born valentine's day 1947
to italian-irish parents
& gone (overdose) June 29, 1975
many of us remember the day
age 28
9 albums then to his name
Sunday, August 7, 2011
Saturday, August 6, 2011
FOLK HERO ~
Billy Bragg
It's another great day in the world when a punk-rocker from the U.K. can survive the storm and grow up to be a workingclass hero, of a sort. Bragg, ever modest, admits he is a performer and how lucky we are at how well and where he dares to perform: on picket lines, in the tear-gas, worldwide touring from the busk-curb to the stage, on the radio, a terrific songwriter, and one who has taken up the mantle of likewise spreading the songs of Woody Guthrie, who sang the songs for us, when there was an us.
There still is.
Listen to Billy Bragg for an hour below and feel yourself feel worthy.
Billy Bragg
It's another great day in the world when a punk-rocker from the U.K. can survive the storm and grow up to be a workingclass hero, of a sort. Bragg, ever modest, admits he is a performer and how lucky we are at how well and where he dares to perform: on picket lines, in the tear-gas, worldwide touring from the busk-curb to the stage, on the radio, a terrific songwriter, and one who has taken up the mantle of likewise spreading the songs of Woody Guthrie, who sang the songs for us, when there was an us.
There still is.
Listen to Billy Bragg for an hour below and feel yourself feel worthy.
Friday, August 5, 2011
25 MILLION CARS / 35 YEARS ~
Shell Gets Tentative Approval to Drill in the Arctic
Shell Gets Tentative Approval to Drill in the Arctic
By JOHN M. BRODER and CLIFFORD KRAUSS
Published: August 4, 2011
WASHINGTON — The Department of the Interior on Thursday granted Royal Dutch Shell conditional approval of its plan to begin drilling exploratory wells in the Arctic Ocean next summer, a strong sign that the Obama administration is easing a regulatory clampdown on offshore oil drilling that it imposed after last year’s deadly accident in the Gulf of Mexico.
The move confirms a willingness by President Obama to approve expanded domestic oil and gas exploration in response to high gasoline prices and continuing high levels of unemployment. It comes as the issuing of drilling permits in the gulf is quickening, including the granting on Thursday of a permit for a Shell floating drill rig for a 4,000-foot-deep well. That means that that all five of its rigs there will be back to work after a long drilling halt.
The decision to tentatively approve Shell’s plan to drill four exploratory wells in the Beaufort Sea off the North Slope of Alaska represents a major step in the company’s efforts to exploit the vast oil and gas resources under the Arctic Ocean, although some hurdles remain.
The company has spent nearly $4 billion and more than five years trying to win the right to drill in the frigid waters, against the opposition of many environmental advocates and of Alaska natives who depend on the sea for their livelihoods.
Opponents say the harsh conditions there heighten the dangers of drilling and make cleaning up any potential spill vastly more complicated than in the comparatively benign waters of the gulf.
Administration officials cautioned that the company must win a number of secondary permits before it can begin punching holes in the seabed. The plan approved Thursday, considered the overarching one, contains detailed information on how the company would respond to any blowout and spill.
“We base our decisions regarding energy exploration and development in the Arctic on the best scientific information available,” said Michael R. Bromwich, director of the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement, which oversees offshore drilling. “We will closely review and monitor Shell’s proposed activities to ensure that any activities that take place under this plan will be conducted in a safe and environmentally responsible manner.”
Shell enthusiastically welcomed the decision. “We feel very good about it,” said Pete Slaiby, Shell’s vice president in Alaska. “It’s one of the road marks we wanted to see. It makes us very happy.”
But the announcement only partly smooths the rocky relations between the administration and the oil industry, with the president remaining committed to repealing $4 billion in annual oil company tax breaks. The administration has also been wary of encouraging the industry’s aggressive plans to drill in shale oil and gas fields across the country because of concerns about potential drinking water contamination.
“This strikes me as a shift back to the track that the administration was on prior to last year’s oil spill,” said Michael A. Levi, an energy and environment fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. “It seems the lesson that the administration took is that offshore drilling needs to be regulated better and done better, not that it shouldn’t be done at all.”
The plan is almost certain to face legal challenges.
“No drill bits are going to hit the Arctic seafloor until at least one and probably several courts have reviewed this plan,” said Brendan Cummings, senior counsel at the Center for Biological Diversity, which is already suing to stop drilling in the Chukchi Sea west of Alaska. “From the perspective of ocean drilling and climate, it’s hard to see a difference between this administration and the last one.”
Shell still needs to win approval of its drilling plan for the Chukchi Sea, which is west of the Beaufort Sea and more remote.
The company has proposed drilling four wells at a depth of approximately 160 feet of water about 20 miles from shore in the Beaufort Sea. The BP well that exploded in the gulf in April 2010 was at a depth of more than 5,000 feet and 40 miles from the Louisiana coast. The accident killed 11 workers and spilled nearly five million barrels of oil into the gulf.
Energy experts and industry executives said the move on Thursday reflected a partial warming of relations between the oil industry and Obama administration since the BP disaster.
“I don’t know if I would call them friends yet, but I look at this as a step in the right direction,” said Craig T. Castille, operations manager for deepwater projects at Stone Energy, who added that the permit process in the Gulf of Mexico remained slower than the industry would like.
Shell has spent years trying to convince federal regulators and several courts that it can drill safely in the Arctic, and every year one hurdle or another has stood in its way.
Shell has already invested nearly $4 billion on its 10-year offshore leases and preparations for exploration in the forbidding Chukchi and Beaufort Seas. Its current plan is to drill up to 10 exploratory wells in the two seas, potentially leading to production by the end of the decade.
Shell has been obliged over the years to tighten its spill response plan, especially since the BP accident at the Macondo well in the gulf. It is proposing to use two drill ships in the Arctic, each capable of drilling a relief well for the other; to put an extra set of shears on its blowout preventers; and to keep emergency capping systems near drill sites to capture any leaks.
The Alaskan Arctic may hold 27 billion barrels of oil, enough to fuel 25 million cars for 35 years. But environmentalists warn that a spill in the Arctic would be more catastrophic than the Gulf of Mexico accident was because the Alaskan waters are dark and inaccessible, and because they are vital breeding grounds for many aquatic species that are endangered or at risk.
Marilyn Heiman, director of the Pew Environment Group’s Arctic program, said that the region was the harshest area in the world in which to drill for oil, as well as a delicate habitat for a variety of sea mammals. The proposed well sites are subject to fierce winds and high seas in the fall and lie hundreds of miles from the nearest Coast Guard stations.
“Hard questions need to be asked about any oil company’s ability to mount a response to a major oil spill in hurricane-force winds, high seas, broken and shifting sea ice, subzero temperatures, and months of fog and darkness,” Ms. Heiman said in an e-mail from Alaska.
John M. Broder reported from Washington, and Clifford Krauss from Houston.
UPDATE:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/18/opinion/dont-allow-oil-drilling-off-alaskas-coast.html?hp
photo : moratoriumnow
n.y. times
Thursday, August 4, 2011
ROCKY ~
June Foray
Now 93 years young and still at work, June Foray played nearly every female on The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show, including Natasha Fatale and Nell Fenwick, as well as male lead character Rocket J. Squirrel (a.k.a. Rocky Squirrel).
June Foray
Now 93 years young and still at work, June Foray played nearly every female on The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show, including Natasha Fatale and Nell Fenwick, as well as male lead character Rocket J. Squirrel (a.k.a. Rocky Squirrel).
Foray and Stan Freberg are among the few surviving voice artists from the Golden Age of theatrical cartoons.
Wednesday, August 3, 2011
EARTH GOODBYE ~
from the Good Folk at Planet Drum ~
On the morning of Thursday, July 28th, Planet Drum Foundation's founder, Peter Berg, breathed his last. His life-partner, Judy, and daughter, Ocean, were with him. In many ways his death was too soon and unexpected. Now he has joined the electric pulse of the planet; he exists in the earth and sky, water and wind, and in our hearts and memories. Look for him in the glittering sparkles of sunlight, in the stars at night, and in all the beauty of Pachamama which he so loved.
Peter was a clear-seeing, passionate, visionary activist, analyzing all aspects of human species interactions and following through his ideas with action. Prior to his bioregional work, he participated in early civil rights action and theater; wrote, directed, produced, and acted in plays for the SF Mime Troupe; and formulated theory and actions with the Diggers in San Francisco, writing ecstatic prose/poetry manifestos.
Peter founded Planet Drum Foundation in 1973, and continued as its director for 38 years. The originator of the term "bioregion" and concept of "reinhabitation," Peter was a noted ecologist, author and speaker. According to Gary Snyder, Peter's work and Planet Drum's newsletter Raise the Stakes were "of immeasurable importance in defining and disseminating the ideas and possibilities of bioregionalism." Works include extraordinarily innovative revegetation and green city projects both locally and abroad, which directly manifest his vision of ecological and cultural sustainability. "Throughout his long career he stayed with living right in San Francisco and in word and deed was a proponent of a non-dualistic urban/hinterland view of bioregionalism. Peter was a unique and cranky figure," -- Gary Snyder.
Peter's books include: Envisioning Sustainability, Discovering Your Life-Place: A First Bioregional Workbook, A Green City Program for the San Francisco Bay Area and Beyond, Figures of Regulation: Guides for Re-Balancing Society with the Biosphere, and Reinhabiting a Separate Country: A Bioregional Anthology of Northern California. Articles and interviews with him have been published internationally, and he has done presentations and workshops at events, conferences, schools/universities, etc. worldwide.
No one will be able to replace his presence, but Planet Drum Foundation will continue. In his last months, Peter laid the groundwork to ensure that the Foundation would carry the bioregional legacy into the future. As part of this effort, Peter and his brother established the Eliot and Peter Berg Endowment Fund.
"We didn't play it for the Big Time. We didn't play it for the Small Time. We played it for the Real Time"-- Peter Berg 7/24/11
Planet Drum Foundation 415-285-6563
P.O. Box 31251
San Francisco, CA 94131
www.planetdrum.org
peter, so long
Peter Stephen Berg
October 1, 1937 -- July 28, 2011
October 1, 1937 -- July 28, 2011
from the Good Folk at Planet Drum ~
On the morning of Thursday, July 28th, Planet Drum Foundation's founder, Peter Berg, breathed his last. His life-partner, Judy, and daughter, Ocean, were with him. In many ways his death was too soon and unexpected. Now he has joined the electric pulse of the planet; he exists in the earth and sky, water and wind, and in our hearts and memories. Look for him in the glittering sparkles of sunlight, in the stars at night, and in all the beauty of Pachamama which he so loved.
Peter was a clear-seeing, passionate, visionary activist, analyzing all aspects of human species interactions and following through his ideas with action. Prior to his bioregional work, he participated in early civil rights action and theater; wrote, directed, produced, and acted in plays for the SF Mime Troupe; and formulated theory and actions with the Diggers in San Francisco, writing ecstatic prose/poetry manifestos.
Peter founded Planet Drum Foundation in 1973, and continued as its director for 38 years. The originator of the term "bioregion" and concept of "reinhabitation," Peter was a noted ecologist, author and speaker. According to Gary Snyder, Peter's work and Planet Drum's newsletter Raise the Stakes were "of immeasurable importance in defining and disseminating the ideas and possibilities of bioregionalism." Works include extraordinarily innovative revegetation and green city projects both locally and abroad, which directly manifest his vision of ecological and cultural sustainability. "Throughout his long career he stayed with living right in San Francisco and in word and deed was a proponent of a non-dualistic urban/hinterland view of bioregionalism. Peter was a unique and cranky figure," -- Gary Snyder.
Peter's books include: Envisioning Sustainability, Discovering Your Life-Place: A First Bioregional Workbook, A Green City Program for the San Francisco Bay Area and Beyond, Figures of Regulation: Guides for Re-Balancing Society with the Biosphere, and Reinhabiting a Separate Country: A Bioregional Anthology of Northern California. Articles and interviews with him have been published internationally, and he has done presentations and workshops at events, conferences, schools/universities, etc. worldwide.
No one will be able to replace his presence, but Planet Drum Foundation will continue. In his last months, Peter laid the groundwork to ensure that the Foundation would carry the bioregional legacy into the future. As part of this effort, Peter and his brother established the Eliot and Peter Berg Endowment Fund.
"We didn't play it for the Big Time. We didn't play it for the Small Time. We played it for the Real Time"-- Peter Berg 7/24/11
mail@planetdrum.org
Planet Drum Foundation 415-285-6563
P.O. Box 31251
San Francisco, CA 94131
www.planetdrum.org
peter, so long
Tuesday, August 2, 2011
SO LONG ~
(its been good to know you)
great books
(its been good to know you)
Albert Saijo
Albert Fairchild Saijo, 85, of Volcano, died June 2, 2011 at his residence. Born Feb. 4, 1926, in Los Angeles, he was a member of the 100th Battalion, 442 Regimental Combat Team, serving in Italy; a designer, carpenter and woodworker; a poet whose book, "Outspeaks -- a Rhapsody," won the National Small Press Award for Poetry in 1998; and his work is mentioned in the "Norton Anthology of Modern Contemporary American Poetry" and numerous other anthologies.
Private services will be held.
He is survived by wife, Laura Saijo, of Hilo; sister, Hisayo Saijo, of Hilo; four stepchildren; one niece; one nephew.
Arrangements by Homelani Memorial Park and Crematory.
from West Hawaii Today
great books
GOOD MORNING ~
The War on You
Submitted by Michael Collins on Sat, 07/30/2011 - 22:52
Have no doubt: those in the upper ranges of the top 1% of wealth in this country (aka The Money Party) want to kick you to the curb.
They want to reduce your social security and make you go broke paying for medical care.
They want to lower your wages and trash your retirement.
They ignore the clear facts that we've had negative job growth since 2000 and the situation is just getting worse.
They want to ship jobs, factories, and entire businesses overseas and give companies that do that a big fat tax credit for doing so.
They've been given so much for nothing for so long. Now, they're ready to take it all. It's their time!
The most recent assault is the ridiculous debate about raising the debt ceiling. There should be no debate. Failing to raise the ceiling right now means deliberate default on debts, refusing to pay bills the government can pay. It's called fraud.
The pressing need to fix the budget is a separate issue. Reduced spending and increased revenues should come through broad public involvement and open debate. It mandates that the rulers behave like adults.
But this crisis isn't about putting together a real budget. It's about creating a budget that punishes you, your family, and friends. It's about taking your attention away from your vital interests to maximize income and control by The Money Party.
Were the leaders on either side of the debate serious, the Bush era tax cuts would be rescinded. These cuts on the top 1% were temporary. Guess what? Congress lied. When the temporary tax breaks ran out a few months ago, they were revived and renewed just when we had the greatest need for revenues.
The Money Party won't give up its wars either. Iraq and Afghanistan have added $4 trillion to the national debt of $14 trillion. Why not stop the wars? How hard is that to figure that out?
Getting rid of Bush tax cuts for the super-rich, ending the wars, and moving out of the recession/depression would be huge steps toward balancing the budget. But that won't happen with this Congress and this president. Why? That would cost the financial elite money for taxes and lost income for all those weapons they sell to support the wars.
The Attack on You Began in Earnest Just Years Ago
Congress repealed Depression era banking regulation that kept your banks from risky investments in 1999.
Congress enacted legislation in 2000 that allowed extremely risky investments in real estate and other derivatives, illegal for nearly a century.
In 2001, the big banks and Wall Street celebrated its newly purchased freedoms with a decade-long binge of fraud and risky investments. Like a greedy con artist, they took everything they could from people here and around the world until there was no more to take. We have now hit the wall thanks to them.
The outrageous expenses of wars based on lies caught up with us and shoved the deficit to new heights. The tax cuts for the top 1% took away revenues needed to balance the budget.
The money they steal from the Social Security surplus is no longer enough. They want to keep the tax in place for us and take an even bigger rake-off.
This crisis is manufactured by the ongoing greed of The Money Party. It is funded by the US Treasury. You pay for it, all of it.
End
This article may be reproduced with attribution of authorship and a link to the article.
Monday, August 1, 2011
WOODY ~
One of our cats was named after Woodrow Wilson Guthrie who was named after someone else.
A terrific American boy who grew up in Okemah, Oklahoma amidst great tragedy and flight — he took to the road early, a high school dropout and avid reader, penning one of the great memoirs of American literature Bound for Glory.
He also was a columnist for The Daily Worker, hobo, radio performer, husband of three and father of eight.
He kept to a drawing pad all his life and was one of the towering songwriters of the modern era.
There was barely a subject he didn't touch or a folksinger he hasn't influenced.
(July 14, 1912~October 3, 1967)
Steven Brower & Nora Guthrie (Rizzoli 2005)
www.rizzoliusa.com
One of our cats was named after Woodrow Wilson Guthrie who was named after someone else.
A terrific American boy who grew up in Okemah, Oklahoma amidst great tragedy and flight — he took to the road early, a high school dropout and avid reader, penning one of the great memoirs of American literature Bound for Glory.
He also was a columnist for The Daily Worker, hobo, radio performer, husband of three and father of eight.
He kept to a drawing pad all his life and was one of the towering songwriters of the modern era.
There was barely a subject he didn't touch or a folksinger he hasn't influenced.
(July 14, 1912~October 3, 1967)
(a fine fellow and book)
Steven Brower & Nora Guthrie (Rizzoli 2005)
www.rizzoliusa.com
Sunday, July 31, 2011
WITH ME ~
nodepression.com
Jimmy Dale Gilmore
Jimmy Dale Gilmore is a Taurus born in the Panhandle of Texas in 1945 (Amarillo) and raised in Lubbock. Same neighborhood as Roy Orbison and Buddy Holly (with Alabaman Hank Williams thrown in for good measure) and one could say Gilmore is their grandchild. Give a listen to his haunting tenor voice. When not appearing solo, or with his son Colin, or with The Flatlanders (Joe Ely and Butch Hancock) which has been a world all its own with these three musicians since 1972, Gilmore lives in Austin. He appeared in the bowling alley scene of the Coen brothers film The Big Lebowski as the sweet pacifist soul "Smoky."
nodepression.com
Wednesday, July 27, 2011
1930 ~ 1950
Ludwig Wittgenstein
It is a great temptation to try to make the spirit explicit.
A confession has to be a part of your new life.
If you use a trick in logic, whom can you be tricking other than yourself?
In my artistic activities I really have nothing but good manners.
The way to solve the problem you see in life is to live in a way that will make
what is problematic disappear.
The fact that life is problematic shows that the shape of your life does not fit
into life's mould. So you must change the way you live and, once your life
does fit into the mould, what is problematic will disappear.
But don't we have the feeling that someone who sees no problem in life is
blind to something important, even to the most important thing of all? Don't I
feel like saying that a man like that is just living aimlessly — blindly, like a
mole, and that if only he could see, he would see the problem?
Or shouldn't I say rather: a man who lives rightly won't experience the
problem as sorrow, so for him it will not be a problem, but a joy rather; in
other words for him it will be a bright halo round his life, not a dubious
background.
If I am thinking about a topic just for myself and not with a view to writing a
book, I jump about all round it; that is the only way of thinking that comes
naturally to me. Forcing my thoughts into an ordered sequence is a torment
for me. Is it even worth attempting now?
I squander an unspeakable amount of effort making an arrangement of my
thoughts which may have no value at all.
The origin and the primitive form of language game is a reaction; only
from this can more complicated forms develop.
Language — I want to say — is refinement, 'in the beginning was the deed'.
Nobody can truthfully say of himself that he is filth. Because if I do say it, though it
can be true in a sense, this is not a truth by which I myself can be penetrated:
otherwise I should either have to go mad or change myself.
You cannot write anything about yourself that is more truthful than you
yourself are. That is the difference between writing about yourself and
writing about external objects. You write about yourself from your own
height. You don't stand on sti;ts or on a ladder but on your bare feet.
Nothing is so difficult as not deceiving oneself.
In philosophy the winner of the race is the one who can run most slowly. Or:
the one who gets there last.
No one can speak the truth; if he has still not mastered himself. He cannot speak
it; — but not because he is not clever enough yet.
The truth can be spoken only by someone who is already at home in it; not
by someone who still lives in falsehood and reaches out from falsehood
towards truth on just one occasion.
One of the most important methods I use is to imagine a historical
development for our ideas different from what actually occurred. If we do this
we see the problem from a completely new angle.
Aim at being loved without being admired.
Don't take the example of others as your guide, but nature!
A philosopher is a man who has to cure many intellectual diseases in himself
before he can arrive at the notions of common sense.
What's ragged should be left ragged.
When I came home I expected a surprise and there was no surprise for me,
so, of course, I was surprised.
The thought working its way towards the light.
Madness need not be regarded as an illness. Why shouldn't it be seen as a
sudden — more or less sudden — change of character?
Wisdom is cold and to that extent stupid. (Faith on the other hand is a
passion.) It might also be said: Wisdom merely conceals life from you.
(Wisdom is like cold grey ash, covering up the glowing embers.)
Just as I cannot write verse, so too my ability to write prose extends only so far,
and no farther. There is quite definite limit to the prose I can write and I can
no more overstep that than I can write a poem. This is the nature of my
equipment; and it is the only equipment I have. It's as though someone were
to say: In this game I can only attain such and such a degree of perfection, I can't
go beyond it.
Even the most refined taste has nothing to do with creative power.
When you are philosophizing you have to descend into primeval chaos and
feel at home there.
Where others go ahead, I stay in one place.
Ambition is the death of thought.
One age misunderstands another; and a petty age misunderstands all the others
in its own nasty way.
LUDWIG WITTGENSTEIN
Culture and Value
translated by Peter Winch
(Chicago)
Ludwig Wittgenstein
It is a great temptation to try to make the spirit explicit.
A confession has to be a part of your new life.
If you use a trick in logic, whom can you be tricking other than yourself?
In my artistic activities I really have nothing but good manners.
The way to solve the problem you see in life is to live in a way that will make
what is problematic disappear.
The fact that life is problematic shows that the shape of your life does not fit
into life's mould. So you must change the way you live and, once your life
does fit into the mould, what is problematic will disappear.
But don't we have the feeling that someone who sees no problem in life is
blind to something important, even to the most important thing of all? Don't I
feel like saying that a man like that is just living aimlessly — blindly, like a
mole, and that if only he could see, he would see the problem?
Or shouldn't I say rather: a man who lives rightly won't experience the
problem as sorrow, so for him it will not be a problem, but a joy rather; in
other words for him it will be a bright halo round his life, not a dubious
background.
If I am thinking about a topic just for myself and not with a view to writing a
book, I jump about all round it; that is the only way of thinking that comes
naturally to me. Forcing my thoughts into an ordered sequence is a torment
for me. Is it even worth attempting now?
I squander an unspeakable amount of effort making an arrangement of my
thoughts which may have no value at all.
The origin and the primitive form of language game is a reaction; only
from this can more complicated forms develop.
Language — I want to say — is refinement, 'in the beginning was the deed'.
Nobody can truthfully say of himself that he is filth. Because if I do say it, though it
can be true in a sense, this is not a truth by which I myself can be penetrated:
otherwise I should either have to go mad or change myself.
You cannot write anything about yourself that is more truthful than you
yourself are. That is the difference between writing about yourself and
writing about external objects. You write about yourself from your own
height. You don't stand on sti;ts or on a ladder but on your bare feet.
Nothing is so difficult as not deceiving oneself.
In philosophy the winner of the race is the one who can run most slowly. Or:
the one who gets there last.
No one can speak the truth; if he has still not mastered himself. He cannot speak
it; — but not because he is not clever enough yet.
The truth can be spoken only by someone who is already at home in it; not
by someone who still lives in falsehood and reaches out from falsehood
towards truth on just one occasion.
One of the most important methods I use is to imagine a historical
development for our ideas different from what actually occurred. If we do this
we see the problem from a completely new angle.
Aim at being loved without being admired.
Don't take the example of others as your guide, but nature!
A philosopher is a man who has to cure many intellectual diseases in himself
before he can arrive at the notions of common sense.
What's ragged should be left ragged.
When I came home I expected a surprise and there was no surprise for me,
so, of course, I was surprised.
The thought working its way towards the light.
Madness need not be regarded as an illness. Why shouldn't it be seen as a
sudden — more or less sudden — change of character?
Wisdom is cold and to that extent stupid. (Faith on the other hand is a
passion.) It might also be said: Wisdom merely conceals life from you.
(Wisdom is like cold grey ash, covering up the glowing embers.)
Just as I cannot write verse, so too my ability to write prose extends only so far,
and no farther. There is quite definite limit to the prose I can write and I can
no more overstep that than I can write a poem. This is the nature of my
equipment; and it is the only equipment I have. It's as though someone were
to say: In this game I can only attain such and such a degree of perfection, I can't
go beyond it.
Even the most refined taste has nothing to do with creative power.
When you are philosophizing you have to descend into primeval chaos and
feel at home there.
Where others go ahead, I stay in one place.
Ambition is the death of thought.
One age misunderstands another; and a petty age misunderstands all the others
in its own nasty way.
LUDWIG WITTGENSTEIN
Culture and Value
translated by Peter Winch
(Chicago)
Monday, July 25, 2011
Sunday, July 24, 2011
Saturday, July 23, 2011
READERS ~
father & son photographs over the years taken by the quiet hand of the household
photos above © susan arnold
henry miller
On the whole, I must say, I have found better men — better in every sense of the word — among the uncultured than among the cultured ones of the world. The most monstrous crimes against humanity are being committed every day by those who have had all the advantages of learning. By making people more literate, more book conscious, we can hardly say that we are thereby making better citizens of them.
A book is no better than, and usually not as good as a rock, a tree, a creature of the wild, a wisp of cloud, a wave, or a shadow on the wall. We who make books are indebted not to books but to the things which impel men to write books: earth, air, fire and water. If there were not a common source from which author and reader alike draw, there would be no books. Would it be such a calamity, a world without books? Could we not still communicate our joys, our discoveries, by word of mouth? Falling back on the tongue, there would be no need to destroy whole forests, mar the landscape, befoul the air, or dull the minds and bodies of those who toil to provide us with mental and spiritual fodder in the form of books.
— Henry Miller
from - "To Read or Not To Read"
Stand Still Like the Hummingbird
New Directions, 1962
A book is no better than, and usually not as good as a rock, a tree, a creature of the wild, a wisp of cloud, a wave, or a shadow on the wall. We who make books are indebted not to books but to the things which impel men to write books: earth, air, fire and water. If there were not a common source from which author and reader alike draw, there would be no books. Would it be such a calamity, a world without books? Could we not still communicate our joys, our discoveries, by word of mouth? Falling back on the tongue, there would be no need to destroy whole forests, mar the landscape, befoul the air, or dull the minds and bodies of those who toil to provide us with mental and spiritual fodder in the form of books.
— Henry Miller
from - "To Read or Not To Read"
Stand Still Like the Hummingbird
New Directions, 1962
father & son photographs over the years taken by the quiet hand of the household
photos above © susan arnold
henry miller
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