Literary Review of Canada – September 2023: The September issue features Michael Taube on Jason Kenney, the life of Jack Austin, the legacy of a horse racing dynasty, our tenacious statistics bureau, memories of melmac, and Vincent Lam’s latest—with a cover from Alexander MacAskill.
The question is asked all the time, usually in unpoetic moments; it’s an occupational hazard of teaching literature. There I’ll be at the clinic, sinuses on fire, when sure enough the doctor asks, “What’s your favourite book?” My practised answer, no hemming and hawing, is Moby-Dick. Everyone’s heard of it, and it sounds reassuringly substantial. (No one wants to hear a professor say Twilight.) “Oh, Time, Strength, Cash, and Patience,” I’ll mumble to myself as I walk out with my prescription.
From the start, women were at the center of the demonstrations that swept Iran last year. Schoolgirls emerged as an unexpected source of defiant energy.
One morning this past winter, the students at a girls’ high school in Tehran were told that education officials would arrive that week to inspect their classrooms and check compliance with the school’s dress code: specifically, the wearing of the maghnaeh, a hooded veil that became a requirement for schoolgirls in the years after the Iranian Revolution. During lunch, a group of students gathered in the schoolyard. A thirteen-year-old in the seventh grade, whom I’ll call Nina, pressed in to hear what was being said. At the time, mass protests against the government were raging across the country; refusing to wear the veil had become a symbol of the movement. An older girl told the others that it was time for them to join together and make a stand.
The twenty-nine-year-old musician pursues technical, rather than emotional, manipulation with her instrument. She can coax from it the sounds of an accordion, a drum, or a string orchestra.
“Do you listen to Sudan Archives?” Most of the time, but not every time, the response to this question is one of confusion. How can one listen to the archives of a country? Sudan Archives is, in fact, a twenty-nine-year-old musician—a singer, rapper, producer, arranger, lyricist, and violinist. She creates a “fiddle-punk sound,” as she describes it, that blends folk, ambient, soul, house, and whatever other tradition she feels is available for the taking. Sudan (the name that her colleagues, her fans, and, increasingly, her intimates call her) begins composing by striking a riff on one of her five violins, which she uses differently from most other American producers.
The Hunt family owns one of the largest private oil companies in the country. Leah Hunt-Hendrix funds social movements that want to end the use of fossil fuels.
Let’s say you were born into a legacy that is, you have come to believe, ruining the world. What can you do? You could be paralyzed with guilt. You could run away from your legacy, turn inward, cultivate your garden. If you have a lot of money, you could give it away a bit at a time—enough to assuage your conscience, and your annual tax burden, but not enough to hamper your life style—and only to causes (libraries, museums, one or both political parties) that would not make anyone close to you too uncomfortable. Or you could just give it all away—to a blind trust, to the first person you pass on the sidewalk—which would be admirable: a grand gesture of renunciation in exchange for moral purity. But, if you believe that the world is being ruined by structural causes, you will have done little to challenge those structures.
Brücke Films (August 7, 2023) – There are many wonderful places in Kumamoto Prefecture, Japan, where my cabin is located. I will introduce a small portion of them on my own walking tour.
Kikuchi Keikoku (Kikuchi Gorge) is a 4km long gorge located in Aso Kuju National Park. The water runs from the outer rim of the Aso Crater. It is also known as Kikuchi Suigen (water source), and was selected as one of the 100 best waters in Japan
The Globalist Podcast, Monday, August 7 2023: We discuss the events from the Ukraine peace summit in Jeddah and find out about Niger’s emboldened Islamic insurgents following the country’s coup.
Also, the latest fashion news and flick through the day’s papers.
The presidential bid by Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has tested the bonds of an iconic Democratic clan that does not want him to run and does not know what to do about it.
‘We Are Feeling Overpoliced’: State Troopers Join Patrols in Austin
The city ended a partnership with the Texas Department of Public Safety this month after troubling incidents. In response, Gov. Greg Abbott sent in more troopers.
In War on Congestion Pricing, Governor Turns to Courts and Trash Talk
A lawsuit that Gov. Philip Murphy of New Jersey has filed against New York’s congestion pricing plan has reignited a border war and led to charges of hypocrisy.
Insider Business (August 6, 2023) – The US has sent Ukraine millions of 155mm rounds since the war started, including cluster bombs. But there’s a global shortage of 155 shells, and some are afraid that the US is depleting its stockpile. We visited the Scranton Ammunition Plant to see how common shells are made.
Video timeline:0:00 Intro 0:52 Why 155s are so important in Ukraine 2:40 How 155mm shells are made 4:20 History of 155mm shells 4:53 Other expensive weapons NATO has sent Ukraine 5:51 How America is sending cluster bombs during shortage
DW Travel (August 6, 2023) – Berlin is way more then just a party hotspot. DW reporter Hannah Hummel shows you three of her favorite castles in Berlin that you can visit in just one day.
Hannah takes you from the Mediterranean-style Glienicke Palace to the royal baroque Charlottenburg Palace and on to the remote Grunewald Hunting Lodge Palace.
Jits into the Sunset Films (August 6, 2023) – Sitting on the western side of the Himalayas, Bhutan is a Buddhist Kingdom that famously prioritises the happiness of its citizens over national wealth. It is also famous for prioritising its citizens’ happiness over national wealth (GDP).
We were lucky enough to be invited to explore this unique country steeped in history and culture, where a traditional way of life reigns supreme and we were given access to film places cameras have never been before. Join us as we explore a remote indigenous mountain village, meditate with monks, and are welcomed into the homes of locals.
American Heritage Magazine (August 2023) – This World War II issue features ‘Was the Bomb Necessary?’; Struggling to End the War; What were the Japanese Thinking?; Hersey Uncovers the Horror, The Bomb’s Toxic Legacy, and more…
American bombings in Japan, such as the firebombing of Tokyo during Operation Meetinghouse on March 10, 1945, left approximately 84,000 civilians dead. Photo by Ishikawa Koyo
In the spring of 1945, American bombing raids destroyed much of Tokyo and dozens of other Japanese cities, killing at least 200,000 people, without forcing a surrender.
After the bloody battles at Iwo Jima and Okinawa, planners feared as many as two million American deaths if the US invaded the Japanese homeland.
By the summer of 1944, U.S. military power in the Pacific Theater had grown spectacularly. Beginning days after the D-Day invasion in France, American forces launched their largest attacks yet against the Japanese-held islands of Saipan on June 15, Guam on July 21, and Tinian on July 24. Situated 1,200 to 1,500 miles south of Japan in the crescent-shaped archipelago known as the Marianas, they were strategically important, defending the empire’s vital shipping lanes from Asia and preventing increased aerial attacks on the homeland.
Much of the debate over ending the war centered on the role of Emperor Hirohito, the “living deity,” after the conflict. Library of Congress
As defeat became inevitable in the summer of 1945, Japan’s government and the Allies could not agree on surrender terms, especially regarding the future of Emperor Hirohito and his throne.
As the Allied armies closed in on the German capital in 1945, the complications for ending the war in Europe paled, in comparison with the difficulty of forcing a Japanese surrender. For the Japanese military, the concept was unthinkable, a state of mind confirmed by the hundreds of thousands of Japanese servicemen who had already been killed, rather than giving up a hopeless contest.
For the Japanese leadership, the whole strategy of the Pacific war had been predicated on the idea that, after initial victories, a compromise would be reached with the Western enemies to avoid having to fight to a surrender. Switzerland was thought of as a possible neutral intermediary; so, too, the Vatican, for which reason a Japanese diplomatic mission was established there early in the war.
The Japanese government watched the situation in Italy closely, when General Pietro Badoglio became prime minister after the fall of Mussolini’s fascist regime, and remained in power after the Italian surrender in 1943. If Badoglio could modify unconditional surrender by retaining the government and Victor Emmanuel as king, then a “Badoglio” solution in Japan might ensure the survival of its imperial system.
August 6, 2023– Emma Nelson, Damita Pressl and Charles Hecker unpack the weekend’s hottest topics. We also hear from Monocle’s editorial director, Tyler Brûlé, and our Bangkok correspondent, Gwen Robinson.
News, Views and Reviews For The Intellectually Curious
Brücke Films (August 7, 2023) – There are many wonderful places in Kumamoto Prefecture, Japan, where my cabin is located. I will introduce a small portion of them on my own walking tour.
Insider Business
Jits into the Sunset
