Frederic Colier, Author at Books du Jour

New from BWLB: “Stanley Kubrick: The Odysseys,” by Fabrice Jaumont

04/11/2019 by Frederic Colier

“Stanley Kubrick: The Odysseys,” by Fabrice Jaumont ($ 9.99, 140 pages)

April 2, 2018 was the 50th anniversary of a 1968 premiere screening in Washington, D.C. of Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey. The film remains the most fascinating cinematographic adventure given to experience. As a tribute to the masterpiece, and to the maestro himself, this essay which was first presented in 1995 as a scholarly paper explores the multiple connections to the Odyssean theme that one may find in Stanley Kubrick’s filmography.

Kubrick’s unweaving and re-weaving of the cinematographic tapestry reflect his attachment to the changeability implied in the Odyssean theme, which has become the theme of questioning, the perpetual questioning of one’s possibilities. The camera’s shuttling back and forth in time, round and round in space, through the means of dolly movements, shots and reverse shots, circular and spiraling recurrences, equates the director’s shuttling between classical and avant-garde techniques, between painting and photography, between musical intensity and spatial silence.

A chassé-croisé which the pluricephal director utilizes with a view to producing new angles of view and new parallaxes: a constant Kubrickian experimentation of the cinematographic language.

New release from BWLB: “Relative Man” by Ionel Petroi and Ivanka Stoïanova

04/09/201904/08/2019 by Frederic Colier

“Relative Man: the Music of Ionel Petroi,” by Ionel Petroi and Ivanka Stoïanova.

Born in Yugoslavia into an ethnic Romanian family, raised in Serbia, groomed in the Paris music circle before relocating to New York, if anything, provide a strong metaphor for Ionel Petroi’s “Musique Relative.” What came first the relative identity or the music? Is this latter the emanation of the former? In this long overdue memoir, Ivanka Stoïanova, a musicologist with worldwide experience, explores the relative journey of this complex modern, contemporary musician. Ivanka’s pointed questions allow Petroi to unravel himself in many unexpected ways. But always with sincerity and humility. We follow him from his humble beginning playing accordion in Serbian villages to his rise at the Paris Conservatory of Music, through his meetings and conversations with likes of Boulez and Ionesco, and scoring half-tone pieces for various ensembles, via the endless obsessive quest for honing and refining a personal musical style. Of course no journey, especially such an eclectic musician’s, would be complete without a little detour to visit his love of cinematic scores. This memoir spans a wide reaching scope of Petroi’s entire musical productivity to date. (translated from the French by Frank Debonair)

Author du Jour: Douglas Rushkoff

01/24/201901/22/2019 by Frederic Colier

If you do not know who Douglas Rushkoff is, it is not too late to catch up. You will not regret it. He is the Naomi Klein male version. While I am not sure, he would appreciate I say this, this is, if I am right, his twentieth books on culture, the digital economy and media, and he only gets better, clearer, wiser, punchier and to the point, with each new book. Rushkoff knows how to inspire and shock the crowds by revealing flaws and exposing false assumptions. His unique vision of the Techno-hyper-mediatized landscape is a perception we cannot do without. In this new book, “Team Human,” Rushkoff zeroes in on the pervasive effect of our most cherished human accomplishment: our technology, and what it is doing to you, to us, to our society . . . Here I will defer my authority to his clarity of thoughts and future projections. Get his book now.

“Team Human” is a manifesto―a fiery distillation of preeminent digital theorist Douglas Rushkoff’s most urgent thoughts on civilization and human nature. In one hundred lean and incisive statements, he argues that we are essentially social creatures, and that we achieve our greatest aspirations when we work together―not as individuals. Yet today society is threatened by a vast antihuman infrastructure that undermines our ability to connect. Money, once a means of exchange, is now a means of exploitation; education, conceived as way to elevate the working class, has become another assembly line; and the internet has only further divided us into increasingly atomized and radicalized groups.

“Team Human” delivers a call to arms. If we are to resist and survive these destructive forces, we must recognize that being human is a team sport. In Rushkoff’s own words: “Being social may be the whole point.” Harnessing wide-ranging research on human evolution, biology, and psychology, Rushkoff shows that when we work together we realize greater happiness, productivity, and peace. If we can find the others who understand this fundamental truth and reassert our humanity―together―we can make the world a better place to be human. (Book description from Amazon)

New Hemingway Short Story . . .

08/03/2018 by Frederic Colier

The Strand Magazine (based in Detroit, MI) just performed a major coup, releasing a new short story by Hemingway, the master of concision and staccato writing. The short story entitled, “A Room on the Garden Side,” was until today previously unpublished.

It tells the story of Robert, a soldier stationed in Paris during the liberation from the Nazis in summer 1944. To read the full story and its critical context follow the links. The release was covered by the NYT and made its front page. Congratulations to Andrew Gulli, Strand Magazine Editor.

Author du Jour: Rob Dunn

05/17/2018 by Frederic Colier

“Never Out of Season: How Having the Food We Want When We Want it Threatens Our Food Supply and Our Future,”

by Rob Dunn

(Little, Brown and Company, pp 348, $27.00)

The opening chapter of “Never Out of Season,” exposes the book premise flat out. It deals with the short history of the banana. This rather prosaic fruit, available in abundance, at least in New York, from every street vendors on most street corners, is not the result of simple happenstance or sustained popular delight. Its ubiquitous presence is both the product of refined methods of distribution and the result of a long selective agricultural process, an outcome we have grown to rely and take for granted. This hegemony of productivity is what Dunn, through this masterfully well-documented book replete with singular stories reading like detective stories, underlines with conviction to sound the alarm. Indeed, even if you do not buy his banana argument, his historical cases will not leave you indifferent to the danger of monoculture, and all the risks associated with it. While history has proven over and over the futility of such approach, we persist in the same direction.

When a pest or a blight breaks down the natural defense of an organism, it kills it. This is what happened to the banana. Since only one type of it was grown, once the Panama disease contaminated the fruit, it did not simply destroy a field, it wiped out an industry, with all the societal fallout this entails. Following the banana trail, Dunn merges into the potato territories and the Great Irish Famine of 1845-48, by going to the roots of the problem, chronicling the pest arrival, its development, and the reason devastation on such scope happened at all. An uncanny situation since Ireland was still exporting food towards England. Was the famine exacerbated because of a lack of communications? Did the protectionism that always accompanies the defense of special interests help its spread? Or was it the failure of scientists to gain credibility while they held solutions within reach? Or was it simply the compounding of several interlinked factors?

“Never Out of Season,” goes on to analyze other scourges impacting cassava, wheat and more . . . What becomes transparent in the search of solutions against blight and pests, wracking havoc on continents and political stability, is that successes have been often reliant on a set of isolated individuals, who followed their own instincts. You will learn much through their stubborn efforts: their frustrations and years of failure, before discovering a cure. In the meantime, danger still lurks. While quick-fixed politics to produce vast quantity of food works, the pressure goes counter to variety. Dunn warned us, with the growing global population, we are walking a thin line, in the proximity of pending disaster. It is precisely past mistakes that bring the promise of hope not to repeat them.

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