John and Tom were drinking beer and talking about their old times. John was still single, but Tom was married, although he didn't seem to be very happy about it. Tom was telling his friend how one mistake, sometimes affected the whole life of a man, when his friend, John, interrupted him. He was impressed by the strange appearance of a woman who was walking towards them. The woman was extremely ugly and she was dressed like an alien. She was wearing an old-fashioned dress and she had a funny hat on her head.
"Look at that terrible monster! It is coming near us!" - John said to his friend Tom.
"Don't worry, John! It's my wife." - answered Tom, in a low voice.
Then, John realized that he made a big mistake and began to apologize for it. But when Tom saw his faithful
friend saying that he was sorry for what he had said, Tom looked at John and said:
"It's not your mistake, my friend," said Tom. "It's mine."
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People are starting to blame invasive advertising for the stress in their lives. A few generations ago, people encountered only a few dozen ads in a typical day.
Today, 3,000 marketing messages a day flow into the average North American brain. That’s more than many of us can handle on top of all the other pressures of modern life. The fun image that advertising has traditionally enjoyed is now giving way to a much darker picture of advertising as mental pollution.
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Joaquim Maria Machado de Assis (1839-1908)
Machado de Assis was born in Rio de Janeiro, the son of a house painter and a Portuguese woman. Machado received little formal education. He learned French from a neighboring baker. Machado worked as a printer's apprentice at the National Press, and later he was a salesman and a proof-reader in a bookshop. During these years he started to write stories, poems, and novels. He began to gain fame as a poet in his mid-twenties, and by the late 1860s he had become a successful Brazilian man of letters.
He is widely regarded as Brazil's greatest novelist. Machado wrote nine novels, eight short-story collections, four volumes of poetry, 13 plays, and numerous critical essays. He often satirized middle-class values and behavior. Machado de Assis was an astute observer of the human mind and he revealed its dark sides. He shared with many authors of his period a reformist concern, but his view was colored with irony and skepticism.
His most famous novel, Dom Casmurro, is marvelously humorous, and sinister. Machado creates provoking unresolvable doubts in the reader's mind. It's no wonder that he is considered Brazil's greatest novelist and Capitu his most fascinating heroine; like the Mona Lisa, much lies hidden behind a superb portrait. If you've never heard of Machado de Assis, do yourself a favor and seek him out. He's well worth the effort.
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Anniversary Hype
Critics can deconstruct his legacy all they want. But it won’t keep
fans from snatching up those Mozart golf balls.
THE BIRTHDAY BASH
By Tara Pepper
Whatever the source or extent of Mozart’s genius, there is no doubt about his entrenched popular appeal. The world’s concert halls are gearing up for the 250th anniversary of his birth on Jan. 27 with a year of commemorative events. His hometown of Salzburg will host 260 concerts and 55 masses devoted to his music, and the Salzburg Festival (July 21 to Aug. 31) will feature performances of all 22 of his operas. Vienna, where the composer died in 1791, will showcase five new opera productions at the restored Theater an der Wien. In November the city will host a festival of new music inspired by Mozart and organized by Peter Sellars, who will also unveil his new, contemporary production of Mozart’s unfinished opera “Zaide” there in May. It will travel to Mostly Mozart festivals in London and New York in June and July. In Paris, film director Michael Haneke will present a new production of “Don Giovanni” later this month. (Mozart’s official birthday Web site details celebrations at mozart2006.net.) To be sure, the anniversary means big business. Austria’s national tourist board estimates that the Mozart brand is worth $8.8 billion. Salzburg stores are stocked with Mozart T shirts, calendars, beer, wine, milkshakes, golf balls, baby bottles – even a Mozart bra that plays “Eine Kleine Nachtmusik” when it is unfastened. “Salzburg and Vienna have both invested huge amounts in the anniversary, both as a means of attracting tourism and boosting their national status,” says London Evening Standard critic Norman Lebrecht. The anniversary has also prompted a flurry of more useful offerings. In his new documentary, “In Search of Mozart”, director Phil Grabsky followed the composer’s footsteps 40,000 kilometers around Europe, interviewing conductors
and musicians. He provides new interpretations of his music and letters, depicting Mozart in his historical context as a hardworking entrepreneur. “There were a lot of myths and inaccuracies about Mozart’s life in [the 1984 film] ‘Amadeus’ that need to be revised,” he says. Julian Rushton’s new biography, “Mozart: His Life and Work,” attributes the composer’s genius less to divine gifts than to perseverance. “We’re moving on to view him a bit more dispassionately,” says Rushton. Critic Anthony Holden recently published a study of Mozart’s librettist, “The Man Who Wrote Mozart: The Extraordinary Life of Lorenzo Da Ponte,” and Cambridge University Press has issued a lavish new Mozart Encyclopedia.
Perhaps Mozart will best be remembered for deepening the range of emotion that instruments could express. If you see any of the commemorative concerts this year, search out the moments of greatness – the cataclysmic finale of “Don Giovanni,” written months after the death of his father, or the Clarinet Concerto in A. The intense emotional ambiguity makes it nearly impossible to tell if the music is sad or joyous. At the heart of works like these is Mozart’s understanding that the most beautiful, lively phrase can be fully appreciated only in the shadow of its antithesis. When death in a minor key lingers in the cello section, or haunts a sparkling piano trill like unearthly thunder, something close to musical perfection
is reached. And no one has come close to Mozart in creating those kinds of emotional contradictions.
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THAT`S ALL FOLKS!!!
GOOD READING AND HAVE A NICE VACATION!!!
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