The Beast Within

You may have noticed I haven't been about lately again, but this time, my explanation is of a medical nature.
As I type, I'm still experiencing the monstrous tearing and ravenous gnawings of some inconceivable terror from beyond the ken of man.  Doctors claim that it is simply a viral infection which will pass in due course with the right medication and procedures, but I know better: truly, some alien being has taken up residence in my abdominal cavity and enjoys nothing more than to wrench my organs and gizzards like a crone twisting dripping towels over a bucket, or chewing at my intestines like a teething puppy.

Hopefully this fiendish horror will vacate the premises sooner rather than later, but until then, I'm returning to reading. I gave Fritz Leiber another go, feeling that he deserved another chance.  I still dislike "Ill-Met in Lankhmar" (and I'll probably have to explain myself one of these days) but then I read "The Circle Curse," which I found a pleasant change in pace: gone were the weird sentence structures and overly-flowery prose (considering the authors I like, that's saying something), and instead the tale was imbued with a strange, eerie atmosphere.  A true Weird Tale. 

I read on to "The Jewels in the Forest."  Now THAT'S what I'm talking about!  A fantastic story chock-full of adventure, thrills, mystery, invention and ingenuity.  I loved the supporting characters, the enigma of the Jewels was compelling, and the reveal of the Guardian was a good enough twist that I was pleasantly surprised, though not thrown out of left field.  Best of all, I could finally understand why the rapport between Fafhrd and Mouser was so beloved.  Finally, I think I'm "getting" it.

But then, I read "Thieves' House"... and was blown away.  This is a story I'd happily place alongside such favourites as "Kings in Darkness," "Black God's Kiss" and "The Charnel God" as my favourite non-Howard Sword-and-Sorcery stories.  It's one I might perennially re-read, it's that good.  It's unmistakably Leiber, but everything is tempered so precisely and perfectly that it's somewhat transcendent.  Then I read "The Bleak Shore," which was a beautifully dark and appropriately bleak tale reminiscent of Hodgeson or Clark Ashton Smith's dark fantasies, and after that "The Howling Tower," which was another grim, stark tale.  This is the side of Leiber I was looking for, the one that balanced out the comedy with the realism, like the early Discworld books (and it's clearer more than ever just the extent Pratchett's debt to Leiber was in those days).

So yes, I'm finally getting Fritz.  In addition, I've been re-reading The Land That Time Forgot, which is always giving me something new to ruminate over, and I'll likely be having a gander at some other books.  Hopefully whatever's practising their plaits with my guts will tire eventually, and I'll be back in business in due course.

Undeath of the Author and the Vagaries of Sub-Creation

So, of course, the internet is all in a tizzy as it transpires that George Lucas is continuing to monkey around with Star Wars by inserting new sounds and effects to the trilogy in a seemingly never-ending quest to tinker and fine-tune something which many people was fine the first time around. Most of it revolves around this scene:



While I love Star Wars, I don't have quite the same attachment others have to the series, likely because I was much older when I first saw it than most of my contemporaries. Besides, I'm a Trekkie, I'm honour-bound or something. Yet at the same time, I easily sympathise with those who object to these sorts of changes: even if you're not a massive fan of the films, altering such a dramatic, pivotal scene as Darth Vader's redemption by adding a big NOOOOO completely destroys the impact of the scene. Instead of being an understated, wordless, powerful image, it descends into cheesy melodrama. So why does Lucas insist on making changes that undermine the strength of his own creation?

There seem to be two main points of view in all this.

The first is that George Lucas is the creator of Star Wars and so it is entirely within his creative rights to alter his work as he sees fit. If he wants to add in stupid things like CGI beasties wandering in front of the camera or adding screams that ruin the understated power of scenes, then he's well within his rights to do it. Just as Harlan Ellison and J.D. Salinger were well within their rights to demand that their unfinished works be destroyed upon their death to stop posthumous collaborations. After all, he's the author, creator and artist, so who are we to decide what he should or shouldn't do to his own creation?

The second is that once a work has been exposed to the world, it ceases to be the sole propriety of the artist, but belongs to all of humanity. When a painting is displayed in an art gallery, or a book is published, or a film is released, then it has become part of the cultural landscape. It, in effect, belongs to everyone. George Lucas can thus be considered the creation of Star Wars, but in a sense, it no longer belongs "exclusively" to him, but to everyone.

It's an interesting dilemma with many ramifications.

A Tale of Two Remakes

A very interesting little link that perfectly illustrates what I'm talking about when I say Conan really needed more than Grog, Girls and Gore to succeed.  This article talks about the differences between Rise of the Planet of the Apes and Conan the Barbarian: obviously I don't agree with everything, but it's still very well thought out, and the description of the form in particular rings true.

Rise of the Planet of the Apes is really more of a “reboot,” to use the preferred terminology of an entertainment industry that has real trouble coming up with fresh ideas, and has therefore taken to devising a whole new language for retreads.  Actually, since Tim Burton already tried rebooting the Apes franchise with his lavish but unloved 2001 film, this is technically a re-re-boot.  It makes a few cute nods toward the original films through repurposed dialogue, but it sets up an entirely new version of the POTA universe, which was originally (spoiler alert for those who somehow missed the earlier films!) a massive temporal paradox.

Despite its copy-of-a-copy pedigree, the new Apes film is terrific, because it found something fresh and original to do with its venerable material.  The rise of the Apes is now a result of bio-engineering run amok, rather than time-traveling chimpanzees giving birth to their own predecessor.  Within this framework, tough moral questions are asked about the nature of loyalty. 

James Franco gives his best performance to date as a scientist whose enduring love for his father, and resulting determination to cure Alzheimer’s, leads him to cut some corners that should not have been cut.  He’s right and wrong, admirable and worth of censure, in equal measure.  In fact, all of the human characters in the story make the epic mistake of underestimating a technology that has the power to rewrite not just DNA, but history itself.

This technology leads to Caesar, a hyper-intelligent chimpanzee brought to life with an astonishing motion-capture performance from Andy Serkis – the undisputed grand master of an entirely new form of theatrical performance.  Caesar’s loyalty to the humans he sincerely loves is pitted against his sense of duty to his species, and his growing hunger for personal dignity. 

What results is a tragedy that becomes all the more powerful because it seems so horribly inevitable.  Great special effects and stunt work are placed in the service of a solid, thoughtful script.  It’s great science fiction, because it takes a single hypothetical – and not entirely implausible – bit of technology, and weaves an entirely believable story around it.  

This is exactly what I'm talking about. The trailers for Rise of the Planet of the Apes showed a compelling story: the tale of good-intentioned science leading humanity down the road to hell; the battle an oppressed minority wages in order to achieve dignity, equal opportunities and fair treatment; a man realising the unforeseen consequences of his work. You wanted to know what happened to the characters you see; you want to know how the story will unfold, even if you know it'll eventually end with the Apes dominant; you are invested, interested, piqued by what you're seeing. And that's just the trailer!

Again: who saw the Conan trailers and thought "wow, I wonder how this story's going to end up?" "What's Khalar Zym's story, what does he want, what will he do?" "What is this movie about beyond the lizard-brained thrills of Grog, Girls and Gore?"  It sure wasn't me.  If there were, then all power to them.  But I wasn't seeing any. This is as much the fault of advertising as it is the film, of course.  When you think of the many ways a Conan film could be just as provocative and meaningful to modern times as Apes - think about how the barbarism/civilization dynamic could be applicable to the modern world, how the treatment of faith could be mirrored by modern interfaith dynamics, how Conan himself could be a different kind of hero - it really drives home what a colossal failure Conan was from a creative standpoint.

It's perhaps inevitable I'd find issue with their discussion of Conan, but although they're there, most of their criticisms are entirely valid.

There was no need to retell his origin story.  This was not a franchise that needed its own Casino Royale or Batman Begins​.

On the contrary, I think it did - because the 1982 film's origin story is completely and utterly different from what Howard told us.  Conan's village was never wiped out, his parents never killed, there was no quest for revenge against an evil warlord, he never had some special sword, he was never trying to retrieve his father's sword - virtually anything that the 2011 film shares with the 1982 film has nothing to do with Howard's work.  The Conan franchise needed to start from the ground up and completely forget about the 1982 film, incorporating the elements that Howard DID mention.

Imagine a Conan origin film that doesn't have a revenge plot at all, where Conan isn't enslaved - be it literally, or metaphorically - nobody kills Conan's parents or destroys his village, nobody steals his father's sword, he doesn't have to learn some ludicrous riddle or mystery of steel.  What about an origin story that's nothing like the 1982 or 2011 films, with young Conan breaking a wild bull's neck, hunting mountain-beasts with a spear, slaying chieftains, climbing the cliffs and crags of his homeland, culminating in the battle of Venarium; then going north to fight alongside the Aesir, being captured and escaping the Hyperboreans, experiencing the civilized wonders of the Hyborian Kingdoms, and ending up in Zamora in time for "The Tower of the Elephant." Then imagine how the barbarism/civilization dynamic comes into that, as Conan goes from a near-feral barbarian boy to a curious and awestruck thief.

Obviously I would prefer an actual adaptation of one of Robert E. Howard's fantastic stories than yet another origin story, but considering the 1982 film is so contradictory to Howard's creation, a new origin would establish once and for all that this is new, different and not a remake.  Pretty much like what Rise of the Planet of the Apes did.  Sadly, that wasn't the film we got, because Avi Lerner and Joe Drake are imbeciles.

She can scarcely hold her own against Conan’s bland love interest… who would have been a voluptuous damsel in distress in a real Conan story, but feminist Hollywood has strict rules against those, so she’s soon taking down the front-line warriors of the ancient world’s most formidable army.

Or she would be an actual action heroine like Valeria, a female warrior who's the closest anyone - man or woman - in any story comes to Conan's equal. Or she would be a dominant, independent, strident queen who's mistress of her domain like Yasmina or Yasmela. Or she would be a cunning, intelligent schemer like Belit or Zenobia... You get the point. Even the voluptuous damsels like Olivia and Sancha manage to be proactive: those two actually save Conan's life at some points in the story. Howard was actually very ahead of his time when it came to female characters.

Rather than any of those, Tamara was that most odious of modern action cliches, the "faux-action girl," where she's only as competent as the script demands.  If the script calls for her to be badass, she kills foes left and right: if the script calls for her to be captured, she screeches like Willie Scott and does nothing to save herself. In one scene, she's taking down entire groups of soldiers with clear finesse in her swordplay: in another, she's cowering in a corner in terror. No consistency.

Another strange aspect of the new Conan’s bloody, but bloodless, adventure is the decision to jettison its fantastical religious trappings.  One of the most memorable scenes from the original film was Conan’s up-yours prayer to his grim war god Crom, but the new film makes a point of having the villain declare that Conan’s people have no gods.  The Lovecraftian demons who frequently orbited Howard’s tales decided to take this adventure off.

The new film says the Cimmerians have no priests or churches, not that they have no gods.  You hear Ron Perlman say "by Crom."  It's true Conan never discusses his spirituality in the film, but at least he doesn't do it in a contradictory manner like the prayer to Crom (Howard's Cimmerians didn't pray: they figured any god worth their salt gave a man all they needed to prevail at birth, and that asking for further aid was a grave insult and sign of weakness and dependence). It would've been nice for him to say Crom at least once, though.

"Caesar the chimpanzee got a reboot, while Conan the Barbarian got a retread."

That, sad to say, says it all.

The things you learn in research...

Work on the Encyclopaedia Hyboriana is getting back on track, while Deuce Richardson's suggestion of Hyborica is starting to intrigue me. However, I feel I might've left you all in the dark. So I thought I'd give you an idea of the sort of things which cause me to constantly reassess my work.

I've said before that I find something new in every rereading of Howard, and nowhere has that been more prevalent than my research for the Encyclopaedia. As I go through the tales finding every instance of Conan's utterance of "Crom," correlations between story titles and metaphors in preceding tales, and the plethora of allusions, sometimes something completely unrelated pops out at me.  Sometimes it's just a little extra detail, other times it forces me to totally change entire entries.  Each time, I wonder if it's worth including in the main body of the text, or whether it should be delineated strictly as conjecture. It can lead to me wandering far from the path.

Here are a few of those observations.

A Scottish Barbarian in London

I saw Conan. I hated it. But not everyone hated it. Maybe it's just me. Maybe I should see it again, this time in 2D without the glasses-over-glasses ruining it for me: perhaps I'll have a different reaction upon a second viewing.

With that out of the way, let me tell you a tale, of a Scottish barbarian and his long-suffering assistant travelling south to the other side of the island. Danger, mystery, excitement, and more abound in this journey, with days feeling like weeks, minutes like hours. Truly, a quest to be sung by the great bards and skalds for all time.

Or maybe not.  I guess I'll just write it on the blog.

What the hell happened?

So not only is Conan: The Wrath of Zym 2011 a critical failure, but it looks increasingly likely that it's going to be a commercial disaster, too.  It shames me to admit I feel a small measure of shadenfreude: see, Lionsgate?  This is what you get when you try to remake an Arnold film without Arnold, and more importantly, without the things that made the 1982 film a cult classic.  See, Millennium?  This is what happens when you try and build a story around the sets you have available instead of the talent.  See, CPI?  This is what you get when you try to compromise, when you try to make a film that tries to appeal to the lowest common denominator instead of making something bold, challenging and different.

But frankly, all those feelings of "we told you so" are utterly submerged in a deeper, darker feeling of regret.  So many people worked hard to make this film work: seamstresses working their fingers to the bone, production designers having nervous breakdowns trying to make everything work, SFX engineers trying to wring every drop of quality out of their rendering software, actors sitting for hours in makeup chairs.  Even the people I hold directly responsible for the mess the film became - the producers, aside from Fredrik Malmberg (though I do think he made some decisions which didn't pay off) and especially Avi Lerner, and Marcus Nispel - didn't try to make a bad film. I may feel vindicated that another example of people monkeying around with REH and thinking they know how to make a better story than one of the founders of 20th Century fantasy fiction has failed... but I'm more angry that this happened.  After everything that's happened, I didn't want the film to fail.

What to make of this?

Hypothetical Conan Trailers - King Conan: The Phoenix on the Sword

Since my idea for Conan the Barbarian: Black Colossus was such a success, I decided to have a bit of fun with some more hypothetical trailers, including some of my ideas for prospective Conan films.

King Conan: The Phoenix on the Sword

A little background: an idea I had was an anthology film that combines "The Frost-Giant's Daughter," "The God in the Bowl" and "The Tower of the Elephant," using "The Phoenix on the Sword" as a framing story.  These are the first four stories Howard wrote, after all, and they show a pretty interesting spectrum of Conan's life: king, warrior, and thief.

"The Phoenix on the Sword" - 24 pages
"The Frost-Giant's Daughter" - 9 pages
"The God in the Bowl" - 19 pages
"The Tower of the Elephant" - 23 pages

Now, if we take the old "one page equals one minute" idea for a second, we can see that "The Phoenix on the Sword" and "The Tower of the Elephant" have roughly equivalent length, while "The God in the Bowl" is shorter, and "The Frost-Giant's Daughter" shorter still. Obviously depending on the direction this could expand or contract, but I think on can justify "The Frost-Giant's Daughter" as a ten minute sequence, "The God in the Bowl" a twenty-minute one, and "The Tower of the Elephant" as a full half-hour. While "Phoenix" is only a page longer than "Tower," it's absolutely chock full of potential for expansion, or just plain spending more time on it.

Preparing the S.H.I.E.L.D.W.A.L.L. for the onslaught to come

Man, that damned movie...

Anyway, I'm trying my best not to be negative, but in all the reviews for the upcoming film I've seen so far, few, if any, seem to know the slightest thing about Robert E. Howard. This isn't one of them - it's a review of the 1982 film - but it highlights exactly the sort of problems I'm having.  The largest of which being that some people think they can comment on Robert E. Howard purely by watching the 1982 film.  This review is the most profound example of that sort of thing for reasons which will become obvious.

Conan. Oh, Conan. A pulp hero whose whole deal was that he was big and strong and didn’t mind cutting a guy from crotch to throat, ripping out his tongue and throwing it to the starving dogs in the corner. But he also has a bruiser’s intelligence, that kind of thick-necked thoughtfulness an MLB slugger brings to the plate.

To be frank, that describes an awful lot of pulp heroes: Conan had a lot more to offer than that.  Conan was an outsider, someone born outside the comforts of civilization, and yet also curious about its history, wonders and treasures.  Sure, he's brutal, but also capable of great generosity and selflessness later in his career, to the point where he's a noble and just king.  He's a surprisingly complex, intellectual and thoughtful character who grows and evolves over the course of the stories without losing his sense of self. 

I will say, that description of "bruiser's intelligence" fits Steve Costigan to a tee, though.

Most importantly, however, Conan has the physique of, well, a bodybuilder. 

It would be fairer to say Conan has the physique of someone who lives his life on the edge of death.  He grew up climbing sheer cliffs, hunting animals with spears, constantly battling enemy tribes.  The bodybuilding physique only came from the illustrations and comics, and was further cemented by Arnold.


So far, so predictable.  But this... this is impressive.

They retained Howard’s almost Jungian terminology: Wheel of Pain, Riddle of Steel, Eye of the Serpent, Mountain of Power.

... None of those terms appear in any Robert E. Howard story.  At all.  They're all Stone/Milius creations.  The story of the 1982 film has nothing to do with Robert E. Howard, save that it features a character called Conan, from a place called Cimmeria, and he happens to be a muscular swordsman.

Now riddle me this: how can a film retain "Howard's almost Jungian terminology" when that almost Jungian terminology is completely and utterly absent in the stories?

This is just the beginning.  We've already had dunderheids making statements like this:

It’s certainly obvious that a lot of work went into the film, both as a faithful re-imagining of the original, and as a fitting adaptation of Robert E. Howard’s writing, with much of its imagery being pleasingly evocative of his books’ pulp covers... though it wisely never takes itself too seriously, it never gets too ridiculous. It’s certainly far more enjoyable than it might have been, and whilst inevitably the question must be asked whether a remake was necessary, the film is a solid piece of violent fantasy, that should be enjoyed by fans and newcomers alike.

And eejits spouting this:

Though in most films such a skeletal narrative would spell disaster, it actually works perfectly for Conan The Barbarian. This is a no-frills action experience so fast paced that it leaves no room for high falutin' clap trap like introspection and ambiguity, and Nispel sensibly makes no effort to modernise the brutish, boorish Conan, whose caveman-like demeanour is actually part of his muscular appeal. "I live, I love, I slay...I am content," he says in a rare moment of thumbnail self-analysis. The handsome, charismatic Jason Momoa (Stargate: Atlantis) admirably commits to the role of Conan 100%, and makes for a likeable, impressively physical hard-man hero, while simultaneously injecting finely judged jolts of humour into his essentially one-note character...
As originally designed by Robert E. Howard, the world of Conan The Barbarian was an ugly and violent one, and Marcus Nispel captures much of that greasy, mud-crunched viscera here. Though he fails to work up any truly unforgettable set pieces to rival director John Milius' inspired visions on his big-and-bold 1981 cult hit, Conan The Barbarian (which starred Arnold Schwarzenegger in the title role), Nispel certainly succeeds in making a gutsy, ballsy, bloody action-adventure flick worthy of its central character's towering, archetypal mythos.

And puddinheids trumpeting this:

Momoa actually filmed Conan before (now wildly successful) Game Of Thrones. And he exudes more charisma in his big screen leading role than most of the muscle bound heroes in previous decades, carrying the film with ease, even if Conan himself is restricted by his own motto “I live, I love, I slay and am content.”
Still, the lack of political correctness in Conan’s outlook on life and love is, depending on your point of view, part of its appeal, and for the most part is played in a comedic fashion, free from the malice which permeates so much modern horror, having most of the audience I saw it with laughing along.

And tubes mumbling this:

There is no point to analyze or criticize this bare bones plot because there is nothing to add. Going into Conan with zero expectations and a need to escape certainly helped the nearly two hours running time, and for its many flaws, unoriginal plot, wooden acting and atrocious pacing, Conan succeeds on some level because it fulfills the quota of a manly man beating stuff to a pulp... There is certainly nothing to be inspired by, it is all by-the-book and probably true to the source material in terms of how pulpy it all is... he kills stuff really well, demeans women and eats stuff really fast, there is not much more you can look for in a barbarian.

And glaikits simpering this:

Fully aware and firmly grasping how one-dimensional a character Conan is, Momoa gamely picks up the proverbial sword and hacks away at his enemies with strength and style. The plot is threadbare, as you should already expect, so, really, there is no need to break down what is simply almost two hours of testosterone-filled blood, sweat, fight and gore. Oh, and revenge... This is a lowest common denominator violent actioner, paced so fast you won't - and shouldn't - have time to breathe or think. Concentration, in-depth plot lines and analysis? There is simply no room or no time. Not when what you've come for is to witness a new brute flex his muscles and sell that rough-and-ready caveman-like demeanour. Call it man appeal in a bottle.

And most infuriatingly, numpties snorting this:

An ultra-violent action-adventure, which centers on the same character that Schwarzenegger played but is not a remake, the movie delivers the basic goods (but not more) expected of a primitive mythic epos whose story is driven by obsession and vengeance, guts and blood... The filmmakers are certainly aware of the simple (and simplistic) mythic qualities of the literary material, which explains its long-enduring appeal especially among teenage boys.

This entirely unnecessary potshot got my hackles up:

Screenwriters Thomas Dean Donnelly, Joshua Oppenheimer and Sean Hood mercifully spare us most of the arcane mythology with which Howard larded his original tales, putting what little setup auds need into the mouth of narrator Morgan Freeman, whose presence offers the first clue that the project aspires to some sort of respectability. 

Mercifully? You say that as if Howard's work wasn't worthy of being collected in the Library of America or Penguin Classics, or cited as one of the foundation stones of the modern fantasy genre alongside Tolkien, or that the Hyborian Age wasn't a well-crafted and fascinating milieu worthy of consideration alongside Middle-earth.

And then this sirrah makes this magnificent generalization:

If you believe you’re going to see an intricately crafted piece of cinema, you are sadly delusional (and most likely insane). What we do get is something that, if contextualised in its genre, satisfies on an adequate level.The title alone generates associations and it’s exactly what we are presented with; testosterone, violence, objectification, blood, gore, and sheer brutishness in abundance, as we follow a protagonist that would make 300′s Leonidas look like a crying school girl. Sure, Momoa plays the title role effectively and let’s face it, it’s never going to be the most challenging, as intellect and subtlety are substituted for brawn and killing power (a prime example of the dynamic of the character is when he bellows, “Woman! Here! Now!”).

It doesn’t sink to its predicted lows, but you weren’t expecting the depth of Inception now, were you? It doesn’t try to be anything other than what it is; a non taxing, fantasy-action, that entertains when it comes to its set pieces and choreographed fights, yet ultimately proves that this, indeed, is no more than a shameless cash in, rather than a thought provoking creation, a la Rise of the Planet of the Apes. Momoa delivers a Neanderthal-like performance suited to the character, which culminates in a film that can ultimately offer no depth in terms of story or character development...

Expecting a Conan film to be an intricately crafted piece of cinema would make one "sadly delusional," and "most likely insane"?  Surely not, just "maladjusted to the point of psychosis" would suffice.

No, no, I'm not going to be negative.  I have to stay positive.  The Critique is... well, I'll be frank, it's going to rip the film apart.  The more I've been thinking about the film, the angrier I've been getting, especially when I come across "whadaya expect, Citizen Kane?" type responses.

Clark Ashton Smith, 50 years in the worlds between worlds

In all the hubbub about the Conan premiere and my subsequent review, I feel infuriated at myself for letting the regulars at The Blog That Time Forgot down, as well as allowing the supposed "Conan" film (I'm back to using apostrophes) to cloud my mind so much that I very nearly missed another important milestone: the 50th anniversary of Clark Ashton Smith's death.  After unforgivably missing C.L. Moore's centenary, I'm not going to let this celebration of the Emperor of Dreams be unmarked.

In addition, I really miss the pow-wows of the posters here, and frankly, I'm so sickened by the new Conan film that I'm probably going to be a lot less involved in the site.  I'll still post links, news and information, but after my critique and a few other things in the pipeline, I'm not going to let it dominate my waking hours.  I've spent enough time on it, and there's so much that's fallen by the wayside in the process.

So, Clark Ashton Smith. As I've said before, there was a period of my life where he was my single favourite author, and he remains one of my top ten.  Since I was caught unaware, I don't have anything prepared, but my memories of "The Empire of the Necromancers" still hold true, and he deserves more exploration. In addition, drop on by Two-Gun Raconteur for Brian Leno's interview with Smith emeritus Donald Sydney-Fryer, Rusty Burke's hearty hail to the sorcerer on REHupa.com, and Ryan Harvey's fantastic interview on Black Gate. Wander over to The Eldritch Dark to see what new wonders the folk there have uncovered, or just re-immerse yourself in the incomparable prose and poetry in the site's black library. Or just swing by your shelf and pick up one of the stories in print form.

Break the skin of civilization and you find the ape, roaring and red-handed...

I haven't been blogging for a while, not just due to the film premiere running up, but various events happening at home.  Some of which have surely not gone unnoticed in international news.  I live far from the madness running rampant through England, though there's no telling how the Scots will react.  Perhaps the Scots will decide that rioting in Glasgow, Edinburgh and Aberdeen would be too "English," and we enjoy a rare quiet week in the cities. Wales and Northern Ireland join us from the sidelines, watching our southeastern brother tearing itself apart. Sibling rivalry is a constant in the United Kingdom, but for all our chants and jeers in football games, we're still united for now, and the plight of England is met with dismay. England's skin has been broken, and we have wild men with hands and bellies, filled with hate and filled with lust, looting and pillaging and destroying.

And for what?  Social change?  Reaction to a political outrage?  Expressing terror and panic?  Apparently, no one is sure. Some blame a general malaise, a madness which has afflicted England's cities, causing them to burn and demolish for seemingly no reason beyond simple opportunism.  Others say the gap between rich and poor has grown so vast that mass looting is truly a viable solution to their financial woes, and acting in a concerted nationwide robbery would mean higher chance of evading capture.  Still more blame "kids these days."

Truly, we can call England's cities civilized. I say this not out of parochialism - Scotland's cities have proven themselves to be just as civilized on many an occassion - and not to decry civilization.  Just out of an observation that for every creative and protective act of civilization, there is an equal and opposite destructive and aggressive act of civilization.  In this past week, we've seen the fruits of architectural genius being torched to ashes by the anger of malcontents; the spoils of economic conquest hoisted away by new victors; the peak of city life washed away in a torrent of fear and chaos.

I'm still going to the Conan premiere. I grew up in the West Coast of Scotland during the years of the Lockerbie disaster, the Dunblane Massacre, and the final days of The Troubles, and Greenwich hasn't seen much of the rioting.  I'll likely be safe, and I'm surely not going to be looking for trouble, as long as trouble doesn't get in my way.  My skin's already broken.