The instructions of the meme are:
1) Pick up a nearby book (NEARBY, don’t search);
2) Open it on page 161;
3) Find the 5th complete sentence;
4) Post this sentence on your blog;
5) Don’t choose the best phrase or the best book;
I have a number of books near at hand (I am typing this from behind the desk of one of the millions of bookshops in the world - more on this soon).
Some of the books nearby are good, some of them are trite. I decided to choose one of the good ones for the purpose of this meme, and one fitting the general theme of this site.
Also, by coincidence last night, on one of the very rare occasions I have turned on the television set in recent times, I watched the writer of this very book moving his hips and singing his sweet words on Globo.
And the book is:
TROPICAL TRUTH - A STORY OF MUSIC AND REVOLUTION IN BRAZIL
By Caetano Veloso
Translated by Isabel de Sena and edited by Barbara Einzig
Published by Da Capo Press 2003
It’s a water damaged copy (a memory of The Big Rain that came to town in February 2007) but ‘new’ in that it was unread until about a week ago, when I picked it up and was drawn into by these words on the acknowledgements page:
Towards the end of the fifties, Rodrigo Veloso gave me a subscription to the magazine Senhor, which led me to the discovery of Clarice Lispector, whose books Rodrigo started buying for me assiduosly, as he did those of Jõao Guimarães Rosa and Jõao Cabral de Melo Neto. This endowed me with a depth of love for books that surpasses my superficial aquantaince with them to this day. Thank you.
I discovered Clarice Lispector at the end of the nineties, and am also grateful to the person responsible… But back to The Nearby Book:
Scanning 1960’s history, music, culture and politics in Brazil, Tropical Truth tells the story of Tropicalismo. As well asbeing an insight into the Tropicalismo movement itself, it’s also a background to the art and ideas shaping Caetano Veloso himself - one of the most important songwriters in Brazil.
I haven’t read the original in Portuguese, so I don’t know how the translation compares to the original, but the English is fluid and easy to read - I don’t agree with the reader critics on Amazon who think otherwise. It’s an interesting read about an important time in the story of modern culture in Brazil, and it’s one of those books that makes you go - ‘uh-huh’ and ‘oh right….’ out loud as the stories of the main players of the time are unfolded in the text.
So onto the rules of the meme. Here is the 5th sentence on page 161:
Everything that came to be called tropicalismo was nourished by acts of violence against a taste that had matured steadily and was everywhere lucidly defended.
This sentence does, in fact, sum up what the reader will glean from the whole book - that tropicalismo was a reaction to everything presented as entertainment. Get it?
That, I say, is the meaning of culture.
The sixth rule of the meme is to tag 5 other blogs. I dislike the idea of tagging people, so if you want to participate, then please consider yourself tagged. All I ask is that you link back to me so I can muse on your Nearby Book.