History Greece, Roderick Beaton Creators, Conquerors, and Citizens: a history of ancient Greece, Robin Waterford From Alexander to Cleopatra: the Hellenistic World, Michael Grant Helen of Troy: Goddess, Princess, Whore, The Hemlock Cup: Socrates, Athens, and the Search for the Good Life, Venus and Aphrodite: A Biography of Desire, Bethany … Continue reading Jay’s Revised Modern Canon 2021 Edition World Literature: Greece
History The Discovery of France, Parisians, Graham Robb Seven Ages of Paris, The Age of Napoleon, Alistair Horne Our Paris: Sketches from Memory, Inside a Pearl: My Years in Paris, The Flaneur: A Stroll Through the Paradoxes of Paris, Edmund White Caesar’s Footprints: A Cultural Excursion to Ancient France – … Continue reading Jay’s Revised Modern Canon 2021 Edition World Literature: France
Satires, fantasies of Russian Surrealism and a bizarre pagan mythology, subversions of Soviet Realism; the works of Andrei Sinyavski, iconoclast and scholar of Pushkin and Gogol, resonate with the force of his dark visions. For his is an art forged in the hell of a Soviet gulag, and from within the set of … Continue reading Andrei Sinyavski, on his birthday October 8, 2021 revision
History Central Europe: Enemies, Neighbors, Friends, Lonnie R. Johnson Heart of Europe: Poland, Davies Poland: The First Thousand Years, Patrice M Dabrowski The Spirit of Hungary, Sisa The Will To Survive: A History Of Hungary, Bryan Cartledge The Habsburgs: To Rule the World, Martyn Rady Romania, … Continue reading Jay’s Revised Modern Canon 2021 Edition World Literature: Eastern Europe
Bataille remains a figure of transgression as the art of freedom; his championing and discipleship of Nietzsche, influence on Henry Miller and William S. Burroughs, his great friendship with Jacques Lacan and fiery relationship with Simone Weil, and above all his creation of Surrealism with his great rival Andre Breton resonate through our civilization … Continue reading Georges Bataille, on his birthday September 10
In celebration of the author and her perplexing novel, which continues to provoke impassioned discourse and afright the horses. Emily Bronte saw herself as the Titan Prometheus, cast out of heaven like Milton’s rebel angel, and bearing the stolen fire of the gods. I have always seen in her a kindred spirit, and myself … Continue reading Emily Bronte, on her birthday July 30, 2021 revision
The collective unconscious which unifies all humanity as a transhistorical colony organism below the surface of our personalities and awareness and referential to Platonic Idealism and Logos, being human as a process of growth he called individuation and modeled on alchemy as a pancultural spiritual faith, synchronicity as an acausal connecting principle; personality as … Continue reading C.G. Jung, on his birthday July 26
My Life; a spoken autobiography, Fidel Castro Fidel Castro Handbook, George Calloway Reminiscences of the Cuban Revolutionary War: Authorized Edition, Ernesto Che Guevara Cuba Libre!: Che, Fidel, and the Improbable Revolution That Changed World History, Tony Perrottet Cuba: What Everyone Needs to Know, Inside the Cuban Revolution: Fidel Castro and the Urban Underground, Julia E. … Continue reading Cuba: A Reading List
Where do we begin, and where do we go from here? A reading list on Existentialism and Sartre: Sartre: A Philosophical Biography, by Thomas R. Flynn provides an excellent guide to his life and work. Flynn’s Existentialism: A Very Short Introduction, is the best general work of its kind, and his massive interrogations of … Continue reading Existentialism Reading List
There is no literature without Sartre. One must read the novel Nausea, the play No Exit, the short story The Wall, the philosophical essay Being and Nothingness and its guide To Freedom Condemned, the lecture Existentialism is a Humanism, and his magnificent work of literary scholarship and iconography in which he creates a figure … Continue reading Jean Paul Sartre, on his birthday June 21, 2021 Revision
Dollhouse Park Conservatory & Imaginarium 