The Bucknellian

By Rob O’Donnell

Columnist

Attempting to describe the sound of The Head and the Heart’s self-titled debut album is complicated, so bear with me on this one. In fact, put this paper down and just buy the album. No matter what genre you usually identify with, it will make your night. 

Songs like “Down in the Valley” and “Winter Song” make me want to brand it as folk rock. They have beautiful acoustic guitar and violin as the driving instruments throughout, both of which call up the melancholy and nostalgic tone usually associated with folk or acoustic music. The lyrics on the entire album are incredibly intimate, and like good folk music they deal with honest topics like adventure, loss, heartbreak and whiskey. With all that said, the first time that I heard them was at the Newport Folk Festival, so I might be a little biased in my opinion. But as a testament to their skill, I heard them perform three songs and bought the album on the spot. So, as I said before, drop the paper and go listen.

For those people still reading, I’m going to change my mind and call it indie rock. I’m hesitant to do that, since the genre indie rock is the label that an album receives when it literally doesn’t fit into any other category. Which is why it is perfect in this case. Sorry. It is just way too upbeat and pop-sounding to be called folk music. I don’t mean pop-sounding in a bad way: in fact I actually mean it as a compliment. These are songs that I can actually play when I’m hanging out with my friends and not get grief for (because apparently Bob Dylan is not “party music”). Songs like “Lost in My Mind” and “Ghosts” can even be danced to, which is a sin for folk. You have to be a fairly confident dancer, but it can be done.

But overall, the album is fantastic. The songs all flow into each other and make the album really cohesive, not just a random assortment of songs in no particular order like a lot of artists. It’s a very eccentric sound, so the cohesiveness is crucial. They are one of the few bands that can turn listening to an album into a true experience. Taking a walk around town with The Head and the Heart on my iPod is one of my favorite things to do, and I suggest you do the same. Or if you’re too lazy, we’ll be playing the album this week on Those Damn Jackelopes from midnight to 2 a.m. on Thursday nights.

By Michelle Reed

Contributing Writer

 

University students and Lewisburg residents will soon have new opportunities to view and interact with contemporary art at the University’s Downtown Art Gallery.

Richard Rinehart, director of the Samek Art Gallery, sees the new gallery as an important part of the growing emphasis on the arts in Lewisburg.

“I think this new gallery could effect a dramatic positive change in the cultural landscape of Lewisburg,” Rinehart said. “We have the capability to bring the best art being produced in the world today to the heart of this community. There is a bit of a sea change taking place in this region currently with the newly renovated Campus Theatre, the Presidential Arts Initiative, edgy new galleries in Williamsport and a collage center opening in the future in Milton. Joining existing art and performance venues in the area, these new venues–including Bucknell’s new Downtown Art Gallery–can further Lewisburg as a cultural destination.”

The exhibitions at the Downtown Art Gallery will be separate from the program at the Samek Art Gallery on campus. Rinehart views the separation of the galleries as an opportunity to provide the campus and community with two different artistic experiences.

“By having distinct exhibitions, we double the opportunities for connecting with audiences,” Rinehart said. “Plus, the Samek is in the heart of academia, which suggests one kind of exhibition, whereas the Downtown Gallery is in the heart of the community, suggesting a different sort.”

The smaller size of the Downtown Art Gallery will allow for a much different presentation than one might encounter at the Samek Art Gallery.

“Size suggests the type of exhibition. The Samek is a relatively large gallery that suggests group shows and historic retrospectives, whereas the Downtown Gallery is much smaller, suggesting single-artist solo contemporary art shows where we can take advantage of living artists to visit town for residencies, lectures, and so on,” Rinehart said. “So, I see the two galleries complementing and balancing each other and providing a richer mix of cultural programming for the area.”

The Downtown Art Gallery will open its doors on March 31 with an opening celebration for the public on March 31 and April 1 from 12 – 5 p.m.

By Courtney Bottazzi

Staff Writer

Imagination and luck becomes a winning combination when paired with a creative mind.

Fortunately for poet Yiyun Li, she has the creative imagination and luck on her side. On Tuesday, the University had the honor of hosting Li, author of “Gold Boy, Emerald Girl,” “The Vagrants” and “A Thousand Years of Good Prayers.” 

Li has earned many prestigious awards including the Frank O’Connor International Short Story Award, PEN/Hemingway Award and the Guardian First Book Award. She was also included in The New Yorker’s top 20 writers under 40. 

Li read excerpts from one of her short stories, “Kindness,” and held two question-and-answer sessions. Melanie Santos ’12, a psychology and creative writing major, introduced Li at the reading and praised the writer’s unique style.

“The language is simple, yet elegant. The power comes from the honesty of her characters,” Santos said.

After hearing Li speak about her characters, it’s hard not expect one of them to walk through the door–that is the extent of their resemblance to real life. Li explained that she always ends a story before she knows all of her characters’ secrets.

“With characters, write what you don’t know. Curiosity drives me to know. I don’t know these characters and I want to,” Li said.

It was clear that Li has a remarkable imagination. She was able to thoroughly construct her characters’ identities so that she can hear and hold conversations with her characters.

“Being a writer is like being an actor. You have to ask yourself, how would an old person drink?” Li said.

Similar to an actor’s preparation, Li dives into the roles of her characters. When asked about the beginning of her career, Li explained how she realized she did not to please the masses.

“You’re not looking for everyone to love your story. You’re looking for one right reader; one editor who can read the story right,” Li said.

Li grew up in Beijing and retold stories of how she has been confronted by people of Chinese heritage who disagree with the portrayal of her country. She stated that she would not write propaganda; the China on the pages was her China.

Additionally, Li perceives her stories to be accessible to many different people.

“The stories to me are more universal, they can belong to more than one culture,” Li said.

Li shared her advice for beginning writers with the audience.

“You have to be a reader before you are a writer,” Li said.

Additionally, she suggested, do not become swept away with the writings of authors who are currently labeled as “hot.”

“For every living writer you read, you have to read two dead authors. Always go back to the Russian writers,” Li said.

When praised for her success, Li gracefully laughed and told her audience that sometimes she believes she’s just lucky. It is clear Li’s remarkable skill as a writer is not simply chance and yet, she unintentionally echoes and fulfils Tennessee William’s famous quote, “Luck is believing that you’re lucky.”

By Carolyn Williams

Staff Writer

Tom Perrotta’s latest novel “The Leftovers” has been called his most ambitious work to date, beating out the popular successes “Election” and “Little Children,” both of which spawned successful film adaptations. “The Leftovers,” however, deals with a subject material quite unlike illicit high school love affairs or stories of infidelity and marital boredom.

The plot of the novel takes place primarily in suburban Mapleton (basically Hometown, USA). Our main players are the Garvey family, who have been left physically intact after the events of October 14, though their emotional health is less certain. Three years before the novel begins, the “Sudden Departure” took place, a mysterious disappearance of seemingly randomly selected individuals worldwide. Though this occurrence looks an awful lot like the prophesied Rapture of biblical fame, the event causes a panic among people of all denominations, because there seems to be no rhyme or reason to who made the cut and who got left behind. While some deny that this “Rapture” was the real deal, others take drastic measures to prepare themselves for their second chance at any cost.

Perrotta steers clear of religion for the most part, though, using the Rapture idea as inspiration only, instead dealing more with the individual reactions and coping mechanisms of those who were left behind to pick up the pieces of a bewildered world. Kevin, the Garvey family’s patriarch, takes on the position of Mapleton’s mayor in hopes of restoring some optimism to the still unsettled community. His wife Laurie goes the other way, though. Deciding she cannot return to “normal” life, she joins the radical faction the Guilty Remnant. There she takes a vow of silence, moves into a commune, dresses only in white and stalks her former friends and family members around Mapleton, a constant reminder of what everyone is so desperate to forget.

Their two children are similarly adrift. Once a conscientious, shy student, 17-year-old Jill has shaved her head for fun and taken to coming to school high and bumming around with the local “bad” kids, but touchingly prepares a Christmas gift for the mother who abandoned her, and worries about her dramatically slipping grades. Tom, who dropped out of college after the Sudden Departure to follow the cult leader Holy Wayne, has finally, after three years, come to realize with Wayne’s arrest that following a “savior” will not solve his problems, nor will it help him find his footing in this new world.

Perrotta hasn’t been called the “Steinbeck of the suburbs” for nothing, and, as always, his writing about this subset of upper-middleclass American life is dead on, losing none of its reality even in such an unusual situation as faces the citizens of Mapleton. Though perhaps not as gripping as the desperate, slightly twisted, “Little Children,” “The Leftovers” is still an excellent read, and a very solid sixth novel from Perrotta.