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88 posts tagged people
“A Montaigne essay, like a Shakespeare soliloquy, gives us the impression that we are in the presence not of a disembodied, opinion-spouting voice, but of a real person. Long after those essays lost their relevance, long after the second-hand reports from the Americas and meditations on 16th-century French politics ceased to be news, they have maintained their appeal because they are a personality embodied. And the foremost trait of that personality is freedom: freedom to take up and turn over absolutely any subject in human experience, on any prompting or none; to follow any tangent simply because it catches his eye; to begin and end a continent apart, or simply to trail off; to know for the simple sake of knowing. In Montaigne’s day, that freedom was the privilege of an aristocrat. Today, unless we trade it away for a mess of relevance, it’s the birthright of anyone with a high school education and an Internet connection.”
Forget her voice for a minute. Think about what she looked like.
Rail thin, smooth skin, winning smile, mischevious almond-shaped eyes, high cheekbones — she looked like the model she had been. Conventionally and undeniably beautiful. Clive Davis recognized that those physical attributes…
The excellent Caille on Whitney Houston. Caille often posts some of the more interesting photographs you will find on Tumblr.
Paul Wittgenstein (Nov. 5, 1887 to 1961), older brother of philosopher Ludwig.
Photo: Madame D’Ora Atelier
Paul Wittgenstein (Nov. 5, 1887 to 1961), older brother of philosopher Ludwig, was a well-respected concert pianist who lost his right arm in combat in WW I. Nonetheless, he persisted with his musical career, enticing several composers to write concertos for the left arm especially for him.
Most celebrated among these works is that of Maurice Ravel which is still frequently performed by pianists today (one- and two-armed ones alike)…
Photo: Madame D’Ora Atelier
Parenté à plaisanterie
OK. The country of the week this week is Niger. In the midst of preliminary Saturday research (we’re required here at Tragos HQ to finish our investigations into each country by Friday night), I learned that there is such a thing as, “parenté à plaisanterie,” or, “cousinage à plaisanterie,” which I’ll say off the cuff means something like, “kinship joking.”
My sources tell me “kinship joking” is a social practice you mostly find in West Africa where you’re allowed to—maybe supposed to—make fun of your extended family and even other ethnic groups. Consequence free. It’s a license to mock, and all for the sake of “décrispation sociale,” which you could say is something like, “cooling off of social tensions.”
I would love it if anyone out there in the know (as opposed to me) could offer more information about this whole “kinship joking” phenomenon.
For now: on to Niger…
SOCRATES, STOP DRAGGING ALCHIBADES AWAY FROM “THE EMBRACE OF SENSUAL PLEASURE”!
(Man, I love eighteenth century painting titles.)Anyways, if you guys haven’t heard of Alchibades, you’ve kind of been missing out, cause he’s kind of a big deal. And also a bad ass, but we’ll get to that in a bit.
He was one pretty hardcore military advisor. So hardcore that he would also get some pretty powerful enemies . So unfavorable were these enemies that Alcibiades would have to shift over to different states.
And then what did he do? Just continued offering military strategies to whichever state he was in like a boss. Hah! So, this man was really his own man. And had beautiful curly locks to boot!
Yes. For sad people like me, the presence of a Fuck Yeah Alcibiades in this universe is what justifies the internet. Just: thank you.
(via fuckyeahalcibiades)
1863
Hi.
I am not expecting fireworks or parades in Ankara today. But I can always read some Whitman. I like to think of Walt when I think of America. It’s not redemption, the existence of his poems, but maybe just the right kind of celebratory consolation.
Pierrot fotógrafo por Felix Nadar
“Clarence lived a wonderful life. He carried within him a love of people that made them love him. He created a wondrous and extended family. He loved the saxophone, loved our fans and gave everything he had every night he stepped on stage. His loss is immeasurable and we are honored and thankful to have known him and had the opportunity to stand beside him for nearly forty years. He was my great friend, my partner, and with Clarence at my side, my band and I were able to tell a story far deeper than those simply contained in our music. His life, his memory, and his love will live on in that story and in our band.” - Bruce Springsteen
Photo by Danny Clinch
For Byronic.
A favourite writer: Kathy Acker (April 16, 1947 – 1997) was an American experimental novelist, punk poet, playwright, essayist, postmodernist and feminist writer - and we lost her way to soon to cancer…
“We don’t have a clue what it is to be male or female, or if there are intermediate genders. Male and female might be fields which overlap into androgyny or different kinds of sexual desires. But because we live in a Western, patriarchal world, we have very little chance of exploring these gender possibilities.” — K.A.
Photo: Kim Stringfellow
An odd fact: I once took a class taught by Kathy Acker. We were never friends, but I credit her for introducing me to George Bataille, Italo Calvino, and Marguerite Duras.
For some odd reason, she also invited me once—once—to go weightlifting with her. She was incredibly intense about this experience, and I still believe she did it as a lesson. Or not a lesson. More like an: exemplum. I would, take it or leave it, realize how much the past and future and other illusions sapped a moment.
I remember that she would sit in a corner huddled over her boom box blasting Joan Jett before she’d start each class.
I don’t think about her all that often, but my god: she was my opposite, which is a true compliment to her, and a mitigating circumstance for myself.
For anyone who knows me well out there: know this: she assigned Bataille’s Story of the Eye. And I read it.
(I passed out twice, which I consider a personal triumph.)
(via elvira)
“While still in college [Elizabeth] Bishop met the poet Marianne Moore, who was twenty-four years her senior. Moore’s greatest lesson, she said later, was her insistence on getting every detail in a poem right. Bishop herself would go to astonishing pains to make sure that she was being accurate. For her poem “Crusoe in England,” she had a friend visit a goat farm to find out how goats open and close their eyes.”
Charles Simic, The Power of Reticence (via winesburgohio)
I lament the fact that I was not that friend.
