A daily dose of odds and sods, some interesting, some bizarre, some funny, some thought provoking items which I have stumbled across the web. All to be taken with a grain of daily salt!!
I'm reading Plato's Symposium kids. It's all about love but will talk about that later.
This was a funny description by Aristophanes who is at a dinner party with Socrates and he describes how primeval man was round with four hands and feet, two faces, and could roll forward on four legs like a barrel. That would be so funny to see eh?
Alas, they got uppity and challenged the gods. So Zeus cut them down in the middle and Apollo fixed us up by fixing the cut, fixed the belly. And then because the two separate halves couldn't live together, they started dying off. So Zeus made man and woman separate.
But deep inside you, lives the seeds of that primeval man. So when you meet your soul mate, you cannot explain what you want from her/him but just want to be one.
It's obviously not medically right or evolutionarily correct but a nice explanation by the ancient Greeks eg?
So I've been re-reading the Ananga Ranga son. It's not a book that's frequently mentioned in the annals of this genre of literature. You may have heard about the Kama Sutra which was written early in the first millennium. And that's quite famous. In a variety of ways. But basically son its classification gone mad. And bangs on about positions. No doubt you need to know about them. Just the missionary position is boring. But then some like it. And fine so be it.
But there's much more to physical love than just the act of coitus son.
A good physical relationship goes a very long way son. It brings you close together. The Sicilians call the moment of orgasm as the 'little death'. The tantriks like to go to meet God via sexual practises (I've got a very very interesting book on this including Hindu and Buddhist tantric practises).
But you have to work at it son. The key key key thing to remember is that in bed, it's not your pleasure which is important. It's your partners pleasure which is paramount. And you only enjoy when the partner enjoys as well. Never make it just about yourself.
The above mentioned table is an example. But I disagree that the way to keep a women happy is just restricted by age. Every girl whatever age likes attention and politeness. Flattery as well. Well not obsequious flattery. That's not real and girls are smart. They will look through it. But compliment them. Buy small things. Tiny things. The cost isn't important son. In fact the cost is a detractor. If it's low cost then you have spent your time thinking through the present. Any idiot can buy an expensive present son. And stay away from girls who just like expensive girls. They aren't the girls with whom you can establish a long deep meaningful relationship with.
Going back to the physical side. The whole body is a playground son. Remember that a butterfly kiss can be more erotic than a French kiss. A gentle kiss over the naked shoulder can be better than sex. A discreet thumb rub inside the palm can make her anticipate much more than any levels of 'wanna fuck baby?' THe whole body is to be explored. Slowly and gently. And yes sometimes hard and fast. But learn her eyes. Her breathing. The sssshhhhtttt sound through her clenched teeth when she comes is great. The eyes which open hugely after she's come full of love and bottomless depths and that lassitude in the body is a joy that few men achieve.
Do grab the book if you can. Not a big book. One additional benefit is that it comes with the symposium of Plato where Socrates and his friends talk about what's love.
Quite an extraordinary book. Translated in 1873 by that indophile Richard Burton, it gives a fascinating insight into how the 15th/16th century Hindu viewed marriage and physical love. What makes this book even more fascinating is that it's conjoined with the symposium of Plato. I've never read the latter although I have read the Ananga Ranga many moons back.
The symposium of Plato is a record of an evening in Athens where Socrates and a group of friends, after dinner are lying about on the couches and each is expected to speak about love. And you get the most amazing and exquisite declarations of love. Ranging from the love of God to love of woman to love of a man. Fascinating.
And then Ananga Ranga. It's a book for men. And I love it's lists. Lists of how you should use nails on a woman. Lists of where you can't make love. Lists of how to stroke hair. Lists of how vaginas are. Lists of how skin is. Lists of spells. Lists of potions. Lists of penises. Lists of personality types. Lists of lists. It goes on and on.
Before you think that this is a licentious charter it isn't. It's meant for a man who wants to be with one woman but allows him to know of techniques and knowledge which can ensure the man has 32 women in one. So if you want to be a good lover, definitely read it. And for heavens sake, don't try out any of the potions. They will kill you.
The notes by Richard Burton are fascinating as well. Gives an indication of what people in the 1890's used to think of India. It's a bit shocking to read now but yes.
last year, I came across a fascinating paper. The paper said that there is a belief in the middle east that Saladin destroyed the Fatimid Dynastic libraries. Saladin is a famous character and he is best known for how he tweaked Richard's nose.
But his story is fascinating, not least because of the reactions. Cairenes who are educated and know a bit about their history hate him. Why? because he took the wealth of Cairo and took it off to Damascus...but this was worse...when he conquered Cairo, he apparently destroyed the Fatimid Libraries.
I didnt know that there was a library in the first place! You always associate Egypt with the Library of Alexandria, not something in Cairo!
check out this link. The numbers look a bit OTT but suffice to say that there were 40 rooms full of books, manuscripts, documents, papers and the like. FOURTY rooms full of amazing stuff.
As it so happens, the paper, Did alā al-Dīn Destroy the Fatimids' Books? An Historiographical Enquiry by FOZIA BORA published in the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society July 2014, pp 1 - 19, takes us through a fascinating story about how the collection wasnt actually destroyed but sold on. Let me quote a little bit from the paper which made me really wince and cry.
Abu Sh ̄ ama’s informant describes the collections that fell into S ̄ .alah ̄. al-D ̄ın’s 34 and then reconstructs related events as follows: 1171, 1. Qad ̄. ̄ı al-Fad ̄.il, a lover of books, was allowed to survey the collections and take ‘a great quantity’ of them. 2. S.alah ̄. al-D ̄ın cut off the bindings from many of the rest that were in a good condition, to sell or re-use the leather, and threw the unbound contents into a lake. 3. Other volumes were sold to the public,35 over a period of ten years. 4. When news of the books in the lake became common knowledge, ‘people’ recovered those, too, because ‘[books] are revered items’. 5. Much of the corpus that was initially discarded was thereby preserved, and this is how ‘that which we have [today] was attained’.
Bloody Kurd, the second point made me furious - how he ripped off the bindings! just to sell the sodding leather, but it gladdened my heart to read about how the Cairenes felt that the books are revered items. do not think that this has stopped, look at this story from recent times. So sodding painful to see. May their groins be infested with camel lice and may their arms be too short to scratch.
that said, dont forget the Lavon affair, when the Israeli's bombed the libraries in Cairo.
All this to be taken with a grain of piquant salt!!!
things that you find out while browsing the interwebs. So I was looking for some more information on Kalki Avatar after seeing this amazing illuminated manuscript in the British Library. It showed the 10 avatars of Vishnu. So I went looking for more information on Kalki. Quite an interesting story, but then my attention was diverted by a line at the bottom of the wikipedia page where it said that Mirza Ghulam Ahmad, the founder of the Ahmadi Sect of Islam claimed to be the Kalki Avatar. I quote,
"Mirza Ghulam Ahmad claims “Krishna... appeared as a Prophet in India... I am the Krishna whose advent the Aryas are awaiting in this age. I do not make this claim on my own, but God Almighty has repeatedly disclosed to me that I am the Krishna - King of the Aryas - who was to appear in the latter days...” (TEOI, V4, P83) and then there was this entire debate about Prophet Mohammad, of all places, in Quora. Reminds of the time that I managed to wind up somebody on a mailing list when I said that given that the God that Jews, Christians and Muslims worship is the same (although some people quibble about it, see here and here), then Judaism, Christianity and Islam are all different sects. Not such a good idea. anyway, it was quite interesting to read the Islamic links to Kalki...
This was an interesting argument from one of your oxford uni mates. Do you know this fellow?
I am conflicted about vegetarianism and non-vegetariansm. If you had asked me few years back, I would have been a strict non-veg, if you take my bacon away, there will be blood on the floor, and no pun intended. But I am starting to wonder now, from a medical perspective as well as an ethical perspective. And then there is the joke, I eat meat not because i love meat but because I hate animals. My work with the animal charity also is making me question non-vegetarianism. Finally, I go see the zoo's and feel really bad about the animals, specially after seeing them out in the wild, magnificent creatures and we pen them into tiny cages. Sad.
You may want to give this prize a shot..what do you think?
The latest issue of The Journal of Practical Ethics has just been published online, and it includes several fascinating essays (see the abstracts below). In this blog post, I'd like to draw attention to one of them in particular, because it seemed to me to be especially creative and because it was written by an undergraduate student! The essay – "How Should Vegans Live?" – is by Oxford student Xavier Cohen. I had the pleasure of meeting Xavier several months ago when he presented an earlier draft of his essay at a lively competition in Oxford: he and several others were finalists for the Oxford Uehiro Prize in Practical Ethics, for which I was honored to serve as one of the judges.
In a nutshell, Xavier argues that ethical vegans – that is, vegans who refrain from eating animal products specificallybecause they wish to reduce harm to animals – may actually be undermining their own aims. This is because, he argues, many vegans are so strict about the lifestyle they adopt (and often advocate) that they end up alienating people who might otherwise be willing to make less-drastic changes to their behavior that would promote animal welfare overall. Moreover, by focusing too narrowly on the issue of directly refraining from consuming animal products, vegans may fail to realize how other actions they take may be indirectly harming animals, perhaps even to a greater degree.
Kannu Did you notice the payments scanner in the taxis we took in Quito? Here's a bit more information on the system. I was completely gobsmacked to be in a country which doesn't have its own currency that it controls. I know the euro is something like that but to live in a country which has willingly given up control of its currency means such a giant loss of sovereignty that I'm amazed. One of the reasons why I hate the euro. I as a citizen have no power over the currency is such a crazy situation. And then the irony that a leftist government (remember how all the guides were fulminating against the president?) having no control over its currency and being driven by the arch priest of right wingers, the USA. And the final indignity, the central bank building is now converted into a sodding numismatic museum. Tragic son tragic. Remind me to tell you about blockchains sometime. Love Baba Ecuador Is The World'sic First Country With A Public Digital Cash System http://www.fastcoexist.com/3049536/ecuador-is-the-worlds-first-country-with-a-public-digital-cash-system (via Instapaper) The runaway success of mobile money products like M-Pesa, which first took off in Kenya, has inspired dozens of copycats around the world. Many countries in Africa, Asia, and Latin America now have services allowing people to store and transfer money using their cellphones. But there's something different about Ecuador's new Sistema de Dinero Electrónico. It's being operated not by a private phone carrier or financial company, but Ecuador's left-leaning government. M-Pesa-like products have been hailed for bringing millions of people into the formal financial system, enabling commerce between people in different locations, and cutting theft and tax avoidance. But Diego Martinez, an economist in Ecuador's central bank, says the government wanted its own service, because it thinks it can reduce the transaction costs that come with private offerings.
One of the lovely paintings I saw. I love these sights. When I’m able to discreetly look at these bibliophile girls who are buried in their books. How they twirl their hair around their fingers. How their eyebrows quirk and how their eyes widen and narrow and blink as they are immersed and follow the book. Forgetting the cacophony of the trains and crowds of people on the platform. Lovely.
I read this article today shown below. Its a great article son. Very very interesting. A small article but which really nails the commonly held tropes and shibboleths which are extant in the world today. Such a clear and articulate argument son. People do not really appreciate these basic truths. The links are very valuable as well. I have remarked on all these points generally other than perhaps the feminism angle, havent really worked or commented on it that much but very interesting son. Worth spending an hour to go through the links, you will find it very beneficial for your studies as well as arguments for politics and philosophy.
My 13-year-old homeschooled sons just finished my labor economics class. I hope they take many more economics classes, but I'll be perfectly satisfied with their grasp of economics as long as they internalize what they learned this semester. Why? Because a good labor economics class contains everything you need to see through the central tenets of our society's secular religion. Labor economics stands against the world. Once you grasp its lessons, you can never again be a normal citizen.
I loved this list. And made me think kids, when I die, what do I want my last words to be?
My thought is, 'wheeee, my next life, here I come'
Fun times eh? It's the final adventure. The great unknown. Will be so great. I just hope I'm not going to be like Churchill and say, I'm bored of all this. Of course I'm not bored of all this. But that journey beyond death is fun.
Anyway. Happy reading.
I'm looking forward to the movie tonight with both of you.
If you spend your entire life writing, it makes sense to make your last words count. Mark Twain recommended employing one's final breath in a deliberate, dignified message. Death is too important an occasion for improvisation or whimsy. Twain wrote, "There is hardly a case on record where a man came to his last moment unprepared and said a good thing — hardly a case where a man trusted to that last moment and did not make a solemn botch of it and go out of the world feeling absurd." After all, no author ought to die failing in the very thing he or she made a living perfecting. Below, there are numerous examples of writers' last words. Some, you'll find, are more poetic than others.
"I must go in, the fog is rising." —Emily Dickinson Leave it to Dickinson to stay poetic in the most overwhelming of situations.
"On the contrary!" —Henrik Ibsen Ibsen's comic response to his maid, who suggested the playwright's health was improving, endures for many of his fans.
"I want nothing but death." —Jane Austen This was Austen's reply to her sister when asked what her wish was.
"It is most beautiful." —Elizabeth Barrett Browning The Victorian poet's send-off is a cheery juxtaposition to Austen's.
"Moose...Indian" —Henry David Thoreau Thoreau's last words were both nonsensical and fitting.
"Take away these pillows, I won't need them any longer." —Lewis Carroll Carroll evidently knew his time was coming to an end, and left the world with both a trivial and dramatic declaration.
"I don't think two people could have been happier than we have been. V." —Virginia Woolf These are the last sentences of Woolf's suicide note. She was addressing her husband, Leonard.
"God Bless Captain Vere!" —Herman Melville The great American novelist spent his last moment partially living in his fiction. Captain Vere is a character in Billy Budd, which Melville worked on until his death.
"I am sorry to trouble you chaps. I don't know how you get along so fast with the traffic on the road these days." —Ian Fleming When Fleming's body finally had its fill of scotch and cigars, the James Bond author apologized to the medics in his ambulance for the inconvenience he caused
"What's that? Does my face look strange?" —Robert Louis Stevenson There are minor variations of Stevenson's final words (e.g. "Do I look strange?"). Either way, the Jekyll and Hyde author's last words were a response to the brain hemmorage that in only moments was to incapacitate and kill him.
"A certain butterfly is already on the wing." —Vladimir Nabokov This is a fitting final line for the lepidoptderist Vladimir Nabokov. A master of self-publicizing, Nabokov likely did not leave these final words to chance.
"Dying men can do nothing easy." —Benjamin Franklin The American Renaissance man said this to his daughter, who prompted him to lay differently so he could breathe less laboriously.
"Does nobody understand?" —James Joyce These last words are fitting for a true mischief-man of literature. Writer of Finnegans Wake, Joyce was an experimenter who worked and tested the very limits of language. His final lines also express the thoughts of many English teachers who have ever taught one of his books.
"Goodnight, my kitten." —Ernest Hemingway These words were said to the author's wife, right before he was to take his life at the age of 61.
"I'm bored with it all." —Winston Churchill In true Churchillian fashion the former Prime Minister let death know it had his permission to take him.
"On the ground" —Charles Dickens Dickens' final words were said as he experienced a stroke at home. It was a reply to his sister-in-law Georgina who recommended lying down.
"Well, I've had a happy life" —William Hazlitt These last words are rather sanguine for a man who wrote an essay called "On the Pleasure of Hating."
"I don't think they even heard me" —Yukio Mishima Mishima addressed a crowd of soldiers in Japan, encouraging them to overthrow the government and restore the power of the emperor. He died soon after from a gruesomely-executed seppuku.
"All right then, I'll say it: Dante makes me sick" —Lope de Vega The Renaissance playwright was able to get this literary grievance off of his chest before leaving our world.
"Warry, shift!" —Walt Whitman The poet's last words to a nurse are not likely to be counted among his best.
"This is the fight of day and night. I see black light." —Victor Hugo TheNotre Dame de Paris author's poetic last words echo Goethe's "Oh light!"
"Good bye. If we meet…" —Mark Twain Addressed to his daughter Clara, Mark Twain's final words were more about extending love than preserving his reputation for cleverness.
"I believe we shall adjourn this meeting to another place." —Adam Smith The economist said this before the invisible hand of mortality came for its prize.
"Go on, get out. Last words are for fools who haven't said enough." —Karl Marx Marx said this to his housekeeper who wondered with what style the thinker was going to depart this world.
Which are your favorites? Did we miss any authors' famous last words? Let us know in the comments below!
Reader, specializing in Twentieth Century and contemporary fiction. Committed to spreading an infectious passion for literature, language, and stories.
