WSJ Historically Speaking: Why Walls Rarely Keep Enemies Out

Photo: DEAGOSTINI/GETTY IMAGES

Photo: DEAGOSTINI/GETTY IMAGES

News of the latest theft of sensitive American information— this time of some 4 million records from the federal government’s Office of Personnel Management, allegedly by Chinese hackers—highlights the unfortunate truth about defensive walls. They may offer great psychological  comfort, whether as firewalls in the online world or stone walls and natural barriers in the real one, but they rarely work.

In the Book of Joshua, the Israelites engineered a brilliant victory by stamping their feet for seven days and blasting the walls of Jericho with their trumpets. In “The Aeneid,” Virgil described how the Trojans brought about their own downfall by bringing the famous wooden horse inside their gates. In his monumental “The Histories,” Herodotuslauded the courageous but futile last stand of the Spartans at the Battle of Thermopylae (480 B.C.) after they were betrayed by Ephialtes of Malis, who showed the Persians a secret route through the mountains that led to the back of the Greek lines. But these striking failures didn’t deter subsequent generations from believing that walls could keep them safe.

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The Sunday Times: Here’s a trigger warning for all campus censors: I shall fight you

Photo: Leeroy

Photo: Leeroy

I stopped watching HBO’s Rape of Thrones — sorry, Game of Thrones — three years ago. I appreciated the plotlines and strong characters and I’ve had both women and men explain to me why it’s necessary for the actresses to play hyper-­‐sexualised roles. But at the end  of the day, to me it’s a sleazy peep show about tits and bums gussied up with high production values and clever dialogue.

There’s a level of crude objectification, a cinematic revelling in the humiliation of women that speaks to something else. It disgusts me on many levels, not least because I believe that “something else” is modern society’s continuing toleration of sexual inequality.

So what’s an angry feminist to do? Well, watch a different programme, for a start. But more effective: complain, debate and generally participate in the marketplace of ideas to try to persuade others that “edgy” entertainment doesn’t have to mean taboo-busting depictions of women being degraded.

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WSJ Historically Speaking: The First Ladies and Their Predecessors

Photo: CSU ARCHIVES/EVERETT COLLECTION

Photo: CSU ARCHIVES/EVERETT COLLECTION

Dolley Madison was born this month in 1768. One of the greatest first ladies in U.S. history, she had a style and energy that brought a uniquely American twist to the role of political spouse. She transformed the White House, not only giving the interiors a much-needed face-lift but also making the presidential residence the social epicenter of Washington, D.C. Among her many gifts to the nation was her insistence that George Washington’s portrait be rescued when the British burned the city in 1814.

But Dolley Madison’s greatest achievement was in creating the role of first lady. President Zachary Taylor used the term for the first time at her funeral in 1849. After her time in the White House, Americans expected first ladies to play a public part, one that was above day-to-day politics and often national in its scope.

The idea of the political spouse has deep historical roots. Livia Drusilla, the ruthless and powerful wife of Caesar Augustus, was instrumental in shaping the destiny of the Roman Empire. Yet even she was imitating a role model that had its original expression in ancient Mesopotamia, the cradle of civilization.

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The Sunday Times: America’s lost its can-do spirit in the jam of trains, planes and automobiles

Photo: Will Langenberg

Photo: Will Langenberg

I wish I could say that last week’s tragedy in Philadelphia — where a speeding Amtrak train jumped the tracks, killing eight people and injuring more than 200 — will create sufficient shockwaves that the government will have to change its attitude towards America’s crumbling infrastructure.

Even a small change would help, such as an end to the political deadlock over fitting all trains with the new anti-accident technology known as positive train control. Unfortunately I don’t think that’s possible.

America is a young country, not even 250 years old. Yet a creeping sclerosis is spreading through the body politic. The country’s ability and, more important, its will, to fix what needs fixing and improve what needs improving is collapsing.

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WSJ Historically Speaking: The Many Meanings of May Day

Photo: ART MEDIA/PRINT COLLECTOR/GETTY IMAGES

Photo: ART MEDIA/PRINT COLLECTOR/GETTY IMAGES

The Law of Non-­‐Contradiction states that it isn’t possible to be both Y and Not-­‐Y at the same time—which suggests that the law never encountered May Day, the public holiday celebrated on May 1,  which both is and isn’t a celebration of summer. May Day owes its origins to the ancient festivals—from the Roman Floralia to the Celtic Beltane—that celebrated the first plantings of the season and the coming of the solstice.

May Day owes its origins to the ancient festivals—from the Roman Floralia to the Celtic Beltane—that celebrated the first plantings of the season and the coming of the solstice.

By the end of the Middle Ages, the day had become one of the most important on the calendar. Just as the fir tree has become a popular symbol of Christmas, the flowering hawthorn—also called the May tree—became the sacred emblem of summer. (When Shakespeare wrote, “Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May” in his famous Sonnet 18, he meant the tree, not the month.)

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WSJ Historically Speaking: Charlie Hebdo and a Rubicon Moment for Free Speech

Source: Gerard Biard, right, Editor-in-Chief of Charlie Hebdo, and Jean-Baptiste Thoret, second from right, accept the Freedom of Expression Courage Award at the PEN American Center ceremony in New York on Tuesday. Photo: ASSOCIATED PRESS

Photo: ASSOCIATED PRESS

On balance it would have been awkward if the boycotters of the annual awards dinner of PEN American Center had changed their minds and attended on Tuesday night. At the very least their presence at the literary gathering might have been an unnecessary distraction. At worst it could have been taken as an insult to the memories of the 12 members of the satirical French publication Charlie Hebdo who died on Jan. 7 while exercising their right to free speech.

The heartfelt standing ovation for Gerard Biard and Jean-Baptiste Thoret—who accepted the Freedom of Expression Courage award on behalf of the magazine—had its own eloquence. Unusually, the many writers in the room didn’t need to say anything to make themselves heard. Simply being at the dinner was a statement, a Rubicon moment for those who believe that universal human rights is a cause worth dying for. Just as boycotting the awards has become the rallying event for those who believe that it comes second to other considerations.

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The Sunday Times: The friction making Baltimore burn is not race but class

Photo: Skitter Photo

Photo: Skitter Photo

The riots in Ferguson, Missouri, last year were provoked by racism. No rational person could argue otherwise after a black man was shot dead by a white police officer. The facts speak for themselves. This small suburb adjacent to the port city of St Louis has only 21,000 residents, two-­‐thirds of whom are black. Yet its officials are almost without exception white — from the 94% white police force to the white mayor, the white police chief and almost all-­‐white city council.

In Ferguson’s case, at least, one answer to the institutional imbalance is relatively easy to see: encourage more people to vote in local elections and they will have more say in the outcome. A mere 6% of black voters took part in the 2013 local elections. It stands to reason, if more people within the community are involved in its decision-making processes there is a greater chance that the right kind of change will happen from within.

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WSJ Historically Speaking: Even Poets Get Spring Fever

Photo: GETTY IMAGES

Photo: GETTY IMAGES

Spring is finally dispelling the cheerless gray of winter. In a few more weeks, city dwellers will begin the time-­‐honored practice of heading to the countryside in search of pristine nature, tranquility and cooler climes.

In the third century B.C., Theocritus of Syracuse became one of the earliest poets to celebrate nature for its own sake. His deceptively simple poems about shepherds and farmers inspired a new poetic form, the pastoral elegy.

Almost two centuries later, the great Roman poet Virgil (70-19 B.C.) freed the genre from its literal underpinnings to give it a certain philosophical bent. His pastoral poetry was more than just an elegant commentary on the countryside; fundamental to its purpose was the exploration of our relationship with nature. “Let me love the rivers and the woods,” Virgil declares in “The Georgics,” before going on to ponder whether he should spend his life contemplating rural delights.

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Daily Mail Online: Carey Mulligan lets her natural beauty shine through as she wears minimal make-up and a simple black ensemble to celebrate new movie Far From The Madding Crowd

Daily Mail Online 04.23.15By Clare Swanson

While she’s often celebrated for her beauty, Carey Mulligan appeared intent on keeping things low-key when she stepped out in New York City for a high-profile event on Wednesday.

The 29-year-old actress attended a special luncheon to celebrate her upcoming movie, Far From The Madding Crowd, and it was the sheer simplicity of her look that drew admiration. With her dark brown tresses styled in a neat bun, the British screen star let her natural beauty shine through as she wore make-up for her moment in the spotlight.

She also kept her ensemble equally simple yet eye-catching, stepping out in an embellished sleeveless plunging black top, which she teamed with a black skirt and matching heels.

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The Huffington Post: At Lunch With Carey Mulligan and Matthias Schoenaerts

By Regina Weinreich

La Grenouille experienced a British invasion yesterday for a lunch celebrating the film Far From the Madding Crowd, based on Thomas Hardy’s beloved 19th century novel. Carey Mulligan, currently starring in Skylight on Broadway, plays Bathsheba Everdene, a strong-willed and occasionally wrong-headed heroine, a pre-feminist, you could call her. Belgian actor Matthias Schoenaerts portrays Gabriel Oak, the pre-feminist hunk who protects her. He is loyal, kind, brave, talented, hard-working, and dreamy. When I asked Schoenaerts, memorable for his performance opposite Marion Cotillard in Rust and Bone what he thought of this character, he enthused, “I can learn from him. I want to BE him.”

The film shares with another fine recently released period film, Effie Gray: the actor Tom Sturridge. In FFMC, he’s a soldier, a lout, who briefly wins Bathsheba’s heart, “beneath her” in Gabriel’s estimation. She marries him anyway, bringing on a set of misfortunes. In Effie Gray, about the wife of essayist and art historian John Ruskin, Sturridge portrays the sensitive artist with whom Effie Gray (Dakota Fanning), another pre-feminist, truly connects.

The luncheon being a Peggy Siegal affair, Amanda Foreman (who goes by Bill) interviewed Mulligan and Schoenaerts, with Finding Neverland’s Matthew Morrison, Julie Taymor, Tina Brown, Stefano Tonchi attending. Sir Peter Westmacotts, British Ambassador to the United States and Danny Lopez, British Consul General in New York, introduced her, noting her contribution to literature. Everyone always asks how Foreman does it, writing her books, managing a household including her five children, and hosting House of Speakeasy which that night would convene at City Winery featuring authors Elif Shafak, Tom Robb Smith, and House of Cards showrunner Beau Willimon. By working all the time, she says.