corollary

Freud the pseudo-scientist

Some interesting articles about Freud. I didn’t need very much convincing to decide that the whole area is pseudo-science. Colin McGinn in the NYRB leads off, with a discussion of Freud's theories. This is followed by some responses to his article, and a response of his own. (This is a good feature of the NYRB, controversial articles are usually followed by an Exchange wherein critics get to write extended pieces in reply, but where the original author gets to reply to the reply.)

Then there’s a review of a German book describing how Freud cooked his evidence in the London Review of Books. There were (short) responses to this article and a long reply to these by the original reviewer.

A promming we will go

I went to my first Prom of the year on Wednesday night. The first piece was Bach’s Prelude and Fugue in C minor, BWV 546. This was played on the organ. It was a little strange to be listening to solo music in the Royal Albert Hall. I was in the central arena, “promming”, and most of the people around me were standing, but I couldn’t see much point in standing to watch the distant organist's back. Great music, this. Not necessarily an easy listen; it would be easy to turn off and just wonder at the noise, but a little bit of application allows you to hear the different lines and appreciate just what’s going on.

Next up was Mothers shall not cry by Johnathan Harvey, a world premiere (and BBC commission) with the composer in attendance. I didn’t think much of this. It was trying all too hard to be symbolic, relied on visual cues that were just naff (sword-wielding warrior with bandages on his eyes blessed by bejewelled princess; sheesh), and wasn’t musically coherent. There were lots of interesting musical effects (use of speakers and various electronic effects around the hall included), but nothing really flowed.

I disliked the programming as well; after this 21st century stuff, we had to then throw ourselves back in time to the 19th century to hear Brahms’s double concerto for violin and cello. This was music I knew quite well. I don’t think it’s Brahms's best ever composition, but there were moments in the first and third movements of typical and thrilling Brahmsian intensity; strings rapidly flowing over pulsing rhythms sustained by deep pedal points. I much prefer this to Bruckner’s “loud” passages, which seem too dependent on brass fanfares. I remember one moment of real, rapt beauty from the slow second movement too.

Finally, the concert finished with another Bach prelude and fugue (in E flat, “St. Anne”), but orchestrated by Schoenberg. It was strange hearing familiar music in this unusual setting. Initially, I couldn’t help but smile as the orchestra was doing such neato things. By the time it finished, I was less convinced that the orchestral colour was doing much for the music.

Three professional reviews of the same concert: from the Times, the Telegraph, and the Independent.

Book links, and the evil of George Lucas

A couple of book-related links today. First, some comp-sci humour (read the review by John E. Fracisco). The book is one I remember being part of my childhood, but in no very specific way. Perhaps I read it, perhaps it just lay around in the school library so that I could recognise the cover 20 years later.

Secondly, a neat story about compiling a book of 200 great novels written after 1950, by one of the two compilers. The first book mentioned, Plumb, a great New Zealand novel, is one I read and enjoyed since coming to Cambridge.

Finally, a diatribe on the evil that is George Lucas.

Just found an interesting web-log about software. It's called Joel on software, and here's some interesting stuff from it:

• On deciding what sort of company you're going to be, a Ben-and-Jerry's company, or an Amazon company.
• How to hire programmers.
• Things you should never do; mainly about how bad it is to attempt to rewrite everything from scratch.

Microsoft's .NET thingy is given so much hype in its official “white paper” that it’s near impossible to tell what it’s about. (There’s more information at the MSDN site.) In any case, it seems that one of things made easier in this brave new world will be software rental. And maybe this would be a better model, even if it was Microsoft’s doing. Philip Greenspun makes quite a convincing case anyway.

Sanitised English titles

We went to see the Swedish film Show me love (original title: Fucking Åmål) on Friday night. I thought it a very good film, with a wonderful happy ending and a very affecting story all in all. It apparently did as well in Sweden as Titanic. There are pages of comments on the IMDb page, from people all around the world, and they are almost all very positive. Rightly so, of course.

From someone in Onsala, Sweden:

This was a great movie. But after I saw it I hated life. And found out of meaningless it is. And if Åmål is so boring that they say in the movie. Then they should see Onsala. The most boring town in the world.

Having read a few online reviews of Show me love on Monday, I was struck by how many American reviewers commented on how lousy they thought the lighting in the film was. This wasn’t something I noticed at all. My reaction tended to be understanding and sympathetic, along the lines of What is it with these whingers?, but it is definitely true that different countries use quite different lighting conventions in at least their TV programmes. It’s usually pretty easy to place a programme that you don’t recognise that’s running behind a shop window, say, just by something about the light.

Superficially, I’d say that American TV seems to generally be quite brightly lit, and that Australian TV is even more so, but I think there’s probably more to it that my perception is aware of, but which I can’t express.

I’ve just had my birthday, so I have accumulated a number of new books for the List. I got the first two books in the series of naval novels by Patrick O’Brian (loads of people have reviewed these positively; even Christopher Hitchins in the NYRB), The wealth and poverty of nations by David Landes, Stalingrad by Antony Beevor, and The code book by Simon Singh. Expect reviews in about 18 months (!). (I have finished Mitford now, so progress is being made, honest.)

I also got an Oscar Peterson CD, Oscar Peterson's finest hour, published by Verve. This I can review already; it’s very good.

I’m writing today rather than tomorrow because I’m going to go to London tomorrow to watch England play the West Indies at cricket. The “Windies” are 2-1 down in the series, so England only need a draw in this match to win a series against them for the first time since 1969.