The Politics of Art & Authenticity

Credit to: http://disquietinternational.org/sites/default/files/katherine%20vaz%20small.jpg?1349124661

I never thought I would ever say this but as good as it is to hear an author read their own work, Katherine Vaz should never read anything. As I was sitting in that crowded room, filled with Vaz’s closest friends and some of her students I thought to myself, they must be used to the raspy, cutting sound of her voice, my guess is from years of smoking. I simply couldn’t get her voice out of my head. Her new story seemed interesting and the detail she uses is quite vivid, sometimes too vivid, but powerful. I would have enjoyed it more if someone else had read it unfortunately.

As I was reading the “Lisbon Story” I was trying to read with the main characters voice, a sultry Portuguese  voice that I would have enjoyed to hear, but all I kept hearing was a chronic smoker reading the story and puffing smoke in my face. With such imagery and detail as the “Lisbon Story” had, I was captured by this women’s time in Lisbon and her various interactions in her father’s house. The story, as well as the new story Vaz is writing, was very interesting and had clear signs of her originality as an author. Vaz clearly has some connections to Portugal, constantly referring to places in the small coastal country in both of her works. Her knowledge and research of the times and the places she writes about are also evident in her work. Vaz uses numerous metaphors as well to describe something as simple as pajamas with sea animals on it and turn it into “marine animals around his remains were floating at the ready to coast him…” (Lisbon Story, 48.). There were similar uses of metaphor in her reading that really brought up the idea of feeding someone who is imprisoned with bird songs. Vaz uses her metaphors well and in abundance, my only feeling is that she can be too descriptive sometimes and it hurts the story more than it helps the reader get her vision.

When it comes to the way she read the story and the way I read “Lisbon Story”, Vaz destroyed my inner voice. Every sentence I read I heard Vaz’s voice reading it the way she did. It hurt my experience greatly in both reading the story and at her reading. When my inner voice finally kicked back in and I began to enjoy “Lisbon Story”, Vaz’s voice came running back into my head, talking in unison with my inner voice. Once again I began to not like the story and I had to stop reading. It seems to me that hearing the author’s rendition of their own work should be more about the emotion and vision the author wants to impress upon the reader. But when a person is hearing a story, they want to hear the character, they want to hear the soothing voice of the narrator, not the author. When I was read to as a child I wanted to hear the funny voices my parents gave every character, not the monotone voice of the author. This is the same way I felt when hearing Katherine Vaz. I just believe some people simply shouldn’t read, leave that to British actors and Betty White.

Credit: http://www.bam.org/media/312114/2012_NWF_Mainstage_HouseDivided_613x463.jpg

I’m sorry for the late posts Professor Davis, power here in Brooklyn has been crazy from the hurricane, hopefully this isn’t too late.

The only sense I wasn’t using during this strange and thought-inducing play was smell (I was constantly holding and rolling the playbill and I was chewing gum). The way the play flowed from the Grapes of Wrath scenes to the Wall Street bigs fighting to the decaying house in Ohio was seamless and perfect. Everything connected and made sense in every way. I especially enjoyed the way the actors used the old film projector style to magnify their faces and emotions on the house screen, it reminded me of the old Grapes of Wrath movie that used to do the same thing when an actor was talking. The use of this house in Ohio was an amazing metaphor for what people who were affected by the mortgage crisis were going through. The pain of losing ones home, of having to leave sometimes your most valuable possessions, and the banks treating you like a number rather than a person. This was the reality for many families during this crisis, and the connection to what many people went through during the Great Depression was spot on.

The actors were great in their portrayals of Wall Street bigs and the family in the Grapes of Wrath. The music of the past and the noises of a busy stock exchange provided a great contrast between the past and the present. The really amazing thing was that when one part of the play was focusing on the Wall Street scenes, you never noticed the actors moving in the background getting ready for the next Grapes of Wrath scene. The transitions were seamless and  unnoticeable. This was my first multimedia play and I enjoyed it greatly. If I ever see another it has a lot to live up to because this play truly captured my attention and interest.

It was probably the sequence of being read to before reading Katherine Vaz‘s work on my own that has lead me to think that she is better at spinning the story on paper than reading her vision to her audience. Though listening to an author read her work makes it seem more meaningful and personal, it also confuses the audience as to what is precisely going on in the story. It is harder to get past the author’s voice and to imagine the voices of the characters than when one is reading alone. Now that I have literally heard Vaz’s voice, however, I found that when I was reading her work, I was hearing her actual voice as the protagonist’s voice. It was actually not much different than what I experienced during the reading.

As I was reading the “LISBON STORY” I felt myself expecting the same tone in the same setting that she had in the story she had read aloud even if it was not the case. Thus, I was surprised when I read, “The cupboards, canary-yellow and apple-red, cheery plastics I’d installed in the post-revolutionary seventies…lukewarm.” For the first few minutes of reading I was thinking that this took place in some historical past way before the, “post-revolutionary seventies,” and the years after. It was then that I started to re-think the story and refuse to be influenced by whatever I had heard from Vaz concerning the other reading. It, however, proved difficult. I kept hearing her voice and associating it with the other story, especially since “LISBON STORY” also had a female protagonist and Vaz’s style of writing is exactly the same in each. I just could not get over it.

When more characters were introduced such as Mateus and Tonio, it was also harder to imagine their respective male voices speaking in accents and tongues foreign to Vaz’s real voice. I kept hearing her voice attempt to read in Spanish as a male and…failing. Not because I could not imagine her rolling her R’s and such but failing because it was not authentic to the characters speaking. This was probably the biggest hang-up that I experienced with both stories.

There were positive aspects to hearing, though. During the reading, I was able to witness and feel the passion she had for writing the story which is something that I do not usually think about. When first reading a text, envisioning the author is not my main priority and so to literally hear her passion and drive was definitely a new experience. There were points when she painted the setting with her words that made it very vivid and realistic. She paused to explain what she had read which both helped me understand the story a little more but broke the trance of experiencing the story.

As for reading on my own, it was the same experience minus the explantation breaks. Because I had kept hearing her voice in my head, it was like listening to the story rather than straight-up reading, thus,  I did not feel much different. Again, I do believe that it was because I had heard her before I had read her that my experiences turned out in that way. At least when reading, it was easier (still difficult but easier) to get over her hypothetical voice barrier that blocked me from truly hearing the characters.

http://prairieschooner.unl.edu/?q=book-prize/our-lady-artichokes-and-other-portuguese-american-stories

My experiences overall were both positive and negative. It is undeniable that Katherine Vaz is a talented writer. Her voice, however, is not suited for her characters.

Perhaps, for some people, the different style and mixed media used took away from the authentic play feel of the performance, but in my opinion that is exactly what made it a performance. House/Divided  was an eclectic and vibrant play that succeeded in weaving together multiple view points, pointing out the similarities between past and present, and accurately showing some problems we currently have in society.

The play showed the differing opinions of the financial situation from the rich and the poor by quickly shifting from past to present, from character to character, without so much as a gradual transition. The house kept moving as the times kept moving and the shift from silent to full-blown music added to the rise and fall the audience was meant to experience. At least, that’s what it did for me. I was excited then calm, bored then intensely focused.

https://www.facebook.com/BAMstage

There was one scene where I was completely enraptured and my attention was set. It was during the interrogation of Alan Greenspan by two authority figures. The way the actor portrayed his emotion, confusion, frustration, anger and lies was just so brilliantly done. Of course, the fact that his face was shot close-up and played in a large black and white screen overhead as he was playing the part added to the grand effect, but still, the acting and delivery of the lines was what made it truly great. It felt as if I was watching the real thing- I saw it from a witness’s point of view and also watched it as a film.

House/Divided was such a unique way of presenting a story. I wonder how other types of stories can be shown to an audience using the same multi-media methods. I applaud BAM for taking the risk of presenting such a project.

Although I was not able to attend the actual reading due to sickness, I was lucky enough to find the video footage of her reading an excerpt from one of her early pieces, Fado. 

http://katherinevaz.com/fado-other-stories_283.html

I don’t have many memories of having someone read stories for me. Even during childhood, having your parents read bedtime stories was something I would only see in a movie or TV as part of western culture. Being an independent child, I generally enjoyed reading by myself. I liked to be immersed in my own thoughts and visions as I read the story.

Reading Lisbon Story was not easy at first. With all the foreign terms and images the author tried to depict, I needed time to adjust to the setting. After a several attempts of rereading the first few pages, I finally found my pace and started reading until I reached the end of the story without noticing the time flying. Her story is definitely descriptive and the character’s voices, very distinct. I did not have much trouble distinguishing who’s whom and picturing rather exotic and unfamiliar scenes as I was reading. But in the end I think it was the message of the story which helped me understand better and keep reading, the theme that revolves around basic human lives and respect, common in almost every culture.

The video of her reading I found does not contain the whole story but Vaz gives a general summary in the beginning and in the middle to help the audience follow the contents she is going to read out loud. When she was giving the brief introduction of the characters and their relationships somehow I found it very difficult to catch up and draw the image inside my head. Without establishing this basic information of the characters, I knew I was going to be so confused and disoriented, trying to figure out the characters name with the background, the situation and the reasons behind their actions. I had to physically draw out the picture of the relationships to help me understand. People say hearing the actual author read her story is the most direct way to understand the story as it is. Generally I would agree. Who can have better understanding of the story and idea of how to deliver it than the actual creator herself? However, listening to Katherine Vaz read the story, I understood why there’s the screen writer, the director and the actors performing each role. During her reading I could definitely feel that it was derived from her own childhood experiences through her enthusiasm of the voice and etc. However, her rather “not soft” and “not very childlike” (I’m trying to be as indirect as possible) voice just disrupted me, the listener, from being deeply engaged in the story. My image of the protagonist, who is suppose to be a young girl, did not seem to harmonize well with the voice.

In sum, her stories whether in print or sound contained a lot of imagery to keep the audience interested and the story, containing real live situations and human emotions were good enough to make it relatable despite the cultural differences that may exist to some readers. However, although I have huge respect towards the authors and their reading sessions, I prefer reading by myself to being read to by someone else. I like imagining the voices inside my head, controlling the speed of the scenes, putting my own thoughts and having my own moments of reflections. These just seem to be very unlikely when you are being read to especially at the moment where you have no control of stopping or rewinding the story.

I acknowledge that it might have been different if I had attended the reading and heard it myself. Which is why I look forward to do it as soon as I get the chance. However, I believe it would be better to have read the story beforehand so I can better compare and comprehend it and ask questions to further the knowledge of the literature.

http://theater.nytimes.com/2012/10/26/theater/reviews/builders-associations-house-divided-at-bam.html

The day I went to watch House/Divided was full of first time experiences: first time eating at Shake Shack, first time figuring out how to get to Brooklyn, first time to BAM, and first time watching an augmented reality theater performance. When the professor first introduced  House/Divided to the class, all I knew was that it is going to be a very experimental piece. As a person who is more used to traditional form of arts I have to confess I was not as excited as I was before watching the opera Carmen. But, since you never know what New York has to offer, I tried to attend with anticipation and interest.

The way to BAM was not an easy experience. From almost getting lost to climbing up all the stairs, I tried to imagine the magnificence of the real life size house to keep myself motivated. When I finally got up, seeing the skeleton of the house, I was very disappointed at first. However, when they projected the house on the transparent screens, I could not close my mouth out of excitement. I should have realized at that moment that it was only the beginning of all the technological wonders the performance was about to bring.

Only having the slightest knowledge of  John Steinbeck’s work, I had to concentrate so much to understand, absorb the knowledge as well as notice the details that draws parallelism between current economic situation and situation back then. After getting a hold of the storyline and the pattern I couldn’t help but draw my attention to all the other elements of the performance.

From the staggering recreation of the stock exchange, projection, houses, props, lights to acting, I could not imagine how much these people worked to make all this possible. What especially caught my attention was the use of real time video shots of their actings on the screen. I tried excessively to find the camera, calculating the possible angles but the effort was futile. Having seen some TED performances using recorded video footages and acting like its being filmed at the moment to trick people (in a positive way) I was so curious whether it would be the same for House/Divided but the acting and the video were without discrepancies I hardly believe it was prerecorded.

The overall experience was surreal and amazing but only criticism I would give is that they tried to implement so much at the same time things seemed to be slightly off hand. Although it was my first view, I realized quite a lot of mistakes including acting and technological difficulties. And as a viewer, I couldn’t help but feel slightly overwhelmed by the massive amount of information, whether visual or audio, they were trying to deliver. But then I realized that their efforts to take control of everything seemed to draw comparison to my life in general as well. Trying out all that there is and what I can do, figuring out what works or does not work, trying to implement everything all at once, I have felt like I’ve fallen apart, triggering adverse effects.

I’m not saying it was a disaster but I think sometimes it needs time to get used to it. And it is the effort that counts toward a new era of performance.

When someone reads something they tend to interpret it their own way.  The reader personalizes the experience by reading the piece in a certain tone.  I tend to enjoy reading something myself rather than being read to.  It is never intentional but when people read to me two things tend to happen.  I become bored, become drowsy, and fall asleep.  That or my mind begins to wander and I question what I’m being read.  These questions lead to more questions and even more questions, which I attempt to answer, and in the act of trying to answer I completely forget that I’m being read to and miss vital pieces of information in the story.

I hate to say it but at one point during Katherine Vaz’s reading this happened to me.  I did not quite expect her voice to be as it was.  It did not catch my attention and was somewhat monotonous in my opinion.  Her voice didn’t change but it rose when she was reading something she was excited about.  In other words, the reading seemed dry.  She droned on and on and at one point her reading became background sound to my own thoughts on her book.

I think I would buy her new book if I ever came across it in a bookstore.  Despite being long it seemed to have an interesting story line and plot.  I also believe that if I read this work then I would put my own tone to it, which would make it more interesting to me.  Also if I read it some of the more confusing pieces which had been read might become clearer to me.  I’m sure there are some words I misheard and didn’t hear at all.  There were also strange but interesting pieces like eating song.  I had never heard of such a thing before.  I am glad Katherine explained where she coined the term and what it meant.  If she hadn’t, I’m sure I would have been lost through most of the reading.

She tends to add a lot of detail, which I enjoy.  These details make Vaz stand out as an author.  For example, she writes in the Lisbon Story, “The carpeting was cornflower tint, and geodes caught sunrays on a mantel that had been barnacled with them since my childhood.” After reading the story, I found that this was one of the lines that stood out most to me.  Her heavily detailed writing paints vivid pictures in anyone’s mind for all parts.

All in all I feel that Katherine Vaz is a very good writer. Her writing is very entertaining with pieces of her own personality speckled across each piece.  During the reading I thought that there were sentences that seemed like they were run-ons due to the amount of details crammed into them.  If her book was written anything like Lisbon Story then I think I was wrong in assuming that, that it was her pauses, attempting to set the tone, that made the sentences longer than they really were.

source:

http://disquietinternational.org/sites/default/files/katherine%20vaz%20small.jpg?1349124661

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2012/10/26/arts/26DIVIDED_SPAN/26DIVIDED_SPAN-articleLarge.jpg

BAM was not as fancy as Lincoln Center but it offered the homey feeling when entering the theatre. House/Divided was honestly the first play that did get my full attention. Maybe it was because the seats weren’t very comfortable or because the plot was really interesting. Maybe both.

I thought the digital effects were amazing. It was incredible how the scenes were able to transition so quickly from one era to another. The play compared the Depression-era and what is happening in this decade about the home foreclosures. The audience saw the similarities of these economic downturns.

The opening scene was an eye-grabber. It amazed me that the house was digitally formed. I wondered what kind of material they used for the house because it was also possible to see what was behind the house or inside it. I don’t know whether that film turner, or whatever it’s called, was just a prop or actually was used to project the picture onto the house. I also liked the digital screen on the background of the New York Stock Exchange. The modern setting gave off the franticness of Wall Street and how quickly everything gets done.

I think what also appealed to me in the play was the business jargon used because I recently took a midterm in my business class! I actually knew who Alan Greenspan was and what earnings per share was. Thank you, Professor O’Malley, my business professor. My favorite part was the hearing of Alan Greenspan and how he tried to justify the housing bust.

I did enjoy this play. I also liked the fact that it was only an hour and a half long because usually all the events that I have been to so far they are really long and it gets very tedious trying to pay attention after a long day of school. I have never seen a play like this before but I am glad I did.

It took me awhile before I got my Internet back so I could write this post, so I’ve had a lot of time to internalize listening to the reading and the reading that I read myself.

Although I am personally not a fan of book readings, I’m glad I went. I’m glad I had this experience. It really made me think.

At first, I didn’t enjoy the book reading. I thought Katherine Vaz read slowly and dryly, and this took away from the description, the excitement, of the book. As a listener, I could hardly follow what she was saying, let alone picture the scene and imagine myself in the book, which is something I usually do when I read. Like I just said, I am not a proponent of book readings. I have always thought the reader should have the liberty to imagine the book, create his or her own setting, and use his or her own ability to discern the author’s tone and purpose. If someone is reading this book aloud, that takes away much of the book-reading experience. The listener hears the book from another’s viewpoint, and not his own.

Well, I didn’t like the way Vaz read her book. When I read her work myself, I could imagine myself reading it aloud, only much more louder, stronger, and more emotional than the way she read it. I thought I could have read it better.

But looking back, I have come to realize that I am merely a reader. I didn’t write this book. I am not the one who created the plot, characters, metaphors, dialoge, etc. My interpretation of her book is only my opinion, how I understand the story, and maybe not how it is necessarily supposed to be understood, or how the author wanted readers to understand her book. Vaz is the author, the creator, the producer. Perhaps she read it in that tone for a reason. I’m not really sure why. But she obviously has her reasons for doing so, and I know it had to add some sort of stylistic content that probably enhanced her work in some way. And the more I think about it, the more my head starts to hurt.

It was really interesting hearing the story read aloud. There is always more than one way to hear a story, and maybe one way isn’t better, or more correct than another way. Vaz left me thinking about rhetoric and literature. She left me a little confuzzled.

Because of Hurricane Sandy, I was unable to make a post about Katherine Vaz reading on time since I lost my internet last night. Sorry, Prof. Davis, hope you understand! Thankfully, I got it back today.

In all honesty, I got there earlier just because of the food. Hey, we are broke college students after all. As everyone, got situated into the room, I was still munching on some delicious cookies. I have never been to a reading where the actual author read an excerpt of her brand new book.When the reading began, I had never expected Katherine Vaz’s voice to sound to be so raspy. Her voice was very distinct and I can actually remember it as I think back to the day I heard her reading. I wish she were more animated with the voices to differentiate who said what. To be honest I did daze out of her reading. She should have added more enthusiasm and feeling into what she read. I am sure she is very passionate about what she wrote but I wish she showed it a little better. It was weird to have a median, in this case, Katherine Vaz, from the book to the listener, mainly because I wasn’t used to being read to. But it was interesting when Vaz did tell us how she came about the ideas in the novel.

Some stories were meant to be read to, such as bedtime stories for little children. But this story shouldn’t be read aloud by Katherine Vaz. Reading by yourself gives a new perspective. It makes you feel as if

you are surrounded by the environment you read. Everyone has their own way of thinking. Each word or phrase can mean something completely different for each person and that’s the beauty of reading. When reading on our own, you feel the same emotions as the characters. I try to picture as if I were actually there. In my head, I do read with different voices that I think would suit the characters very well.

While reading “Lisbon Story,”  Vaz was very descriptive. She mentioned even the smallest details. Sometimes I did feel like those details were quite extraneous. I did like how she incorporated a little Portuguese in almost every page. It showed a little bit of the cultural and helped the experience of being in Portugal. For example, the use of pá and CREDO, which could mean two opposite things depending on how it is said. She also used many metaphors such as ” You serve me the food of jails.” Overall, I think Katherine Vaz is a very talented writer. But she should just practice reading it aloud more to get emotion and help entice the audience. It was definitely easier reading her work than listening to it. I give Katherine Vaz respect and appreciation towards doing the reading and sharing it with Baruch students.