In January 1917, General Aleksandr Krymov returned from the Eastern Front and sought a meeting with Michael Rodzianko, the President of the Duma. Krymov told Rodzianko that the officers and men no longer had faith in Nicholas II and the army was willing to support the Duma if it took control of the government of Russia. “A revolution is imminent and… Read More March 8, 1917: February Revolution begins in Russia
Dahlia Scheindlin Israel’s right wing is no stranger to political victory. Rightwing parties have governed for the better part of more than four decades and each time Benjamin Netanyahu has won an election since 2009, euphoric supporters have cheered King Bibi, while losers have gloomily prophesied the end of democracy. But Netanyahu’s sixth government, formed in the final… Read More Israel is at a crucial crossroads: it can save itself or slide into despotism
World heritage monuments in Córdoba and Istanbul stand at the centre of a reductionist bid to rewrite the past In these two remarkable buildings at opposite ends of Europe, in their stones and slates and marble and gold, in their pillars and arches and windows and mosaics, can be glimpsed the complexities of European history,… Read More Mezquita and Hagia Sophia: two sacred symbols and the culture wars that belie their complex history
There seemed a certainty in degradation: T. E. Lawrence, Seven Pillars of Wisdom In Asia Minor or in Alexandria, in the second century of our faith (when Basilides was announcing that the cosmos was a rash and malevolent improvisation engineered by defective angels), Nils Runeberg might have directed, with a singular intellectual passion, one of the… Read More Three Versions of Judas: Jorge Luis Borges
With the help of new archaeological approaches, our picture of young lives in the Palaeolithic is now marvellously vivid April Nowell The sun rises on the Palaeolithic, 14,000 years ago, and the glacial ice that once blanketed Europe continues its slow retreat. In the daylight, a family begins making its way toward a cave at… Read More Children of the Ice Age
NB: An interesting essay. However, Heyking seems to conflate China and ‘Asia’. DS John von Heyking In order to cut through the two false alternatives – “catch up” and “social harmony” – I appeal to the original figure of Western liberal education, Socrates. Socrates indeed embodies the individual as it has been transmitted throughout the… Read More The Figure of Socrates and its Significance for Liberal Education in Asia
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow On the shores of Gitche Gumee,Of the shining Big-Sea-Water,Stood Nokomis, the old woman,Pointing with her finger westward,O’er the water pointing westward,To the purple clouds of sunset. Fiercely the red sun descendingBurned his way along the heavens,Set the sky on fire behind him,As war-parties, when retreating,Burn the prairies on their war-trail;And the moon, the Night-sun, eastward,Suddenly starting from his ambush,Followed fast those bloody footprints,Followed in that fiery war-trail,With its glare upon his features. And Nokomis, the old woman,Pointing with her finger westward,Spake these words to Hiawatha:“Yonder dwells the great Pearl-Feather,Megissogwon, the Magician,Manito of Wealth and Wampum,Guarded by his fiery serpents,Guarded by the black pitch-water. You can see his fiery serpents,The Kenabeek, the great serpents,Coiling, playing in the water;You can see the black pitch-waterStretching far away beyond them,To the purple clouds of sunset! “He it was who slew my father, By his wicked wiles and cunning,When he from the moon descended,When he came on earth to seek me.He, the mightiest of Magicians,Sends the fever from the marshes,Sends the pestilential vapors,Sends the poisonous exhalations,Sends the white fog from the fen-lands,Sends disease and death among us! “Take your bow, O Hiawatha,Take your arrows, jasper-headed,Take your war-club, Puggawaugun,And your mittens, Minjekahwun,And your birch-canoe for sailing,And the oil of Mishe-Nahma,So to smear its sides, that swiftly You may pass the black pitch-water;Slay this merciless magician,Save the people from the feverThat he breathes across the fen-lands,And avenge my father’s murder!” Straightway then my HiawathaArmed himself with all his war-gear,Launched his birch-canoe for sailing;With his palm its sides he patted,Said with glee, “Cheemaun, my darling,O my Birch-canoe! leap forward,Where you see the fiery serpents,Where you see the black pitch-water!”… https://www.hwlongfellow.org/poems_poem.php?pid=283 The Gael – The Last Of The Mohicans Theme
John von Heyking Conversation and the “Turning Around of the Soul” One of the common criticisms of the contemporary university is that it lacks individuals unwilling or incapable of conversing. Critics such as Anthony Kronman and Stephen Miller rightly observe that there’s something about contemporary culture and the contemporary university hostile to the arts or… Read More Periagoge: Liberal Education in the Modern University
How conservatives made him their icon and distorted his ideas Kim Phillips-Fein How did Smith’s ideas become so thoroughly integrated into conservative defenses of the free market against regulation? And are these the only ways of reading his work? These are the questions at the heart of Adam Smith’s America, Glory M. Liu’s intriguing account of… Read More The Betrayal of Adam Smith
First posted February 22, 2016 NB: This post deals with the political debate sparked off by the recent events in JNU. It is for the consideration of ordinary students as well as other concerned individuals, in India and abroad. It is offered in the belief that a forthright dialogue on divisive themes is the only way… Read More What is to be Undone (2016)
