More reflections on "the First Cities": To a friend who was waxing nostalgic

Yeah, the good old days. I really miss those clay tablets that we used to press with our cuneiforms to do our lessons. Everything started going downhill when they introduced papyrus, and pretty soon, even common people were scribbling nonsense and reading and misinterpreting the sacred texts. I miss those gladiatorial contests, too. And slavery. Boy, that sure was a labor-saving device, except of course for the slaves.

Fortunately, the Republicans have taken the right steps to take us back to those good old times. Wiping out all remnants of corrupting culture in Iraq was a start, and then letting those people know that democracy is too important to leave to the people.�In a similar vein, Tom Delay has decided that money is too valuable to give it to people who don't have enough of it. They'd probably just waste their $400 checks on groceries and shoes for the kids, instead of spending it on big-ticket items to boost the economy.

Favorite New York Times quote of the day

"The New York Times will be in great hands no matter who leads." - Gerald Boyd, announcing his resignation as managing editor. (What? You don't believe he said that? See today's article by Jacques Steinberg.)

5,000 years of churning

We just got back from viewing the show at the Metropolitan Museum, "Art of the First Cities," with statuary, clay accounting and story tablets, personal ornaments and fragments of architecture from Ur, Urek and their successor cities, beginning around 3,000 BC. The show is a fragment of what it might have been, because so many of the greatest treasures have just been looted from what remains of their bombed out homeland of Mesopotamia. Still, it's mighty impressive to be reminded that we human beings have been struggling to civilize ourselves for over 5000 years, without making any progress. For signs of stupidity and destructive arrogance to equal any known to Nebuchadnezzar or Ozymandias, see the truly scarywww.probush.com.

I, Simurgh

From as early as I remember, I have known that I could fly. All I really had to do was truly believe, to unlock the chain of doubt, and soar. You can, too. If you don't already know this, you will after seeing the marvelous movie, Winged Migration.

When I told a friend how wonderful it had been to leap from the top of S�o Conrado peak in Rio de Janeiro beneath the delta wing of a hang-glider, to fly beside the pelicans over the great favela and the valley and the country club and finally the sea, before circling back to land softly on the beach, he stared at me in panic. Just the idea of it made him gasp -- he suffers from acrophobia. Well, then I guess I must suffer from acrophilia. I loved it! And a year or so later, when my son took me climbing up a sheer rock face in the Shawangunk Mountains, and we stopped for a breather after the second stage of the climb and I looked down at the circling buzzards -- waiting for one of us to fall, no doubt -- I felt tired but very much at home, believing (against all logic and experience) that even if I lost my grip, the air currents would support me as surely as they did those feathered wings.

The Simurgh is a gigantic and magical four-winged bird that nests in the Tree of Knowledge, wherein grow all the fruits of the Earth. When the Simurgh flaps its wings in take-off from the tree, it scatters the seeds in the direction of the downdraft -- which is how pineapple ended up in South America, and cherries in Japan. In the 13th century, the Persian poet Farid al-Din Attar discovered its true nature, through the twin sciences of etymology and analogy. "Si" in Persian happens to be the word for the number 30, and "murgh" -- well, I don't know what that means in Persian, if anything, but Farid thought it must be "birds." In his delightful poem, the birds of the earth, seeking the simurgh to be their leader, go on such a long exhausting flight that only 30 of them remain aloft. It is then that they realize that they themselves are the simurgh. We must be our own leader. Go see this movie, "Winged Migration," and you too can be part of the simurgh.

What I meant to say: Archives back on-line

I had finally figured out one thing I'd been doing wrong, but then I did something else stupid that I can't figure out how to undo, that is, to delete from the site. So please forgive the two stuttering entries on this topic below. Anyway, the archives are back. Among the more interesting items from the past (this blog began at the start of this year) is the little essay from January 18 on how and why I wrote A Gift for the Sultan. Just click on "Archives" (left column of this page) and find that date. There's lots more, of course, including my responses to arrests and executions in Cuba, on Hugo Ch�vez, on Bush's war and our opposition, and so on.

'Uxorious obsession'

You've got to admire Michiko Kakutani. When she doesn't like your book, she'll take all the effort required to tell you just why. See today's review of Norman Rush's latest, Mortals, where she takes poor Norm to task for (among other things) his character's "uxorious obsession."

Great phrase. I probably suffer from a bit of it myself, as I remarked this morning to my uxor. A sure sign is the number of references to her that you'll find scattered through this weblog.

Archives back on-line

I finally figured out what I'd been doing wrong. Among the more interesting items from the past (this blog began at the start of this year) is this little essay from January 3 on No comments:

'Archives' now on-line

Finally I've figured out what I was doing wrong. Now you can see everything I've posted since beginning this weblog at the beginning of the year. Among the things you'll find there is this little essay, No comments: