Is the Guardian worse than it used to be?

Was it some kind of editorial mess-up, or was Lex of this parish praising British Sea Power in today's Review section?

ERM WHAT

obviously not but WHAT HAS HAPPENED

haven't read garton ash for years, but have always been fond of a story he told about being a journalist in an iron curtain country in the 70s or 80s, re phone-surveillance

he and some dissident -- a literary type -- were chatting on the phone, not about politics (which would have been nuts) but about novels... at a certain point, some way into the chat, a third voice unexpectedly broke into the conversation, to tell them they were BOTH RONG abt such-and-such a classic author/text, and what all right-thinking intelligent readers knew to be the case was [insert opinion here]

anyway, i have always liked the notion of this impatient secret policeman, unable to bear the pretentious nonsense his targets were blabbering, being unable not to bust cover and put them straight literature-wise

xp

http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2011/sep/08/film-and-music-playlist?INTCMP=SRCH

"This rousing 14-minute art-rock epic remains the standout of what was one of the noughties' finest debuts" -- the lex

:D

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>:(

lex otm

xp print edition F & M playlist:

British Sea Power, Lately

... This rousing 14-minute art-rock epic remains the standout of what was one of the noughties' finest debuts.

Alex Macpherson

Didn't think you would be writing that!

and oh dear

Man I really hope this isn't a hilarious attribution cockup and that there's actually a new Alex Macpherson who will be consistently repping for Belle & Sebastian and Embrace records from now on.

"Alex Macpherson on his all-time favourite album, Pulp's Different Class"

"nimble bass lines"

TGA seems to know a lot, about world politics

I would think that re Stalinist states his liberal view is the correct one

There are interesting arguments to make against him, eg re the easy assumption of endless Chinese power: China could change socially, democratize and hence cause problems for its growth -- etc, etc

but he is a lot better than most commentators, in the Guardian, actually.

was always amused by Perry Anderson way back, 1999 or so, reviewing TGA and saying he was a Cold Warrior, a man of the Right, and TGA indignantly writing in and contradicting this (LRB)

actually TGA wrote in to say he WAS a Cold Warrior and proud of it!

it's been rectified online :)

kmt i had no idea british sea power were even still going, i remember having to see them as a student. fucking dreadful nonsense that for all its "arty" pretensions sounded no less stodgy and unexciting as any other bog standard indie SHITE

also funny in that exchange with TGA (or perhaps a later one)*: perry a. using the word "amphibologies", basically as a super-fancy way of saying "ambiguities"

*they all merge into one very article no living human has reached the end of, or ever will

<3 lex forgetting to submitting using pseudonym chris salmon

http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/musicblog/2011/sep/07/favourite-album-lost-souls-doves
Guardian and Observer writers are picking their favourite albums – with a view that you might do the same. Here, Alex Macpherson floats away with the music of Doves

kmt

this was mine

http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/musicblog/2011/aug/12/tori-amos-from-choirgirl-hotel

I don't remember Perry A using that word
or do I?
maybe I do!
he does use recondite words !!

I share some of your experience of his work
but mainly re the Cyprus essay
which just went on and on and on

and on and on

and it was only about bloody Cyprus !!!

against this
he is a master of prose
virtually the best non-fictional writer of English prose
that I can think of
or wish to
think of.

I mostly find him a pleasure to read

but not about Cyprus.

i am absolutely using "amphibologies" next chance i get

ha ha third google entry for same is... an article on perr.

4th entry should now be this thread?

pinefox, that is a strange claim about anderson re: prose. I mean my only exposure to him are those endless lrb articles, but there's nothing really there that makes me think 'yes, a master'. Just seems to chug along, telling me more stuff, then more stuff again, then some more stuff. And then I forget the stuff.

and it was only about bloody Cyprus !!!

wtf is this supposed to mean you tit

i have mixed feelings. he's a comic figure in lots of ways. but 'in the tracks of historical materialism' is a straight-up jam.

of course in the matter of the greatest living English prose writers there is always your other favourite - Michael Wood.

Just bought this: http://www.amazon.co.uk/New-Old-World-Perry-Anderson/dp/184467312X

It has a WHOLE CHAPTER on boring old Cyprus, will soldier on regardless.

xp
ah yes I think we may just have wildly different expectations of good non-fictional prose.

another funny PA story: when he published a series of critical essays in the LRB in the early 70s on key conservative thinkers -- oakeshott, hayek i think, forget the others -- e.p.thompson sent him a note saying "these are rascals! please stiffen your tone"

The LRB was going in the early 70s?

started late 70s/ early 80s IIRC?

Maybe New Left Review?

just looked it up -- it's from pel's obit for thompson, in 93:

"‘What’s Perry up to these days?’ he enquired. Tariq mentioned something I’d written on conservatism in this paper. ‘Yes, I know,’ Edward replied. ‘Oakeshott was a scoundrel. Tell him to stiffen his tone.’"

no sorry yes it's the early 80s -- never spill coffee on yr laptop, i have to use a difft keyb for k, 7, 8, and 9 :(

scoundrel! even better :D

i think the essays were collected into a handbook of villainy

I once searched the LRB archive for PA and found a lot of stuff on conservatives around the early *1990s*, actually!

maybe that was what memorious Mark S meant, or maybe not

perry anderson's book of the sand

I think it is a general fact about PA - quite probably increased as time has passed - that he likes praising conservatives and right wing thinkers

the people he despises are people in Labour parties, social democrats, US Democrats, liberals etc

there may be a name for this phenomenon

PA's 1980 book on EPT himself is also magnificent

it's true that PA is comical

but then it strikes me that most great modern non-fictional writers are

because they have a schtick, they are so imitable, they become a cherishable caricature of themselves

Can I just defend the Perry Anderson article on Cyprus, and note that his stuff on Turkey should be read w/a Diamanda Galas CD in the background.

I have read all of those -- think all of the ones on Italy, France, Cyprus, Turkey, Germany (England isn't valid) were all put together in a book about the European project.

A project which might fall apart in the next five years so get in while you can.

He wrote an iffy sorta article on the Historical novel last month which was the basis for a fairly classic ILB thread, btw.

That book is the one I linked to above. Looking forward to reading it.

Oops sorry Neil was skimming through...

given perry's snobby hostility to the idea that aggregate political value can emerge from the stunted perspective of masses considered individually (absent the guidance towards class action of the great radical minds of the day viz p.anderson), it's quite entertaining that he thinks aggregate political value can emerge from the stunted perspective of nations and banks considered as class actors (absent any attention paid whatever to the great radical minds of the day viz p.anderson)

he is both learned and readable however, as landed conservatives often can be

Like him more in terms of learning -- always interested in which cultural bits he'll talk about (always films or books, but seldom music (of course)).

But yeah otherwise its a bit too 1984 at times.