Thursday, October 30, 2008
5-årsjubileum av "best of volvo.info.se" (ungefär)
Skrotbilar, stadsbor, enskiften, fysikens lagar, byggnadsmetoder, spänning, lärdom, Sebastian, Frodo, politik, svampar, historia, norrlänningar, skånska anarkistiska bönder, äventyr, antropologi, kultur, osanningar och verklighet. Dogmamentary från 2004.
..och på grund av att den nya stämningen ändå inte längre tillåter studie- eller arbetsro tipsas om Katastrofala omslag.
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
Gäst hos verkligheten
av Pär Lagerkvist
När man läser Pär Lagerkvists barndomsskildring i det förra sekelskiftets Växjö slås man av den lägre materiella standarden i dåtidens Sverige. Den tacksamhet och livsförståelse denna uppväxt ger får jag känslan av att många idag, födda med välfärd och helt okunniga inför ett annat samhälle, verkar antingen sakna eller förneka. Jag är medveten om att det är en otroligt viktig balansgång att inte hamna i ett slags exotiserande av den ädle fattige, men att också kunna se faran i att se trygghetssystemen som självklara. För att hålla levande den ansvarskänsla som krävs för en välfärd måste man förmå att uppskatta denna, och då måste man vara medveten om ett annat liv än det bortskämda. I boken Fishing in Utopia: Sweden and the Future that Disappeared tror jag att detta är en av Andrew Browns huvudpoänger, den att ju längre bort minnena av fattigdom är, desto mindre är drivkraften för att skapa välstånd, och när hågkomsten helt är borta gror välfärdssamhällets förfall.
Lagerkvists bok är en vacker berättelse om barndomsupplevelser och varma relationer, om att uppskatta de små sakerna i livet. Den beskriver äventyret att ta trallan på järnvägen, med far som är stationsmästare, från småstaden ut till morföräldrarna på landet och den då samtida förändringen från bondesamhället till det industriella och urbaniserade Sverige. Men Gäst hos verkligheten har också de existentiella spörsmålen Pär Lagerkvist ofta tampades med, sammandrabbningen med den kyliga rädslan för döden och huruvida gudstron i uppväxten verkligen har en solid grund när man själv knackar på dörren för att bli vuxen.
Gällande Andrew Browns funderingar om Sveriges inte längre existerande framtid som utopi är en annan viktig poäng den om dess trånga begränsning. De skandinaviska ländernas jantelag är motsatsen till ett pluralistiskt sinnelag, och då är det lätt att hitta grogrund för politisk ovilja mot dem man inte tycker passar in. Min övertygelse blir mer och mer att den sociala konformitet som politisk korrekthet innebär ger mer näring till rasism än mycket annat. Det som politisk korrekthet uppnår är att för stunden tvinga de flesta att tycka en viss sak, samtidigt som den förfrämlingar och förhindrar ett nödvändigt förnuftigt mellanmänskligt samtal för att konstant uppfostras in i ett dynamiskt samhälle.
Guardian och Economist om Browns Fishing in Utopia.
När man läser Pär Lagerkvists barndomsskildring i det förra sekelskiftets Växjö slås man av den lägre materiella standarden i dåtidens Sverige. Den tacksamhet och livsförståelse denna uppväxt ger får jag känslan av att många idag, födda med välfärd och helt okunniga inför ett annat samhälle, verkar antingen sakna eller förneka. Jag är medveten om att det är en otroligt viktig balansgång att inte hamna i ett slags exotiserande av den ädle fattige, men att också kunna se faran i att se trygghetssystemen som självklara. För att hålla levande den ansvarskänsla som krävs för en välfärd måste man förmå att uppskatta denna, och då måste man vara medveten om ett annat liv än det bortskämda. I boken Fishing in Utopia: Sweden and the Future that Disappeared tror jag att detta är en av Andrew Browns huvudpoänger, den att ju längre bort minnena av fattigdom är, desto mindre är drivkraften för att skapa välstånd, och när hågkomsten helt är borta gror välfärdssamhällets förfall.
Lagerkvists bok är en vacker berättelse om barndomsupplevelser och varma relationer, om att uppskatta de små sakerna i livet. Den beskriver äventyret att ta trallan på järnvägen, med far som är stationsmästare, från småstaden ut till morföräldrarna på landet och den då samtida förändringen från bondesamhället till det industriella och urbaniserade Sverige. Men Gäst hos verkligheten har också de existentiella spörsmålen Pär Lagerkvist ofta tampades med, sammandrabbningen med den kyliga rädslan för döden och huruvida gudstron i uppväxten verkligen har en solid grund när man själv knackar på dörren för att bli vuxen.
Gällande Andrew Browns funderingar om Sveriges inte längre existerande framtid som utopi är en annan viktig poäng den om dess trånga begränsning. De skandinaviska ländernas jantelag är motsatsen till ett pluralistiskt sinnelag, och då är det lätt att hitta grogrund för politisk ovilja mot dem man inte tycker passar in. Min övertygelse blir mer och mer att den sociala konformitet som politisk korrekthet innebär ger mer näring till rasism än mycket annat. Det som politisk korrekthet uppnår är att för stunden tvinga de flesta att tycka en viss sak, samtidigt som den förfrämlingar och förhindrar ett nödvändigt förnuftigt mellanmänskligt samtal för att konstant uppfostras in i ett dynamiskt samhälle.
Guardian och Economist om Browns Fishing in Utopia.
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
A Confederacy of Dunces
by John Kennedy Toole
New Orleans is still on my list of cities to visit, but as I read A Confederacy of Dunces on a recent stay on the Greek island of Samos I believe my environment should not have been altogether faulty. I partly build this thought on the introductory quote of A.J. Liebling's The Earl of Louisiana on how the waves of the Mexican Gulf, the Caribbean and the Mediterranean is one homogeneous sea, although interrupted here and there. On the banks of the Mississippi River, not too much upstream in the delta where the transformation to the Mexican Gulf has begun, lies the port of New Orleans. I understand the birthplace of Jazz has much in common with a port town in, say Greece or Italy, albeit in America. Hence, even more exciting I trust.
The anti-hero of Ignatius Jacques Reilly leads the most squalid and depraved good for nothing life with his mother, Irene Reilly, in 1960s New Orleans. He is thirty years old, exceedingly smug and has not seemed to do much use with his existence. The economy of this household striving to achieve full white trash standard forces him to get an income. Gainful employment is something Ignatius opposes for all his worth and he does his best not to have to. He succeeds in failing work as he uses it as a political platform, partly in obstinacy with his study mate from his time at the university, Myrna Minkoff, whom now spends her time in New York. Ms Minkoff loathes Louisiana and is into radical sexual politics and agitates erotic freedom as a weapon against reactionary forces.
In the book we get to follow the political thinking of Mr Reilly and his attempt of creating, for himself, some kind of coherence of it all. It is a transition from the party of divine right which culminated in the rather fantastic insurgence of the Crusade for Moorish redress, to the eternal dispute between pragmatism and morality and the question of the glorious goal of Peace is worthy the terrible mean of Degeneration. The latter leads him to the disheartening attempt of trying to recruit sodomites. His suffering mother contacts a charity psychiatric clinic, and just before the ambulance comes to take Ignatius away, the musk odorous Myra Minkoff is there to liberate.
Despite how unreasonable Ignatius Jacques Reilly is, he is it in an intellectually sorrowful way, and I cannot help but agreeing in some of his acrimony over modern life. It is a sad fact that John Kennedy Toole committed suicide in 1969, but perhaps not too unthinkable as at least part of the story seems to have been somewhat biographical. It would have been quite something to read of the future adventures of Ignatius and Myra on their road towards New York and beyond. In any way do I not disagree with the Pulitzer board that posthumously gave the author of this book the prize for fiction in the year I was born.
New Orleans is still on my list of cities to visit, but as I read A Confederacy of Dunces on a recent stay on the Greek island of Samos I believe my environment should not have been altogether faulty. I partly build this thought on the introductory quote of A.J. Liebling's The Earl of Louisiana on how the waves of the Mexican Gulf, the Caribbean and the Mediterranean is one homogeneous sea, although interrupted here and there. On the banks of the Mississippi River, not too much upstream in the delta where the transformation to the Mexican Gulf has begun, lies the port of New Orleans. I understand the birthplace of Jazz has much in common with a port town in, say Greece or Italy, albeit in America. Hence, even more exciting I trust.
The anti-hero of Ignatius Jacques Reilly leads the most squalid and depraved good for nothing life with his mother, Irene Reilly, in 1960s New Orleans. He is thirty years old, exceedingly smug and has not seemed to do much use with his existence. The economy of this household striving to achieve full white trash standard forces him to get an income. Gainful employment is something Ignatius opposes for all his worth and he does his best not to have to. He succeeds in failing work as he uses it as a political platform, partly in obstinacy with his study mate from his time at the university, Myrna Minkoff, whom now spends her time in New York. Ms Minkoff loathes Louisiana and is into radical sexual politics and agitates erotic freedom as a weapon against reactionary forces.
In the book we get to follow the political thinking of Mr Reilly and his attempt of creating, for himself, some kind of coherence of it all. It is a transition from the party of divine right which culminated in the rather fantastic insurgence of the Crusade for Moorish redress, to the eternal dispute between pragmatism and morality and the question of the glorious goal of Peace is worthy the terrible mean of Degeneration. The latter leads him to the disheartening attempt of trying to recruit sodomites. His suffering mother contacts a charity psychiatric clinic, and just before the ambulance comes to take Ignatius away, the musk odorous Myra Minkoff is there to liberate.
Despite how unreasonable Ignatius Jacques Reilly is, he is it in an intellectually sorrowful way, and I cannot help but agreeing in some of his acrimony over modern life. It is a sad fact that John Kennedy Toole committed suicide in 1969, but perhaps not too unthinkable as at least part of the story seems to have been somewhat biographical. It would have been quite something to read of the future adventures of Ignatius and Myra on their road towards New York and beyond. In any way do I not disagree with the Pulitzer board that posthumously gave the author of this book the prize for fiction in the year I was born.
Wednesday, October 01, 2008
Down There on a Visit
by Christopher Isherwood
As I was unable to find this book in any of the English bookstores I visited this August, and was left with references to obscure tiny publishing houses on the other side of the Atlantic pond, I had the incentive to finally try out the "used & new"-option at Amazon. And was I glad by the success of my attempt. Some garage bookseller in the UK had a good paperback of the first Four Square edition, published two years after the book first came out in 1962.
Down There on a Visit was published some decades after The Berlin Stories but it takes place around the same period of time, starting a little bit earlier and continuing quite a few years after the timeline of the Berlin novels. The writing of Isherwood had become somewhat different during those years, perhaps more mature a language one would be inclined to call it. It consists of four short stories in chronology, but with a few years in between each of them. Though all four stories told autobiographically has their own protagonist, many of the people return and become enlaced in the other stories and thus the tales are entwined. Rather than actually calling it autobiographical, Christopher makes a point out of whether the self of today is in a one-to-one relation with the self of the past. In fact he seems to view the Isherwood of the stories almost as a stranger, not only in opinions, accent, mannerisms, prejudices and habits, but also by the looks: We have in common the label of our name, and a continuity of consciousness; there has been no break in the sequence of daily statements that I am I. But what I am has refashioned itself throughout the days and years, until now almost all that remains constant is the mere awareness of being conscious. As Christopher had left his worker idolisation for a spiritual worship of some sort, the quote ends: And that awareness belongs to everybody; it isn't a particular person. I am a glad person that it is obtainable to all of us.
As I was unable to find this book in any of the English bookstores I visited this August, and was left with references to obscure tiny publishing houses on the other side of the Atlantic pond, I had the incentive to finally try out the "used & new"-option at Amazon. And was I glad by the success of my attempt. Some garage bookseller in the UK had a good paperback of the first Four Square edition, published two years after the book first came out in 1962.
Down There on a Visit was published some decades after The Berlin Stories but it takes place around the same period of time, starting a little bit earlier and continuing quite a few years after the timeline of the Berlin novels. The writing of Isherwood had become somewhat different during those years, perhaps more mature a language one would be inclined to call it. It consists of four short stories in chronology, but with a few years in between each of them. Though all four stories told autobiographically has their own protagonist, many of the people return and become enlaced in the other stories and thus the tales are entwined. Rather than actually calling it autobiographical, Christopher makes a point out of whether the self of today is in a one-to-one relation with the self of the past. In fact he seems to view the Isherwood of the stories almost as a stranger, not only in opinions, accent, mannerisms, prejudices and habits, but also by the looks: We have in common the label of our name, and a continuity of consciousness; there has been no break in the sequence of daily statements that I am I. But what I am has refashioned itself throughout the days and years, until now almost all that remains constant is the mere awareness of being conscious. As Christopher had left his worker idolisation for a spiritual worship of some sort, the quote ends: And that awareness belongs to everybody; it isn't a particular person. I am a glad person that it is obtainable to all of us.
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