Better Than Friday - 74
Sooo...How ya'll doing out there?
All is fine here.
Is it? Yes.
Yes. It's fine.
...
Meanwhile...I'm trying to think of a rating system to give a more nuanced idea of how quality a book is.
So far I'm thinking of just stealing the 1-10 rating system of Fantano.
1-5 stars just doesn't seem like enough.
1. The Father of the Japanese Short Story and the Haunting Influence of Suicide
Ryūnosuke Akutagawa is considered the father of the Japanese short story.
He committed suicide at the age of 35, afraid he was succumbing to the same mental illness his mother had.
His suicide influenced the suicide of Osamu Dazai (who I'm about to review)...
...Who himself went on to influence the suicide of Yukio Mishima.
Yet another disturbing reminder that actions do have consequences. Fascinating though.
I haven't read him yet, but I look forward to it.
The Akira Kurosawa film Rashomon (Can't remember if I've seen it...If not, shame on me) was based off of one of his short stories, "In a Grove".
2. So there was an enormous "sex-cult" in my state in the 80's that I'd never heard about until now.
Shows how much I know about my own backyard.
Great soundtrack in this documentary including an excellent track by Timber Timbre called "Run".
Terrific song. Reminds me a bit of Roy Orbison's "Running Scared" in its escalation.
For remembering stuff in the shower.
One of my best friends/patron Brian sent me this for Christmas.
What a Gent. Very useful gift.
4. Goya's Black Paintings: ‘Some people can hardly even look at them’
I was lucky enough to see these in person. Unbelievable.
5. There never was anyone like him. There never will be.
Happy Birthday David Bowie.
Also every time it starts raining heavily outside, this starts playing in my head.
I know.
But I can't stop it.
Just got stuck in there way back when and now it's hard-coded.
A little while ago there were quite a few crows in the neighborhood, which normally would not be terrifying until there's about 50 of them all cawing at once. The photo doesn't do justice.
Wondering if it was because there are fewer people out and about...Serious Hitchcock vibes.
Comments (9)
lots of people hate crows, jackdaws and magpies but I like these intelligent birds. Loved reading Crow Country by Mark Cocker, him observing & enjoying gatherings of thousands of corvids https://www.theguardian.com/books/2007/jul/28/featuresreviews.guardianreview5
At the risk of being redundant, I, too, find the current review structure unique and perfect for the channel's vibe. If you were reviewing several books each week like some booktubers and stuck mainly to popular books then I think a rating system would be helpful. But I feel the books you review are already self-screened to an extent to prevent complete trash from filtering through, and it's usually clear how you feel about a book and what type of reader to which you'd recommend it. I also appreciate how even if you don't love a book you'll say that fans of other particular types of books might enjoy it more.
I agree with what Brook says, if it's "Better than food" than it's a clear recommendation of the book. We can then bring our own thougts to the review and decide if it's something worth checking out. A 1-10 scale makes things less clear. When is the book better than food? 7? 8? 8.5? Or god forbid something like 8.74? What's the difference between a 7 and an 8? What one is trying to do with a scale is to reduce the complex qualities of the book to a simple linear scale, which is bound to fail and entirely subjective. Instead, having a very rudimentary system like is it "better than food" leaves room for interpretation, one's own experience and expectations.
instead of numbers, you could use other book titles (or authors) as reference - like, "on a scale from Twilight to Story of the Eye, I'd rate this somewhere around The Hearing Trumpet..." But I think your 'Better than food?" question, coupled with all your comments about the book, are probably better than any rating system. it's more exact, and allows for your feelings about the book to change without the review needing to change.
Can ratings really save us from occasional buyer’s remorse or reader’s remorse? Perhaps better to poll your audience on the books for a diversity of opinions? But then, who wants to follow the crowd?
think i saw goya's dog first based on something in one of your reviews, gira maybe? beautiful piece
I aprecciate the fact that you're trying new things, althought I love the "inquantifiable" aspect of your reviews as think it is perfect as it is. Keep up the good work my man!
I think that your reviews makes very clear of what do you like about the book and what didn't, and the "better than food" (yes/no) also do that. But anyway, it could be interesting to see how that goes :)
I love the abstract feeling aspect of your reviews! 1-10 feels too clinical for valuing art imo