Fragments of a blog
Fragments of a blog
Reading Faramerz Dabhoiwala‘s review of three books on British imperial history, I saw this quote from 1911 concerning West Indians of color: …lazy, vicious and incapable of any serious improvement, or of work except under compulsion. In such a climate…
Late in May, Chris Bertram posted this photograph on Crooked Timber under the title Brazil, shop at night. The shop is in Pirenópolis, a city in the state of Goiás. The sign in the center of the photograph reads: “Temos…
At Language Hat‘s, a link to and discussion of Alexander Blok in Dialèt Bresà, a translation or “transplantation” of Alexander Blok’s famous poem, Night, Street, Lamp, Drugstore, into a Gallo-Italic language, by Valentina Gosetti. The language is her native dialect,…
Charles Seife writes about Stephen Hawking’s association with George Mitchell, the father of the American shale revolution: In 2002, Hawking met the oil baron George P. Mitchell and began a decadelong relationship that ended only when the magnate died in…
About ten days ago, Language Hat wrote about the 1928 novel The Cynics by Anatoly Mariengof (alternatively transliterated as Marienhof): Given its low profile, I probably wouldn’t have read it if Joseph Brodsky hadn’t called it one of the most…
Here’s an extract from The Rainbow (1915) by D. H. Lawrence describing Will Brangwen’s infatuation with German religious art: These were the finest carvings, statues, he had ever seen. The book lay in his hands like a doorway. The world…
Adam Kirsch writes in the New Criterion: If millions of people think Rupi Kaur is a poet, comparing her to Wallace Stevens won’t convince them otherwise. I believe I understand correctly what Kirsch is saying here but I wish he…
Back in September 2018, Steve Bannon was interviewed by Zanny Minton Beddoes at the Open Future Festival in New York. The event was organized by The Economist. At that moment, the interviewer had served as its editor-in-chief for three and…
Tortoises, consisting of six long, unrhymed poems by D. H. Lawrence, was printed in 1921 in New York City (by Thomas Seltzer). In Baby Tortoise, Lawrence writes: Voiceless little bird,Resting your head half out of your wimpleIn the slow dignity…
By the way, I don’t even think Putin was offended when Biden called him a killer by replying “yes” to the interviewer’s question. (But then I don’t think Putin’s feelings are central to this story – Biden’s message is.) In…
President Biden stated the obvious in an ABC interview, as Bloomberg reports: After ABC News Chief Anchor George Stephanopoulos asked Biden if he believes Putin is “a killer,” Biden murmured agreement and said “I do,” without elaborating. By itself, killer…
Almost six years ago, I wrote about Herztier — the title of Herta Müller’s famous novel — morphing into The Land of Green Plums in English. While some Romance language translators strove to stick to the meaning the author had…