LINES OF THE DAY

". . . But the past does not exist independently from the present. Indeed, the past is only past because there is a present, just as I can point to something over there only because I am here. But nothing is inherently over there or here. In that sense, the past has no content. The past -- or more accurately, pastness -- is a position. Thus, in no way can we identify the past as past." p. 15

". . . But we may want to keep in mind that deeds and words are not as distinguishable as often we presume. History does not belong only to its narrators, professional or amateur. While some of us debate what history is or was, others take it into their own hands." p. 153

Silencing the Past: Power and the Production of History (1995) by Michel-Rolph Trouillot

Wednesday, April 17, 2013

What Shakespeare Said, Because It Was Spring

Perhaps it is more accurate to say, "What Shakespeare Wrote, Because It Was April He Was Writing In His Plays, Whether Or Not The Weather Was April in the Scene."



This is from his late play, "Winter's Tale," to which Germaine Greer points us in the New Yorker (surely the Bard delighted in the word play - tension between this passage and the title-theme):

Daffodils,
 That come before the swallow dares, and take
 The winds of March with beauty: violets, dim,
 But sweeter than the lids of Juno’s eyes
 Or Cytherea’s breath: pale primroses
 That die unmarried, ere they can behold
 Bright Phoebus in his strength—a malady
 Most incident to maids: bold oxlips and
 The crown imperial: lilies of all kinds,
 The flower-de-luce being one.
 (Act IV, Scene 4, lines 136-45


And now, I must see off el V, as he begins the journey to New Orleans and EMP, the Banjo Conference and the Senegal Conference.




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