tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30407104827217784662011-07-08T11:25:22.573+01:00Motherfucking right, it's confusing; it's a gas, baby, you dig.Catchfirehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343971971860225713noreply@blogger.comBlogger161100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3040710482721778466.post-90868523521073132142008-04-28T16:53:00.003+01:002008-04-28T16:59:11.537+01:00

Blind Man with a Pistol has moved to Wordpress.com!Head to http://blindmanwithapistol.wordpress.com/ for the latest.

Catchfirehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343971971860225713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3040710482721778466.post-47819851764357181062008-04-16T12:18:00.005+01:002008-04-16T13:50:57.553+01:00

"I really don't want to cry," came the impassioned plea from J.K. Rowling. "Because I'm British." J.K. Rowling testified Monday in the copyright case Rowling vs. RDR Books. RDR Books wants to publish the Harry Potter Lexicon, the work of American librarian Steve Vander Ark (who claims to have read the series more than 50 times). The Lexicon, originally a website that once received a fansite award

Catchfirehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343971971860225713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3040710482721778466.post-27596741012409779742008-04-15T12:08:00.008+01:002008-04-15T16:27:26.362+01:00

Uri Averney wrote an excellent article for Counterpunch.org that wonderfully articulates the difficulty I have with the global "Free Tibet!" campaign.[W]hat is really bugging me is the hypocrisy of the world media. They storm and thunder about Tibet. In thousands of editorials and talk-shows they heap curses and invective on the evil China. It seems as if the Tibetans are

Catchfirehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343971971860225713noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3040710482721778466.post-92080875696229452882008-04-08T16:11:00.004+01:002008-04-08T16:57:02.000+01:00

Stanley Fish, as you may know, maintains a blog at the New York Times. This week, his blog takes on "French Theory in America" in a book review of Francois Cusset's survey of deconstruction and its ilk, French Theory: How Foucault, Derrida, Deleuze, & Co. Transformed the Intellectual Life of the United States.Professor Fish is remarkably clear in his explication of he much-maligned,

Catchfirehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343971971860225713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3040710482721778466.post-5264370760521484412008-03-31T09:11:00.003+01:002008-03-31T09:41:22.024+01:00

Make no mistake, the Internet is not public space. Bell Canada and Rogers Telecommunications are making this as evident as they can.Hat-tip to M. Spector on babble.

Catchfirehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343971971860225713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3040710482721778466.post-72499226154413089012008-03-29T10:00:00.009Z2008-03-29T12:00:23.809Z

"Turn off the light," sings Nelly Furtado. It's Earth Hour. Promoted heavily by the World Wildlife Fund, Earth Hour is an action in which the world can "take a stand against climate change" by refusing to use electricity from 8:00 pm to 9:00 today, March 29, 2008. Well, that's nice.What's better are the hundreds of Canadian businesses supporting Earth Hour. From Bell Canada to Cadillac Fairview,

Catchfirehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343971971860225713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3040710482721778466.post-53103684913190548142008-03-27T16:29:00.010Z2008-03-27T17:17:18.555Z

LeBron James, who is often pipped as the best-dressed man in the NBA, recently became only the third man to grace the cover of Vogue Magazine. What's more, James is the first African-American man to ever feature on the most-prized spot in fashion. The image is certainly forceful: the powerful, 6'8" James with the graceful Gisele Bündchen hanging off his arm. But magazine analyst Samir Husni is

Catchfirehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343971971860225713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3040710482721778466.post-2672876608717161392008-03-26T18:11:00.007Z2008-03-27T10:45:54.010Z

Atheistic and skeptical political philosopher John Gray has published a wonderful essay in The Guardian on the extensive recent polemic against religion.An atmosphere of moral panic surrounds religion. Viewed not so long ago as a relic of superstition whose role in society was steadily declining, it is now demonised as the cause of many of the world's worst evils. As a result, there has been a

Catchfirehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343971971860225713noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3040710482721778466.post-29653340480509590182008-03-19T09:01:00.003Z2008-03-19T09:21:56.021Z

Your true task, as a son, is to reproduce every one of the enormities [committed by your father], but in attentuated form. You must become your father, but a paler, weaker version of him. The enormities go with the job, but close study will allow you to perform the job less well than it has previously been done, thus moving toward a golden age of decency, quiet, and calmed fevers. Your

Catchfirehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343971971860225713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3040710482721778466.post-57376798438690712912008-03-17T19:09:00.017Z2008-03-18T10:05:08.951Z

By now you should have heard the story of Ryerson University, facebook, and Chris Avenir. While many would prefer to boil the story down to the question did he or didn't he, most people realize that more is at stake than a single instance of academic dishonesty.The first issue that springs to mind is one of policing: policing, surveillance and coercion. The administration at Ryerson University

Catchfirehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343971971860225713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3040710482721778466.post-63849250359248595782008-03-12T08:40:00.004Z2008-03-12T08:49:59.104Z

"Glasgow is a magnificent city," said McAlpin. "Why do we hardly ever notice that?" "Because nobody imagines living here," said Thaw. McAlpin lit a cigarette and said, "If you want to explain that I'll certainly listen.""Then think of Florence, Paris, London, New York. Nobody visiting them for the first time is a stranger because he's already visited them in paintings, novels, history books

Catchfirehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343971971860225713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3040710482721778466.post-30689429370676047272008-03-11T09:25:00.002Z2008-03-11T10:27:49.175Z

Two more literary hoaxes surfaced last week, turning a two-year trend into a full-on rout. The latest culprit, Marget B. Jones née Seltzer, author of the faux-memoir Love and Consequences, issued a "tearful" apology in the New York Times. The story, hot on the heels of Misha Defonseca's fictional Mémoire of the Holocaust Years, wrought instant comparisons to James Frey's admission that A

Catchfirehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343971971860225713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3040710482721778466.post-68252584236182641872008-03-09T16:40:00.011Z2008-03-10T05:30:43.073Z

Anti-cartoon Afghans are at it again. Thousands of Afghan students staged protests over a Dutch film that characterizes the Qur'an as fascist and over the recently reprinted famous Danish cartoon that depicted the Prophet Mohammed in a "bomb-shaped turban." The incident also recalls the case of Gillian Gibbons who spent fifteen days in a Sudanese jail for naming a "teddy bear" Mohammed after

Catchfirehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343971971860225713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3040710482721778466.post-81990197257704684272008-02-25T17:20:00.010Z2008-02-26T10:45:15.762Z

As the entire world already knows, Apple Inc. revealed the MacBook Air last month at the 2008 Macworld conference. The "world's thinnest notebook" retails from $1799 to $3098 USD. It's "ultrathin, ultraportable and ultra unlike anything else" according to the Apple website. It "rethinks conventions." "Innovation" is thrown about like it's going out of style. In short, the MacBook Air

Catchfirehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343971971860225713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3040710482721778466.post-24653980608383392412008-02-23T11:24:00.009Z2008-03-18T01:19:21.435Z

Alain Robbe-Grillet died last week. While his macho media posturing and depictions of sadism, pedophilia and sexual perversion render him a much more public figure (and hence, more controversial) in France, his influence on English literature in the the late-twentieth century remains emphatic and undeniable. In Pour un nouveau roman (1963), Robbe-Grillet outlined a theory of the novel (while

Catchfirehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343971971860225713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3040710482721778466.post-65056863793661136012008-02-18T11:46:00.008Z2008-04-15T11:46:47.975+01:00

I volunteered to read for the 2008 James Tait Black Memorial Literary Prize for fiction. It is a prize organized by the University of Edinburgh and will be awarded this August during the Edinburgh International Book Festival. I received a stack of nine novels, and I decided that a fitting debut blog entry would be the reviews I submitted to the panel of judges to help them compile their short

Catchfirehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343971971860225713noreply@blogger.com3