2023-11-30 | Winds of november, nostalgia for an imagined past
Many unfinished reading notes this month. I read From Russia With Love and found it very funny
in unintentional ways (the head of the Russian secret service is bisexual and it gives her arcane
and terrifying powers (as opposed to a general ambivalence/ inability to sit still), the main plot
twist is that the pride and joy of the British secret service voluntarily gives his gun to the first
undercover Russian operative he meets and gets shot in short order, etc etc.).
The style is very elegant at points in the sort of Eton way, but I’m reminded that nostalgia and
preoccupation with style -to which I probably have a tendency- are not neutral positions (something something Kissinger,
something something hagiographies). I also read some things that were good, but still processing on that front.
Speaking of nostalgia for an imagined past - it’s the last day before Advent and so,
atmospherically, somehow, the last day to listen to this
(and of course {the Song that November Taught Me}).
Dude from Czechoslovakia writing songs in the 1980s imagining sailing on the Hudson Bay ships.
I heard it in childhood and came across it again unexpectedly recently, and the vibe is dark,
cold, vast, and frankly impeccable, pan flutes included. (I was trying to explain to Canadian friends
that starting at the beginning of the 20th century there was (and still is) is a whole contingent
of people in the centre of Europe going into the woods behind town on the weekends and pretending to
be in the Canadian north. It deserves a longer explanation and I’m not the one to give it, but it’s a
thing I have time for, from a few directions. Anyway, we may try to put together a radio show in Toronto
of Czech songs about the Canadian north. Send me your tips if you have them.)