Confused plot and too many dead or wounded dragons for my liking. It’s the romance between a Hawaiian strongwoman princess and a pansexual mermaid, coupled with a wicked sense of humour, that makes this comic worth checking out.
Do we have to compare the writer’s style with that of others? One can say It’s tempting to say I was about to say that Karina Sainz Borgo writes as concisely as Borges and as poetically as Márquez... But no, that would be denying the author her own style. I don’t know how proficient she is in Dragon but sometimes she writes in what must be close to the tongue of true mages, in Le Guin’s sense*. I say “sometimes”, for the book published entirely in that language won’t be readable by most humans. Sainz Borgo is well aware of it. In fact, this novel (novella, fable, chronicle, whatever you call it) refers to another book called La isla del doctor Schubert, the real one:
La intérprete dejó por escrito la vida del navegante educado por un centauro, el último secesionista berlinés, expedicionario y cirujano que zarpó sin argonautas de un portal de la calle Lagasca. Encuadernada en silencio, La isla del doctor Schubert es la bitácora de un paraíso... para quienes consiguen soportarlo. Sus páginas están escritas contra el viento, y si los renglones a veces se quiebran es porque la prosa se marea cuando alguien la recita en tacones.
So it is not magical realism: it is magic, with no need for realism whatsoever†. Doctor Schubert himself, ex-surgeon of the Kaiser, appears to be a nice guy, a powerful if a bit absent-minded wizard à la Magician from An Ordinary Miracle. And the story of two Juanas is a pure genius.
La isla del doctor Schubert is not especially difficult reading but it is intense. It took me about a month to finish the book — every evening I could read no more than one chapter. That’s magic for you. Be warned.
Al tercer día de su llegada a la capital alemana, el doctor Schubert halló una nota manuscrita en su buzón que alertaba sobre la desaparición del retrato que pudo pasar por un Modigliani. Cuando subió para comprobar si era cierto lo que afirmaba ese papel, encontró un trozo de pared limpia que señalaba su ausencia. Desorientado y confuso, convocó al jurado de la Secesión, pero todos habían muerto tras su última visita.
Tras sorber la primera cucharada, los hombres más fuertes de la isla se desplomaron como naipes. Despertaron confusos, con la mente en blanco. El bebedizo había borrado los tatuajes y las arrugas que surcaban sus pieles e hizo retroceder sus recuerdos. Con el paso de las semanas, perdieron los dientes cubiertos de sarro y en su lugar renacieron otros de leche. De su rostro áspero y barbudo una piel lisa e inédita. El doctor Schubert intentó perfeccionar su receta durante treinta cenas más.
El doctor Schubert suele perdonar la vida a los pasajeros de los barcos de recreo: criaturas alimentadas con col agria que una vez al año viajan por el mundo convirtiéndolo en un lugar peor. Justamente porque jamás aprenden de sus errores, quiso diseñar para ellos un castigo ejemplar, pero le fallaba la concentración.
| * | Speaking of dragons: I didn’t know until now that there are only two surviving artifacts featuring the phrase “hic svnt dracones”. Apparently, mediaeval cartographers preferred more reasonable if a tad pedestrian “hic svnt leones”. Another day, another bit of knowledge. In any case, dragons were not the top of Doctor Schubert’s concerns. |
| † | “The dragons do not dream. They are dreams. They do not work magic: it is their substance, their being. They do not do; they are.” — Ursula K. Le Guin, The Farthest Shore. |
I first saw The Dragon in the mid-1980s, at the Theater Studio in the Southwest (Театр на Юго-Западе), with Viktor Avilov as Lancelot. I was so impressed by it that To Kill a Dragon, a 1988 film by Mark Zakharov, was practically bound to disappoint. So it did. (Zakharov himself set an impossibly high standard with An Ordinary Miracle, also based on a play by Schwartz and featuring the same great Aleksandr Abdulov, Oleg Yankovsky and Evgeny Leonov.)
I have to say that I am quite fond of dragons. They are wise and magnificent creatures and slaying a dragon is a heinous crime. The Dragon of Schwartz, of course, is not a dragon at all; it is an allegory of authoritarianism. Deposing a despot is not enough: we have to kill the dragon in each one of us.
But The Dragon is far from dull moralising. After all — and above all — it’s a comedy. The Burgomaster (post-dragon, the President of the Free City) and his son Heinrich (later, the burgomaster) are suitably creepy. So what? Don’t be afraid of these clowns: let’s laugh at them.
Генрих. Не хочешь ты, папочка, попросту, по душам, поговорить с единственным своим сыном! |
Heinrich. I can see, daddy, that you don’t want to speak to your only son honestly and sincerely. |
| ⬖ ⬖ ⬖ | ⬖ ⬖ ⬖ |
Бургомистр. Слушайте приказ. Во избежание эпидемии глазных болезней, и только поэтому, на небо смотреть воспрещается. Что происходит на небе, вы узнаете из коммюнике, которое по мере надобности будет выпускать личный секретарь господина дракона. |
Burgomaster. Listen here. In order to avoid an eye disease epidemic, and strictly because of that, it is hereby forbidden to look at the sky. You will learn of everything that is happening up there from communiqués that sir dragon’s personal secretary is going to be issuing from time to time as needed. |
| ⬗ ⬗ ⬗ | ⬗ ⬗ ⬗ |
Генрих. Жених, отвечай мне по чистой совести. Согласен ли ты взять в жёны эту девушку? |
Heinrich. Groom, answer me in good conscience. Do you agree take this girl to be your wedded wife? |
| Евгений Шварц, «Дракон» | Evgeny Schwartz, The Dragon (translated by Yuri Machkasov) |
Schwartz wrote The Dragon in 1942—1944. After its première in 1944 at the Leningrad Comedy Theatre under direction of Nikolay Akimov, the play was immediately banned. Revived by Akimov in 1962, it was banned again after little more than one season. Soviet art bureaucrats saw The Dragon’s satire transcending any particular régime. And they were absolutely right: the play is as relevant today as it was 80 years ago.
Timur’s got this box set as a delayed birthday present; these (extended) Christmas holidays we watched all three films.
The first film in the series, and, unsurprisingly, the best. Given that it is co-directed by DeBlois and Sanders, the dynamic duo behind Lilo & Stitch, it is hardly surprising that one of the protagonists, viz. the dragon Toothless, seems to be just a gracile, winged, cat-like version of the famous Experiment 626. And why not? The only drawback is the absence of a worthy villain.
Wow. Hiccup finds his mother, loses his father, finally faces a human baddie and becomes a new Viking chief. Meanwhile, our feline Stich becomes a new dragon alpha (a glaring misnomer; dragons are not known to be social animals — probably the film creators couldn’t find a better word for a dragon analogue of “king of the beasts”). In spite of all this, the “2” film underwhelms. Most sophomore efforts do.
If the “2” film had a predictable tyrant of Drago Bludvist, The Hidden World features much subtler Grimmel (voiced by the great F. Murray Abraham, who brought to life many a villain par excellence), a dragon killer for the sake of pure evilness. The island of Berk in the beginning of the film, “the world’s first dragon Viking utopia”, looks more like Chinatown at the Chinese New Year and the music at times also gets rather oriental — a welcome change from whatever was passing for Viking music in the first two films. The stunning visual effects (not quite) offset the patently formulaic ending of the saga.
When we hear or read something incomprehensible, we say “it’s all Greek to me”. Naturally, Greeks would use different expression. In Greek, German, Dutch, French, Portuguese and many other European languages, they say “it’s all Chinese to me”. Spanish go one step further: Es chino básico, “it’s basic Chinese” (implying that you probably should forget about mastering intermediate-level Chinese). But you know what? We all know a bit of Chinese. Here are ten or twelve Chinese words that you should be familiar already, even if you didn’t realise that until now.
The Tao that can be told is not the eternal Tao.
The name that can be named is not the eternal name.
The nameless is the beginning of heaven and Earth.
The named is the mother of the ten thousand things.
The Tao begot one.
One begot two.
Two begot three.
And three begot the ten thousand things.
The ten thousand things carry yin and embrace yang.
They achieve harmony by combining these forces.
More vector graphics — this one inspired by Merry and Pippin’s song from The Lord of the Rings:
“...the only brew for the brave and true comes from the Green Dragon.”
When we move to Fuerteventura, Timur wants to put this sign on our house. Apparently he thinks we are opening a pub there.
Yesterday, Yuri and I went to see Avatar. Well I never. It may be a highest-grossing film of all time but I can’t help thinking that I was watching an overpriced three-hour long trailer for the 3-D videogame of the same name. I found it astoundingly boring. Jeez, I even fell asleep once. Of course it did not help that the other night I did watch a truly awesome old-school movie, Sherlock Holmes.
Avatar the movie has no acting to mention and is criminally devoid of any sense of humour. If that were not enough to put anyone off, it piles a cliché upon a cliché, with no original idea in sight. It was clear from the start that the only way to defeat American Sky People aggressors is to put a mind of a former Marine into a Blue Cat People body, seat him on a large dragon and give him a Sky People’s machine gun. The Sky People weaponry is apparently modelled on out-of-date Bionicle toys and as such is not as scary as one may think. For instance, the bullet-proof glass in their vehicles is easily pierced by the arrows. True, I enjoyed the dragon flight scenes there, but I’ve already seen Ice Age 3 and that animation was actually funny.
On a positive note, I am glad that Cameron scrapped the sex scene between the two main Blue Cat People, because it would be too painful to watch. (Why, even them kissing was embarrassing.) And I’ve got to keep the 3-D glasses.
