Wednesday 16th July 2025
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Sensual Absence in Jim Jarmusch

Ellie Czyzowska
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Sensual Absence in Jim Jarmusch

There is something sensual about black and white to me – perhaps it is because we live in a technicolour world, so to view a film purposefully put into black and white, it is easy to gain a sense of ‘pleasure’ from the artistic choice. This is exactly how I feel about Jim Jarmusch’s two early films, Stranger than Paradise (1984) and Down by Law (1986), which are both slow-moving, cynical (one more than the other) pieces of cinema about everyday men and women going through life.

When we consider Stranger than Paradise, it is a film which more of less defines existentialism. Jarmusch focuses on our three main (and more or less only) characters: Willie, a Hungarian immigrant trying to lead an ‘all-American life’, his cousin Eva who has come to stay, and his best friend Eddie. They give existentialism a ‘cool’ edge, and the minimalist style of the film suits the unsatisfied lives they all seem to be living. At one point, while road-tripping across Florida (ironically described as ‘Paradise’ despite its boring, dull landscape depicted), Eddie stomps across the snow and exclaims that ‘everything looks the same’. This is the message of the film, and this is what the black-and-white emphasises. Classic, ‘Old Hollywood’ directors were forced into greyscale, but now that it has become an artistic choice, it allows the viewer to ask why it was chosen – in the case of Stranger than Paradise and Down by Law, there are a few reasons.

The first is that to strip any film landscape of its colour can, to an extent, force the viewer to look closer for its beauty. For a film like Stranger than Paradise, which is trying to show you the mundanity of the real world, the lack of colour means that either you peer closer and try to find something worth focusing your attention on, or you look away, you turn the film off, and you move on.

But black-and-white doesn’t have to strip the landscape of ‘beauty’, as shown by Down by Law, a film about three men who end up in a prison cell together and decide to break out. There is a restless energy to every shot in this film – I mean, Tom Waits stars, it was hardly going to be dull. This energy is released in large by light, a pleasing shift from the darkness of the monotonous greyscale. We see each of the three men smoking in the cell, cigarettes always having been a symbol of sensuality for the bodily pleasure and ‘chic-ness’ they represent. Once the trio have broken out, we see them light a fire in the woods, and the bright white of the flames seems to represent their new-found, but difficult to maintain, sense of freedom. We feel vindicated watching these men warm themselves against bleached light, and colour would only have ruined the scene – if there is one thing Stranger than Paradise and Down by Law teach about Jarmusch, it is that he does a disservice to himself every time he makes a film in technicolour. 

A connecting factor of both these films is John Lurie, who plays Willie in Stranger than Paradise, and Jack in Down by Law. He is perfectly suited to this existentialist-chic, melodramatic ‘nothingness’ or early Jarmusch, an aesthetic the director skilfully recreated in colour with his 2015 Patterson (hello Adam Driver), his own time being spent acting, painting, and playing jazz on his saxophone, a lifestyle that belongs to Stranger than Fiction. Jarmusch and Lurie in their years of film-making clearly had a close relationship, the director even starring in one of the six episodes of Lurie’s parodic reality tv show Fishing with John (which I 100% recommend, episode four stars Willem Dafoe and is eternally rewatchable) – Jarmusch knew what he was doing when he cast Lurie. There is a clear understanding of the sensual in both of these men – Lurie’s acting is sleek and contained, he both melts into the black-and-white, but also distinguishes himself from the rest of each scene. A prime example of this is in Eva’s first night at the apartment in Stranger than Paradise, where the two cousins sit and watch television together in silence. There is nothing going on in this scene, and it, like all in the film, ends fading into black, but you feel what is being unsaid there – you feel ‘fulfilled’, and this is the sensuality of Lurie’s acting.

 For Jim Jarmusch, black-and-white does not mean boring or lifeless – it does not there to make the film harder to concentrate on, and really all of these comments are meaningless. Stripping these films of colour brings back a sense of elegance to their plot – they are modern stories of isolation and longing, and if they had been shot in colour, this would have been a disservice to the abilities of the actors, and of the director. The fact that they have such a sensuality to them, and achieve this with such absence, is one of the many reasons they are two of my favourite films to ever have been made.

Boards, Beats and Bros: Mid90s Review

Angelica De Vido
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Boards, Beats and Bros: Mid90s Review

Twenty-five years on from the titular mid-1990s moment, Jonah Hill’s directional debut offers a nostalgic portrayal of the atmosphere and popular culture of this time. The film follows thirteen-year old protagonist, Stevie (an impressive Sunny Suljic), as he becomes friends with a group of older misfit teens, who unite through their love of skateboarding. Following the traditional narrative arc of the coming-of-age tale, the film follows Stevie as he rides out the highs and lows of adolescence, and learns important life lessons along the way.

From the film’s opening scene, where Stevie is bullied and attacked by his older brother, Hill underlines how Stevie’s difficult home life leads him to constantly seek escape out in the Los Angeles urban environment, which offers a liberation from the stifling domestic mise-en-scene. One day when he is mooching around town, he spots a group of older teenage boys skating and joking around, and he develops an instant admiration-crush on them. As Stevie befriends and gets to know these boys, he becomes inculcated into the style, language, and music of 1990s skate culture, which Hill portrays as offering a crucial solace and community for the adolescent misfits, and socially marginalised in the city – from African-American Ray (a moving, nuanced performance by Na-Kel Smith), who is routinely harassed by the LAPD whenever he attempts to step foot in an affluent neighbourhood of the city, to Fourth Grade (Ryder McLaughlin), whose family is so deprived that he cannot afford to buy new socks. Indeed, a key realisation for Stevie throughout the film is that no matter how “cool” and unfazed people might seem, everyone has their own secrets and problems, and we each cope with these in different ways. For these boys, their coping mechanism is skateboarding.

From the film’s opening shot, which illustrates a number of skateboards placed haphazardly across the floor, to the final shot of the boys skating along the highway together to the extradiegetic song that declares, “This is dedicated to the ones I love,” the redemptive homosocial power of skateboarding is placed at the heart of this film. Indeed, this film centres on an exploration of the nature of ‘brofriend culture’ of adolescent male friendships, and the love of the art of skateboarding and the freedom it provides. In this regard, Hill’s film is in keeping with the tradition of skateboarding coming-of-age films, beginning with Larry Clark’s infamous dark portrayal of 1990s toxic masculinity in Kids (1995), to the far more emotionally-resonant, insightful recent film Skate Kitchen (2018), and the documentary Minding the Gap (2018). However, in opposition to these recent films, Mid90s’ episodic, loose plot means that the film ultimately fails to offer a coherent, in-depth and emotionally-resonant insight into the appeal of skate culture for the socially marginalised.  Instead, Hill’s film feels more like an indulgent reminiscence of the popular culture landscape of this decade.

Mid90s is structured through a patchwork of quotidian scenes – from Stevie playing video games on the sofa at home, to him drinking milkshakes with the other boys on the steps of the local high school. Hill shot Mid90s on 16mm, which gives the film a 1990s home video aesthetic. In addition to this aesthetic, and its hip hop soundtrack, the film also explores the materiality of 1990s adolescent masculinity, as Stevie begins to construct his emerging young manhood through collecting a range of cultural signifiers of masculinity – including hip hop tape cassettes, weights, trainers, and baggy jeans, all of which he purchases and admires with wonder and excitement, as he attempts to emulate the style and behaviour of his older friends on the skateboarding scene.

With the encouragement of his new friends, Stevie racks up a series of adolescent “firsts” during the film – from a first kiss, to the first time travelling in someone’s car without a parent present. However, the film also depicts the more harmful side of “brofriend culture”, as Stevie experiences a number of more ‘negative’ first experiences – from going along to house parties with the older boys and taking drugs and getting drunk for the first time, to being seriously injured in a drink-driving accident when he naively allows himself to be driven home by a drunk friend along the LA freeway.

Overall, Mid90s offers an interesting, entertaining insight into the redemptive power of skateboarding – and the bro culture that surrounds it – to offer solace to adolescent male lives in crisis. However, Hill’s primary focus on providing a nostalgic portrayal of 1990s urban aesthetics, sensibilities, and popular culture means that the film ultimately misses an opportunity to offer an in-depth insight into the central role of homosocial communities in riding out the waves of emotional turmoil of adolescent experience.

Sensuality In Strauss’ ‘Salome’

Josh Taylor
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Sensuality In Strauss’ ‘Salome’

It seems almost inevitable that sensuality would play a vital role in an art form like opera. A synthesis of emotionally charged music, labyrinthine plots, and divinely grandiose sets make for an unrivalled dramatic experience, full of sensory stimuli so that, when combined the almost universally romantic nature of operatic drama, sensuality is a common occurrence. Fleeting moments of sexual tension or drawn out duets of passion have gradually become as common in opera as the word ‘amore’ is in their libretti. 

Any opera buff, upon hearing the word ‘sensuality’, will almost instantly think of Salome, Strauss’s one act opera based on Oscar Wilde’s play of the same name, which culminates in a necrophiliac scene wherein the titular role kisses the decapitated head of John the Baptist. Still controversial for some audiences even now, the sensually-infused nature of such a scene was clearly intended to provoke and is musically just as ground-breaking as the narrative is morally-questionable. Culminating in a cadence that includes what has been described as “the most sickening chord in all opera”, the entire scene is underlined with a haunting trill, sustained by various instruments creating an eeriness now more commonly identified with horror soundtracks than the opera hall. The persistent interruptions of oboes pervade the bars in which Salome’s voice is absent, before sinisterly assimilating with her in a declining scale, launching the voice and orchestra into a perverse melodic tangent. C sharp major comes into play, but Salome has no reason for such musical optimism, clearly misinterpreting the dire situation she is in, as the orchestra tangle her back into the minor shortly after. As if the audience needed anymore reminding, an orchestral rumble, an earthquake or perhaps the gates of hell opening, begins moments before each of Salome’s more recitative-style phrases, adding to the foreboding of the scene.

Fraught with leitmotif, the music of this closing scene is difficult to fully appreciate without reference to the wider opera, but the way in which Strauss crafts such horrific sinistry, all revolving around one moment of sensuality is striking. The switches between minor and major emblemise the contorted reactions forced upon the audience: here is a woman, so engrossed in her sensual desires that, no matter how perverse they may be, she is in some way deserving of the audience’s sympathy. The discordance in the orchestra is not only a symbol of the ominous fate of Salome, but of the moral complexity the audience feels upon experiencing such sensuality. The musical presence of the sensuality is just as jarring as its physical representation, and it is clear that, both in the score and on the stage, sensuality has a shock factor like little else; the entire opera leads to this one kiss, a transient, sensual moment, that nonetheless defines and reshapes the hour and a half that precedes it.

Salome’s kiss is undoubtedly an extreme example, a sensual climax of an obscene kind, but musically important nonetheless, and a moment that illuminates its preceding pages of music. But sensuality in opera is not merely constricted to the grand and climactic. On the other end of the scale, an equally (if not more) famous scene (for very different reasons), situated at the start of an opera, revolves around the innocent touch of a hand, musically and narratively moulding the remaining two and a half hours to come. 

Only a few decades before Strauss, Puccini’s ‘Che gelida manina’ was composed as the first solo aria for Rodolfo, the tenor, in La Bohème. The high C has since been enshrined as a litmus test for any tenor worth their salt and the aria is one of opera’s most famous. Typically Puccini in its lyricism, there is a great deal of realismo composition going on too that accentuates the brief moment of sensuality; these sweet layers return through the rest of the opera to remind character and audience of a naïve, rose-tinted, fleetingly sensual touch of the hand that lit a spark between the two lovers. 

The opening phrases, fairly short with minimal accompaniment and conversational libretto, imply a hesitant relationship, a man rendered nervous by touching the cold hand of a woman he loves. As the aria progresses, fairly slowly, gradually building, so too does the orchestra grow in richness, with strings more consistent in their accompaniment and doubling of the tenor voice, vocal tessitura rising, and more classically metaphorical lyrics about love coming out of the locker in an attempt to woo Mimi. Vocal silence is no longer hesitant, but an opportunity for orchestral flourishing, building up the internal courage before the hopeful climax in that high C is unleashed by the voice. A sudden retraction of opera-ness then returns, with the song back on a conversational tone, but only now, post tenor mating-call, the conversation is far more intimate and familiar: the high C worked. Though on first glance there doesn’t seem to be much depth to this aria, it is the ensuing music that grants it its development: Mimi’s following aria, structurally very similar, seamlessly blends into a duet between the two lovers with similar thematic progression in both, stemming from Rodolfo’s nervous attempts at love. Themes from these three arias recur throughout the ensuing opera in various forms, reminding the audience of the sensual bond between the two, subtly nodding to their origins, even at times when things look to be a little bleak between them. Indeed, before Mimi’s death, a gently minor variation of phrases from their first encounter whispers on the strings, as if she is drifting off into the past, towards that sensual moment when they met, full of optimism and hope.

Sensuality, perhaps inextricable from opera, can take form on either end of the spectrum: from orchestrally complex and scandalous to an almost child-like modesty in action and musicality, and everywhere in between, the sensual forms an innate compositional and emotional tool. Hardly surprising from such an impassioned art form.

Frequencies and what they do to you

Henry Griffiths
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Frequencies and what they do to you

So, what is sound? It’s a cliche opener, but the answer is easy enough.

Sound is just wiggly air.

It’s as good a definition as any and brings up an interesting issue – the sheer inability of the English language to describe sounds on their own. When we try to talk about sounds, we usually end up talking about the physical objects that produce the sound, rather than the sound itself as an abstract entity. We might describe a “drumbeat” or a “guitar strum” or a “cymbal clash,” but we lack any specific words in our vernacular to talk about what these sounds actually are, outside of a few crude descriptors for volume and pitch. Try and describe your favourite song without referencing the instruments used to create it and you’ll see what I mean. This deficiency in our language represents the historical attitude towards sounds as being inherently tied to the objects that create them and disentangling this assumption is one of the key goals of contemporary sound art practice today.

The human experience of sound is instinctively tied to the real world. Our primate brains are hardwired to try and detect the source of sounds, to try and figure out a “story” to a series of sounds, to detect danger and gather coherent information about our surroundings whenever we can. By detaching sound from its creator, sound art can confuse and even intimidate us by presenting us with a dense impenetrable soundscape or a stripped-back ethereal one.

This primal instinct for understanding is well-displayed in possibly the most famous piece of sound art, sometimes controversial but undeniably revolutionary, John Cage’s 1952 work 4’33”, a musical score that instructs its performers not to play anything at all for the duration of the piece. Primed to consciously listen instead of merely “hearing” by the expectation of a concert setting, the listeners apply their heightened focus to the natural quiet soundscape of the audience itself in lieu of any actual performance and find themselves instead straining to pick up all the tiny natural sounds that humans are constantly making without realising. The overall effect ends up being a slow and exploratory one, as each audience member carefully picks up one tiny sound at a time and then examines the sound from all angles to try and figure out its source – a fidgeting child crinkling a sweet wrapper, a man scratching his stubble, a shoe brushing the floor, etc, before moving onto the next mysterious microsound one can detect and trying to solve it too.

In the opposite direction, some sound artists delight in presenting the listener with completely alien sounds, produced by complex synthesizers and scrambled by digital processing until they have become so abstract any link to the real world is nigh-impossible. A good example of this is the process of “sonification”, where non-audio data is converted to sound form by a computer program and played back. A ubiquitous real life example of sonification you possibly have never thought about is the ticking/chiming of a clock – the idea of time passing having a “sound” is absurd, and yet we have been contextually taught by our surroundings to associate the ticking of a clock integrally with the abstract concept of “time” – ticks speeding up to indicate time passing faster and slowing down to indicate the opposite. Sonification is used for practical purposes in Geiger counters, altimeters in planes, and sonar displays in ships but sound artists can also take this process and apply it to more abstract and unfamiliar concepts to great effect. Mario De Vega’s 2015 “DOLMEN” installation of receivers and bundled radio scanners worked to intercept the everpresent but invisible torrent of radio and infrared signals passing through the air and turn them into audible sounds. If one made a phone call in the vicinity of his radio mast, one could hear the squawk and howl of their phone’s outgoing signals being picked up and rebroadcast by his piece. This interactivity guided the audience to a deeper appreciation for the sounds that aren’t there, the silent chatter of digital signals all around us temporarily given a voice by De Vega to express themselves with.

But sound art isn’t just self-reflective, it can connect people too. Live performances of sound art produce a rare intimacy between listener and artist, akin to watching a painter working with their brush in real-time rather than just observing a static end-product. The tilted head of the practitioner as they delicately tweak dials, the furrowed brow as they gently position a microphone just so, the understated quietness of someone carefully considering their next noise, these things are captivating in a way few other experiences are as a performer (or performers) gently coax sounds from a box. Unlike a painting, a film or a commercial song, these performances only exist in the moment and then in memory – the moment you are sharing with the artist is a special one that you will never be able to experience again, adding a deep poignancy to the experience, and that transient aspect and lack of a fixed material context elevates sound art performance to an almost unparalleled level of intensity.

Hungry for Love, or Just Plain Hungry?

Peter Lewis
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Hungry for Love, or Just Plain Hungry?

It’s back. After a whole year, the sundrenched, bikini-clad gawp-fest that is ‘Love Island’ is returning to our screens. Love it or hate it, the hype around the fifth season is already sweeping across the internet, just in time for summer exams. However, recent discussions surrounding the duty of care that reality TV provides for its contestants has resulted in a backlash against the programme, especially in light of the tragic deaths of two former islanders.

Undoubtedly the easiest thing to criticise ‘Love Island’ for is its unrealistic portrayal of body image. Defending the casting decisions, the Controller of ITV Digital Channels said at the Edinburgh TV Festival: “I think on the body image thing, we cast very attractive people because it’s a sexy show.” Being a “sexy show” evidently results in a cast who look as if they spend half their life in the gym, and the other half in the tanning salon. In fact, these are the main activities the islanders seem to participate in throughout the show, either seen lounging around on sun beds or pumping dumbbells in the scorching heat. Interestingly though, one activity we rarely see the islanders engaged in is mealtimes, with the only memorable instances coming from the dates we get to see, or when preparing food is set as a challenge.

One assumption is that the islanders, being lean, mean, grafting machines, are starving themselves to keep their trim physiques; however, reports from previous contestants suggest that this is far from the case. Montana Brown has revealed in interviews that all the contestants are in fact catered for extremely well, being served lunch and dinner, and being able to request specific foods. Breakfast is the only meal they have to prepare for themselves, which is why we do occasionally see contestants frying eggs in the mornings.

The producers’ excuse is that there isn’t time to show meals, while other reports have revealed that microphone checks take place as the contestants are eating, limiting what can be shown. Both reasons are valid, though don’t alter the damaging presentation of eating habits offered by the show. While it could be argued that the absence of mealtimes is simply another way in which reality TV distorts real life, it doesn’t square up well with the heightened attention to food given by shows such as ‘I’m a Celebrity.’ Rather, the imbalance of working out to eating could be considered psychologically damaging to impressionable viewers.

The solution to this problem is obvious. In the same way that the show cut scenes of contestants smoking, the show could include scenes of the contestants sat together eating. This would add a little normality to the strange foodless existence that is Love Island, as well as encouraging healthy eating habits.

The Best Steaks in Oxford!

Zahra Farzanekhoo
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The Best Steaks in Oxford!

The Porterhouse is a hotel and restaurant with a small cult following due to the fact that they have the best steaks in Oxford. Nestled in a tranquil residential street, a minute’s walk from Said Business School and the rail station, The Porterhouse offers a small and intimate dining experience away from the restaurants in the loud and overexposed Westgate and away from the restaurants in the repetitive and bland George St. With its extremely friendly staff and tranquil atmosphere, it is the perfect place for a first date, casual dinner, or to treat your old man this coming Father’s Day.

The Porterhouse is a place that knows what it is good at. The menu is simple, there are only a handful of options for each course and they make sure their steaks are the highlight. They have a variety of cuts available including a range of dry-aged steaks, each displayed on a chalkboard in each of the restaurant’s two dining rooms, both of which are diligently crossed out following each order. Unfortunately, there is only one vegetarian option, the Portobello grill, and only one pescatarian option, the tuna steak. My more health-conscious friends have told me that both are excellent choices; however it is something to bear in mind when deciding where to eat. It’s probably not the best place to take a vegan on a date, for instance. However, if you’re not put off by the limited menu, and appreciate the restaurant’s clarity in their focus, you’re in for a very enjoyable dining experience!

I first had the opportunity to visit The Porterhouse at the start of this year. It was a friend’s surprise birthday dinner and we had the private dining area, appropriately called the Smoke Room, to ourselves. We ordered a variety of sharing steaks from the chalkboard and waited eagerly for them to arrive. Needless to say, we were very pleased when they did. The wait was a little longer than I would have hoped for, but I suppose that is to be expected when you order the weight equivalent of a new born baby in red meat. Since then, I’ve gone back several times, and have never once been disappointed by my experience!

Most recently, I went twice in 5th Week. On the latter occasion, I was exhausted and had just spent three hours trying to get back to Oxford from London (all the trains out of Paddington were delayed!), and so decided to treat myself at what is by far my favourite restaurant in Oxford. I had the bone marrow as starter, followed by the dry-aged flat iron and finished off with their chocolate fondant and sticky toffee pudding; the man at the table across from me did laugh when half the dessert menu arrived at my table but he seemed to respect it. Their steaks are lovely; I don’t know how to explain it. Its steak is better than all the others I’ve had in Oxford, and you have to try it to understand. But what really makes me keep returning to The Porterhouse is the sticky toffee pudding.

As all my friends could tell you, the highlight of my week is when my college hall has apple crumble or sticky toffee pudding; on many occasions I have dropped everything to run to the dining hall before it closes as soon as my friends text me. It’s somewhat become a joke how much my mood depends on whether I get such texts or not – and when hall is not there to fulfil my cravings, I find myself at The Porterhouse. The sticky toffee pudding is just sublime: it’s the perfect level of sweetness and has a subtle and distinct nutty taste. It’s genuinely one of the best things I’ve had and if you’re not big on your steaks, go to The Porterhouse just for this alone.

At The Porterhouse, you can have steak for breakfast, served to you by lovely and helpful staff, accompanied with a glass of wine or cocktail from their very impressive range, finished off with their impeccable desserts. I cannot imagine a more perfect meal, at least, not in Oxford. It’s a hidden treasure and it’s the kind of place that fits the whole ‘if you know, you know’ notion. Well, now you know, so go.

The State of Our Plates Post-Brexit

Clare Tierney
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The State of Our Plates Post-Brexit

The consensus among experts is that Brexit will impact food prices. Except that the extent and intricacies of this dilemma can, for now, only be speculated upon, uncertain as we still are about whether, Noel Edmunds-style, it will be deal or no deal. Some sectors will be affected more than others, in accordance with how much of certain foodstuffs we import from the EU. Allow me to serve up the latest findings and predictions on this rather unsavoury of issues, so you can decide for yourself whether to abandon studying to work instead on stockpiling Biscoff.

Like a lot of Brexit-related discussion, it would be easy to postpone worrying about food supplies until further down the line. It is simpler to assume it ‘won’t affect me’, but studies indicate to the contrary: many popular supermarket trolley items may take a hit. An LSE study predicts that “speciality cheese [will be] particularly prone to shortages.” Think halloumi, camembert, mozzarella. The same goes for popular cuts of meat, such as leg. And vegans, don’t think you get off lightly. Britishgrown tomatoes make up only 20% of the tomatoes we consume, roughly. Plenty of other fruit and vegetables paint a similar picture.

The degree to which we see price increases for these products will depend on what happens in the negotiations of trade tariffs and the conditions for border checks on EU imports, as well as exchange rates. Currently, the UK, isn’t subject to tariffs on imports, nor inspection of cargo imported from an EU member state. However, this will change post-Brexit, with marked chaos set to ensue if we leave without a deal. The UK Trade Policy Observatory based at the University of Sussex calculated that an average tariff of 44.6% on dairy could translate to a price rise of 8.1%. The fact that the pound has already fallen in value is suspected to have “contributed to a small rise in food prices” a study by the London School of Economics says. These two factors plus the effect of border checks – “one day of delay for a lorry will easily cost a business 600 to 1,000 euros” (£500- £850), according to a KPMG report – means feeding ourselves will, almost inevitably, cost more.

Certain retailers began stockpiling prior to the original exit date of 29th March, with WH Smith among them, focusing on chocolate. However, now that the date has been pushed back to 31st October, CEO Stephen Clarke says “we’ll have to unwind [the stockpiling] and build it again”, due to expiry dates on the products. Understandably, there is no merit in beginning to stockpile perishable food items now, with Brexit planned for Halloween. Stockpiling in the lead up to the March date has, therefore, backfired in some cases. Tesco chief executive Dave Lewis says the supermarket has now started focusing on items with a long shelf-life, in a move to be “proactive” should Brexit hit our food supply chain hard. But stockpiling gets even more complicated once you consider the annual pressure on warehousing at Christmas time. Co-op CEO Steve Murrells believes that “we’ll have to be smart about the way we substitute, using canned grocery items to possibly replace some fresh items,” so with space for tins of sweetcorn tight, a solution will have to be found.

Our domestic-grown and produced foodstuffs are, also, far from immune from the negative impacts of Brexit. British agriculture currently relies heavily on EU subsidies that allow farmers to make a living from their trade. Without these subsidies, the likes of dairy and vegetable production could become unsustainable, so even if man can currently live by British milk alone, this may not be the case post-Brexit.

In summary, you needn’t start stockpiling now. Tesco has thought ahead, so even if brie is off the menu, tinned peaches will save you from starvation. Be prepared to pay a premium for that antipasti tray, though. Or just up sticks and move to Italy.

But on a serious note, here’s hoping International Trade Secretary Liam Fox can secure some reasonable tariff deals and, more crucially, we aren’t left in a no-deal limbo.

Philosophy in the Bookshop – Nigel Warburton in Conversation with Naomi Wolf

Grace Tomlinson
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Philosophy in the Bookshop – Nigel Warburton in Conversation with Naomi Wolf

Naomi Wolf’s new book, Outrages: Sex, Censorship, and the Criminalisation of Love, charts the development of censorship around sexual deviancy and morality in the 19thcentury, through the lives of John Addington Symonds, writer and critic, and Walt Whitman. She spoke in conversation with Nigel Warburton (co-author of Reading Political Philosophy: Machiavelli to Mill) at Blackwell’s on Thursday the 23rdof May, as part of a wider promotional tour, and as part of Blackwell’s ‘Philosophy in the Bookshop’ series, set to include speakers such as Armand D’Angour and Jonathon Reé. 

She began by explaining how moving it was to be giving a talk in Oxford, where the graduate thesis out of which Outrages came was researched and written. Oxford holds significance for one of the subjects of her book, too. J A Symonds studied at Balliol, where he fell in love with William Fear Dyer, a choirboy three years his junior. He was eventually elected to an open fellowship at Magdalen. He left Oxford for Switzerland following a breakdown prompted by an accusation of homosexuality, despite its eventual dismissal. Wolf charts the effect the Obscene Publications Act of 1857 had on Symonds and his writing, and on wider society. Most of Symonds’ work remained unpublished during his lifetime, locked in a metal box in his study for fear of arrest. Her study of censorship and decency laws becomes transatlantic with the inclusion of Walt Whitman, with whom Symonds enjoyed a close epistolary friendship, although they never met face-to-face. Symonds was an admirer of Whitman’s, frequently asking him to speak up on behalf of British writers from the position of increased freedom he enjoyed in America, until similar censorship laws were introduced in the States. 

Wolf argues that the censorship laws of the 19thcentury were motivated by a need for social control, rather than an organic wave of moral panic over sexual deviancy – she points to the examples of the forced venereal disease examinations under the Contagious Diseases Act of 1864, which allowed authorities to arrest any woman suspected of prostitution and keep her in a ‘lock hospital’ until the end of her sentence. Wolf highlights the little-known fact that these examinations were often extended to men suspected of sodomy, with a whole branch of science devoted to examining men’s anuses to judge whether they engaged in gay sex. When discussing her research for this, Warburton brought up the controversy that emerged on BBC Radio 3, when historian Matthew Sweet pointed out that Wolf had wrongly interpreted the phrase ‘death recorded’ in the Old Bailey records as evidence of an execution following a conviction of sodomy, when the two men she cites were not sentenced. She responded by acknowledging the mistake, saying it would be corrected in the next print run, but cited other instances of men being executed for gay sex in the period, claiming that the fact that two of these men were not actually executed does not invalidate her thesis. Warburton directed those who wanted to follow the controversy to Twitter. (I have since followed her, and she has been tweeting about it. A lot.) 

The floor was then opened to questions, and we were immediately assaulted by people asking Wolf to comment on trans issues. Wolf responded with an admission that she had been told not to wade into this discussion, as it is so different in the UK than in America, but that she was going to anyway. She said she believed people should be able to identify however they want, and use any bathroom they want to, which, although a noble sentiment, unfortunately opened the floor for people to jump in with increasingly aggressive ‘but what about THIS debate’ questions which Wolf was clearly unequipped to answer. The discussion was eventually shut down by Warburton, and we moved on to some fairly interesting questions – like one from a philosophy student asking how to make the curriculum more diverse, probably prompted by Wolf’s earlier comment that she had abandoned her original idea for a post-grad thesis in the 80s because she was told the Oxford dons didn’t think feminist criticism a valid method of study. There was then an opportunity to buy a copy of the book, and get it signed. She remarked to us that we should keep hold of the book, since the now-corrected mistakes in it would make it a collector’s copy. I look forward to reading it.

An Artificial Low

Shamika Tamhane
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An Artificial Low

Ottessa Mosfegh’s novel, out in paperback since July last year, details the experience of an unnamed orphaned young woman living in New York at the start of the millennium who embarks upon a year of sleeping in a bid to fix her ennui. With the help of a questionable psychiatrist called Dr Tuttle who plies her with prescriptions to every sleeping pill under the sun, the narrator spends a whole year in a self-induced coma with only occasional trips to get coffee and visits from her bulimic best friend Reva as interruptions. The narrator is white, privileged, and in her words, like an ‘off-duty model’, with ample opportunities she rejects, brimming with insights on the world she sees.

Moshfegh places her novel in a pre-9/11 New York filled with super-ficiality and narcissism, best exemplified in the Chelsea art gallery where the protagonist worked before getting fired. It is a place of emptiness, filled with ‘avant- garde’ art designed more to excite shock than to present anything of value, a trend which the narrator mocks repeatedly. With a straight face, she baldly describes how the star artist Ping Xi inserts pigment pellets into his penis and then masturbates on a canvas to produce works which were ‘all nonsense, but people loved it’.

Locating the plot in this period is an excellent move – a time far enough from the present that technology and social media do not intervene in the central sleep mission, while still being recognisable. Chunky cell-phones, and VHS tapes of old Whoopi Goldberg movies crop up intermittently in the plot.

Rest and Relaxation is not the most restful or relaxing of reading experiences. The protagonist is caustic and darkly humorous, but I soon begin to find myself agreeing, and viewing the world through her misanthropy. But for all the cynicism which pervades the book, there are moments where I felt genuine sympathy.

There are instances of disconcerting sentimentality, as when she explains her reluctance to sell her dead par-ents’ house because there may be remnants of their skin cells and fingernails still inside. It is often the physicality and imagery which are the most moving: descriptions of Reva crying or binge-eating. Like Moshfegh’s previous work Eileen, there is a deliberate attempt to create a subversive image of a woman that might provoke disgust. She is no sleeping beauty – three-day spells of hibernation triggered by Infermiterol (a made-up drug) leave her covered in stains and ‘eye boogers.’

For a novel in which the heroine spends a lot of time comatose, it is enthralling. The voice is compelling and witty, drawing one into the experience.

Characters like the quack Dr Tuttle (found in Yellow Pages of course) and Reva, whose dialogue is straight out of a Noughties advice column, fill up the pages with vivid nonsense. Lines are delivered candidly and designed to leave you with a wry smile. The ending is epiphanic, and left me questioning all that had just happened in the past 300 pages without rendering them at all a waste of time.

Menial Heroics

Amelia Stout
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Menial Heroics

Looking at this book, it’s difficult to know what one’s getting oneself into. ‘Convenience Store Woman’: the phrase has a kind of menial heroism to it. And reading the book is like realising that, in a climate of social pressure and conformity, some kind of purpose can be found at the checkout till of a convenience store, in a world of rice balls and cans of coffee, amongst the ringing greetings of ‘Irasshaimasé!’

Keiko Furukura, the heroine, has been a misfit since childhood. Now 36, and having worked at the Smile Mart convenience store for 18 years, she deals constantly with the probing questions of a nosy, judgemental society. ‘How come you’re only doing that sort of job?’ ‘How about if we find someone for you?’ ‘Why don’t you register on a marriage site?’ Desperate times call for desperate measures, and Keiko, deciding that ‘deep down’ she ‘wanted some kind of change’, establishes an arrangement with self-pitying, misogynist co-worker Shiraha (also on the margins of society) that will bring an end to their existence as ‘foreign objects’. But the desperation from which society continually suggests she should be suffering is exactly what Keiko so noticeably rejects throughout the novel. There is a kind of poignance to her innocence and honesty: ‘my very cells exist for the convenience store’.

It’s rare to find a relatively static narrative evoke such an intense atmosphere. And it’s strange to be persuaded that the atmosphere of a convenience store has a beauty that warrants the best part of an entire novel. But there’s a sort of tranquility and predictability about the store, a refusal to apologise for what it is, that contrasts strikingly with the constant self-pretence of the world outside. The impulse to construct one’s own narrative, for example, is a source of sustained interest for Murata throughout the novel. Keiko’s sister Mami is the main culprit. As Keiko notes with almost childlike simplicity, ‘she was getting carried away with making up a story for herself.’ Such moments are nicely preserved in Ginny Tapley Takemori’s translation.

The slightly unnatural quality of Murata’s dialogue complicates things slightly, though. Conversations often feel drawn out, characters are prone to over-explanation, Shiraha’s mansplaining becomes almost sickening. It sometimes feels as though Murata is spoon-feeding us. This infuses the world of the novel with a kind of pervasive unreality, a convenience-store-type perfection that we can’t quite believe. It’s an interesting and unsettling technique. In establishing a gulf between the reality of the world and the unreality of Keiko’s version of it, it gives rise to an ironic sense that Keiko is saving herself from the homogenising effect of society by resorting to an alien, robotic, and unnatural alternative.

But regardless of this tension, we realise that the wish to belong is basic to all mankind, but prompts widely differing behaviours. To one person, belonging means getting married, having kids, being promoted. To another, it’s living life by the manual, being useful, being ‘a cog in society’. And that’s a notion that I think most readers will find reassuring.

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