According to Murakami a good writer should " observe,observe, observe and only then judge.".Murakami never writes short stories whilst writing a Novel and never writes Novels whilst writing short stories.
A lot of the stories will appear to be familiar as they were incorporated into his Novels , especially Norwegian Wood , showing that though the writing process for Novels and Short Stories is apart they are not exclusive but mutually compatible and can easily cross over to both formats to great effect , hence making some sense of the title.
"In many of these stories, narrative tension is prolonged by a refusal to
explain; Murakami's ghost stories and murder mysteries remain ghostly
and mysterious. Has the serial adulterer been cursed, or does his nausea
have nothing at all to do with his predilection for deceptive
seduction? Murakami never says, and the result, as in so much of his
work, is profoundly memorable."
The girl in the video review gives a fair account of the stories and their appeal.
If the purpose of a really good book to make you laugh and challenge the
status quo,this Book is the one that does it Big Time.It brilliantly
instills truths in your head in such a way they will lodge in your psyche
and refuse to budge no matter what one tries until you acknowledge them
(with a view to acceptance) OR , compels you to provide your own
antidote with a counter that stands up to long term scrutiny.And youll
gain a new appreciation for Chinese Temple Bells.
The Book can be regarded as a final testimony ( or last chapter as Kurt calls it) to the Work and Ideas of Vonnegut.
In this talk Vonnegut explores some of the themes of the Book and the life of a Writer with some great insights for the Internet age and observations that reading a book is THE Western method of Eastern type meditation.
Published at around the time Chavez was winning a series of Democratic Elections in Venezuela , in the name of the Bolivarian Revolution.
The Books timely appearance with the modern Bolivarian revolution playing out makes for a captivating metaphor for the choices of Hugo Chavez to quit having established the foundations of getting rid of the Monrovian Doctrine that blighted the continent in the 20th and early 21st Centuries or to keep continuing , albeit with plebiscites , to perpetually amend the constitution to perpetually continue the terms an incumbent can continue in the top office.
This Book details a semi-fictional account of Simon Bolivars last journey , a tale of waning physical and political power at a time when Chavez himself had a crossroads to navigate , to bow from power and leave a solid legacy for the development of the current Bolivarian Movement or to hold on to power personally and create a situation when one mans ego makes a whole movement whimper and peter out having lost its roots and goals and , ultimately, direction.
The book contains great insights to many of Bolivars liberation struggle observations that are universal in space and time like on page 122 we find "Europeans believe only what Europe invents id good for the entire universe , and everything else is detestable." A Euro-centric trait that even amongst the European Left today makes them judge ( or more accurately mis-judge) the sentiments and aspirations of freedom and liberation struggles in non-European societies.And more importantly , on page 221 ,an observance that should be a remedial motto for the elites and leaderships of nations that do win the struggle against decolonisation in the new world order "I despise debt more than i do the Spanish"
The video below has an interview with Isabel Allende on the inspiration of Marquez for South American Culture and Politics.
"On the other hand, one could argue that the book is entirely
political - today - because it shows us a slice of America before the
Great Corporate Homogenizers got ahold of us.
Before we walled
ourselves into our highly-mortgaged houses to stare for hours, alone, at
our TVs, eating the mental gruel of multinational corporations who
profit from wars.
Before our highest ideal - our "American Dream" -
was to build up a small business so we could sell it off to Disney, as
did the woman Bush congratulated in his State of the Union speech, but
when the real American Dream was grounded in community, safety,
friendship, and a healthy acceptance of eccentricity."
The review in the video below gives an ample example of the appeal of this novel for the new reader.
It is a fitting endnote that two sequels to the Novel were both flops , which probably ties in with the readers of the 40s and 50s already out-growing the age of having culture , especially humour , being spoon fed from top-down by the class system and instead embracing the humour of the grassroots developing their own thoughts, ideas, opinions and ultimately cultural and political agendas as this review from the Guardian Paper tentatively alludes.
It is best to end with a review from someone who likes the Book , though even he admits it has aged somewhat.
This was the last of his novels , published just before he was awarded the Nobel Prize.
A tale of what he regarded as a morale decline the American Culture , though it has to be said that it was also a landmark to his own moral decline that led the man who wrote Grapes of Wrath in the late 30s to an outspoken supporter of the Vietnam War and critic of the Anti-War Artists and Writers in the mid to late 60s.
The plot is nuanced , so that much sympathy can be directed towards the main character that will do a ghastly deed against his person and soul for a trifling advantage.On page 90 we get some hometown advice about dealing with difficult situations that linger in the mind " ...cant push it out of mind...instead , remember it from start to finish whenever it comes and then youll slowly forget bits of it over time" and on page 93 we find the protagonist trying to justify to himself but realising "...no one wants advice-only corroboration."
And having sold out he tries to return to normal , having failed to satisfactorily convince himself on page 164 "...People buy from People they know.Its called goodwill and it works." , In the end the End does justify the means of this depraved morality the lead falls into on page 187 "...Success and Strength are above morality , above criticism."
The video below has a panel discussing the themes of the Book:
In
God Bless You, Dr. Kevorkian, Vonnegut skips back and forth between
life and the Afterlife as if the difference between them were rather
slight. In thirty odd "interviews," Vonnegut trips down "the blue tunnel
to the pearly gates" in the guise of a roving reporter for public
radio, conducting interviews: with Salvatore Biagini, a retired
construction worker who died of a heart attack while rescuing his
schnauzer from a pit bull, with John Brown, still smoldering 140 years
after his death by hanging, with William Shakespeare, who rubs Vonnegut
the wrong way, and with socialist and labor leader Eugene Victor Debs,
one of Vonnegut's personal heroes. What began as a series of
ninety-second radio interludes for WNYC, New York City's public radio
station, evolved into this provocative collection of musings about who
and what we live for, and how much it all matters in the end. From the
original portrait by his friend Jules Feiffer that graces the cover, to a
final entry from Kilgore Trout, God Bless You, Dr. Kevorkian remains a
joy. - See more at:
http://www.buffalolib.org/vufind/Record/1042863/Reviews#sthash.jMhHH7U5.dpuf
In
God Bless You, Dr. Kevorkian, Vonnegut skips back and forth between
life and the Afterlife as if the difference between them were rather
slight. In thirty odd "interviews," Vonnegut trips down "the blue tunnel
to the pearly gates" in the guise of a roving reporter for public
radio, conducting interviews: with Salvatore Biagini, a retired
construction worker who died of a heart attack while rescuing his
schnauzer from a pit bull, with John Brown, still smoldering 140 years
after his death by hanging, with William Shakespeare, who rubs Vonnegut
the wrong way, and with socialist and labor leader Eugene Victor Debs,
one of Vonnegut's personal heroes. What began as a series of
ninety-second radio interludes for WNYC, New York City's public radio
station, evolved into this provocative collection of musings about who
and what we live for, and how much it all matters in the end. From the
original portrait by his friend Jules Feiffer that graces the cover, to a
final entry from Kilgore Trout, God Bless You, Dr. Kevorkian remains a
joy. - See more at:
http://www.buffalolib.org/vufind/Record/1042863/Reviews#sthash.jMhHH7U5.dpuf
In
God Bless You, Dr. Kevorkian, Vonnegut skips back and forth between
life and the Afterlife as if the difference between them were rather
slight. In thirty odd "interviews," Vonnegut trips down "the blue tunnel
to the pearly gates" in the guise of a roving reporter for public
radio, conducting interviews: with Salvatore Biagini, a retired
construction worker who died of a heart attack while rescuing his
schnauzer from a pit bull, with John Brown, still smoldering 140 years
after his death by hanging, with William Shakespeare, who rubs Vonnegut
the wrong way, and with socialist and labor leader Eugene Victor Debs,
one of Vonnegut's personal heroes. What began as a series of
ninety-second radio interludes for WNYC, New York City's public radio
station, evolved into this provocative collection of musings about who
and what we live for, and how much it all matters in the end. From the
original portrait by his friend Jules Feiffer that graces the cover, to a
final entry from Kilgore Trout, God Bless You, Dr. Kevorkian remains a
joy. - See more at:
http://www.buffalolib.org/vufind/Record/1042863/Reviews#sthash.jMhHH7U5.dpuf
In
God Bless You, Dr. Kevorkian, Vonnegut skips back and forth between
life and the Afterlife as if the difference between them were rather
slight. In thirty odd "interviews," Vonnegut trips down "the blue tunnel
to the pearly gates" in the guise of a roving reporter for public
radio, conducting interviews: with Salvatore Biagini, a retired
construction worker who died of a heart attack while rescuing his
schnauzer from a pit bull, with John Brown, still smoldering 140 years
after his death by hanging, with William Shakespeare, who rubs Vonnegut
the wrong way, and with socialist and labor leader Eugene Victor Debs,
one of Vonnegut's personal heroes. What began as a series of
ninety-second radio interludes for WNYC, New York City's public radio
station, evolved into this provocative collection of musings about who
and what we live for, and how much it all matters in the end. From the
original portrait by his friend Jules Feiffer that graces the cover, to a
final entry from Kilgore Trout, God Bless You, Dr. Kevorkian remains a
joy. - See more at:
http://www.buffalolib.org/vufind/Record/1042863/Reviews#sthash.jMhHH7U5.dpuf
This interview from the period just before the Iraq War gives a detailed insight on the concepts and thoughts of Vonnegut on the lessons of the past and the challenges of the present.
Alas the execution , through a mixture of financial constraints at the time in Dostoyevskys life and the flaw of any concept that brings a Manifest Destiny in a Nation becoming a self-appointed Spiritual Guardian of the Races , does not , and could never , match the vision.Technically , Dostoyevsky would work on a single draft whilst his previous only copy would be getting printed by the publishers , thus giving him no working copy of the previous installment so that he could get all the threads of the story together in a coherent order.The supreme biographer of Dostoyevsky , Joseph Franks calls it right when he states the book is "perhaps the most original of Dostoevsky's great novels, and certainly the most artistically uneven of them all,".That statement very much comes across as you admire the incredible undertaking whilst also regret the forced , awkward rush of something that deserves the artist getting the space needed to proclaim such a monument to the world.
Many portions he dictated as he walked around the Room , not knowing himself the direction the work would take , and if he did decide to change tact he had no way of recalling the already printed previous draft from the publishers if he , as he done many times with other Novels , wanted to change direction with the plot or characters.
"I think The Idiot to be a masterpiece - flawed, occasionally tedious or
overwrought, like many masterpieces - but a fact of world literature
just as important as the densely dramatic Brothers Karamazov or the
brilliantly subtle and terrifying Devils . In those two novels, as in
the simpler Crime and Punishment , Dostoevsky had plots and political
and religious ideas working together. In The Idiot he is straining to
grasp a story and a character converting themselves from Gothic to
Saint's Life on the run. What makes the greatness is double -the
character of the prince, and a powerful series of confrontations with
death. The true subject of The Idiot is the imminence and immanence of
death. The image of these things is Holbein's portrait of Christ taken
down from the cross, a copy of which hangs in Rogozhin's house, and
which was seen by both Dostoevsky and Prince Myshkin in Basle. It
represents, we are told, a dead man who is totally flesh without life,
damaged and destroyed, with no hint of a possible future resurrection.
The form of the novel is shaped by the inexorable outbreak of
Dostoevsky's deepest preoccupations. It is the quality of Dostoevsky's
doubt and fear that is the intense religious emotion in this novel - to
which Lawrence was no doubt reacting."
" Haruki Murakami's novels have gained immense popularity because they
guide readers through some of life's darkest and most dangerous
territory – the cold, dark winter woods of death and grief and abuse –
and do so with wisdom and warmth."
The video below is a look into the social and emotional journey of Murakami and his larege following of readers.
"When a true genius appears in the world, you may know him by this sign, that the dunces are all in confederacy against him."is a quote by Jonathan Swift which inspired by title of this posthumous tale , a debut book that has since become a popular novel in the Catch-22 type mould.
As a posthumous released work it has much merit going for it potential wise but it has a very much proto-type project feel about it.
This review by jacr100 is a very apt summation of the readers experience.
"If anyone is confused by that title, I’d better explain: I’ve been
pondering why the majority of previous reviewers have either loved or
hated this book. I think one reason is that you have to really engage
with the character of Ignatius J. Reilly in order to expose the funny
side of the novel. Admittedly his lofty sense of self-importance and
heedless misanthropy won’t make this easy, not forgetting his
predilection for hot dogs, burping, etc; but if you bear with him, the
scorn he pours forth on virtually everyone he comes into contact with
does start to make you chuckle, particularly since his anachronistic
language and imaginative insults sound positively alien amidst the
casual slang of his New Orleans acquaintances.
There are some
genuinely funny moments, and the storyline is structured along the lines
of classical farce drama, with the unfortunate Ignatius spiralling
downwards into an ever more precarious position, both socially and
financially. Not that he cares, mind you – he has only entered the
world of work temporarily and under coercive pressure from his mother,
biding his time until his great social commentary modelled on the
philosophy of Boethius propels him to prominence. I agree with one
other reviewer that it is this latter project that makes the book a
little turgid at times, when Ignatius casts down pages of vitriolic
invective in his diary. These sections aren’t boring, but neither are
they that funny, and the reader might be forgiven for skipping them to
get back to Ignatius loudly criticising the latest film, or
condescendingly mocking whomever he encounters that day.
Anyone who
is looking for a deep social satire, portrait of New Orleans, or
critical insight into the reality of the American Dream probably won’t
be too enamoured with this book, since it achieves these very subtly,
against a backdrop of farce and characters who in many cases are
exaggerated or one-dimensional. But if you approach this book not
expecting – or even wanting – to discover the psychologies or ‘truths’
of human existence, and instead begin with an open mind just large to
accommodate a near-obese, pompous buffoon with aims to change the
society he despises for its ignorance and avarice, you might be in for a
pleasant surprise."
The profile of the Book increased when it and the writer received a Pulitzer prize , as this reviewer in the video suggests sometimes prize giving bodies "some of these prize-giving bodies try to prove how much smarter they are than you and I".
"'A Confederacy of Dunces' is a story of loneliness amid crowds, a comedy
that hurts. At the centre is an anti-hero named Ignatius J Reilly. If
Don Quixote had been thrust into the underbelly of modern New Orleans,
this is exactly who he would have become. Hypochodriac, melancholic, a
walking catastrophe, an unlikely philosopher in a world where few have
patience for abstractions. With his clumsy ways, tweed trousers and
inexcusable bluntness, he doesn't fit in, entering social contexts with
his lumbering, elephantine fashion. The reader cannot decide whether to
pity or admire him, but loves him all the same. As Walter Percy said, he
is "in violent revolt against the entire modern age.""
Looking back in China , a little like in Spain under Franco or South America under the military dictators , is not merely an innocent reflection on times past , it has to be a journey in which the reality of the past has to be a shadowworld , a universe peopled by spectral beings in a ghostly world where memories merge into unreal metaphorical paintings on a canvas magic-reality masquerading as myth over experience.
In saying all this the Book does not really have a "soul" of its own that captures the reader with a vision for a better alternative , more it comes across as a sad lament of a man who himself has lost touch with his inner soul.
"Back to the question, though, of what ''Soul Mountain'' is about: every
reader might answer the question differently, but to me at least it was
ultimately less a travelogue than a searching account of an individual's
ramblings to himself as he bounced between the oppression of the group
and the oppression of loneliness. Escape from the collective is a
particularly resonant theme for Chinese intellectuals like Gao, for
status and power have always been conferred on Chinese scholars by the
state -- typically a repressive one.
The Cultural Revolution from 1966 to 1976 reminded intellectuals, if
they needed any such reminder, that the group could turn on them
suddenly and ferociously. In those years, teachers and officials would
abruptly find themselves paraded in front of a mob and forced to bend
down, arms twisted painfully behind their backs, as their colleagues,
friends, children and even spouses stepped up to denounce them as spies,
counterrevolutionaries or ''stinking'' reactionaries. Those struggle
sessions subsided after 1976 but left many people with an enduring fear
of political campaigns and mob rule. Perhaps it is not surprising that
Gao is drawn to Taoist recluses in the mountains"
Written at a time when the Shia resistance was consolidating the political landscape and already making Iraq a major Iranian sphere of influence came the military resistance led by Muqtada Al-Sadr which set US forces into a retreat , thus making US planners realise the Military domination of Iraq was already in an unstoppable countdown.
The reason of success for the Shia was that they formed an alternative Government first and then the object of the Political and military resistance was to defeat the Occupation and put the Alternative Government in place.
"Patrick Cockburn's friend and colleague Robert Fisk once wrote that he
saw journalism as `writing the first draft of history'. On the sleeve of
Cockburn's latest book on Iraq it states that `this is the first book
about Muqtada al-Sadr, the most important political figure in
post-occupation Iraq'. The question that arises is did Cockburn have
enough material to write a biography of al-Sadr? Or did the gap in
knowledge and frenzy in politics surrounding the Iraqi cleric prompt the
publishers into pushing Cockburn into writing a first draft instead?
Reading
the book one discovers that it is indeed the later. But Cockburn knows
Iraq well enough to write a decent background account of the rise of
Shia in Iraq that will appeal to those who are unsatisfied with the US
official rendering of Muqtada as little more than a renegade. It reads
as a coherent narrative heavily laced with journalistic anecdotal
evidence to provide a very readable background to one of the `new
Iraq's' new politician's.
The difficulty is access to Muqtada
himself. Cockburn's experience in the first chapter, where he just
manages to avoid death at the hands of the Sadrists, highlights the
danger in getting close to him. So despite reading an entire book
nominally about him, the reader is still left wondering who the man
behind the evolving myth actually is.
Cockburn covers a lot of
ground very quickly in the book. He starts with a twelve page
introduction to `the Shi'a of Iraq' and races on through the Iran-Iraq
War, the subsequent Shia uprising and the various trials and
tribulations of Muqtada's family as they walk the deadly tightrope of
the Saddam era. The cornerstone of Cockburn's book is to connect the
history of the Shia with its relevance today - which is an implicit
critique of those who would enter Iraq from an ahistorical perspective.
At one point he explains how post-invasion the Grand Ayatollah Ali
al-Sistani banned chess. Why? because `Yazid was playing chess in his
palace in Damascus when the head of Imam Hussein was brought to him'
(p.26).
The key focus is on the rise of Muqtada. Cockburn
explains his emergence as the response to a vacuum created by an
ill-conceived and unimaginative US invasion. The collapse of the Saddam
Hussein regime and the inability of the US to replace it allowed the
Shia clergy and its mosques, repressed for so long under Saddam, to
spring up and take control of vast swathes of local politics. It was the
failures of the invasion plan, combined with earlier failures in the
West's policy towards Iraq, that set the scene for an environment into
which Muqtada would emerge. Cockburn cites the mass impoverishment of
Iraqis as an essential precondition for the `swift rise of Muhammad
Sadiq al-Sadr in the early 1990s and his son Muqtada after 2003'
(p.107).
Cockburn's short chapters covering lengthy historical
events argue that Muqtada was a natural and predictable consequence of
the fall of Iraq. The US occupation of Iraq and the initial top-down
`Coalition Provisional Authority' (CPA) run by Paul Bremer, could never
accept this existence of a contesting authority figure. That Sadr's
support was based on a grassroots legitimacy born from the split blood
of his own family clashed with CPA's bunkered Green Zone mentality that
somehow Washington staffers could build the new Iraq as they liked.
Cockburn
is correct when he points out that "the Shia were not, after all,
trying to break up Iraq, but get their fair share of power within it"
(p.82). Ironically, considering that America considered Iraq's sovereign
unity a matter of critical importance, the CPA supported the Iranian
backed SCIRI and exiled based Dawa party over a homegrown Sadrist
alliance. Muqtada even harnessed what was left of battered Iraqi
nationalism and in 2005 offered support to the besieged insurgents in
Fallujah.
There is little doubt about the importance of Muqtada
al Sadr in the deeply fragmented political landscape of modern Iraq.
Cockburn's work is a testimony to this importance, yet you feel that
much more will and can be written on one of Iraq's most elusive figures."
Like a revolution in Iran , we find that the Al-Sadr senior leaders under Saddam the " Shia now possessed a clergy and religious organisation that was separate from the State.Potentially it could provide an alternative leadership for the Shia. The death of Al-Sadr Senior meant that the younger Al-Sadr could take this "organisation" in a society that had " no central government in many centuries...explains the strength of non-state agencies."
We also find that the massacre of the communists when Saddam came to power was also accompanied to the slaughter of shias in government and civil service positions whilst the nationalisation of the Baathist regime took business away from shias and into mainly sunni led government.
In this interview Patrick Coburn gives more insight into Muqtada and Iraqi affairs before the pullout.
"I'd
heard such good things about Rupert Thompson. I might try another book
down the road, but this one was uniquely terrible, I couldn't even
finish it. From the unoriginal, solipsistic narrator to the meandering
pace and dearth of any suspense or momentum, I couldn't help but think
of the author sitting down every day and arbitrarily picking something
new for his protagonist to do. ("Today I'll have him order a pastry!"
... "Today he should meet yet another person who's unexplainably
friendly to him even though he's a dick toward everyone!")
If anything, this reminded me of Haruki Murakami, where the entire world happens to
the male protagonist, in which he expends minimal effort to woo women,
make friends, and embroil himself in vague mysteries. I can only take so
many books with bored, listless middle-class guys (who somehow don't
need to work a day job) narrating to the reader their peregrinations
around the city.
I'm sure the myriad strands of the plot come
together, but the central conceit is so weak I couldn't bring myself to
care. Also, there are dozens of gaps in logic regarding when Blom can or
cannot see (the rules Thompson creates for this only seem to apply when
he doesn't feel like describing anything visual). An apt title for the
book, indeed."
In this interview Rupert describes a later Book and some of his processes.Including a very profound definition that Novels can teach compassion by making one life on another person or society.
"D’Amato the boxing trainer and Doctorow the novelist share the same
conception of professionalism, and both believe Mailer meets it.
D’Amato, who describes Mailer as “someone who was curious not only about
boxing but also about people’s minds,”"
As the reviews point out this style can be seen as the Author giving himself the centre stage as much as the participants , but they miss the point that in order to "be with them" he has to adopt the persona of being and moved with them in very close physical and emotional ways.
The video below gives a brief reading from the Book by Alec Baldwin
Vonneguts style is to write as he would speak to his hometown audience which gives it a humourous immediacy.
This review gives a good overview of some of the themes of the Novel which are still appealing to the youth which was born many decades after the Book came out
But last word goes to Kurt Vonnegut himself giving the background of the Novel and what the times meant to his generation in which Technology and Concepts , as well as Human Leader had the ability to be Tyrants of the age.As he says at the 3min20secs mark "I was a great believer in Truth , scientific Truth , until Turth was dropped on Hiroshima."
Some of the Scholarship is impressive in a way that makes one admire someone who has managed to produce a corpus almost single-handedly thus inspiring a whole generation of academic researchers to put meat and bones on a vast conception.
The high praise though has to be counter-balanced by quite fundamental flaws in structure and conclusions which , if this work was a building , would not get the necessary safety certificates to make it a viable place for habitation.
The first is in the cultural and colonial assumptions which make this work a very Euro-Centric vision with the implied theme that only Europe or the West has the answers and progress is to be judged in how Europeanised ( the more palatable euphemism being "Westernised") Non-European Societies can become.The very few Examples from Africa/Islamic World , mostly French Occupied Algeria are given a very negative , almost dismissive , short-shrift.Mostly her objections to Polygamy which she implies is very Common though it is quite rare in the Algerian/Muslim World.An odd objection to dismiss a whole religion and continent considering she was also involved in a "Morganistic" relationship at the time sharing the affections of Sartre with up to four Woman simultaneously.She also seems to have an almost pathologically negative attitude to the concept of Family on the sole evidence that she did not always get along with her Mother.Then there is the dearth of any examples from South America , Asia or even Slavic case studies which hardly make the Work conducive to establishing an Universal as opposed to a Highly Western European template for Womanhood.
Another major anomaly is her citing of quotes from Fiction Novels ( again mostly Western European ones) with the same weighting as one would give scientifically based academic peer reviewed case study analysis.A flaw that is entirely understandable as it is her Work that made this kind of detailed study of the field of gender issues whilst she could not turn to input that was not there before.Despite this valid consideration her methodology has to be seen as critically flawed in every sense of the word.
In the video below we have a lecture which clarifies , or not , the themes of the Book.
Ultimately Beauvoir asks the question of not what does it mean to be a Woman , but what does it mean to be a Western European Woman , which means the answer will only be as good as the question , which in this case cannot lead to a Universal Answer but only a template which will not be applicable to Non-European Cultures and Values , if , indeed, the answer even matches the Questions to Europeans in todays Social and Employment Corporate marketplace.
Written before apartheid was finally defeated in the late 80s/early 90s about an incredible individual who had won the Nobel Prize for Peace when it was still a credible trophy for genuine strugglers for peace and reconciliation, this book has a tense element of whether apartheid will ever be overcome in the lifetimes of Tutu and the Author herself.
"Du Boulay shares in the biography that Tutu proclaims with great faith
that apartheid cannot stand forever, that God is on the side of justice
and will prevail. However, Tutu must certainly have wondered at the time
if such change would come in his lifetime."
What I enjoyed most about Shirley DuBoulay's biography of Desmond Tutu
was its faithfulness to Tutu's true personality and character, both the
positive and the negative characteristics. For example, DuBoulay is
willing to admit that Tutu's calling to the priesthood was not
especially strong at first; however, by the time he began life as a
priest, everyone saw that he had a unique ability to connect to all
different types of people. More than most, he was able to place himself
in another person's shoes, and constantly tended to his parishioners'
every need. DuBoulay also admitted that Tutu was irresponsible with
money, and was overly sensitive in that he allowed his feelings to be
hurt easily.
On page 102 Tutu convincingly state " Justice is the only basis of true order" based on the spirit , on page 114 of "UBUNTU - the African quality of being a person that is deeper than being a mere Human , but a Spiritual Being also."
In the lecture below Tutu Reconciling Love and how this process was applied to the aftermath of uniting South Africa after the fall of apartheid , he also gives a deeper explanation of Ubuntu from the 24min 40 secs mark.
This is the best introduction and east access primer to the context and conduct , as well as historical perspective , of the Spanish Civil War.A
concise yet detailed study within a very readable and manageable book
of less than four hundred pages.Especially valuable is the essay
bibliography to the many thousands of sources , archives , commentaries
and books on the war throughout the decades to the present allowing the
reader to choose which parts of the conflict they wish to investigate in
a deeper way.An outstanding work by the best academic authorities on
the War and its aftermath.
As a historian Preston
readily admits he is partial on the side of the victims and oppressed
against the powerful and the architects of terror.A viewpoint and stance
that gives his work more urgency and credibility than would someone
trying for a balance that can ultimately get so out of hand that the
historian gives the same voice to both , in the case of the Holocaust,
to the victims as well as the lighters of the ovens which can lead to a
gross distortion of history and its lessons for our and future times.
On
page 25 describes some of the errors of the democratically elected
Socialist Government is dealing with the earlier tensions prior to the
war "Moreover, the PSOE was hobbled by its reliance on a rigid "Dogmatic" and simplistic faith in French marxism , and on page 47 "The Government did not react strongly enough to a spate of Church burning"
This
was due to in large measure of the Government not being able to muster
enough resources to counter the anarchistic actions of anarchists ,
actions that put up the back of the traditional forces and reduced the
credibility of the Government to control the law and order situation and
command its mandate to govern for all of Spanish Society.This meant
that , by page 57 we have "Southern Owners had declared War on the
republican government by refusing to plant crops .....with land reform
in the air the landowners did not feel disposed to invest in their land
", hence blocking land reform on the pretext of defending Church and
"traditional" country values from the attacks of Communists.This in turn
led to , on page 59 "Republican imprudence meant the catholic practice
was attacked rather than block politics doctrine , thereby alienating
many ordinary catholics with a republican disposition."
On page 244 we find "The Communist Party was pushed from relative obscurity to the arbiter of Republican Politics due to Soviet aid passing through its channel". In the perverted sectarian politics of the hard left the Communists and Anarchists spent more resources and treasure trying to liquidate each other than trying to preserve the integrity of the Socialist war effort.This was mainly because Stalin was playing a delicate game of trying to appease the Western Powers , placating the Fascists and using exporting his anti-Trotsky campaign beyond Soviet borders knowing full well that the Soviet Union would not be ready to fight a war with any of these powers for a few years yet.
Preston
rightly identifies the War as the first battles of the 2nd WW , where
fascism tested the will of the International Community and its
commitment to democracy and found the confidence , as in many cases
support , to continue the aggression into the International Theatre in
the 40s.
The Spanish People should have received the
support of the International Order , instead they were the victims of a
bloody Fascist filling in a sandwich between capitalism and communism.
Picasso made over 28,000 pieces of art in his time ranging from the most famous wall length paintings to minute working of sculpture and serenely simple manipulation of everyday objects.
On the Amazon reviews page this Book attracts either 5 Stars or 1 Star , nothing inbetween suggesting the ones with the 1 star review have what Truthseeker points out "Yet again a reviewer ignores the
evidence in order to smear what I presume are ideological opponents.
Sigh. As to negativity - is what the authors say untrue? No evidence of
that from your review.".
The
video below gives an indication of the findings of the authors into
this exposure of a very murky world that seems to have one thing in
common - the undermining of democracy both at home and abroad
The
ethos of the relationship is described on page 344-45 " some countries
want to get things done which a gentleman would not touch , they turn to
the one who gives services , who is prepared to serve his master and
dance for him ; he is not only willing to fulfill any of the wishes ,
but also enjoys the fact and is proud of it....he makes an ideology of
his servitude and calls it "realpolitik"".
Andrew and Leslie Cockburns 1991 book on Israels relations with the
C.I.A is still a valuable book with regard to the reality of the Israeli
States involvement in the world at large.
It details a diverse
range of issues from the arms deals to Iran which continued seamlessly
from the Shah to the Ayatolah, Israeli involvement with the right wing
dictatorships of Central America, its collaboration with apartheid era
South Africa on weapons programmes (nuclear and conventional), its
kidnapping and murder operations overseas aswell as spying and
industrial espionage in the United States.
Even for the most
hardened cynic of Israeli actions (based on a study of reality not
prejudice) will be astonished at the sheer opportunism and sickening
character of Israeli actions including arms sales and training to
Columbian drug cartels. The nature of the Israeli Arms industry is
curtly summed up in the statement of an industry executive bemoaning the
"threat of peace" and the end of the murderous wars of Central America.
Other
issues involve the Israelis contempt for the sovereignty of other
nations - witness the ham fisted murder of a Norwegian waiter of
Morrocan origins in front of his pregnant girlfriend and the abduction
of the courageous Israeli whistle blower Vanunu from Italy.
There
is no limit to the opportunism of the Israeli establishment, "Is it
good for Israelis?" seems to be the only measure - morals, ethics are
just not in the picture. Even their closest allies in the U.S. are
treated with contempt from time to time for instance the Israelis had
intelligence relating to the truck bombing of U.S. personnel in Lebanon
in 1983 but didnt pass it on.
One looks forward to the day the
Israelis are put in their place, ie. within the 1967 borders; perhaps
then reparations can be made (and paid) to the victims of their vicious
and violent actions.
This book should be essential to anyone
interested in the real facts about Israels foreign and covert policies,
it is well sourced and includes interesting interviews with many of the
figures involved, though perhaps not the best read if you are not
familiar with modern Middle Eastern history and Israeli relations with
the U.S"
Bob Woodward come to prominence during the Watergate period as a champion journalist in the famous dictum of Amira Hass of " identifying and challenging the centres of power".
Rather sadly this Book tracks the demise of the Woodward of the 70s to the modern style dupe of the "embedded journalist" syndrome that has made them ciphers to the narrative of power conditioning public opinion to the agenda of the power blocks in the decision process of superpower interests.
A chilling example of this turnaround of the transaction of the Woodward challenging Nixon Administration to being an embedded cipher for the Bush Administration is when he asks Rumsfeld if he should rewind the tape recorder to erase a comment that may be deemed inappropriate.
What we get is an interesting "live" dialogue of court interests and intrigues which registers high in dramatic interests and entertainment but little in impartial judgement and challenge of decision making circumventing public checks and balances which is fundamental to the American system of government decision-making.We are rewarded by a Fly-On-The -Wall Documentary story without the "Wall" itself being the main centre of the inner essence of the story.
The video below has a long interview with Woodward about the Bush process of decision making.
An interesting factor is the exposure of the "Pentagon" wing with the Office of the Vice-President which become an inner sanctum that made and ran policy that should , if everything is running properly , be run by the State Department and the President.In this respect it is highly revealing how little informed and briefed Colin Powell is , sometimes much less than Woodward himself , in matters when his input as Secretary Of State and onetime top Soldier of the US would have been vital as well as constitutional in getting the balance of a military and civilian approach to the challenge of 9/11.
This video below gives an example of just how much from the heady heights of Watergate his journalistic standards have been warped , in which he fails to detect any "lie" despite admitting to being 15 months in the company of the Bush and the drive to War on Iraq.
In this second volume on the Life and Works of Matisse , Spurling covers the years after 1908 covering the First World War , the bizarre relationship with the owner and commissioner of many of his works Barnes , the spin partnership between Gertrude Stein and Picasso which sought to undermine Matisse at the expense of their legacy as well as the illness that prevented Matisse from painting for many years , instead giving him the a second talent with Art with Paper cut-outs.
On page 219 we find Matisse relating his Artistic essence " you must create , between yourselves and your object , a stronger and stronger bond...always remembering this truth , that the design is not to be found in the model but in ourselves.This sort of operation cannot be forced , because it requires on our part ( as well as intelligence) something that comes from the depths of our soul : emotion".
The video below is a short documentary which examines Matisse birthplace , inspirations and legacy to modern thinking.
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