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Criticism

Review of A Naked Woman in the Snow by Dariush Beritan

May 13, 2024

A Naked Woman in the Snow is a short-story collection by Dariush Beritan. Indeed, it’s a… short short-story collection, at about 80 pages and containing five stories. In other words, although (as you will see in this review) it’s not a collection for everyone, it also doesn’t require much of your time. That makes it a marvelous opportunity to try something you’re unfamiliar with.

Familiarity with the subject matter – or lack thereof – will be the key concept in this review, because at the same time it’s what assigns the collection much of its expressive power yet also what keeps it from being fully relatable. But this isn’t as much of a problem as you might think. Indeed, I’d even say it’s a literary device – it’s not a bug, it’s a feature!

review of a naked woman in the snow; image of wheatfield — A good portion of *A Naked Woman in the Snow* is set in settings far outside what I’d term “the Anglophone experience”

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Review of A Trick of the Light by Brandt Ryan

March 25, 2024

Criticism

creativity, film, Gothic, music, review

A Trick of the Light is a short film by Brandt Ryan – based on a short story by Pinckney Benedict that first appeared in the Zootrope literary magazine. If the name is familiar, you’ve also read my review of his play Restitution. If the name of the film itself rings a bell, perhaps you’ve noticed it on my Bandcamp page. You see – and this should also serve as a disclaimer of sorts, though it hasn’t affected this review – I’ve composed the score for the film. I’ve also had many interesting conversations with Brandt about art, creativity, films, and the Gothic.

Speaking of, you might have noticed “Gothic” is one of the tags accompanying this post. Is A Trick of the Light a Gothic film? There isn’t a yes/no answer to this (which, funnily enough, would be a heck of a Gothic marker if you asked me as a Gothic fiction specialist), but I’ll come back with the long answer in a moment.

You might also recall there is (at the time I’m writing this) one more film review on Home for Fiction: Robert Eggers’s The Lighthouse, which is as Gothic as it can be. Plenty of coincidences – another Gothic markerPerhaps I’m being a bit hasty calling coincidences a Gothic marker, but there is an undeniable connection between the Gothic and what Bakhtin called “adventuristic time”. If you’re interested in the topic, also see my post on coincidences in Frankenstein.! Let’s take a closer look to see why A Trick of the Light is a genuinely intriguing, affectively impactful short film.

A Trick of the Light, album art of soundtrack — Album art of the *A Trick of the Light* soundtrack

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Pornography or Erotica? On Art’s Function, Purpose, and Essence

March 18, 2024

Criticism, Philosophy, Society

art, criticism, experience, experiencing, love, philosophy, sexuality, society

The topic might sound unusual and, ironically enough, this too is part of the theme. Namely, we should be able to explore a topic as ubiquitous as human sexuality. The differentiation between pornography and erotica (erotic art, that is) is problematic. United States Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart notoriously said he couldn’t define it but he knew it when he saw it.

That isn’t good enough.

I want to define it and I want to understand it. I’ve had some discussions on the topic with my friend Igor, and I decided to take my side of the emails we exchanged, edit it for length and focus, and turn it into a post.

But here’s an important caveat: My main interest isn’t in defining pornography (or erotica). Rather, I want to create a more general theoretical framework that talks about the differences between art’s function, purpose, and essence. So while there will be a fairly in-depth discussion on pornography, erotica, and their differences, my ultimate focus will divert to art in general.

pornography vs erotica. Image of young woman — Erotica doesn’t even need to display nudity to be erotic. Though, funnily enough, even nudity *itself* can be a matter of definition (i.e. historical/cultural contexts). Is the woman of the photo nude (a little? a lot?) or not? Ask a twenty-year old secular, liberal person in present-day Helsinki and a Victorian prude like Christina Rossetti, and you’ll get very different answers!

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