Can the Beholder be wrong?

"Beauty is in the eye of the beholder," we say.  And to at least some extent, this is true.

Once the objet d'art is created and displayed, the artist certain retains little control over its reception, interpretation and perhaps most importantly, its being understood.  We all blithely concede that each person who looks upon a painting with not depart from the viewing with the same impression of the piece or with duplicate feelings and emotions stirring within them.  One onlooker views the Mona Lisa or a Picasso or Warhol or Pollack and thinks it a pleasing enough work of art.  Another finds himself overcome, tears pouring down his face.  A third, while understanding the artistic merit and historical relevance, thinks the entire thing quite ugly and shudders to think of it hanging above her sofa.  [A fourth, perhaps we can imagine, just doesn't 'get' this whole art business and silently contemplates the dullness of this entire outing.]

Now, my dilemma is this: does this apply to the written word and narrative?

Generally speaking, does not an author compose his prose with a certain thesis, theme, exploration, or conclusion in mind, however general?  Is there not always something the reader is meant to realize, do, or understand?  This can be as specific as after reading this essay or watching this documentary one should ban the Twilight series from all school reading lists and libraries, or it might be as general as, after reading this novel or viewing this film, one should be reflecting upon one's attitudes toward love--- but what is fundamental is that this "it" is always there.

Therefore, one can actually leave a work of prose or narrative with an impression or understanding of the work's meaning (purpose, theme, thesis, moral etc.) that is, in fact, wrong.

As an example, I shall recount an event that inspired me upon these reflections:

I recently watched an excellent television miniseries, a costume drama that follows the life of a upper class British family from 1870s until the 1920s.  Presupposing the work's lovely cinematography, dumbfounding,  stunning costuming and cast as a given, what is most extraordinary about this series is its delicate handling of its two central characters: a rich, profoundly repressed, and jealous young man who and the young, beautiful, artistic, poor woman who naively marries him to relieve the temporary financial burdens of her father's death.  As expected the marriage quickly turns sour, fraught the inherent unsuitability of the partners, the husband's fervent but repressed passion for his wife, her deadening depression and unhappiness, the complete inability of either to communicate with the other, complicated by the husband's obsession with viewing their relationship in terms of ownership and rights--- a view that is sanctioned by society's rules, both social and legal.  Both parties do rather horrible things, but with the cards so stacked against her, I think it is fair to say, as one character does, "I rather think she has suffered more."  Regardless, the beauty of the series is its ability to keep the viewer from completely villainizing either character.  Somehow it manages to keep an adulteress and a rapist profoundly sympathetic, and as it took such pains to do so, I assume that one of the main aims of the narrative is to reveal the complexities of a failed marriage, explore the incompatibilities of people with different understandings of love, and the devastating and destructive nature of Victorian views of marriage and wifely obligation and husbands' rights.

So, I was greatly taken with this series, considered it a triumph, a great success, and consequently suggested it to my mother.

One can imagine my astonishment when she reports back to me her complete lack of sympathy for the wife.  She found her completely unsympathetic, and generally, she brings all her suffering upon herself due to her "not trying at all to make her marriage work."  I tried to counter that she does try somewhat, and that as the early months of their marriage is skipped over we can probably assume that she probably tried more and also had to recover the the sheer shock of discovering the true jealous, repressed and misunderstanding nature of her husband, and that she does acknowledge becoming both cold and apathetic but being too depressed to rise to the occasion.  I also pointed out that her husband not only generally smothers her and misunderstands her, but is completely incapable of considering her wants more than superficially (especially as they are usually counter his own), yells at her and berates her, bars her from seeing her friends and plots behind her back to essentially hoard her to himself in a secret house in the country.  My mother's response: well he buys her all those nice things, and he only does those terrible things as a reaction to her apathy and coldness.  She doesn't even try to communicate with him or make him or herself happy.

I am, in short, flabbergasted in that my mother has watched the same miniseries as I and come away with an impression not only completely opposite my own, but completely opposite what I perceived to be the fundamental message and purpose of the narrative itself.  For example, the fact that the husband attempts to win his wife over by showing her with gifts, in my book, cannot be used in his defense because the film uses those very actions to demonstrate his inability to understand her, his inability to express himself outside of the terms of ownership, and his inability to consider her desires above his own.  The man literally rapes his wife (or as he probably understands it, demands his husbandly privileges) and then buys her a ruby necklace in the morning, and cannot understand why this does not remedy their frosty relationship.

My mother's considering the wife not only unsympathetic, but completely at fault for the failed marriage due to her frigidness and lack of wifely effort is not just in opposition to mine, but is actually the incorrect way to interpret the narrative and not what it intends the viewer to conclude.  She is wrong.

But is she?  Can one have an incorrect interpretation?  This returns me to my original concern.  Is beauty in the really eye of the beholder.  My mother and I have found different and opposing 'beauties;' can they coexist?  Or can the beholder view the thing entirely wrong? In some cases of art we seem to say, "Yes of course!  You completely misread that passage!" and other times we seem to say "No, of course not.  It is up to interpretation."  Does the answer to this question lie with the artist's intent?  If the artist intends degrees of interpretation, then interpretation cannot be wrong or incorrect, but if not, and he desperately tries to steer the beholder to see things from a certain vantage point (a practice around which filmmaking and narrative I think revolves and excels in mastery) interpretations based on an extremely distorted point of view can be wrong.  Or do we hold fast to the maxim of beauty-finding being the sole privilege of the beholder?

Or more perplexing even still, if we take a leaf from the book of Oscar Wilde, is all this disagreement really just an expression of some discordant element in the worldviews of my mother and I?  Wilde writes: "It is the spectator, and not life, that art really mirrors."  So, perhaps, neither of us wrong.

Although, I can't help but feeling, as most probably do, that when it comes down to it, I am right and that the makers of the series would agree with me.

Doctor Who, horrified

The first red flag went up as I watched the season one finale of Fox's sci-fi, horror, procedural drama Fringe. After 19 episodes of searching for the illusive William Bell, revolutionary researcher, corporate mastermind and former partner to mad scientist turned FBI consultant, Walter Bishop, the determined Olivia Dunham discovers (after several, 'He can no longer be found on this world'-type winks from various minor characters): what do you know, Bellie (as Walter seems to call him occasionally, or maybe Billy which would make more sense) is camped out in a parallel universe! "There's more than one of everything" the episode title tells us while bashing us over the head with significance-laden one-liners.

Hmm. A science-fiction show in which an exclusive branch of the government quivers with fear that part-human, part-machine beings have started opening gates (rifts anyone?) between worlds and are now planning to trek over for a day of universal destruction. Sound familiar? "Yes!" holler the Whovians, waving their Doomsday dvds. [During the two episode plot of 'Army of Ghosts' and 'Doomsday' part-human, part-machine beings march through a rift in time an space from a parallel universe, and make attempts at world domination--- resulting in much consternation and bereavement. "MUCH bereavement," sob the Whovians, again waving their Doomsday dvds, crying and listening to their Doctor&Rose playlists.] Russel T. Davies and friends should be getting out their intellectual property law because J.J. Abrams and co. are not done scavenging for plot points.

This week the show revisits the Observer--- no, not the newspaper, but a mysterious and hairless man who wears dated clothes and with a fondness for hot sauce. Or I should say, the Observers, as Olivia and Peter find out there are more than one of them. Guess what they do? They manipulate the laws of time and space, show up randomly in times of crisis, goof around with strange and wondrous tech, resist the wear and tear of age, and photoshop themselves into famous images from history from the Boston Massacre to the demise of Franz Ferdinand--- see that's one of them right there, right next to the Doctor.

"Who are these guys?" Peter questions dramatically, scowling with his typical frowny face.
"Timelords!" shouts out Walter.
Astrid hits him, "They cut that line dummy!? Remember?"
Walter eats some jelly babies to console himself.

Unfortunately for this new breed of timelord, I mean, for these Observers, one of them goes rogue, radically stopping a girl from getting on a plane that is going to crash into the ocean. Ok, the Doctor would not be too pleased with this type of meddling either, what with the laws of time and space collapsing on themselves and destroying the world, but at least he would draw the line at sending an assassin to kill the poor tied-and-gagged-for-her-own-safety girl. Luckily in the end rogue Observer sacrifices himself and this appears to rebalance everything.

"I think, it is what they call feelings," whispers rogue Observer as he croaks. "I think it is what they call love."
"What good are your skills if you cannot save the woman you love?" cackles back a co-Observer.
Whoops! No that was the dalek in Season 1 epsiode 6 of Doctor Who. Either way, rogue Observer bites the dust. And credits.

We, Whovians, should continue to keep a close eye on Fringe and its infringements, but we can take consolation in the fact that the Doctor is still much cooler than these sudo-timelords. They have none of his charisma, charm, wit, in-jokes, penchant for running up and down corridors, or any TARDIS-worthy equivalent, and they certainly could not pull off the converse sneakers/tuxedo look. And, they definitely have none of the dashing good looks topped with the dynamic explosion of awesomely mussed hair that makes all the girls go weak in the knees.

The Doctor still lords the universe, though we wouldn't mind him taking one pointer from these wannabes. Maybe the next time he is forced to 'genetic transfer' Martha Jones, he could eat some chili pepper first. Just a suggestion.

Leveling the Scales

I recently had the privilege of watching Britain's (un)offically smartest man--- Stephen Fry, that is--- bustle endearingly through his latest guest star stint as Doctor, now Chef, Gordon Gordon Wyatt on Fox's stellar police drama, Bones. Whilst making other intelligent observations about the quality of both the episode and Fry's performance, I recall saying to myself, "My, isn't Stephen looking trim these day!" Whether the man who has in the past described himself as a "floundering whale," "sloshing bin of yogurt" or similar has indeed shed pounds or not (which in the interest of his health I hope he did as I and his millions of other fans want to prolong his life as long as science and fiction possibly can) the point is our witty Twitter king is looking slimmer.
A few days later, I happened to catch another gem of British comedy yucking it up on the Graham Norton Show: Robert Webb and David Mitchell. Graham noted that Robert Webb, the sexy one of the dynamic duo, and wife had recently had a baby girl. (Pause for Webb enthusiasts' celebratory dance, song, etc.) "Oh David you look marvelous considering you had a baby three months ago!" quips Grahmy dearest, making a jab at David's now not-pudgy tummy after the comic cutie happened to have lost some weight from "having a bad back" and "doing some walking" according to self-report. Cue Mitchell rant about vanity and self-loathing, while Webb grins from ear to ear faithfully beside him. ("He's funny!" adds a giggling Anna Paquin helpfully, just in case we missed out on that fact.)
Alan Davies, yet another hilarious humorist, also has made comments about his weight. In mocking the 'can you pinch an inch' attitude to women of his acquaintance, 'Yes!' screams the not-exactly-Capt. Lardy, "Because when I'm reaching up for something, I don't want to split open."

But how atypical is all this! Talking about men's weights? Usually we don't even bat an eye when some fat, ugly balding chump gets it on with the gorgeous, super-fit supporting actress. See The Witches of Eastwick for a pronounced example of this. But here we are, celebrity gossiping about men losing weight for once! Maybe the tables are finally starting the turn as men get a taste of high cosmetic standards women are expected to adhere. Newly-hunkified and notorious male-grooming-phobiaed Mitchell (although a lot of us have confessed to being attracted to him purely for his intelligence and beautiful personality. Yay girls for not being lookist!) has sounded the alarm on this front. In his Unusually Smart Soapbox rant, Mitchell pleads with the handsome men of the world to tone it down and stop being so gosh-darned stylish, because it makes it hard for duds like him to to impress people with their 'unusually smartness' when donning their socially-sanctioned tuxedos and bow ties.

"Black-tie is a gift to men! It requires no thought, and it makes any of us as good as it is possible for us to look! Why would you throw that away? . . . Whatever your twisted motivation is, for heaven's sakes, stop ruining it for the rest of us. If cool men continue to selfishly indulge their individuality, the convention will disappear and we'll all have to think about what we wear forever after. We'll be in the same situation as the poor women! . . . Men, in general, don't have to look as good as women. We should be clinging to that with all we're worth! Women have to fall back on make-up, botox and surgery. The cosmetic and sartorial yoke under which they labour is terrifying, and it looms for us if we, or indeed just a few of us, renounce the black-tie."

And yet, it is also quite possible that we should not get our hopes up. These anomalous male weight-loss jabs have been aimed at a group of unclassically handsome men, who, after all, make a living out of self-mockery. They are free to be self-aware and are generally smart enough to take shallow and superficial attack in their stride. The beautiful men of the big and small screens may not be as hardy. It might be just the women and the chubby comics who have the truest grit, after all.

Les novelles britanniques

So random but oh so fantastic bits of news for those of you interested in the goings on in the British entertainment world (and yes some of this is so last month, but I've just heard of it):

(1) Michael Sheen is in the much anticipated New Moon. Isn't he just precious!?!



I mean, he already had a few nice roles in, oh, I don't know, Bright Young Things, The Queen, and Frost/Nixon but this will really kick-off his career.

(2) My much beloved Primeval has negotiated itself back to life after an apparently unprecedented routine of corporate acrobatics. We could even go so far as to call it an **anomaly** (Har har har). The powers that be have also taken steps to "ensure that the spectacular special effects that have made Primeval such a huge success will continue throughout the new season." Cuz where would we be without those? Oh time traveling dinosaur show. We love you.

(3) Gavin & Stacey, which has managed to remain frustratingly absent from youtube, has been picked up by ABC. Thank God!

(4) Russell Brand is in love with Katy Perry. They are dating. It is magical.

As someone who in a fit of madness actually read two thirds of Brand's remarkably enjoyable autobiography this summer, this bit of celebrity gossip cannot help but make me go "Awwwwwww." Despite his being blatantly un-PC and vile, the Western mainstream media consumer still seams to adore him--- as if we know that underneath that gruff sex and drug addicted exterior is a just a quirky, talented teddy bear. (To be quite honest, his book does revealing as quite a lot more lucid and sensitive than he may appear.)

If love of a good woman can turn Brand from his nefarious and self-gratifying ways, well then what more evidence do we need that love conquers all and that there just might be hope for the rest of us?

To the happy couple!