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La douce France has outdone herself yet again.
A basic post-colonial inventory, to situate us:
Item: One (1) human head. Mummified. Provenance: New Zealand.
Item: One (1) patrimoine national français. Gloriously preserved. Exquisitely curated. Contents: châteaux, medieval armaments, lighthouses, churches, monasteries, stolen Maori human remains, etc. Provenance: ci et là, eh beh je sais plus mais c’est beau, hein?
Item: One (1) insane, self-righteous, paranoid-nationalist ministre de la culture. Provenance: Toulouse / one of François Fillon’s many deep, dark closets.
French Debate: Is Maori Head Body Part or Art? [NYT]
Rouen n’en fait qu’à sa tête [Libération]
Thing is, one of the many insidious things about colonialism is that it causes people to traffic in human remains. And then to put stolen remains, like this mummified Maori head, on display in museums. And to call those stolen remains part of one’s own “patrimoine national.”
One of the many insidious things about European metropoles’ tendency toward post-colonial oblivion is that those practices don’t get revised once the whole colonial project has been soundly denounced by basically everyone.
Now, it’s true that there are bits and pieces of Barbaric Peoples all over the damned place in museums in the west. (Interestingly, though the NYT claims there are 30 Maori heads in the Museum of Natural History, it’s not possible to find them through the museum’s website. “No, no, no heads here!” Says the site. “Pretty photographs and mildly condescending language in abundance, but nope! No actual heads! Move along, move along!”)
But we all love France, reader, because really, only in France could the minister of culture get away with freezing a city tribunal to insist that a mummified head (a human head, reader. a head. that once belonged to someone.) should not be returned to its Antipodean home, on the grounds that such an “atteinte injustifiée au patrimoine national” might set a dangerous precedent that would cause the historic and artistic centers of France to dissolve.
… I had written additional commentary. But it is completely unnecessary, I realize. Atteinte! Injustifiée! Patrimoine fucking national! Is anyone else snarfing her coffee / falling about / trying not to burst into horrified, humiliated tears?
Douce France, cher pays de mon enfance, bercée de tendre insouciance, je t’ai gardée dans ma tête mummifiée… Douce France… la la la…
– I have discovered Radio 3. Thanks to Crispinella for the tip on Doctor Faustus tonight, which led me to discover weekly live Evensong, which led me to discover the Early Music Show, and ultimately just to keep the radio on all the time. Bless the BBC.
– Frank Rich, as usual, makes more sense than anyone else at the goddamn New York Times.
– I held until quite recently a semi-solid notion that literary publications will necessarily swing left-of-center, intellectually as well as politically. Not, apparently, so. Mouse, meet the TLS! Slightly trivially to the main thrust of my violent reaction to this paper, I’m still reeling from Adam Bresnick’s characterization of Milton’s Satan as “the very type of the terrorist [...] the avatar par excellence of the festering Bin Ladens of the world.” Now, I haven’t read Paradise Lost, and yet I know that’s shitty reading, that’s how shitty it is (Flavia, help me out here) — and that’s before we get into the xenophobia inherent in the assumptions about what a “terrorist” is, or in the term “festering,” with all its evocations of dirt and disease, the Vague But No Less Threatening Third World… stop me, reader, before I continue to waste energy shredding up this review’s ridiculous little paean to white male humanism.
– I’m in no position to evaluate George Packer’s assessment of the American occupation of Iraq in a recent New Yorker, but the following formulation voices something I’ve been feeling as incoherent distress, and have been unable to articulate: “In Washington, the debate over the war is dominated by questions about troop numbers and timelines — that is, by immediate American political realities” as opposed to Iraqi ones. “The country seems trapped in an eternal present, paralyzed by its past mistakes.”
– Anyone who says Web 2.0 isn’t having an impact on how those of us who are addicted to it engage with the world is completely full of shit. Before I had my coffee this morning, I formulated in my little brain an entire response to / hesitant endorsement of the first few pages of Empson’s Seven Types of Ambiguity… and I imagined it in the form of a blog comment. Now (embarrassingly past noon), I’m only halfway through my coffee, so I’ll leave this to you: if Empson had a blog, what would be its title?
– Et enfin, Marcel Marceau! Un p’tit adieu alors, tendre et silencieux.
Okay, kids, your mouse has been off having a life for the past two weeks. I’m sure you’ve all been cold and lonely out there in Malaysia and Myanmar (?!), but don’t you fret. I’m back to my usual not-having of a life.
Now, we have a few Orders of Business to address. I have been tagged for two “eight” memes, which will follow shortly. But first, an open letter.
Dear Nation,
Happy Birthday.
You feel old when these occasions roll around, don’t you? You look back at how far you’ve come and you think “Shit, just yesterday I was just a hapless little landmass covered in ice, and now look at me.” But face it, Nation. You’re still just an angsty adolescent of a polity, in the scheme of things. You’ve had a rough childhood, but you’re a bit of a prodigy so you’ve muscled through all right. And now you’re entering that awkward, isolating phase where not everyone thinks you’re such a hotshot anymore. You’re trying to prove yourself, once and for all. You’ve gone a bit far, actually, if one were to be honest about things.
But it’s okay. Some of us are willing to forgive you. Every young entity comes into contact with misguided mentor figures, the Jean Brodies of the world, as it were. You end up doing something stupid like going off to Spain to fight on the wrong side of the war. Or, you know. Whatever.
So here’s the thing: it’s your birthday and I hope you have a rockin’ time of it. But cut the crap, would you? Ditch the self-aggrandizing, pretentious bullshit, stop bossing around everyone you think is less cool than you are, start opening up and allowing yourself to be vulnerable. Accept help from those who can offer it. Listen to your elders, to your peers, and to those younger or weaker than yourself. Lose the ego and start acting like an adult, because it’s about bloody time you started earning your keep around here.
Now go have a few drinks, let off some steam, and have a safe night.
Oh, and please, for fuck’s sake, stop blowing shit up.
All my love,
A Very American, Very Disturbed but Stubbornly Optimistic Mouse
Professor Lyrical has been putting together a new frosh course on literary identity construction, the idea being to communicate that you are, more or less, what you read or write and that, like Emma Bovary, if you’re not careful, what you read can destroy you. Or, in the case of Onegin’s Tatiana, learning what your own literary sources are will renew you, even empower you.
On the syllabus for this course is Roth’s Human Stain, which I am now reading for the first time, enjoying thinking about how Lyrical will teach it and how her froshlings will engage with it. And it has just caused me to experience an astonishing revelation. These students were nine years old for the Clinton sex scandal and impeachment hearings. They were nine.
When Bush was first elected, they were eleven. On September 11, 2001, they were twelve. Twelve. They came into their political consciousnesses — not to mention their literary ones — under Bush. He is the only president they have known in their lives as critical thinkers and engagers with the world. Clinton was mine.
This seems to me to be a crucial divide. They are only six years younger than I am, but theirs is a new generation. They are Bush’s kids.
They will read this novel, saturated as it is with what Roth calls the “ecstasy of sanctimony” of the Clinton-Lewinski moment, through the eyes of kids who came of age under Bush. “No,” Roth writes, “if you haven’t lived through 1998, you don’t know what sanctimony is.” But he wrote that sentence before the Christian Right fulfilled the totality of its sanctimonious destiny, and the students who came to their own maturity right along with it will read that sentence differently than I do.
Lyrical, who came of age under Eisenhower and in many ways became who she is in Krushchev’s U.S.S.R., doubtless has a third, entirely different perspective on both the novel and her students’ potential readings of it.
What this comes down to, I suppose, is how strange it is not only to be an adult, but to have adult memories. Stranger still to realize how deeply colored one’s identity is by who happened to be the Big Man in Charge when one was a teenager. This simple fact makes me think of this year’s entering class as foreign to me. What are their ideals, I wonder? What politicized them? What fierce, inchoate angers have they nursed since they were twelve and a mad cowboy hijacked their country, and how are their fierce, inchoate angers different from my own?
What will Coleman Silk mean to them?
This is me not posting about the obvious. There will be no weeping, wailing, nor gnashing of teeth (’specially not gnashing). There will be crossing of fingers and hoping against hope.
Look: not posting.
There. Now, to bed.
You know things are bad when the lead story in one of a nation’s most powerful newspapers is an effort to convince people that a victory for the lead candidate in that nation’s upcoming election won’t cause widespread riots.
That’s right: French people are worried that before the man running on a security platform even begins to exercise the duties of his potential office, he may become his own greatest security threat. And they’re not wrong.
Jesus lap-dancing Christ, I can’t wait until this is over.
Okay. So, it’s late (a little). And I’ve had a coupla beers. Nevertheless, I think I will stand by the following statement in the morning:
I hereby endorse Mike Gravel for president.
Yes, Mike “Queer Love Bomb” Gravel.
Mike “Dude, You’ve, Like, Out-Kuciniched Kucinich” Gravel.
Mike “Crazy Old Coot, Yes, But Crazy Old Coot For The Left” Gravel.
Mike “Bring The Fun Back To The Fringe” Gravel.
For President. Let the people decide!
I have been, err, abstaining from recording here my anxieties regarding the second round of the French presidential election, which will take place this Sunday.
But today, Jean-Marie Le Pen outdid himself, calling on all those who voted for him in the first round to “abstain” from voting on the sixth. That’s right: si vous ne pouvez pas voter pour moi, mieux vaut ne pas voter du tout. Just in case you were under the impression that fascism is good for democracy, Le Pen is here to demonstrate that, after all, no. It’s not.
In his speech he accuses the Parti Socialiste (PS, represented by Evita Perón — I mean Ségolène Royal) and the Union pour un Mouvement Populaire (UMP, represented by Nicolas “Hose the Arab scum!” Sarkozy) of hijacking French politics and marginalizing France’s political, well, margins. Even if you don’t understand French, watch the video to get an impression of his persona. In addition to his usual Evil Turtle aspect, Le Pen here displays his Petulant Fascist Child side — he didn’t get what he wanted, so now he’s throwing a tantrum. What he wanted was, at best, a repeat of the 2002 election in which a divided left produced a right-wing second round, with Le Pen facing off against Jacques Chirac (who subsequently won the presidency by the biggest landslide in the history of the Cinquième République). A nice consolation prize for poor little Jeannot would have been to maintain his usual 15-18%, the figure at which his party, the Front National (FN) has stabilized in regional elections in recent years.
Unfortunately for the FN, that nasty Sarko shamelessly (on that point, at least, I agree with Jeannot) stole his votes and he scraped a measly (to him) but terrifying (to us) 11%. Now, in a way, it’s a shame that Le Pen couldn’t get over himself and endorse Sarko, who has been happily riding the FN’s magic carpet of anti-immigrant invective — such an endorsement might have done more harm than good to le petit Nicolas, and thus boded well for France.
Instead, Le Pen is asking his electors to disenfranchise themselves voluntarily in this second round. Don’t get me wrong. I sincerely hope that none of Le Pen’s supporters will vote on Sunday, because if they vote, they will vote massively for Sarkozy (though to my startlement I read a report stating that 16% of those who intend to vote intend to vote for Royal). I am merely astonished that Le Pen openly acknowledges his desire to shut down all public discussion, and if he can’t do that, to remove himself and all his followers from that discussion. Today’s declaration is, in effect, a call to abstain from democracy as it is defined by the République, to abstain from the culture of debate that the Parti Socialiste, Royal, Bayrou, and Sarkozy have, more or less willingly, embraced.
You’re perhaps thinking, “Okay, yeah, so what do you expect from a fascist?” Anything and everything, including today’s speech. But I never cease to be astonished that the French electorate supports this man in such tremendous numbers. Of course, his supporters will tell you, “He’s not a fascist; he’s an extremist.”
Comme on dit dans le sud, ohputainmerde.
1. The Supreme Court ruling on Gonzalez vs. Planned Parenthood and Gonzalez vs. Carhart:
I am as frightened and enraged as everyone else is. I am also in awe, yet again, of Ruth Bader Ginsburg. I don’t know what else there is to say.
2. The Virginia Tech killings:
I think Horace’s post on academic freedom and the dangers of pathologizing students is very apt. Universities, even and especially primarily undergraduate institutions like my little alma mater, are at risk as it is of returning to operating in loco parentis. Adding “security” questions into the bargain will only alienate students from faculty and vice versa, and both from their administrations. Good pedagogy and healthy relationships do not stand up under the influence of mistrust and paranoia. It is not VT’s fault that a very troubled individual shot dozens of innocent people to death. Universities are not and should not be equipped to deal with massacres, lest it lead to the kind of fight-fire-with-fire mentality exhibited in this outrageous Daily News opinion piece. So let us mourn, continue to love each other as well as we know how, and, in the immortal words of Crosby, Stills and Nash, teach our children well.
3. The French présidentielle:
I took a vow months ago not to speak, write, or converse in non-verbal signs or grunts about this topic. If you’re desperate for my opinion, it is well summed-up by the image that decks the cover of this week’s Economist. Monday will teach us things, and then we will be waiting again, perhaps to learn more, or only to shake our heads, on May 6. We cannot know, because the French electorate is notoriously unpredictable. My guess? Nicolas Sarkozy is simply going to be the next Président de la République, and all we can do is cross our fingers and hope he knows what he’s doing. In the words of a famous French comedian from the banlieue: “Nicolas, je connais plein de jeunes des banlieues qui vont voter pour vous, et vous savez pourquoi? Parce que comme ça, au moins vous ne serez plus au ministère de l’intérieure.”
4. The American presidential:
I re-take my French oath. Foutez-moi la paix.
5. Imus:
Hooliganery notwithstanding, Tenured Radical still has the best take on this I’ve yet seen. And Gwen Ifill remains high on my list of heroes.
There. I did it. I commented on Current Events. Your regularly scheduled narcissism, snark, conveyance of senses of superiority and other items totally irrelevant to your life will continue shortly.
