Why I Love Lester

In his essay, “Brian Eno: A Sandbox in Alphaville”, Lester Bangs, arguably the greatest Rock n’ Roll writer of all time, uses ethical methods including doing the homework, establishing good character, and intimate distance in an attempt to demystify some of Brian Eno’s legend, and argue for the importance and place of electronics in modern music. Bangs conducts massive amounts of research and extensive interviews with the legendary producer, musical philosopher, and creator of the ambient music genre. Though at this time he was already the most respected critic in his field, Lester still uses some of the classic rhetorical means of establishing ethos in the essay.
In that way, he uses both forms of ethical proof: invented and situated. His situated ethos is the fact that at this point in his career he had already established himself as a unique and singular vision in the landscape of rock writing, and had to say little for people to take his opinion as gospel when it came to contemporary music. But, in the essay, Lester actually uses invented ethical proof as well. He used extensive research, cataloguing Eno’s music and career, as well as conducted numerous interviews with Eno himself; in an effort to the have the audience see him and the work from a true journalistic perspective. His extensive knowledge of Eno’s life and work as well as the casual dialog he developed with the man give credence to the face that though he was writing only about music, Lester was still a serious writer and social critic.
Lester clearly adheres to the rhetorical school of thought that a writer can only present themselves as intelligent through demonstrating that they have put in the time of doing the homework and the research. He presents himself in the first paragraph in the first person, meticulously listening to Eno’s music, even describing some of it and how it sounds to him, as well as meticulously researching the man.
Lester says, “The other day I was lying on my bed listening to Brian Eno's Music For Airports. The album consists of a few simple piano or choral figures put on tape loops which then run with variable delays for about ten minutes each, and is the first release on Eno's own Ambient label. Like a lot of Eno's "ambient" stuff, the music has a crystalline, sunlight-through-windowpane quality that makes it somewhat mesmerizing even as you only half-listen to it, Listing all the projects he's been involved with in his career so far is a bit like trying to enumerate the variegate colors and patterns on a lizard's back.” Lester continues on with a detailed description of Eno’s career to that point, and it is clear to the reader that he is more than familiar with the man’s music and his place in popular culture. One of the most fascinating things about Lester Bangs’ writing was that he never assumed. Though he could usually safely believe that he was often “preaching to the choir” when it came to his music essays, he always took the time to give the best, most concise, and least biased view of a musician that he could demonstrate (except when it came to Lou Reed evidently).
To further his credibility, Lester talks of the extremely casual and likeable relationship that he and Eno established through their interviews. By showing the audience that Lester, a man of infamous glutton and debauchery, could talk humbly and interestedly with Eno, a man of considerable prestige and academic appeal, he proves that he is both a common man and a man of intelligence that is truly interested in the issues at hand. He even admits his reservations to interviewing a man as prestigious as Eno, “I had been following his work for years, and just wanted to find out what kind of guy he was. I didn't expect much, really, or rather what I expected was either some narcissistic twit or more likely a character whose head was permanently lodged in the scientific/cybernetic/conceptual art clouds. Somebody who might be nice enough but was just a little too... ethereal.” But ultimately demonstrates

Birthday.

22 on the 22nd! It’s like a dream come true!

Well, actually, I just feel older, more worried that I am not doing anything with my life, and even more worried that teenaged apathy is spreading to my young adult years. I had a nightmare last night that my wonderfully thick and full hair magically fell out over night, the anxiety is killing me!

All in all things aren’t too bad. Been having lots of fun, writing a lot, listening to good music, blah blah. Checking the facebook all day to see who has written me happy birthday posts, I guess I am a text book narcissist, are most writers vein? I should ask a psychologist.

Extremely tired and ready for the week to be over, too much internship hooplah and journalism deadlines driving me over the edge. I need a drink, or something. My father will be in town tonight and he’ll be treated me and some closer friends of mine to dinner and booze. Do Americans, actually, do people, ever celebrate anything without food and booze? I can’t imagine turning 22 and not having a drink, which probably speaks volumes about my character, good thing I’m writing in on my internet blog where the entire world can see it!

I wish there was a concert I had desire to see tonight. Something loud, yet tuneful, no obscure noise or anything. I actually think Metallica would be an ideal birthday band, just do shots and listen to the amps blare “For whom the Bells Toll” would surely make me feel fulfilled for the year. I wonder if Hetfield or Lars has actually read “For Whom the Bells Toll”, they should, they might actually like it, got lots of nice violence. That Hemingway sure did have one dark conception of humanity.

I love how people always seem to care more about others’ birthdays than the actual person whose birthday it is. So many calls, the entire same thing, “22 on the 22nd!”, or, “Feeling old?” “No I’m not feeling fucking old I’m only 20!”, is generally what I’m thinking, but I generally write it off with a polite thanks. And the social networking sites are ridiculous! People wishing me a happy birthday that I haven’t talked to or thought of in years, and others who I flat out have never talked to! The only thing I’m thinking about is that I’ll be thirty in 8 years, and considering 14 doesn’t seem that long ago, I am truly not looking forward to it. I can almost guarantee that at 30 I’ll still wear Nike Dunks and Black Flag shirts, pathetic really. Hopefully then I’ll be a published writer, either that or I’ll have gotten my big break in the acting business, starring in the upcoming film version of “Blood Meridian” as the Kid. Oh, how I do love fantasies.

I just don’t want to lose my hair.

The Long Road Home; pt. 7

He walked into the car, it was freezing, and the windows were clouded with fog and ice. He was hungry, and tired. It had been months since he had a decent night’s sleep. Well, he wasn’t actually sure how long it was.
The ignition was shot. He spent what seemed like hours trying to chug the engine along into starting, the noise was starting to nauseate him. Finally, it started, and the warmth of the car heater brought peace to his mind and hearth to his body. He made his way off the exit, and onto the road. It was dark, and his lights were dimming out. He could barely see, and yet, he went on.
He popped some more amphetamines, all though the feeling of slight euphoria they gave him did not amount to the guilt he felt over taking them. He was tired of such a useless routine, and longed for something new. He drove forward, and sideways, the only sign of hope being the occasional traffic light, or an animal crossing the road.
About 100 miles down the road he stumbled upon a horrific accident. There were two cars; one was a large black sub that was sitting on its side in the middle of the road, and the other, a white convertible that had flipped onto the snow towards the left side of the road. There were not yet any police on arrival, and not an ambulance to ensure these people’s fate. The decision was his and his alone.
He saw a woman trying to escape from her window of the SUV. Her hand was severed, most likely from the broken glass of the windshield, and the blood loss was immense, spraying the black SUV with its effervescent glow. He leapt out of his car to help her.
“Please, help me sir,” she said, “My husband, he is stuck.”
He gazed inside the gar, and to his horror saw the man’s head sticking through the glass, pieces of it broken off and lodged in his exposed brains. He fought the urge to puke and gained his composure. The amphetamines turned out to be not such a bad idea after all.
“Listen Miss, we need to get you to a hospital,” he said.
“My husband,” she cried, “We’ve been married for 33 years, he can’t die.”
“I know, I know,” he said, “but please let me help you.”
He dragged her from the car as she shrieked hysterically. He removed his prized leather coat and used it to clot the blood flowing from the woman’s left wrist. He ran to his car and retrieved a bottle of vicodin, a fifth of vodka, and a first aid kit.
“Here, please take these, it’ll numb” the pain,” he said, “both kinds.”
She lay back, and he fed her three pills, and had her tilt her head slightly so he could use the booze to wash them back, she made a distasteful gesture with her face as the harsh warm vodka warmed her and calmed her.
“Thank you,” she said, “you’re kind, you might now know it yet, but you’re kind.”
The woman’s face was losing color, and it was then he noticed a far more serious wound in her belly, a large piece of glass that had wedged itself between her ribs. He tried to dress it up with gauze. It was too late. The woman coughed blood and her eyes rolled into her head, and she sat there in his arms, lifeless, and at peace.
The man saw headlights coming into his vision. He had forgotten about the car on the side of the road, but it didn’t matter.
A large man stepped out of the ambulance, and approached him. He looked at the lifeless woman sitting in his arms.
“There was nothing you could have done,” he said, “But this woman will be eternally grateful for what you tried to do.”
Then, he cried.

Mandatory Blog 1

We, writers, are familiar with the ancient rhetoricians and their belief that an argument is not complete unless appealing to ethos, the speaker’s credibility, or logos, the issue itself. But as Aristotle states`, there is a third intrinsic proof, pathos, the appeal to powerful human emotions. As English speakers, we think of the term “pathetic” as a grand insult for the most pitiful of behaviors, but taken strongly, the term literally means to arouse powerful emotions.
Aristotle stated three specific criteria for emotional appeal to be used as intrinsic proof within a piece. First, one must understand the state of mind of people who are angry, indignant, or joyful; second, they need to understand who is capable of arousing such emotions within people; and third, they must understand the reasons for which people become emotional. In his essay “Under the Influence” of which details the powerful effect a father’s alcoholism has on his son, Scott Russell Sanders adheres to all three criteria and creates a powerful essay that is sure to leave a lasting impression on even the most passive of readers.
He begins his essay with, “My father drank. He drank as a gut-punched boxer gasps for breath, as a starving dog gobbles food-compulsively, secretly, in pain and trembling. I use the past tense not because my father quit drinking but because he quit living. That is how the story ends for my father, age sixty-four, heart bursting, body cooling and forsaken on the linoleum of my brother’s trailer.” Clearly, without even really making a solid effort to do so, Sanders elicits a strong response in the reader. It is clear that the writer’s father and his voracious drinking had lasting psychological damage on him. By just evoking painful memories, we are able to sympathize with a man who isn’t directly asking for our sympathy.
Clearly he demonstrates the ability to understand human emotions, and because are emotions are generally affected by direct stimuli, it is known that those we care about, our friends and more so our family, have more bearing on our emotions than others. Sanders is talking about his father, the man that arguably shapes the young adult male (in many cases) more than any other person, and the debilitating psychological baggage that his father’s binge-drinking brought on. Sanders writes, “I lie there hating him, loving him, fearing him, knowing I have failed him.” He details the complex and confused emotions that occur from such a difficult experience as watching a loved and trusted family member destroy himself with booze. His father’s drinking was able to simultaneously make feel angry, helpless, and guilty, all while still being able to project love onto his father. These internal conflicts of facing a plethora of emotions brought on by a single event can relate to any human being as we are all faced with conflicting and confusing emotions, thus, he is able to directly relate to the reader even if he/she might not have any experience with alcoholism.
By appealing to the reader’s emotions, Sanders is able to make a highly convincing argument against alcoholism. By telling his own story of his father’s booze addiction he is also able to establish ethos, as a known talented writer and a man with personal experience in the matter, he clearly is able to come off as someone well-versed in the issue. Just to strengthen his argument, he even offers statistical numbers as to the vastly high rates of alcoholism in the United States. By using such grand emotional appeal, Sanders successfully elicits a strong response from the reader and makes a highly powerful statement of the social dilemma of alcoholism and its effect on the children of alcoholic parents.

The Long Road Home; pt.6

He re-entered the lobby with the intention of checking out.
He approached the register, and the hotel manager was sitting in his chair, ignoring a phone call, and clipping his toenails.
“I need to head out,” said the man.
The manager looked up and raised his left eyebrow, revealing a glass eye, hollow and white.
“You most certainly do,” said the manager, “but I don’t think it’s quite your time, you have a long ways ahead of you before you ever escape.”
“Escape?” said the man.
“I meant head out,” replied the manager, “In any case, its only 25 dollars a night, and since you haven’t stayed here but three hours, it’ll be 25 dollars anyways.”
The man reached into his back pocket, it was empty, no wallet, no cash, nothing. He realized he left it in the woman’s room, and he was damned if he was going to make that visit ever again.
“I, uh, I seem to have lost my wallet,” said the man, “is there some form of collateral I can offer you?”
The manager’s glass eye was gleaming, and his hardened face momentarily tensed, before giving way to his generally calm veneer, “Well, I generally only accept hard currency, but there are some exceptions for those that I find……., intriguing.”
“Intriguing?” he asked, before realizing what it was about him that made him so, he re-focused on the task at hand; getting back to the road.
“Well, what kind of promise do you require?” said the man.
“You must promise to keep hopeful,” said the man, “hope is the only power you have left, and without it you will never again know the beauty of love or the magic of passion,” said the manager.
The man had no idea what this kind but strange manager meant, and he made very little effort to decipher the meaning. He stood for a moment trying to read the manager’s facial expressions. The manager was staring directly into him, he knew him.
“I can do that,” said the man.
“Do what?” said the manager.
“Remain hopeful.”
“Promise me feller; promise me that you will keep hope.”
The man, true to judicial fashion, raised his hand, crossed his heart, and said, “I promise that I will remain hopeful.”
The manager nodded approvingly, and reached out to shake the man’s hand. Their hands met, and they stood there in silent cordiality. As the man was ready to turn away, he noticed a tear streaming down the manager’s left half of his face, but paid little attention to it, and finally broke free of that miserable existence of a motel.
As he walked out, it was dark. He made his way to his car, and felt something of an epiphany. He realized that prior to his encounters with the woman and the manager, he had no hope, he was drifting through this false reality of a life, but his conversation with the man re-invigorated him with hope and passion, and he was ready for something new. He knew he was almost there, but the question was how would he get there?

Top 5 Most Evil Charachters in Literature pt. 5; Iago

Save the best for last indeed.

Iago is till this day, what I consider the greatest villain in all of literature. He is in many ways the very first portrayal of, or at least the best earliest of the most remembered, a classic psychopath in literature. He is Shakespeare’s most sinister villain, only rivaled by Lady Macbeth and Edmund from King Lear. Iago is a Machiavellian schemer and liar, expertly manipulating all the characters in the play, and most notably Othello himself, while maintaining his reputation as an honest and decent advisor. His cunning is very little rivaled in literature. He is even referred to in the play as “Honest Iago”, denoting that not only do other people believe his lies, but they often think of him as the person most worthy of their trust. Shakespearean critic A.C. Bradley has said, “Evil has nowhere else been portrayed with such mastery as in the evil character of Iago.”

For those of you whom aren’t familiar with the play, well first off, get familiar, to me it’s his greatest achievement, a massive entangled web of lies and hatred all stemming around the relationship between Othello, the novel but corruptible soldier, and Iago, the manipulative and sadistically jealous advisor. Iago and Othello are longtime soldiers who have fought together for years. At the beginning, Iago tells the audience he has been unfairly passed over for promotion to lieutenant to Cassio. Iago plans to have Othello demote Cassio, and eventually cause Othello’s total destruction. Iago does have an ally in Roderigo, a dim-witted and easily-fooled insignificant, who helps Iago under the false pretenses that once Othello is gone, Othello’s wife Desdemona will be with Roderigo.

There is no one able to lie so masterfully as Iago in all of literature. First, he sets into motion a drunken brawl that ensures Cassio’s demotion, and begins on his real scheme. He will leas Othello to believe Desdemona is sleeping with Cassio. He cons his wife, Emilia, into stealing a handkerchief that Othello had given her, and tells Othello that he had seen it in Cassio’s possession. Othello suitably flies into maddening jealousy, and Iago tells him to hide behind the curtains while he talks to Cassio. He leads Cassio into a rather explicit conversation about Cassio’s mistress, Bianca, but leads Othello it is about Desdemona. Othello is stricken with grief, and orders Iago to murder Cassio. Instead, he lets his ally Roderigo fight Cassio, and murders Roderigo while Cassio is only wounded. Iago’s plans imminently succeed when Desdemona is murdered by Othello. Nevertheless, Iago’s wife brings his treachery to light and he is arrested at the end of the play.

The most study of Iago has had to deal with his motives, and why he felt such need to wreak such horrible havoc on the other characters’ lives, and many scholars felt he did this for no real reason other than that he good, making him a classic misanthropic sociopath. Samuel Taylor Coleridge described Iago’s motives as “motiveless malignity”, meaning he sought to destroy the other characters for no personal gain. In Act 1, Iago presents his motives as bitterness over being passed for promotion and his racist hatred over Othello, a black man, being with Desdemona, a white woman. But, many would seem to find these excuses to little more than classic sociopathic rationalizations and his real reason is his supreme confidence in his ability to destroy Othello and escape arrest or suspicion. Iago only presents his true evil nature in his asides to the audience, and presents himself as charismatic, witty, and charming to the other characters, also hinting at a sociopathic nature. He even offers sound advice to both Othello and Cassio. In any case, there are few characters like Iago, and he is very much a metaphor for the destructive nature of jealousy itself. We are never told what Iago is like before the play, and due to his status as celebrated soldier he was most likely heroic, but his ambitions turned to human destruction driven by petty jealousy. He is without guilt, and revels in the mayhem he has caused. Some say that he is a representation of the darker side of Othello himself, that little voice in the back of our heads telling us that our lovers don’t really love us. He is a manifestation of human hatred and malignity, and this is why he is the greatest evil in all of literature; he is an evil we all can identify with.

Top 5 Most Evil Charachters in Literature pt. 4; Mr. Hyde

Robert Louis Stevenson's "the Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" is to this day the greatest fictional portrayal of split personality disorder ever written. The story is particularly frightening because Dr. Jekyll is a kind and benveolent man noted for his numerous good deeds, and it is because he tries so hard to live up to this good persona that an absolutely malevolently evil and sadistic persona forms within that same personality, essentially with Mr. Hyde taking over Dr. Jekyll completely. The book is left ambiguous, and we are never explicitly told what Jekyll does when he becomes Hyde at night, though it was certainly something of a depraved and immoral nature. In my mind, I always felt Stephenson was trying to hint at a bloodlust for prostitutes. The fact that Jekyll takes the potion to become Hyde also hints that he feels that as Hyde he is allowed to engage in immoral activities that a doctor of his stature would never be able to get away with freely. It is most likely that Dr. Jekyll has this evil in him at all times, but it is the potion that only gives him the courage to do something that he feels constantly a need to do, such as when he killed the benevolent Sir Danvers in the streets of London for no other personal gain than the thrill of the kill.

Freud believed that our unconcious repressed thoughts have massive influence on our concious thoughts. Dr. Jekyll was trying so hard to repress his evi side, or his bad self, that all of us have within us, that an actual seperate and malevolent personality was formed to act out these darker urges. If someone repressed all thier dark urges to the unconcious mind than these urges can manifest unconciously, thus creating a Mr. Hyde like dual personality. The book is terrifying because Dr. Hyde/Mr. Jekyll is a representation of both pure good and pure evil. The failure to accept the tension of duality between good and evil is related to Victorian Theology in that Satan was banished to hell for failing to accept that he was a created being and not in fact God.