The Great Unknown is a collection of 19 short stories by Australian writers. According to Angela Meyer, the editor, “it was while watching the original series of The Twilight Zone that the book… was born.” “The strange, the absurd, the macabre, the speculative and the fantastical” nature of these stories, saw them chosen and compiled as examples of the kind of influence American television programmes like The Twilight Zone has had on contemporary Australian writers. (more…)
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An interesting question I read the other day asked about the Red Brick Road in the 1939 film The Wizard of Oz, and what one might have found at the end of it (as opposed to following the word of Glinda and the Munchkins, as Dorothy did, and following the Yellow Brick Road). What was it exactly they didn’t want Dorothy to see? (more…)
The degree to which literature can influence or affect an individual is dependent on many factors, and is all but impossible to measure objectively. Even narrowing our focus to look only at the way gender is portrayed in children’s books, and the part these books play in shaping the attitudes and ideas a child forms in relation to gender stereotypes, is difficult to gauge. One person may say that a particular piece of literature had such an impact that all of their views on gender are based on just one book; for another, literature has played a tiny part in an immense amalgam of conflicting and complementary ideas and influences from all manner of sources; and for another still, literature may have no direct influence whatsoever. (more…)
Stories is a collection of twenty-seven short fiction pieces, penned by separate contemporary mainstream writers. These are works of fantasy, but not fantasy in the traditional mainstream sense. Neither elf nor dwarf nor wizard makes an appearance. There are no dragons, no castles, and no kings in this book. There are a couple of vampires, some gods, a ghost, and an alien or two, that is true. But this is fantasy fiction that, for the most part, defies the traditional, stereotypical norm, each piece selected by Gaimann and Sarrantonio based on the fact they were difficult to nail to a particular genre; imaginative fiction, encompassing a broad range of subjects, intended to leave the reader asking “What happens next?”
And in this sense the book is a success. Stories gets you hooked and leaves you hanging for the next page’s fix. (more…)
There is a photo floating around of me being silly (I know! Shock-horror, right?) and kicking a leg out to one side.
A friend enquired who the Russian bloke was, har-har, siting the Cossack-dancer-ish move and the t-shirt I had on; as well as a large skull it has a crossed hammer and wrench printed on it, not dissimilar to the hammer and sickle of Soviet Russian fame. (more…)
This song got me home on my jog through the hills of Cipaku this morning, my own personal film clip. It seemed to match my mood and the setting I was in quite well.
Hazy, smoky, grey and smoggy, jogging past where all of Cipaku’s rubbish is piled, set alight to send more clouds of toxic smoke into the air.
Past all the fancy new townhouses and mansions under construction up near Jalan Bukit Idaman.
It won’t be long until it’s transformed from a relatively pleasant place to exercise – vacant grassy lots and empty roads – to just another patch of suburbia, full of McMansions and hundreds of good little SUV-driving consumers. And I am doing nothing to help this situation.
Although, I don’t have an SUV…
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I only have vague memories of the Challenger disaster. I have very clear memories of being haunted by it though.
This track, along with the archival footage – watching the final moments of the seven astronauts – gives me serious goosebumps. I find it both disturbingly morbid and fascinatingly beautiful all at the same time.
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It would appear Seekae are fond of disturbingly morbid film clips though. If you dare, watch this.
[Originally written in September, 2013]
On the last weekend of the last school holidays we spent a day up at Tangkuban Perahu, an active volcano about 20kms drive from our place. (Incidentally, it’s closed to the public now due to an eruption a couple of weeks back and then a few clouds of poisonous gas seeping out of the ground.)
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I decided long ago that commercial television and radio had a lot to answer for. Making us believe stuff that simply isn’t true, making us want [to buy] shit we really don’t need, telling us we should be interested in stuff that is really, really dumb!
Which perhaps helps explain why I have always loved Regurgitator.
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