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WU | Any Sheep, Any Study

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In my poetry class last semester, our second unit of study was “The Weird.” Our homework was incredibly vague — write a poem or two that is weird, with only one stipulation: No mythical creatures, supernatural beings or magic. Our weird poems had to be about ordinary things. The goal was not to look at things that are different, but to look at things differently. (I wrote about California rolls.)

Fast forward a couple months into the pandemic: I’m reading Excellent Sheep by former Yale English professor William Deresiewicz, and “The Weird” appears again. In his book, Deresiewicz laments the dearth of “passionate weirdos” on today’s elite college campuses.

animals

Blending Boundaries: RAMS at Cornell Cinema

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Grímur Hákonarson’s Icelandic film, RAMS, won’t warm you up. Set in a secluded, mountainous valley, winter rolls into the lives of Gummi and Kiddi, two sheep-rearing brothers, much as it does in Ithaca, and brings with it an ironically accessible story of death and rebirth. Despite the wind and snow, RAMS captures the warmth of our approaching spring. The film combines an understanding of humanity and nature in the lives of Gummi and Kiddi, two aging men, neighbors and antagonists. When scrapie, a brain-eating sheep disease, infects Kiddi’s herd, veterinarians demand that every sheep and ram in the valley be slaughtered.