Ah come, come quickly, spring!
come and lift us towards our culmination, we myriads;
we who have never flowered, like patient cactuses.
Come and lift us to our end, to blossom, bring us to our summer
we who are winter-weary in the winter of the world.
D.H. Lawrence, Craving for Spring
My ambivalence about spring has reached its peak: I long to linger in parks, to ogle vivid-hued tulips and catch whiffs of honeysuckle. But the park, indeed, all of outdoors has become the enemy—what wafts through the air are specks of pollen, sinister swirls of dust that summon headaches and a haze of addled confusion that make these days a trial to be endured until the end of June.
My popping ears piped down long enough to let in the strains of Mahler’s First Symphony (that’s Symphony No. 1 in D Major, if you’re nasty) at Carnegie Hall this past Thursday, courtesy of pal and music critic Bruce Hodges. The orchestra, Staatskapelle Berlin, conducted by Daniel Barenboim, set forth an evening of music suited to an altered state; the First is one of the great haunting works of the 19th Century canon, a ghostly memory poem punctuated by bursts of passion and joy. I hear the verdict is out on Barenboim’s approach but I appreciated his showmanship—watching the conductor and the musicians literally throw their backs into the work made it a bristling, moving event. If your local orchestra has it scheduled, by all means go.
Sound and vision reached its epoch, however, at a Saturday viewing of Star Trek at New York’s Ziegfeld Theater. Yet another chapter in their quest to find the final frontier (and a payout at the box office), you might think. But if you’ve a drop of affection for Kirk, Spock and the USS Enterprise, the pleasures director J.J. Abrams manages to wring from a story we all think we know will surprise you anew. It’s a formula he’s been honing since Alias ruled the little screen: attractive cast (here, headed by Chris Pine and Zachary Quinto, pictured) featuring Eric Bana, who’s a revelation as the villain Nero, wingding suspense and special effects that actually feel innovative instead of shopworn. Such a nice distraction from rhinitus, a sore throat and pollen-induced somnambula: I loved the ride, and so will you.