One of the most beautiful songs I've ever had the fortune of coming across. Whenever I hear this song, I imagine gales, rain and a desolate landscape. Like the area around my home town. Perfect for a dark autumn evening in. The novel on which the song is based is also one of my all-time favorites, and the 1992 movie is a very worthy version of it. The connection and love between Catherine Earnshaw and Heathcliff in the novel and in the film is so touching you'd long for it to be possible in real life. And the despair he feels after she's dead and he's left with taking care of her daughter (also named Catherine) and her two cousins, doing so with quite the iron fist really does depict much of the frustration and lunacy he must have felt (and had) from losing the love of his life. A simply wonderful story. All of a sudden I want to read it again.
But seriously, when it comes to artistic expressions of Emily Brontë's work, for me nothing can compare to Kate Bush's haunting gem of a song. Everything comes so beautifully together in it. She quotes the book in a few instances, referring to the actual story extremely closely and the atmosphere of it is eerie and haunting, yet fascinating. It sort of draws you in, allures you into letting the ghost "grab your soul away" by it.
Furthermore, the orchestration is stunning. The simple start with a few bars of a delicate piano, growing with the string section and electric guitars, then the drums, and culminating in the chorus. The combination of chords is downright exquisite, combining the known with a sudden twist to it, to give you an idea that something just isn't quite right in the story. And of course with the chorus seemingly wanting to continue ad infinitum. Which it sort of does, in a sense, in its fading at the very end. And the guitar riff at the end! Aw, man! Just tops it all off gloriously!
When it comes to Kate's voice, it just fits perfectly to it all. Ghostlike, yet at the same time childlike, perhaps alluding back to the childlike aspect of Catherine Earnshaw's persona. I think I read somewhere that in this song she sings in a falsetto voice. Can't really blame her, because the pitch is way, way up there. Beyond the high C, I think. It starts on a high E (if there is such a term... In any case, it's the E after the high C), and her highest note is just one step above, on the F.
She'd actually made 2 music vids for this song, one with her wearing a white dress and surrounded by smoke, against a black backdrop. This one I particularly like. The other one features her in a red dress out in the woods somewhere. It's ok, I guess, but in this case I'd say less is more in terms of background. And the red does not really do it for me with Cathy's ghost image. So yeah, I like the first one better. Either way, her makeup really accentuates her eyes, making them larger and really brings out the haunting image of the protagonist. If Emily Brontë had a chance to hear this song, I'm sure she would be immensely proud - and perhaps shed a tear or two.
Anyway, I'm yapping on now about all kinds of trivia about this song. *lol* That's because I've just stumbled over the most gorgeous montage with this song and the 1992 movie. This user really made sure that the lyrics and images complemented each other. And in addition, the images are so heartbreakingly beautiful in themselves. Yes, it's Juliette Binoche and Ralph Fiennes. And I must say they look very nice together, to say the least. Besides, they did one heck of a good job in the movie as well.
And here's Kate's white dress vid, just for the record. :-) Yes, I've posted it before, but I don't think there's anything wrong in posting it again. Heck, I adore that song!
Signing off (and dreaming on),
Elise
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
Monday, February 16, 2009
Cute AND gives food for thought.
Yoko Ono posted this note on Fb just recently, and upon reading it I found it rather quite interesting. So (if she doesn't mind me doing so) I thought I'd share it with you all:
25 Things Even My Best Friends Didn't Know Until Now
by Yoko Ono
From the Bottom Up:
1. I like to wiggle my toes when I'm waiting for something - like in the waiting room of my dentist. It makes me less nervous.
2. I like to be barefoot as much as possible. Places I'm definitely barefoot are: a) at home b) in bed c) in the shower. What's wrong? You guessed that much? Well, you never know, do you!
3. In fact I love to put my feet up at the end of the day, and watch them looking kinda good. I say in my mind to them: “Thank you for taking me around for so many years to so many places and still doing so - with happy steps. You're the best!”
4. I have rather short legs to match my short height. I love that. The fact that they're short makes them easier to go around with. Can you imagine if I had long legs? They might go in different directions from each other, or something. Then what would I do? Short legs work very well for me.
5. Okay, I must confess. I love wearing high heel shoes. I love wearing silk stockings. I love wearing hot pants. When I arm myself with those three, I feel like a tough girl from the 1930's. If I didn't look at myself in the mirror, I might just mistake myself for Rita Heyworth, or Marlene Dietrich. How great is that?!
6. Oh, I forgot to tell you about my ankles, calves and thighs. Well, later.
7. I must go back and tell you about my flats. When I wore flats at my college campus in the 50's, I had these great flats which made one of my toes stick out. I thought that it was so creative. Wherever I went, the girls at campus looked at the toe, looked at me, and expressed disapproval with their eyes. I loved it. But they were nowhere as special as high heeled shoes. They did not make my heart beat fast.
8. So now we go to gloves. I love gloves. I have leather ones, lace ones, satin ones. Long, medium, short. All great looking. But I hate wearing them. It's too bad. Because I could wear them and look really sharp. But I don't like them on - my hands cannot breathe properly. My hands love to feel the air, the breeze, the wind, the sun. So I put on really great ones that match my outfit, go out, and take them off right away. It's really too bad. My hands are knobbly and tiny. Not a good combo. So I would love it if I could show off the gloves instead of my hands. But...that's life.
9. I love rings. But for some reason, just like the gloves, I like to take them off right away, as soon as I am alone. I go to an opening wearing a nice ring. I come out of it, get in the car, and the
first thing I do is to take off the ring and put it in my purse. I don't like that feeling of something restricting my finger.
10. Speaking of stuff that bothers me: I hate putting things on my face. They say it's better to put some cream on your face if you don't want to shrivel up like an old potato one day. So I got all the latest cream I read in the ads. But once I had put one of them on, it made me feel so
sticky that I had to immediately wipe it off with a very hot towel. I couldn't help it. My whole face rebelled against the stickiness. Speaking of sticky: Once I put on some green mud on my face and got pimples for a week. That was not good.
11. Now hats! I think everybody has a vague idea that maybe I love hats, since I am always wearing one. In case you might think that maybe I'm trying to hide a bald spot or something, I occasionally take it off to expose my bushy hair. But soon enough, I put it on again. The reason is so complex that I’d have to go to a shrink for a year, and probably still wouldn't find out what's making me do this. I don't go to any shrink, so I will probably never know. Maybe I just like hats. Or maybe I think I will look taller if I wore one. Or maybe I think people's focus will go to my hat and not my face. Of course, I'm not saying there's anything wrong with my face, honey. A girl does not have to hide under a hat, ever. If there were a few wrinkles and shades, they just make you look more interesting.... So they say.
12. All my life my mother told me that I had strong jaws like a guy. It was not womanly. Well, I got them from my father, I think. So yes, I won't say I am particularly feminine. So what? I used to hide my jaws with my long hair. John used to say “Show me your face!” and took my hair out of my face. "Look, you're beautiful. I don't know why you are hiding with your hair." I kept myself hidden.
13. I also kept my hands in my pockets as much as possible. My mother didn’t have to point out to me that my hands were stringy. But they were.
14. My head was unusually large for my small bod. So John called me a “Martian".
15. I look at the sky and feel like my home is somewhere far away - so I thought I might really be a Martian - a result of cross-breeding thousands of years ago.
16. I used to love wandering aimlessly. I used to walk about 7 miles in the city aimlessly, but with the speed of the wind! I can't do that now. If I did it now it would be unfair to the security guard.
17. But I've got tons of great things to do at home. Most people think "what?" Because they want a name for what I do. What is the name for it? I just like pottering around my flat, fixing the crooked frames, looking over the park and day dreaming.
18. It's so nice to see the sky through a small opening of an old fashioned window from my apartment!
19. I think of the days we were gods and goddesses, playing ball with planets. We were larger than dinosaurs. But now we sit like good girls and boys and watch the small tennis ball going left and right, forgetting the days when we use to play with bigger balls. What happens when we shrink even further, and become the size of cockroaches? Will we be still playing with something that echoes the time when we were larger?
20. When the war started, I thought it would be more economical to drop 10 thousand dollar bags from the sky to the people of the country. It's cheaper, and what they need. But now we don't even have enough money to do that.
21. When I daydream, I go all the way to the end of the Earth, and come back. It's a nice exercise.
22. Well actually, not always. Sometimes I just go to the city I love. Once I was flying low in Geneva, and I saw a friend of mine walking. The interesting thing was that friend was somebody who died over ten years ago. He did not have any strong reason to be in Geneva. I just wanted to share this with you because it seems that we just wander where we like, and when we want. Not for any reason. I loved that.
23. Now that you know so much about me, I should not go all the way to 25, or should I? For number 23, Let's say, I am a person who needs a lot of time to myself. If I don't have the time, I will be making it, anyway. My mother use to wave her hand in front of me and say "Yoko are you there?" Well, if I were always there, I would not be me, would I?
24. John and I felt that we were like people in an H.G. Wells story. Two people who are walking so fast that nobody else can see them. Well, that creates a problem, too. Sometimes you want to have a good chat with friends.
25. In a day, sometimes I feel so much love for the world, I think my heart is bursting. Sometimes, I feel so scared, I want to shrink myself even further. I think that's what happened to us gods and goddesses. Like the dinosaurs, we realized that it's too dangerous to be so large. So we kept shrinking ourselves to what we are now. We might get even smaller. I see the sign in the engineers making smaller gadgets, smaller and smaller. Pretty soon, our fingers will be
too large to operate them. So what are we doing? I trust in the human wisdom. We are incredibly intelligent beings. So we might know something without thinking that we know.... Well, even my best friend didn't know until now that I was thinking of crazy things like this.
Have a good day!
yoko ono
New York City
Feb. 2009
* * * * * *
Signing off,
Elise
25 Things Even My Best Friends Didn't Know Until Now
by Yoko Ono
From the Bottom Up:
1. I like to wiggle my toes when I'm waiting for something - like in the waiting room of my dentist. It makes me less nervous.
2. I like to be barefoot as much as possible. Places I'm definitely barefoot are: a) at home b) in bed c) in the shower. What's wrong? You guessed that much? Well, you never know, do you!
3. In fact I love to put my feet up at the end of the day, and watch them looking kinda good. I say in my mind to them: “Thank you for taking me around for so many years to so many places and still doing so - with happy steps. You're the best!”
4. I have rather short legs to match my short height. I love that. The fact that they're short makes them easier to go around with. Can you imagine if I had long legs? They might go in different directions from each other, or something. Then what would I do? Short legs work very well for me.
5. Okay, I must confess. I love wearing high heel shoes. I love wearing silk stockings. I love wearing hot pants. When I arm myself with those three, I feel like a tough girl from the 1930's. If I didn't look at myself in the mirror, I might just mistake myself for Rita Heyworth, or Marlene Dietrich. How great is that?!
6. Oh, I forgot to tell you about my ankles, calves and thighs. Well, later.
7. I must go back and tell you about my flats. When I wore flats at my college campus in the 50's, I had these great flats which made one of my toes stick out. I thought that it was so creative. Wherever I went, the girls at campus looked at the toe, looked at me, and expressed disapproval with their eyes. I loved it. But they were nowhere as special as high heeled shoes. They did not make my heart beat fast.
8. So now we go to gloves. I love gloves. I have leather ones, lace ones, satin ones. Long, medium, short. All great looking. But I hate wearing them. It's too bad. Because I could wear them and look really sharp. But I don't like them on - my hands cannot breathe properly. My hands love to feel the air, the breeze, the wind, the sun. So I put on really great ones that match my outfit, go out, and take them off right away. It's really too bad. My hands are knobbly and tiny. Not a good combo. So I would love it if I could show off the gloves instead of my hands. But...that's life.
9. I love rings. But for some reason, just like the gloves, I like to take them off right away, as soon as I am alone. I go to an opening wearing a nice ring. I come out of it, get in the car, and the
first thing I do is to take off the ring and put it in my purse. I don't like that feeling of something restricting my finger.
10. Speaking of stuff that bothers me: I hate putting things on my face. They say it's better to put some cream on your face if you don't want to shrivel up like an old potato one day. So I got all the latest cream I read in the ads. But once I had put one of them on, it made me feel so
sticky that I had to immediately wipe it off with a very hot towel. I couldn't help it. My whole face rebelled against the stickiness. Speaking of sticky: Once I put on some green mud on my face and got pimples for a week. That was not good.
11. Now hats! I think everybody has a vague idea that maybe I love hats, since I am always wearing one. In case you might think that maybe I'm trying to hide a bald spot or something, I occasionally take it off to expose my bushy hair. But soon enough, I put it on again. The reason is so complex that I’d have to go to a shrink for a year, and probably still wouldn't find out what's making me do this. I don't go to any shrink, so I will probably never know. Maybe I just like hats. Or maybe I think I will look taller if I wore one. Or maybe I think people's focus will go to my hat and not my face. Of course, I'm not saying there's anything wrong with my face, honey. A girl does not have to hide under a hat, ever. If there were a few wrinkles and shades, they just make you look more interesting.... So they say.
12. All my life my mother told me that I had strong jaws like a guy. It was not womanly. Well, I got them from my father, I think. So yes, I won't say I am particularly feminine. So what? I used to hide my jaws with my long hair. John used to say “Show me your face!” and took my hair out of my face. "Look, you're beautiful. I don't know why you are hiding with your hair." I kept myself hidden.
13. I also kept my hands in my pockets as much as possible. My mother didn’t have to point out to me that my hands were stringy. But they were.
14. My head was unusually large for my small bod. So John called me a “Martian".
15. I look at the sky and feel like my home is somewhere far away - so I thought I might really be a Martian - a result of cross-breeding thousands of years ago.
16. I used to love wandering aimlessly. I used to walk about 7 miles in the city aimlessly, but with the speed of the wind! I can't do that now. If I did it now it would be unfair to the security guard.
17. But I've got tons of great things to do at home. Most people think "what?" Because they want a name for what I do. What is the name for it? I just like pottering around my flat, fixing the crooked frames, looking over the park and day dreaming.
18. It's so nice to see the sky through a small opening of an old fashioned window from my apartment!
19. I think of the days we were gods and goddesses, playing ball with planets. We were larger than dinosaurs. But now we sit like good girls and boys and watch the small tennis ball going left and right, forgetting the days when we use to play with bigger balls. What happens when we shrink even further, and become the size of cockroaches? Will we be still playing with something that echoes the time when we were larger?
20. When the war started, I thought it would be more economical to drop 10 thousand dollar bags from the sky to the people of the country. It's cheaper, and what they need. But now we don't even have enough money to do that.
21. When I daydream, I go all the way to the end of the Earth, and come back. It's a nice exercise.
22. Well actually, not always. Sometimes I just go to the city I love. Once I was flying low in Geneva, and I saw a friend of mine walking. The interesting thing was that friend was somebody who died over ten years ago. He did not have any strong reason to be in Geneva. I just wanted to share this with you because it seems that we just wander where we like, and when we want. Not for any reason. I loved that.
23. Now that you know so much about me, I should not go all the way to 25, or should I? For number 23, Let's say, I am a person who needs a lot of time to myself. If I don't have the time, I will be making it, anyway. My mother use to wave her hand in front of me and say "Yoko are you there?" Well, if I were always there, I would not be me, would I?
24. John and I felt that we were like people in an H.G. Wells story. Two people who are walking so fast that nobody else can see them. Well, that creates a problem, too. Sometimes you want to have a good chat with friends.
25. In a day, sometimes I feel so much love for the world, I think my heart is bursting. Sometimes, I feel so scared, I want to shrink myself even further. I think that's what happened to us gods and goddesses. Like the dinosaurs, we realized that it's too dangerous to be so large. So we kept shrinking ourselves to what we are now. We might get even smaller. I see the sign in the engineers making smaller gadgets, smaller and smaller. Pretty soon, our fingers will be
too large to operate them. So what are we doing? I trust in the human wisdom. We are incredibly intelligent beings. So we might know something without thinking that we know.... Well, even my best friend didn't know until now that I was thinking of crazy things like this.
Have a good day!
yoko ono
New York City
Feb. 2009
* * * * * *
Signing off,
Elise
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
Omigosh, I found another gem of a vid!
Seriously, Republican or Democrat, this guy is GOOD!!! XD
Signing off (again),
Elise
"Ubi Caritas et Aaaaaamor... Ubi Caritas Deus Ibi Est..."
Why I wrote this, I have no clue. It just seemed like a good idea at the time. (FTR, this is Latin (!) and means something along the lines of "where there is charity and loooooove, where there is charity, God is present.")
So. Long time, no blog. Needless to say, I've been kinda busy lately; what with the whole new idea of studying Hispanic texts from "el Siglo de Oro" ("the Golden Age"). I must admit that I was panicking quite a bit after the first week we had classes. I mean, this course started two weeks after the other ones and if we wanted to change into another we only had 4 days to decide. That is NOT fair. At all. I was in fact one of those who thought about changing courses into something easier (or sounded easier, at least); in fact I'd also discovered a Spanish Poetry course, which would span from the Golden Age to contemporary poetry. However, after having fretted about this to my parents, I decided - at the last minute - to stick to what I already had. Besides, I believe that this course would prepare me better for any challenges ahead in terms of teaching as well as future course qualifications. If I pass this (God willing), I believe this will be of great aid to me. After all, we'll be studying Don Quijote in a little while (i.e. the most famous Spanish novel in the world, and also coincidentally dubbed the "world's greatest novel".
Size-wise, I'm not too sure about that.
Besides this, so far I've managed to stick to my New Year's resolution of working out more. I must admit it's become more of a habit now, which is exactly what I wanted. Mind you, I should have had some more time to do this to get the full benefit of it (and also do some more cardio-vascular exercises - but I find these utterly booooriiiing), but as of now with my Lit. and Pragmatics and all that comes with them this can't be done.
Ugh, I've lost my life. Please leave your name and address in a comment if you've found it.
Hang on, actually, I'm telling a lie here, 'cause Mom's coming over this weekend! *happy dance* Think she's anxious about seeing my new room. Plus she's going to deliver some books from Spain she bought for me when on vacation. Among others... the Spanish version of Don Quijote. I must say I feel kinda guilty for using those books, 'cause they're so pretty... They've got such nice pics in them with glossy pages - and a case to put them in (!)... And there I come with my ammo of highlighters, pens, pencils and erasers ready to smear, smudge, color and scribble all over it. But hey, it's either this or pay up for other varieties of books I already have. So there.
Meanwhile, I've FINALLY finished La Vida de Lazarillo de Tormes! Yaaaay! My first completion of a book from the Golden Age!!! It wasn't all bad, it just takes up A LOT of time to look up the words. I'm one of those people who has to scribble down things in the margin or above words to remind myself of what they mean, so that just adds on to the workload. But hey, no pain, no gain. :-)
Oooh, btw, I found the most intriguing vid I've ever come across so far! I dunno, it's just the different reactions of the customers seeing the camera on the conveyor belt (or not even noticing it) and the apparent ignoring of the chefs that's interesting. Very artsy. Besides, I adore sushi, which makes me love this vid even more. :-) Oh, and btw, this was shot at a "Tokyo/Asakasa sushi bar named Maguro-bito".
Signing off (slightly blah, but content for having finished Lazarillo (although the greatest Spanish literary feat remains... *swallows hard*)),
Elise
So. Long time, no blog. Needless to say, I've been kinda busy lately; what with the whole new idea of studying Hispanic texts from "el Siglo de Oro" ("the Golden Age"). I must admit that I was panicking quite a bit after the first week we had classes. I mean, this course started two weeks after the other ones and if we wanted to change into another we only had 4 days to decide. That is NOT fair. At all. I was in fact one of those who thought about changing courses into something easier (or sounded easier, at least); in fact I'd also discovered a Spanish Poetry course, which would span from the Golden Age to contemporary poetry. However, after having fretted about this to my parents, I decided - at the last minute - to stick to what I already had. Besides, I believe that this course would prepare me better for any challenges ahead in terms of teaching as well as future course qualifications. If I pass this (God willing), I believe this will be of great aid to me. After all, we'll be studying Don Quijote in a little while (i.e. the most famous Spanish novel in the world, and also coincidentally dubbed the "world's greatest novel".
Size-wise, I'm not too sure about that.
Besides this, so far I've managed to stick to my New Year's resolution of working out more. I must admit it's become more of a habit now, which is exactly what I wanted. Mind you, I should have had some more time to do this to get the full benefit of it (and also do some more cardio-vascular exercises - but I find these utterly booooriiiing), but as of now with my Lit. and Pragmatics and all that comes with them this can't be done.
Ugh, I've lost my life. Please leave your name and address in a comment if you've found it.
Hang on, actually, I'm telling a lie here, 'cause Mom's coming over this weekend! *happy dance* Think she's anxious about seeing my new room. Plus she's going to deliver some books from Spain she bought for me when on vacation. Among others... the Spanish version of Don Quijote. I must say I feel kinda guilty for using those books, 'cause they're so pretty... They've got such nice pics in them with glossy pages - and a case to put them in (!)... And there I come with my ammo of highlighters, pens, pencils and erasers ready to smear, smudge, color and scribble all over it. But hey, it's either this or pay up for other varieties of books I already have. So there.
Meanwhile, I've FINALLY finished La Vida de Lazarillo de Tormes! Yaaaay! My first completion of a book from the Golden Age!!! It wasn't all bad, it just takes up A LOT of time to look up the words. I'm one of those people who has to scribble down things in the margin or above words to remind myself of what they mean, so that just adds on to the workload. But hey, no pain, no gain. :-)
Oooh, btw, I found the most intriguing vid I've ever come across so far! I dunno, it's just the different reactions of the customers seeing the camera on the conveyor belt (or not even noticing it) and the apparent ignoring of the chefs that's interesting. Very artsy. Besides, I adore sushi, which makes me love this vid even more. :-) Oh, and btw, this was shot at a "Tokyo/Asakasa sushi bar named Maguro-bito".
Signing off (slightly blah, but content for having finished Lazarillo (although the greatest Spanish literary feat remains... *swallows hard*)),
Elise
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