There’s no doubt but that Arvo Pärt‘s Miserere fully comprehends the dark, dismaying aspects of contemporary life, hence the inclusion of fragments of the Dies Irae, but it comprehends the darkness in a manner that in calling for mercy transcends it, recalling the Music of the Ainur in Tolkien‘s Silmarillion — and the Prologue to John’s Gospel, offering the natural obverse to John 1.5: “And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.”
[ by Charles Cameron — continuing my series on the “serpent bites tail” reflexive form (1, 2, 3, 4) in which analytic gems and other insights may often be easily discovered or succinctly expressed — read this post fast for fun, or reflectively (!!) for the ripples ]
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I’m going to lead off with this tweet, which seems very timely considering the news this last week or so about Syria…
A lot of people who will not bleed for their beliefs argue for a war they will not pay the blood price for.
I thought this was another quite beautiful example of “serpent bites its own tail” phrasing — timely too — uttered by JM Berger in summarizing his Loopcast with Daveed Gartenstein-Ross on the current status of Al-Qaeda, highly recommended, BTW:
@intelwire on @TheLoopcast w @DaveedGR:"an evolving understanding of a movement that is evolving while we're understanding it" < gt summary
Okay, having given pride of place to those three, I’d like to catch those of you who are interested up on an entire series of self-referencing tweets I’ve run across since I last posted. I’m really collecting these things because I’d like, one of these days, to do a thorough analysis of what they teach us about our modes of thought, and how we can apply that to pattern-recognition in our own readings, and creative insight in our writings and analytic output… In the meantime, don’t feel obliged to read every last one, just dip in as you feel inclined — think of this as a reference section, okay? Take what you need and leave the rest.
Reminds me of Keynes' "prettiest girl contest" description of the stock market. Not about market forces but perceptions of perceptions.
I have pulled these two news-tweets from the BBC out and juxtaposed them, because the charges in both cases had to do with murder, although Hasan was also found guilty of multiple additional attempted murders — but we should not forget the just-concluded trial of Bradley / Chelsey Manning, nor the pretrial hearings now under way for Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and his alleged 9/11 co-conspirators — nor for that matter the USS Cole case, which has just while I was writing this post been postponed till October.
Workplace violence? Treason? Torture? Dishonor? Death Sentence? Jihad? Martyrdom?
Comparing and contrasting these different yet related situations, we have before us what seems to me to be a war in microcosm…
[ by Charles Cameron — books, Gitmo and Snowden — signing off with a great clip from Three Days of the Condor exhibiting the benefits of reading ]
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I’m not entirely sure that Fifty Shades of Grey qualifies as Literature, but I think it can squeeze by as Lit — just as I’m not sure the topic of this post has much to do with National Security, but NatSec seems to fit.
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And hang in there — there’s a clip from Condor at the very end…
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From Gitmo, then:
A member of Congress said Tuesday he disclosed the popularity of the erotic sometimes sadomasochistic series Fifty Shades of Grey among Guantánamo’s most prized prisoners not to titillate but to set straight for their global followers that they were not devout holy warriors passing their Ramadan reading the Quran.
“It demystifies them. It exposes them for who they actually are,” said Rep. Jim Moran, D-Va., in a telephone interview that sought to set straight that the captives in the secretive Camp 7 complex are “not exactly holy warriors. Just the opposite. These people are phonies.” [ … ]
What made the disclosure so odd is that, during media visits to the trailers that house the prison camp’s collection of about 18,000 books, many of them religious, the Defense Department contractor in charge, Milton, says he systematically forbids the circulation of books and videos that are either lascivious or exceptionally violent..
The Herald contacted Moran on vacation after a prison camps spokeswoman, Army Capt. Andi Hahn, checked with the Army officer in charge of the detention center library and replied that the Fifty Shades of Grey series is a “prohibited” book. [ … ]
Moran said he has long favored exposing the Pentagon prisoners to great works of Western literature, and had asked the same questions in the less secretive prisons containing the 150 or so other prisoners, 84 of them approved for release or transfer in 2010. In those prison, the troops responded more generically that detainees who broke the rules get to keep just two library books in their cells while cooperative, communal captives get to borrow eight at a time. [ … ]
In February, military spokesman said they were forbidden to elaborate on war court testimony that showed Camp 7’s troops seized as banned a previously approved book by ex-FBI Agent Ali Soufan called Black Banners. [ … ]
Another attorney, Carlos Warner, said while his Camp 7 client, Muhammed Rahim, was interested in American popular culture he couldn’t imagine him reading the Fifty Shades of Grey series sometimes referred to as “mommy porn.”
In March, Warner said, he handed Rahim the bestseller fantasy novel American Gods, about a freed prisoner, now being serialized for HBO — and was fully engaged in it.
Because of his enthusiasm, Warner got a card for Rahim from the book’s author, Neil Gaiman. “I hope you enjoy American Gods. It was written before Guantánamo and all this current madness,” the British novelist wrote Rahim in June at Warner’s behest. The lawyer said he plans to show it to Rahim at their next meeting.
American Gods is not an approved book at the detention center library, the prison spokeswoman, Hahn, said in response to a question Tuesday.
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Meanwhile, regarding Edward Snowden…
Edward J. Snowden has the time, and now he has the classics. [ … ]
His Russian lawyer earlier this week left him a shopping bag with books by Dostoyevsky, Chekhov and Nikolai Karamzin to help him learn about Russian reality.
According to news accounts, the lawyer, Anatoly Kucherena, gave his client Dostoyevsky’s “Crime and Punishment,” the tale of law, order and redemption, telling him, “You should know who Raskolnikov was.” He added that the Chekhov was “for dessert,” and also provided him with the writings of Karamzin, a historian, for background on the nation’s development.
One has to ask: Is Dostoevsky really the best choice? Raskolnikov could hardly be expected to cheer up Mr. Snowden. Sonia, the girl whose love saves Raskolnikov’s soul, may remind him of Lindsay Mills, the pole-dancing, exhibitionist girlfriend he left behind. [ … ]
Are there better Russian books to help Mr. Snowden get to know the Russian soul? One could do worse than to read Gogol, whose absurdist short story “The Nose” could help Mr. Snowden understand that living in Russia might not make any more sense than living in the United States. And Tolstoy – well, no matter how much time Mr. Snowden has, he may not have enough time for Tolstoy. [ … ]
Why should Mr. Snowden confine himself to the literature of Russia? After all, Edward Everett Hale wrote a book that must absolutely resonate with Mr. Snowden and his plight: “The Man Without a Country,” whose main figure is tried for treason and cries out before the judge, “I wish I may never hear of the United States again!” Walter Kirn’s “Up in the Air” would continue the travel theme. John le Carré’s George Smiley offers glimpses into Russian life that ring with gloomy authenticity.
The French, who gave us the word ennui and sharpened the concept of existentialism, produced the works that may most help Mr. Snowden adjust to his new life, especially those of Jean-Paul Sartre. What masterpiece better describes his situation than “No Exit”?
Zenpundit is a blog dedicated to exploring the intersections of foreign policy, history, military theory, national security,strategic thinking, futurism, cognition and a number of other esoteric pursuits.
