Darkness

"Out of Darkness" - by Christopher Watson

"Darkness is the void of creation from where everything comes from and where everything finally goes back in to. It's unknown. Unexplored. Its the unfolding of the future. Its the moment of creation. Its David fighting Goliath. Its child coming out of the womb. Heroes live here. Its the path of ones heart. Its the edge of the universe.

Its a wonderful. Its a scary. Its a creative. Its a place of birth. Its a place of death.

Its chaos. Creative minds and adrenaline junkies live in this place. That's what the "zone" is. Darkness is nirvana. Darkness is god. Its not a place of security. Its a place of glory. Its the place of enlightenment. Its the moment of now. Its eternity. Its a place where men become gods.

Fear of unknown is fear of darkness. Fear of darkness is fear of life."


- Bon Vivant -

Tao Te Ching

"The tao that can be told is not the eternal Tao
The name that can be named is not the eternal Name." 

1.

When the Master governs, the people 

are hardly aware that he exists.
Next best is a leader who is loved. 

Next, one who is feared.

The worst is one who is despised.

If you don’t trust the people, 

you make them untrustworthy.

The Master doesn’t talk, he acts. 

When his work is done,
the people say, ”Amazing:
we did it, all by ourselves!” 

2.

Throw away holiness and wisdom, 

and people will be a hundred times happier. 

Throw away morality and justice,
and people will do the right thing.
Throw away industry and profit,
and there won’t be any thieves.

If these three aren’t enough,
just stay at the center of the circle 

and let all things take their course. 

3.

He who stands on tiptoe 

doesn’t stand firm.
He who rushes ahead

doesn’t go far.

He who tries to shine
dims his own light.
He who defines himself
can’t know who he really is. 

He who has power over others 

can’t empower himself.

He who clings to his work
will create nothing that endures.
If you want to accord with the Tao, 

just do your job, then let go. 

4.

The path into the light seems dark,

the path forward seems to go back,
the direct path seems long,
true power seems weak,
true purity seems tarnished,
true steadfastness seems changeable, 

true clarity seems obscure,
the greatest are seems unsophisticated,

 the greatest love seems indifferent,
the greatest wisdom seems childish. 

5.

If you want to be a great leader, 

you must learn to follow the Tao. 

Stop trying to control.
Let go of fixed plans and concepts, 

and the world will govern itself.

The more prohibitions you have, 

the less virtuous people will be. 

The more weapons you have,
the less secure people will be. 

The more subsidies you have,
the less self-reliant people will be.

Therefore the Master says: 

I let go of the law,
and people become honest. 

I let go of economics,

and people become prosperous.
I let go of religion,
and people become serene.
I let go of all desire for the common good, 

and the good becomes common as grass.

6.

The gentlest thing in the world 

overcomes the hardest thing in the world. 

If you look to others for fulfillment, 

you will never truly be fulfilled.

Whoever can see through all fear
will always be safe.

The more you know, 

the less you understand.

Seeing into darkness is clarity. 

Knowing how to yield is strength. 

The great Way is easy,
yet people prefer the side paths.

Those who know don’t talk. 

Those who talk don’t know. 

Not-knowing is true knowledge. 

Presuming to know is a disease. 

                                                                      Lao Tzu

Kafka on the Shore

Observer by H. Koppdelaney

"Sometimes fate is like a small sandstorm that keeps changing directions. You change direction but the sandstorm chases you. You turn again, but the storm adjusts. Over and over you play this out, like some ominous dance with death just before dawn. Why? Because this storm isn't something that blew in from far away, something that has nothing to do with you. This storm is you. Something inside of you. So all you can do is give in to it, step right inside the storm, closing your eyes and plugging up your ears so the sand doesn't get in , and walk through it, step by step. There's no sun there, no moon, no direction, no sense of time. Just fine white sand swirling up into the sky like pulverized bones. That's the kind of sandstorm you need to imagine.


And you really will have to make it through that violent, metaphysical, symbolic storm. No matter how metaphysical or symbolic it might be, make no mistake about it: it will cut through flesh like a thousand razor blades. People will bleed there, and you will bleed too. Hot, red blood. You'll catch that blood in your hands, your own blood and the blood of others.


And once again the storm is over and you won't remember how you made it through, how you managed to survive. You won't even be sure, in fact whether the storm is really over. But one thing is certain. When you come out of the storm you won't be the same person who walked in. That's what this storm's all about,"


                                                                        "Kafka on the Shore" by Haruki Murakami

Roll The Dice by Charles Bukowski

if you’re going to try, go all the
way.
otherwise, don’t even start.

if you’re going to try, go all the
way.
this could mean losing girlfriends,
wives, relatives, jobs and
maybe your mind.

go all the way.
it could mean not eating for 3 or 4 days.
it could mean freezing on a
park bench.
it could mean jail,
it could mean derision,
mockery,
isolation.
isolation is the gift,
all the others are a test of your
endurance, of
how much you really want to
do it.
and you’ll do it
despite rejection and the worst odds
and it will be better than
anything else
you can imagine.

if you’re going to try,
go all the way.
there is no other feeling like
that.
you will be alone with the gods
and the nights will flame with
fire.

do it, do it, do it.
do it.

all the way
all the way.

you will ride life straight to
perfect laughter, its
the only good fight there is.

The Auteur Theory of Cinema

In 1895, at a fashionable café in Paris, the public screening of the world’s first film took place. This ‘motion picture’, as it was then called, was La Sortie de l'Usine Lumière à Lyon (Exit from the Lumière factory in Lyon). It was made by two brothers, Auguste and Louise Lumiere and consisted of a single scene, 46 seconds long, showing workers exiting a factory after work. Neither the audience nor the Lumiere brothers probably realized the historical importance of the occasion; they were taking part in the birth of the most modern of art forms- the cinema.

The next few decades saw many advances in the technical as well as the aesthetic aspects of cinema. The art of editing made it possible to join images to tell a story. Other processes led to the attachment of sound to the images. Another few years and the ability to color these images was available. With these advancements, the audience’s interest in the medium also steadily increased. The process of film making and viewing became a profitable industry and business.

Hollywood was at the forefront 

of the technical development of 

cinema during the 1920s and 30s

The birth of Hollywood and its subsequent meteoric rise, led to a new way of making films- the ‘Studio System’. In simple terms, studios were companies that hired artists under contracts, put in the money required for the film projects and owned the distribution rights to market these films. Although a necessary outcome of the growing financial demands required to make films, the studio system led to an atmosphere of creative impotency where new ideas and techniques were deemed financially risky and the established norms of ‘what sells’ were adhered to strictly.



Meanwhile, cinema in Europe found it hard to develop a vision of its own and most of the films created were a shadow of their American and British counterparts. In France, the screen writers were considered the main force behind the creative process. Most films were adaptations of famous novels- an art form which was still considered inherently superior to the immediacy of the visual medium. Amidst this atmosphere of the cinema having become an industry in Hollywood and an acquiescent servant to the novel in Europe, a reactionary movement started among the film critics in France. This movement aimed to set forth a new way of looking at films which would lead cinema to be seen as a unique art form that had all the attributes to make it comparable with the other established art genres such as music and literature. This theory would eventually come to be known as The Auteur Theory of Cinema. The central precept of this theory was that the main creative force (or the ‘author’) behind the film should be the director. He should not only have the technical knowledge of the various aspects of film making but more importantly his films should envisage a personal artistic experience.

  Andre Bazin: Founder of Cahiers Du 

Cinema revolutionized film theory and 

criticismin Europe during the 1950s.

One of the earliest essays which led to the initial formalization of this theory was written by the film critic Alexandre Astruc in 1948. In this seminal essay he coined the term camera-stylo or the camera-pen. By this term he meant that the director should use the camera like a writer uses his pen; to develop a language- visual in this case- through which he would be able to express even the most abstract thoughts and feelings. Astruc went as far as to say that the ideas of the time could only be expressed in the language of the cinema and not in the more popular genre of the novel.

In 1951, Astruc’s close friend the film critic Andre Bazin founded the French film magazine Cahiers Du Cinema. Over the next few years the influence of this magazine gradually increased in film circles around the world. The magazine set about to redefine the tenets of film theory and criticism bringing it more in line with Astruc’s ideas of the cinema-pen. Bazin in his influential essay, “The Evolution of the Film Language”, traced the history of cinema to its current state and cited the need to usher in a new era where the film would represent a director's personal vision, rooted in his subjectivity and self-consciousness.

Francois Truffaut: The French film critic 

led the attack on the French cinema’s

 infatuation with ‘writers’

Among the various critics writing for the Cahiers was Francois Truffaut who became the fiercest proponent of the auteur theory in France. Written for Cahiers, Truffaut’s essay “A certain tendency in French cinema”, scathed at the focus of French cinema on the screen writer and the resulting inability of this cinema to rise to the level of other art forms. Truffaut noted that many directors, even those working under the constraining atmosphere of the studio system of Hollywood, were able to leave a personal mark on their films. This could be in the themes or the more formal aspects of film making but their emphasis on certain aspects led to an indelibly personal product. He also observed that most of these directors either completely or partially wrote their own films. For Truffaut this was true cinema and he advocated that all film makers should aspire for this achievement in their work.

The auteur theory initially developed in France but gained its final form across the continent in the works of the American film critic Andrew Sarris. In his 1962 essay, “Notes on the Auteur Theory”, Sarris clearly defined and furthered the theory. He stated that over a group of films a director must exhibit recurrent characteristics of style which serve as a personal signature and the way a film “looks” should have a relationship with how a director “feels”. In his subsequent works Sarris used the theory to form a canon of great film directors and classified them from mere technicians to true auteurs who are able to express their inner lives on the canvas of the screen using a personalized visual language.

     Alfred Hitchcock: The Hollywood film maker

 was considered a true auteur for his 

inimitable cinema

The auteur theory generated great debate over the coming years. Its opponents cited film as a collaborative effort which needed the input of many trained professionals to attain its final shape. They deemed the theory’s elevation of the director above everybody else as disrespectful to the artistic abilities of all the other persons involved in the project. However, most would not deny the central role of the director in coordinating the various aspects of film making and hence possibly having the most bearing on what a film ultimately looks and feels like. The proponents of the auteur theory would describe this role of the director as similar to that of the conductor of an orchestra. He may not be able to play all the instruments but he needs to combine the individual parts to create a harmonious arrangement that is able to express a coherent meaning.

With the gradual decline of the studio system, a new breed of independent film makers, with unique personal takes on various themes and genres, came to the forefront in Hollywood. In Europe various movements such as Italian Neorealism and the French New wave led to an unprecedented evolution of cinema in terms of its artistic possibilities. The auteur theory gradually assimilated in the mainstream discourse on films and became one of the many valid ways in analyzing a film and discussing its merits and demerits. Even today when people refer to Midnight in Paris as the ‘new Woody Allen film’ or wonder when the next ‘Quentin Tarantino film’ will be released, they are actually using the auteur lexicon.

The auteur theory served an important role in the evolution of cinema by releasing it from a period of creative sterility and continues to provide film aficionados with another facet to appreciate and enjoy cinema as an art form.

-ZAIDAN IDREES

The Crunch by Charles Bukowski

too much too little 

too fat
too thin
or nobody. 

laughter or
tears 

haters
lovers 

strangers with faces like
the backs of
thumb tacks 

armies running through
streets of blood
waving winebottles
bayoneting and fucking
virgins. 

an old guy in a cheap room
with a photograph of M. Monroe. 

there is a loneliness in this world so great
that you can see it in the slow movement of
the hands of a clock 

people so tired
mutilated
either by love or no love. 

people just are not good to each other
one on one. 

the rich are not good to the rich
the poor are not good to the poor. 

we are afraid. 

our educational system tells us
that we can all be
big-ass winners 

it hasn't told us
about the gutters
or the suicides. 

or the terror of one person
aching in one place
alone 

untouched
unspoken to 

watering a plant. 

people are not good to each other.
people are not good to each other.
people are not good to each other. 

I suppose they never will be.
I don't ask them to be. 

but sometimes I think about
it. 

the beads will swing
the clouds will cloud
and the killer will behead the child
like taking a bite out of an ice cream cone. 

too much
too little 

too fat
too thin
or nobody 

more haters than lovers. 

people are not good to each other.
perhaps if they were
our deaths would not be so sad. 

meanwhile I look at young girls
stems
flowers of chance. 

there must be a way. 

surely there must be a way that we have not yet
though of. 

who put this brain inside of me? 

it cries
it demands
it says that there is a chance. 

it will not say
"no." 

Everybody speaks for God. Nobody Speaks for man.

Jacob Jordaens, Prometheus(1640)

In Greek mythology , Prometheus was a Titan who was punished by Zeus for stealing fire from heavens for humans. He stood for human values against the values of God. As a punishment, Zeus tied him to a rock and has his liver eaten by an eagle everyday, only to have it grow back to be eaten again the next day.


Job on the other hand is a biblical figure  who was tested by God in his bet with the Devil. The test was how good he is in the face of an ordeal. He sacrificed his human values in submission which is the hallmark of all monotheistic religions.


In the audio above (it takes few seconds for audio to start), Joseph campbell compares humanistic values of Greeks vs sacrificing human values for God as shown in the Jobs story. 


Now the big question is , if the values one attribute to his God collide with the fundamental human values which values should  he/she honor? God or Human? The answer to this question will be an answer to what kind of human being the person is.