Polish poet, diplomat, prosaist, writer, and translator; Nobel Prize winner
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Send us a textIt's a real treat to welcome one of my all time medical humanities heroes to the podcast again this week. Sam Guglani is an oncologist, poet and novelist. He is the curator of the incredible Medicine Unboxed, hosting a festival which I've thoroughly enjoyed attending and this wonderful podcast https://soundcloud.com/medicineunboxedSam was generous enough to give up his time to talk about his wonderful novel Histories back in season 2 (listen here: https://bedsidereading.buzzsprout.com/1880290/episodes/11212760-histories) and it was so lovely to spend time talking with him again, this time about Preparation by Czeslaw Milosz.
Part of the reason for the market bloodbath is because the finance wizzes didn't factor in that Trump would actually do the truly moronic thing he kept saying he would. Their shock over his recklessness is intensifying the crash. Meanwhile, a trio of administration fools trying to defend the tariffs—Lutnick, Bessent, and Hassett—showed there is no grand design to the trade war, White House infighting is getting hot enough that even Elon is subtweeting Trump, and the folks we elected over on the Hill could actually do something to try to stop the market carnage. Plus, new reporting on our government's kidnapping of migrants, Republicans in North Carolina are trying to steal a supreme court seat, and where is JD Vance? Bill Kristol joins Tim Miller for the weekend pod. show notes JVL on the end of the American Age Lauren on the backlash against Dems in major law firms who are bending the knee 60 Minutes segment on migrants sent to the Salvadoran penal colony Tim's 'Bulwark Take' responding to the 60 Minutes report Tim talking with AEI's Stan Veuger about Trump's terrible tariff math The book, "The Captive Mind" by Polish poet Czeslaw Milosz
Rebecca Lemov discusses with Ivan six things which should be better known. Rebecca Lemov is a historian of science at Harvard University and has been a visiting scholar at the Max Planck Institute. Her research explores data, technology, and the history of human and behavioural sciences. She lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts with her family. Her new book is The Instability of Truth, which is available at https://wwnorton.com/books/9781324075264. Brainwashing is not about other people https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/freedom-of-mind/202412/so-youve-been-brainwashed-without-realizing-it-what-now The rise and fall and rise of Barbara Pym https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/06/06/when-barbara-pym-couldnt-get-published Kate Smith https://musicologynow.org/kate-smith-and-our-minstrel-past/ Nashville film https://www.theguardian.com/film/2021/jun/25/nashville-review-robert-altman The story of the three frogs by Czeslaw Milosz https://bookhaven.stanford.edu/2016/06/happy-birthday-czeslaw-milosz-he-was-no-hero-and-he-knew-it/ Brainwashing and trauma are connected, but that was never, or rarely ever, recognized by the experts. https://www.randifine.com/post/brainwashing-the-cunning-psychological-tactic-used-in-narcissistic-abuse-domestic-violence-and-cults This podcast is powered by ZenCast.fm
Phil and Jake discuss Witold Gombrowicz's "Against Poets" and Czeslaw Milosz's "Ars Poetica?" The Manifesto: Witold Gombrowicz, "Against Poets" https://www.degruyter.com/document/doi/10.12987/9780300183399-006/html?lang=en&srsltid=AfmBOopUFE9LX61sfmOAYszduQw78uOlvfHGgFOUPvi-0afjm9eQ2nhI The Art: Czeslaw Milosz, "Ars Poetica?" https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/49455/ars-poetica-56d22b8f31558
Hello to you listening in Torremolinos, Spain!Coming to you from Whidbey Island, Washington this is Stories From Women Who Walk with 60 Seconds for Story Prompt Friday and your host, Diane Wyzga.It seems like only yesterday the holiday tune All I Want for Christmas was looping on play lists.Almost two months later I've decided what I want for Valentine's Day. No, more than a day! This is how I want to live, to give my heart to the world, as in the compassionate words of the Nobel Prize winning Polish-American poet, Czeslaw Milosz: “Not that I want to be a god or a heroJust to change into a tree, grow for ages, not hurt anyone.”~ by Czeslaw Milosz Story Prompt: What about you? To what are you willing to give your heart this Valentine's Day? Write that story!Bonus 1: who Milosz wasBonus 2: "Provinces" is one of the monumental splendors of poetry in our ageYou're always invited: “Come for the stories - stay for the magic!” Speaking of magic, would you subscribe and spread the word with a generous 5-star review and comment - it helps us all - and join us next time!Meanwhile, stop by my Quarter Moon Story Arts website to:✓ Check out Communication Services I Offer✓ For a no-obligation conversation about your communication challenges, get in touch with me today✓ Stay current with Diane on LinkedIn, as “Wyzga on Words” on Substack, and now Pandora RadioStories From Women Who Walk Production TeamPodcaster: Diane F Wyzga & Quarter Moon Story ArtsMusic: Mer's Waltz from Crossing the Waters by Steve Schuch & Night Heron MusicAll content and image © 2019 to Present Quarter Moon Story Arts. All rights reserved.
Poet's don't typically compete for “coolest book cover,” and it's probably because Zbigniew Herbert won years ago. Today's poem is his tender look at poverty, pleasure, and irretrievable loss. Zbigniew Herbert was born on October 29, 1924, in Poland in the city of Lvov, which is now a part of the Ukraine. His grandfather was an Englishman who settled in Lvov to teach English. His father, a former member of the Legions that had fought for restoration of Poland's independence, was a bank manager. Herbert's formal education began in Lvov and continued under German occupation in the form of clandestine study at the underground King John Casimir University, where he majored in Polish literature. He was a member of the underground resistance movement. In 1944, he moved to Krakow, and three years later he graduated from the University of Krakow with a master's degree in economics. He also received a law degree from Nicholas Copernicus University in Torun and studied philosophy at the University of Warsaw under Henryk Elzenberg.During the 1950s, Herbert worked at many low-paying jobs because he refused to write within the framework of official Communist guidelines. After widespread riots against Soviet control in 1956 brought about a political “thaw,” Herbert became an administrator at the Union of Polish Composers and published his first collection, Struna swiatla [The Chord of Light] (Czytelnik, 1956). The book immediately placed him among the most prominent representatives of the “Contemporaries” (young poets and writers associated with the weekly Contemporary Times).In 1957, Herbert published his second collection of verse, Hermes, pies i gwiazda [Hermes, the Dog and the Star] (Czytelnik). Four years later, he published his third book of poems, Studium przedmiotu [Study of the Object] (Czytelnik, 1961). In 1968, his Selected Poems, translated into English by Czeslaw Milosz and Peter Dale Scott, was released in both the United States and England, making Herbert one of the most popular contemporary poets in the English-speaking world. In 1971, he released the first Polish edition of Selected Poems.Herbert's 1983 collection, Raport z oblezonego miasta i inne wiersze [Report from the Besieged City] (Instytut Literacki), dealt with the ethical problems Poland faced while under martial law. The book was issued simultaneously through an emigré publishing house and as an underground edition in Poland. He also published a number of essay collections and works of drama. In 1962, he released his famous work, Barbarzyńca wogrodzie [Barbarian in the Garden] (Czytelnik), which was eventually translated into numerous languages.Herbert's numerous awards include the Kościelski Foundation Prize, the Austrian Lenau Prize, the Alfred Jurzykowski Prize, the Herder Prize, the Petrarch Prize, the Bruno Schulz Prize, and the Jerusalem Prize for the Freedom of the Individual in Society.Herbert was a coeditor of the poetry journal Poezja from 1965 to 1968 but resigned in protest of antisemitic policies. He traveled widely throughout the West and lived in Paris, Berlin, and the United States, where he taught briefly at the University of California, Los Angeles. He died in Warsaw on July 28, 1998.-bio via Academy of American Poets This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit dailypoempod.substack.com/subscribe
Hello to you listening in Glossop, Derbyshire, England!Coming to you from Whidbey Island, Washington this is Stories From Women Who Walk with 60 Seconds for Time Out Tuesday and your host, Diane Wyzga. Tuesdays are a respite for me. A chance to contemplate for a moment the beauty of a world that might seem to have turned its back on all things beauty-full. I seek out poetry - some I understand - some I ponder as a wander, as with this poem by Czeslaw Milosz entitled “Love”: Love“Love means to learn to look at yourselfThe way one looks at distant thingsFor you are only one thing among many.And whoever sees that way heals his heart,Without knowing it, from various ills—A bird and a tree say to him: Friend.Then he wants to use himself and thingsSo that they stand in the glow of ripeness.It doesn't matter whether he knows what he serves:Who serves best doesn't always understand.” It is no wonder this Nobel Prize-winning poet also wrote these lines:“Not that I want to be a god or a heroJust to change into a tree,Grow for ages, not hurt anyone.” [Czeslaw Milosz] Question: Who are you aspiring to be, to change into? You're always invited: “Come for the stories - stay for the magic!” Speaking of magic, would you subscribe, share a 5-star rating + nice review on your social media or podcast channel of choice, and join us next time!Meanwhile, stop by my Quarter Moon Story Arts website to:✓ Check out What I Offer,✓ Arrange your free Story Start-up Session,✓ Stay current with Diane on LinkedIn, as Wyzga on Words on Substack, and now on Pandora Radio!Stories From Women Who Walk Production TeamPodcaster: Diane F Wyzga & Quarter Moon Story ArtsMusic: Mer's Waltz from Crossing the Waters by Steve Schuch & Night Heron MusicAll content and image © 2019 to Present Quarter Moon Story Arts. All rights reserved.
Internationell författarscen 26 september 2000.
Welcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: On attunement, published by Joe Carlsmith on March 25, 2024 on LessWrong. (Cross-posted from my website. Podcast version here, or search for "Joe Carlsmith Audio" on your podcast app. This essay is part of a series that I'm calling "Otherness and control in the age of AGI." I'm hoping that the individual essays can be read fairly well on their own, but see here for brief summaries of the essays that have been released thus far.) "You, moon, You, Aleksander, fire of cedar logs. Waters close over us, a name lasts but an instant. Not important whether the generations hold us in memory. Great was that chase with the hounds for the unattainable meaning of the world." ~ Czeslaw Milosz, "Winter" "Poplars (Autumn)," by Claude Monet (image source here) My last essay examined a philosophical vibe that I (following others) call "green." Green is one of the five colors on the Magic the Gathering Color Wheel, which I've found (despite not playing Magic myself) an interesting way of classifying the sort of the energies that tend to animate people.[1] The colors, and their corresponding shticks-according-to-Joe, are: White: Morality. Blue: Knowledge. Black: Power. Red: Passion. Green: ... I haven't found a single word that I think captures green. Associations include: environmentalism, tradition, spirituality, hippies, stereotypes of Native Americans, Yoda, humility, wholesomeness, health, and yin. My last essay tried to bring the vibe that underlies these associations into clearer view, and to point at some ways that attempts by other colors to reconstruct green can miss parts of it. In particular, I focused on the way green cares about respect, in a sense that goes beyond "not trampling on the rights/interests of moral patients" (what I called "green-according-to-white"); and on the way green takes joy in (certain kinds of) yin, in a sense that contrasts with merely "accepting things you're too weak to change" (what I called "green-according-to-black"). In this essay, I want to turn to what is perhaps the most common and most compelling-to-me attempt by another color to reconstruct green - namely, "green-according-to-blue." On this story, green is about making sure that you don't act out of inadequate knowledge. Thus, for example: maybe you're upset about wild animal suffering. But green cautions you: if you try to remake that ecosystem to improve the lives of wild animals, you are at serious risk of not knowing-what-you're-doing. And see, also, the discourse about "Chesterton's fence," which attempts to justify deference towards tradition and the status quo via the sort of knowledge they might embody. I think humility in the face of the limits of our knowledge is, indeed, a big part of what's going on with green. But I think green cares about having certain kinds of knowledge too. But I think that the type of knowledge green cares about most isn't quite the same as the sort of knowledge most paradigmatically associated with blue. Let me say more about what I mean. How do you know what matters? "I went out to see what I could see..." ~ Annie Dillard, "Pilgrim at Tinker Creek" An 1828 watercolor of Tintern Abbey, by J.M.W. Turner (image source here) Blue, to me, most directly connotes knowledge in the sense of: science, "rationality," and making accurate predictions about the world. And there is a grand tradition of contrasting this sort of knowledge with various other types that seem less "heady" and "cognitive" - even without a clear sense of what exactly the contrast consists in. People talk, for example, about intuition; about system 1; about knowledge that lives in your gut and your body; about knowing "how" to do things (e.g. ride a bike); about more paradigmatically social/emotional forms of intelligence, and so on. And here, of course, the rationalists protest at the idea ...
Link to original articleWelcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: On attunement, published by Joe Carlsmith on March 25, 2024 on LessWrong. (Cross-posted from my website. Podcast version here, or search for "Joe Carlsmith Audio" on your podcast app. This essay is part of a series that I'm calling "Otherness and control in the age of AGI." I'm hoping that the individual essays can be read fairly well on their own, but see here for brief summaries of the essays that have been released thus far.) "You, moon, You, Aleksander, fire of cedar logs. Waters close over us, a name lasts but an instant. Not important whether the generations hold us in memory. Great was that chase with the hounds for the unattainable meaning of the world." ~ Czeslaw Milosz, "Winter" "Poplars (Autumn)," by Claude Monet (image source here) My last essay examined a philosophical vibe that I (following others) call "green." Green is one of the five colors on the Magic the Gathering Color Wheel, which I've found (despite not playing Magic myself) an interesting way of classifying the sort of the energies that tend to animate people.[1] The colors, and their corresponding shticks-according-to-Joe, are: White: Morality. Blue: Knowledge. Black: Power. Red: Passion. Green: ... I haven't found a single word that I think captures green. Associations include: environmentalism, tradition, spirituality, hippies, stereotypes of Native Americans, Yoda, humility, wholesomeness, health, and yin. My last essay tried to bring the vibe that underlies these associations into clearer view, and to point at some ways that attempts by other colors to reconstruct green can miss parts of it. In particular, I focused on the way green cares about respect, in a sense that goes beyond "not trampling on the rights/interests of moral patients" (what I called "green-according-to-white"); and on the way green takes joy in (certain kinds of) yin, in a sense that contrasts with merely "accepting things you're too weak to change" (what I called "green-according-to-black"). In this essay, I want to turn to what is perhaps the most common and most compelling-to-me attempt by another color to reconstruct green - namely, "green-according-to-blue." On this story, green is about making sure that you don't act out of inadequate knowledge. Thus, for example: maybe you're upset about wild animal suffering. But green cautions you: if you try to remake that ecosystem to improve the lives of wild animals, you are at serious risk of not knowing-what-you're-doing. And see, also, the discourse about "Chesterton's fence," which attempts to justify deference towards tradition and the status quo via the sort of knowledge they might embody. I think humility in the face of the limits of our knowledge is, indeed, a big part of what's going on with green. But I think green cares about having certain kinds of knowledge too. But I think that the type of knowledge green cares about most isn't quite the same as the sort of knowledge most paradigmatically associated with blue. Let me say more about what I mean. How do you know what matters? "I went out to see what I could see..." ~ Annie Dillard, "Pilgrim at Tinker Creek" An 1828 watercolor of Tintern Abbey, by J.M.W. Turner (image source here) Blue, to me, most directly connotes knowledge in the sense of: science, "rationality," and making accurate predictions about the world. And there is a grand tradition of contrasting this sort of knowledge with various other types that seem less "heady" and "cognitive" - even without a clear sense of what exactly the contrast consists in. People talk, for example, about intuition; about system 1; about knowledge that lives in your gut and your body; about knowing "how" to do things (e.g. ride a bike); about more paradigmatically social/emotional forms of intelligence, and so on. And here, of course, the rationalists protest at the idea ...
Hello to you listening in Glossop, Derbyshire, England!Coming to you from Whidbey Island, Washington this is Stories From Women Who Walk with 60 Seconds for Time Out Tuesday and your host, Diane Wyzga. Tuesdays are a respite for me. A chance to contemplate for a moment the beauty of a world that might seem to have turned its back on all things beauty-full. I seek out poetry - some I understand - some I ponder as a wander, as with this poem by Czeslaw Milosz entitled “Love”: Love“Love means to learn to look at yourselfThe way one looks at distant thingsFor you are only one thing among many.And whoever sees that way heals his heart,Without knowing it, from various ills—A bird and a tree say to him: Friend.Then he wants to use himself and thingsSo that they stand in the glow of ripeness.It doesn't matter whether he knows what he serves:Who serves best doesn't always understand.” It is no wonder this Nobel Prize-winning poet also wrote these lines:“Not that I want to be a god or a heroJust to change into a tree,Grow for ages, not hurt anyone.” [Czeslaw Milosz] Question: Who are you aspiring to be, to change into? You're always invited: “Come for the stories - stay for the magic!” Speaking of magic, would you subscribe, share a 5-star rating + nice review on your social media or podcast channel of choice, and join us next time!Meanwhile, stop by my Quarter Moon Story Arts website to:✓ Check out What I Offer,✓ Arrange your free Story Start-up Session,✓ Opt In to my monthly NewsAudioLetter for bonus gift, valuable tips & techniques to enhance your story work, and✓ Stay current with Diane on LinkedIn.Stories From Women Who Walk Production TeamPodcaster: Diane F Wyzga & Quarter Moon Story ArtsMusic: Mer's Waltz from Crossing the Waters by Steve Schuch & Night Heron MusicAll content and image © 2019 to Present Quarter Moon Story Arts. All rights reserved.
Czesław Miłosz (30 June 1911 – 14 August 2004) was a Polish-American poet, prose writer, translator, and diplomat. He primarily wrote his poetry in Polish. Regarded as one of the great poets of the 20th century, he won the 1980 Nobel Prize in Literature. In its citation, the Swedish Academy called Miłosz a writer who "voices man's exposed condition in a world of severe conflicts".Miłosz survived the German occupation of Warsaw during World War II and became a cultural attaché for the Polish government during the postwar period. When communist authorities threatened his safety, he defected to France and ultimately chose exile in the United States, where he became a professor at the University of California, Berkeley. His poetry—particularly about his wartime experience—and his appraisal of Stalinism in a prose book, The Captive Mind, brought him renown as a leading émigré artist and intellectual.Throughout his life and work, Miłosz tackled questions of morality, politics, history, and faith. As a translator, he introduced Western works to a Polish audience, and as a scholar and editor, he championed a greater awareness of Slavic literature in the West. Faith played a role in his work as he explored his Catholicism and personal experience. He wrote in Polish and English.Miłosz died in Kraków, Poland, in 2004. He is interred in Skałka, a church known in Poland as a place of honor for distinguished Poles.-bio via Wikipedia Get full access to The Daily Poem Podcast at dailypoempod.substack.com/subscribe
Two thousand years ago a Roman centurion observed yet another Jewish rable-rousing "messiah" being crucified. Compared to the many taunting passersby, that soldier discerned that something unusual was transpiring. Seeing it all, he uttered an epic historic statement. Truth is, discernment takes time. Catching the nuance takes practice. In this episode I begin building out several ways by which we can build our discernment. How can we recoginze political propaganda? My aim is to help us develop a Jesus-y street smarts. I also work through rhetorical self-defeaters: phrases that are commonly uttered which, supposedly, are show-stoppers. What can we do and say when we hear something like, "well, there are no absolutes"? Come laugh and think with me.
Em cada dia, Luís Caetano propõe um poema na voz de quem o escreveu.
To lead into the next season of Enduring Interest, we're re-releasing our first two seasons, covering totalitarianism and ideology and liberal education. We'll be back on September 8 with a new season covering free speech and censorship. In this episode I speak with Clare Cavanagh, Frances Hooper Professor of Arts and Humanities and Professor of Slavic Languages and Literatures at Northwestern University. She's the author of a forthcoming authorized biography of Czeslaw Milosz and a prize-winning translator of the poets Adam Zagajewski and Wislawa Szymborska. Her essays and translations have appeared in publications including The New York Times Book Review, the New York Review of Books, the Times Literary Supplement, and Partisan Review. Some of her recently taught courses include What is Lyric Poetry? ; Gender and Revolution in Soviet Russian Culture; Heart of Europe: Poland in the Twentieth Century; Poetry and the Cold War; and 19th Century Russian Poetry. Clare and I discuss three poems by Czeslaw Milosz: “You Who Wronged”; “Child of Europe”; and “Mittelbergheim.” These poems are from an early collection called Daylight, some which were written when Milosz was working as a cultural attaché for the post-war Polish government. Clare calls Daylight a “book of struggle” where Milosz is asking questions about his audience and his own perspective and role as a poet. He writes about the falsification of history and the corruptions of ideology. We draw some connections between the poems and the arguments elucidated in his famous book The Captive Mind. Clare also offers her thoughts on Milosz's conception of the role of poetry broadly speaking. We conclude our conversation with some recommendations for listeners on where one might start to engage with Milosz's vast body of work. Clare also shares some of her experiences in meeting Milosz in Krakow and her impressions of him.
In this episode, I speak with Thomas Gardner about Lyric Theology, his recent book that is out now with Baylor University Press. In the book, Thomas looks at four different artists—Czeslaw Milosz, Terence Malick, Marilynne Robinson, and Annie Dillard—as a way of exploring the doctrine of creation. Thomas practices patient, careful engagements with these artists, asking all along the way how their “lyric thinking” might enrich theological reflection. It's a fascinating book and I think you'll really enjoy our conversation. Thomas Gardner is Alumni Distinguished Professor Emeritus of English at Virginia Tech. He's authored numerous books and collections of poetry, including another book with Baylor Press that puts the Gospel of John into conversation with poets. You Might Also Like These Episodes Micheal O'Siadhail on his collection of poetry, Testament. Natalie Carnes on feminist theology and the arts.
Hello to you listening in Gaevle, Sweden!Coming to you from Whideby Island, Washington this is Stories From Women Who Walk with 60 Seconds for Time Out Tuesday and your host, Diane Wyzga.It seems like Christmas was only yesterday and the holiday tune All I Want for Christmas was looping on play lists.Here's what I want for Valentine's Day. No, more than that! This is how I want to give my heart to the world, as in the compassionate words of the Nobel Prize winning Polish-American poet, Czeslaw Milosz: “Not that I want to be a god or a heroJust to change into a tree, grow for ages, not hurt anyone.” [ ~ Czeslaw Milosz] Question: What about you? To what are you willing to give your heart this Valentine's Day?You're invited: “Come for the stories - stay for the magic!” Speaking of magic, I hope you'll subscribe, follow, share a 5-star rating and nice review on your social media or podcast channel of choice, and join us next time! Remember to stop by the website, check out the Services, arrange a Discovery Call, and Opt In to stay current with Diane and Quarter Moon Story Arts and on LinkedIn. Stories From Women Who Walk Production TeamPodcaster: Diane F Wyzga & Quarter Moon Story ArtsMusic: Mer's Waltz from Crossing the Waters by Steve Schuch & Night Heron MusicAll content and image © 2019 to Present: for credit & attribution Quarter Moon Story Arts
Heal --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/daisy726/support
Översättning: Anders Bodegård Uppläsning: Clas Göran Söllgård Diktsamling: "Det" (Brombergs förlag, 2004)MUSIK Karol Szymanowski: Andante dolcissimo ur Pianovariationer h-moll op 10EXEKUTÖR Krystian Zimerman, piano
Översättning: Anders Bodegård Uppläsning: Clas Göran Söllgård Diktsamling: "Det" (Brombergs förlag, 2004)MUSIK Charles Koechlin: Andra satsen ur Poem för horn och orkesterEXEKUTÖR Ben Jacks, horn. Queenslandorkestern, Barry Tuckwell, dirigent
Garry Nolan is a professor of English Renaissance literature at the University of Leeds in the United Kingdom.
As a little girl, Cynthia Haven loved reading classic works of literature. At sixteen, she began her career as a reporter. And years later, those two interests converged as they led her to interview and write books about three writers and thinkers whom she also came to call mentors: René Girard, Czeslaw Milosz, and Joseph Brodsky. Cynthia joined Tyler to discuss what she's gleaned from each of the three, including what traits they have in common, why her biography of Girard had to come from outside academia, Milosz's reaction to the Berkley Free Speech Movement, Girard's greatest talent—and flaw—as a thinker, whether Brodsky will fall down the memory hole, why he was so terrible on Ukraine, why Cynthia's early career was much like The Devil Wears Prada, the failings of Twitter, and more. Read a full transcript enhanced with helpful links. Recorded May 18th, 2022 Other ways to connect Follow us on Twitter and Instagram Follow Tyler on Twitter Follow Cynthia on Twitter Email us: cowenconvos@mercatus.gmu.edu Subscribe at our newsletter page to have the latest Conversations with Tyler news sent straight to your inbox.
[sous mes yeux – Résidence numérique // La fin du monde L'œuvre qui suit est un poème-polyphonique réalisé avec la classe de 3e4 du collège Montgolfier – Paris 3e. Elle est inspirée par Le dernier de jour de la fin du monde du poète polonais Czeslaw Milosz sous fond de Matrix, le cyberfilm culte des sœurs Waschowski. On y trouvera des bouts de désastre collectif, des fragments d'espoir et de combat. Et des éclats d'humour, aigus et chaleureux. Ce projet a été imaginé par la poète Anne Mulpas, accompagnée de la monteuse son Rym Debbarh-Mounir dans le cadre d'une Résidence numérique / L'Art pour Grandir-Ville de Paris. Merci aux jeunes auteurs et autrices, à leur enseignant Thomas Boudie pour cette joyeuse apocalypse ainsi qu'à la Maison de laPoésie de Paris et la DASCO qui accompagnent et soutiennent cette belle aventure.
Slowly Fading….. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5FXjT2sR4aJc4Yho0FWCmA --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/daisy726/support
Al terminar la semana, Gil se encontró con esto: la revista The New York Review of Books reeditó esta semana una entrevista de Nathan Gardels con Czeslaw Milosz
"A Mente Aprisionada" de Czeslaw Milosz. Livro de ensaios sobre os perigos do totalitarismo, publicado em 1953, considerado fundamental para perceber os fenómenos totalitários. Ed Cavalo De Ferro
Subscribe to Quotomania on Simplecast or search for Quotomania on your favorite podcast app!Czesław Miłosz was born to Weronika and Aleksander Milosz on June 30, 1911, in Szetejnie, Lithuania (then under the domination of the Russian tsarist government). Milosz graduated from high school in 1929, and in 1930 his first poems were published in Alma Mater Vilnenis, a university magazine. In 1931 he cofounded the Polish avant-garde literary group "Zagary"; his first collection of verse appeared in 1933. He spent most of World War II in Nazi-occupied Warsaw working for underground presses.After the war, he came to the United States as a diplomat for the Polish communist government, working at the Polish consulate first in New York City, then in Washington D. C. In 1950 he was transferred to Paris, and the following year he requested and received political asylum. He spent the next decade in Paris as a freelance writer. In 1953 he published The Captive Mind (Alfred A. Knopf), and his novel, The Seizure of Power (Criterion Books, 1955), received the Prix Littéraire European from the Swiss Book Guild. In 1960 he moved to the United States to become a lecturer in Polish literature at the University of California at Berkeley. He later became professor of Slavic languages and literature. He did not visit Poland again until 1981.In 1980, Milosz was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. His other honors include an award for poetry translations from the Polish PEN Center in Warsaw, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and the Neustadt International Prize for Literature. He has written virtually all of his poems in his native Polish, although his work was banned in Poland until after he won the Nobel Prize. He has also translated the works of other Polish writers into English, and has cotranslated his own works with such poets as Robert Hass and Robert Pinsky. His translations into Polish include portions of the Bible (from Hebrew and Greek) and works by Charles Baudelaire, T. S. Eliot, John Milton, William Shakespeare, Simone Weil, and Walt Whitman. He died on August 14, 2004.From https://poets.org/poet/czeslaw-milosz. For more information about Czesław Miłosz:Previously on The Quarantine Tapes:Elif Shafak about Milosz, at 02:08: https://quarantine-tapes.simplecast.com/episodes/the-quarantine-tapes-025-elif-shafakEdward Hirsch about Milosz, at 18:58: https://quarantine-tapes.simplecast.com/episodes/the-quarantine-tapes-173-edward-hirschSuketu Mehta about Milosz, at 16:00: https://quarantine-tapes.simplecast.com/episodes/the-quarantine-tapes-079-suketu-mehta“The Separate Notebooks”: https://www.amazon.com/Separate-Notebooks-Czeslaw-Milosz/dp/0880010312/“Czeslaw Milosz”: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/czeslaw-milosz
Subscribe to Quotomania on Simplecast or search for Quotomania on your favorite podcast app!Wislawa Szymborska was born on July 2, 1923, in Bnin, a small town in Western Poland. Her family moved to Krakow in 1931 where she lived most of her life. Szymborska studied Polish literature and sociology at Jagellonian University from 1945 until 1948. While attending the university, she became involved in Krakow's literary scene and first met and was influenced by Czeslaw Milosz. She began work at the literary review magazine Życie Literackie (Literary Life) in 1953, a job she held for nearly thirty years.During her lifetime, Szymborska authored more than fifteen books of poetry. Her collections available in English include Monologue of a Dog (Harcourt, 2005); Miracle Fair: Selected Poems of Wislawa Szymborska (Norton, 2001); Poems, New and Collected, 1957-1997 (Harcourt, 1998); View with a Grain of Sand: Selected Poems(Harcourt, 1995); People on a Bridge (Forest, 1990); and Sounds, Feelings Thoughts: Seventy Poems(Princeton UP, 1981). She is also the author of Nonrequired Reading (Harcourt, 2002), a collection of prose pieces.While the Polish history from World War II through Stalinism clearly informs her poetry, Szymborska was also a deeply personal poet who explored the large truths that exist in ordinary, everyday things. "Of course, life crosses politics," Szymborska once said "but my poems are strictly not political. They are more about people and life." In 1996, Szymborska won the Nobel Prize in Literature. Her other awards include the Polish Pen Club prize, an Honorary Doctorate from Adam Mickiewicz University, the Herder Prize and The Goethe Prize. Wislawa Szymborska died on February 1, 2012, at the age of eighty-eight.From https://poets.org/poet/wislawa-szymborska. For more information about Wisława Szymborska:“Vermeer”: https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2010/08/19/vermeer/“The Milkmaid” by Vermeer: https://www.rijksmuseum.nl/en/collection/SK-A-2344“Wisława Szymborska”: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/wisaawa-szymborska
Read by Terry CasburnProduction and Sound Design by Kevin Seaman
John J. Miller is joined by Cynthia L. Haven to discuss Czeslaw Milosz's book 'The Captive Mind.'
What are you doing here, poet, on the ruins Of St. John's Cathedral this sunny Day in spring? What are you thinking here, where the wind Blowing from the Vistula scatters The red dust of the rubble? You swore never to be A ritual mourner. You swore never to touch The deep wounds of your nation So you would not make them holy With the accursed holiness that pursues Descendants for many centuries. But the lament of Antigone Searching for her brother Is indeed beyond the power Of endurance. And the heart Is a stone in which is enclosed, Like an insect, the dark love Of a most unhappy land. I did not want to love so. That was not my design. I did not want to pity so. That was not my design. My pen is lighter Than a hummingbird's feather. This burden Is too much for it to bear. How can I live in this country Where the foot knocks against The unburied bones of kin? I hear voices, see smiles. I cannot Write anything; five hands Seize my pen and order me to write The story of their lives and deaths. Was I born to become a ritual mourner? I want to sing of festivities, The greenwood into which Shakespeare Often took me. Leave To poets a moment of happiness, Otherwise your world will perish. It's madness to live without joy And to repeat to the dead Whose part was to be gladness Of action in thought and in the Only two salvaged words: Truth and justice.
Empezamos el año con una visita excepcional, la de Mercedes Monmany. Mercedes es licenciada en ciencias de la información por la Universidad Complutense de Madrid, crítica literaria, traductora, escritora y ensayista especializada en literatura contemporánea europea. Posee reconocimientos del mas alto nivel en el campo de las artes y las letras en Francia, Italia y Serbia, y es miembro de varios jurados literarios internacionales, asesora editorial y comisaria de exposiciones sobre grandes escritores universales. Mercedes escribe regularmente en las páginas de cultura del diario ABC y en otras revistas literarias, y su agenda de contactos y amistades es el who is who de la literatura contemporánea en Europa. Sus últimos libros publicados son “Sin tiempo para el adiós. Exiliados y emigrados en la literatura del siglo XX”, “Ya sabes que volveré. Tres grandes escritoras en Auschwitz”, y “Por las fronteras de Europa. Un viaje por la narrativa de los siglos XX y XXI”. Hablaremos de Viena y Trieste como lugares extraordinarios de creación cultural hasta principios del siglo XX, de los autores judíos como los únicos y verdaderos europeos cosmopolitas, de la dificultad para adoptar una nueva lengua propia y pertenecer a varias culturas a la vez, del canon literario y la cancelación de grandes escritores occidentales, de la falta de honestidad de algunos intelectuales y el coraje de muchos otros, de fronteras, de exilios, y de escritores magníficos: Stefan Zweig, Joseph Roth, Natalia Ginzburg, Vladimir Nabokov, Irene Nemirovsky, Nina Berberova, Amos Oz, Czeslaw Milosz, Adam Zagajewski, Yuri Andrujovich y tantos otros. Mi petición para el nuevo año os la imagináis: si os gusta el programa, seguid apoyándolo suscribiendoos en mi canal de YouTube, en Facebook, en vuestra app de podcast, en mi web pacobeltran.com, dejando comentarios y mensajes, y difundiéndolo en redes sociales. Notas del episodio en https://pacobeltran.com Escucha el programa en tu app de podcasts habitual y suscríbete en https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCUnbHZm_mH5HNahpqJNs8FA? https://pacobeltran.com https://twitter.com/pacobelt Grabado el 29 de diciembre de 2021.
Subscribe to Quotomania on Simplecast or search for Quotomania on your favorite podcast app!Czeslaw Milosz was born to Weronika and Aleksander Milosz on June 30, 1911, in Szetejnie, Lithuania (then under the domination of the Russian tsarist government). Milosz graduated from high school in 1929, and in 1930 his first poems were published in Alma Mater Vilnenis, a university magazine. In 1931 he cofounded the Polish avant-garde literary group "Zagary"; his first collection of verse appeared in 1933. He spent most of World War II in Nazi-occupied Warsaw working for underground presses.After the war, he came to the United States as a diplomat for the Polish communist government, working at the Polish consulate first in New York City, then in Washington D. C. In 1950 he was transferred to Paris, and the following year he requested and received political asylum. He spent the next decade in Paris as a freelance writer. In 1953 he published The Captive Mind (Alfred A. Knopf), and his novel, The Seizure of Power (Criterion Books, 1955), received the Prix Littéraire European from the Swiss Book Guild. In 1960 he moved to the United States to become a lecturer in Polish literature at the University of California at Berkeley. He later became professor of Slavic languages and literature. He did not visit Poland again until 1981.In 1980, Milosz was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. His other honors include an award for poetry translations from the Polish PEN Center in Warsaw, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and the Neustadt International Prize for Literature. He has written virtually all of his poems in his native Polish, although his work was banned in Poland until after he won the Nobel Prize. He has also translated the works of other Polish writers into English, and has cotranslated his own works with such poets as Robert Hass and Robert Pinsky. His translations into Polish include portions of the Bible (from Hebrew and Greek) and works by Charles Baudelaire, T. S. Eliot, John Milton, William Shakespeare, Simone Weil, and Walt Whitman. He died on August 14, 2004.From https://poets.org/poet/czeslaw-milosz. For more information about Czeslaw MIlosz:Previously on The Quarantine Tapes:“Ars Poetica?”: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/49455/ars-poetica-56d22b8f31558“Czeslaw Milosz's Battle for Truth”: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/05/29/czeslaw-miloszs-battle-for-truth“Czeslaw Milosz”: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/czeslaw-milosz
In this first episode of The Identity Series, we explore the meaning and power of identity through the fascinating case of Polish-Lithuanian Nobel Prize-winning writer Czeslaw Milosz.Born in Lithuania, Milosz survived the Nazi occupation of Poland, became a member of the Polish Foreign Service under the communist regime, and was then exiled for being a strong critic of communism. His famous collection of essays, The Captive Mind, reveals his struggle with his own sense of identity and belonging as an artist under a communist regime and became symbolic of the Baltic-Eastern European cultural, national and geopolitical ‘borderlands'. We also explore other artists who were affected by the shifting of national boundaries during the first decades of the 20th century.Speakers include British singer-songwriter Katy Carr, known for her songs about Polish history; Katia Denysova, a researcher on the influence of socio-political factors on Ukrainian art in the early 20th century; Professor Clare Cavanagh, specialist in modern Russian, Polish and Anglo-American poetry and a biographer of Milosz; and Rigels Halili, lecturer in modern history and Balkans culture at Centre for East European Studies at Warsaw University. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.
Översättning: Anders Bodegård Urval och uppläsning: Eva Ström Diktsamling: "Det" (Brombergs förlag, 2004) MUSIK Lili Boulanger: Från en gammal trädgård. EXEKUTÖR Solveig Funseth, piano
In this episode I speak with Clare Cavanagh, Frances Hooper Professor of Arts and Humanities and Professor of Slavic Languages and Literatures at Northwestern University. She's the author of a forthcoming authorized biography of Czeslaw Milosz and a prize-winning translator of the poets Adam Zagajewski and Wislawa Szymborska. Her essays and translations have appeared in publications including The New York Times Book Review, the New York Review of Books, the Times Literary Supplement, and Partisan Review. Some of her recently taught courses include What is Lyric Poetry? ; Gender and Revolution in Soviet Russian Culture; Heart of Europe: Poland in the Twentieth Century; Poetry and the Cold War; and 19th Century Russian Poetry. Clare and I discuss three poems by Czeslaw Milosz: “You Who Wronged”; “Child of Europe”; and “Mittelbergheim.” These poems are from an early collection called Daylight, some which were written when Milosz was working as a cultural attaché for the post-war Polish government. Clare calls Daylight a “book of struggle” where Milosz is asking questions about his audience and his own perspective and role as a poet. He writes about the falsification of history and the corruptions of ideology. We draw some connections between the poems and the arguments elucidated in his famous book The Captive Mind. Clare also offers her thoughts on Milosz's conception of the role of poetry broadly speaking. We conclude our conversation with some recommendations for listeners on where one might start to engage with Milosz's vast body of work. Clare also shares some of her experiences in meeting Milosz in Krakow and her impressions of him.
Den totalitære erfaring er noe indre. En kan kjenne igjen retningen på at det skjer noe med språket. Ordene betyr ikke lenger det samme som før. De dukkdeter opp i nye sammenhenger og vi læres umerkelig til å forstå hva den nye meningen er. Forfattere som George Steiner og Viktor Klemperer analyserte nazistisk terminologi. Czeslaw Milosz den kommunistiske. Folk undervurderer kraften i kontroll over språket. De har hørt om hvordan kommunistene fjernet folk fra bilder og retusjerte historien. Men mektigere er evnen til å omformulere språket. Det er en måte å omprogrammere hjernen på. Vi ser det i nydannelsen av meningen i ord som demokrati, falske nyheter og misinformasjon. Alle handler om at noen vil at du skal tenke i bestemte baner. Det begynte så smått med at politikerne og medier ble enige om å omskrive språket slik at man kalte tingene noe annet. Ting var aldri vanskelige, de var krevende. Og alt ble utfordringer. Det var som gymnastiske øvelser. Du hørte dem hver dag fra du sto opp og umerkelig gled de inn i underbevisstheten slik at du også brukte ordene. Denne aksepten markerer et trinn på forvandlingen inn i det nye systemet og selvsagt er det mange andre tungt ladede ord, som multikultur og integrering. De har vært brukt så lenge at vi ikke merker at rollene er byttet om: Det er vi som skal integreres og oppgi vår medfødte kultur og historie. Når man først blir klar over det, er det ikke vanskelig å se at noen ønsker vi skal kappe fortøyningene til vår egen historie. Hukommelse og lojalitet blir en motstands/opprørshandling. NTB vil ha oss til å kjøpe at Gaza er okkupert, for det sier FN. Når jeg kommer på Eidsvoll stasjon møter Gaza meg i form av kvinner i hijab og heldekkende svarte frakker. Det er ingen berikelse. Det er diktatur, akkurat som i Gaza. NTB vil ha oss til å tro at disse menneskene har rett til å angripe og drepe israelere i «selvforsvar». Da vet jeg hvor jeg står: Med israelerne. Noen vil forlede oss til å tro at terror er det samme som menneskerettigheter. Nietzsche snakket om Umwertung av alle verdier, at verdiene snus på hodet. Det var en forløper til nazismen. Det er derfor et ytterst dårlig signal at medier og politikere går gjennom samme øvelse. Videoen er klar så fort den er ferdig å prosessere på Rumble. Følg oss der! Vi er tilbake på YouTube (så lenge det varer) og da har dere mulighet til å chatte med oss over denne episoden kl 22:00!Følg oss også på PodBean, iTunes, og alle steder podcasts finnes. Husk å rate oss med 5 stjerner så flere likesinnede sannhetssøkere finner oss der!
Poems: Veni Creator by Czeslaw Milosz and The Summer Day by Mary Oliver Music: Tim Kim *Optimized for headphone listening
Nobel Prize winning poet Czeslaw Milosz was born on this day in Lithuania, 1911. He once said, “Language is the only homeland.”
Sacred and Profane Love Episode 36: The Realist Poetry of Czeslaw Milosz by Sacred and Profane Love
In this episode, I am joined by Professor Thomas Pfau (Duke University) to discuss the Polish poet Czeslaw Milosz. We talk about his realism--i.e., his conviction that the task of poetry is to convey the truth by getting us to pay careful attention to reality. We discuss his philosophical and theological influences--Augustine, Aquinas, Pascal, Weil--and how these show up in his poems. For Milosz, poetry is the habit of accurate vision--we can only capture the real by looking. Therefore poetry is not self-expression, but testimony or witness. Milosz, we agree, is a religious poet in that he seeks to affirm the world, to celebrate and marvel at the mystery of existence, even as he is keenly aware that the world is fallen and full of suffering and, in the end, not really our proper home.
Ett porträtt av den polske poeten och författaren Adam Zagajewski som räknas som ett av de stora namnen inom den samtida poesin. Ulla Strängberg besökte honom i hans hemstad Kraków sommaren 2015. Den polska poesin har producerat namn som Herbert Zbigniew, Czeslaw Milosz och Wyszlawa Szymborska, de två senare Nobelpristagare. Adam Zagajewski är ett av de stora namnen in den samtida europeiska poesin. Hans verk - essäer, novellsamlingar och lyrik - bär spår av ständiga förflyttningar. Han växte upp i Lwów i östra Polen som efter kriget kom att tillhöra Ukraina. Hela hans familj flyttades till Schlesien. 1982 flyttade han som dissident till Paris och återkom tjugo år senare. Han har bott i Stockholm och varit gästprofessor i Houston. Men Krákow, ungdomsstaden där han studerade, har blivit hans fasta punkt. Staden med de många kyrkorna och gator byggda enligt Chopins preludier, som det står i en dikt. Första gången Ulla Strängberg träffade honom var i Paris under exilen i början av 80-talet. Nu blev det ett samtal om individualism och totalitarism, om en varma beröringen av en röd pionjärhalsduk, om den europeiska identiteten och om ambivalensen som livshållning. Trots alla uppbrott och underjordiska aktiviteter under generalernas tid, påstår han att hans liv varit ganska händelsefattigt. Jag förlorade två fosterland, men jag sökte mig till ett tredje, en plats för fantasin, och jag valde poesin som fältet för mitt sökande. Adam Zagejewski Ulla Strängberg ulla.strangberg@sverigesradio.se Det här reportaget sändes första gången sommaren 2015.
Energy, belief, my own religious journey... Poem Meaning by Czeslaw Milosz. When I die, I will see the lining of the world. The other side, beyond bird, mountain, sunset. The true meaning, ready to be decoded. What never added up will add Up, What was incomprehensible will be comprehended. – And if there is no lining to the world? If a thrush on a branch is not a sign, But just a thrush on the branch? If night and day Make no sense following each other? And on this earth there is nothing except this earth? – Even if that is so, there will remain A word wakened by lips that perish, A tireless messenger who runs and runs Through interstellar fields, through the revolving galaxies, And calls out, protests, screams. Visiting the Chester Beatty Library Principles of Theosophical Society (inspired by Koot Hoomi/Kuthumi) 1:To form a nucleus of the universal brotherhood of humanity without distinction of race, creed, sex, caste, or colour. 2:To encourage the study of comparative religion, philosophy, and science. 3:To investigate the unexplained laws of nature and the powers latent in man. The quote I close on is from Confucius (I'm not going to write it out - I want to surprise you!)
Janine Turner's Front Porch Philosophy & God on the Go Minute.
Today is different. I recite a poem by Czeslaw Milosz. One of the most poignant poems ever written. Have a blessed day!
You can listen to the newsletter by clicking the play button above or you can click the “Listen in Podcast app” link and follow the directions to open this feed in your podcast app. Currently, you may find the feed on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, and Spotify.You are listening to the weekly newsletter of the Christian Study Center of Gainesville. This first week of July, we're reflecting on one of our most precious resources, our attention. If you are not already subscribed to the newsletter we encourage you to do so. You can find a link on our website at christianstudycenter.orgOne of the conditions of living in a world structured by digital media is that we are daily overwhelmed by an unremitting, uninterrupted, and relentless flood of information. Under these conditions, the capacity to rightly order our attention becomes an indispensable virtue. Disclaimer: attention is a topic that I've addressed on numerous occasions, including the first talk I ever gave at the study center in 2018. So I'm hesitant about taking up the theme again, but I remain convinced that it is a topic of immense importance and one we do well to revisit with some frequency. I won't comment on digital distractedness or social media platforms designed for compulsive engagement or the inability to get through a block of text without checking your smartphone 16 times or endless doomscrolling, as it is now fashionable to call it, (really just a new form of the old vice acedia) or our self-loathing tweets about the same. These matter only to the degree that we believe our attention ought to be directed toward something else, that it is in these instances somehow being misdirected or squandered. Attention, like freedom, is an instrumental and penultimate good, valuable to the degree that it unites us to a higher and substantive good. Perfect attention in the abstract, just as perfect freedom in the abstract, is at best mere potentiality. They are the conditions of human flourishing rather than its fulfillment. In his famous Kenyon College commencement address, the novelist David Foster Wallace argued that we should understand attention as constituting a form of freedom. “The really important kind of freedom,” Wallace claimed, “involves attention and awareness and discipline, and being able truly to care about other people and to sacrifice for them over and over in myriad petty, unsexy ways every day. That is real freedom.” This at least gives a useful heuristic by which we might think about attention. Does it feel to you as if you are free in the deployment of your attention throughout any given day? I know that it often doesn't feel that way to me. I frequently find myself attending to what I know I shouldn't or unable to attend to what I should. This is not a function of external coercion, strictly speaking. I experience it chiefly as a failure of will, as a form of unfreedom stemming from a regime of conditioning to which I've submitted myself more or less willingly. And I feel the loss. The loss of focus, yes. The loss of productivity, yes. But also the loss the world and the loss of some version of myself to which I aspire. I find myself needing constantly to ask, “What is worthy of my attention?” or, better, “What is worthy of my attention given what I claim to love, what I aim to accomplish, and who I hope to become?” If by our attention we grant its object some non-trivial power over the course of our thoughts, feelings, and actions, then this may be one of the most important questions we can ask ourselves. Several years ago, reflecting on this very matter, I wrote about the need for what I called attentional austerity. Austerity is not a warm or appealing concept, of course. But Ivan Illich can help us better frame the matter. “Austerity,” he wrote in Tools for Conviviality, has also been degraded and has acquired a bitter taste, while for Aristotle or Aquinas it marked the foundation of friendship. In the Summa Theologica … Thomas deals with disciplined and creative playfulness. In his third response he defines “austerity” as a virtue which does not exclude all enjoyments, but only those which are distracting from or destructive of personal relatedness. For Thomas “austerity” is a complementary part of a more embracing virtue, which he calls friendship or joyfulness. It is the fruit of an apprehension that things or tools could destroy rather than enhance [graceful playfulness] in personal relations.From this perspective, then, austerity becomes a virtue in service of a greater good, a virtue we do well to recover. But it is not only a matter of consciously ordering one's attention toward the good, of wresting it back from an environment that has become a elaborate Skinner box, it is also the case that we would do well to cultivate a form of expectant attentiveness to what is, a form of attention that commits itself to seeing the world. The Polish poet Czeslaw Milosz once observed that “In ancient China and Japan subject and object were understood not as categories of opposition but of identification.” “This is probably the source of the profoundly respectful descriptions of what surround us,” he speculated, “of flowers, trees, landscapes, for the things we can see are somehow a part of ourselves, but only by virtue of being themselves and preserving their suchness, to use a Zen Buddhist term.”Further on in the same essay he wrote about the wonder that arises when, as he put, “contemplating a tree or a rock or a man, we suddenly comprehend that it is, even though it might not have been.” This kind of wonder is perhaps its own reward as well as the gateway to the love of wisdom as the ancient philosophers believed. I hear in Milosz's words an invitation, an invitation to step away from the patterns of digitally mediated reality, which while not without its modest if diminishing satisfactions, can overwhelm other modes of perception, temporality, and place. The question of attention in the age of digital media may ultimately come down to the question of limits, the acceptance of which may be, paradoxically given modern assumptions, the condition of a more enduring and satisfying life. What digital media promises on the other hand is an experience of limitlessness exemplified by the infinite scroll. There is always more and much of it may even seem urgent and critical. But we cannot attend to it all, nor should we. I know this, of course, but I need to remind myself more frequently than I'd care to admit. Michael SacasasAssociate DirectorStudy Center ResourcesPascal's is closed from July 27th through July 5th and will re-open on Monday, July 7th.In next week's Dante reading group, we will be covering cantos 22-25 of the Inferno. If you'd like to connect with group, please email Mike Sacasas at mike@christianstudycenter.org.Be sure to check out the archive of resources available online from the study center. Classes and lectures are available at our audio archive. You can also peruse back issues of Reconsiderations here.Recommended Reading— Alan Jacobs's 79 theses on attention, which will, in fact, repay your attention. Genuinely to attend is to give of oneself with intent; it is to say: For as long as I contemplate this person, or this experience, or even this thing, I grant it a degree of dominion over me. But I will choose where my attention goes; it is in my power to grant or withhold.Yet as soon as we think in this way, the way Simone Weil urges that we think, questions press insistently upon us: Do I really have the power to grant or withhold? If not, how might I acquire that power? And even if I possess it, on what grounds do I decide how to use it?— Brad Littlejohn on the importance of coming to a shared apprehension of reality:In other words, we must somehow learn to hold together passion and patience: a deep conviction that the truth matters, and that our differences on a matter so urgent are intolerable. And at the same time we must be willing to wait—to wait on the world for more clarity about what is actually going on, to wait on our friends through the long months and years it can take to come to a common mind, and to wait on the Lord for the strength to endure it all. For it will be painful—both passion and patience come from the same root meaning “to suffer.” — Ten years after publishing The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains, Nicholas Carr talks to Ezra Klein about the book and its enduring relevance. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit christianstudycenter.substack.com
Robert Hass and Czeslaw Milosz share the stage to discuss poetry, philosophy, and the writing process, including excerpts from their work.
REFLECTION QUOTES “We are at the classic-romantic barrier now, where on one side we see a cycle as it appears immediately… and this is an important way of seeing it… and where on the other side we can begin to see it as a mechanic does in terms of underlying form… and this is an important way of seeing things too.” ~Robert M. Pirsig, American philosopher and novelist in Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance “Materialism is a conviction based not upon evidence or logic but upon what Carl Sagan…called a ‘deep-seated need to believe.' Considered purely as a rational philosophy, it has little to recommend it; but as an emotional sedative, what Czeslaw Milosz liked to call the opiate of unbelief, it offers a refuge from so many elaborate perplexities, so many arduous spiritual exertions, so many trying intellectual and moral problems, so many exhausting expressions of hope or fear, charity or remorse. In this sense it should be classified as one of those religions of consolation whose purpose is not to engage the mind or will with the mysteries of being but merely to provide a palliative for existential grievances and private disappointments. Popular atheism is not a philosophy but a therapy.” ~David Bentley Hart in The Experience of God “Christian theology can fit in science, art, morality…The scientific point of view cannot fit in any of these things, not even science itself. I believe in Christianity as I believe that the Sun has risen not only because I see it but because by it I see everything else.” ~C.S. Lewis (1898-1963) in “Is Theology Poetry?” “I am not ashamed to own that I believe that the whole universe, heaven and earth, air and seas, and the divine constitution and history of the holy Scriptures, be full of images of divine things, as full as a language is of words…there is room for persons to be learning more and more of this language and seeing more of that which is declared in it to the end of the world without discovering all.” ~Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758), famed American theologian “In the end, coming to faith remains for all a sense of homecoming…of responding to a bell that had long been ringing…” ~Malcolm Muggeridge (1903-1990), British journalist SERMON PASSAGE Acts 18:23-19:7 (NASB) 23 And having spent some time there, he left and passed successively through the Galatian region and Phrygia, strengthening all the disciples. 24 Now a Jew named Apollos, an Alexandrian by birth, an eloquent man, came to Ephesus; and he was mighty in the Scriptures. 25 This man had been instructed in the way of the Lord; and being fervent in spirit, he was speaking and teaching accurately the things concerning Jesus, being acquainted only with the baptism of John; 26 and he began to speak out boldly in the synagogue. But when Priscilla and Aquila heard him, they took him aside and explained to him the way of God more accurately. 27 And when he wanted to go across to Achaia, the brethren encouraged him and wrote to the disciples to welcome him; and when he had arrived, he greatly helped those who had believed through grace, 28 for he powerfully refuted the Jews in public, demonstrating by the Scriptures that Jesus was the Christ. Chapter 19 1 It happened that while Apollos was at Corinth, Paul passed through the upper country and came to Ephesus, and found some disciples. 2 He said to them, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?” And they said to him, “No, we have not even heard whether there is a Holy Spirit.” 3 And he said, “Into what then were you baptized?” And they said, “Into John's baptism.” 4 Paul said, “John baptized with the baptism of repentance, telling the people to believe in Him who was coming after him, that is, in Jesus.” 5 When they heard this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. 6 And when Paul had laid his hands upon them, the Holy Spirit came on them, and they began speaking with tongues and prophesying. 7 There were in all about twelve men.