
Douglas Coupland: Moody - century19
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/c737c3fc-1468-11e5-ad6e-00144feabdc0.html
======
plg
"Douglas Coupland is currently artist in residence at the Google Cultural
Institute in Paris"

Try explaining THAT to someone from past decades. Wow

~~~
jgrahamc
The Medici's made a fortune in banking and politics and were great sponsors of
art.

~~~
kitcar
I think more-so what past decades may find unusual is that a Canadian, born in
Germany, is an artist in residence position in France, at an American
institution.

~~~
mariodiana
In all fairness, in the days of the Medicis, those who were both educated and
well-off lived in as cosmopolitan a society as the one you describe.

------
robotresearcher
> Until the mid-20th century, alcohol was it.

Not really. Cannabis, opium, mushrooms, etc. have been around forever and have
been marginalized to a greater or lesser extent over time, and often much less
than they were in the 20th century.

I've enjoyed some Coupland work, but I didn't get this piece at all.

~~~
hunterjrj
I'm with you - this is a noted (at least in Canada) author, who appears to be
ignorant of history and especially of markers in his own craft. Sherlock
Holmes/snuff, etc.

~~~
coldtea
> _Sherlock Holmes /snuff, etc._

Sherlock Holmes or Freyd etc, is not indicative of any trends in the general
population. Might as well have used Mescalito indians as an example to rampant
psychedelics use in the USA in the 19th century...

~~~
hunterjrj
"It originated in the Americas and was in common use in Europe by the 17th
century"

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snuff_%28tobacco%29](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snuff_%28tobacco%29)

~~~
coldtea
In the same Wikipedia articles it mentions several times that it mostly spread
among the elites.

------
applecore
Is “neural reconfiguration generated by extended internet usage” a real
phenomenon, or is that just a clever turn-of-phrase for reading?

~~~
blfr
Neural reconfiguration generated by extended anything is probably real. This
is the point of practicing or training.

~~~
coldtea
It also happens with not practicing and not training, drug use, prolonger
stress, brain-washing etc (in the negative way).

------
facepalm
I usually like to read Coupland, but I disagree here. Seems to me there were
always ways to experience different moods: simply by doing things. Watching a
sun setting would evoke different moods than chopping wood or reading a book.

------
treerock
I get the impression, reading certain writers, that they live in some parallel
universe very different from my own. Just about every paragraph here had me
saying 'what?'.

~~~
shadeslayer
Try reading Generation X [1] by the same guy, I'm still trying to make sense
of the book after 2 weeks of finishing it :P

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generation_X:_Tales_for_an_Acc...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generation_X:_Tales_for_an_Accelerated_Culture)

~~~
equalsione
20+ years later it's hard to have a context on Generation X and how perfectly
it captured that moment in time. (American Psycho was published the same year
- how's that for context!). Post-Regan, Post-yuppie (well, almost), Pre-
grunge, mostly pre-internet...

Generation X, McJob etc are all parts of the lexicon now. Fight Club always
felt to me like a kind of follow-up to Generation X.

It's the weakness in Couplands whole "capture the zeitgeist" storytelling. 150
years on, Great Expectations is still relateable. Generation X, not so much. I
still love the book though :-)

------
Kluny
I don't exactly disagree with what he said, but what was the point of this
article?

