The Spirits Behind the Writers

The Spirits behind the writers

Horace reports that the 5th century Athenian poet Cratinus, in a light-hearted defense of his famed intemperance, declared, “No verse can give pleasure for long, nor last, that is written by water drinkers.” Cratinus wasn’t entirely kidding: Legend says he died of grief upon seeing a full cask of wine break into pieces. And writers of subsequent ages have taken his sentiment to heart. Wherever you find the pen-and-ink set, drink is an emblem of vivacity and wit, at times regarded with semireligious reverence. (Continue reading at latimes.com)

via L.A. Times | Joseph Tartakovsky 

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1. Graffiti, as it has evolved in the last 30 years or so, is not living up to its potential. Instead of aggressively reproducing its own internal code like a machine that has gone out of control and keeps banging its head into the same wall over and over again, the graffiti community should break out of its current deadlock. If graffiti would leave behind the world of custom, convention and fashion and entered a modus operandi in which graffiti was about language first it would be an entire different game and likely much more exciting. The current arsenal of styles, forms and images used by graffiti writers is a limited one. By opening up the frontiers of possibility, by incorporating models and thoughts from all ages, graffiti writers could be entering a field where there is much to discover. Their private graf language would no longer be marginalized and stereotyped by the conservative way things are supposed to be done. In order to achieve this graffiti would need to start communicating with people from outside the scene again, doing so in a smart way and on its own terms. (via  Graffiti and the Obelisk)
2. What wine can tell us about the nature of reality. Scientists at Cal-Tech and Stanford recently published the results of a peculiar wine tasting. They provided people with cabernet sauvignons at various price points, with bottles ranging from $5 to $90. Although the tasters were told that all the wines were different, the scientists were in fact presenting the same wines at different prices.  (Continue reading at Boston.com) via Boston Globe | Jonah Lehrer 
3. "One of the big things that caught my attention was after he moved to Nashville in the '60s, he and another Texan, Waylon Jennings, eventually told the Nashville people to go to hell, and they left," says Sample, who will join Nelson in performances of the "American Classic" material in Chicago on Sept. 27 and 28 for a PBS special to air in the fall. (Willie Nelson in Jazz Country, L.A. Times)

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