Wednesday, May 08, 2013 ******************************* READING ******************** There is a new book out on bankers and politicians titled ASSHOLES: A THEORY. If it is as good as its title will be a best-seller. * After having sex with his wife, Tolstoy wrote in his diary: “It was so disgusting; I felt I had committed a crime.” * Gorky on Tolstoy and God: “They sometimes remind me of two bears in a den.” Thomas Mann is right: Gorky’s REMINISCENCES OF TOLSTOY is the best thing he ever wrote. * Chekhov and Zarian agreed on one thing about writing: Leave something to the imagination. No need to explain and describe everything. Delete the first and last paragraphs. * In Saul Steinberg’s biography. I note so many parallels: childhood in the Balkans (Romania for him, Greece for me) education in Italy (Milan/Venice), life in the New World (U.S./Canada), favorite contemporary writers (Nabokov, Bellow). * Elia Kazan believed his “method” created Brando. In his DIARY Richard Burton asserts Brando was ruined by Kazan. At one point he identifies him as the British Brando. Burton hated acting. His ambition was to be a writer. To the end he remained a voracious reader. # ON PATRIOTISM (VII) ********************************* To say or imply or suggest that Armenian patriotism is better than Turkish, American or any other kind of patriotism is like saying cancer in one nation is better cancer in another. * I would like to meet an Armenian whose speech is not contaminated by patriotism, whose understanding of our past has not been shaped by our own historians, and whose values are not tribal or parochial but universal. * Patriotism may be defined as collective narcissism. But whereas individual narcissism is treated as a psychological aberration, collective narcissism is thought of as a sacred civic duty. And why? Because the ruling classes everywhere need individuals willing to kill and die in defense of their powers and privileges. * To say we live in a world where wars are inevitable amounts to saying all human disagreements and conflicts must end with murder or suicide. * If most individual conflicts are resolved without the death of either or both parties, why not collective conflicts? # READING RICHARD BURTON’S DIARY ************************************** On Reagan: “--dangerously stupid.” * On Nixon: “I dislike drunkards and he was drunk as the devil the last time I saw him.” * On film directors: “I don’t remember anything they said except idiocies which I ignored.” * On Laurence Olivier: “…he really is a shallow little man with a very mediocre intelligence.” * On Mussolini: “Fundamentally he was a weak but decent man.” * He rates Spengler above Toynbee because he hates the English – totally unaware of the fact that Toynbee hated the English more than he did. # THE UNBEARABLE WEIGHT OF REALITY ******************************************** It is not history or social, economic, cultural and geographic conditions beyond our control that have divided us and keep us divided today; rather, it is the gradual and cold-blooded development of a system – a system of cunningly formulated prejudices, dogmas, and lies – that favors the dividers among us and penalizes the proponents of solidarity and unity. In short: our problems are ours; they are not enemy action, and if they are, the enemy is within. * Speaking the truth is easy; what’s hard is to make it palatable, comprehensible, and bearable. * Perennial victims are not and cannot be morally superior. * I agree with those who assert we are the real Chosen People – chosen to be the targets of bloodthirsty barbarians, both foreign and domestic. #