The oath

I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands, one Nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

(Should be rendered by standing at attention facing the flag with the right hand over the heart. When not in uniform men should remove any non-religious headdress with their right hand and hold it at the left shoulder, the hand being over the heart. Persons in uniform should remain silent, face the flag, and render the military salute.)

G-Force: Berlusconi e a Rainha

A cena foi mais ou menos a seguinte: Berlusconi grosseirão gritando "Mister Obama" no fim da foto grupal com a Rainha da Inglaterra, Obama respondendo, educadamente (Mister Berlusconi...) e a Rainha passando pito no italiano: "What it is it?!".

G-force 2009

Terminou a reunião dos líderes do mundo.
Lula, Obama e Gordon Brown fizeram as pazes
com Hu Jintao e Medvedev, e decidiram ressuscitar
o FUNDO MONETÁRIO INTERNACIONAL.

Isso me lembra De Volta para o Futuro. Voltamos
aos anos 80. Vou deixar o cabelo virar mulet
e tirar a poeira do meu terno de ombreiras.
Parecia a liga da justiça.

Do Economist:

Financial markets rallied after the G20 news, though this was as much because of sprigs of good economic news emerging, as the harmony that was displayed. This was despite disappointment that the European Central Bank had cut its main interest rate on Thursday, by just a quarter of a percentage point, to 1.25%. American unemployment figures on April 3rd , which could be shocking, may puncture some of that optimism, and should temper any temptation among G20 leaders to claim success. Their efforts to reflate the world economy may have avoided a 1930s-style Depression so far. But rising joblessness and years of pain may lie ahead as banks, businesses and households in the West continue to struggle to pay down their debts.

The Times They Are A-Changin', by Bob Dylan

Come gather 'round people
Wherever you roam
And admit that the waters
Around you have grown
And accept it that soon
You'll be drenched to the bone.
If your time to you
Is worth savin'
Then you better start swimmin'
Or you'll sink like a stone
For the times they are a-changin'.

Come writers and critics
Who prophesize with your pen
And keep your eyes wide
The chance won't come again
And don't speak too soon
For the wheel's still in spin
And there's no tellin' who
That it's namin'.
For the loser now
Will be later to win
For the times they are a-changin'.

Come senators, congressmen
Please heed the call
Don't stand in the doorway
Don't block up the hall
For he that gets hurt
Will be he who has stalled
There's a battle outside
And it is ragin'.
It'll soon shake your windows
And rattle your walls
For the times they are a-changin'.

Come mothers and fathers
Throughout the land
And don't criticize
What you can't understand
Your sons and your daughters
Are beyond your command
Your old road is
Rapidly agin'.
Please get out of the new one
If you can't lend your hand
For the times they are a-changin'.

The line it is drawn
The curse it is cast
The slow one now
Will later be fast
As the present now
Will later be past
The order is
Rapidly fadin'.
And the first one now
Will later be last
For the times they are a-changin'.

Copyright ©1963; renewed 1991 Special Rider Music

Porgy and Bess, Gershwin e Billie Holiday: you go to my head

Selo inspirado na ópera-jazz de 1935 "Porgy and Bess", the George Gershwin, sobre a vida nas favelas de Charleston, na Carolina do Norte. Ouça aqui a ária Summertime em versão de 1937 na voz de Billie Holiday.

livros e leitores no Brasil

Antes de se discutir as mazelas da literatura no Brasil, é preciso admitir a cruel realidade: mais de 50% da população adulta não têm estudos ou estudou no máximo sete anos. Apenas 4% estudaram 15 anos ou mais, ou 5.524.947, segundo o IBGE.

Apesar das dimensões atuais e da expansão do sistema educacional observada nas últimas três décadas, 1,2 milhão de crianças e adolescentes (3,95% da população de 7a 14 anos) ainda estavam fora da escola em 2000, e mais de 35,8 milhões de jovens e adultos (30% da população com 15 anos ou mais) possuíam menos de 4 anos de estudos1, encontrando-se possivelmente em situação de analfabetismo funcional.

Em 2006, foram publicados cerca de 40.000 títulos, totalizando mais de 350 milhões de livros por ano. É livro pra caramba.

Entretanto, pesquisadores da UFRJ1, apontando inúmeros problemas no setor, além do alto custo do livro no Brasil, citam queda de 51% nas aquisições do governo, no período de 1995 a 2004. Segundo dados da pesquisa, o governo compra menos e a preços menores: em 1995, comprou 130 milhões de livros, num total de R$ 1.261.000,00; em 2004, 135 milhões de livros e gastou 529.000,00. Em 1995, pagou R$ 9,70 o exemplar, em 2004, R$ 3,92.

Pode parecer muito, mas segundo a clássica pesquisa "Retrato do leitor do Brasil", de 2001, as "informações parecem configurar um ambiente em que a leitura não é socialmente valorizada, em que o livro não tem um lugar assegurado".

Os dados da pesquisa confirmam a necessária e estreita relação entre leitura e educação e, objetivamente, com a escola, primeira encarregada da alfabetização e do letramento. Esse vínculo natural torna-se imperativo num país com as desigualdades sociais nos níveis existentes em nosso país, onde a família não exerce o papel de primeira e mais importante definidora do valor da leitura.(SIC)


Mas há um dado interessante nessa pesquisa, também amparada no censo do IBGE em 2000. Cerca de 60 milhões (35%) declaram gostar de ler em seu tempo livre. Uns 38 milhões dizem fazer isso com freqüência. Levando-se em conta que a pesquisa envolve não apenas os adultos mas também os alunos da rede de ensino público, surge a imagem de um país com muitos jovens leitores, subsidiados pelo governo, que compra mais de 130 milhões de livros por ano. De vez em quando circula um mito de que só existem 30.000 leitores no Brasil ou coisa parecida. Existem muitos leitores por aí. O livro é que é caro, provavelmente por causa das pequenas tiragens. O problema não é ganância dos empresários do setor, pelo contrário, é até um pouco de covardia na hora de quebrar os dogmas do que é um livro no Brasil - formato, preço, logística de produção local em vez de centralizada. A distribuição é cara devido ao péssimo estado da infra-estrutura brasileira de transportes, portanto os buracos na estrada e o preço do óleo diesel comem boa parte do custo de um livro chegar a Salvador, por exemplo. Some a isso a concentração da indústria gráfica e da imprensa no Sudeste.

Precisa-se de uma política pública de incentivo à leitura, que envolva bibliotecas e escolas. A União e os governos estaduais têm que admitir que a realidade do gasto anual por aluno no sistema não corresponde ao que deveria ser. Boa educação cria leitores. Em vez de discutir os méritos da auto-promoção ou do uso da internet como veículo de divulgação da literatura, a intelectualidade brasileira deveria estar conduzindo debates muito mais profundos sobre os problemas do país e os meios de resolvê-los. É muita alienação, de ambos os lados. Fica configurado o mesmo vaidoso ciclo de embates entre as gerações literárias, um clima de ataques, cada um cumprindo seu respectivo papel na ordem das coisas - em eterno loop modernista, mas falta a desordem e o impulso de reagir dos pioneiros.

Boca do inferno (ou fogo que nunca apaga)

Do flog de John H. Bradley



In the heart of the Karakum desert of Turkmenistan the Darvaza Gas Crater or The Burning Gates give off a glow that can be seen from miles away during the dark night. The large crater is a result of a Soviet gas exploration accident in the 1950’s. It was created when a Soviet drilling rig was drilling for natural gas fell into an underground cavern resulting in a crater which today measures roughly 60 meters in diameter and 20 meters deep. The huge crater was set alight shortly after being discovered and has been burning ever sinse. The smell of burning sulfur can be detected from a distance and becomes quite strong as you near the hot edge of the crater.

Judicandus homo reus and Air (let's get classical)

Aria "Lacrimosa", do "Requiem" de Mozart.



"Air", de Bach
(do youtube)

The "Air on the G String" is an adaptation by August Wilhelmj of Johann Sebastian Bach's "Air". The air is usually played slowly and freely, and features an intertwining harmony and melody.

The original piece is part of Bach's Orchestral Suite No. 3 in D major, BWV 1068, written for his patron Prince Leopold sometime between the years 1717 and 1723.

The title comes from violinist Wilhelmj's late 19th century arrangement of the piece for violin and piano. By transposing the key of the piece from its original D major to C major, Wilhelmj was able to play the piece on only one string of his violin, the G string.

Antidote for alienation

“Uncle Tom’s Children”: fast paced and powerful writing to help you with all the soul-searching going around

Saying you’re too tired to have a conscience is not a good excuse for avoiding “Uncle Tom’s Children”, the book that shot Richard Wright to fame in 1940. Is understandable if you say you don’t like violence or hate, but be aware: sometimes, people can manage to transmute these things into something beautiful and mind opening.

Wright was critical of this power after the book’s success, and tried to write something that would be truly provocative for its time. He complained about rich banker’s daughters reading it and relating to its suffering, and perhaps he was being too ambitious, but we can never condemn too much of the right kind of ambition in a writer: “Native Son”, his attempt at transgressive art, he even questioned the guilt of enlightened bourgeoisie and its true responsibility on oppression. He failed miserably, since the novel, his first, allowed him to become one of the most successful black writers of his era.

Is curious how the most solitary of all pursuits, at the same time, takes you somewhere you had never been, to meet a whole thicket of new people. Tonight, for it took me about six hours to crack Wright’s collection of five short stories, I met a southern pastor and politician, saw him wade into a swamp intimidation and social unrest; a lonely, tragic wife; a black boy who escapes miraculously and another who doesn’t; and many more so forth.

Wright is a fast guy with an aggressive sense of dialogue and scenes that will materialize easily in your imagination. He also bends the rules sometimes, as when he piles too many coincidences in the story of a certain Mr. Mann trying to save his family during a flood in New Orleans. Or when he drifts into a stream of consciousness by the cheating wife that barely helps us feel like the one struggling with an overwhelming baby and isolated emptiness. These are brilliant stories with minor flaws that only people who read too much will feel bothered about. I can’t guarantee you won’t be angered by Wright’s ideological and deterministic sprees, though.

But he will surely crack open your head with the story of Dan Taylor, a southern pastor divided between the politics of being powerful in a Dixie town during the Great Depression, and the needs of his hungry people. He has heat coming on from all sides: the powerful whites want him to calm the insurgency, first using political tactics and even torturing him later on to make their point, while the communists say that if the demonstration is too thin and fails to achieve its goal it will be the reverend’s fault.

Meanwhile, things are getting testy at the congregation, where the spiritual sub-leaders want Taylor to take responsibility for leadership and one of them is even challenging his power. In the end, the pastor finds the solution after trying to explain his son what has happened and the true meaning of it. He must teach him right, thinks Taylor. Then he summons up a brilliant lesson about religion and being powerful: the people. “Even the Reds cant do nothing ef yuh lose yo people”, says the pastor in delightful vernacular.

Read it, digest it, keep it or give it to someone else who you think might really like it. But don’t sit around not being aware of what has happened and share an hour of two with someone else’s creation. And think. That’s what it’s all about.

The complete stories, by Zora Neale Hurston (New York, HarperPerennial, 2008)

To read the edition of the complete short stories of Zora Neale Hurston (1891 – 1860) in chronological order is perhaps one the most enlightening aspects of this collection, because it gives us the opportunity to follow her evolution as a writer through the span of almost 40 years. She starts with stories that overflow with the lightness of fairy-tale but matures into the brutal social fabric of family and community life, artfully exercising a vernacular vocabulary that gives her work historical significance and a unique flavor.

The published stories also have a striking difference to the unpublished ones in terms of toning down the ebullient sexuality of her prose. There are some structurally complex stories, like “Spunk” and “The six-gilded bit” that evoke some of the main themes in Zora’s imaginary: love, justice and redemption for the oppressed. The small-town intrigues of “The Eatonville Anthology” reminded me of “Winnesburg, Ohio” (1919), by Sherwood Anderson, but expressed in a way that was particular to the culture from where it sprung. “High John the Conquer” is a symbol of peaceful resistance and a fantastical renovation of old slave myths – the slaves sing to make the work lighter but also to avoid bowing to the master and to maintain an integrity of the self.

The mystical church described in “Mother Catherine”, with its collage of religions and traditions, is a place of laughter and well-being that faithfully depicts the ambient one can find either in the Cuban Santeria or the Brazilian Camdomblé, where the spiritual leader is someone who is closer to the faithful and religious experience can be a naturally joyous endeavor. The structure that Hurston chose to frame the short story is also very elegant, bringing us into this world by bits and images. Only after she has immersed us in the sacred grounds is that she briefly introduces herself as the narrator. I thought that was an absolutely organic way of starting such a vivid portrait.

There’s only so much that someone can write about these short stories with too little time, but it has to be noted that some of the unpublished work in this collection do Ms. Hurston more justice as documents than literary works, being in a very incipient state – I’m talking about the last two stories, “The seventh veil” and “The woman in gaul”. They seemed more like fragments of a future romance than complete stories in themselves. Overall, the book presents a strong sense of Hurton’s modernistic experimentations and of her own fictional universe, while allowing us to glimpse her evolution as an artist and researcher.

Remédio anti-alienação: The Shock Doctrine

The Prairie

Trying to advance the romanticism of Walter Scott, James Fenimore Cooper brings forth much deeper meaning to the traditional capture and pursuit novel. He shows the
end of America's youth, the inevitable march of progress and ecological disaster. Some of his characters and settings (like the rock in the middle of the prairie) evoke donzel in distress umbilical structures, but he is aiming for a little more.
But his reference is either theater of painting, and explores this when describing a painted shirt worn by the indian. The long, implausibe dialogs are part of the game.

African-american modern poetry

(do site de James A. Emanuel)

Reared in the “Wild West” of the USA; earned Columbia University doctorate; had professorships in New York, France, and Poland; published 345-plus poems (in 13 individual books, 145 or more anthologies, and many journals); 32 literary essays; a now-classic anthology; an autobiography; a pio­neer book on Langston Hughes; book reviews (some in The New York Times) and a CD (poetry with saxophone accompaniment).

In 1992, created a new literary genre, jazz-and-blues haiku, later read often, with musical background, in Europe and Africa (efforts basing the Sidney Bechet Creative Award given him in 1996). During 1995-2000, placed at least 6,000 documents in his The James A. Emanuel Papers in The Library of Congress, Manuscript Division, Washington, D.C

Experience

"To all things great and glorious":
his wine moved to his lips.
"There are so few," she answered;
her brim touched his fingertips.

They stared the fire into an ash;
their glasses bent their hands
while they, enchanted wistfully,
re-travelled many lands.

Sonnet for a Writer

Far rather would I search my chaff for grain
And cease at last with hunger in my soul,
Than suck the polished wheat another brain
Refurbished till it shone, by art's control.
To stray across my own mind's half-hewn stone
And chisel in the dark, in hopes to cast
A fragment of our common self, my own,
Excels the mimicry of sages past.
Go forth, my soul, in painful, lonely flight,
Even if no higher than the earthbound tree,
And feel suffusion with more glorious light,
Nor envy eagles their proud brilliancy.
Far better to create one living line
Than learn a hundred sunk in fame's recline.

Brock family

Um homem que dirigia uma picape rumo ao Capitólio, onde fica o Congresso dos Estados Unidos, foi preso ontem na entrada do complexo. O homem, que dizia ter uma encomenda para o presidente Barack Obama, foi detido com um rifle em seu veículo, segundo a polícia. Ele foi identificado pelos policiais como Alfred Brock, de 64 anos, de Winnfield, Louisiana.

Brock foi acusado por possuir uma arma de fogo não registrada e por posse de munição não registrada, segundo a sargento Kimberly Schneider, porta-voz da polícia do Capitólio. O suspeito não fez nenhuma ameaça explícita ao presidente, acrescentou Schneider. A polícia fechou por um breve período a entrada norte do Capitólio, enquanto a picape era inspecionada. Não foi encontrado nenhum outro material perigoso e o veículo foi guinchado.

(Agencia Estado, 11/02/2009)

"Black Boy", by Richard Wright (New York, Harper Perennial)

Wright ends "Southern Night", the first part of "Black Boy" with his dreamed escape from the brutal south. "This was the culture from which I sprang", he states. He ends his profound narrative of growing up in a society of ignorance and hate with a hopeful note, albeit a naïve one. On reaching the north, Wright feels the onset of a "second childhood". Adulthood increased his responsibilities to his family, but also granted him a degree of freedom. Nonetheless, he finds again the same mechanisms of oppression when working on the hospital, after the Great Depression had set in. When he discovers the brotherhood of the John Reed club and its communist agitators, Wright is once again embraced by a family, but this time it's also a political structure and ideological machine. Always a spirited and free-thinking man, Wright clashes with the paranoid leaders and is again cast away from his family. Not surprisingly, he is antagonized by the white secretary of the party's leader on the last scene of "The Horror and the Glory": he has encountered the same system of hate and exclusion from which he fled. But this time, the older Wright is imbued with a strong sense of purpose. He has understood the true "hunger" of America, has seen the first seeds of rebellion against materialism. His denouncement of the persecutory ways of communists is ahead of its time and certainly a factor that influenced publication of only the first part, a neatly fitting modern story of slavery, suffering and self-determination. The second part gives the whole book a different, more profound meaning, increasing the layers of his struggle and bringing forth the true universality of life's tragedy that permeates the mood of "Black Boy",
an "inexpressibly" sense of true humanity, of hunger for life. Wright receives tempting offers from the party leaders in exchange for his loyalty, but he already has discovered his true hunger, that is to "hurl words into the darkness". The formation is complete – "Black Boy" can be read not only as poignant tale of freedom from slavery and mental servitude, but also as a writer's beautiful bildugsroman, as proposed by Mikhail Bakhtin: "the dynamical unity of a character's image".