JoshuaAndAndrew

Hillbillies Everywhere: Abundant—And Proliferating

2012-01-24T23:38:00.020-05:00

An American family of hillbillies from the Ozarks?

No, a Danish family of hillbillies from Copenhagen.

This hysterical yet revolting photograph depicts a July 2011 gathering of the family of a Danish blogger. The blogger shall remain unidentified—but she works in Copenhagen’s National Gallery and blogs about life in Copenhagen. The blogger, contrary to all clear evidence, considers herself to be educated and sophisticated, surely an alarming prospect for anyone that stumbles upon her blog.

I happened upon the Dane’s blog while following a trail of vicious anti-Roman Catholic news articles that had appeared in the European press last year.

The Danish blogger added her own vile anti-Catholic ranting to the stew, writing a dumbfounding and frightening “essay” about the Roman Catholic Church that was one of the most hate-filled and ignorant things I have ever come across on the worldwide web.

The post that followed the anti-Catholic rant on the Dane’s blog—a post in which the authoress presented photographs of herself and her immediate family—explained everything.

Until firmly established otherwise, I must assume that the idiot blogger from Copenhagen crafted her breathtaking display of nonsense about the Roman Catholic Church while watching television, outdoors, with the other appalling members of her hillbilly family.

A Passage To India

2012-01-21T13:15:00.014-05:00

An outtake from David Lean's ravishing and masterful "A Passage To India".

Barry Lyndon

2012-01-18T18:43:00.017-05:00

An outtake from Stanley Kubrick's ravishing, and deceptively complex, "Barry Lyndon", a film I have been fortunate enough to have seen on the wide screen.

Bad News From The Great White Way

2012-01-14T23:46:00.040-05:00

Press releases containing bad news are generally released late on Friday afternoons, as persons experienced in public relations know that newspaper readership reaches its low point for the week on Saturdays.

The press release below was issued late yesterday afternoon, and has not yet received much attention, which is why I offer it in its entirety.

________________________________________________

January 13, 2012, New York, New York 5:38 p.m. EST

Jujamycn and The Nederlander Organization jointly announce a permanent halt in production of the long-awaited one-woman show, “Matt Gatens As Chita Rivera”, which was expected to move into the Ethel Barrymore Theatre in June after the current Broadway production of “Death Of A Salesman” completes its scheduled run. Jujamycn and The Nederlander Organization will no longer provide continued support for development of this Matt Gatens one-woman vehicle and have no plans to revisit the project in future. All persons associated with the production have been released from their contracts and commitments.

In development for the last three years, “Matt Gatens As Chita Rivera” has become involved in insurmountable legal entanglements that prohibit the production from moving forward.

Director Susan Stroman abandoned the show in March, citing “irreconcilable differences” with Mike Gatens, father of Matt Gatens. Mike Gatens had attempted to assert influence and control over “Matt Gatens As Chita Rivera” since the production’s inception, angering many persons associated with the show and causing some investors to withdraw their backing. Stroman’s abrupt departure led to the departures of numerous other personnel, leaving only Gatens himself, as of the date of production shutdown, the sole surviving member of the original creative team.

Last year, Gatens, in violation of his contract, and without informing Jujamycn and The Nederlander Organization, entered—and won—a global beauty pagean t, choosing to represent the nation of Venezuela. Numerous contractual personal appearance commitments required of the pageant winner by the organizers of the pageant have severely limited Gatens’s availability for rehearsals of “Matt Gatens As Chita Rivera”. When Jujamycn and The Nederlander Organization attempted to call Gatens back to work, pageant officials threatened to obtain an injunction against the “Matt Gatens As Chita Rivera” production unless Jujamycn and The Nederlander Organization promptly and unconditionally released Gatens from his run-of-the-play contract.

Jujamycn and The Nederlander Organization have done so today.

Berchtesgaden, Again

2012-01-13T21:38:00.024-05:00

Wilhelm Keitel, Hermann Göring, Karl Dönitz, Heinrich Himmler and Martin Bormann at Berchtesgaden in 1943.

Joseph Goebbels At Berchtesgaden

2012-01-12T19:19:00.028-05:00

Berlin 1945

2012-01-11T15:49:00.008-05:00

Flying Into A War Zone

2012-01-07T22:50:00.012-05:00

Two Cars Bought

2012-01-02T20:05:00.009-05:00

After interminable hemming and hawing, Andrew and I have bought our second car. In fact, we bought two new cars today.

When we move into our new house on Saturday, we want to make sure we have two vehicles available to us. This is so because we will be living ten miles further from downtown, and ten and eleven miles away from other family members (Andrew and I will be living “out in the middle of nowhere”, according to Andrew’s mother).

Andrew and I have been car-shopping for months—and, until today, we were unable to make a firm decision what to buy.

The situation was so bad, we had become embarrassed to keep visiting the same dealerships over and over. In fact, things had arrived at the point at which Andrew’s father had started sending Alex with us on our car-shopping sprees, hoping that Alex might be able to jar us into making a decision.

The stratagem of sending Alex with us being unsuccessful, Andrew’s father took matters into his own hands this morning. During breakfast, he announced that he was taking us car-shopping today.

Indeed, Andrew’s father more or less made our choices for us—and conducted the negotiations, too.

We headed straight for the Volkswagen dealership, and made a beeline to the GTI models, with Andrew’s father taking the lead. His first words to us as soon as we arrived at the GTI models: “This model has a hatchback, so you can haul things when necessary. I would get the four-door model rather than the two-door model if I were you.”

Andrew and I looked at each other, and sheepishly shook our heads in an affirmative manner.

“I would get one with a shade of gray” were Andrew’s father’s next words—at which point Andrew and I decided we preferred the “Carbon Steel Gray Metallic” color to one of the other silver/gray/black shades available.

Once Andrew and I had settled upon the particular GTI we wanted to buy, we learned that we were not done.

“I would replace the Jetta with a new Passat” was Andrew’s father’s next announcement. “Do it now instead of waiting another two years.” He was referring to our 2004 Jetta, which Andrew’s parents had bought for Andrew when Andrew enrolled in law school.

Andrew and I had not planned on buying two new cars, but the idea made sense, and we started examining the Passat models in stock. We settled on a “Platinum Gray Metallic” model with black interior—after seriously considering a “Candy White” model, which we ultimately decided would be a poor color for getting through Minnesota winters.

Once our choices were complete, Andrew’s father smiled and said, “I am saving you the trouble of going through this exercise again two years from now. And you’ll get a better deal, buying two cars instead of one.”

I am confident we did get a good deal, although I am not qualified to know. We left everything to Andrew’s father. Andrew’s father stated terms, the dealership accepted the terms without modification, and dealership clerks immediately started taking down information necessary to register the cars in our names.

That was it. We were in and out of that dealership in fifty minutes, two cars bought, one car traded in, all necessary papers signed. We arrived back home at 10:30 a.m., our main business for the day complete.

There is only one thing left for us to do: Andrew and I must return to the dealership tomorrow morning to deliver a check, to deliver the Jetta, and to deliver title to the Jetta—and to pick up our new cars.

96 Years Ago This Morning

2012-01-01T13:30:00.021-05:00

Kaiser Wilhelm inspecting German troops on the Eastern Front on New Year's Day 1916.

Refreshments Were Served And A Good Time Was Had By All

2011-12-30T16:20:00.015-05:00

New Year’s Eve at the Berghof 1939.

D.A.D.D.D.

2011-12-29T19:41:00.013-05:00

One of my Christmas gifts to my sister was a kind of joke: two Dads Against Daughters Dating Democrats bumper stickers. (I had to buy two, as the vendor only sells the bumper sticker in pairs.)

My sister is a political conservative, and she has claimed, since she was a freshman in high school, that she could never marry a Democrat. I thought she might appreciate the sentiment expressed on the bumper sticker—which she very much did.

She immediately affixed one of the bumper stickers to a storage unit in her bedroom at home, and she intends to take the other bumper sticker back to Vanderbilt and mount it on her dorm wall.

Further, my sister asked me to send her six more D.A.D.D.D. bumper stickers after she returned to Nashville, because she wants to give them to four friends—and to two professors “who are greatly in need of something like this”.

I told her that the $9.95 I had spent on her two bumper stickers had exhausted my bumper sticker allowance for the year, and that she would have to spend her own money if she wanted more bumper stickers.

As Christina Claimed In Her Book . . .

2011-12-24T00:31:00.010-05:00

Best Christmas Wishes

2011-12-21T00:06:00.017-05:00

Just In Time For Christmas . . .

2011-12-14T23:49:00.008-05:00

Edina’s Southdale Mall, America’s first multi-level, fully-enclosed, climate-controlled indoor shopping center, pictured in 1956, the year Southdale opened.

Local news sources reported today that the only remaining original Southdale tenant, a three-generation family business operating at Southdale for 55 years, was being forced out of the mall. Its final day at Southdale will be Christmas Eve.

Belief

2011-12-14T21:57:00.012-05:00

I stopped believing in Santa Claus when I was six. Mother took me to see him in a department store, and he asked for my autograph.

Shirley Temple

The Arrest Of The Flensburg Government

2011-12-13T22:35:00.020-05:00

23 May 1945, Flensburg (in North Germany): British forces arrest the key figures of the immediate post-Hitler German state, the so-called “Flensburg Government”—General Alfred Jodl, Albert Speer and Admiral Karl Dönitz—and escort them into captivity. The three highest-ranking German officials became, from the morning of their arrests, Prisoners Of War.

Jodl (whose widow Andrew’s father met and befriended in the early 1970s) was sentenced to death at Nuremburg. Speer, in an act of staged contrition, managed to escape the hangman’s noose, and was given twenty years. Dönitz, largely because American Admiral Chester Nimitz came to his aid (by submitting an Affidavit noting that German naval warfare in the Atlantic had been little different than American naval warfare in the Pacific), got off with ten years.

German Refugees Heading West In April 1945

2011-12-05T18:06:00.018-05:00

German refugees heading West in early April 1945, looking to escape the brutal atrocities of The Red Army as the Russians raped and pillaged their way toward Berlin.

It was the final four weeks of the war in Europe.

The Brandenburg Gate May 1945

2011-12-04T15:54:00.012-05:00

A Couple Of Academic Standouts

2011-12-01T22:41:00.029-05:00

University Of Iowa Men’s Basketball players Bryce Cartwright, from Compton, California, and Melsahn Basabe, from Brooklyn, New York, both of whom are expected to be declared academically ineligible shortly after the first of the year and, as a result, unable to compete in intercollegiate athletics.

One would never be able to guess, from the photograph alone, that these individuals are not cut out for academic achievement. Seldom have I seen two more dedicated, clean-cut, scholarly-looking student-athletes.

And, for the record, I vigorously denounce the many comments on Iowa sports message boards suggesting that these two players have well-known substance-abuse problems and are routinely referred to throughout Iowa City and environs as “those two potheads”.

After all, everyone knows that the University Of Iowa Athletic Department does NOT tolerate drug use and that the Iowa Athletic Department’s drug-testing program is pure as the driven snow.

The Reich Chancellery In May 1945

2011-11-30T16:29:00.016-05:00

A mother and child play outside Albert Speer’s Reich Chancellery in the second week of May 1945, only days after the end of the war.

The balcony on which Hitler appeared for special occasions is visible in the background.

The hyper-efficient Germans always cleared streets immediately after air raids, which explains why streets in the photograph are free from debris.

By mid-May, the rest of the debris in the photograph had been plowed and deposited against and alongside the walls of the former Chancellery; the debris was to reach the floor of the balcony. This fact is known from countless photographs—by American, British and Russian soldiers as well as by professional photographers working for various news agencies—taken from May 16 onward, photographs that depict soldiers and visiting dignitaries posed atop the piles of debris immediately adjacent to “Hitler’s Balcony”.

Those other photographs allow the photograph above conclusively to be placed in the second week of May. It was taken sometime after the conclusion of The Battle Of Berlin but before the tons of debris had been shifted.

Guests At A Table We Did Not Spread

2011-11-23T13:34:00.021-05:00

John George Brown (1831-1913)
The Boat Builder
1904
Cleveland Museum Of Art

Oil On Canvas
30 1/2 Inches By 40 Inches

The Boredom Must Have Been Overwhelming

2011-11-17T21:58:00.018-05:00

This rare color photograph, from May 1945, only days after the war’s end, shows recently-surrendered German soldiers interned in a British Prisoner Of War Camp in occupied Germany.

Hundreds of thousands of German soldiers spent weeks and weeks in such open-air camps before they were discharged and allowed to return to their homes.

The many dugouts must be beds the soldiers created for themselves. It must have been warmer sleeping in dugouts than on flat ground.

Fraxinus Americana

2011-11-11T21:59:00.027-05:00

Andrew and I shall soon be homeowners, whether settlement is effected on November 18 or a few days later. We walked through the house this afternoon, and there is still considerable work to be done.

We bought an all-brick town home in a new development that features several residents-only amenities. The development includes a golf course, clubhouse with nonpublic restaurant, indoor and outdoor swimming pools, indoor and outdoor tennis courts, a private gymnasium with regulation basketball court, a private fitness center, and a private park. Access to the development is by private road, and only by private road, so the development should be very peaceful and very quiet.

There are only ten town homes in the entire development; all the other homes in the development are large single-family homes. The town homes, all ten in a single row, are situated right at the edge of the development’s private park, which means that Andrew and I shall have an enormous eighty-acre front yard in which to romp, with trees, shrubbery and flowers all professionally maintained.

Andrew and I will be the first to go to settlement on the town homes.

We chose this particular property because we liked the development and because we liked the unique design of the town homes.

The town homes are professionally designed. Each of the town homes features commissioned windows and commissioned doors and commissioned wallpapers and commissioned wall coverings and commissioned border papers and commissioned woods and commissioned kitchen and bath cabinetry and commissioned lighting fixtures and commissioned carpets, all designed by a single professional designer (whom we met).

The house Andrew and I selected will feature a color scheme of various shades of blues, ivories and grays (with a very sparing touch of rose and an even more sparing touch of lemon yellow), with white ash wood—Fraxinus Americana—prevailing in the kitchen and baths for both flooring and cabinetry, and white marble used for kitchen-tops and bath-tops. We thought ours was the most beautiful and most restrained of the ten town home designs. (I think it may have been the various kitchen and bath wallpapers that ultimately caused us to sign on the dotted line. The different kitchen and bath wallpapers are amazingly subtle and amazingly beautiful.)

There are noble and stately exterior masonry moldings above and around the front door and above and below all front windows, the first-floor front windows are floor-to-ceiling in height, and the roof has a remarkable steep pitch with intricate brick chimneys extending six and eight feet above the topmost roofline, all features of which contribute to a very beautiful and very distinctive front exterior.

From the front of the house, the town home appears to be two stories, but from the back of the house it is seen as three stories.

At the back of the bottom level is a giant garage large enough to accommodate four cars; in the middle of the bottom level is a utilities room; and at the front of the bottom level is a family room with three small windows at ground level and an enclosed stairwell to the main level. Andrew and I did not order the family room finished. We can have the family room finished at a later date if we choose.

On the main level, there is an entrance hall, a powder room, and an enclosed stairwell to the upper level, all on the Eastern front side of the house. A living room/dining room—with no partition, and with a large fireplace on the living-room side—runs the entire length of the Western side of the house, front to back. There is a deck off the dining room, with floor-to-ceiling French doors serving as passage. The effect is that of a supremely elegant shoebox-shaped room with giant windows at each end.

On the Eastern side of the house is the giant kitchen, which extends eighteen feet beyond the back wall of the town home (the builder terms the kitchen extension “the garden room”). The kitchen extension has three giant skylights, rows of windows on all three sides, and a set of floor-to-ceiling French doors leading to the same deck as may be reached from the dining room. The effect is a room utterly filled with light.

Between the kitchen and the dining room is a set of floor cabinets as well as a set of ceiling cabinets. The ceiling cabinets feature glass on both sides, a beautiful way of dividing the kitchen from the dining room—there is a keen sense of two separate spaces, and yet one may easily see from one room to the next.

The main floor has eleven-foot ceilings. There are beautiful crown moldings and chair moldings in the living room/dining room.

There are only two bedrooms on the upper level (we suspect this was a deliberate measure to discourage families with children from buying the town homes, since all ten town homes feature only two bedrooms). One bedroom runs the full front width of the house, with four large windows overlooking the park. This giant room, which also features a fireplace, may very well be our favorite room of the house. Its proportions are beautiful, and the views are beautiful.

The smaller bedroom, right across the hallway from the giant bedroom, is at the back of the house. Each bedroom has full bath facilities.

Andrew and I intend, at present, to furnish only three rooms of the house.

We will, of course, furnish the kitchen. We intend to buy a very large dining table and ten dining chairs so that visitors may come and eat whenever they want. There are built-in cushioned window seats on two sides of the kitchen extension—so, what with the dining chairs and the window seats, there will be plenty of kitchen seating for visitors.

We will furnish the front bedroom as a living room/library. We intend to buy bookcases, desks/modules (with chairs) for our computers and our sound system, and three sofas that may be converted into beds. Andrew and I intend to use the front bedroom permanently as our living room/library—and the room can serve as a lavish guest bedroom for visitors whenever needed.

The small bedroom will be furnished with the bedroom furniture we bought in Boston.

The main-level living room/dining room will not house a single piece of furniture for the foreseeable future—and we do not care if people make fun of this fact.

There are a couple of downsides to our soon-to-be new home.

Andrew and I will shortly be living ten miles further outside the city, and that will make our daily commute into the city longer. We will also be living twelve miles from Alec, Lizbeth and the kids, eleven miles from Alex, and ten miles from Andrew’s parents, a fact signifying that we shall have much more leisure-time driving in our future.

Because we shall be on the road more, Andrew and I have been car-shopping in order that we always have two cars at our disposal once we move into the new house. We are, alas, having difficulty making a decision which model to buy—and sales personnel are, I believe, tired of seeing Andrew and me enter local showrooms (since we always leave without making a purchase).

Much the same is true of our furniture-shopping: we are having trouble picking out anything. We cannot even find a kitchen table that will be ideal for the kitchen.

Our indecisiveness is causing us distress—and we are already asking ourselves whether it was a wise move to buy a designer property.

Reims 1917

2011-11-03T23:24:00.014-04:00

The Old Women Of Reims 1917

2011-11-02T20:48:00.027-04:00

During World War I, the French government commissioned thousands of color photographs.

Color film was to remain rare for another two decades, and the color film used in France during the war was undeniably primitive, yet France’s photographic archive of World War I is of an amazing standard, historic and unparalleled among countries fighting in the war.

In March and April 1917, photographers descended upon the destroyed city of Reims to photograph the city’s destruction—as well as the city’s inhabitants.

The photograph above was taken on March 28, 1917.

The photograph below was taken on April 5, 1917.

October 31

2011-10-30T21:46:00.016-04:00

The Battle Of Britain ended on this day in 1940.

After the Battle, there was no longer any fear of a German invasion of Britain.

Buying

2011-10-30T21:43:00.009-04:00

We are in the process of buying a house, buying a second car, buying furniture.

The buying never seems to stop.

It is exhausting.

The Candy Man On Leno: Cartoon Of The Day

2011-10-27T22:23:00.052-04:00

Thank God we don't watch television.

I don't see how anyone can stand it.

Hamburg 1943

2011-10-22T15:19:00.021-04:00

Hamburg after the 1943 air raid and firestorm.

I do not know where in Hamburg the above photograph was taken. The devastation displayed in the photograph is on an unimaginable scale—the destruction is so complete there are no surviving landmarks that allow the viewer to identify the area of Hamburg depicted in the photograph.

The photograph below was taken near Saint-Michealis-Kirche, because the church itself may be seen in the background, still standing. Saint Michaelis was nowhere near the firestorm—the firestorm was at least five miles away from Saint Michaelis—and yet the destruction near Saint Michaelis was also on a shocking scale.

Although its walls and tower did not collapse, Saint Michealis was burnt out in 1943 (in the photograph, one may see that the church roof is no longer in place).

Saint Michaelis was to be bombed again in 1944 and 1945, suffering direct hits in both latter years. The church had to be completely rebuilt after the war.

Cartoon Of The Week

2011-10-14T21:37:00.006-04:00

Furtwangler In Wartime

2011-10-12T16:46:00.027-04:00

Wilhelm Furtwangler conducting the Vienna Philharmonic in May 1943 at an armaments factory in Berlin.

Another photograph of Furtwangler conducting a wartime concert for armaments workers may be found here.

Kicking The Can, Postponing The Reckoning

2011-10-05T21:31:00.017-04:00

The various schemes for the European Financial Stability Facility are little more than a shell game to kick the debt can further down the road. How will shuffling the bad debt of broke countries from broke banks into a leveraged “special purpose vehicle” ultimately backed by the taxpayers of broke and nearly broke countries solve anything in the longer term?

All it may do is postpone the reckoning and insure an even bigger bust later.

Charles Biderman

‘Twas Always Thus

2011-10-02T20:12:00.021-04:00

And since G.O.P. Front Runner Ronald Reagan relies upon a base of support that is on the far right wing of the Republican Party, some experts have long declared that if he wins the nomination, the G.O.P. would simply be repeating the suicidal Goldwater campaign. Ex-President Gerald Ford left no doubt about his views when he warned last month: “A very conservative Republican cannot win in a national election.”

National opinion polls continue to show Carter leading Reagan by an apparently comfortable margin of about 25%. They also show that more moderate Republicans like Ford would run better against the President.

Reagan cannot hope to win, however, unless he moves beyond the hard-line conservative base that has sustained him since he first appeared on the national political scene as a spokesman for Goldwater himself.

TIME, 31 March 1980

Vienna 1893

2011-09-30T23:41:00.016-04:00

Central Vienna, First District, 1893

Munich 1919

2011-09-29T16:25:00.014-04:00

A Bolshevik demonstration in Munich in 1919.

The Towers Of Frauenkirche

2011-09-20T20:22:00.015-04:00

The towers of Munich’s Frauenkirche, with the colors of Munich on the left and the colors of Bavaria on the right.

The Skyline Of Minneapolis

2011-09-15T14:07:00.013-04:00

Flying Down To Rio

2011-09-06T19:49:00.016-04:00

In August 1941, while war raged in Europe, Pan American Airways initiated an elaborate series of overseas journeys to South America for the American traveling public. The international flights used Pan Am’s Flying Clippers, at the time the most popular aircraft in the world for long-haul passenger flights.

The Pan Am advertisement may be substantially enlarged, and read in its entirety.

Less than four months later, Pan Am’s overseas passenger flights ended.

America had entered the war—and all Flying Clippers were put to exclusive war use.

International air traffic for civilians was not to resume on a meaningful scale until 1946.

"Butley"

2011-08-30T18:33:00.000-04:00

Dominic West as Butley in Simon Gray’s “Butley” at the Duchess Theatre, London.

To be blunt, West stunk. The whole production stunk.

West is uglier than sin, which did not contribute to our enjoyment of the afternoon.

The theater was practically empty the afternoon we saw “Butley”. The many unoccupied seats were exceptionally well-deserved.

The production has closed since we attended the August 4 matinee.

"Betrayal"

2011-08-30T18:27:00.001-04:00

Kristin Scott Thomas in Harold Pinter’s “Betrayal” at the Comedy Theatre, London.

To be blunt, Thomas stunk. The whole production stunk.

Thomas is uglier than sin, which did not contribute to our enjoyment of the evening.

The theater was practically empty the evening we saw “Betrayal”. The many unoccupied seats were exceptionally well-deserved.

The production has closed since we attended the August 4 evening performance.

"Rosencrantz And Guildenstern Are Dead"

2011-08-30T18:19:00.024-04:00

Samuel Barnett and Jamie Parker as the title characters in Tom Stoppard’s “Rosencrantz And Guildenstern Are Dead” at Theatre Royal Haymarket, London.

To be blunt, Barnett and Parker stunk. The whole production stunk.

“Rosencrantz And Guildenstern Are Dead” was the London production I had most looked forward to seeing. It turned out to be the very worst of the productions we attended.

The theater was practically empty the evening we saw “Rosencrantz And Guildenstern Are Dead”. The many unoccupied seats were exceptionally well-deserved.

The production has closed since we attended the August 5 evening performance.

"Pygmalion"

2011-08-30T18:11:00.002-04:00

Rupert Everett as Higgins in George Bernard Shaw’s “Pygmalion” at the Garrick Theatre, London.

To be blunt, Everett stunk. His may have been the single worst performance I have ever witnessed (although it would be unfair to deny the Eliza of the production the right to compete for such honor).

Everett is uglier than sin, which did not contribute to our enjoyment of the afternoon.

The theater was half-full the afternoon we saw “Pygmalion”. According to a British gentleman sitting near us, “there would not be five people in the paying audience this afternoon were it not for the fact that everyone is here to see Diana Rigg”.

The production, which we saw on the afternoon of August 6, will close on Saturday.

"The Cherry Orchard"

2011-08-30T18:02:00.001-04:00

Zoe Wanamaker as Madame Ranevskaya in Anton Chekhov’s “The Cherry Orchard” at The National Theatre, London.

To be blunt, Wanamaker stunk. The whole production stunk.

Wanamaker is uglier than sin, which did not contribute to our enjoyment of the evening.

The production has closed since we attended the August 6 evening performance.

“The Cherry Orchard” performance we attended was sold out. That fact doesn’t speak well for London audiences or London critics (who largely heaped praise on the production). The production should have been booed to the rafters.

I cannot help but observe that Ben Brantley of The New York Times, whom I do not generally admire, likened the London “Cherry Orchard” production to Stephen Sondheim’s “Follies”, referring to the London “Cherry Orchard” staging as “that Chekhov play about aging vaudevillians who get together to put on one last show”.

Crossing Arms, Planting Feet

2011-08-21T16:02:00.021-04:00

Those with the capacity to hire American workers—small businesses as well as large, publicly traded or private—are immobilized. Not because they lack entrepreneurial zeal or do not wish to grow; not because they can’t access cheap and available credit. Rather, they simply cannot budget or manage for the uncertainty of fiscal and regulatory policy. In an environment where they are already uncertain of potential growth in demand for their goods and services and have yet to see a significant pickup in top-line revenue, there is palpable angst surrounding the cost of doing business. According to my business contacts, the opera buffa of the debt ceiling negotiations compounded this uncertainty, leaving business decision makers frozen in their tracks.

Now, put yourself in the shoes of a business operator. On the revenue side, you have yet to see a robust recovery in demand; growing your top-line revenue is vexing. You have been driving profits or just maintaining your margins through cost reduction and achieving maximum operating efficiency. You have money in your pocket or a banker increasingly willing to give you credit if and when you decide to expand.

But you have no idea where the government will be cutting back on spending, what measures will be taken on the taxation front and how all this will affect your cost structure or customer base. Your most likely reaction is to cross your arms, plant your feet and say: “Show me. I am not going to hire new workers or build a new plant until I have been shown what will come out of this agreement.”

Dallas Federal Reserve Board President Richard W. Fisher, speaking in Midland, Texas, on August 17, 2011

________________________________________________

And, of course, the U.S. moved back into recession in the Second Quarter (and perhaps the First Quarter), with the current Third Quarter showing shocking deterioration in economic indicators.

“When The Rise Of The Oceans Began To Slow And Our Planet Began To Heal”

2011-08-20T13:02:00.008-04:00

1940 Redux

2011-08-11T16:01:00.007-04:00

Trafalgar Square

2011-08-02T15:29:00.015-04:00

We shall leave for Great Britain tomorrow.

We shall return on Sunday, August 14.

My Final Updated List

2011-08-02T14:32:00.026-04:00

Below is a list of all non-orchestral concerts Andrew and I have attended since I last updated this list.

________________________________________________

Tokyo String Quartet
Lynn Harrell, Cello

Jordan Hall
Boston

________________________________________________

Pinchas Zukerman, Violin And Viola
Yefim Bronfman, Piano

Symphony Hall
Boston

________________________________________________

Takacs String Quartet

Jordan Hall
Boston

________________________________________________

Dmitri Hvorostovsky, Baritone
Ivan Ilja, Piano

Symphony Hall
Boston

Cardboard For Glass

2011-08-02T13:48:00.015-04:00

During World War II, German industry could not fulfill the demand for glass.

As soon as the Allies began in earnest the air campaign against Germany, broken windows—of which there were millions—could not be replaced.

In Berlin, the authorities devised a short-term solution to the shortage—indeed, the absence—of glass: sheets of cardboard were issued to the citizens of Berlin.

A Horrible Warning

2011-07-30T22:43:00.029-04:00

If you can’t be a good example, then you’ll just have to serve as a horrible warning.

Author Catherine Aird

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There but for the grace of God . . .

Why would anyone proudly post such a revolting photograph of himself? It boggles the mind and perplexes the soul.

The appalling person in the photograph embodies, in countless ways he could never possibly comprehend, the crud underbelly of America.

Tweet, Tweet, Tweet

2011-07-28T19:36:00.022-04:00

Now that my bar exam is over, Andrew shall have to find some new subject about which to tweet.

I had hoped I might receive a nice gift to celebrate my completion of the Minnesota Bar Exam, but my hopes were to be dashed.

My preferred gift was a Kaiser Wilhelm nut dish, issued in 1913 to mark the 25th anniversary of Kaiser Wilhelm’s ascension to the Hohenzollern throne.

Every household should have at least one Kaiser Wilhelm nut dish—and a matching pair, if possible.

Made of the finest Dresden china with fine pierced trim, the Kaiser Wilhelm nut dish depicts the Kaiser and Kaiserin and German national eagle, all portrayed in vibrant if not radiant color.

For weeks, I had been dropping countless hints about my wish for a Kaiser Wilhelm nut dish . . . but no one presented me with a Kaiser Wilhelm nut dish yesterday.

I’ll have to carry on somehow without one—and try to contain my bitter disappointment.

Perhaps a trip to Britain next week will help me cope with my woe.

Albert Speer Testing The Panzer IV

2011-07-23T22:44:00.012-04:00

German Armaments Minister Albert Speer testing a variant of the Panzer IV during World War II.

Were Serious People Ever Listening?

2011-07-22T12:51:00.015-04:00

Public Policy Polling, a Democrat firm, said that if he ran for president today he'd lose, that his job numbers are "worse than they appear," and that he continues to have real trouble with undecided voters.

And if you've watched him lately, you know why. When he speaks on the debt negotiations, he is not only extremely boring, with airy and bromidic language—really they are soul-killing, his talking points—but he never seems to be playing it straight. He always seems to be finagling, playing the angles in some higher game that only he gets. In 2½ years, he has reached the point that took George W. Bush five years to reach: People aren't listening anymore.

Peggy Noonan, writing in today’s Wall Street Journal

Yanks

2011-07-21T20:35:00.014-04:00

American GIs in Britain during World War II.

Lodz 1942

2011-07-19T16:08:00.012-04:00

Deportation of Jewish inhabitants of Lodz, Poland, in 1942.

And Yet Another Updated List

2011-07-13T12:39:00.069-04:00

Since I last updated this list in July of last year, Andrew and I have attended another eleven orchestra concerts.

The concerts are listed below.

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The Handel And Haydn Society
Symphony Hall
Boston

Harry Christophers, Conductor
Rachel Podger, Violin

Mozart: Serenade No. 13 (“Eine Kleine Nachtmusik”)
Mozart: Violin Concerto No. 5
Mozart: Overture And March From “Mitridate”
Mozart: Symphony No. 38 (“Prague”)

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The Handel And Haydn Society
Symphony Hall
Boston

Bernard Labadie, Conductor
Robert Levin, Piano

Haydn: Symphony No. 83 (“Hen”)
Beethoven: Piano Concerto No. 4
Haydn: Symphony No. 94 (“Surprise”)

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Boston Symphony
Symphony Hall
Boston

Christian Zacharias, Conductor And Soloist

Haydn: Symphony No. 80
Mozart: Piano Concerto No. 15
Mozart: Piano Concerto No. 16
Haydn: Symphony No. 95

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Boston Symphony
Symphony Hall
Boston

Kurt Masur, Conductor
Nelson Freire, Piano

Schumann: Symphony No. 1 (“Spring”)
Schumann: Piano Concerto
Schumann: Symphony No. 4

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Boston Symphony
Symphony Hall
Boston

Christoph Dohnanyi, Conductor
Arabella Steinbacher, Violin

Ligeti: Double Concerto For Flute, Oboe And Orchestra
Mozart: Violin Concerto No. 4
Dvorak: Symphony No. 7

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The Handel And Haydn Society
Symphony Hall
Boston

Harry Christophers, Conductor

Handel: Israel In Egypt

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Akademie Fur Alte Musik, Berlin
Jordan Hall
Boston

Telemann: Overture (Suite) In F Major
Bach: Brandenburg Concerto No. 5
Bach: Violin Concerto No. 2
Handel: Concerto Grosso, Op. 6, No. 2
Telemann: Concerto In E Minor For Recorder And Flute

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Saint Petersburg Philharmonic
Symphony Hall
Boston

Yuri Temirkanov, Conductor
Alisa Weilerstein, Cello

Rimsky-Korsakov: Russian Easter Overture
Shostakovich: Cello Concerto No. 1
Brahms: Symphony No. 4

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Boston Symphony
Symphony Hall
Boston

Charles Dutoit, Conductor
Bernarda Fink, Mezzo Soprano
Jean-Paul Fouchecourt, Tenor
Laurent Naouri, Baritone
Tanglewood Festival Chorus

Berlioz: Romeo And Juliet

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Minnesota Orchestra
Orchestra Hall
Minneapolis

Osmo Vanska, Conductor
Yevgeny Sudbin, Piano

Kernis: Concerto With Echoes
Beethoven: Piano Concerto No. 3
Sibelius: Symphony No. 2

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Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra
Ordway Center
Saint Paul

Thomas Zehetmair, Conductor And Soloist
Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra Chorale

Schubert: Offertory In B Flat Major, D. 963
Hartmann: Concerto Funebre
Haydn: Mass No. 14 (“Harmoniemesse”)

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None of the concerts was remarkable, or particularly memorable.

Three performances were a cut above everything else we heard: Kurt Masur’s performance of Schumann’s Symphony No. 1 with the Boston Symphony; Christoph Dohnanyi’s performance of Dvorak’s Symphony No. 7 with the Boston Symphony; and Yuri Temirkanov’s performance of Brahms’s Symphony No. 4 with the Saint Petersburg Philharmonic.

The Temirkanov/Saint Petersburg Brahms Fourth was the fifth time Andrew and I have heard the work together. We had previously heard Brahms Fourths performed by Riccardo Chailly and the Leipzig Gewandhaus, Neville Marriner and the Minnesota Orchestra, Fabio Luisi and the Dresden Staatskapelle, and Simon Rattle and the Berlin Philharmonic.

Five other works I heard with Andrew for the second time last season: Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 3, which we had heard performed by Alfred Brendel and Osmo Vanska and the Minnesota Orchestra; Haydn’s Symphony No. 94, which we had heard performed by Roberto Abbado and the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra; Mozart’s Serenade No. 13, which we had heard performed by Vanska and the Minnesota Orchestra; Mozart’s Symphony No. 38, which we had heard performed by Colin Davis and the Boston Symphony; and Schumann’s Piano Concerto, which we had heard performed by Maurizio Pollini and James Levine and the Boston Symphony.

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American orchestral programming is extremely conservative. I find it interesting, and a little odd, that American orchestras, by and large, avoid performances of High Modernism. American orchestras tend to prefer “accessible” music, such as the featureless and watered-down Aaron Kernis composition Andrew and I had to endure last month. Why would an American orchestra program third-rate “accessible” music by Kernis when it has yet to present the output of Elliott Carter and Henri Dutilleux and Witold Lutoslawski? Such orchestras do not have their priorities straight—and may, with justification, be accused of “dumbing down” their mission.

Apparently it was not always such. Andrew’s father says that American orchestras, as a general rule, stopped programming High Modernism around 1980, coincident with the rise of a new generation of American tonal composers trained in the 1970s, a generation that rejected the academic rigidity of serial writing. Alas, the post-1970 generations of American tonal composers threw out the baby with the bathwater—they have produced no worthwhile and no lasting music. They have produced works that are insipid, even feeble. Their music lacks intellectual content.

We live in a period similar to the time known as The Galant: the complexities of The Baroque Age having been rejected and The Classical Period still awaiting its birth, The Galant was characterized by pleasant yet vapid surface, with no underlying content. The music of The Galant has disappeared—which is precisely what will happen to today’s American art music.

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Over the next year, Andrew and I will probably hear only two orchestras, the two local ensembles. Touring orchestras do not appear in the Twin Cities because there is no local organization that sponsors visiting orchestras.

The schedules for both the Minnesota Orchestra and the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra are fairly interesting for next season, although the Minnesota Orchestra desperately needs to upgrade its roster of guest conductors.

The Minnesota Orchestra is sitting on a giant endowment, but it stubbornly refuses to open its checkbook and engage first-rate guest conductors, preferring instead to hire low-cost journeymen. There is not a single major figure on next year’s roster of conductors. Next season’s Minnesota Orchestra guest conductors: James Gaffigan, Sarah Hicks, Kristjan Jarvi, Courtney Lewis, Andrew Litton, Carlo Rizzi, Stanislaw Skrowaczewski, Robert Spano, Gilbert Varga and Mark Wigglesworth.

The list is a provincial one.

Apparently it was not always such. Andrew’s father says that the Minnesota Orchestra’s roster of guest conductors was exceptional in decades past, but that the guest roster has been in a state of nonstop deterioration for at least twenty-five years. I cannot see much further deterioration, if only because next season’s guest roster is about as bad as it can get, short of engaging Orchestra Hall janitors.

I have no idea how many Minnesota Orchestra and Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra concerts Andrew and I will hear next season. Ten Minnesota Orchestra programs carry some appeal, and eighteen Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra programs have some allure—but it is likely that we shall attend only a fraction of those numbers.

Balanchine And Farrell

2011-07-09T14:43:00.018-04:00

George Balanchine rehearsing Suzanne Farrell.

Andrew’s parents say that Farrell was the greatest ballerina they ever witnessed. They insist that Farrell made famed Russian ballerinas such as Maya Plisetskaya look one-dimensional.

While Andrew was in law school, he met Farrell. Andrew says that Farrell, at the time, looked like any other unremarkable middle-aged woman. In fact, Andrew says, he could scarcely believe that the woman he was briefly talking to was the great Farrell.

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Ballet? Why should you talk about it? Look at it and go home.

George Balanchine

Yet Another Updated List

2011-07-08T12:52:00.042-04:00

Since I last updated this list in July of last year, Andrew and I have attended another eight ballet performances, five by New York City Ballet and three by Boston Ballet.

The performances are listed below in the order we attended them.

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New York City Ballet
New York State Theater
New York

Brahms-Schoenberg Quartet [Johannes Brahms-Arnold Schoenberg/George Balanchine]
Glass Pieces [Philip Glass/Jerome Robbins]
Stars And Stripes [John Philip Sousa-Hershy Kay/George Balanchine]

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New York City Ballet
New York State Theater
New York

Chaconne [Christoph Willibald Gluck/George Balanchine]
Concerto Barocco [Johann Sebastian Bach/George Balanchine]
Tarentella [Louis Moreau Gottschalk/George Balanchine]
Glass Pieces [Philip Glass/Jerome Robbins]

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Boston Ballet
Boston Opera House
Boston

La Bayadere [Ludwig Minkus/Marius Petipa-Florence Clerc]

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New York City Ballet
New York State Theater
New York

Walpurgisnacht Ballet [Charles Gounod/George Balanchine]
Dances At A Gathering [Frederic Chopin/Jerome Robbins]
Concerto DSCH [Dmitri Shostakovich/Alexei Ratmansky]

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New York City Ballet
New York State Theater
New York

Walpurgisnacht Ballet [Charles Gounod/George Balanchine]
Duo Concertant [Igor Stravinsky/George Balanchine]
The Four Temperaments [Paul Hindemith/George Balanchine]
Cortege Hongrois [Alexander Glazunov/George Balanchine]

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New York City Ballet
New York State Theater
New York

Mozartiana [Peter Illich Tchaikovsky/George Balanchine]
The Prodigal Son [Sergei Prokofiev/George Balanchine]
Stars And Stripes [John Philip Sousa-Hershy Kay/George Balanchine]

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Boston Ballet
Boston Opera House
Boston

A Midsummer Night’s Dream [Felix Mendelssohn/George Balanchine]

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Boston Ballet
Boston Opera House
Boston

Divertimento No. 15 [Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart/George Balanchine]
Afternoon Of A Faun [Claude Debussy/Jerome Robbins]
Antique Epigraphs [Claude Debussy/Jerome Robbins]
Symphony In Three Movements [Igor Stravinsky/George Balanchine]

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Other than “La Bayadere”, all ballet performances we attended last season were built around the works of George Balanchine. In the last five years, I have developed a distinct regard for the work of Balanchine, surely the finest choreographer who ever lived.

Some of the works I had already experienced: “Brahms-Schoenberg Quartet”; “Concerto DSCH”; “Mozartiana”; “The Prodigal Son”; and “The Four Temperaments”, a ballet I had seen three times prior to this year’s fourth encounter.

The other works were all new to me. I enjoyed expanding my knowledge of the Balanchine canon. Now back in Minneapolis, I regret that Andrew and I shall have few opportunities to see Balanchine ballets performed.

For us, ballet performances will be few and far between for the next year. Scottish Ballet, The Royal Winnipeg Ballet and Houston Ballet will visit the Twin Cities next season—and that’s it (although several modern dance troupes will also visit Minneapolis during their annual nationwide tours).

In addition, next month we shall see the Mariinsky Ballet perform “Swan Lake” and “La Bayadere” at The Royal Opera House, Covent Garden. We look forward to the Mariinsky performances very much.

Diksmude

2011-07-06T11:34:00.017-04:00

Diksmude, Belgium, in the early months of World War I.

By war's end, the town had been obliterated.

Another Updated List

2011-07-05T21:33:00.013-04:00

The list of opera performances Andrew and I attended over the last year is, once again, a very short one. Andrew and I attended only two opera performances since I last updated this list in July of last year:

Ludwig Von Beethoven’s “Fidelio”, performed by Opera Boston

Giacomo Puccini’s “Tosca”, performed by Boston Lyric Opera

Opera is a dying art form—and, further, it appears to have entered its decadent phase. Most opera performances I have experienced have tended more to destroy the works rather than illuminate them. This phenomenon suggests that neither organizations presenting opera performances nor persons attending opera performances maintain confidence in the continued validity of the art form. The situation will not change until a genius composer arises, and transforms and regenerates the art form. No such figure is on the horizon.

In any case, it is a matter of indifference to me. I have never experienced a thrilling opera performance, and I do not expect to anytime soon. Opera is an art form not well-practiced in the current age.

Andrew and I have earmarked two upcoming Minnesota Opera presentations as of some interest to us: Mozart’s “Cosi Fan Tutte” and Massenet’s “Werther”. It is possible that we may also attempt to catch Puccini’s “Madama Butterfly”. The other two Minnesota Opera productions scheduled for next season—Donizetti’s “Lucia Di Lammermoor” and a new opera about the Christmas truce between British soldiers and German soldiers in 1914—elicit no interest from us.

I actually rather enjoyed the performances of “Fidelio” and “Tosca” we attended last year. I enjoyed “Fidelio” and “Tosca”, not because of the productions or performances, which were not good, but because the works themselves were so strong. I can envision thrilling productions and performances of both operas—and both operas certainly come alive on disc if not in the theater (at least under current conditions prevailing in the world’s opera houses).

One Of The Most Striking Images Of The Great War

2011-07-03T22:14:00.018-04:00

This remarkable World War I photograph from the very earliest weeks of the conflagration shows a German shell bursting against Reims Cathedral on September 20, 1914. The photograph provides one of the most striking images captured by the camera on any front during more than four years of The Great War.

Before the conflict was over, Reims Cathedral was largely destroyed.

With American funds, the cathedral was rebuilt from 1919 to 1938. One year after reconstruction had been completed, war between Germany and France was renewed.

The cathedral was damaged but not destroyed in World War II. Repairs were completed by 1962.

Reims Cathedral’s stained glass lost in World War I is still being replaced to this very day. Indeed, a new series of stained glass windows at Reims Cathedral was unveiled early this morning in France.

Updating My Lists

2011-07-03T07:13:00.019-04:00

The month of July has arrived—which signifies that it is time for me to update my lists!

Over the last twelve months, Andrew and I attended twelve theater performances. The performances are listed below in the order in which we attended them.

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The William Finn-Rachel Sheinkin musical, “The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee”, at The Lyric Stage Company, Boston

William Inge’s “Bus Stop”, at The Huntington Theatre Company, Boston

George Bernard Shaw’s “Mrs. Warren’s Profession”, at American Airlines Theatre, New York

Michael Frayn’s “Alphabetical Order”, at The Harold Clurman Theatre, New York

Arthur Kopit’s “Wings”, at Second Stage Theatre, New York

David Edgar’s Dickens adaptation, “The Life And Adventures Of Nicholas Nickleby”, at The Lyric Stage Company, Boston

Oscar Wilde’s “The Importance Of Being Earnest”, at American Airlines Theatre, New York

Willy Russell’s “Educating Rita”, at The Huntington Theatre Company, Boston

Joseph Kesselring’s “Arsenic And Old Lace”, at The Guthrie Theater, Minneapolis

The Stephen Sondheim-Burt Shrevelove-Larry Gelbart musical, “A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Forum”, at Jungle Theater, Minneapolis

The Frank Loesser-Jo Swerling-Abe Burrows musical, “Guys And Dolls”, performed by The 5th Avenue Theater of Seattle, at The Ordway Center, Saint Paul

Yasmina Reza’s “God Of Carnage”, at The Guthrie Theater, Minneapolis

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During our three years in Boston, our rate of theatergoing slowed to a trickle. Boston is simply not a theater town, and Andrew and I found very little Boston theater to be of interest. Of the twelve performances we caught over the past year, four performances were in New York and four performances have been here in Minneapolis just in the last four weeks. Only four performances occurred in Boston, and we caught two of those four Boston performances—the first two items on my list—on the very same day.

However, the most memorable theater performance from the last year was a Boston production, “The Life And Adventures Of Nicholas Nickleby”, a presentation of The Lyric Stage Company.

Nothing else was especially gripping, although I thoroughly enjoyed Brian Bedford’s portrayal of Lady Bracknell in an otherwise unremarkable “The Importance Of Being Earnest” in New York.

In terms of sheer quality, the two Guthrie Theater productions were head and shoulders above anything else on the list, including the New York presentations, although I was not fond of either play we saw in a Guthrie production.

None of the twelve plays or musicals on my current list has appeared on my previous lists.

When I last updated my theater list almost one year ago, I noted that Andrew and I had attended seventy-nine theater performances since early 2006. With the addition of twelve new performances, the total is now ninety-one.

Our rate of theatergoing is sure to pick up over the next year. We have counted twenty-six Twin Cities productions of some interest to us scheduled for the 2011-2012 season, although it is very unlikely that we shall be able to find time to attend all twenty-six productions. In addition, we intend to catch five theater performances in London in August.

One of the advantages of living in the Twin Cities is that Minneapolis/Saint Paul is America’s top theater town after New York—as well as home of America’s largest and finest and most important theater company.

A thriving theater culture is one of the things that makes the Twin Cities unique.

Tyrone Guthrie knew what he was doing when he selected the Twin Cities as home of his great enterprise.

From the mighty Guthrie, a thousand flowers have blossomed.

For Independence Day

2011-07-01T00:17:00.011-04:00

George Caleb Bingham (1811-1879)
The Jolly Flatboatmen
1846
The Manoogian Collection

Oil On Canvas
38 1/8 Inches by 48 1/2 Inches

As Pertinent Today As 1979

2011-06-30T23:53:00.012-04:00

They tell us we must learn to live with less, and teach our children that their lives will be less full and prosperous than ours have been; that the America of the coming years will be a place where—because of our past excesses—it will be impossible to dream and make those dreams come true.

I don't believe that. And, I don't believe you do, either. That is why I am seeking the presidency.

I cannot and will not stand by and see this great country destroy itself.

Our leaders attempt to blame their failures on circumstances beyond their control, on false estimates by unknown, unidentifiable experts who rewrite modern history in an attempt to convince us our high standard of living, the result of thrift and hard work, is somehow selfish extravagance which we must renounce as we join in sharing scarcity. I don't agree that our nation must resign itself to inevitable decline, yielding its proud position to other hands. I am totally unwilling to see this country fail in its obligation to itself and to the other free peoples of the world.

Ronald Reagan, announcing his candidacy for the Presidency on November 13, 1979

Ypres 1919

2011-06-26T21:35:00.014-04:00

Ypres, Belgium, in 1919, one year after the war, when the ruined city had become a tourist destination, overrun with visitors curious to see for themselves the extent of the destruction.

Ypres 1916

2011-06-21T21:41:00.009-04:00

Ypres, Belgium, in 1916, "after two years of war" in the words inscribed on this British photograph commissioned by The Royal Artillery.

Ypres 1915

2011-06-20T12:47:00.027-04:00

Ypres, Belgium, in 1915, shortly after the First Battle Of Ypres, which occurred in 1914.

There were to be four more Battles Of Ypres before war's end.

Bad as Ypres had been damaged by early 1915, there were no visible city remnants at all by November 1918. Literally everything in Ypres had been obliterated. The city had been shelled into the stone age.

It Needed To Be Said

2011-06-11T15:09:00.011-04:00

BRUSSELS (AP)—America's military alliance with Europe—the cornerstone of U.S. security policy for six decades—faces a "dim, if not dismal" future, U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said Friday in a blunt valedictory address.

In his final policy speech as Pentagon chief, Gates questioned the viability of NATO, saying its members' penny-pinching and lack of political will could hasten the end of U.S. support. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization was formed in 1949 as a U.S.-led bulwark against Soviet aggression, but in the post-Cold War era it has struggled to find a purpose.

"Future U.S. political leaders—those for whom the Cold War was not the formative experience that it was for me—may not consider the return on America's investment in NATO worth the cost," he told a European think tank on the final day of an 11-day overseas journey.

Gates has made no secret of his frustration with NATO bureaucracy and the huge restrictions many European governments placed on their military participation in the Afghanistan war. He ruffled NATO feathers early in his tenure with a direct challenge to contribute more front-line troops that yielded few contributions.

Even so, Gates' assessment Friday that NATO is falling down on its obligations and foisting too much of the hard work on the U.S. was unusually harsh and unvarnished. He said both of NATO's main military operations now—Afghanistan and Libya—point up weaknesses and failures within the alliance.

"The blunt reality is that there will be dwindling appetite and patience in the U.S. Congress—and in the American body politic writ large—to expend increasingly precious funds on behalf of nations that are apparently unwilling to devote the necessary resources or make the necessary changes to be serious and capable partners in their own defense," he said.

Without naming names, he blasted allies who are "willing and eager for American taxpayers to assume the growing security burden left by reductions in European defense budgets."

The U.S. has tens of thousands of troops based in Europe, not to stand guard against invasion but to train with European forces and promote what for decades has been lacking: the ability of the Europeans to go to war alongside the U.S. in a coherent way.

The war in Afghanistan, which is being conducted under NATO auspices, is a prime example of U.S. frustration at European inability to provide the required resources.

"Despite more than 2 million troops in uniform, not counting the U.S. military, NATO has struggled, at times desperately, to sustain a deployment of 25,000 to 45,000 troops, not just in boots on the ground, but in crucial support assets such as helicopters, transport aircraft, maintenance, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, and much more," Gates said.

Gates, a career CIA officer who rose to become the spy agency's director from 1991 to 1993, is retiring on June 30 after 4 1/2 years as Pentagon chief. His designated successor, Leon Panetta, is expected to take over July 1.

For many Americans, NATO is a vague concept tied to a bygone era, a time when the world feared a Soviet land invasion of Europe that could have escalated to nuclear war. But with the demise of the Soviet Union in 1991, NATO's reason for being came into question. It has remained intact—and even expanded from 16 members at the conclusion of the Cold War to 28 today.

But reluctance of some European nations to expand defense budgets and take on direct combat has created what amounts to a two-tier alliance: the U.S. military at one level and the rest of NATO on a lower, almost irrelevant plane.

Gates said this could spell the demise of NATO.

"What I've sketched out is the real possibility for a dim, if not dismal future for the trans-Atlantic alliance," he said. "Such a future is possible, but not inevitable. The good news is that the members of NATO—individually and collectively—have it well within their means to halt and reverse these trends and instead produce a very different future."

Gates has said he believes NATO will endure despite its flaws and failings. But his remarks Friday point to a degree of American impatience with traditional and newer European allies that in coming years could lead to a reordering of U.S. defense priorities in favor of Asia and the Pacific, where the rise of China is becoming a predominant concern.

To illustrate his concerns about Europe's lack of appetite for defense, Gates noted the difficulty NATO has encountered in carrying out an air campaign in Libya.

"The mightiest military alliance in history is only 11 weeks into an operation against a poorly armed regime in a sparsely populated country, yet many allies are beginning to run short of munitions, requiring the U.S., once more, to make up the difference," he said.

His comment reflected U.S. frustration with the allies' limited defense budgets.

"To avoid the very real possibility of collective military irrelevance, member nations must examine new approaches to boosting combat capabilities," he said.

He applauded Norway and Denmark for providing a disproportionate share of the combat power in the Libya operation, given the size of their militaries. And he credited Belgium and Canada for making "major contributions" to the effort to degrade the military strength of Libya's Moammar Gadhafi.

"These countries have, with their constrained resources, found ways to do the training, buy the equipment and field the platforms necessary to make a credible military contribution," he said.

But they are exceptions, in Gates' view.

A NATO air operations center designed to handle more than 300 flights a day is struggling to launch about 150 a day against Libya, Gates said.

On a political level, the problem of alliance purpose in Libya is even more troubling, he said.

"While every alliance member voted for the Libya mission, less than half have participated, and fewer than a third have been willing to participate in the strike mission," he said. "Frankly, many of those allies sitting on the sidelines do so not because they do not want to participate, but simply because they can't. The military capabilities simply aren't there."

Afghanistan is another example of NATO falling short despite a determined effort, Gates said.

He recalled the history of NATO's involvement in the Afghan war—and the mistaken impression some allied governments held of what it would require of them.

"I suspect many allies assumed that the mission would be primarily peacekeeping, reconstruction and development assistance—more akin to the Balkans," he said, referring to NATO peacekeeping efforts there since the late 1990s. "Instead, NATO found itself in a tough fight against a determined and resurgent Taliban returning in force from its sanctuaries in Pakistan."

He also offered praise and sympathy, noting that more than 850 troops from non-U.S. NATO members have died in Afghanistan. For many allied nations these were their first military casualties since World War II.

He seemed to rehearse his position in the coming debate within the Obama administration on how many troops to withdraw from Afghanistan this year.

"Far too much has been accomplished, at far too great a cost, to let the momentum slip away just as the enemy is on his back foot," he said.

He said the "vast majority" of the 30,000 extra troops Obama sent to Afghanistan last year will remain through the summer fighting season. He was not more specific.

In a question-and-answer session with his audience after the speech, Gates, 67, said his generation's "emotional and historical attachment" to NATO is "aging out."

He said he is not sure what this means in practical terms. But if Europeans want to keep a security link to the U.S. in the future, he said, "the drift of the past 20 years can't continue."

Overwhelming Realization Of Utter Defeat

2011-06-10T16:14:00.018-04:00

On April 18, 1945, as American troops entered the outskirts of the city of Leipzig, the Deputy Mayor of Leipzig, Ernst Kurt Lisso, and his wife, Renate, and his daughter, Regina, committed joint suicide in the New Town Hall (“Neues Rathaus”). The suicides were accomplished by cyanide capsules.

Regina Lisso, as may be seen from her hat and armband, was a worker for the German Red Cross at the time of her death.

The Mayor of Leipzig, Alfred Freyberg, and Freyberg’s wife and daughter also committed suicide in the New Town Hall on April 18, as did numerous members of the local Volksturm.

The remains of the Lisso family remained untouched for at least two days.

This photograph, by Margaret Bourke-White, then working for the U.S. Army Signal Corps, was taken on April 20.

This photograph appeared in Life magazine in 1945 as part of a lengthy series of photographs documenting the mass suicides that occurred in Germany as the war drew to its conclusion. Neither Burke-White nor Life ever enjoyed copyright protection over Burke-White’s wartime work—undertaken on behalf of the U.S. Army Signal Corps, Burke-White’s wartime photographs were the exclusive property of the United States Government and, as a result, have always been in the public domain.

In Which They Served

2011-06-07T15:22:00.027-04:00

The destroyer USS Luce in 1944.

The USS Luce was launched in March 1943 and sent to the Pacific theater, where the ship participated in several important naval engagements against the Japanese fleet.

The Luce was sunk by Japanese kamikaze planes on May 4, 1945. The Luce slipped beneath the surface only thirty minutes after one of the planes involved in the kamikaze attack struck the ship’s magazine.

Of the 312 men of the Luce crew, 126 went down with the ship. Of that number, most died instantly upon the explosion of the magazine—but a few were attacked by sharks only minutes after jumping in the water.

By the late stages of the war in the Pacific, sharks had acquired a taste for human flesh and routinely followed ship movements, having learned that a meal might be within easy reach.

My mother has a distant relative who served on the Luce. He was one of the survivors, although he lost an eye as a result of the explosion of the ship’s magazine.

He still lives.

He soon will be 95 years old.

He still drives, and he and his wife still fare for themselves (his wife, for decades, worked for various intelligence agencies, and knew—on a first name basis—many legendary intelligence figures from the 1940s, 1950s, 1960s and 1970s).

The elderly couple goes out for a few hours almost every day. The two remain active in their church, and enjoy visiting their children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren. (One of the granddaughters, like her grandmother, works in intelligence.) They also enjoy dining out at restaurants, which they do several times a week. On occasion, they will dine out more than once a day.

For decades, the U.S. Navy sponsored annual reunions for survivors of the Luce. The reunions were first-class affairs, a fitting tribute by the current armed forces to the bravery and dedication of the fine sailors of the 1940s.

A few years ago, Luce reunions were discontinued. Too few Luce survivors remained living to warrant continuing the annual tributes—and, of those still alive, only a handful enjoyed sufficient health to be able to travel to the reunions.

My mother’s distant relative is now one of only six or seven living survivors of the Luce—and one of only two not living in some type of care facility.

Andrew’s father has a distant relative—also still living—who served in the Merchant Marine during the war. He was assigned to several ships, three of which were sunk in the Atlantic by German U-Boats.

Of the three ships that were lost, most sailors survived one sinking, about half of the crew survived the second—and only three merchant seamen lived to tell about the sinking of the third.

Andrew’s father’s relative is now 89 years old. Although still living at his home, he has suffered from sharply failing health the last two years. He had to stop driving, he is losing his hearing, his kidneys are beginning to malfunction and his mind is weakening. He soon will have to be placed in a care facility.

Neither my mother’s relative nor Andrew’s father’s relative has ever talked about their horrific wartime experiences, not even to their wives.

Packing Things Up, Wrapping Things Up

2011-05-29T16:23:00.005-04:00

Andrew and I are packing things up, and wrapping things up.

We plan to pack our computers tonight. We will be offline at least until Friday.

Andrew and I are not unhappy to leave Boston, but people here have been very good to us. We have no complaints.

One regret: we never made a series of exhaustive visits to the Museum Of Fine Arts in order to undertake a comprehensive examination of its collections. That project will have to wait until another time.

Another regret: the Harvard museums have been closed for extensive renovations our entire time in Boston.

Otherwise, we have experienced Boston about as much as we wanted to. Some things about the city make it a very attractive place, and other things about the city make it a very unappealing place.

Will we miss anything about Boston? There is nothing about Boston I will miss. Large American cities are more or less alike—and Minneapolis is much cleaner and much more prosperous than Boston, and the people in Minneapolis are, by and large, much friendlier and much more courteous than the people of Boston.

We look forward to going home.

A Festering Sea Of Bad Information

2011-05-18T15:42:00.012-04:00

The internet is a cesspool, a festering sea of bad information.

Eric Schmidt

________________________________________________

Ain’t that the truth.

I am appalled, every time I log on, at the idiocy I encounter.

I think intelligent persons must be boycotting the internet.

The internet has become a forum for the screeds of the unemployed, the underemployed, the uneducated and the undereducated.

The Kaiser Visiting German Wounded

2011-05-15T20:57:00.013-04:00

Kaiser Wilhelm visiting German wounded near Verdun in 1916.

The Fall Of Eagles

2011-05-15T15:44:00.009-04:00

Kaiser Wilhelm at Berlin’s memorial service for Emperor Franz Joseph.

Kaiser Wilhelm did not travel to Vienna to attend in person Franz Joseph’s funeral. The Kaiser sent Crown Prince Wilhelm to Vienna to represent The House Of Hohenzollern at Franz Joseph’s memorial observances.

By late 1916, the mood throughout Central Europe was as somber and dark as this photograph; prospects for victory were grim—and would become grimmer still when America entered the war the following year.

World War I: Destroyed Church In France

2011-05-10T19:12:00.009-04:00

A rare and primitive color photograph from 1917 showing the remains of a church in France destroyed by shelling during World War I.

Peaceful Sunday

2011-05-08T15:05:00.013-04:00

Hans Thoma (1839-1924)
Sonntagsfrieden
1876
Hamburg Kunsthalle

Oil On Canvas
42 1/8 Inches By 31 5/16 Inches

Grass-Stain Activities

2011-05-06T22:59:00.009-04:00

I had a terrible education. I attended a school for emotionally disturbed teachers.

Woody Allen

________________________________________________

Which might explain the selections of Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, President of Liberia, and Alec Baldwin as my commencement speakers. I cannot imagine two more absurd choices.

Since, as a practical matter, I cannot skip the ceremonies, I think I may take a travel guide or two to all commencement activities.

Travel guides are compact. Travel guides are unobtrusive. Travel guides feature very short articles. Travel guides include lots of photographs.

Travel guides, consequently, may constitute the ideal vehicle to assist me in enduring inane graduation addresses I have no desire to hear.

I have no idea how my invited guests are expected to survive addresses by the President of Liberia and Alec Baldwin. My guests are as deeply unhappy as I with the gruesome choice of speakers. Indeed, I believe it would be accurate to state that my parents are totally appalled, and that Andrew’s parents are totally appalled.

As far as I’m concerned, the choice of speakers has rendered my graduation exercises nothing more than a joke—and I have basically lost all interest in the full array of graduation activities. The two-day affair now strikes me as entirely unseemly.

Five years ago, when Andrew graduated from law school, the commencement address was offered by Chief Justice John Roberts, the top jurist in the land.

Five years later, the inexplicable choice of speakers for my graduation has robbed the occasion of all sense of dignity and all sense of joy.

What should be a memorable, celebratory event has become an afflicted one.

It shall be a sullen two days in Boston.

________________________________________________

My examinations ended earlier this week, and my formal education is now complete, as I had announced yesterday in my primitive Latin.

I now have almost three weeks to kill before graduation. I think I shall spend most of that time on Minnesota Bar Review materials.

Andrew will work for another two weeks; Friday, May 20, will be Andrew’s final day of work in Boston.

The following week, we have six graduation guests arriving: my parents; my sister and my brother; and Andrew’s parents.

I told Alec and Lizbeth (and the kids) to stay home. I told Alex to stay home.

Depending upon the particular function, I am granted only two or three tickets per graduation event, no more—and I have no idea how to allocate the tickets in order to make everyone happy. (For some events, persons without tickets are allowed to sit on the grass at the outside edge of the various venues—with the result that Andrew has now taken to calling my graduation activities “grass-stain activities”.)

________________________________________________

Movers are scheduled to arrive at our apartment on Tuesday morning, May 31.

It should take the movers no more than four hours to clean us out, since Andrew and I will have completed in advance the boxing of small items as well as the disassembling of furniture insofar as possible.

The following morning, Andrew and I plan to get in the car, and start the long drive home.

EGO UNIVERSA MEUS ERUDIO

2011-05-05T17:29:00.005-04:00

DOCTOR LEGIS.

DOCTUS CUM LIBRO.

DOCTUS CUM MULTIS LIBRIS.

Further Adventures In British Dentistry

2011-04-30T14:10:00.009-04:00

Which is worse: the hat or the teeth?

I nominate the teeth, because the hat may be discarded.

Cannot the British Royal Family afford proper dentistry?

The "Times" Has Spoken

2011-04-30T12:10:00.013-04:00

There’s a thin line between high fashion and foolishness.

The daughters of Prince Andrew and Sarah Ferguson, Princess Eugenie and Princess Beatrice, crossed that line when they arrived for the Royal Wedding in little matronly outfits and hideous hats.

Princess Eugenie wore an outfit by Vivienne Westwood. Irish designer Philip Treacy completed her blue and floral print ensemble (which resembled a curtain) with a hideous hat.

Her sister, Princess Beatrice, wore a beige Valentino couture ensemble with gloves by Cornelia James and an even more ridiculous Philip Treacy creation. Her headpiece sat in the front of her head and was more of a small structure than a hat.

She looked like she was wearing antlers.

The Times (London), 30 April 2011

Gulp

2011-04-15T15:56:00.006-04:00

A distant relative of my mother—an elderly woman, living alone, whose husband died two years ago and whose only son died nine years ago—was brutally murdered in her Victorian home in Southern Virginia last evening around 9:00 p.m.

The photo above, with police cars and crime-scene yellow tape visible, was taken this morning.

Why would anyone choose to kill a harmless, kind, gentle 84-year-old woman?

I am shaken.

Furtwangler In Color

2011-04-14T19:12:00.008-04:00

A rare color photograph of Wilhelm Furtwangler, obviously from the very last months of his life.

Furtwangler was a fascinating figure.

Some odd facts about Furtwangler I recently learned, all of which surprised me greatly:

Furtwangler never conducted the Dresden Staatskapelle.

Furtwangler never conducted the Czech Philharmonic.

Furtwangler conducted performances of Handel’s oratorio, “Judas Maccabaeus”.

Furtwangler conducted performances of Tchaikovsky’s opera, “Iolanta”.

Furtwangler disliked the symphonies (but not the songs) of Mahler, yet Furtwangler nonetheless conducted a performance of Mahler’s Symphony No. 3 in 1920.

Furtwangler disliked the symphonies of Shostakovich, yet Furtwangler nonetheless conducted at least two performances of Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 9 in 1950.

Furtwangler did not conduct the premiere of his own first symphony. Bruno Walter conducted the premiere performance of Furtwangler’s Symphony No.1.

On two of the three occasions on which Furtwangler came to America to conduct the New York Philharmonic (and only the New York Philharmonic), he took the New York Philharmonic on tour, appearing with the orchestra as far south as Washington and as far west as Pittsburgh.

During World War I, Furtwangler conducted in a portion of France under German occupation. Furtwangler conducted wartime performances in Lille while the city was under German control (Lille was occupied by Germany for most of the war).

During World War II, Furtwangler conducted in occupied Denmark. Furtwangler on two separate occasions conducted a Danish orchestra in wartime performances in Copenhagen while Denmark was under German occupation. (Furtwangler had also been in Copenhagen, preparing concerts, on the day Germany invaded Denmark. Those particular concerts were cancelled.)

The latter appearances contradict Furtwangler’s oft-repeated public claim that he never conducted during wartime in countries or territories occupied by Germany.

Music In Wartime For Armaments Workers

2011-04-13T18:05:00.010-04:00

February 1942: Wilhelm Furtwangler conducts the Vienna Philharmonic in a factory concert for armaments workers at Vienna's AEG-Werk.

Funeral Cortege Of Emperor Franz Joseph

2011-04-04T20:14:00.011-04:00

The funeral cortege of Emperor Franz Joseph.

At the time of his death in November 1916, Franz Joseph believed The Great War to be no longer winnable—yet he had been powerless to affect the course or conduct of the war since autumn 1914.

The Austro-Hungarian Empire had lost control over wartime decision-making involving The Central Powers in the war’s very earliest months, when the armed forces of The Austro-Hungarian Empire had failed miserably on The Eastern Front and had had to be bailed out by The German Army. After its debacle on The Eastern Front, The Austro-Hungarian Empire had become effectively a vassal state of Germany—and it was to remain so until the war’s conclusion.

Kaiser Wilhelm did not attend Franz Joseph’s funeral. The Kaiser sent German Crown Prince Wilhelm to Vienna to represent him.

After Franz Joseph’s death, the war was to grind on for another twenty-four months.

Two days before the 1918 cease-fire that finally ended hostilities, The House Of Hohenzollern fell.

One day after the cease-fire, The House Of Habsburg met a similar fate.

Funeral Cortege Of Archduke Ferdinand

2011-03-30T21:02:00.012-04:00

The only public funeral procession for Archduke Franz Ferdinand occurred in Sarajevo, the city in which he was assassinated. The procession occurred the day after his death.

Archduke Ferdinand and his wife, Sophie, were killed on June 28, 1914.

The remains of Ferdinand and Sophie were embalmed that same night in Sarajevo. The remains were to lie in state in Sarajevo’s town hall the following day.

The photograph above captures the funeral cortege either as it makes its way to the Sarajevo town hall on the morning of June 29, or as it makes its way from the Sarajevo town hall to the Sarajevo train station late on the afternoon of June 29.

No funeral procession was permitted in Vienna. The remains of Ferdinand and Sophie were deliberately scheduled to arrive in Vienna late at night on July 2 in order to avoid the prospect of a public procession—and the remains were deliberately scheduled to depart Vienna late at night on July 3 for the very same reason.

The remains of Ferdinand and Sophie were in Vienna fewer than 24 hours.

On the morning of July 3, the remains of Ferdinand were to lie in state for four hours—and not one minute more.

On the afternoon of July 3, a fifteen-minute private funeral was held. Dignitaries, foreign and domestic, were actively discouraged from attending the funeral, with the result that none were present.

Emperor Franz Joseph did not attend his nephew’s funeral; Kaiser Wilhelm did not attend the funeral, either.

From Vienna, the remains of Ferdinand and Sophie were transported by milk train and boat to the small Austrian village of Pochlarn, the village nearest Artstetten, Ferdinand’s castle, where Ferdinand and Sophie were to find their final resting places. No funeral procession was conducted in Pochlarn, as the remains had been deliberately scheduled to arrive after midnight.

Simple hearses were used to transport Ferdinand and Sophie from Pochlarn to Artstetten.

The couple was laid to rest at 2:00 a.m. on July 4.

When the public, days later, learned of the deliberate disrespect shown to the heir to the Habsburg throne, there was a vast outcry.

The outcry was short-lived.

It was drowned out by talk of war.

The Vienna State Opera: An Artist’s Rendition

2011-03-24T23:01:00.014-04:00

Another view of the Wiener Staatsoper—the front façade, on Vienna’s Ring—may be seen in this clumsy watercolor from the early 1900s.

The artist: the man responsible for the building’s destruction nearly half a century later.

Frightfully Busy

2011-03-20T00:49:00.006-04:00

Andrew and I have been frightfully busy these last many weeks. I do not think we have ever been so busy.

Andrew is busy wrapping things up at work. I am busy wrapping things up at school. We are both busy preparing for our move back to Minneapolis. We are both busy helping everyone make travel plans for my graduation (assuming I don’t flunk out at the last minute). I am busy completing preliminary bar exam submissions.

Everything is hitting us at once. We are on the verge of being overwhelmed.

After convincing ourselves for more than two years that we have been happy in our tiny apartment—and we HAVE been happy, but not because of the apartment—and that we were thriving in cozy living quarters, we are both looking forward to an escape from low ceilings and a single window. A return to spacious living quarters will be welcome.

We haven’t a clue where we shall live once we return to Minnesota. We cannot worry about that until we are back home. For the first few weeks, we shall have to live with Andrew’s parents—if they can stand us.

If not, they can shove us off on an assortment of relatives.

The Vienna State Opera, May 1945

2011-03-11T23:47:00.006-05:00

The rear of the Wiener Staatsoper in May 1945, only days after the end of World War II.

A Picture Is Worth A Thousand Words

2011-02-28T00:36:00.018-05:00

Am I the only one that finds this photograph positively frightening?

It is one of the most starkly chilling photographs I have ever seen—as chilling as any photograph that came out of Nazi Germany—and would inspire a grim 10,000-word essay on The State Of America if I did not have more important things to do with my time.

The photograph is not a fake, and the photograph is not intended as comedy—although anyone might be forgiven for assuming that some massive joke were being played, or that the persons in the photograph were play-acting a family of nitwits and boobs.

The photograph is from a 2009 issue of the Cornell alumni magazine, which I was flipping through this weekend at the home of one of Andrew’s friends, who is a Cornell alumnus (and not an especially proud one).

The photograph was taken during the 2008 election campaign. As a matter of good taste, I have excised a figure on the right—although it was impossible to remove this figure entirely from the photograph without interfering with the portrait of the gruesome harridan of a mother standing alongside, which I did not want to do.

The photograph is an instant classic. At one glance, it captures and summarizes—as well as satirizes—The State Of America at the end of the last decade. Through dress, hairstyles, postures, facial expressions and eyes, the members of this vapid and unappealing family are revealed as unintelligent, half-educated, self-indulgent, lacking character, lacking probity—and profoundly and fundamentally in need of regeneration.

Is the family in the photograph even aware, in offering for publication this ridiculous yet somehow iconic portrait of itself, that it invites ridicule?

I grieve for the children in the photograph, appalling as they are.

Of greater importance, I grieve for this nation.

Capitulation Never!

2011-02-25T19:22:00.001-05:00

The Austrian Parliament in April 1945, immediately after the conclusion of The Battle Of Vienna, at which time Vienna became a Russian-occupied city.

The fate of Austria had not been decided at any of the wartime conferences involving Roosevelt, Churchill and Stalin, so Stalin took it upon himself to capture and occupy Vienna before any other power might do so. Indeed, The Russian Army was prepared to advance upon Berlin no later than February 1, but Stalin delayed the Russian march toward Berlin by a full two months in order to assure that the prize of Vienna first became his.

The Russians were to continue to occupy Vienna until 1955.

The posters proclaim "The Bolsheviks: Capitulation Never!" and "The Anglo/Americans: Capitulation Never!".

Things did not quite work out that way.

Street By Street, Block By Block

2011-02-25T18:10:00.014-05:00

April 1945: Russian forces engage in street fighting during The Battle Of Vienna.

From the right half of the photograph, it is seen that the day was a sunny one, although the gloom and smoke of the left half of the photograph leave a very different impression.

Ludwig II Lying In State

2011-02-20T00:41:00.009-05:00

Ludwig II of Bavaria, lying in state in 1886.

Ludwig was responsible for the splendor of Herrenchiemsee, which we visited during our trip to Bavaria and Austria in 2009. Our day in and around Lake Chiemsee was one of the most memorable days of that particular trip.

My entry about our visit to Herrenchiemsee is the most-visited item of my weblog.

Meryl Streep As Margaret Thatcher

2011-02-08T21:34:00.006-05:00

Meryl Streep as Margaret Thatcher, currently before the cameras in London.

Iowa's Matt Gatens, Beauty Queen

2011-01-27T21:50:00.022-05:00

Exactly two weeks ago, an eagle-eyed reader from Evanston, Illinois, a dedicated fan of the Northwestern University Wildcats (and a law student at Northwestern), brought to my attention startling news: University Of Iowa Men’s Basketball player Matt Gatens has recently been entering beauty pageants—and, of all things, winning them!

I was genuinely astonished when my reader—whose eye had been caught by the announcement last autumn that a one-woman show about Broadway legend Chita Rivera was in development, a one-woman show that will star Gatens—alerted me that foreign wire-service news stories on the subject of Northwestern’s 90-71 pasting of the Iowa Hawkeyes on January 12 of this year featured photographs of an overwhelmed and tearful Gatens being crowned winner of a major international beauty contest.

Upon receiving the news from Evanston, I was, to be frank, quite skeptical—until I clicked on the links my reader provided, only to encounter brief news summaries of the Northwestern-Iowa game, news summaries that indeed were accompanied by the amazing photographs below, photographs clearly and unmistakably labeled: “Iowa’s Matt Gatens”.

Until reading the news stories and seeing the photos for myself, I had had absolutely no idea that Gatens had launched a career on the pageant circuit.

Three questions immediately arose in my mind: (1) why did Gatens choose to represent Venezuela; (2) where did Gatens find such a brilliant makeup artist; and (3) why is not The Big Ten Conference making a big deal of the remarkable feat of a conference athlete winning major beauty events while actively competing in intercollegiate athletics?

No doubt the producers of “Matt Gatens As Chita!” can provide answers to my questions.

One assumption: the show’s producers believed that Gatens needed to represent a Latin country while competing on the pageant circuit, since Miss Rivera herself is Latin. Another assumption: makeup artists on Broadway apparently are even more miraculous than I had had any right to expect. A final assumption: the producers of “Matt Gatens As Chita!” wanted to capitalize on Gatens’s beauty queen status for the financial benefit of the show, and not for the financial benefit of The Big Ten Conference (a decision that must have upset Big Ten Commissioner Jim Delany no end)—and have, consequently, remained in strict control of dissemination of news about Gatens’s prowess in wowing the panel of pageant judges that awarded Gatens the winner’s crown.

Normally I am no endorser of tears.

However, under the circumstances, Gatens surely may be forgiven for a small display of waterworks.

What with a major beauty title in his pocket and an important Broadway debut in a one-woman show quickly approaching, Gatens no doubt is overwhelmed by his good fortune.

Sports fans everywhere must be happy for Gatens, especially since that basketball thing never worked out particularly well for him.

Visualization Of Stravinsky

2011-01-20T23:49:00.016-05:00

George Balanchine’s “Symphony Of Three Movements”, danced to Igor Stravinsky’s composition of the same title, is the subject of the above photograph.

“Symphony Of Three Movements”, choreographed in 1972, was one of the last ballets Balanchine created to the music of Stravinsky. Four and one-half decades separate Balanchine’s first Stravinsky ballet, “Apollo”, from his final Stravinsky efforts, all created for the 1972 Stravinsky Festival mounted by New York City Ballet in honor of the composer’s death the previous year.

This weekend, Andrew and I will see one lasting result of the 1972 Stravinsky Festival: Balanchine’s “Duo Concertant”, set to Stravinsky’s work of the same title, will be on one of the NYCB programs we shall attend.

The photograph below, depicting Stravinsky in 1930, was taken by Balanchine.

Was there ever a photograph of Stravinsky that was not unforgettable?

At every stage of his life, Stravinsky overpowered everyone and everything he encountered, including cameras.

Dances At A Gathering

2011-01-20T23:26:00.004-05:00

Tomorrow afternoon, Andrew and I will head to New York for the weekend.

The primary enticement in New York for us: three interesting programs at New York City Ballet.

I am not certain I can say I am a partisan of ballet—but I can state that I am definitely a partisan of the work of George Balanchine. Balanchine was unquestionably a genius, although I am confident I possess only a superficial understanding of the breadth and depth of his genius.

We shall see four Balanchine ballets I have already seen (although not all were danced by New York City Ballet). We shall see another three Balanchine ballets I have not yet seen (one of which will be new to Andrew, too).

We shall also see an Alexei Ratmansky ballet that I have already seen, and a Jerome Robbins ballet that will be new to me.

To end the weekend, we will catch Brian Bedford’s production of Oscar Wilde’s “The Importance Of Being Earnest”. The current Broadway production is based upon Bedford’s 2009 staging for The Stratford Shakespeare Festival.

Bedford himself portrays Lady Bracknell, one of the great gorgon roles of the British stage.

It should be a fun weekend.

Hanseatic Architecture

2011-01-18T16:18:00.011-05:00

This early-20th-Century building, in central Hamburg, is a typical example of traditional Hanseatic architecture, still in use in Hamburg. Inspiration from The Baroque Era remains conspicuous in Hanseatic architecture, as is demonstrated in this handsome yet utilitarian structure.

From what we were able to ascertain, the building was originally constructed to serve, at least in part, as a firehouse. An insurance concern now occupies the building.

Hamburg is my favorite European city, probably because it was the first European city Andrew and I visited together. Our two weeks in Hamburg were delightful.

No other city in Europe features such a remarkable blend of fine buildings from the 16th, 17th, 18th, 19th and 20th Centuries as does Hamburg.

I could live in Hamburg—and I hope we go back some day.

Saint Stephen's Cathedral, Vienna

2011-01-18T13:13:00.009-05:00

Saint Stephen's Cathedral, Vienna, as seen in a 1912 postcard.

Attending To Business

2011-01-18T13:09:00.008-05:00

Since our return from the Christmas holidays, Andrew and I have been attending to business, and only attending to business.

We stayed home during the three-day January holiday weekend, mostly because there was nowhere we wanted to go and nothing we especially wanted to do.

Two years ago, Alex came for a visit during the January holiday weekend. One year ago, Andrew and I went to New York for the January holiday weekend.

This year, we spent the long holiday weekend doing laundry, cleaning the apartment, cooking, and performing other necessary mundane tasks.

Andrew and I may go to New York next weekend, as New York City Ballet’s season resumes this week.

We will make a firm decision before the week is out.