HollowCity/KarlMarx/Airplane!

Today I finished Ransom Riggs' Hollow City. He managed to fit a lot into the last fifty pages, including a revelation about the identity of the bird that we thought was Miss Peregrine along with some surprising news about Jacob's peculiar abilities. Everything is nicely set up for the next book in the series. Two observations occurred to me in this section about the book as a whole. First, when the children are poring over an elaborate copy of the peculiar Map of Days, it struck me how orientalist its geography is. I wonder if part of the appeal of this series is its old-fashioned view of the world. It reminds me of elements of Harry Potter in this regard with its mix of scenes set in the present day with those in the past, or in an alternate world. Second, in a note at the end of the book, Riggs emphasizes again (as he did in his first book) that all the photos he uses in the book are genuine and have not been altered. I find it fascinating that the book is written, at least to some extent, to 'fit' the photographs, but it's also somewhat troubling from an ethical point of view that these images of actual people are being used without their consent, as it were, as part of Riggs' invented world.

I also read the next fifty pages of Jonathan Sperber's Karl Marx. This section covers a short but extremely crucial period in Marx's life, stretching from the publication of ‘The Communist Manifesto’ at the beginning of 1848, through the revolutionary activities of 1848 and 1849, to Marx's going into exile in London in August 1849, where he would remain for the rest of his life. The one thing that really stood out for me in Sperber's account of this time period is how incredibly fluid (some might almost say to the point of self-contradiction) Marx's positions and ideas were during this period. No doubt, this is very much the impression that Sperber wants to create throughout this book, namely, that Marx was uniquely responsive and sensitive to the complexities of whatever situation he found himself in and what he wanted to achieve in that situation. This is just one of reasons, Sperber would say, that it's a mistake to read Marx's work selectively (i.e., in order to bolster his reputation as an infallible prophet), rather than reading it in all of its (sometimes frustrating) particularity. Not for the first time, I found myself wanting to know a lot more about Jenny, Marx's wife. The only times Sperber refers to her is when she is being incommoded by the latest developments in her husband's life. I would love to hear more about her own views in her own words.

Do certain types of film age more quickly than others? I watched Airplane! (1980) tonight for the first time in many years and I felt that it’s aged really badly. It’s partly because the type of disaster movie that Airplane is satirizing doesn’t really exist any more and if you lose that reference point, much of the movie’s humor is going to seem unmotivated. And there are also some phenomena (such as the religious groups proselytizing in airports who are the focus of several of the film’s jokes) that make the film feel really dated. A much more serious problem, however, is the movie’s racism. Jokes about ‘primitive’ cultures and the jive-talking African Americans might have seemed funny 30+ years ago but now they’re just sad. Fortunately, some of the humor survives. Kareem Abdul Jabbar is hilarious as the co-pilot trying to deny his illustrious NBA career and strangely enough it’s the corniest sight gags and bad puns that survive the passage of the years intact. I should note that not everyone feels the way I do about this movie. As recently as 2012, a poll chose Airplane! as the funniest comedy ever.