Literature

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Peter Lunn descibes the central argument in his new book as : "A revolution has begun in economic thought. For generations economists have assumed that people’s behaviour can, at least approximately, be considered to be independent, selfish and rational. Behavioural economics has now shown, initially through laboratory experiments and increasingly via studies in the real world, that these assumptions are systematically wrong. The evidence is convincing and the implications, while uncertain at present, are likely to be profound. " What are your thoughts on this and how do you think this relates to the 'Credit Crunch' ?

At the end of last year BBC Radio 1 provoked widespread derision for its decision to bleep the words 'slut' and 'faggot' from the Pogues' Christmas hit, 'Fairytale of New York'. Within hours the song could again be heard uncensored, a decision justified by the BBC on the basis that there was no 'negative intent behind the use of the words'.

At our next club night, we have invited a range of commentators to make their case for freedom of expression - artistic and otherwise. There will also be examples of art and literature that has been banned over the past century.

For all the lampooning of Radio 1, we seem increasingly confused about what kinds of expression - creative or not - contemporary society is prepared to allow. Of course, there are many countries around the world where freedom of expression is limited, and there are many historic examples of attempts to ban and censor art and literature. But we seem equally confused in the UK in 2008. Few have spoken out in opposition to Brighton Council's decision to introduce a city-wide ban on all music with homophobic lyrics. And there has been little said in public in defence of Samina Malik, the self-styled Lyrical Terrorist who was sentenced to a 9-month suspended sentence for penning jihadist poetry. Of course, it's difficult to defend the artistic merit of Beenie Man's rapping of a 'New Jamaica' after the 'execution of all gays'; still less, perhaps, Malik's nihilistic scribbling. Does freedom of artistic expression mean freedom even for bad poets, homophobes and nihilists, or is this a moral cop-out? Should people who have obnoxious thoughts be challenged legally as well as morally? Are there any limits we should set on what can or cannot be said or written?

Hello, I am interested in how the poet makes us see? How does the poet enable us to 'see' what he is describing? What methods and techniques are employed by poets to let the reader see (and indeeed prevent the reader from seeing)? How can a poet 'frame' scenes within a poem, and how can he use the visual to complement the narratives? I would be very grateful for any thoughts/observations on this, or any direction towards useful reading. Many thanks, Vicky

Paulo Coelho is launching his new book, The Witch of Portobello, through his blog www.paulocoelhoblog.com I found it out because i'm inscibed to his newsletter: http://www.warriorofthelight.com great news! =)

Hello, My name is Heather and I am writing to you from the International Museum of Women in San Francisco. I am working on a team to promote the museums latest project entitled Imagining Ourselves. This project is a global online exhibition that features the art, essays, and music of young women and now young men who are responding to the question what defines your generation? This January and February we are focusing on young men from all over the world and exhibiting their artistic responses to questions about relationship, fatherhood, image and identity, and culture and conflict. Imagining Ourselves gives men a chance to share about their artwork, their views, and their experiences as part of the new generation of young men. The exhibit provides an interactive global outlet and encourages people from all over the world to speak out and take action on vital social issues. All visitors are encouraged to join the conversation on the Conversations Page.

Has anyone read the book by Pynchon, "The Crying of Lot 49"? After reading it, i gave up trying to make sense of the message that Pynchon is trying to convey. Even though it is an interesting reading because the main character, Oedipa, was constantly running into new clues. However, i still don't get why she is looking for these clues and how are these clues important for her and what she is looking for. I just don't get the whole point of this book. Perhaps the sophistication of this book is that it makes people give up trying to make sense of it. Any comments?

THE DEAD THE LIVING AND THE YET UNBORN “I was a very contrary undergraduate more than 40 years ago. It was my habit to register for a course and then to do most of my reading in another field of study.” Such was the opening sentence of American writer Saul Bellow’s Nobel Lecture in December 1976. At the time I had been living in Ballarat Australia for nine months and lecturing in the Social Sciences at the Ballarat College of Advanced Education. I knew very little, if anything, about Saul Bellow. But I could write that opening sentence of Bellow’s now; these words of Bellow’s could very well apply to me. For in my 4 undergraduate years at university, 1963-1967, I often found myself reading in other fields of study than in those I was enrolled. Indeed, I often think it was a miracle I ever passed into post-graduate work and the field of employment. My contrary reading habits, my bi-polar illness, my sexual frustrations, the death of my father, the sadness of my mother, the distractions due to my enthusiasms for and activities in the Baha’i community and the eccentricities associated with my laziness, mood swings and general immaturity---like driving a car without brakes, eating chilli-con-carne four times a week and smoking two packs of cigarettes a day--all militated against my academic success. But, in the end, I got two ‘B’s(67%) and two ‘C’s(59%) in my 4 undergraduate years. In September 1967 I proceeded to try and teach Eskimos, an eccentric activity at the time, if there ever was one.--Ron Price, Pioneering Over Four Epochs, February 8th 2006.

Reviewers are calling this political satire a classic in the tradition of Mark Twain and Kurt Vonnegut. You can check it out at http://www.WaronJunk.com. In response to rampant obesity, the U.S. government declares a war on junk food. Authorities investigate salt addicts. Candy wrappers and barbeque grills are confiscated as paraphernalia. Pre-employment urine screenings test for illicit food traces. Fast-food felons receive ten-year federal prison sentences. Insulin is outlawed because legislators want to avoid sending mixed messages about sugar abuse. Police are charged with corruption for doughnut possession.

I would just like to add, if I may, a small leveller to Tom McBride’s comments on the sadly late Saul Bellow and his friend Allan Bloom on whom Ravelstein is based. I merely wanted to mention the fact that Ravelstein is not – as Mr McBride portrays it – a portrait of a ‘sybaritic homosexual’ whose life is shown up ‘in all its garish materialism’. Such an ungenerous synopsis fails to even nod to the book’s genius (for once the word is not inappropriate). For Ravelstein is, as Martin Amis wrote, ‘numinous. It constitutes an act of resuscitation, and in its pages Bloom lives’ [Experience, p.226].

Having prostate cancer is actually not so bad as it sounds. Promptly treated, it's not especially life-threatening. My own problem has not so much been with the cure as with the condition, because the hormone therapy prescribed suppresses testosterone and makes one impotent. All mammals are naturally driven by the imperative of reproducing their own species. Human beings are no exception. Nubile females naturally want to pair with strong males who can protect and provide for them. It is not really very surprising that rich and resourceful men tend to attract the loveliest of women. And of course, we have a global economy that essentially promotes and equates the pursuit of wealth, power and material success with social acceptance and sexual attractiveness. A poor man not only suffers the stigma of social exclusion but is also somehow emasculated by his shortcomings as an economic unit. He has not just failed as a provider, but as a father, husband, and of course, a lover.

[This thread continues a discussion begun in the "Power of Nightmares" thread over in "American Power and the World." Tim L. Francis-- "I do believe David has a point when he asks about the purpose of Said's arguments, the thrust of his books, the point of it all. After all, it is no different than what Foucault would do -- what are his motives, goals, ideology?" I'm not sure whether this was the precise question you were hoping for a response to, but I'll start here and perhaps you can specify. As I said, I'm curious what you have in mind when you refer to "deconstructionism." When considering Edward Said, it's worth keeping in mind the two sides of his critical profile: the Princeton-educated Columbia University Professor of Comparative Literature; and the intellectual committed to the national cause of the Palestinian people. These two strands converge and diverge at various points in his career, creating at least two distinct "purposes" for many of his writings.

Hello to all supporters of openDemocracy, After reading an article about Francis Wheen's book "How Mumbo-Jumbo conquered the World", I have regained my hope that intelligent and good intentioned members of the humanity will find the way to save us all from the present madness of "monetary globalism" ! The last couple of centuries a small percentage of humanity , crazed by the idea that the accumulation of "monetary wealth" is the only thing that matters in our lives, has been plotting to enslave everybody else for their success. These monetary madmen, or "merchants of death, exploitation and destruction", are using the present World Banking system to

The history of Holocaust memory possesses an odd trajectory. While one would expect an event to fade in significance with the passing of years, the Nazi genocide’s presence in Western Europe, North America, and Israel has instead seemed to grow with each successive decade. Public attention to the legacies of the Shoah is not, however, an omnipresent phenomenon, but rather one that comes in fits and starts—attention is prompted usually by some event, scandal, or anniversary, such as the opening of the US Holocaust Memorial museum, the visit of President Reagan to the Bitburg cemetery, or the sixtieth anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz.

Thanks for the link to Derrida, what could possibly be any more true than a world based on simulation! Welcome to the desert of the Real, Neo! As far as that article on Mumbo Jumbo by whosit, I think the term is B.S.

(This a reply to KA Dilday, 'Jacques Derrida: life beyond the margins' at http://www.opendemocracy.net/themes/article.jsp?id=5&articleId=2169) Having wondered for some time just what power the turgid prose of Derrida was worth, I finally discovered from Dilday that, gosh, it makes ya really think. Duh? Not only that, one way to really appreciate it is to have come from a similarly "oppressed" background. I've devoted lots of my life to teaching and I'm really bored with these sorts of hosannas to academic superstars. Derrideans have never done a damn thing but pontificate and suppress others' thinking by bludgeoning them with obfuscatory prose. His influence has been largely negative and the humanities worse off as a result. Those who know philosophy also know that most of his ideas are quite derivative. His works will be out of print in 50 years, and Dewey, or Wittgenstein, or Socrates, or Hannah Arendt will be much better prods to thought than the wooly-brained prose of the "D" man.

I lived in poverty with my mother for over ten years, and I can tell you that she never got off of welfare. She died poor, and still an undiagnosed schizophrenic. She would talk to people who were not there, even when the welfare department workers were present. But the welfare workers don’t have the power to change anything. After thousands mankind still has not figured out how to stamp out poverty. Well if you do manage to get off welfare consider yourself lucky. The welfare system is not designed to get you rich, or to get you back to work, it’s designed to keep you just alive just enough for you to see the next light of day, barely.

Poverty poverty is a constant war with death starvation the front line as deaths infantry humiliation never ending bombarding the soul tears the wounds of deaths diabolical victory breeding hatred of the rich rich hating the breeding of poorness empty stomachs reaching for black bloody guns evil harbours deaths soul twisting its reason war blood rage endless torment spins rains flood as the earths sorrow quakes amid all of this voices still cry peace prosperity walks alone in darkness passing greed with a socialist smile smiting starvation with grains making death wait one more day

Dorfman is one of my favorite writers and human beings. I would like to contribute to his theme, the historical and human context of the war in Iraq, my poem, "Pardon Me O Babylon" which follows. Pardon me O Babylon Part one: History Mesopotamia, begetting civilization and Creating world wonders: Garden of Eden, Babylonian Hanging gardens, Ziggurat at Ur, Gold statutes and Illuminated manuscripts. O Babylon! What art and culture you gave Us: Civilization and governance, fine pottery, Permanent dwellings and wheels speeding The human journey, and in writing cuneiform The human story telling, the human spirit

If novels are both reflective of the times in which we live and predictive of times to come, then our readers may find Stephan Zimmermann's brand new release, THE CHRISTMAS STRIKE, a chilling offering in the political fiction genre which more than fills the bill. The author develops an intricately-woven terrorist plot, complete with details of a terrifyingly realistic weapon to be used, and expertly probes the motivation behind the action. A novel twist: the educated and dedicated young terrorist is a woman! Preview the book at www.panaxus.com or download it from www.lulu.com, and then let's d