French Press Inversion

This is a pretty sweet coffee technique.

New Year’s Resolution

With more regular hours, more coffee, and less time dedicated to getting from a to b, I plan on writing a bit more this year than last. While I will attempt to keep up this blog as well as the fiction over at Winter Greens, I will also be plunging into a new blog with a little more emphasis on coffee. You can find it over at blood0range. Right now there’s a pretty sweet animated video over there you should check out.

~blood0range (formerly Mr. Orange)

Collegiate Fundraising: A Christian Perspective

In the mail this afternoon I received a letter from my alma mater, Covenant College, a ‘unique’ institution located on a mountaintop just outside the incorporated city of Chattanooga, TN. In it, my semi-retired philosophy professor, Dr. Reg McLelland, beseeched my support for the college based on an ongoing ‘discussion’ occurring on the campus regarding “how to be effective classroom teachers to… students who, though Christians, are still caught up in, and influenced by, a current ‘computer and media culture.’”

Being a professor whom I once considered among the more liberal/progressive minds on campus, I was surprised to hear Reg take issue with (of all things) ‘computer culture.’ I respect a certain healthy fear of dependence upon technology, but the aversion to technological advancement that is evident in the gist of his letter strikes me as closed minded.

Reg goes on to state that “the Church of Jesus Christ desperately needs young people who have been taught to ‘bring every though captive to Jesus Christ’ as they assess the complex and often confusing world around them [and] bring salt and light to the world in which God has placed them.” These somewhat ambiguous statements are blanketed in Christian rhetoric. The college attempts to mold Christian students into thinking participants in the world in which they interact. Which actually happens, surprisingly enough… provided the world they interact in is sufficiently similar to the college’s self-imposed environment (that is to say, populated entirely by Christians).

Covenant College is the most isolated institution of higher learning I have ever experienced. Its graduates who don’t go on to pastor churches and teach in Christian high schools are often (as is my case) left wondering when exactly that $20,000+ will start working for them. The graduate is besieged by missed opportunities resulting from failure of national recognition and an education severely pigeon-holed by a avowedly conservative chauvinistic Calvanistic Christian perspective. For a college which claims to be attempting to influence the world at large, its scope is limited by its location and consequential irrelevance to the course of life of its average student.

What I, personally, have been left with is an intimate knowledge of a philosophy I no longer adhere to and its opinions on the world’s literature. Needless to say, this isn’t what I put on my resume. What does appear there is the fact that in 1 semester spent studying anglo-saxon verse at Oxford University in England I learned more about life, literature, and writing than I did in the remaining 3.5 years of Covenant College education. And I won’t even get into the severe social anxiety caused by attending a school in which I was punished for merely setting foot on the hallway of an opposite gender’s dormitory and where my roommates and I would voluntarily go without dinner each time one of us masturbated.

So, thanks, Reg and Covenant College, for your time and effort this year, not to mention for the 4 years of my life I can never have back. But you won’t be seeing any money from me to help support whatever it is you’re calling indoctrination these days.

~Christopher B. Kornman (‘04), BA English

A few words on Burma (Myanmar), Buddhism, Christianity, Politics, Violence, and Apathy

I wrote the following on Sept. 28, but for some reason neglected to post it until now.

Burmese monks arrested, killed, tortured, generally sedated after a little more than a week of peaceful protests, leading their countrymen in thousands-strong marches in Rangoon and other cities across the country. If Buddhist monks are not sacred, what is? The last vestige of a peaceable religion, in its entirety and fundamentally pacifist, is put down violently less than a decade into our newborn century.

I can’t even begin to express my outrage at the hypocrisies of my own countrymen and our elected leaders. But then our country and its religion is one of war. In our own short history we’ve littered our country and numerous others with the blood of innocents in the name of freedom and democracy. Yet peaceful protests in the name of the same ideals are put down with militaristic precision. I’d like to believe might does not make right, but evidence at hand points to the contrary.

I find little coincidence in the fact that I share my day of birth with Mahatma Ghandi. What precious little I know of his life and what he held dear are akin to my perhaps unfounded desires for humanity and its wellbeing.

Dictators and power-hungry opportunists will always exist. This is our curse as a species; the blood-lust for the ability to exert our will over that of others. However, recognizing this, shouldn’t society in its numerous manifestations of law, religion, governance, etc., strive against these tendencies? Yet instead it seems to be encouraged, not just in the corrupt dictatorships and communist governments of the world, but in capitalist societies as well. Economics drives a hunger for more: efficiency and wealth take precedence over sustainability and altruism.

And let’s not forget the history of injustice and violence in the name of religion throughout the ages. The situation in Burma accentuates the irony of this historical truth: peaceful monks put down by a power-hungry police state.

Maybe this is why those of us who are trying to forget our place in this history of events are so given to indulging in the present: sensuality being the most prominent among the indulgences. Irony and detachment replace activism, for rewriting our own history and our future is an exercise in futility. Forget the past in the present, save our souls by forgetting they ever existed. Nietzsche is still alive and well.

Movie Review: Darjeeling, a Limited Success

Published at Chicago6Corners.com.

Read it here.

“Don’t Trust Whitey”; A Review of the Bourne Ultimatum

Its been at least five minutes since Jason Bourne’s last whirlwind of action and suspense, and apparently the last wave of destruction wasn’t enough. After a blur of action that picks up right where Supremacy left off, and a few flashbacks (some to moments of intimacy between Bourne and his now-deceased girlfriend Marie, others to vague images of Bourne’s training/torture experience) the viewer is suddenly struck by the realization that this is not just another of this summer’s mindless shoot ‘em up revenge action-drama. Of course, it is all of those things, with the possible exception of mindless. But, just like its title character, the Bourne Ultimatum has yet another layer.

Matt Damon again plays everyone’s favorite James Bond reincarnation, Jason Bourne (aka David Webb, who also happens to be my grandmother’s jeweler) who begins to remember tidbits of his origins as a member of Treadstone, the supposedly scrapped military training program that created his identity. The film opens with Bourne seeking out the reporter who obtained an interview with an insider in the Treadstone project. Discovering the existence of a new program, “Blackbriar,” an expanded and updated initiative to train private killers for the CIA, Bourne proceeds to track down clues and persons who can help him recover memory of his past, only to have them ripped from his fingertips at the hands of police and Blackbriar assassins. Finally, with the help of the ladies of the CIA (roles reprised by Julia Stiles and Joan Allen) Bourne makes his way back to the training facility in New York City where he confronts not only his trainer (played by Albert Finney) but the reality of the initiation of his training. As Bourne plunges into the depths of the East River from a multi-story drop at the close of the film, the air bubbles rising to the surface serve as a prelude to Moby’s “Extreme Ways.” Again. After all, what’s a Bourne movie without a little Moby?

The action sequences are well orchestrated, and once again Bourne’s fist-fighting techniques are only upstaged by his quick-thinking and problem solving. A beautiful chase sequence occurs by foot atop the flat roofs of Morocco and a pins-and-needles instruction-over-the-phone relay takes place in a crowded Waterloo Station. And, again typical of the Bourne trilogy, the car chase sequences are among the best in the cinematic experience, including a real arm-rest clincher involving a stolen police car, New York’s finest, a Blackbriar agent, and a median divider. More so than the previous Bourne movies, the action in Ultimatum is riveting and simultaneously unbelievable. Each sequence seems to be an attempt to one-up its predecessors, which makes for excellent special effects and consequently results in a significant reduction in plot and characterization.

The one plot element that does seem to run a bit deeper this time around is the American government’s role in the progression and cover-up of the story. The relevance of seeing the inner-workings of the CIA in their attempts to eliminate Bourne and erase their own fingerprint is significant, and as a result the characters involved in these processes have a depth unrivaled by Bourne himself, who seems limited by countless flashbacks and one-line macho-isms. David Strathairn makes for a convincing and ruthless department head whose strings are pulled by Scott Glen’s CIA Director. When Joan Allen’s Pamela Landy makes it clear she thinks Bourne is no threat, rather unobtrusively and fairly early on in the film (which makes the viewer wonder why she’s even on the project to eliminate Bourne at all) the agency dives into unprecedented webs of lies and deception, culminating with the revelation that Joan Allen is the CIA’s fall girl.

But let’s get real; even in real life the first person you’d say you trust isn’t going to be the director of the CIA. The film’s thin plot hinges on the self-discovery of its main protagonist, and as Bourne discovers his own forms of self-deception, the viewer can’t help but feel at least somewhat betrayed. After all, in a film full of deception that is very clearly deemed immoral in the filmmaker’s (and viewer’s) eyes, the degradation of the character who upholds the moral standard comes as a bit of a shock. But maybe it’s a commentary on the true state of affairs in the world today; we can’t trust even ourselves to make things right. Or maybe it’s simply a device used to put us in Bourne’s shoes for just a few minutes.

Whichever is the case, you shouldn’t trust a critic when you can see the summer’s most engaging action film for yourself.

4/5 stars

Unicycle Loves You, Walking Bicycles, Strange Young Lovers at The Empty Bottle July 30, 2007

In the corner by the bass player two young hipsters — one male, one female — frolicked, gyrated, boogied, bopped, swung, and generally made the rest of us look like thumb-up-our-ass concert denizens. In their defense, however, the music evoked on the Empty Bottle’s free Monday night show on the 30th warranted more than a few nonchalant head-nods.

Strange Young Lovers, a quartet of black-clad rockers, seemed strangely at ease and composed, especially considering it was only their second show. Evoking a post Jack White indie vibe, echoes of The Vines and The Strokes were evident in their familiar yet catchy guitar driven power-punk rock. While the lead singer belted out “I don’t know why, but I like you,” I shook my head in affirmation and a friend shouted into my ear, “If this isn’t screaming for an iTunes single, I don’t know what is.” And he should know, he works for these elitist assholes. I kid… maybe.

Smoke cleared, the crowd pushed in, and Unicycle Loves You took the stage, a quintet of “glitchy popsters” according to Time Out Chicago. Armed with pop sensibility and enough spirited “bah bah bah”s to inspire faith in the long dead gods of rock, ULY stumbled through their first two songs on the border line between dysfunction and mania to emerge the fanatically devout proclaimers of a new era.

As diverse in style as they are in apparel, the hodgepodge of talent (two members hail from Berkeley School of Music) and influence are dizzying at times. 60’s organ blips with Baroque-esque constructions set the backdrop to 80’s inspired jovial lyrics and distinct hints of late nineties lead guitar solos. While the effects of such extreme heterogeneity may induce schizophrenia in lesser bands, Unicycle holds it together with the glue of its upbeat demeanor and an underpinning of cultural cynicism marked by quirky romanticism. Recently, Unicycle Love You signed with indie label Highwheel Records and plan on recording their first album sometime in the fall.

By the time the smoke had cleared from ULY and its growing fan base, I began to head for the door. Walking Bicycles played my way out. To be fair, I didn’t hear enough to review, though it wasn’t my cup of tea… at least from what I could hear through 2 feet of brick wall.

(All photos by Lauren Kornman)

Ruminations Inspired by Camus, Fed by Frustration with American Politics, and Driven by a Desire for Change

The fabric of our democracy is being undermined by the very representatives we have elected to maintain its integrity. The government, an establishment intended to be of and by the people is now in opposition to its public. Humanitarian injustice takes place at home and abroad, surveillance systems that were set up to keep the populace in order are being used indiscriminately against the interest of their wellbeing, and mass corruption ravages the leaders of our country.

Is our democracy no longer legitimate? Does the system serve the public’s best interest or the interest of a few who hold the keys to power and decision-making? I think we know the answers.

Maybe it’s time… time to take action… time to bring about a day of reckoning… If not now, when? If not because of the wrongs committed against us, and in our names against others, then what will it take?

We should look to the ideal established by the students of 19th Century Russia — in the words of Dostoevesky, a “proletariat of undergraduates” — the minority of outspoken revolutionaries who were willing to speak their minds in the face of injustice at the hands of thew few who were in power and cry out into the abyss of a silent majority.

But where to start? It all seems hopeless in the great machinations of bureaucracy and due process. And those of us who have the most at stake often seem the most jaded by the media, the institutions, the press, the politicians, the pharmaceuticals and narcotics used to pacify us, the list goes on… But who are we to blame but ourselves for our inaction. The least we can do is refuse to settle for injustices committed in our names and speak up when others have fallen silent.

The Egotistical Martyr

Across the Temple of Apollo at Delphi the inscription read, “Know Thyself;” certainly a mystery worth delving into. Yet those attuned to social conscientiousness find it difficult balancing introversion with activism. While knowing oneself may be a high calling, the higher calling is humanitarianism, for only in the aid of others is egoism excusable, or even justifiable. The basic sympathy and altruism for fellow beings enlightens the advancement of one’s own self. Without an outward focus, the introversion of self-indulgence is nothing but an obsession with the self that lacks the reference point of a goal towards which to strive.

This having been said, it is not necessarily the case that self-sacrifice is mandatory for the advancement of the greater good. Such martyrs (whether literal or ideological) are often aspired to in the world’s religions, in its philosophies of pacifism or humanism, or in humanitarian charities. However a concern for the wellbeing of living things (and in particular humankind), and moreover actions informed by that concern, are likely beneficial to one’s own growth as an individual.

Those who put themselves under continual self-inflicted humiliation are causing not only detriment to their own character, but are impeding the advancement of those to whom they are deferring. Their self-sacrifice can be divided into two categories: to those above or below them in social standing.

When the martyr subjugates him or herself in a well-meaning attempt to provide assistance to those less privileged, they set an example of weakness. This can in no way aid the progress of the less fortunate individual. Humanitarian aid is admirable, but when it is given by a hand that cannot also come alongside to teach self-sufficiency, the result is an interdependence formed from weakness. If the goal is the advancement of the human race in the arenas of society and economics, the unchecked provision of aid is really a detriment to the cause.

Meanwhile, the martyr who waives off his or her rights or desires in favor of those who are more privileged in rank, status, or recourses commits a greater treason both against him or herself and against society as a whole. By deferring to the higher power without protest, the martyr provides nothing but easy gains for those who are already in positions of greater prominence. It is to no one’s benefit if competition and hard work are not an integral element of societal or personal advancement. This flaw leads to the vices prevalent in our elite classes, namely corruption, greed, bribery, and lust for power and wealth to name a few.

Rather, the self-sacrifice of the underdogs can only have relevance if it is in outspoken rebellion to the sins of the higher power. In this environment, the ideology of opposition empowers the self, informs society, humbles the corrupt, and fights for the advancement of humanitarian causes.

Gonzo Journalism, a Response to My Father

In a brief email exchange over the past couple of days, my father has expressed curiosity at the style of writing I employed in a recently published piece. The following is my response to his questions as to the appropriateness and indications of Gonzo Journalism.

Having read a fair bit of Hunter S. Thompson’s work, I wouldn’t say that he used Gonzo journalism as a tool to point out problems with objective journalism, so much as he used it to completely avoid the pretense of objectivity. I think his philosophy was that journalism is irrelevant if it doesn’t spring from a personal invested interest in a story. As such, his work is effective because he frames the events of the stories in the context of his own personal investment in them. The result is a biased article, but one that often is able to penetrate the heart of the issue at hand.

His most famous work is “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas,” a bristling account of his infiltration of a law enforcement convention on narcotics while at the same time claiming to be on a myriad of illicit substances (including, but not limited to: ether, mescaline, cocaine, marijuana, and LSD. It’s a wonder he lived long enough to shoot himself in the head.). His point, obviously, was that the police were oblivious and that the greater law enforcement community was unable to grasp the extent of the drug culture in the early ’70s.

So, to answer your first question, it’s not so much a matter of appropriate material for Gonzo journalism, as a choice to on the one hand attempt to report an unbiased, impersonal account of an event, or on the other hand invest in the event personally and assess the result. Hence it’s label as experimental journalism.

As far as clues or indications of Gonzo style, the first and most glaring would be the presence of the personal pronoun “I”. In hard news, the journalist is a disembodied voice. The personal pronoun will occur in any number of styles of journalism, including human interest, editorial, etc. So it isn’t exactly a fool-proof indicator, but it will help you distinguish between an attempt at objectivity and a personal story. This is a fairly simple clue.

A slightly more subtle red flag might be that the story feels more like a narrative and less like a news brief. In your typical hard news article, the most pertinent information will be divulged within the first few paragraphs. In Gonzo journalism, the construct of the story is entirely dependent on the theme or thesis the author intends for it to communicate. Thus, you will often find at some point, a distinct tendency for the author to extrapolate personal insights to his audience without any apology for the forthrightness of his or her approach.

Once you have identified these clues, I would look for the central theme or aim of the piece, and disregard some of the smaller, more negligible details of the story. This may be difficult to swallow as someone who finds themselves dedicated to the love and discovery of truth. However, in this style of journalism, the truth isn’t in the details, but in the point of contact with the reader (whether that point is the personal insight, the statement made, or simply a connection to the characters in the story, is entirely up to the reader.)

Gonzo journalism falls neatly into a fairly contemporary critical theory of literature called “Reader Response,” which asserts that the burden of interpretation and, by consequence, significance of a given literary (or really any artistic) work falls primarily upon the reader. Once the author of the work has completed and put his or her work into the public eye, it is fair game. Clearly, there are certain inalienable truths and unequivocal points which exist. However, the manner in which these are absorbed by the reader are colored by personal experience and will therefore differ from person to person. Rather than attempting to make universal sense out of a multi-faceted artistic experience, Reader Response theory embraces the diversity and allows for personal divergences in the affect and interpretation of any given work.

I suppose I’ve rambled on for long enough. Hopefully this is a jumping off point for you. If you’re interested in reading any Thompson, I’ll try to get my copy back from xxxxx for you to borrow.

“Stranger than Fiction” vs. Suspension of Disbelief

At the behest of a number of my friends and relations, I finally got around to watching Stranger than Fiction. It’s worth checking out if you haven’t seen it.

However, I am constantly beguiled by the general acceptance of mediocrity into the canon of great works. It seems that all one has to do is acknowledge the fact that you know your work is mediocre and viola, you’re a genius.

The entire narrative of the movie is a cut and paste amalgam of tidbits from stereotypical phenomena that fall quite neatly into the categories it so cleverly attempts to undermine. While the film is attempting to send positive messages about the quality of life (and/or pancakes) within the framework of a semi-tragic comedy, all it really succeeds in doing is retelling us the same story we’ve been sold a million times before. Namely, the answer to all your problems is to “live your life,” which is about as useful as the psychotherapist near the beginning of the movie telling Harold “trees are trees.” Oh, and then you’ll get the girl.

All of this is neatly framed in the context of a writer’s struggle with block, yet another worn out and exceedingly transparent metaphor. I should say, it is well photographed, and the subtlety of the special effects is refreshing, and the acting is excellent. But in the end, the script is just “ok”.

The thing that gets me is that the author seems to think that by acknowledging this at the end in a conversation between the professor and the writer, he has absolved himself of responsibility for it’s mediocrity. As if by owning up to all of the conventions he has used makes it permissible for him to do so glaringly and unsparingly.

It’s not just this film in particular I’m indignant about. Another notable example of this type of thinking in the literary realm is Dave Eggers’ A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, a self-referential novel if I’ve ever read one.

It seems that my generation is spawning a breed of artists with enormous creative potential and absolutely nothing to say. These stories are well told and at times they are riveting and heartbreaking, but I feel unfulfilled at their finish, in no small part because I have not been spared the details of the creator’s methodology.

I don’t think willing suspension of disbelief has gone the way of the buffalo, at least not yet.

Berlin’s Wall Uprooted

Foxtrots down a slippery slope,
Wolfgang elopes with malediction
and on his breath is some new election
of promise and peace.
“Ease your mind,” he says
with upraised arms full of ivory
while the livery cattle call
across Berlin’s wall uprooted.
Wings of war dropping soundless fury
infatuate t.v. audiences;
tea and oil opiate the masses
and their classless society
lies dying
while Wolfgang keeps trying
for holy war.

Primatives at an Exhibition

Peacock plumes and sharkskin shoes
shaken free of intimacy
dote on depth of field,
drink down rotten cocktails tainted green.
Fleeting glances,

their eyes emerald,
pick at prints of pale-skinned savages
bled dry.

All our Dylans died
or tried to change the times
with electric chords,
placating pulizters,

standing silent in their simplicity.
Suffering sells where
bitches bejeweled jostle
and wax intellectual with bragarts and bullshitters.

Don’t tempt me with tempestuous
promises of proliferation to the poverty-stricken.
My dreams do not disseminate
their dissent to this desicration.
My beatnik bent belies

the brazened patrons of cafe’s
and coffee shops, creeping
underneath

to undermine the minds that mold this
morbid war. When death
is done and winter
comes with all her fated fury,
what word wreaks havoc enough to
awaken wonder at the absent sun
when bleakly breaks the dawn?

Bush’s Ideal of Moderation

January 10: President George W. Bush announces an increase in troops in Iraq.

The nationally televised speech was, as I think most of us expected, simple in verbiage and more or less void of fresh content. We all knew what was coming… despite recommendations from the Iraq Study Group, despite the plummeting approval ratings, despite statements by generals that the 20,000 troops requested simply aren’t available.

The thing that struck me was the repetition of an ideal most American’s have been pining for since the inception of this presidency: ‘moderation.’ At least three times, according to my count, the president mentioned his intentions for Iraq to embrace moderation. And I can’t say I disagree. Radical fundamentalism has been the undeniable cause of sectarian violence in the Middle East. However, it seems to me that Bush has overlooked a greater cause of violence: the US military under Bush’s command.

True to form, our president ignores his own advice. Our lack of moderation in dealing with Iraq is evidenced in no better arena than Bush’s own speech. The fact that he has ignored both the voice of the people and the Iraq Study Group’s findings and recommendations by calling for more troops is its own radicalism. This is a man on a mission to save face.

A lot of shit has been thrown around regarding the motivation for the increase of troops, and it has been posited that Bush simply intends to pass the buck to the next commander in chief. This would be wise thinking, if Bush were an evil megalomaniac, which I doubt he is. I think that instead, our country is run by a man with his head stuck so far up his own ass, he has forgotten the people who elected him and why he is even in office. His drive now is to see Iraq a democracy, and the only reason he seemed to be able to give in his address to the American public was that this would be good for America. I’m all in favor of security, and (despite my inclinations to the contrary and my belief in the complete injustice of this war) feel strongly that we have a responsibility to the country of Iraq (considering the mess we’ve made). However, if Bush’s prime motivation in bringing a close to the war isn’t a similar sense of responsibility to the people in the nation of Iraq, then he has lost the plot in this war.

(As if it hadn’t been lost before it began.)

Memphis in November

The trees here still bleed with colors of autumn, though it’s nearly December. The fingers of a deity touched the roots and the blazing red-gold beatific essence flowed up the trunk and leaked out at the leaves. I’m certain it’s deity and not devil; I can see the radiant sunlight beaming through the dark storm clouds. Patches of blue sky, deeper and richer than the sky has ever been in Chicago are evidence the divine presence has not abandoned this Southern landscape.

It’s the little things I miss, the things that remind me of the festering livelihood still crawling through my veins; a life-force so often frozen nearly out of existence by the snow and ice dormant in the Northern heart. Little things like the sweet reek of foliage and mulch on the breeze, the air so weighed down with moisture and methodical, melancholic thought.

The fallen leaves of oaks and magnolias couple, co-mingle on the brown ground under antebellum architecture that stands tall and proud of the history no one tells. The stones look like they could have been laid yesterday. Her people, too, like variant leaves, rustle through the streets. Different in shape, texture, and hue they still are blown about by the same winds from the West.