Vì người ta cần ánh mặt trời
Nguyễn Đắc Kiên
tôi chưa thấy một đêm nào dài thế,
bốn ngàn năm, giờ lại ngót trăm năm.
hết phong kiến độc tài, đến lũ bạch tuộc thực dân,
hết quân, hết vương, đến lũ tượng thần chủ nghĩa.
bao thế hệ siết rên trong gọng kềm nô lệ.
chuyên chế dã man đục rỗng chí con người.
cha tôi, ông tôi, bao thế hệ ngủ vùi.
tôi chưa thấy một đêm nào dài thế.
không ánh mặt trời, bóng tối chí tôn,
lũ quỷ ám thừa cơ toàn trị,
khủng bố dã man, reo rắc những kinh hoàng,
biến lẽ sống thành châm ngôn “mày phải sợ”.
mày phải sợ mày ơi mày phải sợ,
sợ nữa đi có sợ mãi được không,
cốt tủy mục rỗng rồi trí óc cũng tối đen,
mày lại đẻ ra lũ cháu con “biết sợ”.
bao thế hệ đã ngậm ngùi mắc nợ,
lũ chúng ta lẽ nào lại mắc nợ mai sau,
còn chần chừ gì mà không tỉnh dậy mau,
sống cho xứng danh xưng con người trên mặt đất.
tôi chưa thấy một đêm nào dài thế,
cũng chưa thấy có ngày mai nào không thể.
vì người ta cần ánh mặt trời,
tỉnh dậy đi lũ chúng ta ơi!
Hà nội, 25.2.2012
Because we need sunshine
I have not seen such a long night
That went through forty centuries
Then another one hundred years.
It covered dictatorial feudalism
And white octopus colonialism.
As soon as we were through with royalty
Rushed into its place commie ideology.
Too many generations groaned under the shackles of slavery
Savage totalitarianism drilled and sucked the people's will dry.
Generations of my grandfather, my father, and then of myself,
We all went through a slumber.
I have not seen such a long night
Not a single ray of sunshine while darkness is reigning supreme
The demons take advantage of lack of the light
Carrying out a campaign of terror, instilling fright,
Converting life's aspirations to a command: "thou must fear!"
"Yes, thou must fear, thou must fear.
Keep on fearing, can thou keep it up?
Thy bones lack the marrows, thy brains are dark,
And thou will beget children who'll be fearful as pups."
Many generations have lived as if we were heavy in debt
Do we have to carry on like that
So the next generation would be in debt as well?
Hurry, wake up, don't hesitate!
Live as true humans on this planet!
I have not seen such a long night
Neither have I seen an impossible tomorrow
Because we all need sunshine
Wake up, we must all wake up, so we no longer have sorrow.
Translated by Wissai
February 27, 2013
Wednesday, February 27, 2013
French Bashing versus Gallic Pride
French Bashing versus Gallic Pride
The stories involving bashing and trashing the French being circulated on the Net with the stupid, trite heading "You could hear the pin drop" underlie an interesting relationship between the Americans and the French. The following ad hoc observations are personal and hence very subjective and can be way off the mark. They are not drawn from any large-scale, in-depth survey. "Proofs" for the observations are not going to furnished. However, the observations are based on some verifiable facts, not on fantasies or historical ignorance.
An average American (read: mediocre high school or college graduate who is not much into serious reading) thinks the French are stuck-up froggies who are only good at cuisine, wine making, perfume concoction, and boring movies in which the characters do nothing but bare their bodies and talk, not necessarily in that order. In addition, he thinks that the French were and probably still are lousy warriors on account that the Americans had to rescue the French in WWI, WWII, and gave them a lot of logistical aid during the First Indochina War and the bastards still could not win against underfed, ragtag Vietminh soldiers.
An average Frenchman (read: a lycée graduate whose level of knowledge equals, if not surpasses, that an American college graduate) thinks without the French aid, the Americans would have had a much harder time to obtain independence from the British. He further holds onto an opinion that in helping the French during the two world wars in the first half of the 20th century, the Americans also helped themselves, thus, the Americans were not entirely altruistic as they claimed. Therefore, the stories such as those in circulation alleging the French ingratitude inflame further the French resentment of their diminishing influence in world stage and grievously aggravates the wounded Gallic pride.
The Napoleonic Wars briefly glorified France but marked the beginning of a slow decline of France as a world power while consolidating Britain as a premier world power. In the 19th century the expanding French Empire masked France's weakness. The French language was no longer predominantly spoken in some royal European courts as it was in the 18th century. English was on its away to supplant French as an international language, a lingua franca among the educated. France was defeated in the Franco-Prussian War (1870-1871) . The 20th century witnessed the defeats of France by the Germans twice (the second time after merely 6 weeks of combat), by the Vietnamese, and by the Algerians. Soon the French found themselves, like the British, bereft of an empire except for a few territories like Martinique in the Caribbean and some islands in South Pacific. But unlike the British who were more adept in fostering some genuine common identity (British Commonwealth) among its former colonies, the French failed to establish a similar consciousness even though they have something called La Francophonie, a biannual summit of 77 French-speaking states and governments.
Though the French lament the slow decline of their language in international arena (few people bother to learn French nowadays except in some of their former colonies and their neighbors--the Germans, the Spaniards, and the Italians. The ambitious are learning English, Chinese, Arabic, and Spanish), there's one area where the Gallic pride remains intact: intellectual sphere. Despite having a population of a mere 65 million inhabitants, the French---through an educational system which emphasizes essay-writing, early specialization, and study of philosophy in high school--- have produced a disproportionate high number of world class thinkers, more numerous than those countries whose populations are much bigger. In the United States, Yale University has a strong French Department where French thought usually finds its first acceptance.
Wissai
February 26, 2013
The stories involving bashing and trashing the French being circulated on the Net with the stupid, trite heading "You could hear the pin drop" underlie an interesting relationship between the Americans and the French. The following ad hoc observations are personal and hence very subjective and can be way off the mark. They are not drawn from any large-scale, in-depth survey. "Proofs" for the observations are not going to furnished. However, the observations are based on some verifiable facts, not on fantasies or historical ignorance.
An average American (read: mediocre high school or college graduate who is not much into serious reading) thinks the French are stuck-up froggies who are only good at cuisine, wine making, perfume concoction, and boring movies in which the characters do nothing but bare their bodies and talk, not necessarily in that order. In addition, he thinks that the French were and probably still are lousy warriors on account that the Americans had to rescue the French in WWI, WWII, and gave them a lot of logistical aid during the First Indochina War and the bastards still could not win against underfed, ragtag Vietminh soldiers.
An average Frenchman (read: a lycée graduate whose level of knowledge equals, if not surpasses, that an American college graduate) thinks without the French aid, the Americans would have had a much harder time to obtain independence from the British. He further holds onto an opinion that in helping the French during the two world wars in the first half of the 20th century, the Americans also helped themselves, thus, the Americans were not entirely altruistic as they claimed. Therefore, the stories such as those in circulation alleging the French ingratitude inflame further the French resentment of their diminishing influence in world stage and grievously aggravates the wounded Gallic pride.
The Napoleonic Wars briefly glorified France but marked the beginning of a slow decline of France as a world power while consolidating Britain as a premier world power. In the 19th century the expanding French Empire masked France's weakness. The French language was no longer predominantly spoken in some royal European courts as it was in the 18th century. English was on its away to supplant French as an international language, a lingua franca among the educated. France was defeated in the Franco-Prussian War (1870-1871) . The 20th century witnessed the defeats of France by the Germans twice (the second time after merely 6 weeks of combat), by the Vietnamese, and by the Algerians. Soon the French found themselves, like the British, bereft of an empire except for a few territories like Martinique in the Caribbean and some islands in South Pacific. But unlike the British who were more adept in fostering some genuine common identity (British Commonwealth) among its former colonies, the French failed to establish a similar consciousness even though they have something called La Francophonie, a biannual summit of 77 French-speaking states and governments.
Though the French lament the slow decline of their language in international arena (few people bother to learn French nowadays except in some of their former colonies and their neighbors--the Germans, the Spaniards, and the Italians. The ambitious are learning English, Chinese, Arabic, and Spanish), there's one area where the Gallic pride remains intact: intellectual sphere. Despite having a population of a mere 65 million inhabitants, the French---through an educational system which emphasizes essay-writing, early specialization, and study of philosophy in high school--- have produced a disproportionate high number of world class thinkers, more numerous than those countries whose populations are much bigger. In the United States, Yale University has a strong French Department where French thought usually finds its first acceptance.
Wissai
February 26, 2013
Why do discussions about politics and religions tend to be passionate?
I am more concerned about the why and the how than the what, because everybody knows about the what if they have functioning eyes and ears. It's the why and how that help us arrive at explanatory answers.
I don't profess to have a definite answer to the question in the heading, but the below is my own tentative, groping thinking about the question, in the hopes of receiving feedback:
Politics and religion define who we are and how we think of big issues concerning existential values, instead of basic everyday worries like food, shelter, sex, and yes, love. The positions we take regarding politics and religion reflect our self-conception, our level of understanding and intelligence, and our values. It takes a very strong man emotionally and intellectually to change his views about politics and religion once he realizes he was in the dark, in the wrong side of reason and logic. Such a man must be governed by a respect for truths and verifiable knowledge, and an embrace of fairness in his dialogues about politics and religion with fellow men and women. We must always ask ourselves if we and the person(s) we are having a conversation is such a man (generically speaking, otherwise I would be accused of being sexist), otherwise the conversation is yes indeed boring and fruitless and ends with no enlightenment, but with hurt feelings and festering rancor. That's why ironically the shortest way of finding out who a person is, is by having a conversation with him about politics and religion. He would invariably reveal his true color and character by his views and the way he presents them.
There is one paradoxical thing about being human. Despite sharing many commonalities, humans are indeed different from one another. The differences may come from genetics, self-determination/will, and yes indeed experiences. We try to understand others from their actions and words, and from our own self-projection.
Some humans simply let the primary issue of survival and other mundane matters such as power and glory override nobler and perhaps unique human impulses such as compassion, self-respect, and search for truths via logic (employed even in the analysis of experiences).
Some humans simply refuse to acknowledge the existence of irrefutable facts and truths. All they care is to win points in an argument by playing victim (especially when they cannot refute the points made by others); falling back on trite, stock phrases of escape; and being sarcastic and insulting and vulgar. Those humans are not only intellectually weak, they are also emotionally fragile and indeed in the process becoming less than human in the eyes of impartial observers. To be human is to admit defeat and to acknowledge one's thinking process is simply wrong when the evidence presented and logic dictate such is the case. Persistence in trying to prove one is still right by grasping for straws is pathetic obduracy, and not necessary an indication of firm conviction.
To be truly human is possessing an ability to know right from wrong, truth from falsehood, especially in the discussions of politics and politics where values play a murky but strong role.
Roberto Wissai/NKBa'
Thursday, February 21, 2013
the voyage
the voyage
by murphysruger
I am a sailor, you're my first mate
We signed on together, we coupled our fate
Hauled up our anchor, determined not to fail
For the hearts treasure, together we set sail
With no maps to guide us we steered our own course
Rode out the storms when the winds were gale force
Sat out the doldrums in patience and hope
Working together we learned how to cope
Chorus:
Life is an ocean and love is a boat
In troubled water that keeps us afloat
When we started the voyage, there was just me and you
Now gathered round us, we have our own crew
Together we're in this relationship
We built it with care to last the whole trip
Our true destination's not marked on any charts
We're navigating to the shores of the heart
Chorus 2x
by murphysruger
I am a sailor, you're my first mate
We signed on together, we coupled our fate
Hauled up our anchor, determined not to fail
For the hearts treasure, together we set sail
With no maps to guide us we steered our own course
Rode out the storms when the winds were gale force
Sat out the doldrums in patience and hope
Working together we learned how to cope
Chorus:
Life is an ocean and love is a boat
In troubled water that keeps us afloat
When we started the voyage, there was just me and you
Now gathered round us, we have our own crew
Together we're in this relationship
We built it with care to last the whole trip
Our true destination's not marked on any charts
We're navigating to the shores of the heart
Chorus 2x
Thursday, February 14, 2013
You were neither fragrant flower nor evening mist
You were neither fragrant flower nor evening mist
ChânPhương says:
February 14, 2013 at 9:07 am
Quả là ngọt ngào những tứ thơ mượt mà đến từ “miền đất Trinh Nguyên” của những ngày đầu Xuân Quý Tỵ qua bàn tay của nhà thơ Lưu Nguyễn Đạt:
Hoa phi hoa …
Mưa không mưa …
Tình say tình …
Em đi để lại mùi hương cũ
Đất nước hao gầy dạ khúc ngân
Bài thơ không chỉ họa lại ý và tứ của một bài từ nổi tiếng của Bạch Cư Dị. Nó còn thể hiện được quan điểm “nghệ thuật vị nhân sinh” của một “thứ sử thi” đầy lòng nhân ái đời nhà Đường. Vì thế, sẽ là thiếu sót rất lớn nếu không đem nguyên tác bài từ của Bạch Cư Dị về đây để cùng được thưởng thức:
花非花
花非花霧非霧
夜半來天明去
來如春夢幾多時
去似朝雲無覓處
Hoa phi hoa
Hoa phi hoa vụ phi vụ
Dạ bán lai thiên minh khứ
Lai như Xuân mộng kỷ đa thời
Khứ tự triêu vân vô mịch xứ
Trong số rất nhiều học giả đi trước đã từng dịch bài từ “Hoa phi Hoa” của Bạch Cư Dị này, người đọc thích nhất các bản của dịch giả Liêu Quốc Nhĩ và Quỳnh Chi vì nét mềm mại và tự nhiên của chúng:
Chẳng phải là hoa, chẳng phải sương
Nửa khuya em đến, sáng em về
Đến như giấc mộng xuân không đợi
Đi tựa mây trời không định nơi
LIÊU QUỐC NHĨ dịch thơ.
Là hoa mà chẳng phải hoa
Phải sương lan nhẹ âm ba mơ hồ ?
Chợt về nửa giấc tương tư
Rồi như mây sáng viễn du cuối trời
QUỲNH CHI dịch thơ.
Tất nhiên, người đọc cũng không tránh khỏi chút tham vọng cố gắng lột được cả ý lẫn nghĩa của bài từ xưa:
Có chăng hoa, phải chăng sương?
Hôm đến mai đi gót hường thụy dung
Đến như gối mộng tao phùng
Mơ tan tỉnh giấc muôn trùng tìm nhau.
(Bản dịch của Chân Phương)
You were neither fragrant flower nor evening mist
Yet you came at night and were gone in the morning
You came like an unexpected dream in the spring
And said goodbye like aimless clouds in the sky
English Translation by
Wissai
February 14, 2013
ChânPhương says:
February 14, 2013 at 9:07 am
Quả là ngọt ngào những tứ thơ mượt mà đến từ “miền đất Trinh Nguyên” của những ngày đầu Xuân Quý Tỵ qua bàn tay của nhà thơ Lưu Nguyễn Đạt:
Hoa phi hoa …
Mưa không mưa …
Tình say tình …
Em đi để lại mùi hương cũ
Đất nước hao gầy dạ khúc ngân
Bài thơ không chỉ họa lại ý và tứ của một bài từ nổi tiếng của Bạch Cư Dị. Nó còn thể hiện được quan điểm “nghệ thuật vị nhân sinh” của một “thứ sử thi” đầy lòng nhân ái đời nhà Đường. Vì thế, sẽ là thiếu sót rất lớn nếu không đem nguyên tác bài từ của Bạch Cư Dị về đây để cùng được thưởng thức:
花非花
花非花霧非霧
夜半來天明去
來如春夢幾多時
去似朝雲無覓處
Hoa phi hoa
Hoa phi hoa vụ phi vụ
Dạ bán lai thiên minh khứ
Lai như Xuân mộng kỷ đa thời
Khứ tự triêu vân vô mịch xứ
Trong số rất nhiều học giả đi trước đã từng dịch bài từ “Hoa phi Hoa” của Bạch Cư Dị này, người đọc thích nhất các bản của dịch giả Liêu Quốc Nhĩ và Quỳnh Chi vì nét mềm mại và tự nhiên của chúng:
Chẳng phải là hoa, chẳng phải sương
Nửa khuya em đến, sáng em về
Đến như giấc mộng xuân không đợi
Đi tựa mây trời không định nơi
LIÊU QUỐC NHĨ dịch thơ.
Là hoa mà chẳng phải hoa
Phải sương lan nhẹ âm ba mơ hồ ?
Chợt về nửa giấc tương tư
Rồi như mây sáng viễn du cuối trời
QUỲNH CHI dịch thơ.
Tất nhiên, người đọc cũng không tránh khỏi chút tham vọng cố gắng lột được cả ý lẫn nghĩa của bài từ xưa:
Có chăng hoa, phải chăng sương?
Hôm đến mai đi gót hường thụy dung
Đến như gối mộng tao phùng
Mơ tan tỉnh giấc muôn trùng tìm nhau.
(Bản dịch của Chân Phương)
You were neither fragrant flower nor evening mist
Yet you came at night and were gone in the morning
You came like an unexpected dream in the spring
And said goodbye like aimless clouds in the sky
English Translation by
Wissai
February 14, 2013
Valentine, Valentino, Oh No!
Valentine, Valentino, Oh No!
You called me up and slyly said, "Happy Valentine's Day!"
I replied, "Thanks, the same to you."
Fretfully, you queried,"Was that all you had to say?"
My silence that ensued was the clue
I wished it was she, not you, who made the call to me
For she was my true Valentine, my Valentina
The one that functioned as a lee when I felt lost at sea
And in my mind I didn't have a scintilla
Of doubt she was my heart's desire
Of course, I could pick up the phone and call her
And tell her lately I had troubles sleeping at night
In her sweet, soft, susurrous voice, she would murmur:
"Roberto, mi amigo, what happened? Tell me why."
Then I would hem and haw, and probably tell a lie
But I wouldn't tell her because I thought of her too much
How badly I longed for her tender touch
How I wished I had a courage to bring her a bouquet
Of red roses today, on this year's Valentine's Day
Wissai
February 14, 2013
You called me up and slyly said, "Happy Valentine's Day!"
I replied, "Thanks, the same to you."
Fretfully, you queried,"Was that all you had to say?"
My silence that ensued was the clue
I wished it was she, not you, who made the call to me
For she was my true Valentine, my Valentina
The one that functioned as a lee when I felt lost at sea
And in my mind I didn't have a scintilla
Of doubt she was my heart's desire
Of course, I could pick up the phone and call her
And tell her lately I had troubles sleeping at night
In her sweet, soft, susurrous voice, she would murmur:
"Roberto, mi amigo, what happened? Tell me why."
Then I would hem and haw, and probably tell a lie
But I wouldn't tell her because I thought of her too much
How badly I longed for her tender touch
How I wished I had a courage to bring her a bouquet
Of red roses today, on this year's Valentine's Day
Wissai
February 14, 2013
Em chết bên bờ lúa.
Em chết bên bờ lúa.
"Bài thơ nhớ vợ của Bùi Giáng có một không khí rất đỗi bi ai, tràn đầy hoài cảm:"
Em chết bên bờ lúa.
Để lại trên lối mòn.
Một dấu chân bước của.
Một bàn chân bé con!
Anh qua trời cao nguyên.
Nhìn mây buồn bữa nọ.
Gió cuồng mưa khóc điên.
Trăng cuồng khuya trốn gió.
Mười năm sau xuống ruộng.
Đếm lại lúa bờ liền.
Máu trong mình mòn ruỗng.
Xương trong mình rả riêng.
Anh đi về đô hội.
Ngắm phố thị mơ màng.
Anh vùi thân trong tội lỗi.
Chợt đêm nào, gió bờ nọ bay sang
Bùi Giáng
In remembrance of a wife who died too young
You died by the roadside
Of a rice paddy
Leaving behind
On the pathway
An imprint of a small footstep!
I once passed through the high plains
Mourning clouds passed me by
Amid raging winds and crying rains
Frightened moon took flight
From the winds that sighed
Ten years later I came back
To the same rice paddy
I counted the number of rice plants
Bordering the same footpath
Feeling blood coursing through my worn-out veins
My bones felt like breaking up
I got into town
Up and down the shops I walked
And in sins I drowned
Then one night out of the blue
To me winds from the old paddy flew
Quick and rough translation by
Wissai
February 13, 2013
"Bài thơ nhớ vợ của Bùi Giáng có một không khí rất đỗi bi ai, tràn đầy hoài cảm:"
Em chết bên bờ lúa.
Để lại trên lối mòn.
Một dấu chân bước của.
Một bàn chân bé con!
Anh qua trời cao nguyên.
Nhìn mây buồn bữa nọ.
Gió cuồng mưa khóc điên.
Trăng cuồng khuya trốn gió.
Mười năm sau xuống ruộng.
Đếm lại lúa bờ liền.
Máu trong mình mòn ruỗng.
Xương trong mình rả riêng.
Anh đi về đô hội.
Ngắm phố thị mơ màng.
Anh vùi thân trong tội lỗi.
Chợt đêm nào, gió bờ nọ bay sang
Bùi Giáng
In remembrance of a wife who died too young
You died by the roadside
Of a rice paddy
Leaving behind
On the pathway
An imprint of a small footstep!
I once passed through the high plains
Mourning clouds passed me by
Amid raging winds and crying rains
Frightened moon took flight
From the winds that sighed
Ten years later I came back
To the same rice paddy
I counted the number of rice plants
Bordering the same footpath
Feeling blood coursing through my worn-out veins
My bones felt like breaking up
I got into town
Up and down the shops I walked
And in sins I drowned
Then one night out of the blue
To me winds from the old paddy flew
Quick and rough translation by
Wissai
February 13, 2013
Wednesday, February 13, 2013
Chaos and Magic or Turbulence and Madness
Chaos and Magic or Turbulence and Madness
For years I have been wondering if my life is characterized by chaos giving rise to occasional magic or it is simply turbulence which will end with noisy, assertive madness. Having just written the preceding absolutely breath-taking, beautiful sentence, I must say--- in all candor and clarity, and not with a whisper and whisker of hubris---that it is the case of the former. So armed with that sweet, soothing, self-serving solace, I am going to take a respite from self-consciousness and embrace sleep.
Yesterday was a magical day. I saw her again after an absence (enforced and self-imposed) of ten years. She looked good, considering her age. The charm, the vivaciousness, and the kindness were intact. Even though the weather was quite bad (cold and drizzling) my spirits were not dampened. In fact, joy was percolating inside me, but I didn't show it. I was cool and let fantasy sweep me to the open sea where I was drifting in a serenity that was best described as an amalgam of detachment and assuaged ego. It was then I realized in the matter of the heart, unspoken desires that reveal themselves only through sweet smiles and occasional quick glances, enhanced by febrile, feverish imagination are the type of desires I live for and dream of. Meanwhile I am working on my body and mind and finance to make me eternally desirable to the day I die.
Today is just another day to keep the unspoken desires at bay even though tomorrow will be Valentine's Day. I hope I didn't fall short of the rhythm achieved by the choice of words. This piece is like a symphony if the words are read aloud: the alliteration, the long sentences full of rhymed words, the mood conveyed by concrete, image-building terms, the diction that is far-out fiction, the notion that desire is most beautiful if unspoken and only fantasized, but there is a persistent hint throughout this adagio that if one day the desires are realized, heaven and earth will collide, and tears of both and joy will be shed over the realization that her life and mine would have been magical if we had had some emotional courage and daring. But how could I when I was a man of conscience and unfailing morality and responsibility. Life was not lived just for me. At heart and contrary to popular misconception, I was never selfish. I wish I had been. Yes, I wish I would just live for myself, and for nobody else.
February 13, 2013
For years I have been wondering if my life is characterized by chaos giving rise to occasional magic or it is simply turbulence which will end with noisy, assertive madness. Having just written the preceding absolutely breath-taking, beautiful sentence, I must say--- in all candor and clarity, and not with a whisper and whisker of hubris---that it is the case of the former. So armed with that sweet, soothing, self-serving solace, I am going to take a respite from self-consciousness and embrace sleep.
Yesterday was a magical day. I saw her again after an absence (enforced and self-imposed) of ten years. She looked good, considering her age. The charm, the vivaciousness, and the kindness were intact. Even though the weather was quite bad (cold and drizzling) my spirits were not dampened. In fact, joy was percolating inside me, but I didn't show it. I was cool and let fantasy sweep me to the open sea where I was drifting in a serenity that was best described as an amalgam of detachment and assuaged ego. It was then I realized in the matter of the heart, unspoken desires that reveal themselves only through sweet smiles and occasional quick glances, enhanced by febrile, feverish imagination are the type of desires I live for and dream of. Meanwhile I am working on my body and mind and finance to make me eternally desirable to the day I die.
Today is just another day to keep the unspoken desires at bay even though tomorrow will be Valentine's Day. I hope I didn't fall short of the rhythm achieved by the choice of words. This piece is like a symphony if the words are read aloud: the alliteration, the long sentences full of rhymed words, the mood conveyed by concrete, image-building terms, the diction that is far-out fiction, the notion that desire is most beautiful if unspoken and only fantasized, but there is a persistent hint throughout this adagio that if one day the desires are realized, heaven and earth will collide, and tears of both and joy will be shed over the realization that her life and mine would have been magical if we had had some emotional courage and daring. But how could I when I was a man of conscience and unfailing morality and responsibility. Life was not lived just for me. At heart and contrary to popular misconception, I was never selfish. I wish I had been. Yes, I wish I would just live for myself, and for nobody else.
February 13, 2013
Words, Masks, and Conscience
Recently I took the liberty to elucidate the difference between idiocy and ignorance in the interest of arriving at the truths and of emphasizing that words do matter and each word has its own dominion of meanings. I did not do that as an attempt to assassinate anybody's character or to denigrate his mental capability although I was tempted to extend the elucidation to illustrate how two, maybe three, stupid assholes of a certain forum did deserve the labels of idiots and ignoramuses.
As a student of words and languages, besides being a man humbled by my own limited intelligence and vast ignorance, I have a serious attitude regarding the precision of words employed and the sanctity of truths and logic in all forms of communication. I wish others had had similar attitude, but we are all different and some of us do have a fantasy that we are better than we actually are, but realities always rear their ugly heads. Our consciences are the gatekeepers of our souls. Sometimes our consciences are at odds with what (yes, more what than who) we think we are, especially in the wee hours of the morning when sleep plays hard to get.
What really has been nauseating me is seeing recalcitrant idiots and hopeless ignoramuses resort to snide character attacks and outright lies to get back to me, instead of answering my points which were really unassailable. Those fuckers and assholes got into an argument with me in order to try to make themselves look good in the forum, and not to go after truths and verities. They were really stupid dumb asses and unenlightened scumbags. They were really a waste of my time. The sole reason I took the trouble to "debate" with them was to unmask them so everybody in the forum would see them for what they really were: a bunch of ignorant and idiotic animals. I killed them with my words so I did not have to kill them with my gun.
As a student of words and languages, besides being a man humbled by my own limited intelligence and vast ignorance, I have a serious attitude regarding the precision of words employed and the sanctity of truths and logic in all forms of communication. I wish others had had similar attitude, but we are all different and some of us do have a fantasy that we are better than we actually are, but realities always rear their ugly heads. Our consciences are the gatekeepers of our souls. Sometimes our consciences are at odds with what (yes, more what than who) we think we are, especially in the wee hours of the morning when sleep plays hard to get.
What really has been nauseating me is seeing recalcitrant idiots and hopeless ignoramuses resort to snide character attacks and outright lies to get back to me, instead of answering my points which were really unassailable. Those fuckers and assholes got into an argument with me in order to try to make themselves look good in the forum, and not to go after truths and verities. They were really stupid dumb asses and unenlightened scumbags. They were really a waste of my time. The sole reason I took the trouble to "debate" with them was to unmask them so everybody in the forum would see them for what they really were: a bunch of ignorant and idiotic animals. I killed them with my words so I did not have to kill them with my gun.
Monday, February 11, 2013
Here's why attacking John Kerry by recalcitrant idiots was wrong
Kerry was and still is a good man, who was bothered by the asymmetrical damage inflicted by the United States on Vietnamese land and the Vietnamese people who didn't pose an existential threat to the American people. His anti-war activism was aimed at a cessation of such damage, not by an ideological fondness of communism. Therefore, to think "he was and still is the enemy of the South Vietnamese people" is wrong and absurd and extreme.
Proper/true thinking is hard work. One must be aware of the emotional pitfalls involved in the process of thinking. Just because the VC leaders are bad and because we really hate them, that does not mean that in order to get rid of them, any measure would do, including bombing Vietnam back to Stone Age or stopping all aid to the Vietnamese populace who have nothing to do with the VC leaders and who just happen to be their victims or sarcastically and rhetorically asking any Viet expatriate who does not agree with our extreme "thinking" to go back and live "with" the VC and VCP (Vietnamese Communist Party). Such thinking is roundly ridiculed in the common folks' sayings:
"To cut off one's nose to spite one's face".
"To throw the baby out along with the (used) bathwater".
Extreme thinking backed by persistent noisiness does not mean it has merits.
Any Vietnamese neophyte in politics, unless he's a recalcitrant idiot, would be wise to find ways to work with a former peace activist now turned Secretary of State of a superpower on this planet in the hopes of preventing China from taking over Vietnam outright, instead of demonizing him and calling him with very impolite names.
Proper/true thinking is hard work. One must be aware of the emotional pitfalls involved in the process of thinking. Just because the VC leaders are bad and because we really hate them, that does not mean that in order to get rid of them, any measure would do, including bombing Vietnam back to Stone Age or stopping all aid to the Vietnamese populace who have nothing to do with the VC leaders and who just happen to be their victims or sarcastically and rhetorically asking any Viet expatriate who does not agree with our extreme "thinking" to go back and live "with" the VC and VCP (Vietnamese Communist Party). Such thinking is roundly ridiculed in the common folks' sayings:
"To cut off one's nose to spite one's face".
"To throw the baby out along with the (used) bathwater".
Extreme thinking backed by persistent noisiness does not mean it has merits.
Any Vietnamese neophyte in politics, unless he's a recalcitrant idiot, would be wise to find ways to work with a former peace activist now turned Secretary of State of a superpower on this planet in the hopes of preventing China from taking over Vietnam outright, instead of demonizing him and calling him with very impolite names.
Sunday, February 10, 2013
Tôn Giáo, Chân Lý, và Lẽ Sống
1. Tôi xin có nhận xét sau:
a. Bàn về tôn giáo mà không có căn bản về Triết, logic, history, meditation, neuroscience (especially the neural basis of belief, disbelief, and uncertainty), và cognitive science thì chả đi đến đâu.
b. Ngược lại lời dạy dỗ của nhiều tôn giáo, Con Người tạo ra Thượng Đế để giải thích sự việc chớ không phải là Thượng Đế tạo ra Con Người.
c. Tôn giáo (trong đó bao gồm kinh kệ) là sản phẩm của Con Người. Con Người không hoàn hảo, thì sản phẩm của con người không hoàn hảo. Nếu tự cho một tôn giáo nào đó là hoàn hảo và phản ảnh chân lý bất di bất dịch là chưa biết tí gì về lý luận và sử và đã bị nhồi sọ tẩy não mà không biết.
2. Tôi xin kèm theo đây bài "tiểu luận" có gián tiếp liên quan đến sự bàn bạc.
Certain Meditations on the First Day of Lunar New Year
Ego is a double-edged knife. It can cut through ignorance or it can be used to kill ourselves because we are too weak to change for the better even though we think we have pride.
True pride means the ability to face realities, not the propensity to get mad at those who hurt our feelings because they dare to speak the truths as they see them.
It's funny to realize how we often deceive ourselves into thinking that if something happens or does not happen, we won’t be able to live with ourselves. The truth is that we do have a choice. Choice means options and that's where the danger comes in. We, as humans contrary to lower forms of life, do love have choices and options and freedoms. It does not matter what happens or does not happen to us. What matters is how we react to it. We must find a way to accept it and move on. By doing so we learn to live with ourselves first. The hell with the notion if we can live with others. That comes much later.
There are two steps and they are intertwined. It does not matter which step comes first.
First, we must like and love ourselves enough to live with ourselves.
Second, we must also find the situation in which we find ourselves tolerable enough so we won't kill ourselves. Life, at least for humans anyway, is the process to find meaning of our own existence. That is to say, we must find the purpose of why we live: there are goals to live for and ways to get there.
Have you ever wondered why certain, if not most, lepers and beggars and horribly deformed human individuals don't kill themselves while seemingly healthy and even well-off individuals decided to either kill themselves outright or kill themselves slowly by having self-destructive behavior? The answer is that the former group manages to find meaning in their seemingly pointless existence while the latter only finds meaninglessness.
I think most humans don't really think about these existential issues too much because they go through life by default. They rely on religious injunctions or exhortations as guideposts. They cannot or won't think for themselves because thinking is hard work and dangerous. They rely on feeling. Feeling acts a guide in their decision to live or die. Thinking means there is a drive towards truths and real, logical, and scientific answers. It also means there is an insatiable curiosity about the future and a desire to meet challenges.
Wissai
February 10, 2013
a. Bàn về tôn giáo mà không có căn bản về Triết, logic, history, meditation, neuroscience (especially the neural basis of belief, disbelief, and uncertainty), và cognitive science thì chả đi đến đâu.
b. Ngược lại lời dạy dỗ của nhiều tôn giáo, Con Người tạo ra Thượng Đế để giải thích sự việc chớ không phải là Thượng Đế tạo ra Con Người.
c. Tôn giáo (trong đó bao gồm kinh kệ) là sản phẩm của Con Người. Con Người không hoàn hảo, thì sản phẩm của con người không hoàn hảo. Nếu tự cho một tôn giáo nào đó là hoàn hảo và phản ảnh chân lý bất di bất dịch là chưa biết tí gì về lý luận và sử và đã bị nhồi sọ tẩy não mà không biết.
2. Tôi xin kèm theo đây bài "tiểu luận" có gián tiếp liên quan đến sự bàn bạc.
Certain Meditations on the First Day of Lunar New Year
Ego is a double-edged knife. It can cut through ignorance or it can be used to kill ourselves because we are too weak to change for the better even though we think we have pride.
True pride means the ability to face realities, not the propensity to get mad at those who hurt our feelings because they dare to speak the truths as they see them.
It's funny to realize how we often deceive ourselves into thinking that if something happens or does not happen, we won’t be able to live with ourselves. The truth is that we do have a choice. Choice means options and that's where the danger comes in. We, as humans contrary to lower forms of life, do love have choices and options and freedoms. It does not matter what happens or does not happen to us. What matters is how we react to it. We must find a way to accept it and move on. By doing so we learn to live with ourselves first. The hell with the notion if we can live with others. That comes much later.
There are two steps and they are intertwined. It does not matter which step comes first.
First, we must like and love ourselves enough to live with ourselves.
Second, we must also find the situation in which we find ourselves tolerable enough so we won't kill ourselves. Life, at least for humans anyway, is the process to find meaning of our own existence. That is to say, we must find the purpose of why we live: there are goals to live for and ways to get there.
Have you ever wondered why certain, if not most, lepers and beggars and horribly deformed human individuals don't kill themselves while seemingly healthy and even well-off individuals decided to either kill themselves outright or kill themselves slowly by having self-destructive behavior? The answer is that the former group manages to find meaning in their seemingly pointless existence while the latter only finds meaninglessness.
I think most humans don't really think about these existential issues too much because they go through life by default. They rely on religious injunctions or exhortations as guideposts. They cannot or won't think for themselves because thinking is hard work and dangerous. They rely on feeling. Feeling acts a guide in their decision to live or die. Thinking means there is a drive towards truths and real, logical, and scientific answers. It also means there is an insatiable curiosity about the future and a desire to meet challenges.
Wissai
February 10, 2013
Ngôn Từ và Đức Hạnh
Ngôn Từ và Đức Hạnh
Từ xa xưa cha mẹ thường dạy dỗ
Người sao văn thế ngôn từ cẩn thận
Ăn nói khéo kẻo con sẽ đau khổ
Vì tiểu nhân trong lòng đầy thù hận
Cha mẹ dạy thế nhưng tôi cứng đầu và mang hai cái nghiệp là quá cho cái tôi hơn xa cái tôi của nhiều chúng sinh và có cái miệng hay nói sự thật. Càng giao du với cái gọi là loài người, tôi càng thấy tôi rất may mắn không giống như đa số bọn có hình dáng con người nhưng lòng dạ hèn và ác hơn dã thú.
Nếu kể ra đây từng thí dụ về hành động và ngôn từ của chúng nó để chứng minh sự nhận xét của tôi về đức hạnh của chúng là đúng và có bằng cớ thì đâu có hay ho gì mà lại thiên hạ hiểu lầm cho tôi là ta đây.
Tôi không biết chúng nó tồi tệ như vậy vì bẩm sinh di truyền hay thiếu giáo dục gia đình hoặc thiếu khả năng cầu tiến, hay là vì hậu quả dồn lại cả ba yếu tố trên.
Tôi không biết chúng nó có biết hành động của chúng nó chỉ mang tới sự khinh khi của giới bàng quan.
Tôi không biết chúng nó có bao giờ tự khinh khi chúng nó không.
Tôi suy nghĩ mải và tạm đưa đến một kết luận là chúng hành động thấp kém vì chúng hèn và sợ sự thật. Chúng hèn vì khi viết trên diễn đàn, chúng bóp méo sự thật và đôi khi lại đặt chuyện để ai không theo dõi dữ kiện hoặc không đọc kỹ cách "lý luận" ấu trỉ của chúng thì sẽ cho chúng là phải hoặc là nạn nhân. Đúng là đồ thú vật hèn nhát nhưng thích rống và khóc lóc than thở ai oán như đĩ già mồm cố găng bào chữa rằng mình gái con trinh! Như tôi đã trình bày ở trên, càng tiếp xúc với chúng, càng thấy rõ thú tánh của bọn côn đồ có tí học vấn. Có học nhưng không phải là chúng khôn hay thông minh đâu. Chúng ngu si và dốt nát dễ sợ. Ráng học cho có mảnh bằng rồi chữ trả lại cho thầy, có bao giờ phát triển trí tuệ bằng cách đọc sách đâu. Suốt ngày chỉ kiếm tiền, tối đến thì ôm vợ sau khi nhậu nhẹt với bạn bè.Thế thì ngu và dốt là phải rồi.
Hôm nay là ngày 30 Tết, tôi tự nhủ là tôi sẽ không để bọn tiểu nhân thấp hèn, dốt mà hay nói chữ, láo khoét, ham danh ham tiếng, xỏ lá ba que, thiếu giáo dục gia đình, sử dụng ngôn từ hàng tôm hàng cá của dân ở Chợ Cầu Ông Lãnh, làm xáo trộn tâm hồn tôi trong 2013 và về sau.
Tôi hy vọng với bài "tiểu luận" nầy, chúng nó không còn ngu ngốc nghĩ rằng tôi không thể diễn tả tư tưởng tôi bằng tiếng Việt.
Wissai
February 9, 2013
Từ xa xưa cha mẹ thường dạy dỗ
Người sao văn thế ngôn từ cẩn thận
Ăn nói khéo kẻo con sẽ đau khổ
Vì tiểu nhân trong lòng đầy thù hận
Cha mẹ dạy thế nhưng tôi cứng đầu và mang hai cái nghiệp là quá cho cái tôi hơn xa cái tôi của nhiều chúng sinh và có cái miệng hay nói sự thật. Càng giao du với cái gọi là loài người, tôi càng thấy tôi rất may mắn không giống như đa số bọn có hình dáng con người nhưng lòng dạ hèn và ác hơn dã thú.
Nếu kể ra đây từng thí dụ về hành động và ngôn từ của chúng nó để chứng minh sự nhận xét của tôi về đức hạnh của chúng là đúng và có bằng cớ thì đâu có hay ho gì mà lại thiên hạ hiểu lầm cho tôi là ta đây.
Tôi không biết chúng nó tồi tệ như vậy vì bẩm sinh di truyền hay thiếu giáo dục gia đình hoặc thiếu khả năng cầu tiến, hay là vì hậu quả dồn lại cả ba yếu tố trên.
Tôi không biết chúng nó có biết hành động của chúng nó chỉ mang tới sự khinh khi của giới bàng quan.
Tôi không biết chúng nó có bao giờ tự khinh khi chúng nó không.
Tôi suy nghĩ mải và tạm đưa đến một kết luận là chúng hành động thấp kém vì chúng hèn và sợ sự thật. Chúng hèn vì khi viết trên diễn đàn, chúng bóp méo sự thật và đôi khi lại đặt chuyện để ai không theo dõi dữ kiện hoặc không đọc kỹ cách "lý luận" ấu trỉ của chúng thì sẽ cho chúng là phải hoặc là nạn nhân. Đúng là đồ thú vật hèn nhát nhưng thích rống và khóc lóc than thở ai oán như đĩ già mồm cố găng bào chữa rằng mình gái con trinh! Như tôi đã trình bày ở trên, càng tiếp xúc với chúng, càng thấy rõ thú tánh của bọn côn đồ có tí học vấn. Có học nhưng không phải là chúng khôn hay thông minh đâu. Chúng ngu si và dốt nát dễ sợ. Ráng học cho có mảnh bằng rồi chữ trả lại cho thầy, có bao giờ phát triển trí tuệ bằng cách đọc sách đâu. Suốt ngày chỉ kiếm tiền, tối đến thì ôm vợ sau khi nhậu nhẹt với bạn bè.Thế thì ngu và dốt là phải rồi.
Hôm nay là ngày 30 Tết, tôi tự nhủ là tôi sẽ không để bọn tiểu nhân thấp hèn, dốt mà hay nói chữ, láo khoét, ham danh ham tiếng, xỏ lá ba que, thiếu giáo dục gia đình, sử dụng ngôn từ hàng tôm hàng cá của dân ở Chợ Cầu Ông Lãnh, làm xáo trộn tâm hồn tôi trong 2013 và về sau.
Tôi hy vọng với bài "tiểu luận" nầy, chúng nó không còn ngu ngốc nghĩ rằng tôi không thể diễn tả tư tưởng tôi bằng tiếng Việt.
Wissai
February 9, 2013
We Live in Water, NYT Book Review
Hard-Luck Cases
‘We Live in Water: Stories,’ by Jess Walter
By ALLISON GLOCK
Published: February 8, 2013
The men in Jess Walter’s pungent new story collection, “We Live in Water,” are coming apart. These men — and they are exclusively men, save a few catalytic female characters — are what society (and ex-wives) commonly label disappointments. Trading in ill-considered choices, they have made a habit of letting folks down — their women, their kids, their friends, their creditors and, chiefly, themselves. Walter’s protagonists endure a buffet of self- inflicted misfortune, everything from meth addiction to dodgy parenting, often served in a combo platter with a side of unlucky in love. His characters are all searching, with varying levels of commitment and insight. None succeed.
Instead, after years of deflecting criticism and judgment in favor of ego puffing, serial infidelities and soothing, mind- addling chemical baths, they finally hit the wall of recognition when it is too late — their girl is gone for good, their son eyes them with intractable pity, they are about to be beaten to death and tossed in a lake. Unlike what one is taught in therapy, their aha moments bring little comfort or joy. No one in Walter’s stories is made whole by epiphany. No one rushes out and buys an elliptical trainer or bran flakes. When self-awareness comes, as it does for a recovering addict named Bit in the opening story, “Anything Helps,” it offers only more gristle to choke down.
“Why can’t we be the things that we see and think? Why do we always have to be these sad stories?” Bit laments in group, still clinging to his survivalist, alcoholic charm. At the end, after an enervating exchange with his estranged pubescent son, now living in foster care with well- meaning but simple Christians, Bit’s enlightenment leaves him longing for death, believing all anyone becomes is “a twitching bunch of memories and mistakes, regrets.”
All of which is to say, this is not “Beautiful Ruins” — more just ruin; beauty here is something for suckers. Not that the book is a downer. Well, maybe a little. But that’s only because Walter is unflinching and, possibly, a bit depressed, which is what happens to any compassionate, reasonable person who stares too closely at the world. (As Walter does to captivating effect in “Statistical Abstract for My Hometown, Spokane, Washington,” which juxtaposes a running bit about bike theft with gut-punching observations about poverty and spousal abuse.) Walter makes you laugh, then makes you feel a little queasy about it. This is the alchemy of the damned.
Any wisdom, when it comes, comes from children — or rather, from the loss of their innocence and our observation of it. We see children in dire straits, children of tweakers, gamblers and other fallen men, and then we see what becomes of these kids when they too have grown, and reached, and failed.
Wade, a white-collar criminal sentenced to a pilot program tutoring second graders and sophomores, must read the same book every time to his student Drew, a waif with no healthy male role models in his impecunious life.
“Don’t you want to bring another book?” Wade asks.
Drew demurs, says he doesn’t know what’s in those other books.
“Isn’t that the fun, finding out?”
Drew remains dubious. He knows better. How for most of the planet, “finding out” is rarely fun. How when life is at its harshest, knowing exactly what the ending will be counts more than a hot dinner.
The last five pages of the book Wade reads to Drew contain no words. They are, Walter writes, the pages the boy likes best.
It is a moment of exquisite empathy. The stillness of the scene, a child safe on a man’s lap, transported, if only for a few minutes, is devastating. It calls to mind both the unparalleled power of stories and their limitations. (Few are the writers who appreciate how, not just for some things but for most things that matter, there are no words.)
Walter provides a few respites from the enticing murk. The naïve stalker in “Virgo” who alters horoscopes to manipulate his lover’s moods is funny and pitiful, as is the narrator of the zombie apocalypse romp, “Don’t Eat Cat,” who rightfully declaims: “Sure, the world seems crazy now. But wouldn’t it seem just as crazy if you were alive when they sacrificed peasants, when people were born into slavery, when they killed firstborn sons . . . ” And on and on, summarizing, “Maybe it’s always the end of the world.”
This is funny because it’s true, and horrible because it’s true, and funny because it’s horrible, and so on, forever.
Fortunately, Walter is a bighearted man who excels at writing about other bighearted, if broken, men. That generosity of spirit, coupled with Walter’s seeming inability to look away from the messy bits, elevates these stories from dirges to symphonies. For Walter, we do live in water, an immense soup of muddled humanity sloshing around and spilling over, soaking us all. Everything is a reflection of everything else, with no such thing as disconnection. Or isolation. Or edges. Or solid ground.
“Whole worlds exist beneath the surface,” thinks the lost son in the title story as he stares into a still lake. “And maybe you can’t see down there . . . but there’s a part of you that knows.”
Walter does see down there. He understands that no matter how often we insist we won’t be able to live with ourselves, we really have no other choice. It’s sink or swim.
Allison Glock, the author of the memoir “Beauty Before Comfort,” is a contributing editor for Garden & Gun magazine. She is at work on a poetry collection and, with her husband, a young adult novel.
‘We Live in Water: Stories,’ by Jess Walter
By ALLISON GLOCK
Published: February 8, 2013
The men in Jess Walter’s pungent new story collection, “We Live in Water,” are coming apart. These men — and they are exclusively men, save a few catalytic female characters — are what society (and ex-wives) commonly label disappointments. Trading in ill-considered choices, they have made a habit of letting folks down — their women, their kids, their friends, their creditors and, chiefly, themselves. Walter’s protagonists endure a buffet of self- inflicted misfortune, everything from meth addiction to dodgy parenting, often served in a combo platter with a side of unlucky in love. His characters are all searching, with varying levels of commitment and insight. None succeed.
Instead, after years of deflecting criticism and judgment in favor of ego puffing, serial infidelities and soothing, mind- addling chemical baths, they finally hit the wall of recognition when it is too late — their girl is gone for good, their son eyes them with intractable pity, they are about to be beaten to death and tossed in a lake. Unlike what one is taught in therapy, their aha moments bring little comfort or joy. No one in Walter’s stories is made whole by epiphany. No one rushes out and buys an elliptical trainer or bran flakes. When self-awareness comes, as it does for a recovering addict named Bit in the opening story, “Anything Helps,” it offers only more gristle to choke down.
“Why can’t we be the things that we see and think? Why do we always have to be these sad stories?” Bit laments in group, still clinging to his survivalist, alcoholic charm. At the end, after an enervating exchange with his estranged pubescent son, now living in foster care with well- meaning but simple Christians, Bit’s enlightenment leaves him longing for death, believing all anyone becomes is “a twitching bunch of memories and mistakes, regrets.”
All of which is to say, this is not “Beautiful Ruins” — more just ruin; beauty here is something for suckers. Not that the book is a downer. Well, maybe a little. But that’s only because Walter is unflinching and, possibly, a bit depressed, which is what happens to any compassionate, reasonable person who stares too closely at the world. (As Walter does to captivating effect in “Statistical Abstract for My Hometown, Spokane, Washington,” which juxtaposes a running bit about bike theft with gut-punching observations about poverty and spousal abuse.) Walter makes you laugh, then makes you feel a little queasy about it. This is the alchemy of the damned.
Any wisdom, when it comes, comes from children — or rather, from the loss of their innocence and our observation of it. We see children in dire straits, children of tweakers, gamblers and other fallen men, and then we see what becomes of these kids when they too have grown, and reached, and failed.
Wade, a white-collar criminal sentenced to a pilot program tutoring second graders and sophomores, must read the same book every time to his student Drew, a waif with no healthy male role models in his impecunious life.
“Don’t you want to bring another book?” Wade asks.
Drew demurs, says he doesn’t know what’s in those other books.
“Isn’t that the fun, finding out?”
Drew remains dubious. He knows better. How for most of the planet, “finding out” is rarely fun. How when life is at its harshest, knowing exactly what the ending will be counts more than a hot dinner.
The last five pages of the book Wade reads to Drew contain no words. They are, Walter writes, the pages the boy likes best.
It is a moment of exquisite empathy. The stillness of the scene, a child safe on a man’s lap, transported, if only for a few minutes, is devastating. It calls to mind both the unparalleled power of stories and their limitations. (Few are the writers who appreciate how, not just for some things but for most things that matter, there are no words.)
Walter provides a few respites from the enticing murk. The naïve stalker in “Virgo” who alters horoscopes to manipulate his lover’s moods is funny and pitiful, as is the narrator of the zombie apocalypse romp, “Don’t Eat Cat,” who rightfully declaims: “Sure, the world seems crazy now. But wouldn’t it seem just as crazy if you were alive when they sacrificed peasants, when people were born into slavery, when they killed firstborn sons . . . ” And on and on, summarizing, “Maybe it’s always the end of the world.”
This is funny because it’s true, and horrible because it’s true, and funny because it’s horrible, and so on, forever.
Fortunately, Walter is a bighearted man who excels at writing about other bighearted, if broken, men. That generosity of spirit, coupled with Walter’s seeming inability to look away from the messy bits, elevates these stories from dirges to symphonies. For Walter, we do live in water, an immense soup of muddled humanity sloshing around and spilling over, soaking us all. Everything is a reflection of everything else, with no such thing as disconnection. Or isolation. Or edges. Or solid ground.
“Whole worlds exist beneath the surface,” thinks the lost son in the title story as he stares into a still lake. “And maybe you can’t see down there . . . but there’s a part of you that knows.”
Walter does see down there. He understands that no matter how often we insist we won’t be able to live with ourselves, we really have no other choice. It’s sink or swim.
Allison Glock, the author of the memoir “Beauty Before Comfort,” is a contributing editor for Garden & Gun magazine. She is at work on a poetry collection and, with her husband, a young adult novel.
Saturday, February 2, 2013
Artists, Thinkers, Morality, and Politics
Artists, Thinkers, Morality, and Politics
I have been surprised at the somewhat mild reactions of those who burden themselves with a task of passing severe unfavorable judgments on the decisions of various aging Vietnamese expatriate singers and musicians who opted for a return to their homeland in order to practice their craft before a much larger---hence more lucrative---and still adoring audience, to the recent death of Pham Duy, a titan among Vietnamese musicians, who, along with Duy Quang, his son and a singer, caused a storm of controversy and a flood of ill-tempered and self-righteous ink from self-appointed moralists and self-regarded sage political commentators when these two artists chose to come back to Vietnam.
I am of an opinion that artists have a right to practice their craft (it's hard to make money off art) wherever they feel like it as long as they don't prostitute themselves into servicing any ulterior political aims such as glorifying the repressive regime in power. Certainly, Pham Duy and Duy Quang, and Khanh Ly for that matter, did not do that. Those who have attacked them are small-minded, self-righteous little ignorant monsters and intellectual nitwits who cannot think in a proper manner. In addition, very probably the attackers don't possess an ounce of artistic sensibilities or an iota of original thinking in them.
Artists and thinkers should be primarily measured by the extent they have contributed to the aesthetics and richness of thoughts of the human race, not by their alleged transgressions of the morals and politics of the day unless the transgressions are of heinous and revolting nature.
Heidegger was pro-Nazi, but that didn't diminish his stature as a premier thinker. According to Wikipedia:
"Martin Heidegger (1889-1976) has been considered by many to be one of the titans of twentieth century philosophy. His international reputation was assured with the publication in 1927 of Being and Time, a book that was characterized by the young Jurgen Habermas as 'the most significant philosophical event since Hegel's Phänomenologie ...' The success of Being and Time was immediate and its influence pervasive. Many currents of contemporary thought over the past 70 years have been inspired by and in some cases directly derived from the work of Heidegger. Among these we can mention existentialism, hermeneutics, postmodernism, eco-feminism, and various trends in psychology, theology and literature. His writings have influenced thinkers as diverse as Herbert Marcuse, Jean-Paul Sartre, Jacques Derrida, Paul Tillich and countless others. Heidegger's distinguished career as professor of philosophy at the University of Freiburg was marred by a singular event in his life. After Hitler's seizure of power in 1933 Heidegger the world-renowned philosopher became Heidegger the Nazi, holding membership card number 312589..."
Sartre was a notorious womanizer. He was drawn to teenagers. Sartre even slept with his adopted daughter. Camus was no better, but his wife, Francine, unlike Sartre's long-term companion, Simone de Beauvoir, didn't reciprocate the infidelity. Both Sartre and Camus were Nobel Prize winners
Picasso was also a legendary womanizer and cruel to his mistresses. Picasso needed no introduction.
From this side of the Atlantic, we had Erza Pound, to whom T.S. Eliot dedicated his monumental poem, The Waste Land, which began with the immortal lines:
" April is the cruellest month, breeding
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
Memory and desire, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain..."
and who was a supporter of Italian Fascism, but his name will be likely to live on in American Literature while his politics would be regarded as an errant episode of an unbalanced, but brilliant mind. Here was how his friend Ernest Hemingway remembered him, "He defends [his friends] when they are attacked, he gets them into magazines and out of jail. ... He writes articles about them. He introduces them to wealthy women. He gets publishers to take their books. He sits up all night with them when they claim to be dying ... he advances them hospital expenses and dissuades them from suicide." I would be honored to have a man such as Erza Pound to be my friend.
And finally, we had J.D. Salinger, about whom I did a preliminary thesis in my salad days, sexually involved with an 18-year-old Joyce Maynard when he was 53 years of age for ten months. Salinger's attraction to young girls was probably foretold in his classic story, "For Esmé- with Love and Squalor". Salinger was an important minor writer. His first novel, "Catcher in the Rye" and his collection of short stories, "Nine Stories" have brought solace, comfort, and pleasure to teenagers and adults alike.
My point in writing this short piece was to stress that artists and thinkers are human, and as humans, they are not perfect. In addition, they were not born to please their detractors. They were born to actualize their potential. Their primary obligation is to themselves and to the arts and the thoughts that concern them. The famous and talented ones certainly did actualize their potential. Some of them might have committed acts that conventional and humdrum minds deem morally and politically offensive, but on balance their existence on this planet was still much more meaningful and beneficial to the human race than that of their self-righteous detractors who usually are absolutely nobodies, but love to make noises so they could feel better about themselves.
Wissai
January 31, 2013
I have been surprised at the somewhat mild reactions of those who burden themselves with a task of passing severe unfavorable judgments on the decisions of various aging Vietnamese expatriate singers and musicians who opted for a return to their homeland in order to practice their craft before a much larger---hence more lucrative---and still adoring audience, to the recent death of Pham Duy, a titan among Vietnamese musicians, who, along with Duy Quang, his son and a singer, caused a storm of controversy and a flood of ill-tempered and self-righteous ink from self-appointed moralists and self-regarded sage political commentators when these two artists chose to come back to Vietnam.
I am of an opinion that artists have a right to practice their craft (it's hard to make money off art) wherever they feel like it as long as they don't prostitute themselves into servicing any ulterior political aims such as glorifying the repressive regime in power. Certainly, Pham Duy and Duy Quang, and Khanh Ly for that matter, did not do that. Those who have attacked them are small-minded, self-righteous little ignorant monsters and intellectual nitwits who cannot think in a proper manner. In addition, very probably the attackers don't possess an ounce of artistic sensibilities or an iota of original thinking in them.
Artists and thinkers should be primarily measured by the extent they have contributed to the aesthetics and richness of thoughts of the human race, not by their alleged transgressions of the morals and politics of the day unless the transgressions are of heinous and revolting nature.
Heidegger was pro-Nazi, but that didn't diminish his stature as a premier thinker. According to Wikipedia:
"Martin Heidegger (1889-1976) has been considered by many to be one of the titans of twentieth century philosophy. His international reputation was assured with the publication in 1927 of Being and Time, a book that was characterized by the young Jurgen Habermas as 'the most significant philosophical event since Hegel's Phänomenologie ...' The success of Being and Time was immediate and its influence pervasive. Many currents of contemporary thought over the past 70 years have been inspired by and in some cases directly derived from the work of Heidegger. Among these we can mention existentialism, hermeneutics, postmodernism, eco-feminism, and various trends in psychology, theology and literature. His writings have influenced thinkers as diverse as Herbert Marcuse, Jean-Paul Sartre, Jacques Derrida, Paul Tillich and countless others. Heidegger's distinguished career as professor of philosophy at the University of Freiburg was marred by a singular event in his life. After Hitler's seizure of power in 1933 Heidegger the world-renowned philosopher became Heidegger the Nazi, holding membership card number 312589..."
Sartre was a notorious womanizer. He was drawn to teenagers. Sartre even slept with his adopted daughter. Camus was no better, but his wife, Francine, unlike Sartre's long-term companion, Simone de Beauvoir, didn't reciprocate the infidelity. Both Sartre and Camus were Nobel Prize winners
Picasso was also a legendary womanizer and cruel to his mistresses. Picasso needed no introduction.
From this side of the Atlantic, we had Erza Pound, to whom T.S. Eliot dedicated his monumental poem, The Waste Land, which began with the immortal lines:
" April is the cruellest month, breeding
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
Memory and desire, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain..."
and who was a supporter of Italian Fascism, but his name will be likely to live on in American Literature while his politics would be regarded as an errant episode of an unbalanced, but brilliant mind. Here was how his friend Ernest Hemingway remembered him, "He defends [his friends] when they are attacked, he gets them into magazines and out of jail. ... He writes articles about them. He introduces them to wealthy women. He gets publishers to take their books. He sits up all night with them when they claim to be dying ... he advances them hospital expenses and dissuades them from suicide." I would be honored to have a man such as Erza Pound to be my friend.
And finally, we had J.D. Salinger, about whom I did a preliminary thesis in my salad days, sexually involved with an 18-year-old Joyce Maynard when he was 53 years of age for ten months. Salinger's attraction to young girls was probably foretold in his classic story, "For Esmé- with Love and Squalor". Salinger was an important minor writer. His first novel, "Catcher in the Rye" and his collection of short stories, "Nine Stories" have brought solace, comfort, and pleasure to teenagers and adults alike.
My point in writing this short piece was to stress that artists and thinkers are human, and as humans, they are not perfect. In addition, they were not born to please their detractors. They were born to actualize their potential. Their primary obligation is to themselves and to the arts and the thoughts that concern them. The famous and talented ones certainly did actualize their potential. Some of them might have committed acts that conventional and humdrum minds deem morally and politically offensive, but on balance their existence on this planet was still much more meaningful and beneficial to the human race than that of their self-righteous detractors who usually are absolutely nobodies, but love to make noises so they could feel better about themselves.
Wissai
January 31, 2013
Đĩ Già Mồm (Stubbornness of an Old Whore)
Đĩ Già Mồm (Stubbornness of an Old Whore)
The Vietnamese language has the phrase "Đĩ Già Mồm" which literally means "an old whore who relies on long speech to defend herself". It is an expression of contempt, directed to both men and women given to a bad habit of shameless lying and rationalization in the service of winning an argument or saving face. In a forum of which I am a member, I know there are three dudes of this despicable nature. Of course, I hold these sorry animals in complete contempt. They deep down have no sense of honor nor respect for themselves.
(to be continued)
The Vietnamese language has the phrase "Đĩ Già Mồm" which literally means "an old whore who relies on long speech to defend herself". It is an expression of contempt, directed to both men and women given to a bad habit of shameless lying and rationalization in the service of winning an argument or saving face. In a forum of which I am a member, I know there are three dudes of this despicable nature. Of course, I hold these sorry animals in complete contempt. They deep down have no sense of honor nor respect for themselves.
(to be continued)
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