Maus - Art Spiegelman

I love, love, love Maus!  Such an amazing story of pain, of terror, of suffering, of hurt but also of resistance, persistance, love, fellowship amd survival.
Anja's suicide haunts me...  Why did she end her own life after surviving such a horrific ordeal during WWII?  Vladek is portrayed as a miserable man.  Mala thinks Anja must have been a saint to have tolerated Vladek.  Yet Vladek seems to have been a very loving partner in his narratives to Artie.  We will never know since Anja didn't leave a note.  Somehow, I feel her grief and her family's grief in dealing with her death - powerful, powerful stuff considering that the mice in the book does not show much expression other than raised or furrowed eyebrows.
What a great loss that Anja's journals were destroyed.  I deeply want to hear her voice, her story.

Keeping Vladek's voice (in his own broken English) is perfect - it captures his personality more.
Is Vladek such a miserable person because of his experience in the holocaust?  Was he a more likeable person previously?  Other survivors have not turned out as he has.  Each individual experiences trauma different and thus also reconciles them differently.
"I'm not going to die, and I won't die here!  I want to be treated like a human being." (Maus I: 54)  Would this make others think about the suffering of animals in captivity by humans like I do?
"But you have to struggle for life!" (Maus I: 122) - life is not just happiness, it also includes sadness, challenges and struggles - we may thankfully not eperience the holocaust but there are struggles nonetheless, more for some than others.
Survival for Vladek was due to his quick intelligence/wit, ability to adapt as various professions or to mask as those professionals, his ability to pose as a German and a Jew (it sounds like Anja was too Jewish-looking to pass as a different ethnicity/nationality) but it was due to a lot of luck.
In dire situations, human-animals and I am sure other animals resort to selfish acts for self-preseverance but there is also many stories of love, sharing, caring, suffering for others, risking one's lives for others.  We are capable of 'evil' but also of 'good'.
The killing/extinction of flies with bug spray while talking about Auschwitz (Maus II: 74) is a little ironic if you ask me.
"How amazing it is that a human being reacts the same like this neighbour's dog" (Maus II: 82) - all sentient beings (human-animals and non-human-animals) are capable of suffering, pain and have a desire to live.
Train for cattle to cattle human-animals to death.  Piled up high like 'things' only (Maus II: 85). Why does this horrify us while we justify this cruelty when it comes to food-animals?  Why is the human-animal so short-sighted in their ability to empathize with others?
The mice drawings, their faces specifically remind me physically of my pup's face which perhaps moves me even more.
Art Spiegelman does not tell us too much about himself other than his tensed relationship with his father, mother and ghost brother, Richieu.
Still amazed at how powerful the medium of comic can be - this is inspiring to me!

Letter from a Birmingham Jail - Martin Luther King Jr.

The Letter from a Birmingham Jail is still very relevant today in regards to racial and other social justice issues.  We must look to the root of problems, recognize the intersections of social justice issues and have solidarity with each other in order to affect change.
A great scatching critique of the mainstream systems: it is useless to wait for government to exact change, change comes because oppressed peoples make demands of those in power.  Concessions are granted by governments, by the legal systems - these were fought for.  The government isn't trying to be generous to us.  There is no point 'waiting'.
I support direct action andhave participated in such acts myself.  The critcism I hear of this form of activism resembles what MLK terms as the moderate 'white' - order over justice.  "Sure, sure, we sympathize with Occupy's statements but camping is illegal.  Go volunteer at a soup kitchen, go sign a petition.  These are the ways to enact change".  While I agree that these actions produce some good, this alone is not enough.  Social change is enacted through a diversity of tactics. How to make such people aware that charity merely provides breadcrumbs?  To enact change, we cannot act as our oppressors do, unless necessary - In large numbers, direct action can be a powerful medium to enact change as Rosa Parks and others have.  I am not saying that direct action is the correct way or the only way to exact change.  I reiterate that social change is a continuum of a verity of actions.
The middle class is our current moderate white - complacement and not willing to give up their privileges voluntarily.
Understanding oppressed peoples' discontent helps us to further understan the bitterness that comes from the feeling of helplessness, of nobodyness.  Putting yourself into the Other's shoes.
"Civil discontent is the highest form of patriotism" - Howard Zinn
Legality does not necessarily means that something is moral; ditto for mainstream/majority, long standing traditions and cultures (e.g. female circumcision, meat eating, hunting for sport, etc.)
"We must take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented."- Elie Wiesel (in regards to MLK's "the appalling silence of good people".)
Inward spirituality, morality is more important that church dogma.
I love this piece of work from MLK - it contains so much truths.  I will remember the 'radical' and 'extremist' MLK.  Listen to his speech below.

Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov

I loved this novel.  It contains such beautiful language and although it is not pornographic, it evokes much emotion and imagery - at least for me.  I think Ellie said it well, it is haunting.  Yet fascinating at the same time.  The abuse of power, the deceit, the sexual acts were horrible.  I feel absolutely no sympathy for Humbert Humbert.  Just because he feels some remorse does not make me sympathize for him at all.  In no way is he a victim.  Sure, Lo was no 'angel' and yes, she managed to manipulate Humbert Humbert in her own ways too does not excuse what he did nor lessen his crimes.  To do this is to blame the victim.  Remember comments like, "What was she doing wearing such a short skirt and low cut top anyway?  What did she except" directed at sexual assault victims?  I am not falling for this trap.  Humbert Humbert knows better.  He is the adult, and an educated one to boot.  What does consent mean?  I am not saying that a young person has no agency to consent but to threaten a child (or adult) with a horrible life of state institution or "you're not getting your morning coffee until you have performed your morning duty" is not what I consider to be acts of love or even bribery.  This is an outright threat.

Humbert Humbert is on the outside polite but yet is a different person inside as revealed through his relationship with Lo and his obsession with nymphets.  To be obsess with a cerain body type, to not care about a person's mind at all is baffling - is there something 'missing' in Humbert Humbert?  Is he missing what we call 'conscience'?  And if so, do we hold him legally accountable?  I ask this because someone who is mentally ill/disabled can be legally held non-accountable for the crimes that they commit.  They may be committed to mental institutions indefinitely but they cannot be guilty in the legal system.  How then do we deal with those without a conscience?  What is society's duty to such persons and especially to his/her victims?

What if the roles were reverse and it was a middle aged woman and a twelve year old boy?  How the crime seem 'lesser'?  Is there gender dynamics at play here given that in any heterosexual encounter, the woman is usually in the submissive role, biologically speaking?

I would not invoke cultural relativism in the case of Humbert Humbert and Dolores.  This is a clearcut case to me of manipulative and abuse by Humbert, regardless of Lo's actions and behaviour.  He is a predator and his only redeeming feature to me is that he is not a thief.  He rightfully hands over money derived from Lo's mother's property in the end.

Babette's Feast - Isak Dinesen

I watched the movie many moons ago but didn't realize that it is based on a short story.  A lovely tale!  In the past, it was a movie about food, love, friendship and the pleasures of life.  For better or worse, I know also view it from a vegan/animal ethics perspective as well even though this is not a book about animals.

Babette's loss was great but confused me as she seemed to be mourning for her enemies towards the end of the book for they were the ones who frequented her restaurant but perhaps I misunderstood her as mourning for them only but also for her family and other loved ones.

Babette is clearly a very generous woman to the sisters who have been very kind to her as well.  Money is not so important but her ability to create her art is far more important to her - in this case, her artistic ability as a chef.  The love between the various characters, sometimes subtle is warming.  The sisters never pushes Babette to tell the story of her past and Babette very loyally serves the sisters with no questions asked and no challenges either.  I don't think that the sisters did not accept her, rather I think that they showed their acceptance in their own austere ways and in religious ways, the other ways that they know how to show their love and care.

I certainly don't believe in asceticism but I also don't believe in complete indulgence either.  We need to understand our foodways and how food came to be on our plates.  It is a misconception that vegans eat bland foods.  On the contrary, I eat delicious and nutritious foods everyday.  It just takes a bit more creativity when it comes to vegan foods, that's all.  Live animals transported for food suffer very much on a ship and no doubt the live turtle probably did not have the best trip of her life.  Of course, human-animals do not always think of this.  All they see, in the case of Babette's feast is the food in front of them but not how the food came to be on their plate or who the food was prior to becoming food.  These are issues that deeply consume my being.  I love to eat but to eat with a fuller conscience allows me to enjoy my foods that much more.  Some photos of Ellen's Feast below (Just for the record, I am not an artist!).  All 100% plant based.  I share my meals with loved ones in my life and the act of sharing food with those closest to me is certainly therapeutic and strengthens my relationships with them even though like Babette, I am tired out by the day's cooking!

Mother's Day Feast 2011

Just a dinner for my partner and I

Dinner for some good friends

Raw Carrot Cake - Mother's Day 2011

The Tin Flute - Gabrielle Roy

1. A pretty anti-war theme riding through this novel.  The futility of war and the dangers of overzealous nationalism/patriotism.  Each side geared up to hate the other - for what?  For a paycheque.  This was true during the WWII and it still is today.  Poor Americans are generally the ones who join the military and get deployed to dangerous zones to protect the empire - only today, they masquerade as 'peacekeepers'.  I love the social commentary on draft dodgers vs. pacifists.
2. Women seem to do the majority of the work (paid and unpaid) in the Lacasse household.  The men can only support their family when the enlist in the army.  Families torn apart for the others can live.  Futility of war.  Who really wins?  Takes me back to Marcus Aurelis - defend the empire for what?  For whom?  Is it really worth so many innocent lives tortured and lost?
3. Sacrifice as an act of love.  Emmanuel for Florentine.  Azarius for his wife and family.  Eugene for his mother and family.
4. Jean Lévesque striving for something better than his childhood riddled with poverty - nothing wrong with this - we all want to be able to live a comfortable life but I think we mustn't forget our roots either.  He is of the higher working class striving to be in the upper class.  He is trying too hard to escape his poverty and alienates those around him and he, denying himself love and happiness.
5. Rose-Anna reminds me of my own grandmother and her poverty during WWII also.  My grandmother also ate less so the rest of the family can eat.  The other children of my grandmother were malnourished in their younger days during the war and so they are the smallest children of the lot of nine children.  The role of housewife, mother and wife is a difficult one.    Under-appreciated unpaid work, even still today.
6. At what breaking point do we break our pride so we can live?  I know I don't lack the pride to take on a 'lesser' job if I had to.  I don't look down on these professions and so it doesn't seem demeaning to me, rather it is a necessary step to being to support myself but perhaps this is easy for me to say when I have a better way 'out' than the characters in Roy's novel.

Interesting that M levels a criticism against Roy in that her characters in dire poverty seem to lack agency and reflection.  I certainly agree with M's assessment but I do not generally critize an author of fiction on her characters.  I may critique the characters but not necessarily the author.  The novel/work of art is what it is and we all intepret it in different ways.  We will never really know the intent of the author.  We can speculate and theorize until we are blue in the face.  For me, The Tin Flute is a novel with an anti-war message, highlighting the desparation of men in dire poverty and its connection to war.

Waiting for Godot - Samuel Beckett

Strange characters and relationships!  Interdependence between Didi and Gogo; and Pozzo and Lucky.  They seem to have a terrible relationship with each other yet they cling to each other - maybe cause each other is all they have?  Reminds me of Salamano and his dog in The Stranger.
The seemingly useless ramblings by Didi, Gogo and Pozzo - points to the absurdity in life.  Ranting and ranting for no particular reason, searching for rational answers where there are none.  I catch myself doing this also with my partner and we joke about which of us is Didi and Gogo.  Endless brain chatter and so we distract ourselves so we don't hear the 'dead voices' (ourselves) (p. 40).
Who is Godot?  Is he a metapor for God?  Didi and Gogo waiting for a better future with God - basically an illusion/hope that is futile?  Is that why Godot never comes but they remain hopeful since they have nothing else to hang on to?
I am not clear what the boy represents.  Does he bring Didi and Gogo back to reality that Godot doesn't exists but plays like he does to keep their spirits up?
Does Pozzo represent the arrogant (hu)man and Lucky, the animal?  Pozzo and Lucky seem to have a master and slave type of relationship with each other, much like humans treat animals like slaves.  The slave is told what to do, say, feel and think.
The tedium of poverty, powerlessness and false hope creates a cycle of endless suffering.
Death as respite.

Goodbye to Berlin - Christopher Isherwood

Looooooooove Goodbye to Berlin!  Someday, I'll get around to reading the first novella, Mr. Norris Changes Train in Berlin Stories as well.  Some random thoughts:
1. Interesting how the narration is from an 'objective' point of view.  I use 'objective' loosely since Isherwood (the character) does make subjective comments on the other characters but remains distant at the same time. 
2. The 'other' is celebrated (the 'other' being the English/Isherwood) - reminds me of my time in Japan where you are considered 'special' because of your western status.
3. The 'other' hangs out with each other and is in many ways more accepting of one another - e.g. female sex workers and gay males.
4. Interesting that the sanitorium is an escape haven for Mrs. Nowak - perhaps speaking to the starkness of life as the caretaker of children that in her mind contribute little to the family and society.
5. Strange interdependence of various characters - absurdity of being human?
6. Leaving behind those you cannot help (the Germans during Nazi/wartime Berlin) - feelings of guilt?  Loyalty?  Reminds me of the disasters at Fukushima/Tohoku and the blaming of foreigners who left when the going got rough...  The story ends abruptly - too painful to think about what happened to the various characters?  Isherwood can leave Berlin - he was there as a foreigner and has the privilege to leave but many of the characters did not.
7.  Adaptation - the landlady, Frl. Schroeder adapts to Nazi Germany.  As Isherwood notes, the people will remain in Berlin regardless of which government is in power.  But isn't this adaptation dangerous?  It is part of a survival strategy but at what cost?  Do we agree to fascism and genocide?

The Outsider (L’Étranger) - Albert Camus

I read this in either English 11 or 12 a looooong time ago.  I confess that although this is the second time I am reading the text, it feels like the first time all over again.  Some random thoughts:
1. Mersault seems neither moral nor immoral.  He is amoral.  Should we hold amoral people as immoral as the justice system did to Mersault?  Does this make society moral?  It seems rather immoral of society to do so if someone is actually truly and completely lacking what we call 'conscience'.  How does this then impact the 'justice' system?  Certainly a punitive one, especially with a death penalty doesn't seem like the moral or correct solution...  Raymond is clearly immoral yet he remains a free man.
2. Mersault is honest, a little too honest.  He refuses to embrace religion which is meaningless to him just because he is sentenced to death.  He refuses to show remorse since he doesn't feel any.  I kind of admire this honesty/principle in this regard. 
3. Making the best of one's situation - this seems to be what Mersault did in the second half of the novel and also what he believes his mother did.  Pragmatic/sensible and a wee bit optimistic, no - kind of like Candide.
4. Should someone's character be used to condemn someone in court?  Are we static creatures?  If someone has been indifferent or callous in the past, must this haunt her life forever?  I suppose that this is what we still do in court today if there is only circumstantial evidence and thus this alone is not enough to convict and so we use character/value judgements instead.  Is this justice?  But there were equal amounts of people who testified that Mersault is an honest and good man as those who claim him to be bad.  Why were the 'good' testimonies heard but disregarded?  Was he not condemned from day 1 of the trial then?
5. Mersault has no control over his fate.  He is not allowed to talk or to defend himself.  His lawyer will take care of things.  Why does one suddenly become a ward/infant all over again when one's life is at stake?
6. Salamano's cruelty to his dog seems to elicit laughter from others (e.g. Marie).  What does this say about society and our relationship with non-human-animals? He later grieves for his dog even though their relationship was unhealthy and abusive.  Makes me think of Didi and Gogo from Waiting for Godot.

Brave New World - Aldous Huxley

Some many important themes in this text which I absolutely loved!  While this text can be read as a warning of too much government control, it can also be read as a satire of Huxley's time.  The themes are clearly still relevant today and with more sense of urgency.  Some random thoughts:
1. Women do not seem to be dominant/powerful.  They are mainly portrayed as playthings.  Lenina as pneumatic - like an inflatable fuckable doll. 
2. Lack of relationships.  The humans in BNW are reduced to fuck-buddies.  There does not seem to be any deep friendship or relationships of any kind.
3. Everyone is just a number with a conditioned and 'predestined' role in society, even the Alpha-Pluses although they do have slightly more autonomy.
4. I am reminded of the pyramid of capitalism in which a few reap the benefits of this system while the majority (Epsilon Minus) toll for the property owners, the elites and the ruling class (Alpha Plus).  I started to wonder what rank I am...  Maybe a Gamma Minus or a Delta Plus.
5. I saw soma not just as a drug to make everyone happy necessarily but a 'drug' to numb everyone and to stop people from questioning authority.  It's easy to link soma to prescription drugs in today's BNW but I think soma also comes in the form of propaganda from the government, the education system and the media as well as but it could be consumerism, mindless entertainment, religion and other forms of dogma, etc.
6. Why are the choices the Brave New World, the Savage Reservation or exile?  Are there no other choices?
7. Why is monogamy so threatening in the BNW?  Isn't monogamy one of the best forms of mutual love and cooperation?  Would this not be good in the BNW?
8. To feel pain, to suffer is part of life but so is to feel happiness and pleasure.  I don't think that we have to feel pain in order to feel happy.  I think we want to live life not as an automaton in the BNW and this entails accepting the good and the bad, the pain and the pleasure of in life.  To live as an automaton (even a conditioned 'happy' one), to lack freedom is not really living.  As Bob Marley sings, "I'd rather be a free man in my grave than living as a puppet or a slave".
9. Which brings me again to my veganism - there is no humane meat - the animals are still enslaved, fattened up for human-animal food.  They do not have the chance to be free.  Tell me how is this humane when organic free-range animals still end up at slaughterhouses with bolts shot into their heads (if they are cows).
10. I can relate to Bernard Marx's alienation.  I'm a manager but I do not feel like being a figure of authority and so I try to treat others as my equal.  I feel alienated around other managers.  I don't care to dress up like one and my heart lives with the workers than with management.  It's a funny place to be in...
11. Mustapha Mond can be seen as pragmatic but a sell-out, I think...  While I may not agree with all of John's actions or thoughts, I at least respect him for his principles and dignity.

Civilization and Its Discontent - Sigmund Freud

While I do not disagree that our guiding principle in life is the pleasure principle, I think it is an oversimplification to say that the suppression of our 'primitive' instincts (to rape, kill, commit adultery, etc.) is the main cause of our discontent with civilization/laws/social mores of society.

There is a never ending debate over whether the human-animal is inately good or inately bad - I think this is a futile and irrelavant debate.  It is perhaps more accurate to acknowledge that we have the capability to be both, with both nature and nurture as factors of our goodness or badness.

That said, I do believe that the pleasure principle is applicable to much more than just our pleasure instincts.  We take great joys in nature, in relationships with others (sexual and non-sexual), in art, in relationships with non-human-animals, in kindness from others.  To attribute pleasure/happiness from sexual and 'primitive' instincts is only one slice of the bigger pie.  Freud's text while useful, overgeneralizes and applies an absolute to all particulars.

While society does impose many rules on us and can create neuroses in many of us, this depends on what kind of society we live in.  I do not disagree that our current society/civilization has create much discontent but this is in no small part due to the authoritarian rule by governments who are not acting in the interest of its citizens at large but for themselves, for short term profit and for the corporations, industries and lobby groups that fund them, and in which they essentially work for/are accountable to.

I do agree that ethics is a way to make ourselves feel better over our consciousness of guilt but it is much more than that.  It is a way of life, a useful philosophy - in a way, more so that rigid laws imposed on us. Ethics is to me, the essence of all religion, the humanism minus the dogma of some almighty God(s).  And ethics is contextual rather than absolute.

In the context of my veganism, my discontent is with the treatment of animals as mere property, no different from an iPhone.  It is a sad state of affairs when someone shows more outrage when her iPhone is stolen/vandalized than over how the animals breed, used and abused for clothing, food and beyond is treated.  Civilization?  Are we really civilized with ILOs (Intensive Livestock Operations)?  Is this progress? How can one not despair and feel so much more than discontent over this supposed human 'progress'?  I will not eat tortured animals and misery.  My ethics/consciousness supercedes my base appetite instincts and as such, I derive far greater pleasure when I eat with more consciousness.

To the Lighthouse - Virginia Woolf

I confess that I found the jumpy streams of consciousness a wee bit confusing but the jumpiness is indeed very human and very much like our own jumpy, paradoxical and inconsistent streams of consciousness.  This is very much the brain chatter that Jill Bolte Taylor talks about in My Stroke of Insight!  How do we reconcile the paradoxes and insecurities of our mind?  Mr. and Mrs. Ramsay seem to take opposite approaches.  The former relies on his intellect, ignoring much of his emotions and the latter seem to place most of her emphasis on her emotions rather than her intellect.  Of course, emotion and intellect are not dichotomies either, rather they are part of a whole, of a continuum.  Life is transient - how do we mitigate the impermanence of life?  I do agree with Mrs. Ramsay approach in that we should make the most out of the present moment but we can do this utilizing both our intellect and emotion.  A balance of both is not impossible to attain.  We can cultivate meaningful social relationships, as is crucial to the happiness and survival of our species while cultivating our intellectual mind at the same time.  I would not want the life of Mr. Ramsay in which he is so obsessed with his intellectual life that he in essence does not enjoy the company of his loved ones and seem to miss out on the lives of his own children and wife for the most part.

Mrs. Ramsays dies in the novel as do some other characters.  They die as a blurb in parentheses.  Death is a fact of life.  But so what?  Why would anyone want to live forever, be it literally or metaphorically?  Sure, it would be great if one is able to leave a great legacy of work to humanity but few of us can achieve the latter which seems to have tormented Mr. Ramsay unnecessarily. Should the lived moments not count the most rather than what you can leave behind long after you are dead?  Mrs. Ramsays is remembered well after her death.  Relationships and the summer house seem to decay after her death.  All this is also transient.  She may be remembered by Lily but as time passes, Lily will die and eventually Mrs. Ramsay and others will be forgotten by the living.  So what?  It's not like Mrs. Ramsays will know any better. She is dead.  Why are we, as a species so concerned which after-death?  Is it not more fruitful to pay attention to the living?  There is no one way of living that is right for all.  What is meaningful to me may not be meaningful to another.  It is our responsibility to make life meaningful for ourselves and to live in harmony with others.