I Swear(er)

this is a great idea.

2
Editors-in-Chief Sam Knowles Amelia Stanton Managing Editor of Features Charles Pletcher Managing Editor of Arts & Culture Jennie Young Carr Managing Editor of Lifestyle Jane Brendlinger Features Editors Zo Hoffman Emily Spinner Arts & Culture Editors Clayton Aldern Tyler Bourgoise Lifestyle Editors Jen Harlan Alexa Trearchis Pencil Pusher Phil Lai Chief Layout Editor Clara Beyer Aesthetic Mastermind Lucas Huh Contributing Editors Emeriti Marshall Katheder Sam Carter Matt Klebanoff Copy Chiefs Julia Kantor Justine Palefsky Staff Wrter Berit Goetz Copy Editors Lucas Huh Kristina Petersen Allison Shafir Blake Cecil Nora Trice Chris Anderson

CONTENTS
material living // ethan bealbrown

3 upfront 4 feature

GOT PROBLEMS?
formspring.me/lovecraftdorian formspring.me/emilypostmag

i swear(er) // ben wofford

jumping the shark? // sam carter oxymorons and obscenities // james stomber who is this guy? // kate doyle

5 arts & culture

WANT TO WRITE?
email post.magazine@gmail.com and tell us why youre awesome. if you want to hang out with cool people, we want to hang out with you. yours truly, post-

6 arts & culture 7 lifestyle 8 lifestyle

the taste of fall // jane brendlinger the writing on the wall // marshall katheder sexy sadie // sadie emily post dorian

READ POSTThursdays in the Herald

OUR ILLUSTRATORS
cover // phil lai material living // adela wu i swear(er) // phil lai jumping the shark? // madeleine denman oxymorons and obscenities // caroline washburn who is this guy? // kirby lowenstein the taste of fall // alexa trearchis the writing on the wall // kah yangni sexy sadie // alexa trearchis

LETTER FROM THE EDITORS

As Brown dreads the prospect of a Ruth-less College Hill, Post- fondly looks to its past. We are inspired by tried and trusted sources, by those who paved the way for yours truly. This week, you will find the work of our three favorite editors emeriti, the only three we have, that is. They raised us to the embrace the snark and sass that they so loved, and like doting children, we soaked it all up. So hats off to you, Sam, Kate, and Marshall. Our elders, our muses. Thanks for handing us the reins and then trusting us not to screw it up. Theres some other great stuff in here, too. Someone we didnt even know read one of our pieces, thought about it, and then responded to it by writing us another piece. Thanks, Ben. It seems that were in grateful mood. So well end by thanking you, dear reader. Read on. Until next time,

weekend

Post- Magazine is published every Thursday in the Brown Daily Herald. It covers books, theater, music, film, food, art, and University culture around College Hill. Post- editors can be contacted at post.magazine@gmail. com. Letters are always welcome, and can be either e-mailed or sent to Post- Magazine, 195 Angell Street, Providence, RI 02906. We claim the right to edit letters for style, clarity, and length.

sam and amelia

five
1

GROSS INDECENCY Leeds Thurs - Mon 8PM

MARTHA MARCY MAY MARLENE Granoff Thurs

PAIN ET FROMAGE Machado Thurs 5PM

ROARING 20S BDAY PARTY! Hegeman B 2nd Floor Sun 10PM

STRAIT TALK 2011 SYMPOSIUM Wilson 101 Thurs 6:30PM

TOP TEN Reasons Christopher Columbus is a Dick

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 6TH, 2011

upfront

1 2 3 4 5

Thought he was in India. Like, he was pretty f*cking sure. Disease-ridden dude brought wack syphilis back to Europe. First Italian in America; guidos inevitable. Discovered inhabited land. Sails made of hemp. But didnt burn the Devils Lettuce. Big oversight.

6 7 8 9 10

I aint sayin he a gold digger... Inspired Berge to wear a cape. Responsible for colossal amounts of liberal guilt. Arrested for torture, incompetence, being a ginger. Thought the earth was shaped like a womans breast. Attempted to fondle.

music is
putting the iPod on Mozarts Requiem. Lacrimosa.

Material Living
ethan BEAL-BROWN contributing writer
Somewhere in the back of my mind, the realization had already solidified. A more logical part of myself had dispassionately made its conclusion early in the evening as we packed the car. Either the dresser could fit, or my mom could fit, and there was to be no compromise. But darn if I was going to accept this ultimatum. In some perverse manner it threatened to establish an exchange-value between my stuff and my mother. The next morning I spent a good hour heaving away and rearranging and cramming stuff in drawers, but to no avail: the space of my car was unquestionably finite, and that was that. I had trouble accepting this fact partly because by now Ive been thoroughly brainwashed by American car advertisements. Those Friday evening SUV commercials that show four-kid families easily fitting a weeklong vacations worth of stuff into endlessly modular back compartmentsSimply pull a tab here, and the capacious interior rearranges to fit your needs? Nonsense. I admit that in the end I chose the dresser over my mother. Until then, my parents had been planning a weekend vacation after dropping me off. My despicable dresser and I made sure that didnt happen. No, I had come to see that old, brown armoire as the only kind and good thing standing between me and the empty cave of a room waiting for me in Providence. I had seen our empty house over the summer: the bare architecture revealed in its unflinching skeletal form, devoid of rug and lamp and chair to humanize the angles and soften the shadows. There is nothing to be done in the face of such a void but to throw oneself into filling it. This empty house at the corner of Power and Ives, our empty canvas, grinned a wide, maniacal grin and dared us to make our mark. I knew what was coming, and shoot if I wasnt going to make my house a home. *** Red and green and dark blue checkered bedspread. Walls populated with my grandfathers paintings. A dresser that smells of 20-year-old rat shit, a rug that has barely been saved from the piss of mice. There is a strange sort of hominess here. If the problem with my car was its lack of space, the house presented the opposite problem. Here, there was too much space, and the three of us spent the first sev-

film is

a house or a home?
eral weeks in a perpetual state of quasi-habitation. No one had thought to bring a can opener. A can opener is something you only recall exists once youre standing in front of the sole remaining item of food in the house and its locked in an unyielding tin can. And this isnt the half of it: theres a seemingly endless list of things you need in order to feign normalcy. Drying rack, frying pan, spatula, light bulbs, screwdriver, hammer, glue, wrench, rugs, couch, plumbing snake for the clogged sink, paper towels for the dog messes, shower curtain to hang against the wall to stop the leaking. Recently, in the name of getting more stuff, my housemate Steve and I made our way to a Quaker tag sale on Morris Ave. We werent really sure what we needed in particular, but had the sense that it would be a good thing to go. We found tables upon tables of things upon things. Thermoses that once must have been taken on picnics, wooden bowls that the children had used before they grew up and left at home, Uncle Adlers big old leather jacket, porcelain ducks with bows around their necks, 20 unmatched wine glasses. Its much too easy in such a place to convince yourself of new needs. But, pairing our keen eyes with the Quaker ethic of nonviolence in pricing, we ended up going home with a picnic basket, a bath mat, and a cutting board. And were all the better for it. This house, slowly but surely, is turning into a home.

wondering, why the f*ck does our editorin-chief hate popcorn?!? (Its f*cking disgusting, it gets in your teeth, it smells like death.)

theatre is
Mephistopheles in strappy S&M leather and studs.

books is
definitely not the aimless, George-Eliot loving main character in Jeffrey Eugenides The Marriage Plot.

food is

guest-swiping into the Ratty. We forgot how fabulous Belgium carrots are.

booze is
soaking the seeds in spirits. Let em bloom.

feature
POST-

I Swear(er)

this is a great idea

ben WOFFORD contributing writer

Walking around campus, I keep a dark secret: I am not purebred Brunonian. I slipped into Brown alongside 81 mudblood transfers following my freshman year at Penn. Every day I learn more about my new home in Providence, like when I read Emily Spinners column, Community Works, in Post- on September 22. Welcome to Brown, Spinner explains to newbs like me, where injecting muscle into idealism means repudiating the false paradigm of me-to-you service, and instead embracing a spirit of community works thats manifestly more mutually beneficialbut only if you have the courage to leave the Brown Bubble. Spinner nails it, clarifying the trend thats transformed the service world for decades. But Spinner doesnt ask the most important question: If student culture entails service not just by throw[ing] money at the problem but by serving genuinely, is Brown University doing enough to meet the standard of its students? From what I see, the answer is no. For weeks here, Ive nodded attentively, taken advice eagerly (and gotten lost frequently). Now for once I can share some advice of my own, not despite my transfer past, but because of it. Thats because Penn leads the nation in a progressive model for university-community relations, one that leverages the entirety of university resources and incorporates them into vast spheres of collaborative community spaceand one that explicates the divide between the what is of Penns superlative example of university service and the could be of Browns. Penns success is real. Just skim the accolades of a ten-year crescendo, starting in 2002 when Penn ranked #1 in service learning in US News & World Report. Many national awards later, Penn capped its rise when the Savior of Our Cities report, listing the nations best university civic partnerships, ranked Penn #1 in 2009. Brown received Honorable Mention with 120 others. Penns success belongs to Ira Harkavy, the national expert on service learning and founder in 1992 of the Netter Center for Community Partnerships to address Penns abysmal relationship with West Philly. His idea was radical: rather than encourage student volunteers and hope for the best, Penn would classify the revitalization of West Phillya community that yielded little respect for Pennas a university priority, akin to

growing the endowment or hiring professors. Harkavys model centers on Anchor Institutions, university actors with central urban roles as landholders, job generators, and intellectual resources. The lynchpin of the concept is service learning, bringing students and communities together and cultivating democratic ideals through service. While the Netter Center is more complex than just the quotable Anchor credo, Penns undertaking has preserved a striking fidelity to Harkavys guiding theory. The results are in: the 20-year Anchor Institution experiment has erased Penns status as the worst offender of academic isolationism and catapulted it to the gold standard. Brown epitomizes the Anchor model. A massive employer for Providence, Brown generated $660 million in economic output in 2009. Graduates increasingly choose to live in Providence, a boon for the citys human capital, while Swearer has continually reinvigorated community partnerships. Providence is certainly a city in need, its poverty rate and mortgage crisis more pronounced than almost any other city. Harkavy has visited and engaged Brown with frequently. A BrownPenn civic partnership seems achievable. So what separates us? Penn protrudes into West Philly; Brown is more removed on the East Side. Penn wins with the larger endowment and numerous sub-schools. But Brown has major advantages: our idealism, creativity and compassion. Over 1,000 students volunteer annually through Swearer alonea ratio annihilating Penns. But compassion is not enough: the same report giving Brown an Honorable Mention ranked RISD #20 in the nation. How does a $2 billion universitys civic impact become eclipsed by RISD in the same city? It seems that method, not substance, explains this. Our countless student service organizations (in some of which I participate) are clearly doing phenomenal work.

But Brown institutionally seems reluctant to leverage its students into a ten-year centralized strategyand rightly so. That makes perfect sense given Browns culture and focus. Brown stresses the organic, Penn values structure. But those visions arent incompatible. Success requires us to adapt and survive. So what Penn ideas can we adapt to Brown ideals? I see three simple changes Brown could make to better utilize student service and fulfill its civic promise: Institute an Academically Based Community Service (ABCS) curriculum at Brown. ABCS courses, a massive success at Netter, study problems in both classrooms and bi-weekly field sites (HMOs, high schools, and community centers, to name a few). In the Open Curriculum, students choose what to study; ABCS lets students choose how to study, while integrating undergrads into engaged scholarship. Some departments already offer similar classes, and, with structure and funding, ABCS participation could skyrocket. Second, whichever civic blueprint Brown pursues, make Swearer central in that structure. Triple Swearers budgeta suggestion I can get away with because Swearers budget isnt public. So why not make it public? Some remember Swearers recessionera downsizing, but the solution to a condensed budget isnt hiding itits demanding an expansion. One solution is divorcing Swearers funding through an undisclosed fixed rate of the endowmenthow can Brown pursue a stable civic gameplan thats subject to market fluctuations? and instead make Swearer one of Browns unchanging financial commitments in the University budget. With new resources, Swearer could grow as a structural facilitator, running van services to ABCS field sites, which Netter conducts, or organizing monthly symposiums open to the public in West Providence. Last, expand UCAAP, already one the best civic advising resources at Brown, into a four-year Civic Scholars program (like Penns) that cul-

tivates Browns finest civic intellects. Browns Engaged Scholars would be UCAAP Extreme, an enclave of undergrads dedicated to a de facto concentration in serving Providence both as a groupregular collaborations in service, strategizing, and community seminarsbut also as individuals who complete fouryear capstone projects with public policy recommendations for Providence. These suggestions are realistic; they simply build on what already exists. Theyre not experimental and are proven to work. Dont ask Penn ask a West Philadelphian. If I could combine the best of Penn and Brown, I would eliminate the dichotomy of idealism and structural savvy. At Swearer, an upperclassman grilled me on urban poverty and challenged me to help; at Netter, a Wharton student confessed he couldnt remember his underprivileged mentees name, only tutoring him to better qualify for a banks human relations department. But another story illustrates the same divide: employee mortgages. Penn runs an office of Home Ownership Services, which manages two Penn-funded programs in Forgivable Loans and Cost Reduction; Penn manages the loan, designs the project, and executes a clear goal. Brown offers employees mortgage assistance on a dated webpage buried in Human Resources that directs curious employees to call listed contacts at three outof-state banks to obtain an undefined benefit. (An asterisk denotes that the banks compliance is totally voluntary and Brown assumes no direct interaction.) Isnt there a mortgage crisis going on in Providence? Yes, for what its worth, Browns intellectual idealism is far more appealing than the bare-fanged CEO-or-bust marathon at Penn. Brown students want to save the world, Penn students want to dominate it, goes the saying, but it belies a somber reality: idealism is not enough. Thats why Penn outshines usand leads the countryin urban service. I reject that as a statement about Brown students; clearly, we just need the institutional mechanisms to leverage our resources in Providence. But dont listen to the transfer. Justice doesnt spring from the pages of political science textbooks, writes Spinner, the pure-blood, in her call to civic arms. Thoughts alone never built a bridge. Shes right, and I should know. Its why I came to Brown.

Jumping the Shark?

sam CARTER editor emeritus
there were numerous references to the Brat Pack classic The Breakfast Club. But the references arent really funny. Abed quotes the film at one point apropos of nothing, and another character, not heeding the conventional wisdom that explaining a joke never makes it better, none-too-subtly informs the other charactersand unknowing audience memberswhere the reference is from. The effect on the viewer, if any, is an understanding that the writers simply pulled a Look what I did! move. Problematically, nobody likes a show-off. So theres actually an 11th man in Communitys 10-person ensemble cast: the pop culture reference. The show is now more about what a viewer is familiar with outside the show than her ability to appreciate the humor created within it. Its similar to a friends theory about mashups: These songs really only have meaning when youre familiar with all the parts. Literacy in television and film is therefore expected of a viewer if he or she is to enjoy the showwhich isnt necessarily bad. But a show that is only funny because of a series of knowing nods to a knowing audience hardly sounds like entertainment. If youre a knowing member of the audience, watching the show is just watching someone endlessly refer to works you ought to be watching instead. Abed Nadir, one of the principal characters in NBCs Community, perceives the world through a pop culture lens, explaining everything in terms of the plotlines and characters of television shows and films. While he possesses nearly encyclopedic knowledge, he is, as one might expect, a bit stunted in other respects. In an early episode, another character even suggests that Abed has Aspergers syndrome. As the show enters its third season, Community is starting to seem like Abed: It makes a slew of pop culture references in nearly every episode and shows signs of slowed growth. The series stemmed from creator Dan Harmons experience at a Community college, but the characters are so one-dimensional that its hard to believe they might have some threedimensional inspiration. Little about them suggests theyre anything more than vehicles for the shows sole remaining source of humor: references, both implicit and explicit, to the pop culture of past and present. This reliance on reference is dangerous for a television comedy. With humor derived from the work of predecessors and contemporaries, Community is parasitic and does little to push the boundaries of its genre. Its nothing new to revisit the old. But this diagnosis shouldnt be surprising. Even in the pilot episode,

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 6TH, 2011

arts & culture

communitys parasitic humor

If youre an unknowing member of the audience, youre not only left out of the circle of inside jokes but also left looking for the rare jokes not based on allusions. There is a middle ground between the explicit reference and the too subtle one, and its called satire. Some might say that Community falls under the umbrella of satire, but theyd be wrong. The show never goes far enough to count as satire: it only references, never going so far as to fully inhabit the tropes, clichs or style of what it would supposedly satirize. Its no Black Dynamite, and its certainly no Colbert Report. Why do people watch Community? Probably because its different. But what distinguishes the showits allusionsis now holding it back. Consistently find-

ing Community funny means finding the same gag funny time and again. That makes for a viewer as stunted as Abed especially when you consider that understanding all the references requires acquiring Abeds encyclopedic knowledge of pop culture. If Community wants to be a cultural touchstone like the ones it so frequently references, it will have to add something new to the television comedy. Unfortunately, the only real contenderthe freeform interactions between Abed and Troy, a former high school football staris treated as an afterthought, coming during the end credit sequence. A change is needed if Community doesnt want to jump the shark too soon.

Oxymorons and Obscenities

james STROMBER contributing writer
While Das Racist caught our attention last Spring Weekend with their raucous ode to fast food, Odd Future Wolf Gang Kill Them All shocked the nation with raps about serial killers and raping Taylor Swift. Regardless of approach, lyrical rap is enjoying newfound popularity. Such groups that began by distributing independently recorded, free mixtapes are suddenly making a national crossover. Examining both Das Racists and OFWGKTAs contrasting methodologies helps us contextualize their current standings in the scene. Das Racist is a giant oxymoron. They disregard the rap scene yet perpetuate it, and openly and relentlessly mock the music while simultaneously producing and performing it. The rap trio, formed in Brooklyn by Himanshu Suri (Heems), Victor Vasquez (Kool A.D.), and hype man Ashok Kondabolu (Dap), is completely satirical. Das Racists 2010 mixtapes Shut Up, Dude and Sit Down, Man are just as parodic, but exponentially elevated in absurdism and ambiguity; they make elitist references throughout their music and revel in it. In Nutmeg, Das Racist raps Frank-n-Dank, feelin hot yo, watchin Rosanna Scotto, / Liz Cho, Sade Baderinwa, Sue Simmons, / Mr. G, Mr. Me, Mr. Me Toothey reference a rap duo from Detroit, local NY news anchormen, a track from They Might be Giants and Clipses Hell Hath No Fury. The catchiness is certainly there, but the lyrics are loftier than anything rap has seen before. Das Racists obscure references seem to be another way of mocking commercial rapthey satirize the mainstream tendency to reference other rappers. hough we might rarely pick up on Das Racists references, its clear that theyre not out to rap seriously or be taken seriously. Why would a record label sign a group that so transparently mocks the genre they serve to promote? Greedhead signed Das Racist because their music is catchy and hip; they use samples from Vampire Weekend and beats produced by Diplo. History dictates that catchy music sells. Still, Das Racists new commercial album Relax didnt prove to be all that lucrativethe album sold 1100 units in its first week and 4,500 in its second, resulting in a rank of 103 on the US Billboard 200. Relaxs lack of monetary success demonstrates the transience of lyrical raps rise to popularity and the fickle nature of consumers. Although Das Racist created a national buzz and continues to garner Youtube hits, when a price tag is put on their music, their listeners turn away. While Das Racist is shamelessly snide, Odd Future Wolf Gang Kill Them All, the loose, 10-member collective from Los Angeles, is brazenly extreme and attention grabbing. OFWGKTAs music is centered on obscenities and brutality (some common themes include raping women and taking both lives and drugs). The rappers ages stand in stark contrast to their shock rap: Tyler, The Creator, the leader and ringmaster of the group, is only 19 years old, whereas Earl Sweatshirt, Tylers sidekick and partner in the subgroup EarlWolf, is 16. The group exists to disturb and unsettle people. And theyre no less violent or rowdy livethey break microphones, rile people up, encourage them to chant slurs, and take frequent stage dives. Despite their crude nature, theyre undeniably exciting. But their conflict sometimes digs

lyricism in the f*cking rap industry

deeper and more personal than violence and rape. Tyler, The Creator raps about his fathers absence in Bastard: F*ck a deal, I just want my fathers email / So I can tell him how much I f*ckin hate him in detail. Like Das Racist, OFWGKTAs beats are catchy but recycled. It is lyricism that differentiates them from mainstream rap and facilitated the groups rise to popularity. Unlike Das Racist, OFWGKTA is out to make it to top of the rap scene. In an interview conducted by The Drone, Tyler said, Im hungry for greatness ... Im hungry for VMAs and Grammys, thats my main goal. F*ck this underground bullshit. But whats shocking is that Tyler has achieved the success he set out for, and that the industry enabled them to. Tyler, The Creators video for his single Yonkers was nominated by MTV for a Video Music Award, the teenager went on the win Best New Artist, and Odd Future Records became the groups new label. But is this commercialization just business as usual for the rap industry? Though it may be too early to predict OFWGKTAs fate, Das Racists commercialization has certainly proven to be a flop. When the industry realizes lyrical rap isnt the cash cow they were hoping for, theyll be onto the next big thing. Well let Das Racist continue to mock rap and OFWGKTA enjoy their time in the spotlight, but ultimately their success is a blip in the history of hip hop.

arts & culture

POST-

Who Is This Guy?

the inexplicable, inimitable oscar wilde
kate DOYLE editrix emerita

Youll forgive if this grows personal, but in a sense, the man demands it. In the midst of the first of his three trials replayed and thrust under the microscope for close, elegant scrutiny in Moises Kaufmans Gross Indecency: The Three Trials of Oscar Wilde, showing since last weekend in Leeds Theatrethere comes a reference to the influence produced on an artist by a beautiful personality. Wearing a roguish grin and satin jacket, Wilde has a certain entrancement in his countenance and the amused tilt of his headeven under unfriendly scrutiny. Hes speaking, mesmerized, of Dorian Gray, the title character in his novel. But Im thinking instead of the influence produced Wilde himself, or, at least, his statue hidden in a corner of Dublins Merrion Square. In June 2008, I watched two traveling companions wildly (ha!) snap photos at the sitetugged madly about, it seemed, by the cameras in their hands as if they held the leashes of an excitable pack of Irish wolfhounds. The statue is appropriately atypical: Wilde lounges, chin in hand and eyes cast on a satiric upward trajectory. He sports a swanky suit of colored marble. He sprawlshalf-godlike, halflackadaisicalhigh atop a huge chunk of boulder. Visitors who chance upon it have a habit of clambering up the rock face to sit at the writers side and approximate his wry, clever expression, once theyve finished photographing the multitude of Wilde-isms inscribed on a few stout pillars nearby. Perched next to him on an Irish summer evening in the square, one feels oneself in the company of a dear frienda friend possessed of both a sharp tongue and a taste for the sumptuous. Lounging companionably at the side of Oscar Wilde in this quiet corner of the fair city, you think: what is it about the man? From whence the magnetism? From what source this magic effect, the perennial and persistent appeal? For persistent it is. Theres proof ready at hand on our own campus this semester, in the Department of Theatre Arts and Performance Studies, where not one but two Wildean plays are currently in productioneach one of a wildly (ha! again) singular ilk. The biographically meditative, edging-on-obsessive Gross Indecency by Kaufman, directed by Professor Kym Moore, plays through this weekend. It is set to be followed by Wildes bitingly satirical Lady Windermeres Fan, directed by Professor Lowry Marshall, later this month. If one is a blithe romp, the other is

more complicateda piece of theater understated, tragic, and peculiar. While Windermere is a testament to Wildes brilliant and dramatic flair with pen and paper, Gross Indecency stands for a certain brilliant and dramatic flair in living. Its subject matter is the consequent series of repercussions namely that, from 1895, Oscar Wilde withstood three grueling trials in London for his homosexuality. In the first of these, a libel suit against a statement terming him posing sodomite, Wilde gave testimony for the prosecution that quickly turned sour, resulting in his arrest soon afterward. In the ensuing trials, he was prosecuted in his own right twice over, and finally, jailed. While imprisoned, he developed health complications that led to an early death not long after his release. Preoccupied by cause and effect and irrevocability of this history, Gross Indecencys biographical precision is considerable. It is a play that plumbs history, sifting through the archives of these trials to excavate them for the present day. Yet the subtly spun majesty of the thing, and the scary thread of inevitability running through it, is not so much in history played out (however masterfully), but more in the compulsive pulse at the heart of the playan itching to get at the magnetism, the untouchability, the strange downfall of the literary giant that is Oscar Wilde. Like us, Gross Indecency is captivated by the man, wants to pal around at his side atop a boulder in Merrion Square without quite understanding his charm. And it is possessed by a cer-

tain intrigue that isas the minutes of stage time tick bypermitted to swell to all-consuming infatuation. Brian Cross 12, who plays Oscar Wilde in the production, describes him as a man who seems almost amorphous, who can adjust himself for his crowd, whose spirit is so hard to pin down and whose personality and values seem so hard to categorize. That is a major part of his charm, I feel. For all of his identities as a writer, a genius, a father, a husband, and what we today would call a homosexual, we ask ourselves who is this guy? As the play makes clear, the perennial appeal is in the personalityin all its mystery and bafflement. And as one watches Wilde disintegrate as he takes the stand three times over, the allure is somehow deepened. Smart, impish, eloquent, self-styled; controversial, an aesthete, a man who lived his own philosophies; ultimately conflicted, introspective in the extremeWilde is, in his way, a uniquely Brunonian figure. He is the kind of man whose cause we at Brown take up, not least because his persecution for his sexuality makes him in some sense a tormented hero of our liberal mindset. Still, our fascination is no new phenomenononly an ever-evolving one. Wildes contemporaries were as captivated as we. When he was jailed just before the start of the second trial, crowds swarmed his residence, where they bid with relish in auction that proves (replayed onstage) a wrenching gut moment. Steep prices were handed over for every last manuscript and personal possession

belonging to the famous, now infamous, Oscar Wilde. It is with an equally sensationalist fascination that Gross Indecency makes its own foray into collecting and dissecting the pieces of Wilde. Director Moore takes pains to foreground that her production is nothing if not this: a staged moment, a performance, another bold and infatuated and in a sense impossible attempt to understand a peculiarly compelling figureand for that alone, her production is peculiarly compelling in its own right. The actors enter as ordinary students might, speaking in their own American accents and thumbing through books and papers on a table center stage. The British accents and other mannerisms they begins to affect as the play picks up are quite consciously just thisaffectedand as the play reaches its pinnacle and comes to an end, the characters subside, once again, into the students they really are awed and puzzled, a full century after the fact. This is to say that beyond any piece of fact-finding, historical narrative, or journalism, and beyond any replay of Wildes downfall, Gross Indecency is this: an expression of deep curiosity. And yet: nothing worth knowing can be taught, chirps one fruit of the Wildean wit. Which means, perhaps, that we can never really hope to understand the man who wrote these words. All the same, we hang onto him, hold him up to the lightperhaps for his art and for what he endured, but surely most of all for his personality, as a figure to reverence and even mythologize. At the Oscar Wilde statue in June 2008, one friend of mine and his camera gravitated, mesmerized, toward this one epigram in particular that nothing worth knowing can be taughtpossessed by some desperate wish to snap a photo that would reflect the photographer himself in the black marble beneath this scrawled quotation. In that instant, it seemed Oscar Wilde had summed up the worldview of my would-be rebellious friend, age 18. They were kindred spirits, one sensed. Communing across the years, mentor to mentee, more than a century after the mans death. It was mysterious moment, but then, Oscar Wilde was mysterious man. Just chalk it up to the influence produced by one beautiful personality.

lifestyle
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 6TH, 2011

Me Jane, You Food

jane BRENDLINGER managing editor of lifestyle
Its not just midterms or that chill in the airyou really know its fall when all your food turns pumpkin-flavored. I have a hunch that Starbucks brewed up this conspiracy. Nothing irks me more than the inevitable September Facebook status popping up on my News Feed: Just got my first pumpkin spice latt of the season! Dislike. Try our fall flavors, Starbucks implores, and Im invited to spend $5 on a pumpkin spice latt thats both sickly sweet and orange. Should coffee ever be orange? My salted caramel mocha is so pumped with syrup and additives that I can barely recognize the drink as coffee. Ah, but its not just coffee, you say. Its an overpriced, sugarblasted, make-me-vom-in-the-morning beverage, good to the last drop. The beer industry has also picked up on this autumnal marketing scheme. Fall ales, pumpkin drafts, all with little leaf logos or silly pictures of drunk jacko-lanterns. Theyre not all bad, Ill admit. I recently tasted a pumpkin ale and liked it, but mostly because I couldnt really taste the pumpkin. The real culprit in this instance, Im afraid to say, is Woodchuck. As much as I enjoy the hard cider, especially around this time of year, theyve come out with some revolting seasonal specialties. One of the worst is just labeled Fall. As if theyve distilled the season to a flavor, saccharin with cinnamon and nutmeg. Ill admit, I tried a sip. After all, I thought, Im a girl. I love this stuff! What I got was overspiced and cloying, and I felt like a kid whod eaten too much Halloween candy. I passed my bottle off and grabbed a Blue Moon to cleanse the palate. Please dont misinterpret, there are many fall delights I respect and appreciate. The root vegetable, for instance, roasted in the oven with a touch of maple syrup or sauted with garlic and olive oil. Butternut squash soup (fantastic with fennel and apple). Wholesome activities like apple picking and pumpkin carvingdont forget to salt and toast the seeds! Caramel apples. Hot damn, I could really go for a caramel apple. And pumpkin, yes, is delicious, in pies, breads, and muffins. But please, keep it away from my coffee, and god help you if you pollute my beer with that pumpkin shit. So if you really, really feel the need to eat pumpkinbecause after all, it is fall and thats just what you domake these cookies. Theyre soft and cake-y, and pumpkin and chocolate turn out to be like that awkward couple you wouldnt think would work but have bangin sex. Plus, iced things are always welcome in my house.

the taste of fall

Iced Pumpkin Cookies
Ingredients 2 cups all purpose flour 1 teaspoon baking powder 1/2 teaspoon baking soda 1/2 teaspoon salt 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon 1/2 teaspoon allspice 1 cup butter 1 cup granulated sugar 1 can (15 oz.) pumpkin pure 1 large egg 1 teaspoon vanilla extract, divided 1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips 1/2 cup chopped walnuts

The iced part: 1/3 cup butter, softened 1 teaspoon vanilla 2 cups powdered sugar 1/4 cup milk

Preheat oven to 350 F. Combine flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, and allspice in medium bowl. Beat the butter and granulated sugar in large mixer bowl for 30 seconds. Add pumpkin, the egg, and the vanilla extract; beat until blended. Gradually add flour mixture into pumpkin mixture at low speed until combined. Stir in chocolate chips and nuts. Drop by rounded teaspoons onto baking sheets. Eat some of the dough, but try to reserve at least half the batter for cookies. Self control, Padawan. Bake for 12 to 15 minutes or until edges are golden brown. Cool on a rack, and drizzle each cookie with glaze (I like to pipe it in zigzags through a baggie with the corner clipped: Technique lies in the speed, good friend). Icing: Beat butter and vanilla extract in medium mixer bowl until creamy. Gradually beat in powdered sugar and milk until smooth (frosting will be thin). Now thats some good pumpkin shit.

The Writing on the Wall

marshall KATHEDER editor emeritus
Al Read is at the corner of Steeple and South Main Streets in 1989. Its dark, around 10 p.m., and hes at a choice skate spot in Providence. The skateboarders here gnaw at the edges of civility: rolling airborne off the rusted remnants of tired industry, leaving scarred metal and concrete in their wake. They gamble their bodies for thrills. Skateboards were contraband it was illegal. It was for misfits. It was for radical, crazy, problem children ... I guess you had to be tough. There is evident defiance in their wheeled pursuit. They aim for societys margins, the whir of urethane on asphalt signaling their arrival. This loud expressive sense is not bound to their boards. Read sees his friend Shepard Fairey approach; both are students at RISD. Fairey would go on to be a prolific and trendy icon. His famous red, white, and blue poster of Obamainscribed with the word HOPE would become synonymous with the current presidents 2008 campaign. But Fairey will not help anyones political career tonight. He holds a stack of 8.5 by 11 paper in his arms. Each sheet bears an inked portion of Andre the Giant, the cult 70s wrestler. Tiled pieces to be assembled together. This face now appears on Faireys famed Andre prints (often with the word OBEY) and can be found in abundanceon posters and stickers and his OBEY clothing line. Fairey has a different venue in mind this evening. Buddy Cianci, the infamous Prince of Providence, is up for Mayoral re-election. His slogan reassures that He never stopped caring about Providence. Cianci resigned years earlier after an incident involving a lit cigarette, an ashtray, and a contractor from Bristol he accused of sleeping with his wife. A picture of smiling Cianci, his jacket tossed casually over his shoulder,

obey, back in the day

appears on a billboard with the kindly phrase. Skateboarding beneath Cianci, Read watches his friend climb the billboard. Fairey arranges and pastes Andres face over Ciancis. Its not perfectthe image is too small. And the next day it is taken down. But Fairey tries once more. He goes back the next night with a bigger Andre print and the words Join the Posse to once again plaster over the billboard. The Join the Posse text is pasted to Ciancis waving hand, and the slogan now reads: Andre Never Stopped Caring About Providence. This is the infancy of the AndreOBEY icon, the beginning of Faireys brainchild social experiment. He sought to prove that anything could have meaning thrust upon it: There is no inherent significance in the image. Skateboarders in the late 80s had already started to define their cliques with stickered logos. Toying with lemminglike consumerism, Fairey took this notion of branding a step further. He created what appeared to be an exclusive symbol, and viewers assumed it referenced an in-group. But it was apropos of nothingand the image rose to chic heights without any basis. What seemed to be a selective icon in fact belonged to everyone. But that was the intention. The point was to do something funny, Read said to me recently. It was not cool to like wrestling ... it was in the

realm of the monster truck rally. Shep wanted to prove he could make anything cool. And he did. Andres face can still be found today on Thayer Street. Nice Slice, which Al Read and his business partner opened in 2005, remains the counter-culture bastion for Thayer, an unofficial Brown domain. Andre stickers litter the counter and the Giants eyes leer ominously on the wall. Fairey also designed the popular pizza places logo, and his art is displayed there with abandon. The Slice is sort of a mindless thingevery good experience begins or ends with a slice of pizza, Read said. Faireys Andre (OBEY) the giant and its origins are largely forgotten in Providence, faded like sun-bleached sticker. If this is the end of the icon that defined dissent for a generation, I cant think of a better resting place than the Slice. Next time you get a sliver of Space Junk pizza, snag an Andre sticker. OBEY.

lifestyle
POST-

Excalibur and the OneEyed Monster

SADIE sex columnist
Ive seen enough penises at this point to get a general sense of whats out there. What does an actual average-sized penis look like? Well, not really as big as youd think. Thats probably because, at least for me, I thought most penises would look like the Subway-sandwich schlongs I saw in porn. If youre feeling a little down about the size of your junk, do me a favor: Dont look on the Internet. Those aspiring actors and actresses are paid for their private parts to look perfect. Theyre constantly getting groomed, lubed, and polished. Comparing your parts to what you see on YouPorn is the equivalent of comparing your body to those you find in Fitness Magazine. It just aint happenin, baby. But if you are looking for ways to enhance the looks of your parts, you have to first work on establishing a healthy relationship with your partner outside of the bedroom. In my experience, the man defines the dick. By that, I mean my feelings for a man influence how I view his penis as a physical object. For example, Alex was incredibly sweet, good-looking, and smart. Alex also had a serious mental illness, which made me hypersensitive around him. And, oh yeah, Alex did not have a very big wang. During the first month of our sexual relationship, I was obsessed with how small it was. The thought of it in my mouth repulsed me. It was like a childs. But as I came to trust and believe in Alex, his small, pathetic penis turned into a large, sexy penis. We ended up having fantastic sex, and Alex was the first person to give me multiple orgasms (!!). His size did not actually change while I was with him, of course, but it was because I could now treat him like an emotional adult that I began to see his penis differently. And there are all sorts of other examples. There was Emmanuel, the French guy who was too aggressive for my taste. I had to ask him to leave my apartment because he came on so strong (no pun intended). His penis was enormous and it terrified me. I think, had we been in a relationship that I felt good about, he wouldnt have had a scary penis but a really sexy one! Or take my experience with Mark. I only remember his penis as floppy, although objectively, it was actually large and quite sturdy. But because Mark as a person was so floppyhe was indecisive and unreliableIll always picture his penis this way. Heres the point: Stop worrying about what you can do to make your private parts look appealing. Just go for what feels right. Ive experimented with all sorts of hairstylesbald, mustachioed, short cut, full length and I have to tell you, Ive never had a single guy complain. The point isnt what you do with it; its how you wear it. It doesnt matter if youre enjoying a one-night stand or if youre in a long-term relationship. If you want someone to like the way your stuff looks, make sure this person respects you outside of the bedroom first.

etiquette advice for the socially awkward and their victims

Emily Postshame em into shaving

to be overly exuberant when growing their first beard. If this is the case, a word about proper beard maintenance might be sufficient to set your friend on the path of righteousness. If scraggle is his primary issue, however, youre in dire straits. Short of massaging Rogaine into his face while he sleeps (perhaps not the worst idea), theres not much that can be done to remedy patchy facial hair. Thus, the way is clear: Proceed to Option B. There are a variety of ways to shame someone into shaving off his beard. While I trust your ingenuityand suspect that you have some choice comments brewingI would recommend a pointed joke, such as Did a small mammal with mange crawl onto your face? followed by a short laugh, then the crushing, No, but really. Steel yourself for the astonished, wounded eyes of a kicked puppy. You are emancipating your friend from a variety of horrible, heinous-beard-related fates, including, but not limited to, romantic selfsabotage. But if you cant quite bring your metaphorical foot to connect with his unsuspecting buttocks, go underhanded: Ply him with his favorite liquor, lull him into a drunken stupor, and then shave away.

Dear Emily, My friend has heinous facial hair. You may be familiar with the chinstrap, the hipster mustache, etcetera, but believe me when I tell you that youve never seen a scragglier, more unappealing beard. And yet, he loves it. Should I destroy his illusion that hes projecting rugged manliness, or continue to indulge him? Uncertain about Gross Hair Dear Uncertain, Allow me to enhance your vocabulary. The word of the day is pogomaniac, which means someone who is obsessed with having a beard no matter what anyone says about negative aspects of beards. You see, dear UGH, this facial fixation is not an endearing idiosyncrasy. It is an illness. When it comes to appalling facial hair, there can be no debate, no delay, no dithering: You must act, and act immediately. You may choose one of two approaches. First, and most tactfully, you may attempt to improve the appearance of his beard. Is it merely insufficiently groomed? Young men, astonished and delighted by their entrance into late-stage puberty, tend

telling the roommate to cease and desist

Dear Dorian, I made a really good friend as a freshman, and this year we decided to room together. Things have been great in our double ... mostly. I only have one problem with this otherwise awesome dude: He has no sense of when the appropriate time and place to masturbate is. He does it while he thinks Im asleep, when his back is turned to me, and if he thinks I am studying and wont notice. What I didnt know wouldnt kill me, if he werent also really loud about it. Ideas? Help? PLEASE? Loud Orgasms Undermine Dorm life Dear LOUD, As someone who knows that his masturbatory habits are best suited to living in a single, I can certainly understand your roommates predicament. That said, I can hardly condone his constant masturbation in your presence. At the least, it is unequivocally awkward, and at the worst, it is a blatant disregard of your right to feel comfortable in your own room. One solution I can offer is to start subtly helping your roommate release his tension in other ways (for example, find him a friend with benefits). That way, he will not feel so pressured to release himself that he needs to masturbate while youre in the room. A potential pitfall is that your roommate might find someone who is equally uninhibited when it comes to sex acts with company, and he or she may be loud as well. It seems, LOUD, that the only real way to solve your problem is with a direct confrontation. Sit your roommate down and tell him, Hey, your habit of masturbating when I am in the room makes me uncomfortable. Please cease and desist. Of course, you dont have to be that clinical, but be sure to get your point across. More masturbation while youre there will obviously lead to the situation getting worse, and if he is indeed a pretty cool guy, then he will immediately regret his actions and clean up his act. No pun intended. Your Friendly Neighborhood Twink, Dorian