30 years of middle eastern peace!
Thank you Sadat, though that name is probably anathema in Egypt!
A shame, this is a land mark in the regioon that should be celebrated, not shunned as an embarrasment.
it is time Egypt started to play its own game and leave the whole arab muslim dichotimy behind, be Egyptian and Human. It isn't hard, it is natural to humans with free thought.
Or has John Stuart Mill never reached Egypt?
one day this will happen, and the world will be a better place. Acceptace of others and a full integration of minorities is important to fix the problems of the middle East.
Thursday, 26 March 2009
Friday, 20 March 2009
Begin on the future.
The first time the communists arrested me was in Vilna. I was in the middle of a game of chess. When the Soviet agents dragged me off, I remember calling out to my colleague, 'I concede the game. You win.' The Soviets locked me up in one of their prisons. I was held there for six weeks, and all I could think of was getting out and going back home, free. The second prison was a forced labor camp in Siberia. By the sixth week, I dreamed of being back in that first prison cell. The third time the Soviets put me in solitary confinement, and I dreamed of being back in that Siberian labor camp. So, you see, Mr. Zacks, my job as prime minister of Israel is to make sure that Jewish children dream the dreams of a free people, and never about prisons, or labor camps or solitary confinement.
Wednesday, 4 March 2009
Posterity poll!
my Nominations are below the post.
To see post: http://normblog.typepad.com/normblog/2009/02/the-normblog-posterity-collection-poll.html
I can't believe I've gone a whole year since the last normblog poll. I have been remiss. I hang my head in shame. To make up for this delinquency, I have devised a super-duper, 12-in-one poll and also game, one to delight the mind and entertain the senses.
The story is that, civilization approaching its possible doom (not really, but it's the premise of the poll), the normblog readership has been assigned the task of assembling for posterity a representative collection of the Arts of Humankind, to be preserved in a sealed container so that some future beings of intelligence, discernment and taste can discover it and be impressed. That's you and me, and also you. What we all have to do is to nominate under the following 12 headings those artists whose work we would like to see going into the sealed container:
1. Poet
2. Playwright
3. Novelist
4. Composer
5. Jazz musician
6. Rock or pop star/group
7. Country music ditto
8. Movie director
9. Painter
10. Photographer
11. Sculptor
12. Architect
An eligible entry from you must contain nominations for at least nine of these categories, one name per category, with any that you don't fill 'transferable' to one of the other categories. Thus, should you pass on (shall we just say) country music, you could have an extra poet or painter. But you have no more than 12 choices, spread across at least nine categories.
Do not moan to me about arts that are missing here. They were ruled out by a Pole on the premises who came up with the premise of the poll. Closing date is end of March. After that I will collate your votes and we shall see what normblog readers want to say to the future about our artistic heritage. You are going into the weekend and have time to start thinking about this.
My nominations: (all very hard for me as i am the least artistic person i know (don't sing, dance, paint or play any instrument!! or even know much about films etc..), so all my nominations come from historical posterity, its the way i view things).
now onto my embarrassment.
1. Poet - i have to go for the writer of the epics- Homer.
2. Playwright -Can't really look past Shakespeare (i am British after all)
3. Novelist- have two here a) Arthur C Clark and b) Herman Hesse. Both great writers and visionaries.
4. Composer- Mozart say no more. (though not my personal favourite)
5. Jazz musician- Duke Ellington, he had a huge influence on many great artists, as well as pumping out 1000's of tunes, prolific.
6. Rock or pop star/group- two here a) Bob Dylan and b) John Lennon. both were great songsters (little competition there).
7. Country music ditto - forget it ! Never been there.
8. Movie director - the oddest of all! Stanley Kubrick. a twisted Genius.
9. Painter - Rene Magritte -the best pure painter and a surrealist too boot! who can ask for more.
10. Photographer - not for me!
11. Sculptor - Michelangelo, (would have chosen the sculptors of the Sphinx but they forgot to leave their names.
12. Architect - Geoffroy de leves, built the great Cathedral at Chartres, the best of them all.
i must live in the past! not many moderists in the list. Comes from being an old fart, i suppose.
To see post: http://normblog.typepad.com/normblog/2009/02/the-normblog-posterity-collection-poll.html
I can't believe I've gone a whole year since the last normblog poll. I have been remiss. I hang my head in shame. To make up for this delinquency, I have devised a super-duper, 12-in-one poll and also game, one to delight the mind and entertain the senses.
The story is that, civilization approaching its possible doom (not really, but it's the premise of the poll), the normblog readership has been assigned the task of assembling for posterity a representative collection of the Arts of Humankind, to be preserved in a sealed container so that some future beings of intelligence, discernment and taste can discover it and be impressed. That's you and me, and also you. What we all have to do is to nominate under the following 12 headings those artists whose work we would like to see going into the sealed container:
1. Poet
2. Playwright
3. Novelist
4. Composer
5. Jazz musician
6. Rock or pop star/group
7. Country music ditto
8. Movie director
9. Painter
10. Photographer
11. Sculptor
12. Architect
An eligible entry from you must contain nominations for at least nine of these categories, one name per category, with any that you don't fill 'transferable' to one of the other categories. Thus, should you pass on (shall we just say) country music, you could have an extra poet or painter. But you have no more than 12 choices, spread across at least nine categories.
Do not moan to me about arts that are missing here. They were ruled out by a Pole on the premises who came up with the premise of the poll. Closing date is end of March. After that I will collate your votes and we shall see what normblog readers want to say to the future about our artistic heritage. You are going into the weekend and have time to start thinking about this.
My nominations: (all very hard for me as i am the least artistic person i know (don't sing, dance, paint or play any instrument!! or even know much about films etc..), so all my nominations come from historical posterity, its the way i view things).
now onto my embarrassment.
1. Poet - i have to go for the writer of the epics- Homer.
2. Playwright -Can't really look past Shakespeare (i am British after all)
3. Novelist- have two here a) Arthur C Clark and b) Herman Hesse. Both great writers and visionaries.
4. Composer- Mozart say no more. (though not my personal favourite)
5. Jazz musician- Duke Ellington, he had a huge influence on many great artists, as well as pumping out 1000's of tunes, prolific.
6. Rock or pop star/group- two here a) Bob Dylan and b) John Lennon. both were great songsters (little competition there).
7. Country music ditto - forget it ! Never been there.
8. Movie director - the oddest of all! Stanley Kubrick. a twisted Genius.
9. Painter - Rene Magritte -the best pure painter and a surrealist too boot! who can ask for more.
10. Photographer - not for me!
11. Sculptor - Michelangelo, (would have chosen the sculptors of the Sphinx but they forgot to leave their names.
12. Architect - Geoffroy de leves, built the great Cathedral at Chartres, the best of them all.
i must live in the past! not many moderists in the list. Comes from being an old fart, i suppose.
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