100
Years of Solitude by Gabriel
García Márquez
What resonates is exactly opposite what Michael
Wood once said
about: "a familiar and lasting concern of Latin Americans:
their fear that they are not quite real people, that their world
is not entirely a real world. This is not a metaphysical or epistemological
problem, it is not the European anguish of Kafka or Beckett, and
it is not the uneasiness of North Americans faced with a fast-changing
social and physical landscape. It is an old and intimate feeling,
an actor's weariness with a never-ending career, a feeling that
what is happening cannot really be happening, that it is all too
fantastic or too cruel to be true, that history cannot be the
farce it appears to be, that a daily life cannot be merely this
losing battle with dust or insects, that this round of diseases,
drink, ceremonies, sadness, and sudden death cannot be all there
is."
Instead, Colonel Buendia's world is one that is supremely surreal
in some aspects, and in these instances, concerns are raised that
are specifically epistemological.
We wonder whether the extent of reality that is accepted by society
as a whole is not flawed or constrained by traditional ways we
have looked at the world. That is why religion is embraced so
readily, and why a certain amount of mysticism persists even in
the most europeanly anesthesized individuals.
The
Animatrix (DVD)
by The Wachowski Brothers
Excellent series of animations all following the themes introduced
in the original Matrix motion picuture. The diversity of animation
styles really makes one think about the themes moreso than just
enjoying a regular animated flick. Also, one is _very_ impressed
with the fight
scene in part 1. Must see!