Tuesday, November 25, 2025
Wednesday, April 23, 2025
запрет на Достоевском
На Достоевском лежал запрет, вроде надгробной плиты, и о нем говорили, что он "тяжелый" ; Тургенев был весь разрешенный и открытый с Баден-Баденом, "Вешними водами" и ленивыми разговорами. --Осип Мандельштам, Шум времени
это конец 1890-х. а я думал, что Достоевского только при коммунистах запрещали. ну или не одобряли.
Thursday, April 17, 2025
Георгий Иванов
Хорошо что нет Царя
Хорошо, что нет Царя.
Хорошо, что нет России.
Хорошо, что Бога нет.
Только желтая заря,
Только звезды ледяные,
Только миллионы лет.
Хорошо — что никого,
Хорошо — что ничего,
Так черно и так мертво,
Что мертвее быть не может
И чернее не бывать,
Что никто нам не поможет
И не надо помогать.
-1930
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Это было так прекрасно, что не может кончиться со смертью",-- записывает после брачной ночи молодой Толстой. --Ibid
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К коробке была приколота записка: "Размахайчики, иначе Размахай, иначе Размахайцы. Австралийского происхождения. Просят любить, кормить и водить на прогулку в Булонский лес". лес".
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Monday, March 24, 2025
Friday, February 21, 2025
Monday, October 21, 2024
distinguishing quality
It may be remarked that the harsh opinion of Machiavelli has been more widespread in England and the United States than in the nations of Continental Europe. This is no doubt natural, because the distinguishing quality of Anglo-Saxon politics has always been hypocrisy, and hypocrisy must always be at pains to shy away from the truth. The Machiavellians: Defenders of Freedom, by James Burnhampdf
Sunday, October 20, 2024
Wednesday, October 16, 2024
more on heresy
Pier did not feel that he was in danger, or under pressure either to divulge or to disguise his opinions, which he expressed with some vigour. The God who had given the law to Moses, he said, was a malevolent scoundrel, who would damn nine hundred and ninety-nine out of every thousand men he had made; Pier, if he got hold of him, would spit in his face, bite and scratch him, break him in pieces, ‘May he die of gout!’ He expressed the anticlerical sentiments and anti-ecclesiastical views that had been current in the region – and not only in this region – for a century or more with the same vehemence: the church should have no property; its sacraments were invalid and its alms and penances worthless, since there was no purgatory; its buildings were not churches, but mere structures in which falsity and nonsense were spoken; its liturgy unintelligible, meant to deceive simple people; and the cross merely a piece of wood. Nobody should be condemned to death, and officials who pronounced such sentences, such as preachers of the crusade, were murderers. Marriage was prostitution, and nobody who slept with a woman, even his own wife, could be saved; Pier himself had not done so for two years, though his wife was not a believer but ‘an idiot like you’.The War On Heresy, pg 207
Sunday, October 13, 2024
Есть здесь театры?
Sunday, October 6, 2024
Sunday, September 29, 2024
Saturday, September 28, 2024
пролетарии всех стран
Thursday, September 19, 2024
Monday, September 16, 2024
Monday, September 9, 2024
Friday, September 6, 2024
they just keep scrolling
Back in February, the music historian Ted Gioia wrote an essay on the state of American culture. He argued that many creative people want to create art (work that puts demands on people), but all the commercial pressures push them to create entertainment (which gives audiences what they want). As a result, for the past many years, entertainment (superhero movies) has been swallowing up art (literary novels and serious dramas).But now, Gioia observed, even the entertainment business is in crisis. Hollywood studios are laying off employees. The number of new scripted TV series is down. That’s because entertainment is being swallowed up by distraction (TikTok, Instagram). People stay on their phones because it’s easier. Each object of distraction lasts only a few seconds and doesn’t require any cognitive work; the audience just keeps scrolling. --The Junkification of American Life
Sunday, August 25, 2024
новости
Saturday, August 24, 2024
more on heresy
Ad abolendam was promulgated at a time when the scale, variety and effectiveness of mechanisms of government of every kind and at every level, and of the number of men trained and available to operate them, taking full advantage of the consequent opportunities to develop their careers, line their pockets and undermine their rivals, were increasing exponentially. -The War on Heresy, pg 142
“When Statesmen gravely say ‘We must be realistic’ну да, when politicians talk about morals - watch your pockets
The chances are they’re weak, and therefore pacifistic:
But when they speak of Principles, look out: perhaps
Their generals are already poring over maps."--W. H. Auden, Collected Shorter Poems
pg 148
more on albigensian crusade starting from pg 171:
The most notorious of the events and atrocities that have given the Albigensian wars the reputation of reaching new levels of savagery and destructiveness took place during this first phase of the campaigns and triumphs of Simon de Montfort....
In describing these holocausts Peter of Les Vaux de Cernay uses the Latin phrase cum ingenti gaudio (‘with great joy’)...
Wednesday, August 21, 2024
The level of cynicism
the rest is history obvious
Monday, August 19, 2024
on hate-watching
... hate-watching is now part of the cultural conversation and arguably contemporary life. Chalk it up to morbid curiosity: We start watching a show because it looks appealing, but we keep watching because we want to complain about it at happy hour. It’s fun to be the person who describes a particularly terrible story arc or performance to our friends’ disbelief. Besides, it’s better than whatever is on the news. --I ❤️ a Hate-Watch. Don’t You?неплохое эссе, еще и познавательное: целый список кандидатов на hate-watching. и фраза про новости удачная. еще там хороший термин doomscrolling
Tech companies recognize an unfortunate truth: incentivizing our worst impulses is far more lucrative than harnessing our best ones. In this context-free void, an eyeball is an eyeball, whether the brain behind it is being flooded with dopamine or adrenaline. A click is a click, whether you’re glad or mad.ну и ударный финал: To borrow a sentiment, the opposite of love is not hate, it’s indifference. от себя добавлю: хоть я и hate-read NYT, иногда в ней встречаются достойные вещи, как это эссе....
It is also the kind of behavior, like doomscrolling and replying to trolls, that feeds our less charitable instincts. The more we do it, the more it becomes a habit, a negative approach to the world. We start to expect to be mad, even crave the feeling, and that cynicism spills over into more than just our TV diet.



