Interests meme

[mk_tortie]

jesspallas did this and I asked her to give me three to explain, so here they are!

I lived there for about 10 years, and it's one of those places that's so boring you can't help but feel fond of any little quirks it actually does have (hence putting it on my interests!) So, if you ever go to Basingstoke (it's in Hampshire), particular things you should look out for:

- The Hanging Gardens of Basingstoke
- Fanum House (the AA offices) - tallest building between London and New York, apparently!
- So many roundabouts that it's been nicknamed 'Donut City'
And finally...
- Wote Street Willie ( Britain's largest public phallus!) (see here for a picture: http://www.basingstoke.me.uk/lgwillie.html) - it's actually a statue in the town centre.

Basingstoke has featured in many cartoons and comedies as a place noone would ever want to go to - Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Gilbert and Sullivan's 'Ruddigore', The Young Ones, Monty Python, Only Fools and Horses... it goes on. And two films have been set there!

At college we called it 'Basingrad' but many others know it as Amazingstoke..... normally ironically!


Gliere was a composer in a similar mould to Debussy but less well known. He wrote a lot of piano pieces (which is why I like him, having played one for grade 7) but I had to look him up on wikipedia to find out other stuff... Apparently he was Russian! He wrote in a late Romantic style (folk music combined with breaking Bachian rules of harmony) and continued to do so after most people stopped.


Wim Wenders is a director who was part of the 'New Wave' in West German cinema in the 1970s, a group which also included Werner Herzog (who recently released that film about the guy who lived with bears) and Reiner Fassbinder. He was very influenced by American films of the 1950s, particularly gangster films, and produced a number of films which explore this theme but based in Germany. My favourites of his films are 'Wings of Desire' (which was later remade as 'City of Angels'), 'Alice in the Cities', and 'The Goalkeeper's Fear of the Penalty', which is based on Peter Handke's book of the same name. Wenders has some particular devices he often uses: multiple methods of transport, mentions of American culture such as juke boxes, coke bottles, Marlborough cigarettes, and dark glasses and gangster hats, and he always appears in his films somewhere.

If anyone else would like me to pick three of theirs, ask here!

Comments

[lisbee.livejournal.com]

What?

Also, Basingstoke is not boring. It is the land of dreams, a place of great mytery and hidden depth. (I say hidden, because it is not directly obvious). :)