Something which I think needs repeating is that Anarchism is not just some hardline ideological position (although many assholes indeed practice it that way). Charles Demers' interview with SFU professor Mark Leier, author of Bakunin, for The Tyee, is refreshing in that neither man is trying to one up the other which allows for a pretty earnest discussion.
Leier: No, I don't think bowling leagues are the anarchist utopia, but they, like much of our lives outside of the workplace, are organized without hierarchy and oppression; the most meaningful, truly human parts of our lives already work best when organized on anarchist principles. Yet I also believe that in its function as critique and as a vision of the future -- perhaps the only one that doesn't end in our extinction as a species, or, as Orwell put it, as a jackboot smashing a human face, forever -- anarchism is not only desirable but possible and necessary.
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Planet of Slums by Mike Davis is essential reading for anyone who wants to understand the major social issues that will define the next century (massive rural-urban migration, the disintegration of the post-colonial state, exploding megalopolis' of absolute poverty). He's also a magnificent writer. In fact, I'm so impressed, I plan on reading his earlier book, Late Victorian Holocausts: El Niño Famines and the Making of the Third World (2001) as soon as I pay off my library fines.
If you want a taste of the book, you can read Davis' original article for the New Left Review or dig up that New Yorker from a few months ago with George Packer's article on Lagos.
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After informing the world of my love for Faulkner (really anything southern), many suggested that I check out Carson McCullers and so I'm reading The Heart is a Lonely Hunter. Some of her characters thus far are too obviously vehicles for ideas rather than people, and her dialogue can be a bit grating (especially her black characters) but overall this book has won me over (and I'm only half way through).
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So what's your favourite new Neon Bible (Arcade Fire) song? Currently I'm digging The Well and the Lighthouse but that's just because it's the obvious catchy one.
2 comments:
I really like "Keep the Car Running" off of Neon Bible, but it doesn't pay off enough at the end. They should have repeated that chorus at least ten more times.
Yeah but what's with that whole orchestra thing going on. Not liking it.
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