"A Protest Against Forgetting" Issue #1: AKA the new version of Kevin Smokler's newsletter
Hello again.
It's Kevin.
If you're reading this you probably know me, have met me or come across me on the internet and then subscribed to an earlier effort to publish a newsletter.
I liked those earlier efforts but was never very good about keeping them up. That's probably because I didn't really know why I wanted to write something like a newsletter (which is like building a rock wall in Ireland. No one needs another one, no matter how skillfully done) or what I had to say that fit its size, longer than a photo caption or a blog post but shorter than an essay or a piece of reported journalism.
I ended up jamming a half-dozen drawers of things I was interested in into a bureau with no back and then wondering why doing it felt like it didn't fit. I kept trying to hand you pieces of a thing instead of a thing itself. And I kept getting annoyed when writing a newsletter felt like bumbling, awkward make-work.
So I'm going to try again. Because I have something to share with you this time that matters to me.
I'd like share with you on what we devote our attention to and how we share it with each other. Because those are the two biggest working parts of how we remember.
"Curating" or "curation" is a word I like when it's not weighed down by pretension and marketing hot air. Which is almost never. The need to offer then share a selective rather than comprehensive view of some part of the world has always real no matter whom or what tried to make money off it. Without "curation", we are only seeing and hearing and touching what we know already or whatever can get in our face fastest and loudest. That's paying attention by default, not choosing what we bring into our lives.
The act of careful choice based on research and context and then explaining (like a human, not a self-important gasbag) why you made those choice. That's curating.
Ideally, anyway.
On the best of days, curating is an act of generosity. You are putting in time, sharing what you feel matters, thereby helping others make choices. The act is supported by your diligence. With any luck, all that means the passage of time feels like time well spent rather than time we barely remember.
The name "A Protest Against Forgetting" I got from Hans Obrist Ulrich, director of the Serpentine art Gallery in London. Ulrich uses the phrase to describe the purpose of curating, of highlighting certain endeavors for certain communities and providing context why. I like this a lot better than "curation" as a kind of "I Have Good Taste" Cub Scout Badge. Also "A Protest Against Forgetting" admits the cold reality that, as Linda Holmes wisely said, "we're all going to miss almost everything" and that means we will need friends and wise counsel to determine exactly what is worth the little time we have.
We can't make every moment count. We need stupid, badly-spent moments so the beautiful ones shine by comparison. But it is also very easy to have months and years be suddenly miles behind you and wonder where you were as they sped past. Which means (I think) that we have to train ourselves to pay good attention and make good memories, just like we have to train to run faster or jump higher.
What will happen here: I'll share culture and information I think is worth keeping and not forgetting. And I'll always explain why and how and that doing this means I have your pleasure in mind rather than seeking your praise.
What will not happen here: There won't be much mention of my books and films and other things I'm working on. I'm not worried about you forgetting me or the things I make. Maybe occasionally, but our time here is about other time, most of all, the idea of time itself.
Share well, explain why, do so with wise kindess. Seems like a quiet kind of protest against something as inevitable as forgetting but that's where we'll begin.
Bookmarks:
A half-dozen essays and books you need in your life right now.
(Note: I use Raindrop for bookmarking and don't like it very much. What do you use?)
- "Why is it so hard to Return To Normal?" by Molly Jong Fast (Vogue).
A late-pandemic meditation. I ask myself this question about 3 times a day.
- "Her Kind Of Blue: Joni Mitchell's Masterpiece At 50" by Ann Powers (NPR Music).
A masterpiece on a masterpiece by my favorite music journalist. I cannot tell you how much I appreciate great writing about something that really needs nothing else ever written about it forever and amen.
Written in February. Devastating in the wake of what we know now. Prescient
- "Everything You Know About Obesity Is Wrong" by Michael Hobbes
Mr. Hobbes (co-host of the podcast You're Wrong About) has written a once-in-a-generation roof blower-offer here.
- Why Art Museums?" (Book Forum)
Important question asked in a recent book as society limps back to some sense of normalcy.
If you have not read Last Call by Elon Green (about a serial killer who prayed on gay men in New York in the early 1990s. Published earlier this year), which came out this spring, it is one of the best true crime books I have ever read.
And I have read a ton.
Card Catalog:
Topical factoids. Knowledge not news.
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The month of July used to be named "Quintilis" meaning "5th" since it was the 5th month on the Roman calendar. Julius Ceaser (who was thought to have been born around July 12th 100 BCE) changed it himself to "July", aka his family name "Julius" to name it after himself.
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Invented first in China, the first fireworks were stalks of bamboo. Bamboo contains air pockets that make a loud bang when lit on fire
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More countries celebrate their indepedence days in summer than any other season. August is the most popular month for independence days with 26 countries (Including Jamaica, India, Korea and Pakistan) celebrating theirs.
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The world's largest public swimming pool is part of a resort in Santiago, Chile and the length of 16 football fields.
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The World Cup trophy is 14.4 inches tall, made of 18 karat gold and is hollow. If it were made of solid gold, it would be 14.4 inches high and weigh 180 pounds.
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Mathmatically, the midpoint of summer is August 7th. Christian calendars call August 1st the midpoint of summer as it is halfway between the summer solstice and fall equinox. However the word "midsummer" (as in "A Midsummer Night's Dream" refers to June 21st, or what we in modern times would call the first day of summer. "Midsummer" comes from a more agricultural time when May 1 (and the resultant May Day celebrations) was considered the opening of the season.
Tool Library:
Bookfeed.io is a dead simple solution to problem I've had for too long...
How do you know when your favorite authors release new books? Without say, going to a bookstore every Tuesday and asking someone?
Bookfeed.io is the first decent answer I've had to that question. Add your favorite authors to a list and the result is an RSS Feed that updates whenever one of those authors has a new book.
RSS what? Yeah, that's a leftover from the early days of the internet some of us still love.
If that's too many steps, take your Bookfeed.io feed and drop it into this thing called Feed Rabbit and never think about it again. Notifications of new books by your favorite authors will get delivered to you by email instead.
Listening Room:
Every issue of this newsletter will contain a 10 song Spotify Playist. The theme will always be the same:
"Against Forgetting"
You will have probably heard of the artists on each playlist but the songs of theirs I chose will always be b-sides/deep cuts and overlooked gems.
Sometimes an artist has only one song in them. More often it's us who stops paying attention when the noise of a hit dies down. And us who misses out more great music from an artist we've already decided we like.
This issue's playlist contains songs from Aretha Franklin, Wilco, Grace Jones, Fats Domino, U2, ELO and The Black Pumas that you probably have not heard.
Exit:
"A pen – to register; a key –
That winds through secret wards
Are well assigned to Memory
By allegoric Bards."
Written while sitting upright