Guy Debord's "The Society of the Spectacle" -- Translation and Download

Hey all,

Upon consultation with Debord expert Jen Kennedy, I am suggesting that we use Ken Knabb's 2002 translation (aka the "Red & Black" version) of Guy Debord's "The Society of the Spectacle" for our December reading.

It is available for free online. You can download it as a pdf here and find it at this website.

For those of you indebted to the formal marketplace (I am under the impression the Debord was not), the printed version looks like this.

Our date is 12/21 (palindrome!) and unless anyone suggests otherwise I am going to suggest that we meet again at 8pm.

There was some talk during our first meeting about perhaps screening a Debord film. If anyone wants to take the lead on organizing that I think it could be a nice addition. Perhaps it should be done close to the meeting so that there is more time to read the work.

Why We Heart Photography (?)

As I was reading my friend Erin's post on D.A.P.'s blog about Beatrice Minde's Innenwelt ("Inner World") I was reminded of Dave's question about why we love photography...

I'm not sure I can do much justice to the question, but it is my firm belief that not anyone could take these incredibly subtle, moving photographs. Not everyone could come up with the concept, and frame the space so beautifully. Anyway, Erin does a wonderful job of describing why these images are so striking.

Collective Apathy

Just in time for the holidays: http://nymag.com/daily/intel/2009/11/now_you_have_a_better_excuse_t.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:%20nymag/intel%20%28Daily%20Intelligencer%20-%20New%20York%20Magazine%29&utm_content=Google%20Reader

Errol Morris on Sontag

I meant to post this earlier, but there is a three part series written by Errol Morris about two years ago for The NY Times that is a response, of sorts, to Sontag's book. I recommend checking it out, as it also includes some of the pictures referenced in RTPOO.

http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/09/25/which-came-first-the-chicken-or-the-egg-part-one/?scp=13&sq=errol%20morris&st=cse

I have also (attempted to) put everyone in a list to get notifications when blogs are posted. This will hopefully allow us to just eliminate our email chain and use the blog for all correspondence. Let me know if it doesn't work or you want off.

Eichmann in Jerusalem

Is this thing on?

David suggested I post this here.

I have an idea for a future Enid's Circle book, one which might be pretty timely: Hannah Arendt's Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil. Basically it's Arendt's journalistic account and philosophical meditation on the Israeli trial of the Nazi Adolf Eichmann in the early 60s.

Anyway, not only is it historically and intellectually important in its own right, I thought it also might be interesting to think about in terms of what's going on right now in New York with the Mohammed trial.

Just throwing it out there...

Your man in LA,
Evan

War against War

For anyone didn't get the memo, the next book is Susan Sontag's Regarding the Pain of Others. If you too wish that books had hyperlinks, here are a two that I dug up to accompany the first thirty pages. On page 15 Sontag mentions Ernst Friedrich's book of photographs called War Against War. I wasn't able to find an online version of the book but The Memory Hole has several scanned pages available for viewing. Also, here's a link to the Here is New York post-September 11th photo gallery:
http://hereisnewyork.org/gallery/thumb.asp?categoryID=4