Chopin's Funeral March and the Numinous in Romantic Poetry

I've been asked to give a talk at a church on Romantic Poetry; i.e. the poetry of the Romantic period. The body of my talk will consist of three parts; for each I plan to have a short musical interlude. The last part of my talk will concern the Numinous, for which I want a section from Chopin's Funeral March to be played.



At present I'm still looking for someone who can play my three interludes -- each short pieces by Chopin. The talk is on May 14th, so I still have a few weeks to find someone. If I can't find anybody, I'll just have to play recordings of the music, but that will definitely be less than ideal.

No More Typewriters

That typewriters have become obsolete is not shocking; we are after all in an era of electronic tablets like the iPad that doesn't even have buttons any more, and eventually even the computer keyboard will become archaic. Yet, I cannot help but feel sad that typewriters have come to an end: A few days ago the last typewriter manufacturer in the world closed its doors.

The first story I have ever written was on a typewriter. I was about 10 years old when I wrote it. I can't remember the general plot of the story, but there are some detail I can still recall. It was a science fiction story. The hero had wavy blond hair. He was on a spaceship. The story began with someone calling his name. The were feline-like aliens. (I was probably watching Thunder Cats at the time.)

I can still remember the clacking of the keys; how one would insert the paper and turn the knob on the side to roll the page into place; how one would pull the lever on the right to move the whole drum to the left -- today's equivalent of the "Enter" / "Return" key; one ones fingers would get dirty when one when you have to replace the ink lint (is that what it is called, an ink lint?).

I'm suddenly nostalgic for typewriters.

Wednesday Afternoon: Jump & Insadong

After the visit to Mt. Nam and having lunch there in a restaurant in Seoul Tower, we went to see the theatrical martial art performance Jump. This was my fifth time to see it. An interesting thing I found out in the meantime is that my Taekwon-Do instructor, Master Kim-Hoon, was one of the first instructors for the original Jump-cast.

After the performance some of my colleagues and I went to walk a bit around Insadong. In Insadong street there are a variety of traditional Korean paraphernalia for tourists. The thought that came to me while meandering in Insadong is that there is nothing "new" to me any more. I've lost that fascination a tourist feels when in a new place. It's a pity. There is no more enchantment by the unknown. I nonetheless took some photos here as well, trying to recreate the fascination I felt when I first came to Korea. (The last photo was actually taken at Mt. Nam, not in Insadong.)

Korean brass bells

Buddhist beads

Traditional Korean theatre masks

Old wall, tree and cherry blossoms