Ira Glass on the Secret of Success in Creative Work, Animated in Kinetic Typography

On grit, the art of storytelling, and bridging the gap between good taste and great work.

This American Life host and producer Ira Glass is among our era’s most beloved storytellers.

In this wonderful short motion graphics piece, filmmaker David Shiyang Liu has captured Glass’s now-legendary interview on the art of storytelling in beautifully minimalist and elegant kinetic typography.

The gist of Glass’s message for beginners — that grit is what separates mere good taste from great work, and that the only way to bridge the gap between ability and ambition is to actually do the work — is one that rings true for just about every creative discipline, and something I can certainly speak to in my own experience.

"The most important possible thing you can do is do a lot of work.”

Look for more of Glass’s singular lens on storytelling in The New Kings of Nonfiction, his fantastically curated anthology of essays by some of today’s finest nonfiction storytellers, the introduction to which alone is an absolute literary masterpiece.


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Ira Glass on the Secret of Success in Creative Work, Animated in Kinetic Typography | Brain Pickings

 LINK: http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2012/02/22/ira-glass-on-the-secret-of-success/

NYC Public Library Research Room

 





NYC_Public_Library_Research_Room_Jan_2006.jpg (JPEG Image, 4238 × 1981 pixels) - Scaled (30%)

Art

quotes

The only difference between me and a madman
is that I am not mad. -Salvador Dali

I suppose the limitations are just the
visions of the designer; there aren't any
physical limitations. -Seymour Cray, 1982

Mathematics is the only true metaphysics.
-William "Lord Kelvin" Thompson

An absolute monarch would be absolutely wise and good.
But no man is strong enough to have no interest.
Therefore the best king would be Pure Chance.
It is Pure Chance that rules the Universe; therefore,
and only therefore, life is good. -Aleister Crowley

Fashion is a form of ugliness so intolerable
that we have to alter it every six months. -Oscar Wilde

I practice absurdity quite religiously. -Alfred Hitchcock

This maxim
["God created the integers and the rest is the work of man"]
spoken by the algebraist Kronecker reveals more about his past
as a banker who grew rich through monetary speculation
than about his philosophical insight. -René Thom

The more I see of men, the better I like my dog. -Blaise Pascal

We must respect the other fellow's religion, but only in
the sense and to the extent that we respect his theory that
his wife is beautiful and his children smart. -H. L. Mencken

I'm subversive as hell. -Theodor "Dr. Seuss" Geisel

I don't know how long a musical form like rap,
with no harmonic content, virtually no melodic content,
and ultra-repetitive rhythms can hold people's attention,
but I guess we're going to find out. -Ed Macan

Remember, we don't really need the sun,
because it's very bright in the daytime.
We need the moon because it's dark at night.
-John Whateley

When I was young, I used to think that wealth and power
would bring me happiness. I was right. -Gahan Wilson

It is easy for us to ridicule Descartes* now, but we should
remember Berry Campbell's criterion: the greatness of a man's
contribution can be measured by how long he has held up progress.
Half a millennium is surely world class! -Joseph Bogen
(*for propounding dualism)

The views expressed are not necessarily those of the management.
 

The New York Public Library

 The New York Public Library

west side of Fifth Avenue between 40th and 42nd Streets
Developer: The New York Public Library
Architect: Carrère & Hastings



The library opened May 23, 1911.


In his book, "The New York Public Library Its Architecture and Decoration, published in 1986 by W. W. Norton & Company, Henry Hope Reed describes this correctly as "an edifice of stunning quality - a people's palace of triumphant glory."


"Astor Hall, at the entrance," Reed continues, "with its unique stone vault above an awesome white marble interior, sets the tone for the architectural delights that lie in store for the visitor. Sumptuous light brackets, elaborately decorated ceilings, the great gallery extending along the north-south axis of the building on the first floor, the window bays, the doorways, the great stairways, all combine to lift the human spirit and dignify man's achievements. The elaborately decorated Main Reading Room, almost two city blocks in length, located at the top of the building for light and quiet, is a fitting climax to all that the architects wished to achieve."

The library is one of the most important Beaux-Arts structures ever erected in midtown with its consistently lavish decorative detail.  


The symmetrical main Fifth Avenue facade of the library is splendid, set back on a broad, landscaped terrace with exquisite flagpoles and fronted by its two famous lion statues, popularly known as Patience and Fortitude, that wear wreaths during the winter holidays. Edward Clark Potter was the sculptor of the benign lions.

The facade has several important sculptures including Frederick MacMonnies' "Beauty,"  and George Grey Barnard's "Arts" and "History," on the south and north pediments, respectively.

Atop the handsome portico are inscriptions about the library's three great benefactors: James Lenox (1800-1880) who built the Lenox Library on the present site of the Frick Collection on Fifth Avenue at 70th Street; Samuel Jones Tilden (1814-1886) a former New York Governor and Democratic candidate for President whose home on Gramercy Park is now the National Arts Club and who left $5 million to found a free public Liberia; and John Jacob Astor (1763-1848), who commissioned Washington Irving to write the story of Astoria, his trading post in Oregon and who became the richest man in the country and founded his own library on Lafayette Place in 1852 that is now the New York Public Theater.

In 1897, the state approved city plans to replace the famous reservoir that occupied the site of the present library and much of what is now Bryant Park with a library. 

The exterior white marble came from Vermont and two-thirds of it was rejected as not high enough quality. The marble walls are one foot thick and the basement of the structure has additional brick walls four feet thick.

According to Reed, architect Thomas Hastings had urged that the library and the city buy the Fifth Avenue frontage across from the library to a depth of 91 feet, the distance the main building is set back from the avenue, in order to give it a more important, ceremonial setting. 


The dimensions of the library are impressive. Astor Hall, the main lobby behind the portico, is about 76 by 47 feet with a vaulted ceiling more than 37 feet high. The sinuous vaulted and the arched windows and white marble  soften the space. Of interest is the robust and unusual balustrades of the twin staircases at the north and south ends of the hall, especially their rounded terminals.


The "Landing Hall," shown above, is quite ornate, with stucco, according to Reed, painted to look like rich woods, and murals on printing themes by Edward Lanning in large arched panels. The murals were painted as part of the Works Progress Administration Project between 1932 and 1942.

The Main Reading Room is the crowning glory of the library.  It is divided into a north and south wing with a center divider for the staff to distribute books that come up in dumbwaiters from the miles of stacks below. 

The south wing of the Main Reading Room, shown below, remains very close to the original:  large tables with shaded lamps for reading.


Ceiling murals had suffered badly over the decades and by the 1990's had become barely discernible.  A $15 million restoration painted new clouds on the murals, additionally, the room's large, arched windows were cleaned and the last traces of black-out paint from World War II removed.

Paul Le Clerc, the library's president, said that the main reading room, which can accommodate 636 readers, is about the size of a football field and has 18 chandeliers, "is the key symbolic space within a library that rivals the great European libraries...and its essence is the most pluralistic, democratic access imaginable. The only criterion one needs to get in is curiosity."
 

                       Sculpture of two female figures on the Fifth Avenue facade.




The rear facade of the library facing Bryant Park has been restored and improved.  

Philip Roth tells French publication he's done with fiction - Yahoo! OMG! CA

By Hillel Italie, The Associated Press | The Canadian Press


NEW YORK, N.Y. - Exit, Philip Roth? Having conceived everything from turning into a breast to a polio epidemic in his native New Jersey, Roth has apparently given his imagination a rest.

The 79-year-old novelist recently told a French publication, 
Les in Rocks, that his 2010 release "Nemesis" would be his last. 
A spokeswoman for Houghton Mifflin Harcourt said Friday that she spoke with Roth and that he confirmed his remarks. 
Roth's literary agent, Andrew Wylie, declined comment.

Roth certainly worked hard, completing more than 20 novels over half a century and often turning out one a year. He won virtually every prize short of the Nobel and wrote such classics as "American Pastoral" and "Portnoy's Complaint." His parting words from "Nemesis": "He seemed to us invincible."


Philip Roth tells French publication he's done with fiction - Yahoo! OMG! CA

Link: http://ca.omg.yahoo.com/news/philip-roth-tells-french-publication-hes-done-fiction-210627415.html

Don't take life so seriously!

How to tell if a Catholic is driving too fast

Jewish Olympic Swimmer?

 

The Woodpecker Might have to go!

May your troubles be less, may your blessings be more, and
may nothing but happiness come through your door



Don't take life so seriously! 



 

DANCE




KISS A LOT !




RELAX IN NATURE






HAVE FUN





AND BE HAPPY!!!!




 

Today's Message of the Day is:

Life is short, Break the rules, Forgive quickly, Kiss slowly, Love truly, Laugh uncontrollably, And never regret anything that made you smile.

Send to all the people you care for and don't want to lose in 2012, even me.
If you get 3 back, you are a great friend.

Keith Richards - Cocaine Blues

This is Keith's cover of the classic blues-song originally written and recorded by Luke Jordan back in 1927.





Keith Richards: guitar and vocals (1994).



The lyrics:



well,yonder comes my baby all dressed in white

see baby gonna stay all night

cocaine all around my brain



yonder comes my baby all dressed in blue

see baby what you gonna do

cocain all around my brain



hey baby come here quick

this old cocaine is making me sick

cocain all around my brain



cocaine's for horses, its not for men

they say it'll kill you but they don't say when

cocain all around my brain



ohh baby would'nt you get here quick

this old cocaine is making me sick

cocain all around my brain



it's all around my brain

Category:

Music

License:

Standard YouTube License

George Jones & Mark Knopfler - White Lightnin' - YouTube

Keith Richards Talks About the Blues in Britain - YouTube

uploaded by Rollingtimesorg on May 3, 2009
 

Segments of Keith Richards talking about how the Blues kicked off in Britain, along with the Rolling Stones themselves. Taken from a BBC4 show, "Can Blue Men Play The Whites", as part of Blues Britannia. Also features Bill Wyman and Paul Jones.

Category:

Music

License:

Standard YouTube License

Keith Richards Talks About the Blues in Britain - YouTube

DON,T TELL MAMA I WAS DRINKING - YouTube

DON,T TELL MAMA I WAS DRINKING - YouTube

Paul McCartney: 'Still prancing' - Frost Over the World - Al Jazeera English

 

 

The Frost Interview

Paul McCartney: 'Still prancing'

The famous Beatles songwriter and musician speaks to Sir David Frost about his life in the spotlight. The Frost Interview Last Modified: 03 Nov 2012 13:09

Paul McCartney, one of the most famous musicians of all time, rose to prominence 50 years ago as part of the British pop sensation The Beatles. From humble, working-class beginnings, McCartney, 70, is now one of the richest men in the world. He has even topped the bill at the White House, playing for Barack Obama, the US president. He sits down with Sir David for a full hour to tell his own story of the band, and its break up; to discuss some of the highs - and a few lows - of his life; and to provide a glimpse into his world behind the headlines. The Beatles - John, Paul, George and Ringo - helped to define the 1960s, transforming modern music. They played sell out concerts all over the world, in front of hysterical fans. At the height of "Beatle Mania", fans screamed so loud that the band said they could not hear their own music. With more than 20 number one hits through the 1960s, they were seemingly unstoppable. But the glory days did not last and the group split in 1970. However, the songs written by McCartney and the late John Lennon continue to live on through the generations. "John and I wrote together something like 300 songs, just short of 300. We would meet up, sit down to write and three hours later we would have a song. And never, never did we have a dry session, we always wrote a song .... It was a great thing. Looking back on it I really feel blessed to be the guy who wrote with John. Because he was pretty hot stuff. And writing with me, I was pretty hot stuff too, so the two of us gelled," McCartney says. Recalling the break-up of The Beatles, McCartney says: "I think it was time for John certainly to leave. It was a bit of a shock to all of us, he just announced 'oh I am leaving the group'. We all said 'are you sure about this?' We tried to keep it together but he was definitely going to leave, so that was basically what did it. "But I think, in a way, then we realised that we had come full circle, we had kind of done everything we wanted to do ... So in actual fact it wasn't that bad a thing." On Yoko Ono, Lennon's then-wife who is often blamed for the break-up of The Beatles, McCartney says: "She certainly didn't break the group up." "The group was breaking up and I think she attracted John so much to another way of life that he then went on to, very successfully, add a sort of second part to his career, writing things like 'Imagine' and 'Give Peace a Chance'. I don't think he would have done that without Yoko."  On his own enduring career in music, McCartney says: "I saw something the other day where I was quoted as saying 'It will be pretty sad to be prancing around on a stage at 40'. "But no, I am still prancing," he laughs. "And enjoying it."
Click for Frost Over the World Paul McCartney: 'Still prancing' - Frost Over the World - Al Jazeera English Link: http://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/frostovertheworld/2012/11/201211384338112420.html