London, Part 2

Two Days Ago: Woke up early again, ate yoghurt, went for a long walk to a public garden. Went on a river cruise through London (same one I’d been on last year, but still good). At the end was the Royal Observatory, where the prime meridian is located. Some interesting time/longitude facts—navigation before Google Earth was an art. Back where the cruise took off from we went to a Dali exhibit (with a bit of Picasso downstairs as an afterthought) with a lot of sketches and sculpture which was really quite good. Dali bugs me as a person (his obsessions with Freud and Catholicism and his zeppelin ego irk me), but his art is undeniably good. After that I went to see a play called “The Sexual Neurosis of our Parents” with my parents. Off-West End, and excellent, the story of a mentally handicapped girl who is taken off her medication and discovers sexuality—big time. Experimental to no great effect, but a strong script and some excellent acting. I’ve got a theory that British acting depends on craft where American acting depends on “reality within the moment,” but we’ll see where that winds up.

Yesterday: Woke up early AGAIN, did not much of anything, went to get brunch. Went to the Victorian Albert museum, which had a great Eastern art, an interesting floor all of crafts and trades, and a million other things. Honestly, though, you can only go to so many museums in a short period of time. The highlight for me was walking through a room of stained glass and processional crosses listening to Kanye West’s “Jesus Walks.” Talk about an anachronism. Went through the “Mayor’s Festival” along the Themes where we had Argentinean food from a stall on the way to the Globe, where we saw “Love’s Labour’s Lost.” The Globe is interesting…in this one, as in Titus last year, there really were no absolute stand-out performances, but the entire ambiance made the show. The actors update it only very slightly from how it would be performed in Shakespeare’s time, and the outdoor theatre, use of groundlings, and complete understanding and enjoyment of performing Shakespeare make it really good.