Some more musings on 150 foot buildings in Chinatown and the DTES

The discussion regarding the appropriateness of more buildings up to 150 feet in height in Chinatown and the DTES is continuing. Frances Bula has written about it, and many are talking about it. In the last few days, I have often been asked my views. So the following is a modified version of comments I posted this morning on Frances Bula's site.

I am troubled by the notion that we should consider taller buildings in Chinatown because some businessmen in the Chinatown community think this will lead to economic revitalization.

Conversely, I am troubled by the claims of 30 ‘learned’ academics that we should not allow taller buildings since they will result in a loss of affordable housing for the poor, and gentrification in the area.

With respect to the first comment, revitalization is already happening in Chinatown and in a limited number of DTES locations. I appreciate that some of the Chinatown merchants may not like the changes being brought about by the two new condominium projects V6A and Ginger, and the new restaurants and professional offices opening up in the area that are bringing a new demographic into the area, but the reality is that our Chinatown has changed forever, as a result of the emergence of Richmond’s ‘Chinatown’ and other 'Chinatowns' around the region.

In my opinion, there will continue to be new condominium developments catering to hip young buyers in Chinatown regardless of whether the height limits allow 10 storeys or 16 storeys. But I fear that allowing 5 new buildings up to 16 storeys along Main Street, (as staff are suggesting might be possible), will ultimately lead to a very different character for the area. It’s not just the five buildings…it’s the five more buildings that come afterwards, and then another five buildings and so on....

I worry that these taller buildings along Main Street will likely detract from the heritage character of the area. One reason I worry is that I don’t know what the new buildings will look like. That is why I have suggested to staff that they prepare drawings illustrating what 16 storey buildings might look like from different angles.

Now I admit I might be wrong. So please show me and others the pictures. Then we will all be in a more informed position to comment.

I also admit that some of my concerns are rooted in the above mentioned notion that taller buildings are necessary for economic revitalization. To me this is nonesense. I just don’t believe it.

So what’s the solution, In addition to seeing some illustrations, I would like to hear from architect Joe Wai, who has been working in Chinaotwn for four decades, and knows the area much better than me. He also understands what tall buildings can, and cannot do.

And although we have heard from 30 ‘learned academics’, I would also like to hear from other academics, especially those who are knowledgeable about architecture and planning.

I am troubled by the silence of professors from the School of Community and Regional Planning and the Faculty of Architecture at UBC. I would like to hear their views on the staff report.

I would also like to hear from more professionals in Vancouver’s architectural and planning community. I know some are conflicted, and some may be reluctant to speak out since they worry doing so might compromise their ability to get approvals from staff or Councils in the future. But the planning of important heritage areas in the city are at stake.

I think we all deserve second or third opinions on these important planning propositions.

(And while the professors and architects/planners are at it, I hope they will comment on the building heights/views/capacity report for the downtown.

And then they can comment on other current proposals for taller buildings and higher densities around the city.)

To be honest, I don’t know what they will say. They may completely disagree with my concerns, but I think it is important for staff and Council to hear from these people…not just from caring sociologists and related academics who might have been asked by activists concerned about the potential gentrification of the DTES (or by other colleagues who were approached by activists concerned about the potential gentrification of the DTES).

I would like to conclude on the subject of gentrification, which along with ‘revitalization’ seems to be at the root of this discussion,

I understand gentrification to mean the eviction of lower income households by the ‘gentry’ who move into an area as it is being revitalized and improved.

In the case of the DTES, a lot of the lower income households are living in affordable housing stock that is protected…since it is owned by governments and non-profits, or covered by anti-demolition bylaws. I acknowledge that some of the housing may be deliberately allowed to run-down, but the city can take steps to prevent this from happening too.

Furthermore, whether the building heights are 10 storeys or 16 storeys, we are going to see condominium development in both the DTES and Chinatown…and I think this is a good thing….they will result in healthier, more interesting and diverse communities.

The current situation in the DTES and Chinatown is not acceptable…there is a need for a broader social and income mix, and yes revitalization. But let’s not throw out the baby with the bathwater. This might happen unless we better understand the ramifications of more 150 foot buildings.

Pere Lachaise Grave of Gerard de Nerval

Deathday: Romantic Poet Gerard De Nerval 1855

Gérard de Nerval (May 22, 1808 – January 26, 1855) was the nom-de-plume of the French poet, essayist and translator Gérard Labrunie, one of the most essentially Romantic French poets.

Biography

Two years after his birth in Paris, his mother died in Silesia while accompanying her husband, a military doctor, a member of Napoleon's Grande Armée. He was brought up by his maternal great-uncle, Antoine Boucher, in the countryside of Valois at Mortefontaine. On the return of his father from war during 1814, he was sent back to Paris. He frequently returned to the countryside of Valois during holidays and later returned to it in imagination in his Chansons et légendes du Valois.

His talent for translation was made manifest in his translation of Goethe's Faust (1828), the work which earned him his reputation; Goethe praised it, and Hector Berlioz later used sections for his legend-symphony La damnation de Faust. Other translations from Goethe ensued; in the 1840s, Nerval's translations introduced Heinrich Heine's poems to French readers of the Revue des deux mondes. During the 1820s at college he became lifelong friends with Théophile Gautier and later joined Alexandre Dumas, père in the Petit Cénacle, in what was an exceedingly bohemian set, which was ultimately to become the Club des Hashischins. Nerval's poetry is characterized by Romantic deism. His passion for the 'spirit world' was matched by a decidedly more negative view of the material one: "This life is a hovel and a place of ill-repute. I'm ashamed that God should see me here." Among his admirers was Victor Hugo.

Gérard de Nerval's first nervous breakdown occurred during 1841. In a series of novellas, collected as Les Illuminés, ou les précurseurs du socialisme (1852), on themes suggested by the careers of Rétif de la Bretonne, Cagliostro and others, he described feelings that followed his third insanity. Increasingly poverty-stricken and disoriented, he finally committed suicide during 1855, hanging himself from a window grating. He left only a brief note to his aunt: "Do not wait up for me this evening, for the night will be black and white."[1] He was interred in the Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris.

Legacy

The influence of Nerval's insistence on the significance of dreams on the Surrealist movement was emphasised by André Breton. The writers Marcel Proust and René Daumal were also greatly influenced by Nerval's work, as was Artaud.

Umberto Eco analyses Gérard de Nerval's Sylvie (calling it a "masterpiece") to show the use of temporal ambiguity, demystifying the "mists" during his Six Walks in the Fictional Woods.

Allusions by others

T. S. Eliot quoted the second line of Nerval's sonnet "El Desdichado" in his poem The Waste Land. Donald Swann set that poem to music as "Je Suis le Ténébreux" (its first words) and Flanders and Swann performed it in their revue At the Drop of a Hat (1956); it appears on the live recording. Clive James, in his songwriting collaboration with Pete Atkin, wrote two lyrics that refer to the poem, "The Prince of Aquitaine" and "The Shadow and the Widower".[2]

The British progressive rock music band Pure Reason Revolution draw extensively from Nerval for influence in their lyrics, which often revolve around dreams and use a 'stream of consciousness' technique very similar to Nerval's. The title of their song "Trembling Willows" is a reference to one of Nerval's poems, "Delfica", and its lyrics take many of the same images. Similarly, the song "In Aurelia" comes from Nerval's masterpiece of the same name.

The British rock music band Traffic included a song on their album When the Eagle Flies called "Dream Gerrard." The lyrics were written by Vivian Stanshall as a tribute to Nerval. The song contains surreal lyrics like Nerval's work.

Nerval is referenced in Richard Wilbur's new book Anterooms in the poem "A Prelude". The poem is a mockery of the seriousness of Matthew Arnold and his poem "Dover Beach". Wilbur writes of Matthew Arnold, "And was upon the point of saying "Ah," / When he perceived, not far from the great Aiguille, / A lobster led on a leash beside the sea. / It was Nerval, enjoying his vacances!"

Pet lobster

Nerval had a pet lobster named Thibault which he took for walks in the Palais Royal gardens in Paris on the end of a blue silk ribbon.[3] Nerval wrote to his close childhood friend Laura LeBeau, recounting an embarrassing incident that occurred while on holiday in La Rochelle: "...and so, dear Laura, upon my regaining the town square I was accosted by the mayor who demanded that I should make a full and frank apology for stealing from the lobster nets. I will not bore you with the rest of the story, but suffice to say that reparations were made, and little Thibault is now here with me in the city..."[3]

In an article about the life of Nerval by his contemporary, Théophile Gautier, Nerval is quoted as having said "Why should a lobster be any more ridiculous than a dog? ...or a cat, or a gazelle, or a lion, or any other animal that one chooses to take for a walk? I have a liking for lobsters. They are peaceful, serious creatures. They know the secrets of the sea, they don't bark, and they don't gnaw upon one's monadic privacy like dogs do. And Goethe had an aversion to dogs, and he wasn't mad."[4]

In the Sam Shepard and Patti Smith play Cowboy Mouth, the character Cavale is obsessed with Nerval, making numerous references to him and claiming that Nerval hanged himself on [her] birthday. It also mentions Nerval having a pet lobster, as above, amidst other fantastic claims. This may be the inspiration for the play's character 'Lobster Man.'

Flanders and Swann make mention of Nerval's pet lobster in the introduction to "Je Suis Le Ténébreux".[5]

Works by Nerval

Les faux saulniers (1850)
Voyage en Orient (1851), resulted from his extended hashish-filled voyage of 1842 to Cairo and Beirut. It must have puzzled readers of conventional travel books, for it retells Oriental tales like Solomon and the Queen of Sheba, in terms of the artist and the act of creation.
La Bohème Galante (1852)
Les Nuits d'Octobre (1852)
Sylvie (1853)
Petits châteaux de Bohême (1853)
Les Filles du Feu (1854), a volume of short stories.
Les Chimères poems appended to Les Filles de Feu, translated by Mark Lamoureux
Aurélia (1855), his fantasy-ridden interior autobiography— "Our dreams are a second life," he wrote— which influenced the Surrealists.
Promenades et Souvenirs (1854–56)

References

1.^ Sieburth, Richard, Gerard de Nerval: Selected Writings, p. xxxi, Penguin Group, London, 1999
2.^ James, Clive; Curry, Andrew; Birkill, S. J.. "Shadow and the Widower". Smash Flops.
3.^ Horton, Scott (2008-10-12). "Nerval: A Man and His Lobster". Harper's Magazine.
4.^ Gautier, Théophile. Portraits et Souvenirs Littéraires (Paris: Charpentier, 1875), Richard Holmes trans.
5.^ "At the Drop of a Hat - Je suis le Ténébreux". Flanders and Swann Online.

Animated Version of Edgar Allan Poe's "The Raven"

Mr. Meep Studios

"The Raven" by Edgar Allan Poe - Animated Movie

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
'' 'Tis some visitor,'' I muttered, ''tapping at my chamber door-
Only this, and nothing more.''

Petit court métrage en hommage au magnifique poème d'Edgar Allan Poe, sur une musique du groupe Alan Persons Project, étant également un hommage au poète et à son corbeau.

Milesthefox89 - June 17, 2008

Gustave Dore's "The Raven" Illustrations

Gustave Doré illustrated an oversized edition of Edgar Allan Poe's "The Raven," an endeavor that earned him 30,000 francs from publisher Harper and Brothers in 1883.

Deathday: Raven Illustrator Gustave Dore 1883

Paul Gustave Doré ( January 6, 1832 – January 23, 1883) was a French artist, engraver, illustrator and sculptor. Doré worked primarily with wood engraving and steel engraving.

Biography

Doré was born in Strasbourg and his first illustrated story was published at the age of fifteen. His skill had manifested itself even earlier, however. At age five he had been a prodigy artist, creating drawings that were mature beyond his years. Seven years later, he began carving in stone. Subsequently, as a young man, he began work as a literary illustrator in Paris, winning commissions to depict scenes from books by Rabelais, Balzac, Milton and Dante.

In 1853, Doré was asked to illustrate the works of Lord Byron. This commission was followed by additional work for British publishers, including a new illustrated English Bible. A decade later, he illustrated a French edition of Cervantes's Don Quixote, and his depictions of the knight and his squire, Sancho Panza, have become so famous that they have influenced subsequent readers, artists, and stage and film directors' ideas of the physical "look" of the two characters. Doré also illustrated an oversized edition of Edgar Allan Poe's "The Raven," an endeavor that earned him 30,000 francs from publisher Harper Brothers in 1883.

Doré's English Bible (1866) was a great success, and in 1867 Doré had a major exhibition of his work in London. This exhibition led to the foundation of the Doré Gallery in New Bond Street. In 1869, Blanchard Jerrold, the son of Douglas William Jerrold, suggested that they work together to produce a comprehensive portrait of London. Jerrold had obtained the idea from The Microcosm of London produced by Rudolph Ackermann, William Pyne, and Thomas Rowlandson in 1808. Doré signed a five-year contact with the publishers Grant Co that involved his staying in London for three months a year, and he received the vast sum of £10,000 a year for the project. Doré was mainly celebrated for his paintings in his day. His paintings remain world renowned, but his woodcuts and engravings, like those he did for Jerrold, are where he really excelled as an artist with an individual vision.

The completed book, London: A Pilgrimage, with 180 engravings, was published in 1872. It enjoyed commercial success, but the work was disliked by many contemporary critics. Some of these critics were concerned with the fact that Doré appeared to focus on the poverty that existed in parts of London. Doré was accused by the Art Journal of "inventing rather than copying." The Westminster Review claimed that "Doré gives us sketches in which the commonest, the vulgarest external features are set down." The book was a financial success, however, and Doré received commissions from other British publishers.

His later works included Coleridge's Rime of the Ancient Mariner, Milton's Paradise Lost, Tennyson's The Idylls of the King, The Works of Thomas Hood, and The Divine Comedy. His work also appeared in the Illustrated London News.

He continued to illustrate books until his death in Paris in 1883. The city's Père Lachaise Cemetery contains his grave.