fabliaux

I've read Cuckolds, Clerics, and Countrymen. Translations by John DuVal, commentary by Raymond Eichmann. It has a selection of ten fabliaux that Eichmann feels are most representative.

The introduction defines "fabliaux" as "verse meant for laughter". These are bawdy, often involving seductions, but the sex is precursory. Only one of the ten would meet a more modern idea of erotica (material "to stimulate sexual desire"). In "The Lady-Leech" ("De la Saineresse"), a woman sneaks a lover past her husband by having him cross-dress and pose as a doctor (or more specifically a bloodletter) and then uses double-entendre to describe the treatment.

That aside, I didn't feel like I had wasted my time with the book. The tales were for the most part amusing, if very dated in parts. Husbands beating wives, or cuckolds caught, to an inch of their lives for trangressions are the norm here. Several involve the wrong person being beaten. "The Wife of Orleans" ("De la Borgoise d'Orliens") has a husband trying to catch his wife cheating by posing as her lover. She knows what's going on and plays along only to have the household staff beat him pretending it was her trap for the would be lover.

They really began to pound.
They were not bashful with the sticks.
He couldn't have gotten better licks
If he had paid them ten sous apiece.
...
But after all, it did him good,
And put him out of his bad mood
To know his wife was free from stain.

Which of course, she isn't. I'll probably hunt down some more fabliaux to read.

Final thought: could do without the rhyming couplets, though

A Scanner Darkly

This is an entirely rotoscoped (animation by drawing on top of something previously filmed) movie based on a Philip K. Dick book and directed by Richard Linklater.

There's a good dose of paranoia and true conspiracy in there, too. I have not read the original, but I've read a lot of other PKD and the themes are pure PDK. Several themes are spot-on Richard Linklater, too. Overall the cast and crew seemed suited to the story.

Since I've seen Waking Life, I knew what to expect with the animation and I can see it's usefulness for this material. Though I have to admit, there were times I found the animation too close to photographic realism. Everything (and the faces in particular) were much flatter in the eariler rotoscoped film.

Four red pills out of five.

A Scanner Darkly (2006) www.imdb.com/title/tt0405296/

Waking Life (2001) www.imdb.com/title/tt0243017/

David Macaulay books worth mention

Motel of the Mysteries by David Macaulay tells the tale of an archeologic exploration 4022 of a motel buried since 1985. The cause of the burial? An accidental lowering of the bulk mail postage rate caused postal spam to swell. (The book was published in 1979 and does not use the phrase "postal spam".)

Baaa is probably the favorite book of his among my kids. It tells a very literally sheeple story of a post-humanity world.

Final thought: has liked all of the Macaulay books he's looked at

Bound (1996)

Jennifer Tilly is Violet, the moll of a mobster type and ex-con turned maintenance worker Gina Gershon (Corky) hatch a plan to steal some laundered mone from the mobster.

I just watched it last night. I enjoyed it and found the cinematography very appealling. The "laundering" is quite literal here. It's stolen money recovered from someone who was killed after turning it over. Joe Pantoliano (Caesar) is washing the blood off, hanging the bills to dry and ironing them. It's an amusing sight.

I noticed Susie Bright (well known erotica author and editor) in the lesbian bar. I noticed that there is no continuity in apartment layout.

Corky is working in the apartment to the left of Violet. From the door in both apartments there is a large room to the left. In Violet's it is the living room. The bathroom is clearly to the right of that room in both apartments, the location of the bedroom is not obvious. But a number of scenes rely on the bedroom or the bathroom to have a shared wall between so that people can hear what's going on on the other side.

That's not mentioned with the goofs at imdb, but it bothered me more than all of the goofs that are listed.

Final thought: I was also amused by Corky's way of carrying lockpicks