The World according to Chomsky: Winter Reading Group 2018
In recent years, I’ve known many people who ask themselves, “What can I do, given the state of the world?” In the past year, this question has been especially urgent, given the toxicity of…
Month: December 2017
A Late Night Raid on Victor Terras’s A Karamazov Companion: Commentary on the Genesis, Language, and Style of Dostoevsky’s Novel/1
for Cami “I love Russia, Aliosha, I love the Russian God, though I am a scoundrel myself.” –Dmitry Karamazov So, maybe you’ve already taken the plunge back in Wisconsin, and are now immersed in “A…
Writing to Wake Up: A Course in Creativity and Community
Think about it: Even with all our sophisticated technologies and modes of communication, who feels as though there is enough time? And yet, we need time, as community activist Grace Lee Boggs has said, to…
Finkelstein’s Gaza
I just received Norman Finkelstein’s latest book, Gaza: An Inquest into Its Martyrdom. I noticed this blurb by Alice Walker: “This is the voice I listen for, when I want to learn the deepest reality…
When Simone Met Simone
Most interesting among [Alain’s disciples] was Simone Weil, the future author of Gravity and Grace, who was taking the same classes as the future author of The Second Sex. Simone Weil dressed oddly and always…
“True Happiness and Joy”
Egyptian novelist Naguib Mahfouz received the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1988. He was the author of 40 novels, 350 short stories, and five plays. When I was in Palestine in 2003, I would read…
Should This Be Added to Gene Sharp’s List of 198 Nonviolent Actions?
Today Spielberg’s The Post opens It’s true! — a film about the Pentagon Papers I texted Max if he’d like to go and he responded in a couple of minutes: “I took a quick look…
Waiting in Line To Order an Espresso
I overheard Sylvie Smith ask Emma Wong “What’s up, haven’t seen you on Snapchat?” “Yeah, I haven’t looked at Snapchat In three weeks” Sylvie looked horrified “THREE WEEKS?!!! What’s going on with you?” “Just into…
Three Hours in the Morning
In Talking with Sartre, U.S. professor John Gerassi explores a fascinating range of subjects with the French intellectual, writer, and activist. At the book’s conclusion, Gerassi writes, “What we must do instead, he said, is…
The Struggle Is One
In the 1970s Orbis Books was the U.S. cutting-edge publisher of books coming out of Latin America that heralded the phenomenon of liberation theology. Gustavo Gutiérrez, Leonardo Boff, and Jon Sobrino were among the…