Pottering about

[kerravonsen]

Well, yesterday we went to Federation Square to look at some Australian art, some of which I recognised from lessons at school, but with my Aunt Estelle in the party, there was no worries about knowing the history of any of them, she being an ex art teacher. Of course, I've now forgotten every artist's name. Except that I remember I really didn't like the Sidney Nolan stuff we started with, but incredibly enough, there was one landscape futher on (a salt lake) which I actually liked, which was also by him but so completely different in style you wouldn't think it was the same artist.
I have decided I like abstract art best when it evokes something real, whether that be waves or storms or cities or even anger or sadness. Oddly enough, my favourite instrumental music has also been "semi-abstract" -- I'm thinking of Andrew Thomas Wilson's "And The Rains Came" for example, or some of the instrumentals on the Alan Parsons Project record "I Robot".

Today has been a waste of time. I deliberately slept in, having slept very badly last night. I've had this wretched cough for about a month; not much sign of it during the day, but it wakes me up at night.
Then I got distracted for what remained of the morning playing gnocatan on my PC, and messing about with the Spyrogimp plugin, out of which I saved one nice picture. (I'd show it to you, but I haven't figured out how to upload pictures here yet, and I don't want to track it down now.)
After my very late lunch, determined not to let the whole day be a loss to Sloth, I did some reading of the Cally novel that Judith sent me the start of, so I could do the cover for it. I've gotten an idea, but it will depend on whether I can find a decently representative face for the OMC in the story. I shall scour the net for it after this.

The other thing I've been doing is re-reading Harry Potter after the recent compare and contrast (with Blake's 7) discussion on the Lyst. No, it isn't that Snape is supposed to be similar to Avon -- I knew that already. It was more the questions raised about learning and moral abiguity... Oddly enough it's been holding up better this time around, and I think part of that is because this time I'm not comparing it with Diana Wynne Jones. One of the cover blurbs actually compared it with Roald Dahl, and I actually think it fits better into that slot than with DWJ, for two reasons: (a) it's a younger audience, and (b) it has magic with-a-sense-of-wierd rather than magic with-a-sense-of-wonder. I mean, you don't get a sense of wonder with James and the Giant Peach, but you get a lot of oddness. You don't get a sense of wonder with Quiddich or Any-flavoured beans either, and that had frustrated me a great deal, because with DWJ you do get a sense of wonder quite a lot, and I resented the lack of it in Harry Potter. But Hagrid and his monster collection is about as wierd as living inside a giant peach. So I'm no longer resentful, simply recategorizing.

Comments

[mistraltoes.livejournal.com]

I agree with you about abstract art; I think we need something to connect it to for it to have any meaning to us. And I find art without meaning isn't worth bothering with. But I do still like some abstracts. I'm particularly fond of abstract sculpture, but not as much with the paintings.

I did read somewhere recently that what changed art was the invention of the camera - photographs made realism in painting of much less value than it was formerly. I guess that's true, but it still makes me sad; I like stuff from the Italian renaissance, and the Dutch masters. It would be interesting to see someone working in that vein nowadays.

Snape and Avon - I'm not sure that they're so much alike as as they first appear. They're both snarky loners with a superior air, but I'm not sure that the resemblance goes all the way to the bone, if you will; not certain that Snape is that way naturally. Or at least, there seems to be more pain in Snape's background, and he seems pricklier than Avon. But then, I think the commonest view of Avon exaggerates any degree of 'damage' he may suffer; with Snape, I think it must be more severe. I'm afraid when it comes to the maurauders v. Snape, I have no sympathy for the maurauders after reading in PoA what they very nearly did to him, and seeing very little remorse for it.

You've mentioned the 'sense of wonder' thing before; I'm wondering whether you can define it better? Because I haven't read any Diana Wynne Jones yet, so I haven't even got a pointer. I'm curious as to whether this is just a matter of us differing on our optimum familiarity/invention ratio. Because one of the things I really like about the Potter books is how homey and familiar everything is; I can easily imagine living at Hogwarts. I like the little details, like Ton-Tongue Toffees and Remembralls and other things, that show wizardry used in everyday ways.

Though I do get far more wonder from the movies than the books. Reading about quidditch and repotting mandrakes is nothing like watching them. Am really looking forward to seeing PoA someday. (Oh, dear, now I'm having an urge to rewatch the first two films, and I have NO TIME. Rats.)

As far as Diana Wynne Jones goes, I should really read some to get an idea of what you mean - what do you particularly recommend? All I've got myself is Wizard's Castle and Tough Guide to Fantasyland, but I'm sure I can send to the library for the others if you think anything particularly stands out.

Sense of Wonder

[kerravonsen]

Of course, now I'm going to have to eat my words... because when I tried to think of "sense of wonder" in Diana Wynne Jones works, the ones that I thought of were the "serious" ones, rather than the "wacky" ones which would be the ones better compared with the Potterverse.

The DWJ novels which are closest to the Harry Potter universe are the Chrestomanci novels, especially "Charmed Life" (about a boy and his sister who are sent to Chrestomanci castle to learn wizardry, he being a nine-lifed enchanter and destined to be the next Chrestomanci). That one featured interesting and homely things like candlesticks which had been enchanted to start yelling that they were being stolen the moment they were taken outside the castle; a pet dragon, and a fiddle that had been transformed into a cat. (The other Chrestomanci novels are _Witch Week_, _The Magicians of Caprona_ and _The Lives of Christopher Chant_, and a book of short stories called _Mixed Magics_.)

Ah. I just realized a noticable difference between them: none of these puns and silly names like "Grubbly-Plank" or "Little Whinging". So even when being whimsical, DWJ appears to take things more seriously. Maybe it was that that bothered me about JKR.

The "sense of wonder" is perhaps nearer to a "sense of the mysterious" as well. Because, thinking about DWJ's "serious" fantasy, the Dalemark quartet (_The Spellcoats_, _Cart and Cwidder_, _Drowned Ammet_, and _The Crown of Dalemark_) the magic which happens in most of them is not an everyday thing at all , and is something that isn't tame. On the other hand, thinking of _The Spellcoats_, that one isn't wild, and in some senses it is not even mysterious, but it still isn't... everyday. In that one, it was mostly binding and loosing, curses and the lifting of curses. And a touch of Sight and Illusion.

As for books to recommend, there's the ones mentioned above, for one.
I've never heard of "Wizard's Castle" unless they've gone and renamed "Howl's Moving Castle" for the US market. If so, I've got to wonder why on earth they felt the need to do so, it wasn't as if they had to dumb it down like they had to do for "Harry Potter and the Philospher's Stone". (rolls eyes). Anyway, if it is "Howl's Moving Castle" then that's one of my favourites; one where she really takes the fairy-tale trope and turns it on its head. The sequel "Castle in the Air" isn't as good.
Other favourites of mine are "Power of Three" (which rather redefines the meaning of "little people" and "giants") and "The Ogre Downstairs" which is about a blended family and, instead of a chemistry set, an alchemy set...

Re: Sense of Wonder

[mistraltoes.livejournal.com]

I suspect the reason I'm not bothered by the silly names is because (a) so many actual place-names in the U.K. sound silly to me, anyway, and (b) I don't mind a bit of silly in a whimsical story. Possibly without both factors it would bother me.

Wizard's Castle is just an omnibus printing of Howl's Moving Castle and Castle in the Air. I shall look for the Power of Three, The Ogre Downstairs, and the Chrestomanci books; but to be honest, I've read several blurbs for the Dalemark quartet and never really found them tempting.