To summarise this book, its about a middle class, middle age, middle of the road man, who turns to drink as his business and marriage start to stagnate. Through his own twisted perceptions and some of the twisted perceptions of society, his (relatively) innocent, and stupid, drinking habit becomes the basis for him being committed, for life, to an insane asylum, without possibility of release. He loses everything, his wife, his home, business, position, and finally his own sense of himself - he becomes, as he says, a shadow.
And to add to it, this was written by a famous German author, who, before the war, had written best sellers and been feted as a success. But this was written, in secret and in code, in the dark days of 1944, from inside a Nazi insane asylum himself.
Sounds like fun, but somehow, despite the obvious parallels with himself, he writes with amazing humour about the fall into disrepute, and the actions for which you would normally expect him to be so ashamed and try to hide, he blasts openly. Even the point where he drunkenly tries to raid the family silverware to raise money for more alcohol, is discovered by his wife and nearly murders her (leading to his arrest and imprisonment in the asylum) appears amusing and lighthearted...
It is only when, later in the book, after he has recounted how he managed to fall from his respected position one glass of schnapps at a time, that he enters the asylum, that the tone becomes darker. From this point you realise that the autobiographical nature of the story is getting so close to the bone that he cannot raise himself to joke about it, even in the blackest irony. The pace and delivery change, to a more clinical, efficient description of his surroundings, the habits and lunacies of those he is locked up with and the inhuman treatment these receive. In fact, the outside part, recording his fall, is written in a sort of warm glow - like that he describes he feels with alcohol. You don't mind that he's tried to kill his wife when he's drunk, because its humorous, the actions don't carry any weight, any responsibility. Its only when he sobers up in prison that the tone changes, to the cold, clear analysis of his situation.
It becomes an anguished tale of how the mental patients are forgotten and left to rot, a burden on the relatives and the state, who all wish the problem would just disappear (which the Nazi seemed to brutally solve). But the character does not finish the story rotting as an unjustifiably locked up innocent... from his friendly beginnings you quite like him, and as he sobers up, you pity the harsh treatment, but by the very end, you realise he is not all there, that is 'incurable'... its just what has made him that way that should be changed.
Tuesday, 12 October 2010
trading up, a freecycle building
I'm a member of freecycle, the Yahoo hosted exchange and recycling system, where people get rid of their old junk (another man's gold), by posting an "offered" message on a big group email that is sent to all the users. Offered, coffee pot, SW2... that sort of thing.
Similarly, you can request things... Wanted, coffee pot, SW2... you get the idea. When you see something you want, or something someone needs, which you want to get rid of, you just email them and its done. Its put me in mind of that guy in Seattle who traded a red paper clip up to a house... his version of the "bigger, better" game.
Would it be interesting to see if we could do something similar in architecture? Could we build an entire house, and equip it from stuff that is other people's junk? Extraneous hoovers, bits of drainpipe... I'm not talking about a house made of rubbish, but a properly constructed one. The items offered are often high quality and perfectly working - with the consumerist culture of "upgrading", anything 2nd hand is almost always deemed to be worthless now, apart from houses, where age is seen as a benefit, which is almost unique. A new house, that is already 2nd hand... hmmmm... think that could go down an interesting path...
Similarly, you can request things... Wanted, coffee pot, SW2... you get the idea. When you see something you want, or something someone needs, which you want to get rid of, you just email them and its done. Its put me in mind of that guy in Seattle who traded a red paper clip up to a house... his version of the "bigger, better" game.
Would it be interesting to see if we could do something similar in architecture? Could we build an entire house, and equip it from stuff that is other people's junk? Extraneous hoovers, bits of drainpipe... I'm not talking about a house made of rubbish, but a properly constructed one. The items offered are often high quality and perfectly working - with the consumerist culture of "upgrading", anything 2nd hand is almost always deemed to be worthless now, apart from houses, where age is seen as a benefit, which is almost unique. A new house, that is already 2nd hand... hmmmm... think that could go down an interesting path...
Friday, 8 October 2010
Alternative ways of looking at sound
Its from an advertising point of view, but some of the ideas are quite interesting... lookup
LYe76-Kam Fan Award
on youtube
Wednesday, 6 October 2010
An Ancient Comedy of Urban Errors...
re-posting is cheating, but this was particularly good I thought
http://bldgblog.blogspot.com/2010/10/ancient-comedy-of-urban-errors.html
http://bldgblog.blogspot.com/2010/10/ancient-comedy-of-urban-errors.html
Tuesday, 5 October 2010
The Baader Meinhof Complex - Stefan Aust
This is briiiilliant. Firstly because the Baader-Meinhof group was a name I'd heard, but didn't really know anything about (so it filled in a lot of gaps I didn't know I had in my head), but secondly, and more importantly, there's such a huge, barely concealed tension in the book.
It's an attempt at an objective history of this gang of pretty well intentioned, moralistic students who were part of the worldwide student protests in outrage at the US war in Vietnam, the nuclear arms race, and growing tensions between east and west. From West Germany, protesting in the late 60's student movements, they developed through the 70's into a proper terrorist organisation, one step following another, from protesting at a student demo, to the final act, the hijacking of an airliner alongside a Palestinian terrorist organisation. As they say, "from protest, to resistance
But Aust doesn't manage to be entirely objective - this is his passion, he seethes with angst over the events, because - as is revealed at the start of the book - he very nearly fell into the gang. Events transpired that he left them early, before things really took off, but there is a definite sense of "there but for the Grace of God, go I..."
Its an amazing story, especially reading it now in the anti-septic surroundings of South Bank university in the early 21st century. These were students who wanted to change the world, and felt (quite correctly as it turned out) that they really could. It didn't go as they'd hoped, but their impact was enormous. The context in which it all happened was staggering in its difference to today... the university they were at, on the entrance to the main building, was draped with a 20ft high banner, in massive red letters saying "revolution or death!" or something... people fought with the police on the streets, human rights were worth taking a beating for. What would get people on to the streets now? Its hard not to agree with a certain amount of what these people said and did - a lot of it was total crap, and they became entirely corrupted by the struggle they found themselves in (threatening to blow up an airliner full of innocent tourists is NOT something to emulate), but as Aust puts it, they had a certain style, its like reading the script of Hollywood movie (which in fact, it now is...)
The self confidence, the drive, the seemingly inescapable logic of protest to resistance to retaliation and to offensive that they employed, was incredible. Read it, in a bit of a dry way (from his attempt at a clinical analysis of events) at points, its brilliant.
It's an attempt at an objective history of this gang of pretty well intentioned, moralistic students who were part of the worldwide student protests in outrage at the US war in Vietnam, the nuclear arms race, and growing tensions between east and west. From West Germany, protesting in the late 60's student movements, they developed through the 70's into a proper terrorist organisation, one step following another, from protesting at a student demo, to the final act, the hijacking of an airliner alongside a Palestinian terrorist organisation. As they say, "from protest, to resistance
But Aust doesn't manage to be entirely objective - this is his passion, he seethes with angst over the events, because - as is revealed at the start of the book - he very nearly fell into the gang. Events transpired that he left them early, before things really took off, but there is a definite sense of "there but for the Grace of God, go I..."
Its an amazing story, especially reading it now in the anti-septic surroundings of South Bank university in the early 21st century. These were students who wanted to change the world, and felt (quite correctly as it turned out) that they really could. It didn't go as they'd hoped, but their impact was enormous. The context in which it all happened was staggering in its difference to today... the university they were at, on the entrance to the main building, was draped with a 20ft high banner, in massive red letters saying "revolution or death!" or something... people fought with the police on the streets, human rights were worth taking a beating for. What would get people on to the streets now? Its hard not to agree with a certain amount of what these people said and did - a lot of it was total crap, and they became entirely corrupted by the struggle they found themselves in (threatening to blow up an airliner full of innocent tourists is NOT something to emulate), but as Aust puts it, they had a certain style, its like reading the script of Hollywood movie (which in fact, it now is...)
The self confidence, the drive, the seemingly inescapable logic of protest to resistance to retaliation and to offensive that they employed, was incredible. Read it, in a bit of a dry way (from his attempt at a clinical analysis of events) at points, its brilliant.
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