Lovecraft and Jiri Barta
A few weeks ago I picked up a short-story collection and posthumously-published novella by H. P. Lovecraft. For a while I had been knocking off the shorter works, but found myself distracted by the more personal horrors of waiting for grad-school responses. Nearing what looks to be a realization of the most cynical end to this process, I picked up The Lurker at the Threshold last night and read through my first legitimate 100+ page Lovecraftian work.
Feeling slightly querulous at having read so much smallish print, I just finished another artful stint having taken up a DVD of animated shorts by 'legendary' animator Jiri Barta, moments ago walking away from the television after viewing his Pied Piper of Hamelin.
In short, my imagination is filled with a tilted twisty darkness that has me awash in (figuratively) awry smiles.
Though Barta's work proved more alien (strangely enough) than Lovecraft's, I've felt a kinship to both unlike most works I've picked up over the last few years. Especially tantalizing were the multiple descriptions of abstract imaginings in Lovecraft that, after my first glance, appear uncannily parallel to many of the anchorings of my own artistry; particularly, an attraction to ideas that toy with expanding the boundaries of imagination.
And also though I found much wanting in Lovecraft's prose, particularly finding his overuse of the word "which" to be unfortunately damaging, the ideas that I've for a long time vaguely been familiar with proved wondrous in their own right.
My immediate future darkens with the playful grimaces of Cartesian demons. Probably, I am trapped, for a few months at least, in a region I found myself much loathing a year ago. Probably, I must take up a 'standard' low-level job for the majority of this duration. But then, the hope on the horizon: probably, I will have a lot more to show for myself this time one year from now, especially if I can convince myself to run forward with the 'full time' project I should be working on more productively.
Feeling slightly querulous at having read so much smallish print, I just finished another artful stint having taken up a DVD of animated shorts by 'legendary' animator Jiri Barta, moments ago walking away from the television after viewing his Pied Piper of Hamelin.
In short, my imagination is filled with a tilted twisty darkness that has me awash in (figuratively) awry smiles.
Though Barta's work proved more alien (strangely enough) than Lovecraft's, I've felt a kinship to both unlike most works I've picked up over the last few years. Especially tantalizing were the multiple descriptions of abstract imaginings in Lovecraft that, after my first glance, appear uncannily parallel to many of the anchorings of my own artistry; particularly, an attraction to ideas that toy with expanding the boundaries of imagination.
And also though I found much wanting in Lovecraft's prose, particularly finding his overuse of the word "which" to be unfortunately damaging, the ideas that I've for a long time vaguely been familiar with proved wondrous in their own right.
My immediate future darkens with the playful grimaces of Cartesian demons. Probably, I am trapped, for a few months at least, in a region I found myself much loathing a year ago. Probably, I must take up a 'standard' low-level job for the majority of this duration. But then, the hope on the horizon: probably, I will have a lot more to show for myself this time one year from now, especially if I can convince myself to run forward with the 'full time' project I should be working on more productively.
posted by SJ at 3/12/2009 11:07:00 PM
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