Another bookmark

 I was considering re-booting my blog, acknowledging the changes since 2008, but I don't have the energy for it. Or maybe I just don't like it enough. Instead, I'm adding another book to the list of things to look at: The flowers of Japan and the art of floral arrangement by Conder, J. (Josiah). It is, interesting. And the site has more SIMILAR ITEMS. So many more.

Utopia v Shangri-la

  I think it was in one of Korean Literature Now's Inkstone articles that I came across a reference to Peach Blossom Spring as a phrase meaning 'utopia' in Chinese (though I'm also in the middle of reading a translation of Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio, so it could have been mentioned there). The "Spring" is spring as in source of a river, not the season. The phrase originates in a story Tao Yuanming wrote, sometime before 427 BCE. I'm not sure if it was a tale he recorded, or one he invented.

This translation by Rick Davis and David Steelman titles the piece "Peach Tree Shangri-la". I'm not familiar with the book that Shangri-la was created for, or the publications that were inspirations for it. I did find it interesting that the place described in Peach Blossom Spring doesn't seem like a utopia to me, perhaps because it is described as founded by people who isolated themselves to "avoid the chaos of war during the Qin Dynasty" but seem to have kept the customs of that time. I can't believe that the customs of the Qin Dynasty would be a basis for a utopian existence (though I'm not an expert on Qin customs). 

It has the theme of being backward looking, like Eden. But I feel like the isolation is also an argument against it being a utopia; that is a theme I would like to investigate further. Also the contrast between utopia, hidden societies (Shangri-la) and secret societies (like the Illuminati idea, but perhaps there are other secret society models to compare to utopias). 

Learning game

 Yesterday I went to the event by Asia-Art-Activism at the esea contemporary, a game called Docks and Seamen. The game is based on their archival research and interviews of the Chinese community in Pitt Street in Liverpool. I'm interested in the topic anyway, but having the game experience was much more emotionally engaging than I expected. The game presented factual information, much like a book, but our reactions were more than reading a book would produce. Was it the group interaction, or a quality of game play?

Utopia v Eden, just some jottings

Utopia: an organized area; made by people; dream for the future

Eden: natural, but a garden, not a wilderness; divine and pre-dating people; ultimate past

Places as expression of a concept, not a location. But still somewhere it would be possible to go?

Edit: Three days after I jotted these thoughts down, the Band on the Wall emailed an ad for Sarathy Korwar's gig, so I ended up watching the Utopia Is A Colonial Project music video. Again just some unfinished thoughts here: Is Utopia something imposed? Eden something taken away?

However, I want to investigate Utopia; I'm not sure a comparison to Eden, or Paradise, would be helpful, useful, or enlightening.

Bit on trash

 I use trash in my crafting projects- it isn't a way of cleaning the environment, more like it's the material my environment provides (rather than rafia, or pine needles, for example). My thoughts have never been clear on this.

Riverside Story by xiangyu and Yoshiki Hanzawa: Making Clothes from Trash Found in the River in the almost painfully hip Tokion, touches on some of my thoughts on using trash. But their work seems to be a bit more documentary; something I tend to try to avoid, though I did do a 'vacation in Japan' piece a few years ago. It's hanging in the hall.

Just the headings from “A Few Rules For Predicting The Future” By Octavia Butler

 When Octavia Butler was finally getting well deserved recognition for her science fiction writing, I had the nice experience of realising that I had already read one of her books years before; and it was one I remembered and thought about on occasion.

Thanks to this post by the Nap Ministry, I have been delighted by her essay giving writing advice to others interested in setting a story in the future. It is a bit of a disservice to collect only the heading here, but those alone are so thought provoking, or perhaps inspiring is a better term, that I want particularly to record them:

• Learn From the Past
• Respect the Law of Consequences
• Be Aware of Your Perspective
• Count On the Surprises

story trail

 "But housekeeping, the art of the infinite, is no game for amateurs." Sur, 1982, by Ursula K. Le Guin

I am not good at housekeeping, and feel bad about it. After reading that Those Who Stay and Fight was a reaction to one of Le Guin's short stories, The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas, (also referenced in a BTS music video),  I wanted to read that story as well. It is in The Unreal and the Real volume 2 Outer Space, Inner Lands, which I checked out at the library. Well worth reading. And another quote, from the end of the preface written in 2012:

"I don't know anything about reality, but I know what I like."