every day. My biggest obstacle is I don't know who I am. If anyone loves me as I am I may dare at last to look at myself. For me, that possibility is fairly remote." He then tells us that he wishes he could make her understand that she is "loved whole-heartedly"; the difficulty is, he can't find the right words to make her believe him. He's a friend, a gentle companion, but too tired for any passionate emotions or interventions.
Relationships
The Charlotte-Eva relationship dominates the movie. Eva can't live with her mother and can't live without her; Charlotte is a beloved mother, a hated enemy, an angel whose blessing is sorely desired, and a scapegoat blamed for every sin and mischance. The relationship at some points shifts from mother-daughter to accused and accuser, as Eva brings up every bit of childhood neglect, subtle cruelty, maternal inadequacy and selfishness ("All that was sensitive and delicate, you attacked. All that was alive, you tried to smother") and throws them in Charlotte's face. Charlotte isn't a good mother, but there are times when Eva goes too far, carried away with her need to blame Charlotte for everything, past and present. What does she want from her mother at this point? Would she be satisfied if Charlotte admitted responsibility for her mistakes? Does she still want her mother's love and approval?
Eva's own child, a boy, died at a very young age. In one scene, set in his old nursery, she tenderly speaks of how she senses him near her and feels that he's still alive. This strikes Charlotte as morbid and fanciful, detached from reality - more evidence that Eva is a disappointing neurotic daughter, an impression strengthened when Eva's musings turn philosophical: "To me, man is a tremendous creation," she says. "In man is everything from the highest to the lowest." She adds, her face dreamy and contemplative, "There are no limits. Neither to thoughts nor feelings. It's anxiety that sets limits." (This applies not only to love - once Eva moves past her anxious attitude of trying to please her mother, there is no foreseeable limit to her anger.)
Eva's warmth towards her son contrasts with Charlotte's limited ability to love. But one also wonders what sort of mother Eva would have been had her son lived and started growing apart from her, into his own self, as all children do. Would she have smothered him, stunted him, done everything she could to keep him secured to her? Or would she have been a wonderful mother? As it is she's much more of a mother to her sister, Helena, than Charlotte ever was to either of her daughters. I love how Ingmar Bergman presents these characters to us for close consideration, allowing us to see different sides of them.
Memorable sights and sounds
Autumn colors permeate the film. Fallen leaves and pink flowers. Walls and furniture in warm shades of yellow, brown, and cream. Eva, first seen in a long red dress (Charlotte will later wear a red dress too, with pearls). Eva's and Charlotte's hair. Their eyes red-rimmed with tears.
The camera often lingers on the actors' faces; I can't look away when this happens - the human face is a world in itself. Though the screenplay is powerful the dialogue is sometimes too stiff and stagey (maybe in part because I'm reading an English translation in the subtitles); the feeling of intimacy and humanity is preserved by the close-ups on the faces and the force of the actors' performances.
Stand-out scenes
There's one scene I returned to a few times: when Charlotte watches Eva play Chopin's Prelude No.2 in A minor and then plays it in turn, explaining the piece to Eva (the pianist Käbi Laretei, who was also Ingmar Bergman's ex-wife, played both Eva's version and Charlotte's). The camera settles on the actors - Liv Ullmann and Ingrid Bergman both brilliant - and the scene as a whole sums up their characters' relationship. It's also I feel the best written part of the movie; to understand a work of music and write about it clearly and unpretentiously is difficult.
Later in the movie Charlotte will speak of her own childhood, spent with cold parents; music became her means of expression. Unlike Charlotte, Eva's most profound expressions of emotion and thought emerge in her reflections on human nature and her abiding love for her son. Both Charlotte and Eva are capable of deep connections, but in such different ways. The scene of the Chopin prelude echoes throughout the whole movie; when I think about it now, my skin prickles.
Further thoughts
There's a raw nerve running through the movie. The characters tap at it and flinch. They can't help themselves. They're locked together in love, pain, rage, and endless struggle.
(*Image links back to its source: Wikipedia)
Director: Ingmar Bergman
Language: Swedish (and some English)
Rating: PG
Synopsis
Eva (Liv Ullmann) and her mother, Charlotte (Ingrid Bergman), haven't seen each other in seven years. Charlotte is a brilliant and celebrated pianist, touring around the world. Eva lives a quiet life in a parsonage with her husband, Viktor (Halvar Björk); she also cares for her sister, Helena (Lena Nyman), who suffers from a progressive illness. After Charlotte's longtime companion and lover passes away, Eva invites her to visit the parsonage. Eva hopes for some sort of reconciliation with her mother, a closeness they've never shared. When Charlotte arrives tension mounts between them, and in the course of the night years of pent-up anger, bitterness, and hurt boil over.
Characters
Liv Ullmann's magnificent performance as Eva bares layers of emotion, whether she's flying into a rage or quietly sitting beside her mother as Charlotte animates the room. There are a couple of scenes where Eva is observing her mother silently; no words are necessary because Ullmann's face expresses everything: sadness, admiration, resentment, longing and wonder. This especially comes out in the scene where Charlotte is at the piano explaining and then playing a Chopin prelude that Eva plodded through earlier.
Ingrid Bergman's performance is also powerful. She handles Charlotte's complexity beautifully, the shifts in her mood - she can be lively and coquettish, then stalk around a room looking anxious and lost. Charlotte is a passionate artist, living in her own world, loving the fame and admiration that isolates her from others even as she laments her difficulty connecting with people. She has also been a distant mother; her treatment of Eva is fond but superficial. In the company of both her daughters, Charlotte feels guilt-ridden and suffocated. She's probably ashamed of them too; she can make brilliant music but was unable to produce a brilliant daughter. Eva lives as a shadow, and Helena's illness is so unbearable to Charlotte that Charlotte avoids her.
Eva's husband, Viktor, observes the mother-daughter drama with resignation. Viktor is kind and perceptive but also passive. At the film's start he addresses the viewer directly and reads from a book that Eva has written: "One must learn to live. I practice every day. My biggest obstacle is I don't know who I am. If anyone loves me as I am I may dare at last to look at myself. For me, that possibility is fairly remote." He then tells us that he wishes he could make her understand that she is "loved whole-heartedly"; the difficulty is, he can't find the right words to make her believe him. He's a friend, a gentle companion, but too tired for any passionate emotions or interventions.
Relationships
The Charlotte-Eva relationship dominates the movie. Eva can't live with her mother and can't live without her; Charlotte is a beloved mother, a hated enemy, an angel whose blessing is sorely desired, and a scapegoat blamed for every sin and mischance. The relationship at some points shifts from mother-daughter to accused and accuser, as Eva brings up every bit of childhood neglect, subtle cruelty, maternal inadequacy and selfishness ("All that was sensitive and delicate, you attacked. All that was alive, you tried to smother") and throws them in Charlotte's face. Charlotte isn't a good mother, but there are times when Eva goes too far, carried away with her need to blame Charlotte for everything, past and present. What does she want from her mother at this point? Would she be satisfied if Charlotte admitted responsibility for her mistakes? Does she still want her mother's love and approval?
Eva's own child, a boy, died at a very young age. In one scene, set in his old nursery, she tenderly speaks of how she senses him near her and feels that he's still alive. This strikes Charlotte as morbid and fanciful, detached from reality - more evidence that Eva is a disappointing neurotic daughter, an impression strengthened when Eva's musings turn philosophical: "To me, man is a tremendous creation," she says. "In man is everything from the highest to the lowest." She adds, her face dreamy and contemplative, "There are no limits. Neither to thoughts nor feelings. It's anxiety that sets limits." (This applies not only to love - once Eva moves past her anxious attitude of trying to please her mother, there is no foreseeable limit to her anger.)
Eva's warmth towards her son contrasts with Charlotte's limited ability to love. But one also wonders what sort of mother Eva would have been had her son lived and started growing apart from her, into his own self, as all children do. Would she have smothered him, stunted him, done everything she could to keep him secured to her? Or would she have been a wonderful mother? As it is she's much more of a mother to her sister, Helena, than Charlotte ever was to either of her daughters. I love how Ingmar Bergman presents these characters to us for close consideration, allowing us to see different sides of them.
Memorable sights and sounds
Autumn colors permeate the film. Fallen leaves and pink flowers. Walls and furniture in warm shades of yellow, brown, and cream. Eva, first seen in a long red dress (Charlotte will later wear a red dress too, with pearls). Eva's and Charlotte's hair. Their eyes red-rimmed with tears.
The camera often lingers on the actors' faces; I can't look away when this happens - the human face is a world in itself. Though the screenplay is powerful the dialogue is sometimes too stiff and stagey (maybe in part because I'm reading an English translation in the subtitles); the feeling of intimacy and humanity is preserved by the close-ups on the faces and the force of the actors' performances.
Stand-out scenes
There's one scene I returned to a few times: when Charlotte watches Eva play Chopin's Prelude No.2 in A minor and then plays it in turn, explaining the piece to Eva (the pianist Käbi Laretei, who was also Ingmar Bergman's ex-wife, played both Eva's version and Charlotte's). The camera settles on the actors - Liv Ullmann and Ingrid Bergman both brilliant - and the scene as a whole sums up their characters' relationship. It's also I feel the best written part of the movie; to understand a work of music and write about it clearly and unpretentiously is difficult.
"Chopin was emotional, but not mawkish. Feeling is very far from sentimentality. The prelude tells of pain, not reverie. You have to be calm, clear and harsh. Take the first bars now. It hurts but he doesn't show it. Then a short relief... but it evaporates at once, and the pain is the same. Total restraint the whole time... The prelude must be made to sound almost ugly. It is never ingratiating. It should sound wrong. You have to battle your way through it and emerge triumphant."
Later in the movie Charlotte will speak of her own childhood, spent with cold parents; music became her means of expression. Unlike Charlotte, Eva's most profound expressions of emotion and thought emerge in her reflections on human nature and her abiding love for her son. Both Charlotte and Eva are capable of deep connections, but in such different ways. The scene of the Chopin prelude echoes throughout the whole movie; when I think about it now, my skin prickles.
Further thoughts
There's a raw nerve running through the movie. The characters tap at it and flinch. They can't help themselves. They're locked together in love, pain, rage, and endless struggle.
(*Image links back to its source: Wikipedia)
Monday, May 9, 2011
Week in Seven Words #66
advanced
At the bookstore the four-year-old boy keeps asking his mom to buy him books that are geared towards young teenagers and older elementary school children. After saying 'no' for the dozenth time, his mother finally makes him an offer - "Read one page from any of those books and I'll get it for you." The kid opens a book, stares at it, then says loftily, "I don't feel like reading now. How about I read it when we get home?" His mother laughs but doesn't relent.
indecision
As if I'm plucking petals off a daisy, but instead of saying "He loves me, he loves me not" it's "I can do this, no I can't."
jabbering
Children spill into the cafeteria, squashing ten to a table, swiping at brownies and slices of pizza, sending up a cloud of chatter that their chaperones attempt to shout over.
lightwell
I've walked past this building many times, but I go inside now and take delight - clerestory windows, doors with leaded glass, a giant ornate clock, stairwells curling up past stacks of books.
snorfle
The joy of making someone laugh so hard they have to slap their hand over their mouth to keep crumbs and pieces of cheese from flying out.
strung
Throughout the meeting I'm on edge. Some of what we discuss seems helpful, but I'm not sure. I don't want to be misled.
supportive
I appreciate their encouragement and advice so much. I'll need to let them know.
At the bookstore the four-year-old boy keeps asking his mom to buy him books that are geared towards young teenagers and older elementary school children. After saying 'no' for the dozenth time, his mother finally makes him an offer - "Read one page from any of those books and I'll get it for you." The kid opens a book, stares at it, then says loftily, "I don't feel like reading now. How about I read it when we get home?" His mother laughs but doesn't relent.
indecision
As if I'm plucking petals off a daisy, but instead of saying "He loves me, he loves me not" it's "I can do this, no I can't."
jabbering
Children spill into the cafeteria, squashing ten to a table, swiping at brownies and slices of pizza, sending up a cloud of chatter that their chaperones attempt to shout over.
lightwell
I've walked past this building many times, but I go inside now and take delight - clerestory windows, doors with leaded glass, a giant ornate clock, stairwells curling up past stacks of books.
snorfle
The joy of making someone laugh so hard they have to slap their hand over their mouth to keep crumbs and pieces of cheese from flying out.
strung
Throughout the meeting I'm on edge. Some of what we discuss seems helpful, but I'm not sure. I don't want to be misled.
supportive
I appreciate their encouragement and advice so much. I'll need to let them know.
Sunday, April 24, 2011
Week in Seven Words #64
exuberance
At different points in the seder there are songs waiting to be embraced, spun around and tossed laughing into the air.
grammatical
He corrects his younger sister on a grammatical error that he used to make not too long ago.
iteration
A warm gray afternoon, drizzle on the magnolia blossoms, mud drying on concrete. We seem to talk in echoes from a previous season.
liberating
The holiday begins, and work for the moment ends.
matzah balls
She makes the best kind – the texture, consistency, and flavor are indescribable.
smoky
I contend with phantoms sometimes.
trio
It's us three. We have a lovely time, though we also miss the people who couldn't come.
At different points in the seder there are songs waiting to be embraced, spun around and tossed laughing into the air.
grammatical
He corrects his younger sister on a grammatical error that he used to make not too long ago.
iteration
A warm gray afternoon, drizzle on the magnolia blossoms, mud drying on concrete. We seem to talk in echoes from a previous season.
liberating
The holiday begins, and work for the moment ends.
matzah balls
She makes the best kind – the texture, consistency, and flavor are indescribable.
smoky
I contend with phantoms sometimes.
trio
It's us three. We have a lovely time, though we also miss the people who couldn't come.
Friday, September 17, 2010
Extracts: "Worship and living are not two separate realms."
Yom Kippur (the Day of Atonement) starts this evening, and I'm reading these words now from Abraham Joshua Heschel's book God in Search of Man:
The problem of living does not begin with the question of how to take care of the rascals, of how to prevent delinquency or hideous crimes. The problem of living begins with the realization that all of us blunder in our dealings with our fellow men. The silent atrocities, the secret scandals... are the true seat of moral infection. The problem of living begins, in fact, in relation to our own selves, in the handling of our emotional functions, in the way we deal with envy, greed, and pride.
Worship and living are not two separate realms. Unless living is a form of worship, our worship has no life. Religion is not a reservation, a tract of time reserved for solemn celebrations on festive days. The spirit withers when confined in splendid isolation. What is decisive is not the climax we reach in rare moments, but how the achievements of rare moments affect the climate of the entire life. The goal of Jewish law is to be the grammar of living, dealing with all relations and functions of living.
Religion is trying to teach us that no act is trite, every moment is an extraordinary occasion.
The highest peak of spiritual living is not necessarily reached in rare moments of ecstasy; the highest peak lies wherever we are and may be ascended in a common deed. There can be as sublime a holiness in performing friendship, in observing dietary laws day by day, as in uttering a prayer on the Day of Atonement.
It is not by the rare act of greatness that character is determined, but by everyday actions, by a constant effort to rend our callousness.
Monday, May 10, 2010
Week in Seven Words #14
cuddle
His voice over the phone feels like a close hug.
hangover
The daffodils had passed the weeks partying, chattering brightly, but they're worn out now; they droop over each other and hang brown and queasy over the borders of their plot.
overtire
The week starts out with a strong assertion of summer - blasts of dry heat, insistent sunshine. On the last couple of days though the heat collapses, and the wind and coolness of early spring ease back in, as if to soothe a fever.
scree
It's as if I'm on a rock-strewn slope; my feet keep slipping and my hands scramble for a stable hold.
solemn
Into the muddle of the everyday comes music from centuries ago, aching and solemn.
suspended
Halfway to the second floor I pause by the window. Out of a tangle of branches a bird swoops out and seems to hang for a few moments motionless, before finally pushing against the wind and continuing on its course.
tiptoe
I wish to tiptoe along on the lightness of the evening. Cool air and cautious joy mingle.
His voice over the phone feels like a close hug.
hangover
The daffodils had passed the weeks partying, chattering brightly, but they're worn out now; they droop over each other and hang brown and queasy over the borders of their plot.
overtire
The week starts out with a strong assertion of summer - blasts of dry heat, insistent sunshine. On the last couple of days though the heat collapses, and the wind and coolness of early spring ease back in, as if to soothe a fever.
scree
It's as if I'm on a rock-strewn slope; my feet keep slipping and my hands scramble for a stable hold.
solemn
Into the muddle of the everyday comes music from centuries ago, aching and solemn.
suspended
Halfway to the second floor I pause by the window. Out of a tangle of branches a bird swoops out and seems to hang for a few moments motionless, before finally pushing against the wind and continuing on its course.
tiptoe
I wish to tiptoe along on the lightness of the evening. Cool air and cautious joy mingle.
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