Photo copyright

The Best Political Novels

Let’s talk about your first choice: Nostromo (1904). I like how Conrad seems to have this above-it-all gaze, taking in the workings of everything on the fictional island of Costaguana. Neither side offers fix-it-all solutions; badness exists, to a degree, on both, or all, sides, so there’s no absolute opposition between good and bad and no revolution leads to a bettering of circumstances on the island. Is it consciousness of that that constitutes awakening here?

I don’t think Conrad is interested in asserting any type of moral equivalency—I don’t think he believes the exploited and the exploiters have equal moral claims. Instead, what Conrad cares about is individuality—the possibility or impossibility of a world of individuals—and how each of them, each of us, might be trapped, or might resist being trapped, in the positions and circumstances into which we were born. This, in Nostromo, is best dramatized in the person of Charles Gould: is the mine his birthright? From there, it’s a very direct line to asking the question: To what degree are birthrights delusions, or self-invented?

Again, an awakening as stepping up or away from the unit you were born into–but obviously, as with Yoav and Uri, it’s not enough to leave your motherland. So what does that stepping up entail for Conrad?

For Conrad, especially in Nostromo, it’s a question of personal ennoblement, of honour. So many of his characters have conflicting loyalties and are always trying to negotiate between them. Conrad is especially engaged with the ways in which people fail, or feel as if they have failed, the standards that were set for them. So, for him, “stepping up” as you put it, usually takes the form of a “stepping down,” a betrayal—not least of notions of Empire, or of duty.

Do you think his focus on the individual defining himself, making himself the best he can be, as opposed to his birth–and nationality, and class, and so on–defining him, derives from Conrad’s own status as a kind of transnational drifter?

Sure. He was the displaced son of a Polish patriot who hated the Russians and spoke French and wrote in English. This, for him, is what the sea did. His style is ship style: when you work and live on a ship, it doesn’t matter where you’re from, or where your shipmates are from. The only thing that matters is that they can do their jobs, and that you can do your job. You’re forced to become mutually reliant, for survival. At sea, or on Conrad’s sea, problems of origin fall away or become translated into problems of individual talent and character. The sea, in Conrad’s imaginary, becomes a democracy, a meritocracy, of survival. This, at least, is the “governance” that his Europeans aspire to and are tried by. This is Conrad’s European way of understanding the “natives,” not by appropriating them culturally, but by enlisting and rallying them in a campaign against the elements, a campaign against the pitilessness of

Every heart to love will come
But like a refugee

Leonard Cohen

From the BBC page IDF watch  fires  at the edge of Gaza

War seems eternal in our human world

Killing me will not change anything. They need to kill every last one of us to change the facts.

I dreamed I rowed in a large pea green boat
Accompanied by seventeen cats.
And across the Great Lake,without a mistake
I saw mountains of gentleman’s hats.
I was making no waves in my effort to move,
The cats were discoursing on geometry.
I looked in the mirror fixed onto my boat,
The moon spoke  entrancing Theology.
“I wonder who’ll help me”I thought to myself,
When I saw an entire spectrum of men–
Dirac, Archimedes,Niels Bohr, with their theories.
I got my great inspiration just then.
I need seventeen physicists,that’s one for each cat,
All tied to my boat with a chain.
The force they exert will just compensate
For the magnetic attraction of rain.
Paul Dirac came up, and I looked into his eyes,
They were full of anxiety and pain.
“I am sorry I am unable do what you wish,
But my father never taught me to swim.”
“That is perfectly alright”,I politely replied,
“You can walk on the water instead”
So that’s how my boat and its cargo of cats
Were accompanied back to my bed.
When I awoke the next day,I was filled with dismay.
I saw that Paul Dirac was gone,
With the cats and the boat,of which I just wrote
And I was now completely alone.
I took a quick look,in my old physics book
And there was a photo of Dirac
I stared at his eyes,and I am not telling lies,
He threw me a very strange look.
I caught this strange look,it’s here in my book.
I am saving it for a special event.
When I gather more Data on Relative Quanta,
I’ll understand just what  Paul Dirac meant.

Why is writing an email more difficult  in its etiquette than writing a letter?
For a letter it was always
Dear Mr Digge
Or Dearest Rose.
only varying this with the person and their position in  your life.~
As I wrote recently,it appears beginning an email with “Dear John” is considered wrong.Too formal.Dear no longer means anything much.
As in

Dear Mr X

Your execution has been rescheduled and will now be at 3 p,m Friday
Sorry for any inconvenience.
Yours truly
P.Pilate

Also having a greeting at odds with the ending is always a problem

My  own dearest John
I hate you
Worst wishes ever
Anne

When you meet someone in the street it can be the same.

How are you?
I have got  brain cancer
You’re meant to say, I’m fine
I’m terribly sorry.The chemotherapy has affected my mind
Your hair looks  odd.
You’re not meant to say  that
I’m so sorry.You look great.
Excuse me , the ambulance is waiting
Don’t let me get in the way
But you are  in the way
Always moaning, aren’t you? Look on the bright side.
You are blocking the sun
I can’t help where the sun moves to.
OK.Nice to see you
Mutual
See you later.
See you soon
Cheers,old boy
Cheerio

In this cubicle I sit and read
“How to live inside a little house”
Does it matter  if the heart is dead,
If I  have a new kitchen ,but no spouse?

I see a folding desk and chair beside
Floors of marbled vinyl in deep teal
Yet now inside a cubicle resides
My entire body and my soul revealed.

I used to have a heart when I first wrote
I felt it like a pressure in the chest
But now I have none,see I merely float
And go the way the current thinks is best

I’ve handed in my notice,I am done
A cubicle is not  the place  for fun

I

Town centre 

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/57615/logic-56d23b4c891a9

https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/the-unmothered

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/apr/11/sylvia-plath-ted-hughes-letters-therapist

Extract

Part of what makes the story of Plath and Hughes feel so endlessly symbolic is the way it functions as a lightning rod for changing ideas about sexual politics. Letters are almost as central to the cultural story of Plath and Hughes as the poems they wrote to, and about, each other. Twenty years ago, I embarked on a PhD about Plath’s poetry, but became so fascinated by the tug-of-war over her legacy, our culture’s long and determined effort to turn her from an author into a character that I ended up writing a thesis about that story. Now new documents emerge, and the whole tale gets retold – once more, with different feelings.

The facts may alter with new evidence, but mostly it’s our interpretations that have altered. Our ideas – about feminism, marriage, mental illness, suicide and domestic violence – change and with them our attitudes towards Plath and Hughes.

Sympathies shift, from her to him and back again. Just as I was finishing my thesis came the news that Hughes had suddenly published a collection of poems, Birthday Letters, followed soon by Howls & Whispers, an addendum of sorts

I saw the floor of heaven touch the earth
And I too was affected by its bliss
In the moments just before your death

Like a  heavy satin, gold embossed,
When  your soul went into Paradise
I saw the floor of heaven touch the earth

I saw no suffering Jesus on his Cross
Just a cloud of angels  gold and wise
In the moments just before your death

Straight  my tears fell, like a sheet of glass
As on your serene face I left a kiss
I saw the floors of heaven touch the earth

A sweet bell rang  and my dear man was lost
Nothing can prepare the heart for this
In the moments just after a death

Would we love if we knew the full cost?
He has left me here and I am lost
I saw the floor of heaven touch the earth
In the moments just  around his death

In London town,I saw the moon,

It looked real impressive.

So I lay myself down on  my coat,

So I could pen this missive.

After lying staring up,

I began to feel dead lazy

I thought I saw the Pope go by.

Do ye’ ken I’m going crazy?

He was in this large white car

Wrapped up in royal tartan.

I know you won’t believe me but

I felt almost certain.

I went to a free soup kitchen,

As I’m a homeless person.

I saw ten angels looking down,

So I called “Stop  that staring”

I crawled inside a shop doorway

To get a few  hours sleep.

I I dreamed I  dwelt in the old UK

It nearly made me weep.

If I really was in my England

I ‘d have the N.H.S.

I’d have a council house of my own
And I’d be surely blessed

https://www.americamagazine.org/arts-culture/2017/02/01/yale-poet-interaction-between-faith-and-poetry

Extract

~”On this week’s podcast poet Christian Wiman describes the power of poetry to hosts Matt Malone, S.J., and Kerry Weber. America‘s poetry editor Joe Hoover, S.J., joins to offer his perspective. In conversation with our editors, Wiman described how his ability to write poetry was affected by a period of illness. “It’s dangerous if you’re an artist and the medium through which you process the world is taken away from you. Everything becomes dammed up in you. I met the woman who is now my wife and got sick shortly after that it jolted me into speech. All of those poems [published in Hammer is the Prayer by Farrar, Straus & Giroux]  came directly out of that experience.”

Faith is a major theme in Wiman’s work, which is why he has found a good home as a professor at Yale’s Institute of Sacred Music.  “I think the notion of faith as a crutch is fundamental misunderstanding,” Wiman told our hosts. “Often my experience of faith is that it’s not a crutch. It’s quite the opposite, it’s calling me to something that I can’t quite live up to. I wish it could be more of a consolation, actually.”

If you’d like to learn more about Wiman’s poetry, feel free to see the poem he published in our February 6 issue here.

https://diracseashore.wordpress.com/2012/08/29/art-from-math/

There are too many people on earth
So kill yourself now,don’t give birth
Yet that is immoral
Murder abhorrent
Let’s eat less and wear less, be first!

Do we really need chocolate eclairs?
Vanilla slices are too hard to share
A sponge cake is easier
A  gift  for the queasier
With icing  and jam we want more.

The traffic is hellish today
I  think I prefer to stay here
I hear the birds sing
To the maple they wing
I wish I could  fly right up there

I once played the piano all night
The neighbours were  very polite
“We heard some mice dancing
With music enchanting
But make sure the cat does not bite”

I tried a guitar for a week
I failed to make the strings speak
I went back to the  seller
I  cried,my dear fellow
I  cannot play this as it leaks

Singing is  the cheapest of arts
It’s free if the larynx  won’t smart
You can practise  outside
As you go for a ride
And the cats all around might take part

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2014/01/the-eavesdropper/355727/

Extract:

I remember how we felt  ourselves as one
I did not need to speak in words at all
As if we were both  dwelling in one skin

If I tell, where should my tale begin?
When I first responded to your call?
I remember how we felt  each other one

I touched your hand. still warm.  yet you were gone
Your structure  had collapsed like punctured ball
Oh. we were both  dwelling in one skin

So I am separated from my twin
I feel confused,my mind is in a brawl
I remember how we felt  each other one

From two  persons comes  strange new one
The Trinity of love makes a new soul
Then our work on earth is almost done

Over  long pale sands the  tide will flow
In and out like breathing, as seas roll
If I  write where should my tale begin?
In   that loving tangle of bare limbs?

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/Rafael-campo

EXTRACT

https://www.philosophytalk.org/blog/how-can-smart-people-still-believe-god

Quote:

As a philosopher, I tend to want my beliefs to be based on either direct experience or reasoned arguments. Even if some belief of mine is not in fact so based, I like to flatter myself that all my current beliefs are capable of being, as it were, ratified by either some reasoned argument or by the testimony of direct experience. And I’d like to think that if it were to be decisively settled that some belief of mine could not be so , I would more or less spontaneously surrender that belief, more or less without regret or remorse or wishful thinking of any kind. It seems to me one could and should have much the same attitude toward religious belief. One should want to believe in the existence of god only if one is confident that such belief is capable of being ratified by either reasoned argument or direct experience.

https://futureofworking.com/40-funny-yiddish-sayings/

• a schande (Yid., אַ שאַנדע): a disgrace; one who brings embarrassment through mere association, cf. German eine Schande, translated “a disgrace”, meaning “such a shame”joke
• abi me lebt (Yid., אַבי מע לעבט): abi from Slavic, as in the previous entry; me lebt cognate to the German, man lebt,’ meaning “At least I’m alive”
• aliyah (sometimes spelt “aliyos”): the immigration of Jews from the diaspora to the Land of Israel; also defined as “the act of going up” — towards Jerusalem, “making Aliyah”, by moving to the Land of Israel is one of the most basic tenets of Zionism; from Hebrew, aliyah means “ascent” or “going up”.
• alter kicker or alter kacker (Yid., אַלטער קאַקער): an old fart (from German Alter “old” and kacker “crapper”)^[5]Also sometimes spelled phonetically (from the American point of view) as “alte kocker.”^[6]

• balabusta: a homemaker; usually applied with positive connotations
• bench: to bless, commonly referred to saying Grace after meals (benching) or when lighting shabbat candles(bench-light), from Latin, “benedicere”, (to bless).
• billig or billik: cheap, shoddy (said of merchandise); common expression “Billig is Teir” (cheap is expensive)
• German: Bub for a boy-child,^[7]lovingly used by Morticia Addams in the 1964 TV series with her husband
• bubbameisse: Old wives’ tale, cock and bull story (often attributed by erroneous folk etymology to combination of bubbe, “grandmother”, and meisse, “tale”, but in fact derives from “Bove-meisse”, from the “Bove Bukh”, the “Book of Bove”, the chivalric adventures of fictitious knight Sir Bevys (“Bove”) of Hampton, first published in Yiddish in 1541 and continually republished until 1910.
• bubkes (also spelled “bupkis”): emphatically nothing, as in He isn’t worth bubkes (literally “goat droppings”, in Polish “bobki”)

C

• chalisch: literally, fainting (“I was chalishing from hunger.”), sometimes used as a term of desperate desire for something or someone (“After a thirty-six hour shift, I was chalishing to go home already.”)
• chazerei (Yiddish, חזירײַ khazerai “filth” or, perhaps more literally, “piggery”, from חזיר khazer “pig” from Hebrew חזיר‬ “hazeer”, pig): junk, garbage, junk food
• chesid: good deed or favor. “Do me a chesid and clean your room.”
• chidush or chiddush: (from Hebrew חדש‬ hadash, meaning “new”) the point, upshot, or reason, of a discussion or argument; the conclusion drawn from two or more premises; more generally, innovation. For example: “I don’t get it, what’s the chidush?” Also used when you are making fun of someone for something entirely obvious. “Chidush! Chidush!
• chutzpah: (Yid. from Heb. חצפה‬ hutspe, alt. sp. חוצפה‬) Courage, determination, daring; also audacity, effrontery. Similar in meaning to English slang guts, balls, or nerve. Can carry either a positive or negative connotation.

D

Hey there,Curry
I understand you like to hear the gossip so here goes.Hubs wears 7 pairs of underpants on top of each  other as otherwise  his trousers fall down which has certain advantages,as you can imagine.However it means that the washing has to be done every day.He uses 4 hankies as a minimum and so that is about 54 a week.OI have a hot wash on  the machine but it takes 3 hours.Then I have to clean the 5 bathrooms, the kitchen and the hall every day.I only write when I am aching to do so as we might do with sex but aching is less intense owing to our both having bad hearts,arthritis,high blood pressure and being allergic to cotton and nylon.
But we always have sex on Sunday afternoon in winter as it gets dark so early.
Well, we  gaze into each others eyes and murmur little phrases,like, here you are my lamb,my honeybun,my baby.Seems like all we can do sometimes.
I have to go and make his tea now

Cursings

Sent from my iPhone and my Windows 11 phone.

Kerry Onne

https://www.grammarly.com/blog/how-to-end-an-email/

Nine Email Sign-offs to Avoid

1. Love

I have a friend who once accidentally signed an office email to his entire department with love. He never lived it down. Save this one for family, close friends, and your significant other. The same applies to hugs or XOXO.

2. Thx or Rgrds

You’re not thirteen, and this isn’t a conversation happening in a messaging app. Use your words.

3. Take care

On the surface, take care sounds pleasant, but on closer examination, it seems to imply that the recipient should be wary of potential dangers. Use this only if bears are known to lurk by the Dumpster outside the recipient’s office. (We’re only half kidding!)

4. Looking forward to hearing from you

This one also sounds nice at first, but it’s ultimately passive-aggressive. Your recipient is likely to hear an implied “You’d better write back.”

5. Yours truly

Do you really, truly belong to the recipient? Nope. This sounds insincere and hokey . . . unless you’re writing a letter home to your parents from summer camp.

6. Respectfully / Respectfully yours

This one’s okay if you’re sending a formal missive to the POTUS, but it’s too formal for anything else. In fact, according to Business Insider, respectfully yours is the standard close for addressing government officials and clergy.

7. [Nothing at all]

We live in a world where people frequently email from mobile devices, so excluding a signature certainly isn’t a no-no as an email chain progresses, particularly if your recipient also drops the more formal sign-off. But not signing an initial email or using only the formal signature you’ve created to append to your outgoing emails comes off as impersonal. (Bloomberg disagrees, stating that email has become more like instant messaging than true correspondence these days, but we’re sticking to our convictions.)

8. -[Name] or -[Initial]

While this sort of sign-off may work for very brief, informal emails, it’s too cold and detached for most, particularly when you’re connecting with the recipient for the first time.

9. Have a blessed day

It’s best to keep anything with religious overtones out of your professional correspondence, although this one’s fine if you’re emailing an acquaintance about what you’re bringing to the church potluck.

Bonus Bad Sign-off

Although this sign-off tends to happen more by default when the sender forgets to add an actual signature, we thought it was worth mentioning the ubiquitous . . .

Sent from my iPhone

This may be the most common sign-off of them all. It has merits, of course. It explains away brevity and typos—who’s at their best when typing on a phone? But it also conveys that you don’t care enough to do away with the default email signature that came stock with your device’s email app.

Some people get creative with this signature. A few fun (if not necessarily business appropriate) examples found round the Internet include:

• My parents wouldn’t buy me an iPhone so I have to manually type “Sent from my iPhone” to look cool
• Sent telepathically
• Sent from my laptop, so I have no excuse for typos
• Sent from my smartphone so please forgive any dumb mistakes
• I am responsible for the concept of this message. Unfortunately, autocorrect is responsible for the content
• Sent from my mobile. Fingers big. Keyboard small.
• iPhone. iTypos. iApologize.
• My phone can’t spell for carp

And, for the Stephen King fans among our readers:

• Sent from Jack’s typewriter, Rm 237. No autocorrect. REᗡЯU