the yak occidental

Here is a selection of memorable quotes from Nearer the Moon: From a Journal of Love, The Unexpurgated Diary of Anaïs Nin (1937-1939) . Painting above:  L’infante égarée (c.1944) by Marion Adnams  When Gonzalo talks about ritual the first theatre on the altars of the Catholic Church, the extraordinary fantastic ceremonies full of mystery and grandeur, I feel that I recover a lost world which is beyond my everyday self, the world of my race. When he raves against the vulgarity of the Western world, the scientific epoch, the lack of ritual and significance, I understand. When he fears we are tainted, I understand, tainted with consciousness. But we know deep down we have kept the chalice and an altar, a mystery. I know what passionate affinity attracted me to Fez, what deep roots are stirred in me by the Orient. I had all this sense of form and ritual in the life of dress and symbolism, of continuous significance, and the power of falling into a trance, of moving ou...

Here is a selection of memorable quotes from Deathless by Catherynne M. Valente. Painting above: Portrait of a Woman c.1860 by Hans Makart When Marya saw something extraordinary again,  she would be ready.  She would be clever.  She would not let it ruler her or trick her.  She would do the tricking,  if tricking was called for. p.24 When I am Tsarita, I will break all these machines  and I will set them free. p.110 A marriage is a private thing.  It has its own wild laws, and secret histories, and savage acts,  and what passes between married people is incomprehensible to outsiders.  We look terrible to you, and severe, and you see our blood flying,  but what we carry between us is hard-won,  and we made it just as we wished it to be,  just the colour, just the shape. p.215-216 This house, she knew.  It stayed within her as it had always been,  ...

Here is a selection of memorable quotes from Fire: From A Journal of Love, The Unexpurgated Diary of Anaïs Nin (1934-1937) . Painting above: La llamada (The Call) by Remedios Varo, 1961. I loved my dramatic self in June, realized in June. p.70 Those days when I am not only in love with the whole world, with man and woman, with my old loves, my past, with everybody I know, but also with myself, then the way I see myself is this: alive. I see and love the dancer, the light feet, the efforts at laughter, at lightness, the gravity, and my audacity. What I like best about myself is my audacity, my tricks,my courage, the way by which I am true to myself without causing much damage or pain. The fire in me, the way I excuse and embellish others, my faith in others. What I hate is my vanity, my need to shine, my need of applause, and my sentimentality. I would like to be harder. I cannot make a joke, tease, make fun of someone, without regrets. p.238 The layers of the ci...

Here is a selection of memorable quotes from Incest: From the Journal of Love, The Unexpurgated Diary of Anaïs Nin (1932-1934) . Image above: Self-portrait (c.1920) by Winifred Knights Sometimes it hurts me that there should be less feeling and more intelligence. I seemed more sincere before. But if to be sincere means to throw one’s self overboard, it was a sincerity of defeat [...] To live without a god is more difficult. The drunkenness of triumph is greater than the drunkenness of sacrifice. I no longer need to do so much to cover the ineffectuality of my inner transmutations, to substitute for understanding.  I need to do little, but with a great deal of strength. p.8 We are healthier and stronger as honest adversaries, antitheses, than as friends. p.17 (to Eduardo) Hugh says art comes from fermentation--no matter what the fermentation is about. I cannot deny that I have done my best writing now, while I am fermenting with victory and power. p.28 ...

In the fourth bonus video connected to A Course in Production , we're going to approach animation Production with tactics used by champion poker players like Annie Duke! Previously in A Course in Production I have said that being in Production is a near-constant stream of solving problems, resolving issues, and making the decisions associated with dealing with problems and issues.  At some point or another in your career in Production, you will make, or help make decisions that impact a lot of people, to varying degrees of severity.  For example, do you give up four of your best animators now to help on a test, with the hope that their beautiful animation helps sway the client into going with your studio, even if that means putting your show or another one behind schedule? Do you get your teams to track their work on Shotgun or on a shared google sheet? These are just a couple examples of the various decisions you might make while working in Production.  Annie Duke, who i...

Here is a selection of memorable quotes from Henry and June: From "A Journal of Love" -The Unexpurgated Diary of Anais Nin (1931-1932) . Painting above: Portrait of Marguerite Kelsey (c.1928) by Meredith Frampton The impetus to grow and live intensely is so powerful in me I cannot resist it.  I will work, I will love my husband, but I will fulfill myself. p.1 I really believe that if I were not a writer, not a creator, not an experimenter, I might have been a very faithful wife. I think highly of faithfulness. But my temperament belongs to the  writer, not to the woman. Such a separation may seem childish, but it is possible. Subtract the overintensity, the sizzling of ideas, and you get a woman who loves perfection. And faithfulness is one of the perfections. It seems stupid and unintelligent to me now because I have bigger plans in mind. Perfection is status, and I am in full progress. The faithful wife is only one phase, one moment, one metamorphosis, one ...

Forget Contagion , Jaws is def the most relevant movie for 2020 As I'm sure is the case with many of you, 2020 so far has resulted in a lot more TV-and-movie-watching for myself and my spouse. In an effort to try and expand our streaming horizons a bit, we have come up with a goal we're calling the Alphabet Movie Challenge . The Rules: Go in alphabetical order, of course! Must be a movie neither of us have seen before The title of the movie MUST be dedicated to the Letter in question, no cheating with articles! (ex, A Walk to Remember would be considered a W movie, not an A movie, just as The Notebook would be a N movie not a T movie) Here's what we have watched so far, with my snippy commentary for each one. Yes, here we are....in Berlin...in 1989...I guess? Or so Atomic Blonde would have us believe. A - Atomic Blonde Poor Charlize carried this whole mess so much. The music was obnoxious and the costumes laughable, did not look at all like our characters were in Berl...

There are three trends in feminist TV series that have caught my eye the last few years--and two of them I'm very troubled by. Above: Please note that while Jessica is the one facing the camera, Kilgrave is taking up more space in the pic In the last decade or so, me and the rest of the world have seen a couple things happen: Feminism has become mainstream Due to the overwhelming demand for fresh, exciting content across TV and streaming platforms, we have seen a lot more explicitly-feminist series make it to the small screen When I say "feminist" tv, I think of a few things: The people making the show are mostly women or at least not cisgender men The storylines regularly pass the Bechdel Test The female characters get fully developed and interesting storylines  We tend to see more diversity of the cast with regards to race, size, sexual orientation, and gender While this is good to see, I've noticed a distinct emergence of three trends (bad and g...