Category personal

“The Dark Knight Rises” shootings in Colorado

“…as someone who writes about movies, and who cares about the big, flawed thing we call fandom, I’m saddened by someone turning that shared enthusiasm into a weapon. And even if this tragedy hadn’t happened at the premiere of one of a dwindling number of genuinely mass cultural events, I hate the idea of using […]

The Art of Communication

“Artists don’t address themselves to audiences: they create audiences. The artist talks to himself out loud. If what he has to stay is significant, others hear and are affected.” – Edmund Snow Carpenter I came across this YouTube video by Vi Hart, a mathematician and creator. Carpenter’s decades-old message is still relevant today, as Hart […]

Like Federer

“Genius is not replicable. Inspiration, though, is contagious, and multiform — and even just to see, close up, power and aggression made vulnerable to beauty is to feel inspired and (in a fleeting, mortal way) reconciled.” – David Foster Wallace In 2006, author David Foster Wallace wrote an essay in the New York Times where […]