Reviews and News:
Why did Mikhail Bulgakov, a conservative medical doctor from Kiev, remain in the Soviet Union? Hope of literary fame. But he was unable “to produce – and at times even deduce – what was asked of him.”
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How Facebook ate the news: “The reality of the American media is that Google and Facebook own nearly the entire advertising market—which means that once-powerful American media brands like The New York Times, the Washington Post, the Boston Globe, and every other website you visit are more or less the equivalent of random bloggers who provide their content to Facebook for free. Does spending billions of dollars to produce a good that someone else gives away for free—without paying you a dime—sound like a good business to be in? Well, it’s not. That’s why the world’s premier publisher of Fake News is worth $350 billion—which is 100 times the value of the Times, media’s most uniquely valuable brand, and 350 billion times the value of Newsweek, once one of America’s most important newsweeklies, which changed hands in 2010 for $1.”
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“Santiago Ramón y Cajal, a Spanish histologist and anatomist known today as the father of modern neuroscience, was also a committed psychologist who believed psychoanalysis and Freudian dream theory were ‘collective lies.’” He began recording his dreams to prove Freud wrong. “Thirty years after the death of his daughter, [he] dreams that he is drowning off the coast of Spain, holding his little girl in his arms... ‘I take a walk by the bay (Santander?) and I fall into the water with one of my little daughters in my arms. I fight the waves, I am almost drowning, despite touching the seawall. The nightmare awakens me.’”
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We cannot allow a mine shaft gap.
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A history of the rock star.
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How American English conquered the world.
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Essay of the Day:
In The London Review of Books, Long Ling writes about banquets in Communist China. At one, a country official died after some heavy drinking. “We were well aware that when the new day broke, everyone would be an offender, their careers almost certainly ruined”:
“Banquets take up a large part of the life of Communist Party officials. Until the party launched the ‘Eight Provisions’ in 2013 – guidelines intended to cut back extravagant behaviour by officials – senior officials frequently attended two to three banquets on a single evening. Sometimes banquets would be held consecutively, leaving the host to struggle home after five or six hours of drinking, but more frequently two or more banquets would take place in adjacent rooms in a restaurant, with the host moving from one room to the other to toast visiting dignitaries. The restrictions on banquets came as a great relief. Most officials slowly reduced the number they attended to two or three a week. Everyone felt better, especially those who had developed fatty livers, high blood pressure and stomach problems.
“That afternoon as I left work I stopped to greet a couple of senior officials. We were all setting off home when a female official came in and sat down, accompanied by two men in their forties who were smiling politely and enthusiastically. The female director explained that these two young county officials had recently been promoted to bureau chiefs. This was their first week in their new positions, and since they were in the city to deliver a report, they had taken the opportunity to introduce themselves to the city leadership.
“My apartment was about five kilometres from my office. For the first six months I had an official car to take me home, but this privilege was withdrawn as a result of the reforms so I borrowed a bicycle. Compared to Beijing, the air quality was extremely good, and I looked forward to my cycle ride home. That day, as I was cycling, my phone vibrated several times in my pocket. Somewhat unwillingly, I stopped to answer it. It was the female director, inviting me to attend a simple dinner, as she put it. She said it was rare for the two men to come on a trip to the city and meet someone from the central government in Beijing, and that they would really like to talk to me. In any case, she said, it was dinnertime: all we had to do was find a small restaurant where we could chat and eat a few simple dishes. She was so insistent that I could only refuse her by repeating, ‘Really sorry but I’ve already got another arrangement this evening.’ I hung up and got back on my bike. Soon afterwards, a black Audi pulled up. The female director got out and stood in front of me as the two men wheeled my bike to the side of the road. I tried to turn down the invitation again, but she pretended to be angry, saying: “‘The other three city leaders have already arrived and are waiting for you. It doesn’t matter if we provincial people are beneath you, but you have to show some respect to the city leaders.’ In the end I got into the car.
“In the restaurant, I saw that the people I had recently said goodbye to were all present. I learned later that everyone else had felt they had to accept the director’s insistent invitation. The meal proceeded slowly, following the usual pattern. First the host proposed three toasts. Everyone at the table joined in. The cup used for toasting holds about 30ml of 50 per cent alcohol. Where you sit at the table depends on your seniority. The two new bureau chiefs sat at the lower positions. One after the other they stood up, walked round the table, and proposed a toast to each official, moving from the most senior to the lowest rank. Before each toast they said a few words of gratitude and greeting, and asked for help and guidance. One of the two was a tall, overweight dark-faced man, about my age, perhaps a bit younger. He praised me for looking young; we touched glasses and emptied them.
“After the nine guests had drunk two bottles of spirits – around as much as is usually consumed by halfway through a banquet – I noticed that the female director, who was sitting on my right, seemed distracted. I caught her looking towards the tall, overweight dark-faced man, who was slumped on his chair. Suddenly everyone got up and rushed to him. He seemed to have fainted.”
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Photo: Strawberry Moon over Manhattan
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Poem: Mark Cox, “Lemon Icing”
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