The Heap: Current Read – Inferno by Dante Alighieri

It is about time I read this classic completely. Can you believe that I have never had to read this for high school or college? I did take the Dante II class for my Italian Minor (Purgatorio e Paradiso), but strangely enough, Dante I (Inferno) is not a prerequisite! So I just made it by by reading summaries of any parts of the Inferno I needed for papers.

I’m reading it for three reasons. First, I mean well, I own it. It’s been there on my book shelf, and I’ve just been lazy. Inferno is the quintessential piece of literature of Italian study. It is a sacrilege that I haven’t read this yet! Second, I have a novel I’ve been waiting to read called The Dante Club by Matthew Pearl. Yeah, I’ve had that book for a good year or two waiting to be read. SO! Since the murder mystery is tied to Dante’s poem, I need to read it so I can get more out of the novel. And lastly, I’ve read that a video game based on Inferno is coming out the first quarter of 2010! How sweet will that be?

There is buzz surrounding the game already due to EA’s controversial publicity campaign. During E3, EA actually staged a fake religious protest against the game!

Check out the interview:

Out of control.

I’ll be hitting the Cantos when I can in the upcoming weeks. You can expect some sort of review when I finish, or at least my take on the work… I’m not sure if I am fit to really review a timeless classic…

My Twin?

An email sent by our beloved resident New Yorker John Gleason:

Subject: Josh’s Twin

I was on youtube and saw this video of Luciano Pavarotti performing in a movie.  Is it just me or does he kinda look like Josh when he’s singing?  I might just be crazy but when he started doing those facial expressions, I thought he looked just like you Josh, that and the hairstyle.

I knew my infamous Rock Band singing would leave indeliable, blissful memories! And in Italian! Obviously my twin! I am quite excited about this discovery.

My facial expressions are far more exaggerated, but of course, what DON’T I usually exaggerate?

Response video, anyone? Though, I wouldn’t be singing Un’opera in Italiano. Instead, we ALL know it would be Coheed and Cambria’s Welcome Home or Dirty Little Secret by All American Rejects.

Sigh. That last one, and its significance. 🙂

Enjoy the video and have a good laugh. Your heapmaster is similar in appearence to Pavoratti, sans the Renaissance Era blacksmith outfit.

De temps en temps, tu as crie’, sans raison parfois… parfois avec raison… oui, avec raison parfois

I love foreign movies. Just because our business here at the heap. is trash, doesn’t mean we aren’t refined and cultured… In fact, we LOVE the Italian, French, and Spanish cinema (and other art forms!), language, and culture! (See: il mucchio, la tas, la pila). In addition to foreign movies, we LOVE anything romantic and funny… so if they happen to combine and materialize into a romantic comedy, even better. French film Paris Je T’aime is a beautiful, mosaic-like collection of films which explore the nature of love and its many forms, and particularly, how love occurs and is maintained by the various couples of the 18 villes of Paris. One of my favorite pieces is the one from Faubourg St. Denis starring Natalie Portman as the audible object of affection of a blind man. The cinematography is dazzling, as the audience can see the symbolic status of the relationship through relative body positioning, the use of a disjointed (interrupted) stream of scenes, as well as other effects (like the timeless effect of the couple in the midst of the rapidly moving crowd… and their absence towards the end…) Check it out for yourself! Most importantly, think about blindness, distance, the setting up of “walls” (les examens) to not get hurt. Also, the music! Listen to how the memory sequence becomes trance-like and automatic, causing him to “lose sight” of her until the end.

Chaz and I have finished our own version of the top 30 sci-fi movies of all time, and we will be releasing them about 5 movies at a time every few days or so beginning later today (or tonight). Make sure to check that out! Also I know that I’ve promised a life update for all of you guys in different parts of the country (or world). That will be coming soon, perhaps today or tomorrow, as part of my life update segment, The Trashman Chronicles. Look for it so you know what’s goin on with me!

In case you guys have been wondering, we are all fine here in the Tampa Bay area, we maybe had a combined 10 minutes of rain the past two days, and the wind picked up a little last night, but nothing to worry about. Thank you for your concern! Keep reading and commenting heapsters! (We had an unprecedented 199 views yesterday… thanks to an OCD heapster. who searched for slipknot 142 times?)