Monday, July 25, 2011

Reflections on Comics II

"Hong Kong was opening up to foreign influences then, and I read and watched everything. I loved comic books. My first contact was through Japanese manga and then American superheroes, like Superman, Spider-man and Batman.
- Tsui Hark (The Straits Times, 20 July 2011)

According to this IHT interview, his Film Workshop office is filled with comic books and Godzilla figurines.

Tuesday, July 19, 2011

Best books I've read this year

1. Paying For It by Chester Brown

2. Just Kids by Patti Smith (go watch the Dream of Life DVD after that)

3. A Visit From The Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan (quick, which David Bowie song is this referencing?)

Sunday, July 17, 2011

References to comics

"I don't remember when exactly I read my first comic book, but I do remember exactly how liberated and subversive I felt as a result."
- Edward Said

"I marveled at her comic-book collection, stacks of them earned from a childhood spent in bed, every issue of Superman, Little Lulu, Classic Comics, and House of Mystery."
- Patti Smith, Just Kids

"The one place where there was real excitement was comic books. This really was the golden age of comics. Nearly one hundred million of them were being produced every month by the middle of the decade. It is almost impossible to imagine how central a place they played in the lives of the nation's youth - and indeed more than a few beyond youth. A survey of that time revealed that no fewer than 12% of the nation's teachers were devoted readers of comic books. (And that's the ones that admitted it, of course.)
- Bill Bryson, The Life and Times of The Thunderbolt Kid: Travels Through My Childhood

Bob Dylan setlist in Singapore on 15 April 2011

Someone once told me a blog serves as an archive.

So I finally watched Dylan live.

Gonna Change My Way Of Thinking
It Ain't Me, Babe
Beyond Here Lies Nothin'
Tangled Up In Blue
Honest With Me
Simple Twist Of Fate
Tweedle Dee & Tweedle Dum
A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall
Highway 61 Revisited
Love Sick
Thunder On The Mountain
Ballad Of A Thin Man

Encore:
Like A Rolling Stone
Forever Young

Now if only Bowie would come to Singapore again...