• About
  • C.V.
  • Collage
  • Fauna
  • Flora
  • Landscapes
  • Looks
  • Radio
  • sketchy stuff
  • Video
  • Writing

M.T. Karthik

~ performances, works, writings from 1977 – 2017

M.T. Karthik

Tag Archives: Karthik

Hola, Hello, Bonjour et Bienvenue

31 Sunday Dec 2017

Posted by mtk in Final Post

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

archive, artist, author, ffptp, Karthik, m.t., m.t. karthik, madras, mtk, mtkarthik, thyagarajan

I’m artist and author M.T. Karthik, known as Karthik or MTK.

This is an archive of some things I wrote and did until I was 50; more current MTK can be found during baseball season on my SF Giants blog, Giants Baseball Corner, and there’s stuff up to 2021 on my Youtube chan:

Here on this blog, you’ll find original writing, images and documentation of things I made and performances I gave until the age of 50. As I find and uncover things I dropped along the way and recollect them, I add to it over the years.

I wrote everything on this site – the poetry, essays, fiction and reviews – and shot or produced all the video and photographs (all the images in the headers above) and have occupied the node mtkarthik dot org and removed advertising so you can peruse free of distractions.

In the four decades covered here, I circled the world several times, living for years mostly in California – the San Francisco Bay Area,  Los Angeles – but also in New York City, New Orleans, Austin, San Antonio, Japan, India and Taiwan.

I have not landed. I don’t own property. I am mostly of nowhere and homeless; mostly unknown in both my birth nation and the nation to which I’m naturalized as a citizen. I’m most like ash on the wind or a stone skipping across a lake that studies the taxonomy of species around it.

Love,

M.T. Karthik

Oakland, 2012 and San Antonio, 2017

RPRZ Investigation of Coyotes Hunting Deer in Late 2017

25 Monday Dec 2017

Posted by mtk in coyote, deer, landscape, RPRZ, San Antonio, TX

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

antonio, coyote, coyotes, deer, hunt, Karthik, kill, m.t., mtk, point, recharge, rocky, RPRZ, San, texas, tx, white-tailed, winter, zone

Book Review: Midnight Mass by Paul Bowles

20 Wednesday Dec 2017

Posted by mtk in Book Review, nostalgia, reviews

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

Bowles, collection, Karthik, m.t., mass, midnight, mtk, Paul, review, short, stories, story

I believed I had read all the fiction Paul Bowles ever published in these 18 years since his death. The discovery last week of the short story collection Midnight Mass, with the familiar Black Sparrow paperback binding – earthy tan with green and purple block print – was thus a very emotional experience.

20171220_143854_Film1

Immediately I was flooded by memories and thoughts of the man I considered my favorite author from the time I discovered him in ’87, the summer I got my first tattoo, until his death at the end of the last century.

Instantly, too, in that powerful way that great literature connects us with the world we are in, I remembered myself experiencing his works: where I was, the effect it had upon me. The empowerment and awe I felt after finishing one of his short stories or novels: blown away.

Paul Bowles was a huge influence on me as a writer and thinker. He was one of the most powerful allies in my struggle with immigration to the United States and in philosophical discourse in Europe. That he wrote from the subconscious as described by his wife, Jane, was the most romantic and amazing concept to me when I was young and I longed to be able to do that – not to understand it, but to do it.

The utter irrationality of the Western project, the neoliberal insanity we have all endured so long, was exposed by Bowles and then swiftly and violently shattered by the reality of life among the desert people of North Africa. In other works, a slow and seemingly disconnected series of events between locals in a village would be described with such lucidity and simplicity that the differences in thinking between east and west were made suddenly crystalline in the end – hits you like a koan.

The collision of culture was total and instead of Coca-Cola and the Golden Arches mowing down the village, the puny, minuscule westerners melted away in the heat of the Saharan sun, driven mad.

Midnight Mass is the last collection of Bowles’ short stories published by Black Sparrow and features at its center the elegant, drifting, rootless novella Here To Learn, a gorgeous story about a girl from North Africa who just keeps moving buoyed by her beauty, her wit and her ability to learn quickly how to negotiate the West.

The collection starts with the titular story, Midnight Mass, one of Bowles’ incredible parties; the Nazarenes careening around in their expatriated stupor of drinking, carousing and complaining, the locals bursting with romance only to become suddenly something else – the change of face.

There are stories about the locals and their fantastic, sometimes circuitous logic and its culmination in a kind of basic justice. There are tales about the utter undoing of our perception of a shared understanding of this world.

At the Krungthep Plaza is an amazing story set as the U.S. President is due to pass through a certain North African village. The machinations behind the scenes and the conflicts between locals, expats and the security teams are expertly related, culminating in a wild effusion of emotions that I can only described as angst against the way things are now.

It’s all just so great. I miss Paul Bowles.

(sigh)

Paul Bowles, 18 years after he died, was the best writer I read this year.

 

 

 

Head Tattoo Procedural

13 Wednesday Dec 2017

Posted by mtk in conceptual art, short film

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

antonio, armando, art, Erik, head, Karthik, m.t., mtk, Orr, procedural, procedure, San, tattoo, umbrella

Plug/Unplug and The First Contact Project

12 Tuesday Dec 2017

Posted by mtk in art, audio, beliefs, clips, Commentary, elections, essay, features, history, journalism, nostalgia, radio, social media, talks, thoughts

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

audio, birth, book, computers, contact, copyright, dawn, electronic, essay, first, games, gaming, internet, interviews, Karthik, longform, m.t., media, mtk, nascent, plug, Project, technology, television, unplug, web

Between 2005 and 2011, I collected interviews with people about their first experiences with a computer (The First Contact Project) and

wrote a book about our intersection with technology and how I grew up with it and how it became a part of policy and society (Plug/Unplug)

Here I mix them together for a final expression.

Snow in San Antonio

07 Thursday Dec 2017

Posted by mtk in RPRZ, San Antonio, TX, weather

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

antonio, Karthik, m.t., mtk, point, recharge, rocky, RPRZ, San, snow, texas, zone

 

 

7 Years Filling WP Sites

06 Wednesday Dec 2017

Posted by mtk in thoughts

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

7th, anniversary, Karthik, m.t., mtk, wordpress

Post Script

On December 6th, 2017 I received this:

7 Year Anniversary Achievement
Happy Anniversary with WordPress.com!
You registered on WordPress.com 7 years ago
 which corresponds to my first WP site
Yesterday’s Hoops
covering the 2010 NCAA March Madness Men’s Basketball Tournament.
The coming out year for the mid-majors culminating in an epic Final between Duke and Butler, if you enjoy college basketball or want a reminder of that March Madness, you should read my takes.
Anyway, it lets ya know how many years I’ve been filling WP with content.

Image

Untitled

29 Wednesday Nov 2017

Tags

antonio, art, Karthik, m.t., mtk, root, San, untitled

20171129_103050_Film1

Posted by mtk | Filed under art, conceptual art, TX

≈ Leave a comment

Car on Fire

25 Saturday Nov 2017

Posted by mtk in cars

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

antonio, car, fire, Karthik, m.t., mtk, on, San, texas

Mysolation, a short film concept

23 Thursday Nov 2017

Posted by mtk in Commentary, conceptual art, short film

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

art, film, idea, Karthik, m.t., mtk, mysolation, piece, short

Kayaking Lake Austin

22 Wednesday Nov 2017

Posted by mtk in Austin, birds

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

austin, Karthik, kayak, kayaking, lake, m.t., milan, ocean, omm

The Soviet Project [in progress]

08 Wednesday Nov 2017

Posted by mtk in art, collage

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

collage, currency, in, Karthik, m.t., mtk, newspaper, note, notes, progress, Project, ruble, rubles, soviet, union, ussr

Patti, Autumn, Glo and Regallo

30 Monday Oct 2017

Posted by mtk in fauna, horses, TX

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

blonde, Blue, buckskin, carmello, carmelo, eyed, eyes, gene, horse, horses, Karthik, m.t., mtk, paso, Patti, peruvian, recessive, white

 

Review: Manhattan Beach by Jennifer Egan

22 Sunday Oct 2017

Posted by mtk in Book Review, reviews

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

2017, beach, book, Egan, jennifer, Karthik, m.t., manhattan, mtk, new, novel, review, Scribner

I’d never read a single word of Jennifer Egan’s work until Manhattan Beach, released by Scribner this month, despite that Egan has published four previous novels and won the Pulitzer and a National Book Critics Award for A Visit From the Goon Squad (2010), a novel that has been acclaimed in effusive terms for its inventiveness and originality in all quarters of the literary community.

Everything I read about Goon Squad makes it seem like my type of book. Weird, futuristic, made-up languages; character-POV-shifting chapters … I don’t know how I missed it. Trust me it’s on deck.

Though I’m late to the party, I think it might give me a different perspective on Manhattan Beach. I read it as a straightforward, third-person novel set in the mid-20th century.

Nearly all the early reviews of this novel mention how different it is from Jennifer Egan’s previous work and in specific, often quite vociferously, from Goon Squad. For an author who has been exploratory and inventive with form, Manhattan Beach is a contrast, a historical period piece.

But it turns out Egan worked on this novel considerably longer than any others. She told Alexandra Schwartz in a long form interview for the New Yorker last week she had been working on it for the last 15 years, struggling to put together a story “anybody is going to want to read.”

I recommend it.

Manhattan Beach is an extremely well-researched and fast-paced story set predominantly in Brooklyn near the end of World War II that transports the reader to New York City in the mid-1940’s and fills it with presence and character. Egan has crafted an intriguing family story with which to reveal the city and the times, with particular focus on life in and around the Brooklyn Naval Yards.

The protagonists Anna Kerrigan and her father Eddie, and their family, friends, colleagues and enemies carve out their lives cast in the meager circumstances of a wartime economy that we know from history is coming to a close. Manhattan Beach takes us on a richly detailed tour of the corruption and culture of Brooklyn, New York, the Mafia and the Navy in a very particular period in history: the handful of years before the end of the war, between Pearl Harbor and the fateful flight of the Enola Gay.

It’s an American story about a Brooklyn family and how their life is changed in a tumult. The war hangs at a distance and we see the city – and in particular the Navy Yard and its surroundings as most young, able-bodied Americans are being sent abroad to fight.

Anna is a tremendously likable character and her journey at the Navy Yard to become a diver is a fascinating and well-detailed arc that weaves through the mystery and intrigue of her father’s disappearance and the nefarious underworld of the gangster Dexter Styles.

Egan’s style is crisp, well-researched and yet poetic when necessary. Balanced in approach, one doesn’t get a nostalgic feeling for this period, but rather a view of it as if through a veil. The story unfolds, characters slowly discover things and we get to see something we haven’t been able to see.

The sea – riding upon it, staying alive in it, walking in divers gear and trying to see  through it – plays a significant role in this work and yet it, like the war in the distance functions more as a powerful medium for the development of the characters.

By contrast, the plumbing of Egan’s characters – their thoughts and emotions buffeted about by war, crime and sea change – is lucid and clear. Egan is excellent at interior monologue and reflection by her characters. She gets at rooted feelings with wide-open eyes. This often results in gorgeous passages.

The story includes a brilliantly imagined voyage on a merchant marine vessel named the Elizabeth Seaman. The nod to Nellie Bly goes unmentioned, a subtlety at which Egan is graceful – letting history fall into place where it belongs.

Egan captures the longing and isolation of Eddie Kerrigan, in his stateroom 47 days at sea, suddenly gripped by the notion that he has forgotten the face of his beloved –

” – could hardly picture her anymore. Faraway things became theoretical, then imaginary, then hard to imagine. They ceased to exist.”

Then, almost immediately, a torrent of thoughts pour through him about the first time they met, about her children and their times together. Finally he concludes,

“It was all still there, everything he’d left behind. Its vanishing had been only a trick.”

The story here, of a child and father separated by fateful decisions who alternate between avoiding and seeking one another out, is woven expertly and filled with surprises that emerge, unfolding until events feel inevitable. That’s good storytelling. The characters have a weight and realness to them because they endure and grow. There are deaths and children and gangsters and action.

But the story takes place in a different America, a different New York and it’s glaring on occasion. Characters deliberate over ethically conservative matters with earnestness but it never escalates. How women are perceived, how abortions and unwanted children are handled; these matters are described but never raise up into full blown issues. Racial hierarchies are described with the vernacular of the day: “micks,” “wops” and “Negroes” but racism never emerges enough to be addressed as an issue. It’s just how things were is the feeling one gets.

Manhattan Beach faithfully portrays some Brooklynites, in particular Irish-American, Italian-American and Naval families during World War II and an era of transition from a more sexist, racist and somewhat naive past just up to the doorstep of a future we live in today.

I review without spoilers, so I’ll conclude by saying Manhattan Beach is a great book. New Yorkers will love it and Egan will be helped during awards season by that. But more, I enjoyed Jennifer Egan’s language – lovely turns of phrase – and her character’s introspections. She has managed to create a compelling tale from immense research.

3/5 stars

 

 

 

 

Frogtown Brewery, Los Angeles

05 Tuesday Sep 2017

Posted by mtk in beer, Los Angeles

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

angeles, beer, brewery, california, frogtown, interview, Karthik, L.A., LA, los, m.t., mtk

Heron, Egret and Traffic by the LA River

04 Monday Sep 2017

Posted by mtk in birds, cars, Los Angeles

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

angeles, egret, heron, Karthik, L.A., los, m.t., mtk, river, traffic

Oakland Bay Bridge

27 Sunday Aug 2017

Posted by mtk in landscape, North Oakland, Oakland, travel

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

Bay, bridge, california, Francisco, Karthik, m.t., mtk, oakland, San, sfbay

Final GBC Reader – Thanks for Following

14 Monday Aug 2017

Posted by mtk in Final Post

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

archive, baseball, corner, final, Francisco, gbc, giants, Karthik, League, major, mlb, mtk, National, post, San, sf, sfgiants

The Giants are having an historically terrible year. So it seems a good time to end this project and call it an archive.

Thank you for reading Giants Baseball Corner and engaging with me these seven years from August 2010 to August 2017. It has been a lot of fun.

This site‘s now my archive of the San Francisco Giants during their historic run to three World Series Championships in five years. It was an incredible time to be a Giant fan – filled with relief and joyous wonderment.

Every word, image or thought herein was produced by M.T. Karthik, your MC and host.

Go Giants!

Love,

MTK

RPRZ Backstory: Introducing the Recharge Zone

02 Wednesday Aug 2017

Posted by mtk in landscape, RPRZ, San Antonio, TX

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

antonio, aquifer, authority, background, backstory, bexar, county, edwards, greenbelt, history, intro, Introduction, Karthik, m.t., mtk, point, recharge, river, rocky, San, texas, urban, wildlife, zone

Neotibicen Superbus

29 Saturday Jul 2017

Posted by mtk in insects, RPRZ, San Antonio, TX

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

antonio, audio, cicada, Karthik, m.t., mtk, Neotibicen, RPRZ, San, sound, superbus, texas

RPRZ Rana Catesbeiana The American Bullfrog

25 Tuesday Jul 2017

Posted by mtk in amphibians

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

american, antonio, bullfrog, catesbeiana, frog, Karthik, m.t., mtk, point, Rana, recharge, rocky, RPRZ, San, texas, zone

RPRZ Rana sphenocephala the Southern Leopard Frog

23 Sunday Jul 2017

Posted by mtk in amphibians

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

amphibian, antonio, frog, Karthik, leopard, m.t., mtk, point, Rana, recharge, rocky, RPRZ, San, southern, sphenocephala, texas, zone

RPRZ The Giant Cicada Quesada gigas in Close Up

23 Sunday Jul 2017

Posted by mtk in insects

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

antonio, cicada, giant, gigas, Karthik, m.t., mtk, point, quesada, recharge, rocky, RPRZ, San, texas, zone

RPRZ Black Bullhead Catfish Spawning

22 Saturday Jul 2017

Posted by mtk in fish, landscape

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

antonio, catfish, Karthik, m.t., mtk, olivaris, point, Pylodictus, recharge, rocky, RPRZ, San, texas, zone

Unbelievable I caught this

 

 

 

 

 

 

mtk

RPRZ Quesada gigas, the Giant Cicada

18 Tuesday Jul 2017

Posted by mtk in insects

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

antonio, cicada, giant, giga, insect, Karthik, m.t., mtk, nw, point, quesada, recharge, rocky, RPRZ, San, sound, texas, zone

 

 

 

 

 

 

mtk

RPRZ Walk Along Creekbed After Storms

16 Sunday Jul 2017

Posted by mtk in landscape, weather

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

antonio, creek, creekbed, flow, Karthik, m.t., mtk, point, recharge, rocky, RPRZ, San, storm, texas, thunderstorm, wash, water, Wood, woods, zone

 

 

 

 

mtk

RPRZ Cicadas in the Woods

08 Saturday Jul 2017

Posted by mtk in insects, landscape

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

antonio, cicadas, Karthik, m.t., mtk, point, recharge, rocky, RPRZ, San, texas, Wood, woods, zone

 

 

 

 

 

 

mtk

RPRZ July 6 Report

06 Thursday Jul 2017

Posted by mtk in insects, landscape, weather

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

antonio, drought, Karthik, m.t., mtk, point, recharge, rocky, RPRZ, San, texas, zone

RPRZ Deer Carcass Update

06 Thursday Jul 2017

Posted by mtk in landscape

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

antonio, carcass, carrion, deer, Karthik, m.t., mtk, point, recharge, rocky, RPRZ, San, texas, zone

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

mtk

RPRZ Tarantula Hawk, Genus Pepsis, an Exquisite Pollinator

24 Saturday Jun 2017

Posted by mtk in insects

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

antonio, exquisite, hawk, insect, Karthik, m.t., mtk, pepsis, point, pollinator, recharge, rocky, RPRZ, San, Tarantula, texas, wasp, zone

← Older posts

M.T. Karthik

This blog archives early work of M.T. Karthik, who took every photograph and shot all the video here unless otherwise credited.

Performances and installations are posted by date of execution.

Writing appears in whatever form it was originally or, as in the case of poems or journal entries, retyped faithfully from print.

all of it is © M.T. Karthik

a minute of rain

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QYLHNRS8ik4

Top Categories

Asia audio baseball birds Coastal Cali collage elections essay fauna fiction flora GBC Readers journalism landscape Los Angeles music video North Oakland NYC Oakland performance photography poetry politics protest reviews S.F. short film social media thoughts travel

MTK on Twitter

My Tweets

other mtk projects

  • an SF Giants Fan
  • current Youtube
  • first Youtube site 2007
  • MTK on Vimeo
  • Rocky Pt Recharge Zone
  • SF Mayoral Campaign 2011
  • Yesterday's Hoops 2010

Archives

  • January 2022
  • December 2017
  • November 2017
  • October 2017
  • September 2017
  • August 2017
  • July 2017
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • April 2017
  • March 2017
  • February 2017
  • January 2017
  • December 2016
  • November 2016
  • October 2016
  • September 2016
  • August 2016
  • July 2016
  • June 2016
  • May 2016
  • April 2016
  • March 2016
  • February 2016
  • November 2015
  • September 2015
  • August 2015
  • July 2015
  • June 2015
  • October 2014
  • August 2014
  • July 2014
  • June 2014
  • May 2014
  • April 2014
  • November 2013
  • September 2013
  • June 2013
  • May 2013
  • April 2013
  • December 2012
  • November 2012
  • October 2012
  • September 2012
  • August 2012
  • July 2012
  • June 2012
  • May 2012
  • April 2012
  • March 2012
  • February 2012
  • January 2012
  • December 2011
  • November 2011
  • October 2011
  • September 2011
  • August 2011
  • July 2011
  • June 2011
  • May 2011
  • April 2011
  • March 2011
  • February 2011
  • January 2011
  • December 2010
  • November 2010
  • October 2010
  • August 2010
  • July 2010
  • June 2010
  • April 2010
  • October 2009
  • July 2009
  • June 2009
  • May 2009
  • April 2009
  • November 2008
  • October 2008
  • April 2008
  • January 2008
  • November 2007
  • October 2007
  • July 2007
  • May 2007
  • April 2007
  • March 2007
  • February 2007
  • January 2007
  • December 2006
  • November 2006
  • September 2006
  • February 2006
  • January 2006
  • December 2005
  • November 2005
  • October 2005
  • September 2005
  • August 2005
  • April 2005
  • February 2005
  • January 2005
  • December 2004
  • November 2004
  • August 2004
  • June 2004
  • April 2004
  • December 2003
  • October 2003
  • September 2003
  • March 2003
  • February 2003
  • December 2002
  • November 2002
  • October 2002
  • September 2002
  • May 2002
  • April 2002
  • September 2001
  • July 2001
  • June 2001
  • February 2001
  • November 2000
  • August 2000
  • June 2000
  • March 2000
  • December 1999
  • October 1999
  • July 1999
  • June 1999
  • April 1999
  • March 1999
  • October 1998
  • July 1998
  • June 1998
  • May 1998
  • April 1998
  • February 1998
  • January 1998
  • December 1997
  • November 1997
  • October 1997
  • September 1997
  • August 1997
  • June 1997
  • March 1997
  • January 1997
  • December 1996
  • November 1996
  • October 1996
  • September 1996
  • August 1996
  • July 1996
  • May 1996
  • April 1996
  • March 1996
  • February 1996
  • December 1995
  • November 1995
  • October 1995
  • September 1995
  • August 1995
  • June 1995
  • May 1995
  • February 1995
  • January 1995
  • October 1994
  • September 1994
  • August 1994
  • May 1994
  • August 1993
  • August 1992
  • April 1992
  • November 1991
  • February 1991
  • December 1988
  • October 1984
  • May 1982
  • July 1981
  • April 1977

Blog at WordPress.com.

  • Follow Following
    • M.T. Karthik
    • Join 48 other followers
    • Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
    • M.T. Karthik
    • Customize
    • Follow Following
    • Sign up
    • Log in
    • Report this content
    • View site in Reader
    • Manage subscriptions
    • Collapse this bar
 

Loading Comments...
 

    Privacy & Cookies: This site uses cookies. By continuing to use this website, you agree to their use.
    To find out more, including how to control cookies, see here: Cookie Policy