The Grisly Touch

HBO has a quota to meet in every one-hour episode of the acclaimed fantasy series Game of Thrones. A spilling of guts, a well-lit sex scene, a bare breast here or there, and a few cuss words thrown into the dialogue - there, done.

Despite being what some might call gratuitous, explicit and downright shocking, the series has a touch of humanity aside from the macarbre. Not since Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings have I been so enthralled by a screen adaptation of a fantasy novel. Maybe it's all the girl power. First Arwen escapes the Black Riders in Fellowship, and now, for the first time in television history, mail-order bride Daenerys Targaryen eats the heart of a stallion all on her own. Fierce.

Struck dumb.

Maybe I didn't write because I've had nothing much to prove lately. Bin Laden kicked the bucket. Wall Street got raided. Malema announced his love for the whites. An anarchist swore on the radio. I did none of these.

So, I didn't blog.



Image credit: Probably tumblr. What'd'you think?

A Scarlett Letter

Scarlett Johansson isn't the first high-profile celebrity to have had nude photos illegally released onto the Internet. Cell phone hacking syndicates are responsible for leaking personal photographs of at least 50 other female celebs.

Despite having shown skin in movie roles and posed for Playboy, Scarlett has never been seen fully nude onscreen, let alone in her private quarters without the help of make-up or clever camera angles. The photos aren't terribly unflattering, but the leak  may have done the actress more damage than simply a little public shame. She has threatened to sue any publication that publishes the compromising photos from now onwards. Too late, Scarlett. Even you can't curb that right-click-and-save phenomenon.

None like the Present

American novelist and Nobel Prize Laureate, Sinclair Lewis, was invited to talk to some students about the craft of writing. Standing before the enthusiastic group of undergraduates, he asked: “How many of you here are really serious about being writers?” A sea of hands shot up. Lewis then asked, “Well, why aren't you all home writing?”


And he walked out of the room.

Elevator Silence and Other Great Mysteries

Maybe the following mysteries of life are nothing but rhetorical questions. Still, they baffle me every time.

Why ith the word 'lisp' tho hard to prounounth? That's cruel of you, English language.

Why does toast always land buttered side up?
If they know me by name at the gym, does it mean I'm getting fitter?

Why did kamikaze pilots wear helmets?

Why do women go to the restroom in pairs?

And why are people always quiet in elevators? And why do they look up at the ceiling? I guess it's because it goes up and down, and that's entertaining. And mirrors in elevators - don't get me started on those. It's like a doppelganger invasion, except awkward.

'That's No Noble Steed'

Imagine the conversation went a little like this:

Lady: And what makes you think I cannot open that door myself? Is it because I'm a woman? Well, step aside and watch me be an independent one, you patriarchal bastard.

Gentleman: Pardon me, madam. I was only trying to be chivalrous.

You see the problem?

a little Grimm...

The classic fairytale says she would 'prick
her finger on the spindle of the Spinning Wheel of Death and die'

Well I'd like to say that Sleeping Beauty simply had an unhealthy reliance on pharmaceuticals for those hundred lonely years. A good century's sleep? for that I'd pay good money. Even if it were habit-forming.

Five Symptoms for Relief

A yellow bouquet

AR Rahman for Slumdog Millionaire

Hot Flu Remedy

Vicks in your bath

Steam from the kettle

Choreograph.

Ballet photography as an art form never really occured to me until I watched a production of Swan Lake at the Artscape Theatre a few years back. While watching the supple dancers move about the stage like ghosts, I imagined capturing their poses in a single frame. Their movements would cease at the click of a button, the courageous pas de deux held fast for eternity.

Bricolage.

Today in our Television Genre lecture, Ms. Lecturer showed us examples of bricolage in the post-modern moment.This refers to the way in which cultural entities today appropriate and rearticulate signs from former movements.

In greater English sense, taking a whole bunch of popular culture and sticking it all over yourself. Examples of this phenomenom are Lady Gaga, the punk movement, MacGyver and the modern-day hipster.

I couldn't help smiling to myself. When hipster was mentioned, the audience began to murmur almost knowingly, and most of us bowed our heads in shame. We all know how the saying goes - if the  dress shirt fits , wear it.


                            Or something like that.