It matters muchly! Bigly!
From The Comma Queen (which I had previously thought was my title) and the copy chief of Random House, an important conversation. Also, an article about the latter’s new book. And if that weren’t enough excitement, a piece about the birth of the semicolon (something I could have used in this post, but which I decided would have been too cute by half).
And it truly was one. I was living in Paris at the time, and was still young and foolish enough to think there was something redeemable about communism. Shortly after the fall of the Berlin Wall I travelled through Eastern Europe and began to see how terribly misguided I had been. I also began to see how lucky we all were that the revolution had unfolded peacefully.
Some think that the momentous change that began in 1989 was inevitable. They would do well to remember that in June of the same year, China’s elderly rulers had deployed tanks to crush (literally) the peaceful freedom movement in Tiananmen Square. And there were plenty of communist leaders urging a “Chinese solution” for the demonstrations of 1989. In fact, at the Soviet command post just south of Berlin (which had served as command center for the German Army during World War II, and which had been seized from Hitler decades earlier), Red Army marshals were awaiting orders to march in and save the empire by whatever means necessary.
No one can know what would have happened if more conservative forces within the Kremlin had prevailed. Most likely, there would have been widespread disorder and violence across much of the region, which would have put the West under substantial pressure to intervene. Open war would have been a distinct possibility. After all, large empires throughout history have generally gone out with a bang. If anything, the Soviet experience was an exception.
Read the rest of this analysis from Carl Bildt, Sweden’s former Foreign Minister and Prime Minister.
People: I have taken up knitting. I am a beginner, but I have already made a scarf and am starting up another one in which I will go wild and not only knit, but purl, too! I wanted a hobby that didn’t involve starting at a screen. Excellent knitters tell me that once you get good enough you can – and do – knit while staring at screens (as in the TV). But I’m not there yet.
Therefore, I was somewhat horrified to learn what a nightmare community the knitters can be. Apparently, insufficently “woke” knitters need not apply. Absolute madness. Read this and this to get a taste of how lunatic our world has become.
This piece by Andrew Sullivan reminds me why I used to – between 2000 and 2006/7 or thereabouts – read his blog every single day. I was trying to find a “money quote” (as we old bloggers used to call it) to feature, but the whole thing is excellent.
I’ll give you this much, about the current wokesters…
To watch this version of the left capture all of higher education and the mainstream media, to see the increasing fury and ambition of its proponents, could make a reactionary of nearly anyone who’s not onboard with this radical project.
…but I’ll caution you to read the entire column (link above).
Mark Steyn selected George Harrison’s Something, as his song of the week recently, and I could not be happier. It is one of my favourites. Steyn praises Shirley Bassey’s version of the song, and it is lovely, but my favourite version will always be Sinatra’s, here:
A powerful poem, written in 1939, about the plight of European Jews.
REFUGEE BLUES
Say this city has ten million souls,
Some are living in mansions, some are living in holes:
Yet there’s no place for us, my dear, yet there’s no place for us.Once we had a country and we thought it fair,
Look in the atlas and you’ll find it there:
We cannot go there now, my dear, we cannot go there now.In the village churchyard there grows an old yew,
Every spring it blossoms anew:
Old passports can’t do that, my dear, old passports can’t do that.The consul banged the table and said,
“If you’ve got no passport you’re officially dead”:
But we are still alive, my dear, but we are still alive.Went to a committee; they offered me a chair;
Asked me politely to return next year:
But where shall we go to-day, my dear, but where shall we go to-day?Came to a public meeting; the speaker got up and said;
“If we let them in, they will steal our daily bread”:
He was talking of you and me, my dear, he was talking of you and me.Thought I heard the thunder rumbling in the sky;
It was Hitler over Europe, saying, “They must die”:
O we were in his mind, my dear, O we were in his mind.Saw a poodle in a jacket fastened with a pin,
Saw a door opened and a cat let in:
But they weren’t German Jews, my dear, but they weren’t German Jews.Went down the harbour and stood upon the quay,
Saw the fish swimming as if they were free:
Only ten feet away, my dear, only ten feet away.Walked through a wood, saw the birds in the trees;
They had no politicians and sang at their ease:
They weren’t the human race, my dear, they weren’t the human race.Dreamed I saw a building with a thousand floors,
A thousand windows and a thousand doors:
Not one of them was ours, my dear, not one of them was ours.Stood on a great plain in the falling snow;
Ten thousand soldiers marched to and fro:
Looking for you and me, my dear, looking for you and me.
Apparently, there is a grave threat to the banana crop. This makes me anxious, as I love bananas. I love them so much I wrote a poem about them.
If you are interested in Italy, design, history and cars – or any of the above – you will find this article worth your time.