Thursday, December 14, 2006
Proceedings of the FIS: Naomi Campbell
As Supreme Failure I have noted an ambiguity in the title of our noble Failed Intellectuals Society. We have taken it to mean somebody who is/was an intellectual and failed; but it could mean somebody who failed to be an intellectual. While mulling this over, I came across this story about the great Naomi Campbell. I have posted on Naomi before. I considered then the possibility that she may have Zen-like depths. The remark she delivers in this latest story would seem to provide further evidence for this view - 'It's been really like a tough year in terms of like the accusations and stuff like that. It's been very hurtful and blown out of proportion. But I can't stop getting on with my life...I can't pay too much attention to this negative stuff. I don't like to live in the negative. I like to stay in the present moment and stay positive.' Plainly this woman has failed magnificently to be an intellectual. Perhaps we should extend an invitation. I know it would encourage Stephen Hawking to join our very select band, though it may lead to fisticuffs at the AGM.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
A blog about, among other things, imaginary ideas - What ifs? and Imagine thats. What if photographs looked nothing like what we see with our eyes? Imagine that the Berlin Wall had never come down. What if we were the punchline of an interminable joke? All contributions welcome.
She could always try her hand at professional philosophy. I like her stuff.
ReplyDeleteBryan, what about the Bill Bryson quoting of Mariah Carey: "Whenever I watch TV and see those poor starving kids all over the world, I can't help but cry. I mean, I'd like to be skinny and all that but not with all those flies and death and stuff." Does she qualify, Bryan?
ReplyDeleteIf you widen your definition of failed intellectuals to include those who simply failed to be an intellectual, full-stop, that increases the potential membership considerably, I would have thought. I tried to be an intellectual a few years back. I started on a Monday by wearing a black polo neck, smoking a pipe and leaving long pauses between each sentence. I gave up on Wednesday when I developed a nasty rash on my neck, lost my pipe down the pub, and kept forgetting what I was going to say between sentences. Do I qualify?
ReplyDeleteProPhil, I am sure I have heard Kate Moss discoursing on Heidegger on Radio Three but I could be mistaken.
ReplyDeleteJames, Mariah sounds like an excellent choice. I shall consider her. Neil, one could say it expands the potential membership to include all humankind since everybody, consciously or not, could become an intellectual and, insofar as they do not do so, fail. You certainly qualify, Neil, though I worry about that rash.
I must ring my mother, she'll be chuffed at this - her son, finally, a failure to rank up there with the best of them. My mother has always supported me in my failures - if I hadn't been written-off by her at such an early age, who knows? She recognised my inadequacies and failings very early on and did all she could to nurture them. Thanks Bryan. You've made an old woman very happy.
ReplyDeleteSorry to disappoint you chaps, but the Mariah Carey "quote" is just an urban legend:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.snopes.com/quotes/carey.htm
Being a gentleman, I always defend the ladies, at the ones with big norks.
Does this make me a failed intellectual?
Unfortunatrly my own career as the most dismal of intellectual failures continues unabated in my heroic attempts to get book reviews accepted by Amazon. Undaunted by two past failures. I tried my hand yesterday with Kafka's The Trial, and though so far it has not appeared, I still live in hope. The review was I think titled "Deeply Confusing" and went,
ReplyDelete"What was that all about? I couldn't make head nor tail of it. All I can think of is that the Czechoslovakia of Kafka's day had a bizarre legal system. Though maybe this would be of interest to students of law, I have to say I was deeply disappointed. Rumpole of the Bailey it isn't."
I also tried my hand at Camus' The Outsider, and my review follows
"Existential means to do with existing and this book is to do with the existence of the lead character who is basically an outsider. Read it and think."
Unfortunately I din't make copies of my recent Brave New World and War & Peace reviews, though they included the helpful information that the furure is gonna be great, and both horses and Napoleon populated 19th century Russia.
Andrew, are you sure you are not a character in a Kafka novel yourself? If you are, it might explain a few things. How did you feel this morning when you got up?
ReplyDeleteI certainly wasn't under the impression I had a large number of legs, Neil.
ReplyDeleteThough on a more serious note, it could be seen that Kafka and Camus both exist as characters in Dostoesvky's novels, with particular emphasis in Kafka's case on Notes From the Underground- "I am a sick man", with Kafka's work being the playing out of this man trapped in his own mind. And Camus with Kirilov in Demons. Dostoevsky being the only one to be able to see all the way to the end of the respective intellectual positions.
ReplyDeleteI must retire my application for the FIS as I see my Camus review has been acceptedby Amazon. I knmew someone would recognise quality when they saw it.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.amazon.co.uk/Outsider-Penguin-Modern-Classics/dp/0141182504/sr=1-1/qid=1166270697/ref=sr_1_1/026-6514664-6314041?ie=UTF8&s=books