Just an announcement. I've been in New York since August 2001, and I will be leaving New York in August 2009. I've had eight great years—the longest I've ever spent in one place, and I consider NYC home. And I'll post more about that later this summer, I'm sure. Life will see me land on Chicago's North Side or thereabouts, once again as a full-time student, pursuing a PhD in the Screen Cultures department at Northwestern University, a place which (in addition to the film & media scholars) has a number of heavy-hitters (to cite a few) in political and social thought. I'm quite excited.
Chicagoans, past and present: I'd be more than happy to hear advice about restaurants, neighborhoods & apartments, the repertory film scene, bookstores (especially since the Seminary Co-op is going to be a hike), videostores on par with Odd Obsession or Facets, or how to cope with ungodly Midwestern winters. I do know Chicago a bit already, as my fiancée hails from the area and I've visited maybe 10 times, but it's a big town so I'm all ears.
14 comments:
Congrats, Zach. Hate that we haven't connected more since I've been here. Let's correct that while we can. Yeah?
That's exciting, especially given I plan a Chicago trip in the near future.
You arrived in New York (and NYU) the same month and year as I. And we both, albeit via different paths, arrived in Queens.
Safe passage, Zach! And congratulations as well.
Congratulations, Zach! I'm so happy to hear that you are pursuing your PhD, Dr. Campbell! :)
I've heard that the Chicago Underground Film Fest is a blast. You will do awesome anywhere you live!
I'm in somewhat of the same place, very-nearly-officially off to London this September after coming here in 2003. I'll officially announce when it becomes actually official, but we should make a point of further conversations before our respective leavings.
Ah more midwesterners! welcome!
I'm not actually from chicago (i'm from indiana) so I'm not really on the inside of film scene. But I do go there quite often and have a number of friends there, so I can help with what i know. although there are definitely people with much better info than I.
you may already know these but your two most important web links will now become:
CINE-FILE:
http://cine-file.info/list.htm
and
OCULAR LOCI:
http://www.restructures.net/chicago/film.htm
both of which are extensive and always updated listings of all the film/video screenings going on in chicago. both of which I would send out email updates that I would recommend subscribing too.
They both also have good links pages with most of the the film/video resources available in chicago. Cine-File's is probably the best of the two with venues, festivals, rental stores, Museums, Academic programs, and other good links:
http://cine-file.info/directory.htm
but ocular loci's is good too:
http://www.restructures.net/chicago/film.htm#locallinks
and that is pretty much what you need to know as far as anything film related.
As for bookstores, there are a lot of good ones. as you mentioned the seminary co-op, but also the Hyde park area in general. but there are plenty of other good independent ones sprinkled all around as well as a several half-price book stores. I need to think to recall the names of the ones I could recommend. I will see if I remember. Maybe a google search will refresh my memory.
where exactly on the north side are you going to be living? Evanston? Roger's Park?
I'll try to think of some other stuff.
visit gallery 262 at the Art Institute
Read Issac Rosenfeld's hilariously dead-on description of the Hyde Park neighborhood in his essay collection An Age of Enormity. Rosenfeld's Passage from Home is also a great and largely forgotten Chicago Bildungsroman. (Rosenfeld was Saul Bellow's great friend and literary competitor before Rosenfeld's early demise). Speaking of Bellow, his first novel Dangling Man is an excellent commentary on the Hyde Park scene as well.
Of course, as a University of Chicago man, I have a different worldview from a potential Northwestern man.
look up Tom Gunning at the University of Chicago Film Department. great scholar, good guy.
also, Dixie Kitchen.
Uber Burger
Zach,
You must visit the memorial to Fascism north of McCormick Place - a Roman column given to the city by Mussolini in the 1930s.
And if you ever find yourself in the town of West Chicago (and there's no reason that you ever should) don't hesitate to go to the Old Northe Pancake House for an excellent selection of pancakes at any time of day.
Thanks for the comments everyone. I'll try to get to all the Chicago places mentioned ...
More seriously than my previous comments, Ralph Lerner, one of the more discrete and understated of the Straussians at the University of Chicago, has been gradually moving into thinking about rhetoric and media, especially in his work on Maimonides. Maimonides' expert use of genre and rhetoric has been too little noticed (indeed, Maimonides may well be the most subtle of his use of genre of any philosopher ever). Nathan Tarcov has gradually been doing more about movies - he will often show up to screenings of Ozu, for example.
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