I wish I had time to write a bit more frequently here. Since returning from my business trip on Sunday, I've been going non-stop - class, meetings, class, more meetings, catching up on marking, picking Rachel up from the airport. There was a mildly amusing incident involving lost keys that I'll spare you from; though I will say it concerns yours truly on his hands and knees in a snowbank with a flashlight.
I'm particularly bummed that Leonard Cohen's going to be touring this summer in what's being described as his last major tour. The man's almost two hundred and I certainly don't begrudge him retiring... but the tour schedule does not a thing for me. Right now the only Canadian dates are Toronto and (of course) Montreal. Most dates are in European, where the sophisticated European palate has a deeper appreciation from Cohen's peculiar blend of darkness and desire, whimsy and longing. Still, as Leonard saw me through many a heartache, I'd like to see him in concert once before one of us died.
4 comments:
Well, if you do end up making your way to Toronto to see him, I've got a futon with your name on it. You just might have to share it with the cat.
I saw Cohen a few years back in Toronto, in the same venue he will be playing on this tour. Not a great venue for him, though he does an excellent concert. That was my first time, though my wife had seen him twice (before I even knew her, once in the sixties at York U., and once in the early seventies), and says he was grimly determined back then to rid the audience of undesirables -- meaning people he thought were there in order to be seen there -- by engaging in audience-thinning techniques: rude words, insulting the middle class, and so on. He no longer bothers. I'm kind of sorry about that. He's worth seeing.
Going much further back, my father used to claim that when Cohen had published only his first book of poems, my great aunt (of whom my father was not enamoured), hosted L.C. at a ladies' book club reading. He was becoming known, my father contended, as a young romantic poet. Since that reading at my great aunt's, I was assured, Cohen's work had exhibited a hitherto-unseen bitter darkness of spirit.
Carry on . . .
That's very cool, amphimacer. I love loved Cohen since my teenaged years. A dearly departed co-worker of mine had a daughter who would go on Cohen-spotting trips to Montreal. She claims to have bumped into him several times.
And while I would love to see him in concert, I need to come to terms with the fact that he's aged and looks a little like my late grandma.
Mike, I'm so close to taking away your ability to call yourself a "blogger". It's a privledge you have to work for.
Also, I need someone to introduce me to Cohen. I read a small article about him last summer and was intrigued. Interested?
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