Circles

I suppose it's a virtuous circle. I read a chunk of Ross's The Rest Is Noise - last night it was the excellent chapter on Sibelius - and I rediscover my CDs of whatever he's covered that I've got, as I am doing with the Sibelius series, listening to them with new ears. The problem is that I'm building up a significant wish-list of stuff I'll need to buy, including a good many twentieth century operas, but in the meantime I can refresh my ears on the cheap just listening to what I've got and, not exactly failed to appreciate, but certainly failed to do justice to.

Another bit of reading involving a circle of sorts: I finished A Clockwork Orange over the weekend, in between visiting Mak, it being rather more than thirty years since the first time I finished it. This time the book had changed completely, or possibly I have, which is, in effect, the same thing. After all, essentially we're reading ourselves. This time I found myself engaged in what was obviously a theological tract - a very lively one, but a kind of extended sermon on the nature of aggression and its relation to creativity and the nature of choice. The shocking aspect of this sermon is the way it convincingly connects aspects of ourselves we'd rather keep mentally sundered from each other.

For some reason as I read I kept thinking of Kubrick's film, which I saw just before Kubrick pulled it off general release in the UK. I wasn't so much thinking of how well Kubrick brought the tract to life - frankly I don't think he did to any great degree having plentiful concerns of his own - but I was aware that it was an amazing piece of work and realised I wouldn't mind seeing it again in the hope that I would react differently. Older and wiser, I pray I would not now be quite so stirred by the violence as I was then, and I recall being genuinely excited, which is even odder considering I detest violent movies. Unsettling.