From the desk of Thomas Typewriter…09-21-2020

From the desk of Thomas Typewriter, The Great Works Project assignments, The Great Works Project scripts

Progress continues on The Great Works Project scripts. I’ll finish the final rough draft for Season Five tomorrow or Wednesday. Once that is dine, I’ll start working on crafting the Season Two scriptbook. The last three scripts of Season Five required a complete rewrite. Carro and Z-Mouse suprised me, reacting differently than what I expected. I like when the characters surprise me. A moment of joy.

As for the List, I feel like I need some help. A glaring issue I failed to notice when I compiled the List is the lack of context. I really believed that just exposing one self to great art could trigger a positive change. I still believe that, knowing it to be a powerful form of spellcraft. Yet, with every piece I am left wondering about the context. Why do people like it? What have those before me found special in it? To that end I have ordered three of the books that helped form part of the List*. I ordered “A Lifetime’s Reading: Five Hundred Great Books to be Enjoyed over 50 Years” by Philip Ward along with “1001 Films to Watch Before You Die” and “1001 Albums to Listen to Before You Die.” I hope these will help.

*When creating the List of Great Works, I was concerned about how these lists could be so mono-cultural. I felt that would defeat the purpose. I also was not experienced enough to fully discern the quality of a source. My solution to this was to go overboard and grab a too many sources. Cast a wide net. I of course used the Harvard Shelf of Classics and then added onto it. Here is a list of the sources I used: A Lifetime of Reading by Phillip Ward, Pitchfork.com’s People’s choice Top 200 albums from 1990 to 2010, AFI 100 years 100 Laughs, AFI’s The Top 25 Musicals, AFI’s Top 100, Empire Magazine’s 500 greatest films of all time, NPR Young Fiction Top 100 finalists, NPR Science-fiction/Fantasy top 100 finalists, The Guardian’s Top 25 Blues albums, The Guardian’s Top 20 Operas, The Guardian’s Top 20 classical works, Time Out New York’s survey of animators best animated films, Rolling Stone Magazine’s Top 500 Albums, The Great Works lit collection, The Harvard Shelf of Learning, 1001 Films to Watch before you die, and 1001 Albums to listen to before you die. I also believe I threw the movie Corky Romano on the list just so the list couldn’t be taken entirely serious. The list was important to me but I do not think anyone should take it as anything but suggested reading and viewing.