२७ ऑगस्ट, २००९

"I thought it was the most exhaustingly didactic bodice-ripper I had ever read."



It's Aunt Feminina Boots, talking about the Ayn Rand book club.

And here she is on the feminist book club. ("I want to read about hermaphrodites and Lizzy Borden. Every other woman in the group wants to read Barbara Kingsolver, Barbara Kingsolver, Barbara Kingsolver.")

(Via Metafilter.)

४० टिप्पण्या:

BJM म्हणाले...

Sarah Palin's p'wning teh intertubes again?

Rich B म्हणाले...

For some reason I was put in mind of Barbara Eden when she played the manicurist on the Andy Griffith Show.

pronst - sort of a toast.
fecul - well..

Synova म्हणाले...

That was sort of interesting.

wv: proot

Balfegor म्हणाले...

Well, there is an awful lot of rape-fantasy in Ayn Rand. It stood out to me when I read through Atlas Shrugged and The Fountainhead, and what I remember are mostly the long didactic passages and the uneasy sense that the author was just a little too keen on rape.

Wince म्हणाले...

That video just rocked my perception of how the sexes view each other.

I found Boots' and her southern insouciance very alluring. All the while, for lack of a better description, she was sporting a comb-over hairdo.

Wow, conversely, does that mean women can find some men with comb-overs sexy?

I always thought that was a complete non-starter.

Amexpat म्हणाले...

She's got talent. If I were an agent I'd sign her.

Wince म्हणाले...

For some reason I was put in mind of Barbara Eden when she played the manicurist on the Andy Griffith Show.

Very funny scene, especially Barney Fife.

I wonder if that's how Boots' libertarian book club reacted. Makin' grown men feel under age.

veni vidi vici म्हणाले...

I always thought the name "Barbara Kingsolver" was very interesting. "Kingsolver"? Wisdom from on high!


wv: "ingdoddl" -- Englishmen on holiday.

former law student म्हणाले...

I smiled.

Unknown म्हणाले...

The production values for Mad Men are really on the decline!

Big Mike म्हणाले...

@former, second time I've agreed with you today. Let's not make a practice of this, okay?

WV: kessmaho. Nothing comes to mind that isn't scatological.

tim maguire म्हणाले...

The two videos each have at least one interesting comment. Not a bad watch. I have to admit to a very unoriginal response when she leaned in close to talk about the porno.

wv: tendhole

Just so's ya know.

paul a'barge म्हणाले...

did 'er.

wv: oveneume ... apparently I'm some sort of target.

Bissage म्हणाले...

Great stuff!

And I’m not just saying that because Aunt Feminina Boots reminds me of a mischievously sexy version of Andie MacDowell in “sex, lies, and videotape.”

Call me?

Robert Cook म्हणाले...

It's not a combover...she's wearing a cheap wig. I even wonder whether she's actually a dudette...or a dude, to quote last night's repeat episode of BONES.

Chip Ahoy म्हणाले...

Com'on, join our group.

Are you trying to altruistically improve my life?

No, we're acting from our own rational self-interest.

Well you can just piss off then.

See fellas? I told you I could get her to leave the library.


I knew a guy who read Atlas Shrugged seven times. I thought, "Jeeze, a little slow on the uptake?" She's right, though, it is didactic, and the love scenes are written by someone who had trouble imagining them.

kalmia म्हणाले...
ही टिप्पणी लेखकाना हलविली आहे.
rhhardin म्हणाले...

Ayn Rand converts a Christian.

Look inside and search for "Joey," start at p.17.

rhhardin म्हणाले...

Alan Greenspan puts in a cameo appearance, in that.

Once written, twice... म्हणाले...

Ayn Rand devotees are almost as goofy as Lyndon LaRouche followers.

traditionalguy म्हणाले...

Ayn had a point. The cult of her followers is rather narrow minded though.

Mrs. Bayliss Throckmeyer म्हणाले...

Uh-oh, Maxine has another Twitter-fight on her hands.

http://twitter.com/maxinesplace

Charles म्हणाले...

Thanks for the heads up on Aunt Feminina Boots's Char-Broiled Book Club - great stuff! This one act play about the Rand cult written by Murray Rothbard is hilarious.

http://front-porchanarchist.blogspot.com/2009/03/mozart-was-red.html

अनामित म्हणाले...

Ayn gave her first talk in Hollywood at a Books and Authors group... "Miss Rand," a woman said, "the sex scenes between Roark and Dominique are so wonderful! Do they come from your own experience? What is their source?" Ayn brought down the house when she replied in two words: "Wishful thinking." -- Barbara Branden, The Passion of Ayn Rand

rhhardin म्हणाले...

Those are fake glasses, which spoils the verisimilitude.

"I wonder why she's wearing fake glasses."

You don't know what else she might be lying about.

bagoh20 म्हणाले...

I'm sure many of us losers out here have wondered why we never "made it". You know like Althouse in blogs, Rand in Philosophy, this girl on youtube, Titus in Titusing. They all have manged to excel in those areas and many of us think to ourselves: "Hey I could do that." We never did and never will. Are we lazy, stupid, uninspired, undisciplined?

Well, yes; yes we are.

knox म्हणाले...

I've only read The Fountainhead... "Clunky" is the word I'd use. But hey, Ayn Rand had her philosophy and she very cleverly figured out a way to make it accessible. Rape scenes notwithstanding. A lot of people have read her books and are familiar with her ideas as a result.

The rule of Lemnity म्हणाले...

My God.. its a young Molly Ivans.

Listen .. jump to 0.55

The rule of Lemnity म्हणाले...

Some peoples have a knack for talking.. up and down, loud and soft while in the same sentence.. is just pleasing to my ears.

When Rush is in top form he does a male version of that.

wv - pademia = an academy for talking.

अनामित म्हणाले...
ही टिप्पणी लेखकाना हलविली आहे.
The rule of Lemnity म्हणाले...

..and I'm sticking her on my blogroll right now.

Thats a shame Theo.

Farrah is barely in the ground and you are moving on allready ;)

The rule of Lemnity म्हणाले...

Too late Theo.

अनामित म्हणाले...

Those are NOT fake glasses. They have obvious refractive power. They may be cheap, but they're not fake in the sense of being window glass. They ARE pretty good props, however.

I thought she might be wearing a wig or partial hairpiece, but looking at her other videos, seems it's her own hair. Lot to be said for studied frowseyness.

Of course she's creating an image and playing a character. And it's a damn funny one, so I'm sticking her on my blogroll right now.

अनामित म्हणाले...

Oh, I just had to revise my comment, Lem. This lady goes places I've been hoping to see gone to for quite a while. I'd like to see her ride in better style, but bad cuts and low-rent post-processing may be part of the charm. I just haven't figured that out yet.

Laika म्हणाले...

"We looked in your purse, and we think you can handle Objectivism".

This was delightful. I must go watch the rest of her videos immediately.

अनामित म्हणाले...

Listening to Feminina Boots, I've been having this fantasy of what it would be like if Glen Reynolds had married her, instead of Dr. Helen.

Hector Owen म्हणाले...

Funny! But she should either stop mumbling, or use subtitles.

Deb म्हणाले...

I love the quirkiness of it. A smoothie explodes so I'm going to the library. Of course.

rhhardin म्हणाले...

The glasses leave the profile of the edge of her cheek unchanged.

Either her cheek would jut in (nearsighed correction) or out (farsighted correction). It does neither.

अनामित म्हणाले...

Sorry, rh, I disagree. The correction is positive, and her cheek is, in fact, distorted.

Of course, I'm looking at this on a 24" Apple LED Cinema Display set on 1920 x 1200 pixel resolution at 32 bits, driven by an NVIDIA GeForce 9600M GT card with 512 MB of VRAM, but the original video is admittedly pretty poor.

But, then again, to what degree her glasses are props is utterly and completely beside the point.

You might consider she is playing a comic character, based to one degree or another on her life and interests. I compare her to Sandra Tsing-Loh on my blog, simply because they both are female monologists talking about their lives, a genre I appreciate. Tsing-Loh may be closer to her actual life in what she does, but Feminina Boots is a lot more intelligent, quirky, and, to me, at least, funny.

What she's doing is called "humor," technical details aside.