Out of Storage
Notes to Laurie Anderson Homeland
MEETING THE TUVANS.Fun to juxtapose against the later remarks about storytelling.
After the show the Tuvans were packing their instruments and then they started to walk off into the night. "Hey! Where are you going?" I shouted out into the darkness. As it turned out their Russian manager had forgotten to provide transportation for them back to Lisbon, a two-hour car drive. So they just started to walk, a trip that would have taken until well into the next day. Why? Because they're nomads, the polar opposite of exasperated Americans who would just stand there saying, "Where's the van?"
POLITCS AND STORIES.Whether we are waiting for the van or walking.
Many of the big American stories now, the most-told stories, are apocalyptic. They're stories about how the world is getting hotter, more crowded, and dangerous. They're about arctic floods and disappearing resources and entropy and the world winding down. And nobody knows whether all this is fiction or not. But like many complicated stories about the future, there's no way to predict which version is more likely. It's just sort of a matter of preference. It comes down to which story do you like better? This is another thing I love about stories — they are wild and alive and always changing.
What are days for?
To wake us up.
To put between endless nights.
And so for day 1533
23.02.2011
