The new collection, on the theme of fragile relationships, is moody and minimalist, and it showcases Mould's introspective side.
Greer overestimated, perhaps, his theme's fragile strangeness, and armored it in the equivalent of the painstakingly provided fifties cars and clothes and background music of "Far from Heaven," a blue-lit mock-weeper of a movie.
"LEADERSHIP in fragile times" is the theme of this year's World Economic Forum, the annual conference for the great and the good of the global economy that opened in New York this week.
Mark Linkous, a singer and songwriter whose music, released under the name Sparklehorse, was renowned in indie-rock and alt-country circles for its haunted, allusive themes and fragile beauty, committed suicide on Saturday in Knoxville, Tenn.
The World Economic Forum's announced theme, "Leadership in Fragile Times," could not be more appropriate, because the fragility of the times might be reduced by a broadening of global leadership.
Lightning struck dead a boyhood acquaintance of Paul Auster's on a camping trip, giving him his master theme of "how fragile and fluky the world is".
They created a visceral shock in the slow movement's haunting set of variations: after a fragile passage in which the theme seemed to disappear from view, the melody exploded into life, with vivid, elemental force.
They identified 'fear of hurting the fragile body' as the salient theme and found that earlier experiences of pain and activity undermined fear of damage.
This year, the theme is "Leadership in Fragile Times: a Vision for a Shared Future".
