Skip to main content

On Planes

For those of us who fly trans-Atlantic - as I did yesterday - the thought that "criminals" from Britain, essentially bright young militants from middle-class families, were - in ultra-code-red fashion - intending, any day now, to set off liquid bombs on ten flights, mid-air, mid-Atlantic, en route to New York, LA, or Washington, DC - well, the thought is horrifying; and, had it happened, the crime would have been mass murder, and unforgivable.

What K-H Stockhausen unfortunately uttered in 2001 is now, in a sense, true - these crimes do not have to happen, to have impact - that is, as the odd German composer said at the time, the Twin Towers massacre was greater than art - for its power. Like the best - and worst - conceptual artists, this new band of 24 (plus the five on the run) have out-Hirsted Hirst - they merely conceive of a terrible thing, and behold - every plane traveller in the world is transformed, into a denuded creature, clutching a plastic bag, without water, hair gel or books; mothers must taste of their own breast milk to prove it is not poision. They have made us travellers less opaque.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/terrorism/story/0,,1842411,00.html
Labels:

Comments

Jack Ruttan said…
"Plan B" certainly came through.
Fri Aug 11, 10:30:00 pm 2006
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

IQ AND THE POETS - ARE YOU SMART?

When you open your mouth to speak, are you smart?  A funny question from a great song, but also, a good one, when it comes to poets, and poetry. We tend to have a very ambiguous view of intelligence in poetry, one that I'd say is dysfunctional.  Basically, it goes like this: once you are safely dead, it no longer matters how smart you were.  For instance, Auden was smarter than Yeats , but most would still say Yeats is the finer poet; Eliot is clearly highly intelligent, but how much of Larkin 's work required a high IQ?  Meanwhile, poets while alive tend to be celebrated if they are deemed intelligent: Anne Carson, Geoffrey Hill , and Jorie Graham , are all, clearly, very intelligent people, aside from their work as poets.  But who reads Marianne Moore now, or Robert Lowell , smart poets? Or, Pound ?  How smart could Pound be with his madcap views? Less intelligent poets are often more popular.  John Betjeman was not a very smart poet, per se....
3 comments
Read more

Poetry vs. Literature

Poetry is, of course, a part of literature. But, increasingly, over the 20th century, it has become marginalised - and, famously, has less of an audience than "before". I think that, when one considers the sort of criticism levelled against Seamus Heaney and "mainstream poetry", by poet-critics like Jeffrey Side , one ought to see the wider context for poetry in the "Anglo-Saxon" world. This phrase was used by one of the UK's leading literary cultural figures, in a private conversation recently, when they spoke eloquently about the supremacy of "Anglo-Saxon novels" and their impressive command of narrative. My heart sank as I listened, for what became clear to me, in a flash, is that nothing has changed since Victorian England (for some in the literary establishment). Britain (now allied to America) and the English language with its marvellous fiction machine, still rule the waves. I personally find this an uncomfortable position - but when ...
15 comments
Read more

"I have crossed oceans of time to find you..."

In terms of great films about, and of, love, we have Vertigo, In The Mood for Love , and Casablanca , Doctor Zhivago , An Officer and a Gentleman , at the apex; as well as odder, more troubling versions, such as Sophie's Choice and  Silence of the Lambs .  I think my favourite remains Bram Stoker's Dracula , with the great immortal line "I have crossed oceans of time to find you...".
1 comment
Read more