Comments on "Master and Margarita" by Mikhail Bulgakov
To an American outsider in the early 21st century this book seems to be bristling with jabs at communist party programs in the 1920s and 1930s in the Soviet Union, stereotypical communist party personalities, and Joseph Stalin in particular.
It also seems that Mikhail Bulgakov actually fought against the communists in the Russian civil war, and, subsequently, his work was so severely attacked by Bulgakov's communist literay contemporaries that his output must have been significantly curtailed.
Mikhail Bulgakov's Moscow apartment was searched several times by the secret police, and they must have known about his unpublished manuscripts, but he was never arrested. Perhaps it was because this book, at least, was too fantastical and bizarre and, maybe, too obscure.
Joseph Stalin, who was not Bulgakov's severest critic, actually telephoned Mikhail Bulgakov at least twice, in 1930 and 1937; and the first time he helped him to find work.
"Master and Margarita" ends in a time of such a violent approaching storm, this seems to have been written around 1940 when Mikhail Bulgakov died, that the book seems very prophetic.
Wednesday, July 27, 2011
Thursday, July 14, 2011
Experimental Blog #79
Comments on "Here on Earth" - A Natural History of the Planet by Tim Flannery
"Training in economics" according to Tim Flannery, who is "credited with discovering more species than Charles Darwin and "is one of the world's most influential scientists", makes people less cooperative and "neoclassical economists", in particular, seem likely to become selfish and hardened to the needs of their society.
In an earlier chapter Tim Flannery writes that "there is more genetic diversity in a random sample of about fifty chimpanzees from west Africa than in all seven billion of us." And on the next page he states, "There's as much diversity of thought, mannerism and emotion in a small New Guinean village as there is in the entire world, and in this commonality lies the foundations of our < > hopes for a future."
Speaking of hope and the future; if it is true that people in the past were the same, organically, as people in the future will be, and the world was the same, organically, as it will be in the future; and, also, that all people confirm their own histories, and that everybody together confirms world history; then what real, that is undeluded, hope people think there is for the future depends on what they think of their history and world history in general.
And what about China? The world's oldest continuous civilization, 4000 years at least, and, arguably, the world's most amazing country at the beginning of the 21st century? Don't they seem undaunted by history?
"Training in economics" according to Tim Flannery, who is "credited with discovering more species than Charles Darwin and "is one of the world's most influential scientists", makes people less cooperative and "neoclassical economists", in particular, seem likely to become selfish and hardened to the needs of their society.
In an earlier chapter Tim Flannery writes that "there is more genetic diversity in a random sample of about fifty chimpanzees from west Africa than in all seven billion of us." And on the next page he states, "There's as much diversity of thought, mannerism and emotion in a small New Guinean village as there is in the entire world, and in this commonality lies the foundations of our < > hopes for a future."
Speaking of hope and the future; if it is true that people in the past were the same, organically, as people in the future will be, and the world was the same, organically, as it will be in the future; and, also, that all people confirm their own histories, and that everybody together confirms world history; then what real, that is undeluded, hope people think there is for the future depends on what they think of their history and world history in general.
And what about China? The world's oldest continuous civilization, 4000 years at least, and, arguably, the world's most amazing country at the beginning of the 21st century? Don't they seem undaunted by history?
Saturday, July 9, 2011
Experimental Blog #78
Comments on "The Discovery of Jeanne Baret" - A Story of Science, the High Seas, and the First Woman to Circumnavigate the Globe by Glynis Ridley
The subject of this book, Jeanne Baret, left France with the Louis-Antoine de Bougainville expedition on February 1, 1767. This expedition became France's first successful circumnavigation of the world when it returned to France on March 15, 1769.
France became the third country in the world to achieve this distinction, but Jeanne Baret, who had been disguised as a man for at least 15 or 17 months, had been left at French possessions in the Indian Ocean and did not return to France until late in 1774 or early 1775.
Jeanne Baret did not write a journal or book or, it seems, even letters of any kind in her entire life. It is recorded that she had two children; the first child before the voyage and the other child before the voyage was completed. The author, Glynis Ridley, concludes from a careful study of the 4 accounts that were written about the voyage by participants, including the account written by Bougainville, that Jeanne Baret was "gang raped" not very long after it was finally revealed that she was a female; and using her extremely vivid imagination she tells the story of the life and voyage of Jeanne Baret, along with a great deal of interesting 18th century history and natural history.
Thanks to Glynis Ridley, despite all the resistance of male denial and rationalizing, the world now has a very fine unlikely-likely account of Jeanne Baret, a very strong and hard-working, but, it seems, not very articulate or educated lower class French woman from the 18th century.
The subject of this book, Jeanne Baret, left France with the Louis-Antoine de Bougainville expedition on February 1, 1767. This expedition became France's first successful circumnavigation of the world when it returned to France on March 15, 1769.
France became the third country in the world to achieve this distinction, but Jeanne Baret, who had been disguised as a man for at least 15 or 17 months, had been left at French possessions in the Indian Ocean and did not return to France until late in 1774 or early 1775.
Jeanne Baret did not write a journal or book or, it seems, even letters of any kind in her entire life. It is recorded that she had two children; the first child before the voyage and the other child before the voyage was completed. The author, Glynis Ridley, concludes from a careful study of the 4 accounts that were written about the voyage by participants, including the account written by Bougainville, that Jeanne Baret was "gang raped" not very long after it was finally revealed that she was a female; and using her extremely vivid imagination she tells the story of the life and voyage of Jeanne Baret, along with a great deal of interesting 18th century history and natural history.
Thanks to Glynis Ridley, despite all the resistance of male denial and rationalizing, the world now has a very fine unlikely-likely account of Jeanne Baret, a very strong and hard-working, but, it seems, not very articulate or educated lower class French woman from the 18th century.
Tuesday, July 5, 2011
Experimental Blog #77
Comments on 2 books
"Epigenetics - The Ultimate Mystery of Inheritance" by Richard C Francis
"The term epigenetic refers to long term alterations of DNA that don't involve changes in the DNA sequence itself". These changes are produced from the environment: from the food that we eat, from pollutants, and even from social interactions, and can last a lifetime.
This epigenetic process, or gene regulation, can even be "transgenerational"; either directly, as an "epigenetic mark" that is passed from parent to offspring as part of the original chromosome in the egg or sperm, although this does not commonly happen in mammals; or indirectly, by what is called "genomic imprinting", in successive generations.
"How Many Friends Does One Person Need?" - Dunbar's Number and Other Evolutionary Quirks by Robin Dunbar
This book contains many educational and enlightening "Darwinian" and other current scientific explantions and "stories".
The answere to the question of the title is 150, which the author, Robin Dunbar, says is now called "Dunbar's Number"; and he refers to it 4 times in this book.
"Epigenetics - The Ultimate Mystery of Inheritance" by Richard C Francis
"The term epigenetic refers to long term alterations of DNA that don't involve changes in the DNA sequence itself". These changes are produced from the environment: from the food that we eat, from pollutants, and even from social interactions, and can last a lifetime.
This epigenetic process, or gene regulation, can even be "transgenerational"; either directly, as an "epigenetic mark" that is passed from parent to offspring as part of the original chromosome in the egg or sperm, although this does not commonly happen in mammals; or indirectly, by what is called "genomic imprinting", in successive generations.
"How Many Friends Does One Person Need?" - Dunbar's Number and Other Evolutionary Quirks by Robin Dunbar
This book contains many educational and enlightening "Darwinian" and other current scientific explantions and "stories".
The answere to the question of the title is 150, which the author, Robin Dunbar, says is now called "Dunbar's Number"; and he refers to it 4 times in this book.
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