E.E. Cummings Recites ‘Anyone Lived in a Pretty How Town,’ 1953

in Literature, Poetry | March 4th, 2013

Here’s a great read­ing by E.E. Cum­mings of his famous and wide­ly anthol­o­gized poem, “any­one lived in a pret­ty how town.” The poem has a bit­ter­sweet qual­i­ty, deal­ing with the lone­li­ness of the indi­vid­ual amid the crush­ing con­for­mi­ty of soci­ety, but in a play­ful way, like a nurs­ery rhyme with delight­ful­ly shuf­fled syn­tax.  It is the sto­ry of “any­one,” who lived in “a pret­ty how town” and was loved by “noone.” With the author’s idio­syn­crat­ic omis­sion of some spac­ing, cap­i­tal­iza­tion and punc­tu­a­tion, the poem begins:

any­one lived in a pret­ty how town
(with up so float­ing many bells down)
spring sum­mer autumn win­ter
he sang his did­n’t he danced his did.

Women and men(both lit­tle and small)
cared for any­one not at all
they sowed their isn’t they reaped their same
sun moon stars rain

The poem was first pub­lished as “No. 29” in Cum­mings’s 1940 col­lec­tion 50 Poems. (Click here to open the full text of the poem in a new win­dow.) The record­ing was made on May 28, 1953, when Cum­mings was a vis­it­ing pro­fes­sor at Har­vard. It is avail­able from Harper­Au­dio as part of a one-hour col­lec­tion, Essen­tial E.E. Cum­mings.

You can find the poem list­ed in our col­lec­tions of Free Audio Books and Free eBooks.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Allen Gins­berg Reads His Famous­ly Cen­sored Beat Poem, Howl

Lis­ten to J.R.R. Tolkien Read Poems from The Fel­low­ship of the Ring, in Elvish and Eng­lish (1952)

Tom Waits Reads Charles Bukowski’s Poem, “The Laugh­ing Heart”

Pier Pao­lo Pasoli­ni Talks and Reads Poet­ry with Ezra Pound (1967)

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The Confessions of Robert Crumb: A Portrait Scripted by the Underground Comics Legend Himself (1987)

in Art, Comics/Cartoons, Film | March 4th, 2013

Any­one who’s seen Crumb, Ter­ry Zwigoff’s 1994 doc­u­men­tary about under­ground comics leg­end, R. Crumb, may con­sid­er them­selves fair­ly con­ver­sant in both the art and the off­beat exis­tence of the vin­tage-record-rever­ing sex­u­al adven­tur­er and self-pro­claimed wimp.

But does a trav­el­er pass up the oppor­tu­ni­ty to vis­it Paris sim­ply because he’s been there once before?

Unless you’re a vir­gin to the sub­ject, The Con­fes­sions of Robert Crumb, a BBC doc whose release pre­dat­ed that of Zwigof­f’s defin­i­tive por­trait by sev­en years, will con­tain no major rev­e­la­tions. It’s still a lot of fun though, per­haps more so for hav­ing been script­ed by its main attrac­tion.

Crumb and his wife, fel­low car­toon­ist, Aline Komin­sky Crumb, were uneasy with Zwigof­f’s por­tray­al, a reac­tion they doc­u­ment­ed in Head for the Hills!, a joint­ly authored, two-page com­ic in the New York­er. Their objec­tions ulti­mate­ly lay with the noto­ri­ety the film would con­fer on them. Fame for Crumb is a mon­ster-mak­ing drain on cre­ativ­i­ty. (“And I guar­an­tee we won’t earn an extra dol­lar as a result of this won­der­ful expo­sure,” Aline adds in a word bub­ble, an obser­va­tion the Crumb blog gives the lie to, near­ly twen­ty years out.)

But in terms of what he was will­ing to own up to on cam­era, Crumb the screen­writer is far from a shrink­ing vio­let. The talk­ing heads are min­i­mized and the extend­ed fam­i­ly kept to the shad­ows, but he’s frank about the erot­ic pre­oc­cu­pa­tions that fig­ure promi­nent­ly in his work and have raised more than a few fem­i­nist hack­les over the years. One might even say he plays it up in goofy staged bits, such as the one where he dons a lab coat to exam­ine the pow­er­ful rear and kid­ney bean-shaped pelvic tilt of an impas­sive mod­el clad in 80s-style Jane Fon­da Work­out wear. As social mal­adroits go, he’s not afraid to wear a lamp­shade on his head.

He also reveals him­self as a life­long learn­er, avid­ly research­ing his non-flesh-relat­ed pas­sions. His inter­ests are infec­tious. One hour with Crumb and you may find your­self spend­ing the next two or three on eso­teric top­ics rang­ing from James Gill­ray to Har­ry Roy and his Bat Club Boys.

You can find The Con­fes­sions of Robert Crumb list­ed in our col­lec­tion of 55o Free Online Movies.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Record Cov­er Art by Under­ground Car­toon­ist Robert Crumb

The Inscrutable Imag­i­na­tion of the Late Com­ic Artist Mœbius

Vis­it the World of Lit­tle Nemo Artist Win­sor McCay: Three Clas­sic Ani­ma­tions and a Google Doo­dle

Ayun Hal­l­i­day is a fem­i­nist and a long term Robert Crumb fan.

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Patti Smith’s Cover of Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit” Strips the Song Down to its Heart

in Music | March 4th, 2013

In 2007, Kurt  Cobain’s 1991 anti-anthem “Smells Like Teen Spir­it” was long etched into the con­scious­ness of every music fan, but the musi­cal land­scape had changed con­sid­er­ably since its release. The inevitable mass appro­pri­a­tion of Nirvana’s thun­der­ous dynam­ics and shag­gy rebel­lion had turned out so much bland, over­pro­duced grunge that the sound sank into unlis­ten­able deca­dence. With indie artists doing Gang of Four-like dance punk, eight­ies elec­tro, and any­thing at all that sound­ed noth­ing like Nir­vana, some—like Iron and Wine and the Decembrists—picked up ban­jos and fid­dles and reached back even fur­ther to moody Appalachi­an folk.

So when punk fore­moth­er Pat­ti Smith re-inter­pret­ed Nirvana’s era-defin­ing clas­sic for her ’07 cov­ers album Twelve, she choose the lat­ter sound, a spare coun­try arrange­ment with bass, acoustic gui­tar, vio­lin, ban­jo, and Smith’s time­less voice. No need for drums, it’s been done; what we hear instead is the essence of the song’s lyri­cal and melod­ic pow­er.

As most song­writ­ers will tell you, a good song should strip down to voice and gui­tar with­out los­ing its heart. Smith’s ver­sion of “Smells Like Teen Spir­it” proves that Kurt Cobain’s song­writ­ing stands up to the test, and the black and white video recalls Smith’s own pho­tog­ra­phy. It’s a par­tic­u­lar­ly Pat­ti Smith memo­r­i­al.

Loss defines so much of Smith’s late peri­od work—of Cobain, her broth­er, late hus­band Fred “Son­ic” Smith, and close friend Robert Mapplethorpe—but her com­mem­o­ra­tion of those loss­es has also renewed her cre­ative­ly. In a way, her career revival began with a memo­r­i­al to Cobain, with the song “About a Boy” from her 1996 “come­back” record Gone Again, a par­tial col­lab­o­ra­tion with her hus­band not long before his death. Watch Smith below deliv­er a spell­bind­ing live per­for­mance of “About a Boy” from a June 23, 2000 con­cert in Seat­tle.

If you would like to sign up for Open Culture’s free email newslet­ter, please find it here. It’s a great way to see our new posts, all bun­dled in one email, each day.

If you would like to sup­port the mis­sion of Open Cul­ture, con­sid­er mak­ing a dona­tion to our site. It’s hard to rely 100% on ads, and your con­tri­bu­tions will help us con­tin­ue pro­vid­ing the best free cul­tur­al and edu­ca­tion­al mate­ri­als to learn­ers every­where. You can con­tribute through Pay­Pal, Patre­on, and Ven­mo (@openculture). Thanks!

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Watch Pat­ti Smith Read from Vir­ginia Woolf, and Hear the Only Sur­viv­ing Record­ing of Woolf’s Voice

Pat­ti Smith Remem­bers Robert Map­plethor­pe

The First Live Per­for­mance of Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spir­it” (1991)

Josh Jones is a writer, edi­tor, and musi­cian based in Wash­ing­ton, DC. Fol­low him @jdmagness

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Watch The Twilight Zone’s Pilot Episode, Pitched by Rod Serling Himself (1959)

in Sci Fi, Television | March 4th, 2013

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Sure, cre­ators of tele­vi­sion’s dis­pos­able sit­coms and game shows have to sell their wares, and stren­u­ous­ly, to net­work exec­u­tives. But The Twi­light Zone? How could such an inno­v­a­tive, influ­en­tial tele­vi­su­al insti­tu­tion have ever need­ed to push its way past gate­keep­ers? Yet watch the series’ 1959 pilot above, and, before that even starts, you’ll see cre­ator Rod Ser­ling him­self make his pitch: “You gen­tle­men, of course, know how to push a prod­uct. My pres­ence here is for much the same pur­pose: sim­ply to push a prod­uct. To acquaint you with an enter­tain­ment prod­uct which we hope, and which we rather expect, would make your prod­uct-push­ing that much eas­i­er. What you’re about to see, gen­tle­men, is a series called The Twi­light Zone. We think it’s a rather spe­cial kind of series.” And how.

As the quin­tes­sen­tial late-night, black-and-white plunge into the spec­u­la­tive, the bizarre, the moral­is­tic, and the sim­ply eerie, The Twi­light Zone con­tin­ues to cap­ti­vate viewers—nowadays often, no doubt, YouTube viewers—born gen­er­a­tions after the end of its run. The pilot episode, “Where is Every­body?” sets the tone by fol­low­ing a lone, bewil­dered man through a mys­te­ri­ous­ly emp­ty town, seem­ing­ly aban­doned moments ago. But before that rolls, Ser­ling tan­ta­lizes the boss­es with descrip­tions of oth­er tales then in pro­duc­tion: a man stuck on an aster­oid with a robot, an immor­tal sen­tenced to life impris­on­ment, and a mil­que­toast mis­tak­en for the fastest gun in the old west. Not for noth­ing did Ser­ling build a rep­u­ta­tion as an auteur of human lone­li­ness. But that would come lat­er. “Mr. Ser­ling should not have much trou­ble in mak­ing his mark,” wrote the New York Times’ crit­ic when the show first aired. “At least his series promis­es to be dif­fer­ent.”

If you would like to sign up for Open Culture’s free email newslet­ter, please find it here. It’s a great way to see our new posts, all bun­dled in one email, each day.

If you would like to sup­port the mis­sion of Open Cul­ture, con­sid­er mak­ing a dona­tion to our site. It’s hard to rely 100% on ads, and your con­tri­bu­tions will help us con­tin­ue pro­vid­ing the best free cul­tur­al and edu­ca­tion­al mate­ri­als to learn­ers every­where. You can con­tribute through Pay­Pal, Patre­on, and Ven­mo (@openculture). Thanks!

Relat­ed con­tent:

Rod Ser­ling: Where Do Ideas Come From?

When Roald Dahl Host­ed His Own Creepy TV Show Way Out, a Com­pan­ion to Rod Serling’s Twi­light Zone (1961)

Col­in Mar­shall hosts and pro­duces Note­book on Cities and Cul­ture and writes essays on lit­er­a­ture, film, cities, Asia, and aes­thet­ics. He’s at work on a book about Los Ange­les, A Los Ange­les Primer. Fol­low him on Twit­ter at @colinmarshall.

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So You Want to Be a Writer?: Charles Bukowski Explains the Dos & Don’ts

in Poetry, Writing | March 4th, 2013

Here’s a quick video that serves as an adden­dum to last week’s post, “Don’t Try”: Charles Bukowski’s Con­cise Phi­los­o­phy of Art and Life. As you’ll recall, Bukowski’s head­stone is engraved with the sim­ple say­ing, “Don’t Try,” and, if you look back at his let­ters, the cryp­tic expres­sion could be inter­pret­ed in any num­ber of ways. (See our sum­ma­ry.) But, thanks to Andrew Sul­li­van, we can take anoth­er good whack at mak­ing sense of Bukowski’s immor­tal words. Released in a posthu­mous­ly pub­lished col­lec­tion in 2003, the Bukows­ki poem  “So You Want to be a Writer?” (above) warns the read­er:

if you have to sit for hours
star­ing at your com­put­er screen
or hunched over your
type­writer
search­ing for words,
don’t do it.
if you’re doing it for mon­ey or
fame,
don’t do it.
if you’re doing it because you want
women in your bed,
don’t do it.

Lat­er, the poem con­tin­ues:

when it is tru­ly time,
and if you have been cho­sen,
it will do it by
itself and it will keep on doing it
until you die
or it dies in you.

So here’s anoth­er way to inter­pret, “Don’t try.” Either you’ve got it, or you don’t. And you’ll know it if you do.

The video above comes from the Spo­ken Vers­es YouTube col­lec­tion. Tom O’Bed­lam always does a nice job with the read­ings. In this case, I’m not so sure about the visu­al selec­tions in the clip. But it’s not a per­fect world.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

“Don’t Try”: Charles Bukowski’s Con­cise Phi­los­o­phy of Art and Life

Charles Bukows­ki: Depres­sion and Three Days in Bed Can Restore Your Cre­ative Juices (NSFW)

Tom Waits Reads Charles Bukows­ki

The Last Faxed Poem of Charles Bukows­ki

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“The Me Bird” by Pablo Neruda: An Animated Interpretation

in Animation, Poetry | March 3rd, 2013

From 18bis, a Brazil­ian design & motion graph­ics stu­dio, comes this: a free inter­pre­ta­tion of “The Me Bird,” a poem by the Nobel Prize-win­ning poet Pablo Neru­da. Writes 18bis, “The inspi­ra­tion in the stra­ta sten­cil tech­nique helps con­cep­tu­al­ize the rep­e­ti­tion of lay­ers as the past of our move­ments and actions. The frames depict­ed as jail and the past as a bur­den serve as the back­ground for the sto­ry of a bal­le­ri­na on a jour­ney towards free­dom. A diver­si­fied artis­tic exper­i­men­ta­tion recre­ates the tem­pest that con­nects bird and dancer.” It’s all pret­ty won­der­ful.

Bonus mate­r­i­al: You can watch The Mak­ing of The Me Bird here. And find the orig­i­nal text of the Neru­da poem here. We have more poet­ry put to ani­ma­tion below.

via Andrew Sul­li­van

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Poems as Short Films: Langston Hugh­es, Pablo Neru­da and More

James Fran­co Reads a Dream­i­ly Ani­mat­ed Ver­sion of Allen Ginsberg’s Epic Poem ‘Howl’

Watch an Ani­mat­ed Film of Emi­ly Dickinson’s Poem ‘I Start­ed Early–Took My Dog’

The Ani­ma­tion of Bil­ly Collins’ Poet­ry: Every­day Moments in Motion

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Street Artist Plays Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah” With Crystal Glasses

in Music | March 2nd, 2013

When Leonard Cohen wrote “Hal­lelu­jah” back in 1984, the world did­n’t take imme­di­ate notice. And the song only began its jour­ney toward becom­ing a clas­sic when it was lat­er record­ed by John Cale and Jeff Buck­ley. Now, it’s one of the more wide­ly cov­ered songs out there. Rufus Wain­wright, k.d. lang, Bono, Willie Nel­son, Alexan­dra Burke — they’ve all paid homage to the song. So have less­er-known musi­cians too, like this street musi­cian, Petr Spati­na, who record­ed a ver­sion with crys­tal glass. Be sure to watch it all the way through.

If you would like to sign up for Open Culture’s free email newslet­ter, please find it here. It’s a great way to see our new posts, all bun­dled in one email, each day.

If you would like to sup­port the mis­sion of Open Cul­ture, con­sid­er mak­ing a dona­tion to our site. It’s hard to rely 100% on ads, and your con­tri­bu­tions will help us con­tin­ue pro­vid­ing the best free cul­tur­al and edu­ca­tion­al mate­ri­als to learn­ers every­where. You can con­tribute through Pay­Pal, Patre­on, and Ven­mo (@openculture). Thanks!

via @Pogue

Relat­ed Leonard Cohen Mate­r­i­al:

Leonard Cohen Recounts “How I Got My Song,” or When His Love Affair with Music Began

Ladies and Gen­tle­men… Mr. Leonard Cohen, a 1965 Doc­u­men­tary

Leonard Cohen Reads “The Future” (Not Safe for Work)

Watch Lian Lunson’s 2005 doc­u­men­tary, Leonard Cohen: I’m Your Man

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Sleight of Hand: Stanford Student Solves Rubik’s Cube While Juggling!

in Random, Stanford | March 1st, 2013

If you’re apply­ing to Stan­ford, this is what you’re up against. Under­grads like Ravi Fer­nan­do (Class of 2014) who can solve a Rubik’s Cube … while jug­gling. You might want to have a safe­ty school! 

via @palafo

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Robot Sets Rubik’s Cube World Record: 5.35 Sec­onds

This is Your Brain in Love: Scenes from the Stan­ford Love Com­pe­ti­tion

The Art of Liv­ing: A Free Stan­ford Course Explores Time­less Ques­tions

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