Gilbert Lewis Dot Dot Dot…

Posted on 23 Oct 2013 by Frank Moraes

Gilbert Lewis On this day back in 1857, the great Filipino artist Juan Luna was born. He was also involved in the Philippine Revolution and was even arrested for agitation. But the main thing of note about him is his painting. He had a distinct but compelling style. Happily, he was recognized in his own lifetime. But he died at only 42.

Comedian Johnny Carson was born in 1925. Everyone knows him, so I am just going to try to present to you a joke that Carson once told on the Tonight Show that no one but me thinks is funny. The Democratic National Convention was going on. Jerry Brown had run for president and he came in a distant third. But he was still an important presence at the convention. Carson said (more or less), “A reporter ask Brown if it bothered him that a lot people thought he was a new age hippy. And Brown responded, ‘Well, you give good karma out, you get good karma back.'” Okay, that’s a solid joke. But it died. Carson got nothing from the audience. So he ad libbed, “How about: he said it while meditating on ten pounds of raw liver?” I died. To this day, I think it is one of the funniest things I’ve ever heard. No one agrees with me. I guess you had to be there.

Other birthdays: the architect of the Ecole Militaire, Ange-Jacques Gabriel (1698); not the publisher of “Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations,” linguist John Russell Bartlett (1805); Minnie in Bride of Frankenstein, actor Una O’Connor (1880); linguist Zellig Harris (1909); cartoonist Bob Montana (1920); actor Frank Sutton (1923); the fine film director Philip Kaufman (77); the once good buy finally hack science fiction writer Michael Crichton (1942); film director Ang Lee (59); film director Sam Raimi (54); and songwriter “Weird Al” Yankovic (54).

H2O Dot Diagram The day,however, belongs to the great chemist Gilbert Lewis who was born in 1875. He is known for discovering the covalent bond and for his theoretical work on electron pairs. What you probably know him for is one of the first thing you learn in high school chemistry: Lewis dot diagrams. It is a surprisingly simple but powerful concept. You can see how it works with a water molecule on the right. Each atom has 4 pair locations and when atoms bond, they share one electron a piece. He did far more than this and if you are interested in chemistry and thermodynamics, you should look into him.

Happy birthday Gilbert Lewis!

You Never Can Tell With Chuck Berry

Posted on 18 Oct 2013 by Frank Moraes

Chuck Berry It’s a big day for literature. Moby-Dick was first published on this day back in 1851 under the name The Whale. And almost as quickly, it was disparaged and forgotten and not long after Melville pretty much stopped writing until shortly before his death. It’s sad. There are a lot of similarities between Melville and Cervantes, although the latter never stopped writing. But they both spent what should have been very productive years slogging through life doing government work. Its all very sad, but they both left us multiple gems of varying brilliance.

On this day in 1927, the great actor George C. Scott was born. I’ve liked him for a number of movies, most notably in Dr. Strangelove and Patton. But for me, the best film he ever made was They Might Be Giants. Yes, it is a modern version of Don Quixote, but that isn’t what matters most here. Scott’s performance is by far his most nuanced. Both film and actor are under appreciated.

Assassin Lee Harvey Oswald was born in 1939. I bring him up only because I had no idea he was so young. He had just turned 24 when he murdered President Kennedy. Clearly, he was a very troubled young man. And because of that, I worry about loose talk of revolution and tyranny. In the late 1960s, we definitely got a lot of that from the left. That was wrong and dangerous. But today, we not only get it from the right, we get it from a lot of mainstream people. I suspect the only reason no one has taken a shot at President Obama is that the Secret Service have thankfully gotten so good at their jobs. But it really ought to be unthinkable.

Other birthdays: Baroque painter Luca Giordano (1634); the late Baroque, early Classical composer Baldassare Galuppi (1706); poet Thomas Love Peacock (1785); theoretical physicist Pascual Jordan (1902); one of the great racist villains of 20th century America Jesse Helms (1921); actor Peter Boyle (1935); actor Dawn Wells, our own Mary Ann on Gilligan’s Island (75); one of the few really distinctive movie composers Howard Shore (67); and musician Wynton Marsalis (52).

The day, however, belongs to the very great Chuck Berry who is 87 today and still performing. Most people associate him with his guitar playing. And it is great, fun pentatonic noodling—probably the most distinctive style in pop music. But that’s not why I gave the the day to him. As I noted back on 17 September, “If I had to name the greatest songwriter of the 20th century, it would be Chuck Berry.” His musical sense is wonderful and his lyrics are clever as hell. It’s just amazing stuff. Here is one of my favorites, “You Never Can Tell”:

Happy birthday Chuck Berry!

The Importance of Being Oscar Wilde

Posted on 16 Oct 2013 by Frank Moraes

The Picture of Oscar Wilde On this day in 1758, the great lexicographer Noah Webster was born. He is best known for the dictionary he started that eventually became the excellent modern Merriam-Webster Dictionary. But he really should be known as one of the Founding Fathers of the United States. Most people today don’t understand just how screwed up spelling was a couple of hundred years ago. In fact, if you go back to Shakespeare’s time, it is almost impossible read. Everyone had their own spellings that were based upon how the words sounded to them. And then the same writer didn’t spell things the same. Christopher Marlowe wrote his last name with at least a dozen different spellings. So Webster and others were very concerned about standardizing spelling. And in this context, he created a hugely popular Speller that was used to teach American children for five decades. But as Wikipedia notes, it was “entirely secular by design.” And it really helped to create an American identity that was secular. So if the fundamentalists want to blame someone for our relatively secular society, they should stop ranting about Madison and Paine and start ranting about Webster. As a matter of fact, they could become “spelling deniers.” All those secular spelling rules! God doesn’t want us to speak English anyway. Greek is the language of God! Or rather: Ελληνικός!

The great playwright Eugene O’Neill was born in 1888. When I was younger, I loved him. He was so serious. Now, it is kind of hard to take, but I still admire the work. The thing about him is that he perfected realism in American theater. If it weren’t for him, I don’t think we would have had Tennessee Williams or Arthur Miller or even Edward Albee. He did occasionally write comedies, most successfully Ah, Wilderness! which is still performed. You can look it up; it’s hard to find a good scene. Woody Allen he wasn’t.

Other birthdays: Baroque composer Jan Dismas Zelenka (1679); photographer Paul Strand (1890); futurist painter Primo Conti (1900); singer Nico (1938); actor Angela Lansbury (88); actor Barry Corbin (73); retiring actor Suzanne Somers (65); film director David Zucker (66); actor Tim Robbins (55); and musician John Mayer (36).

The day, however, belongs to the great writer Oscar Wilde who was born on this day in 1854. Look, I could tell you that I love his books and plays. And I do! The Picture of Dorian Gray and The Importance of Being Earnest are both great. And I could tell you that I love his epigrams. And I do! “Some cause happiness wherever they go; others whenever they go,” is brilliant. But mostly, I love him because he was an oppressed minority that the society still wanted to bleed dry. Now, of course, we are so much more evolved! Now we only oppress people that ought to be oppressed! Oscar Wilde is a great reminder to all of us to think about who we thoughtlessly oppress each day. “We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.”

Happy birthday Oscar Wilde!

Ira’s Brother George

Posted on 26 Sep 2013 by Frank Moraes

George Gershwin On this day in 1774, the proto-environmentalist Johnny Appleseed (John Chapman) was born. I didn’t know he was an actual person. It turns out that he didn’t wander around planting seeds, however. He started nurseries and later orchards as a business. And much of the production of those nurseries were used (As always!) to make hard cider and other alcoholic beverages.

The sociologist and photographer Lewis Hine was born in 1874. He did great work during the first three decades of the 20th century to document the lives of regular Americans. A lot of his work was with the American Red Cross, documenting their relief work. In the 1920s he did a series of photographs of Americans at work. But despite his many great successes, he found it difficult to get work in the late 1930s. He eventually lost his house and he died in poverty. In other words, his is a typical story of what we do to great Americans with the temerity to do something with their lives other than make money.

The great poet T. S. Eliot was born in 1888. He is one of those “problem” poets—in his case antisemitism. But we all have character flaws, and it doesn’t too much matter to the work. What I most like about his poetry is his jagged rhythmic sense. I think it has had a profound effect on me in terms of my songs, which have grown ever more playful, although admittedly, less accessible to others. Here is Eliot’s “Hysteria” from around 1920:

As she laughed I was aware of becoming involved in her
laughter and being part of it, until her teeth were
only accidental stars with a talent for squad-drill. I
was drawn in by short gasps, inhaled at each momentary
recovery, lost finally in the dark caverns of her
throat, bruised by the ripple of unseen muscles. An
elderly waiter with trembling hands was hurriedly
spreading a pink and white checked cloth over the rusty
green iron table, saying: “If the lady and gentleman
wish to take their tea in the garden, if the lady and
gentleman wish to take their tea in the garden …” I
decided that if the shaking of her breasts could be
stopped, some of the fragments of the afternoon might
be collected, and I concentrated my attention with
careful subtlety to this end.

The singer-songwriter Marty Robbins was born in 1925. My mother was a big fan of his and his story songs. So this one is for her:

And the Roxy Music frontman, Bryan Ferry is 68 today. I’m torn on him. In many ways, he’s a pretentious twat. But I really do love those first two Roxy Music albums. Anyway, here is one of his solo efforts, “Let’s Stick Together”:

Other birthdays: Romantic painter Theodore Gericault (1791); novelist Joseph Furphy (1843); singer Olivia Newton-John (65); and actor Linda Hamilton (57).

The day, however, belongs to the great composer George Gershwin who was born in 1898. He is often mistakenly thought of as a “serious” or “classical” composer, but he was not at all. It is probably better to think of him as a musical theater composer, which he probably would be known as today if it were not for his death at only 38 due to a brain tumor. It is best to think of him as a cross between a jazz and a classical composer. It would have been interesting to see where he would have gone as a composer, because he certainly hadn’t reached maturity. Still, he left us with a lot of great music like Rhapsody in Blue, here conducted by a fan of his, Leonard Bernstein:

Happy birthday George Gershwin!

The Closing of Allan Bloom

Posted on 14 Sep 2013 by Frank Moraes

Allan Bloom On this day in 1737, the composer Michael Haydn was born. He was the brother of Joseph Haydn. I’m not at all sure why Joseph has become such a staple of classical music while Michael has not. He’s very good as you can see in his Symphony No. 41:

Italian Romantic composer Luigi Cherubini was born in 1760. Beethoven thought he was the best composer of that period—except for Beethoven himself, of course. Here is his Symphony in D Major:

The illustrator Charles Dana Gibson was born in 1867. He was the creator of the “Gibson Girl.” Birth control activist Margaret Sanger was born in 1879. Film producer Hal B. Wallis was born in 1898. Co-writer of “Heartbreak Hotel,” songwriter Mae Boren Axton was born in 1914.

Economist Lawrence Klein is 92 today. Chekov from Star Trek, actor Walter Koenig is 77. Actor Sam Neill is 66. And Canadian actor Callum Keith Rennie is 53.

The day, however, belongs to a man I really don’t like, Allan Bloom who was born in 1930. He is best known for his bestseller The Closing of the American Mind. It’s not that I totally disagree with him, but the man annoys me. The only reason I am giving the day to him is that I have a fairly long history of confusing him with Harold Bloom, who writes about a lot of the same stuff and is often annoying in exactly the same way. I will try to keep the two distinct from now on.

Happy birthday Allan Bloom!

Disrepecting Henry Bergh

Posted on 29 Aug 2013 by Frank Moraes

Henry Bergh On this day in 1632, the father of classical liberalism, John Locke was born. He had a lot of good ideas, but many of his very bad (and wrong) economic ideas are still with us today. But I suppose that he can be forgiven. After all, conservatives would make up the ideas if they had to. And there was nothing in Locke’s own time to indicate just how wrong he was. That’s the thing about history. Locke really was liberal at the time he was working. But that was 350 years ago when we knew a lot less. Now conservatives hang onto 350 year old ideas that have been shown to be wrong. Yet they think that they are the ones who think outside the box.

The staggeringly great neoclassical painter Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres was born in 1780. He was very much a traditionalist and he fought hard against the Romantic movement. His great adversary in this fight was the equally great Eugene Delacroix. The funny thing is that Ingress still shows lots of Romantic influences. These philosophical fights always seem so minor from a distance. Here he is basically doing Mannerism:

Poet Edward Carpenter was born in 1844. Inventor of the electric starter and (unfortunately) leaded gas, Charles Kettering was born in 1876. The film writer and director Preston Sturges was born in 1898. Here is a bit from my favorite of his films The Great McGinty:

The great heart surgeon Vivien Thomas was born in 1910. Actor Ingrid Bergman was born in 1915. Here she is in Casablanca:

Queen Bitch Richard Blackwell was born in 1922. The great singer Dinah Washington was born in 1924. Here she is doing Bessie Smith’s “Send Me to the Electric Chair”:

And Michael Jackson was born in 1958. He is terribly overrated. Just the same he was an incredible talent. I still like this stuff best:

Cinematographer Wolfgang Suschitzky (who did one of my favorites Theatre of Blood) is 101 today. Director Richard Attenborough is 90. Not at all maverick John McCain is 77. Actor Elliott Gould is 75. Strong dollar idiot Robert Rubin is also 75. Really bad director Joel Schumacher is 74. Here’s an example of his work:

And Jack Lew is 58. I only mention it so I can show you this:

The day, however, belongs to the great founder of the ASPCA, Henry Bergh who was born on this day in 1811. Three years ago, I compared him very favorably to Don Quixote, “Bergh spent the next twenty-two years of his life daily going about New York personally stopping animal cruelty—even arresting people and taking them to jail. If he saw a horse-pulled train that was over-crowed, he would stop it and force the riders to get off. Henry Bergh was a Victorian Don Quixote, in the sense of one man out to right wrongs, no matter what the odds.”

Unfortunately, Bergh is nothing but an icon to the ASPCA today. What the group now does is kill animals by the millions. And this is what it has become:

All of this should not stop you from giving to pet shelters. But please help a no kill shelter. Otherwise, you are just buying lawyers and lethal injections. I can assure you that that is what Henry Bergh would have wanted.

Happy birthday Henry Bergh!

Clair de Bussy

Posted on 22 Aug 2013 by Frank Moraes

Claude Debussy On this day back in 1647, the inventor of the pressure cooker, Denis Papin was born. British tool inventor Henry Maudslay was born in 1771. Writer James Kirke Paulding was born in 1778. American astronomer Samuel Pierpont Langley (Yes, that Langley) was born in 1834. The painter of The Spirit of ’76, Archibald Willard was born in 1836.

Philosopher Max Scheler was born in 1874. The great writer and humorist Dorothy Parker was born in 1893. The great Nazi film director Leni Riefenstahl was born in 1902. Photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson was born in 1908. Screenwriter Julius Epstein was born in 1909.

Blues legend John Lee Hooker was born in 1917. Here he is doing “Boom Boom”:

Science fiction writer Ray Bradbury was born in 1920. Playwright James Kirkwood was born in 1925. And General Norman Schwarzkopf was born in 1934.

Novelist Annie Proulx is 78 today. I’m not that fond of her work, but I did learn a great deal from her. She is a very crisp writer and I admire that. But more than that, I learned that novels aren’t really about plot—or at least they don’t need to be. Actor Valerie Harper is 74. Actor Cindy Williams is 66. Here she is in one of my favorite films, The Conversation during which the original conversation (which we hear parts of many times throughout the film) takes place:

Tori Amos is 50. I don’t really know who she is. A singer I think. And comedian Kristen Wiig is 40.

The day, however, belongs to one of the greatest composers ever, Claude Debussy who was born on this day back in 1862. His music can be appreciated on so many levels that I find it hard to believe that anyone wouldn’t it enjoy unless they were tone deaf. Mostly, the music is tonal but in that pentatonic and whole tone scale way that sounds simultaneously exotic and familiar. But he is rarely boring. He has a great sense of when to surprise the listener. In this regard, I think he is significantly better than Ravel, who I also admire.

If you want to listen to a rather sterile rendition of Clair de Lune, Google created a very beautiful and sweet Doodle for the occasion of Debussy’s 151 birthday. You could do a lot better musically. For one thing, you’ve probably heard Clair de Lune way too much already. I highly recommend listening to Debussy’s only opera Pelleas et Melisande. There are a few full versions online if you wish to listen to it. Or you could listen to any number of versions of Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun. There is a very amusing animation to it in the film Allegro Non Troppo. But let me introduce you to some of his later work. This is the eleventh piece of the first book of Preludes, La Danse de Puck. Give it a chance. It is a bit more difficult than a lot of his work, but it is ultimately charming:

Happy birthday Claude Debussy!

Raymond Chandler

Posted on 23 Jul 2013 by Frank Moraes

Raymond Chandler On this day in 1777, the German painter Philipp Otto Runge was born. Much of his work is typically Romantic. But his religious painting seems to me more neoclassical. And it is much more interesting. Romantic composer Franz Berwald was born in 1796. His work is not bad, especially for a saw mill manager. One of the Skagen Painters (basically the Danish Impressionists), Peder Severin Kroyer was born in 1851. The great physicist Walter Schottky was born in 1886. He did not invent the transistor and he was not a racist. (That would be William Shockley.) He did however have one of those little Hitler mustaches. (Shockley did not.) He also invented the ribbon microphone. And the Portuguese singer Amalia Rodrigues was born in 1920. Here she is singing one of her own pieces, “Estranha Forma de Vida”:

Literary critic and long-time editor of Norton Anthology of English Literature, M. H. Abrams is 101 today. That’s what you want in your critics of Romantic era literature, people who actually knew John Keats. Distinctive architect Richard Rogers is 80. Conservative bigot (Redundant?) Don Imus is 73 although he looks more like 113.

Appellate court judge Alex Kozinski is 63. Normally, he wouldn’t merit attention. But he wrote the opinion overturning the conviction of Debra Milke. I’m glad to see that the website devoted to her is back up. They have an article written by Milke last year discussing the day she entered prison (now 22 years ago) on death row, The Day I Arrived… Check it out. Kozinski isn’t exactly a hero. It is just that the Milke case is so screwed up that anyone just doing their jobs properly helps. Meanwhile, despite the fact that the prosecution has no case as far as I can tell, she is set for retrial and the court will not allow her to have bail.

Comedian Jo Brand is 56. Actor Woody Harrelson is 52. I found out two things about him today. First, he has the same birthday as his father, Charles Harrelson who was born in 1938. Second, his father was in the mob and died in prison for killing federal judge John H. Wood Jr. Woody and his father were apparently not close. Actor Philip Seymour Hoffman is 46. And Monica Lewinsky (who I think has been unfairly criticized) is 40.

The day, however, belongs to hard-boiled detective fiction pioneer Raymond Chandler who was born on this day in 1888. At this point in my life, I find all of that stuff pretty hard to read. It is so over-written. Everything is described in much too much detail. And really, can you tell me the difference between Philip Marlowe and Sam Spade? (Marlowe was probably a nicer guy; that’s about it.) Still, I think it is great and I liked it quite a lot when I was younger.

Happy birthday Raymond Chandler!

Guthrie and Bergman

Posted on 14 Jul 2013 by Frank Moraes

Woody Guthrie On this day back in 1743, the great Russian poet Gavrila Romanovich Derzhavin was born. But what do I know? I don’t read Russian. The inventor of the theory of the Aryan master race, Arthur de Gobineau was born in 1816. Who would have thought that a Frenchman would give the Nazis their philosophical start? I hate to bring it up on Bastille Day. On the other hand, I think it is important for modern day conservatives to remember: Gobineau is what it is to be a conservative.

Special message to conservatives: This is what history will think of you. I know you all don’t see it now. But your belief in “equality of opportunity,” which even if it weren’t a myth, will eventually be seen for what it is: a form of intellectual aristocracy. You won’t say it, but you really do believe the race would be better if these “inferior” people just died out. And guess what? Over time, we’re going to need as much genetic diversity as possible. Because what is really valuable (or at least highly prized) now is very specific to this time and place. It will not always be so. But I don’t think that is what you should be thinking about. You should be thinking about what bigots you will ultimately be seen to be.

The writer Owen Wister was born in 1860. He pretty much invented the modern western. What is most interesting about his work is that it shows that even at the beginning the western was fundamentally about protecting the property of the rich. It wasn’t then and pretty much isn’t now about the rugged individualist, except in as much as that rugged individual can help protect the profits of the rich. The painter Gustav Klimt was born in 1862. He was a really interesting artist, but I just don’t find him that compelling.

The great Swedish filmmaker Ingmar Bergman was born in 1918. It was very hard to not give him the day. I don’t think he is unerring in his brilliance. But his films are always interesting and often great. It may be a cliche, but The Seventh Seal is one of the truly great films. And I am especially fond of Scenes from a Marriage. But sometimes, he’s really a bit too much as in Cries and Whispers. Since you really can’t appreciate Bergman in a short snippet, here is a parody of him that is delicious fun:

Okay! Here is probably the most famous scene from the beginning of The Seventh Seal. There are no subtitles. For those who haven’t seen it (And why is that?) Death has come for the knight. But the knight convinces him to delay his death until they finish a chess game. When choosing colors, Death picks black and then notes, “Appropriate, don’t you you think?”

Actor Harry Dean Stanton is 87 today. He’s interesting because he’s looked old for such a long time, he doesn’t look too bad now. Blockbuster film producer Joel Silver is 61. Comedian Jane Lynch is 53. And David Mitchell is 39. Here he is with Robert Webb lampooning the unequal crime fighting duo as we saw recently in Marvel’s the Avengers:

The day, however, belongs to the great folk singer and songwriter Woody Guthrie who was born on this day in 1912. Here he is doing “Hard Travelin'” which sounds very much like it could be on the first Bob Dylan album.

Happy birthday Woody Guthrie!

Happy Bastille Day!

Posted on 14 Jul 2013 by Frank Moraes

So It’s Bastille Day. Although it isn’t technically a celebration of the storming of the Bastille, I still think of it that way. And thus it is the perfect holiday from my standpoint. First, it involves the people attacking the aristocracy. And regardless of what Edmund Burke thought, that’s generally a good thing. Second, it isn’t an American holiday so I don’t have to deal with a disruption to my mail and library access.

The official purpose of Bastille Day is to celebrate Fete de la Federation. I know what you’re thinking, “The what’s it?” This was a feast held exactly one year after the storming of the Bastille to celebrate the establishment of a constitutional monarchy. But it didn’t last long. France had, what you might call, growing pains. But once constitutional democracy was finally established in France, it held on, unlike in other countries like, I don’t know, America.

Francois Hollande has been a bit of a disappointment as the president of France. But most of his problems stem from being stuck with the shared European currency. Here in America, we elected Barack Obama and a Democratic majority in the House and a super-majority in the Senate. Combine this with the fact that Obama really was a very conservative guy and you have a prescription for the federal government really getting some stuff done—not just with his own caucus but with the Republicans as well. But instead, getting anything done was very difficult. Add to that, what did get done was excessively watered down. If that kind of thing happened in France, the people would storm the Bastille.

Over the years, I’ve come to think that the idea of the rugged American is just a myth. The true American is a guy who kills himself just to get by, but still loves the inherited wealthy because he’s too stupid to realize that his father is not George Romney. I’ve long dreamed that the middle class in this country would eventually push back against a government by, for, and of the rich. But now I think as long as the government isn’t actively doing drone attacks on the suburbs, they’ll be just fine. Not that it matters; by that point the entire middle class will consist of one family in Queens.

So let us celebrate a country were the government really has to be concerned that the people will rise up if conditions get bad enough. I’m feeling kind of depressed that Americans only ever revolted in defense of chattel slavery. And many still think they ought to revolt over that—even if they don’t put it that way.

Vive la France!

They Might Be James Goldman

Posted on 30 Jun 2013 by Frank Moraes

James Goldman On this day in 1917, actor Susan Hayward was born. Ed Yost, the inventor of the hot air balloon was born in 1919. And magician Harry Blackstone Jr was born in 1934.

Economist Thomas Sowell is 83. Musician Stanley Clarke is 52. And actor Vincent D’Onofrio is 54.

But the day belongs to playwright James Goldman, who was born on this day in 1927. He was the older brother of novelist and screenwriter William Goldman. He’s best known for the play and the filmed version of it, The Lion in Winter. But I most admire him for the film They Might Be Giants, which was also a play but it has never been published.

The film is extremely deep, but I fear that most people don’t understand it. It is basically a modern version of Don Quixote. But in this telling, instead of Quixote thinking he is a knight, he thinks he is Sherlock Holmes. His family thinks he is insane, so he becomes a patient of a psychiatrist, Dr Mildred Watson. Once learning of her last name, Holmes becomes convinced that she is his Dr Watson. As time goes on, Watson is pulled completely into Holmes’ fantasy. On its surface, the film is just a silly comedy. But it is really quite deep and poses all of the most important questions that humans ask. Here is the end of the film (which is about all I could find), which shows the final commitment of Watson to Holmes’ world. It doesn’t completely work on screen, but on the stage it would have been perfect:

Happy birthday James Goldman!

The human heart can see what is hidden to the eyes, and the heart knows things that the mind does not begin to understand.

Bierce and Reich

Posted on 24 Jun 2013 by Frank Moraes

Robert Reich When I was first introduced to unix in 1988, a big part of the experience was that whenever I logged in, I got a “message of the day” in the form of a little program, typically named “motd.” All the program did was pick randomly from a text file of quotes. I’m sure it was added to over the years by the various nerdy people who developed the various parts of the operating system. And they were very fond of Ambrose Bierce and his The Devil’s Dictionary. It includes wonderful definitions like:

Actually (adv) Perhaps; possibly.

Conservative (n) A statesman who is enamored of existing evils, as distinguished from the Liberal, who wishes to replace them with others.

Religion (n) A daughter of Hope and Fear, explaining to Ignorance the nature of the Unknowable.

Brilliant, right? Ambrose Bierce was born on this day in 1842. And then, when he was 71 he disappeared in Mexico. Bierce was a journalist and author and war hero. Here is a French short film based upon Bierce’s short story, “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge.” It is really good:

Irish playwright George Shiels was born in 1886. Boxer Jack Dempsey was born in 1895. Tennis shoe evangelist Chuck Taylor was born in 1901. The great British astronomer Fred Hoyle was born in 1915. And painter Margaret Olley was born in 1923.

You probably have never heard of him, but actor Al Molinaro is 94 today. But I know you know him, that’s why I’ve included his picture on the right. He was the owner of Arnold’s on Happy Days and (as in the picture) Murray the Cop on The Odd Couple. And I love this quote from him, “I spent twenty years here before I got anything going, and from that I got lucky. It takes a lot of luck in show business. You’ve just got to be lucky and in the right place at the right time.” I wish more people understood how important luck is to their success. And how can you not love that face?!

Guitarist Jeff Beck is 69. Here he is with The Yardbirds, although for the record, I think Jimmy Page is better:

Drummer Mick Fleetwood is 66. Actor Nancy Allen is 63. Scottish actor Iain Glen is 52. And really vile human being who uses religion to oppress the weak, Ralph Reed is also 52.

The day however, belongs to the great political economist who is there on the right under “Daily Off Sites,” Robert Reich who is 67 today. He has it all. He’s an excellent writer with a good sense of humor. Oh, and he’s one of the most insightful political observers around. Having been on the inside as Labor Secretary under Clinton, he understands the politics as well as the economics that is going on. And most of all, he cares that our society is totally screwed up and is trying to do something about it. Here he is in one of his great videos. This one is on Three Economic Myths:

Happy birthday Robert Reich!

Image of Robert Reich by Danorton (own work), licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikipedia.

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