Saturday, May 19, 2007

Minute Lit 3 - Variations

Minute Lit 3 - Variations, was recorded two weeks ago at the Beehive coffee house, in Southside, Pittsburgh. Dawn and I met for several hours to talk through the basic outline for the show, on top of which we spoke extemporaneously about many fun, and some funny, topics. See the show notes below for details and links referenced in the 'cast.

See the podcast online at the Minute Lit main page, hosted on Apple's iWeb: you can subscribe to all episodes of "Minute Lit" and "Minute Lit - Tech" here, viewable in your favorite podcatcher (iTunes, etc.).

Please note that the podcast is recorded in AAC format, an "enhanced" podcast, which includes viewable pictures for those of you viewing on your PC, Mac, Linux boxen or color iPods/nanos. If you use an iPod Shuffle or other screenless audio player, like I do, just listen. :-) Note: if you're not using iTunes, you may need Quicktime [win/mac]

Show Notes:
Minute Lit 3 - Variations [1 hr 5 min 8 sec] (enhanced podcast, AAC, with pictures)

In this edition of Minute Lit, we'll
- explore the meaning and idea of variations in the arts
- the idea that if nothing is new under the sun, then what we see must be variation;
- we'll talk about a word you may not be familiar with, Proskynesis, and
- we'll pose a question to you which we challenge you to answer.


Discussion
Alex -
Kids play based on things they've seen, read or heard about.
Variation in Music
Bach's Goldberg Variations
For more on this, look up "goldberg variations".

Dawn -
Variations in Literature & Film
Quentin Tarentino
Sociologists take Hamlet to Africa
Queen Elizabeth left Buckhingham Palace to be amongst her people
Variations in film adaptations of Hamlet
Vampire lore & Buffy - after Alex mention's Elizabeth Kostova's "The Historian"
Drizzit - games/video games
Star Wars and Star Trek
Scotty's ashes are beamed up

Minute Lit Vocabulary word:
Alexander the Great & Proskynesis

Further Discussion
Minute Lit Tech - Podcast Review:
John Wall and The M Show
Bratz - Dawn shares Karin's views
No clowning around about Clowns

Lit Quiz:
Penelope and Odysseus - the answer to the question about how Odysseus successfully revealed himself to Penelope, his wife.

Minute Lit 3 Quiz Question
E-mail your answer in text or audio to minutelit[at]gmail[dot]com


Pixelcorps.tv
(podcasts, vidcasts) & Pixelcorps.com (classes, discussion) viewing and learning new media
Pittsburgh's G-Spod podcast - serving the Gay/Lesbian world community.

Conclusion

***Correction: While discussing the 4th wall, I attributed Puck's closing soliloquy of A Midsummer Night's Dream to Romeo and Juliet. Please note that Puck and the "If we shadows have offended" speech does, indeed, appear in A Midsummer Night's Dream. A thousand apologies. ~Dawn

Thursday, May 10, 2007

Lucas says: PghBloggers in next Star Wars Films...

Whatta rumor! :-)

The headlines:

Pgh Bloggers tonight at Finnegans Wake! for Blogfest 10.

Lucas Announces two new films in the Star Wars milieu:

"And here's a little news: Lucas tells me he will make two more live-action films based in the "Star Wars" era.

"But they won't have members of the Skywalker family as characters," he said. "They will be other people of that milieu."

The two extra films will also be made for TV and probably be an hour long each. But, like "Clone Wars," Lucas doesn't know where on TV they will land."
By Roger Friedman of Fox News

...and...

Minute Lit episode 3 - "Variations" has been recorded and is now in post-production. :-)

More to come soon on this latest. Dawn and I met at the Southside Beehive last Sunday morning for a great recording session. If you heard the previous episode, there was lots of background noise, from the music and kids and coffee machines. In this episode, we have merely to contend with the HVAC blower, as we'd moved back to the third room at the Beehive. The beehive has very nice vittles in their deli case (I partook of the veggie pesto sandwich) and awesome coffee & tea to sip.

You know, it's amazing how difficult it is for two co-producers, highly involved in separate lives and lifesytles, at different ends of a metropolis, to get together for a quick, intense recording session...but the act of getting together is, I believe, far more rewarding and satisfying than trying to use technology, such as Skype or Talkshoe. Having said that, we may try Talkshoe at some point anyways, as many of our podcast contemporaries are successfully using the podcasting service.

See you at Finnegan's tonight!

..alex.