by Pranab Bardhan

A British friend of mine once told me that when he feels stressed he often turns to re-reading R.K. Narayan’s stories about Malgudi, the fictional placid small town in south India. Much earlier, in the 1930’s, a fellow-Britisher, the writer Graham Greene, had discovered Narayan and became his life-long friend, mentor, agent for the wider literary world, and even occasional proof-reader. He found a kind of ‘sadness and beauty’ in Narayan’s simple depiction of the idiosyncrasies and disappointments of ordinary lives which he imbues with a touching sense of gentle irony and compassion.

Over the last few decades the small town has been at the center of much of urbanizing India, but the depictions in fiction today of the lives there are, as expected, much more complex in their teeming conflicts and raw agony. The literature on this even in south India is quite large, but from my own limited readings, I shall select for discussion here only three books from the last two decades, two of them translated from their originals in Malayalam and Kannada, and the third written in English.

I shall start with the third, titled Between the Assassinations by Aravind Adiga, which is probably the furthest of the three in terms of dissonance from the life in Malgudi. Here we can definitely say: Toto, we are not in Malgudi anymore. The assassinations referred to are those of Indira Gandhi in 1984 and of her son, Rajiv Gandhi, in 1991, but in the book except for merely as a time-marker of those 7 years, they do not play any direct role. Adiga came to be widely noted after he won the Booker Prize for his short novel The White Tiger, a book of stridently raging fury at the crushing inequalities and depravity arising from India’s roaring economic growth and somewhat cardboard characters through which they are played out, a book I did not particularly like. Adiga wrote Between the Assassinations earlier but published it after The White Tiger. Here the fury is less strident, there is more nuance and variety in the characters, and along with aching sympathy there is all-enveloping hopelessness. Here is a typical scene: a lowly cart-rickshaw puller, straining hard going uphill with a heavy load, exhausted by the heat and humiliation and a painful neck, stops his cart in the middle of the busy road, shakes his fist in a futile gesture at the passing, honking traffic and shouts: ‘Don’t you see something is wrong with this world?’ Read more »

Diedrick Brackens. Immersion Circle, from the exhibition “Unholy Ghosts”, Los Angeles, 2019.

More here, here, and here.

Current show at the New Museum.

by Brooks Riley

by Joan Harvey

i couldn’t cry out because my mouth was full of beast & plunder

                     Kamau Brathwaite

A pregnant sperm whale washes up on the beach in Sardinia carrying a dead fetus.

      49 pounds of plastic in its stomach

Iguanas freeze and fall out of trees in Florida.

      unusual cold

In Australia bats’ brains fry in their heads. At least 45,00 flying foxes die on one day. Dozens of baby bats pile up on the ground. Three species of bat corpses piled high. Possums burn their paws on roads and roofs.

      unusual heat

Read more »

by Mary Hrovat

Nature has filled the world with “endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful,” in the words of Charles Darwin. We humans, faced with this abundance and variety of creatures, have used our imagination to the full in giving them descriptive and often evocative names. Some animal names are fairly straightforward; the name big hairy armadillo lacks nuance, although it makes up in charm what it lacks in subtlety. In other cases, though, we’ve come up with epithets that would make a poet proud: the tawny-crowned greenlet, the sharp-shinned hawk, the pricklenape lizards.

Creativity comes into play even in simple descriptions of size and shape. For example, a flat-shelled tortoise is called the pancake tortoise. The least auklet, with its doubly diminutive name, is the smallest auk species, and the smallest owl species is called the elf owl. The Barbados threadsnake (the smallest snake species) is roughly four inches long on average and about as wide as a thick strand of spaghetti. The bumblebee bat is also known as Kitti’s hog-nosed bat, one name reflecting its place as the smallest bat species, and the other describing the shape of its nose. The giant pocket gopher may sound oxymoronic, like jumbo shrimp, until you learn that it’s not somehow a gigantic gopher that fits in a pocket but a large gopher with cheek pouches that it uses to carry food. Read more »

Your Love’s Horizon is What I Want

by Muhammad Iqbal

Your love’s horizon is what I want
The simplicity of what I want

Let’s bestow heaven on the pious
Seeing you face to face is what I want

Promise me you’ll reveal yourself
Tease me. Test my patience. That’s what I want

I’m a small man with a playful heart
“You can’t behold,” is the command I want

Friends, I’m a guest in this gathering
Snuffed like a candle at dawn is not what I want

There, I’ve told our secret in public
I’ve no manners. Scold me. That’s what I want

Translated from the Urdu by Rafiq Kathwari / @brownpundit

by Jeroen Bouterse

“For many years now a division has been established in our universities between the sciences and the humanities. This division is probably more absolute now than it has ever been before.”[1] Thus complains, in 1946, the British Marxist scientist John Desmond Bernal.

It is a worry that seems to anticipate C.P. Snow’s later cri de coeur about the ‘two cultures’. Indeed, the two scientists knew and respected each other; Snow called Bernal “quite obviously and with no fuss about it, a great man”.[2] More interesting than the question of priority, however, is the question why Bernal made this observation when he did, and with this sense of urgency.

Bernal was a radically left-wing thinker, especially interested in the role science could play in social progress. In his twenties, he wondered whether scientists should take a leading role in a progressive society or whether such leadership would not always come at the risk of class distinction – the risk that scientists would, in the end, be loyal to ‘science’ itself, instead of to humanity.

For such a class-conscious thinker, Marxism provided a fitting intellectual home; and indeed, when a Russian delegation led by Nikolai Bukharin visited London in 1931 to participate in an international conference on history of science, Bernal was favorably impressed by the ideologically Marxist perspective it provided on science. “Is it better”, he wondered in a review, “to be intellectually free but socially totally ineffective or to become part of a system where knowledge and action are joined for one common purpose?”[3]

Bernal would not be the only left-wing thinker of his time to see the Soviet Union as a shining example, offering a better response to economic crises than capitalism ever could. Read more »

by Joshua Wilbur

The Palio di Siena is a gorgeous paradox, a horse race with practically no rules in a city enamored with ritual.

Representatives from the contrade, or neighborhoods, of Siena, Italy have competed in this unique spectacle since the 17th Century. Twice a summer, first in July and again in August, Tuscans and tourists gather in the stifling heat to watch a ten-horse, three-lap sprint lasting no longer than two minutes.

More than a race, Il Palio (“the prize”) is an expression of its people, an exercise in uninhibited passion, remnant barbarism, group solidarity, and shameless corruption. I’m fortunate to have extended family— cousins, cugini—who live in a village just outside of Siena. Last week, with my cousins as guides, I experienced the Palio for the first time. 

On the day of the Palio, our group of family and friends (an even mix of Americans and Italians, plus a Canadian and a Cypriot) headed to the Piazza del Campo, where the race is held. Il Campo (“the field”) is one of the most impressive “squares” in Italy— in part because it’s a large, imperfect circle. The race rumbles along the piazza’s edge, past shops and restaurants obscured, for a few days, by wooden bleachers. A dense layer of clay, sand, and tuff is laid over the uneven brick sidewalk, protecting horses and riders from even worse potential injury. Read more »

Burnet moth on flowers on my balcony in July of 2018.

by Gabrielle C. Durham

Whether we’re glancing through a play from high school before donating it or wandering through an antique shop, sometimes we see a word that doesn’t look quite right. Sometimes, misspelled words are a result of advertising campaigns, and other times they are alternate spellings in English. We all know English has some demented rules of orthography (even the word “orthography” can inspire chuckles; “proper writing” in English? Is that a joke?). You’re not alone if you have to remind yourself about “i before e except after c” and its numerous exceptions.

I was thinking about words that may or may not have been commonly used in writing or speech at some point, but more typically now receive a raised eyebrow. It very well may be that you are on a one-person campaign to keep “erstwhile” thriving in the vernacular, and good on you, mate. It may be a little lonely, though. “Erstwhile” has meaning as an adverb meaning formerly and as an adjective, it means one-time or previous, as in an erstwhile partner. This coinage goes back to the 16^th century, but its two parts originated centuries earlier. Has it had a good run? Should it be up for retirement now? It does seem to maintain a legalistic meaning, so maybe the old boy retains some vital essence.

A related word that makes me smile is “umquhile,” also meaning previous or former, usually when talking about someone who has died. Its roots are Scottish, which has pronunciation conventions that continue to elude me. Chances are, no one has any idea what you are writing about if you use this delightful peacock of a word. Read more »

by Joseph Shieber

In a few more months I’ll be teaching my course in the history of 20th century analytic philosophy. In that course we begin with Frege and Russell and end with topics covered in the 1980s and ’90s that interest the students. This means that the course covers a wide range of subject areas in philosophy. We begin with philosophy of language, but we can conclude the semester with political philosophy or analytic feminism or the metaphysics of race.

Because of the richness of analytic philosophy in the 20th century, there is of course no way that a one-semester undergraduate course could cover its entire scope comprehensively. This is particularly true if the instructor has the goal of not just doing intellectual history, but actually doing philosophy: formulating the arguments that philosophers gave for their positions and evaluating those arguments.

So one of the challenges of teaching a course like this is striking a balance between covering of some of the major discussions and movements in 20th century analytic philosophy and providing opportunities for students actually to engage with the arguments that make 20th century analytic philosophy so rich.

Another challenge with which I’ve wrestled is what to do about some of the flawed people who create beautiful philosophical arguments. With the rise of the #metoo movement, this challenge is one that has assumed a new urgency. But the challenge is actually not a new one. Consider, for example, the case of Frege, one of the giants of late-19th century philosophy who is now widely regarded as one of the forefathers of 20th century analytic philosophy. Read more »

Flight From Gravity

…………… a story, a poem
a recollection of 77 summer solstices
bundled into a single thought of when
a young carpenter with muscles, sweating,
carries a 2 by 10 joist from lumber pile to house,
its skeleton being assembled in the sun,
a thought that segues into a later solstice
down the line, along the way,
a solstice of love and its making,
a tale with math & science thrown in:
physics, geometry, stuff he’d read somewhere,
picked up, stuff that fits and shifts,
some good
……………..and not so—

flight from gravity
.
Jim Culleny
5/13/19

by Shawn Crawford

C.S. Lewis, the Evangelical icon who would be thoroughly nauseated by Evangelicals, once wrote we should not kid ourselves into believing the Reformation had anything to do with religious freedom. Once he escaped the stake, John Calvin had no problem watching Michael Servetus burn. Although he did ask for a beheading instead. Full of tender, predestined mercies was Calvin. The Reformation makes much more sense when viewed as a political and theological battle over who gets to light the matches.

But for true clarity, we must of course turn to Monty Python and the Holy Grail. When the crowd wants to burn a woman as a witch (“She turned me into a newt. I got better.”), the question never arises as to the legitimacy of burning witches or even their existence but whether the mob’s superstition or Sir Bedivere’s “science” (If she weighs the same as a duck, she’s made of wood, and therefore a witch) should determine the case. The lighting of matches gets turned into a question of process; let’s make sure we’re burning people for the right reasons.

Both situations, one historical and one fanciful, existed because a worldview, that certain sins (heresy, witchcraft) must be eliminated through the death of the transgressors, had triumphed and stood beyond question. Only later would a debate arise as to whether we should be killing people over matters of faith and religion. That debate continues in certain cultures. Read more »

Sughra Raza. For Pride’s Sake. January 2017, Guangzho.

Digital photograph.

by Abigail Akavia

Short Talk on Why Some People Find Trains Exciting / Anne Carson

It is the names Northland Sante Fe Nickle Plate Line Delta Jump Dayliner Heartland Favourite Taj Express it is the long lit windows the plush seats the smokers the sleeping cars the platform questions the French woman watching me from across the aisle you never know the little lights that snap on overhead the noctilucal areas the cheekwary page turning of course I have a loyal one at home it is the blue trainyards the red switch lights the unopened chocolate bar the curious rumpled little ankle socks speeding up to 130 kilometres per hour black trees crowding by bridges racketing past the reading glasses make her look like Racine or Baudelaire je ne sais plus lequel stuffing their shadows into her mouth qui sait même qui sait.

I have been married for ten years this week. 

We check online and learn together that the traditional material for tenth anniversary gifts is tin. This keeps us entertained for a while, cracking jokes about our marriage as a rusty tin can. Our average age is forty, far from officially old, but officially not-young. The morning of our anniversary goes up in prosaic flames of frustration, as we try—mostly fail—to contain the screams of a three-and-a-half year old who has been offered his breakfast muesli in the panda-bear-bowl instead of the cloud-bowl; whose commandment “the dinosaur t-shirt” was misinterpreted to mean the black shirt with the white dinos instead of the other way around (white shirt, black dinos). Ritual morning miscommunications like the itch on a leg covered with a dozen two-day old mosquito bites.

Almost fourteen years ago, you went to Germany for a year of studies. The summer before the academic year started, we traveled together in Europe. My mother was not ready to have her youngest daughter away for so long with a man she—my mother, that is, but she probably thought I also—didn’t really know that well. And so I found myself playing the age-old part, shouting at her “I am going to marry this man” with the conviction of a young person unaware of how young (and ridiculously archetypal) she sounds, years before you and I actually talked about marriage. But your mother was with us at the airport saying goodbye, because you were leaving for longer than just the summer.  Read more »

by Amanda Beth Peery

MOTEL IN AN OASIS TOWN

Jungle-blooms unfold shiveringly
out of sun-baked stretches and creases in the streets
where round-hipped women wear second-hand silk dresses
over bodies that have been
worn and worn again.

In the motel, we leave handprints
griming the glass behind factory-weave curtains.
We leave handprints just to leave something
like roamers heading to another country
where I’ve heard the land
is so open it can make a man
soul-sick for a horse.

If we try to walk there, we’ll fall into the swarm of blossoms
tripped by thin tendrils of roots unfurling
before we even reach the edge of town.

If we know just one just god
one cruel god, we too will be worn down
in this rented room with its two bibles beside
a TV remote with rubbed-off buttons
in a broth of stale-conditioned air.

Where the cold knifes in below our collarbones at night
long after the whiskey that’s half melted ice
by the leaf-strewn pool on Friday afternoon—
where the proprietress rasps can you hear the beasts out back—
yowling with pity—

and a guest says, don’t I look like something
in this dress—don’t I feel a new life
churning in me, like a brand new galaxy
where blue stars are sparking up in clusters, even as we speak.
And can you hear the animals out back—howling with glee.
While the jungle blooms unfounded, blooms outward into the desert—

by Emrys Westacott

When I studied philosophy as an undergraduate in the UK in the late seventies, Nietzsche was pretty much off limits. None of his texts were included on any of the course syllabi. We devoted an entire term to Gilbert Ryle’s The Concept of Mind, but not even during a year-long course on Phenomenology and Existentialism was Nietzsche so much as mentioned. Such was the analytic insularity of academic philosophy in Britain at the time.

Things have changed since then. Today, in any book store with a genuine philosophy section, the shelf space occupied by books by or about Nietzsche is likely to be greater than that devoted to any other thinker. There are now reliable English translations of all his published works along with his notebooks and letters. And philosophy students will usually have many more opportunities to encounter his texts in the course of their studies.

Exactly why Nietzsche’s star has risen so high over the last few decades is a complex question. Many factors could be cited. His notorious association with Nazism was shown (by Walter Kaufmann and others) to be largely based on a misrepresentation. His seminal ideas about morality, religion, human nature, art, culture, truth and knowledge increasingly seemed to chime with the times. A broadening conception of philosophy within academic departments made room for a writer who had previously attracted the attention of literati rather than philosophers.

But more important than these, I believe, are three further reasons. Read more »

by Brooks Riley