April 15th, 2008 by SWARAAJ CHAUHAN, International Columnist
With its perpetually (and historically) rocky relationship, the Arab and European worlds have seldom met in a peaceful manner (or without suspicion) during the past half a millenium ever since the downfall of the Moorish civilization in Spain. In this context the on-going London Book Fair, with the “Arab World” as guest of honour and Arab writers present in force, provides yet another opportunity to build a bridge between the two worlds.
The Independent writes: “Imperial bureaucrats, soldiers and scholars on one side; radical nationalists, pious militants and oil-rich oligarchs on the other – all have had their various axes to grind, and to wield. Now, perhaps, the writers of the Arab world can begin to find a voice in the West again. It’s always easier to love distant stars when they can shine, plainly and legibly, on the page in front of us.
“The (London) fair will be the culmination of a long-term plan, steered by the British Council, to forge firmer cultural bonds. And, although he comes from far beyond the Arab world (and writes in English), the Afghan author Khaled Hosseini’s double coup in topping the UK charts both with The Kite Runner and A Thousand Splendid Suns has helped to put a spring in the step of everyone who wants to widen the readership for literature from the Middle East and North Africa.
(The Kite Runner novel was the third best-seller for 2005 in the United States, according to Nielsen BookScan. It’s been published in 38 countries, translated into 42 languages, turned into an Oscar-nominated movie – and sold more than 10 million copies — one of the publishing industry’s greatest success stories. Now the search is on for the next big thing to come from the East. The Kite Runner is a 2007 Academy Award-nominated film directed by Marc Forster based on the novel of the same name by Khaled Hosseini (click here for more…)
“In the Gulf, lavishly funded new competitions such as the International Prize for Arabic Fiction (the ‘Arab Booker’) and the Sheikh Zayed Awards have signalled the intention of the emirate of Abu Dhabi to build up its name as a global centre of culture. Not to be outdone, and fretting perhaps at its current reputation as the world capital of bling, neighbouring Dubai begins a new literary festival next year. Also in Abu Dhabi, the Kalima translation project has launched an ambitious, state-financed programme to bring, at the rate of 100 per year, classic and contemporary books from around the world into Arabic for the first time and to distribute them across the region. ” More here…
I lived in London during the mid-1970s. I extensively covered there a major “World of Islam Festival” for The Statesman newspaper in India. The festival was opened by Queen Elizabeth II. “As far as anyone can remember, such an attempt had never been made before—and probably could not have been. It is only recently that one civilization has been capable of looking at another civilization objectively, rather than as a potential rival or convert. Read the rest of this entry »
For the Russians, U.S. recognition of Kosovo’s independence was tantamount to an international crime, and the burning of the United States Embassy in Belgrade by angry Serbs could hardly have been avoided. The New York Bureau Chief of Russia’s Novosti News Service, Dmitry Gornostayev writes, ‘It was somewhat ridiculous to hear the appeal by Deputy Secretary of State Nicholas Burns to the Serbs to respect international law. What is he talking about? He and his colleagues violated it themselves last Monday by recognizing Kosovo’s independence!’ In regard to the past two U.S. presidents and the larger issues of Yugoslavia and Iraq, he writes with a burning sarcasm, ‘If reduced to the terms of criminal law, these global actions at least qualify as robbery and murder. According to the laws of Arkansas and Texas - the home states of the past two U.S. Presidents - the crimes of launching illegal wars in Yugoslavia and Iraq would be punishable by the death penalty. But at the homes of these U.S. presidents no one behaves that way - they are decent gentlemen: they play the saxophone, ride bicycles, keep mistresses under the desk and at the very worst, they drop their bagels and ice cream on the couch. All with perfect decency. But once they go outside, you had better get out of the way.’
By Dmitry Gornostayev, Novosti’s New York Bureau Chief
Translated By Igor Medvedev
February 22, 2008
Russia - Novosti - Original Article (Russian)
When the burning of the American Embassy in Belgrade appeared on television along with armored personnel carriers (filled with Serb policemen bereft of any desire to disperse fellow Serbs with Molotov cocktails), I thought to myself: How long will it be until the Americans recall international law and the Vienna Conventions? [which safeguard the immunity of diplomats and embassies] … They remembered very quickly.
It was somewhat ridiculous to hear the appeal by Deputy Secretary of State Nicholas Burns to the Serbs to respect international law. What is he talking about? He and his colleagues violated it themselves last Monday by recognizing Kosovo’s independence! Read the rest of this entry »
I recently posted here a story by the Spanish newspaper, El Diario Exterior, about how the European left is feeling somewhat threatened by the rise of the Obama star in the U.S., as his success could weaken one of their pet claims - that racial division prevents equality of opportunity etc. and that racial prejudice is still endemic - especially in “rightist America”. Meanwhile, argued the intriguing article from Spain, the European right are embracing him.
Why? An Obama victory would be on the back of a huge youth vote. A victory thus won would demonstrate that the United States has moved hugely toward, if not entirely arrived at, a post-racial politics. Such a move would not follow from anything Obama has done, but from the opportunity he provides for a younger generation, who do not divide their world up ethnically, to make a statement about who they are, and thereby what their country is. Such an act of self-definition and expression - by individuals at a ballot box in defiance of any social narrative - would be worthy of celebration. And such an act speaks to all that is best about the political right. Moreover, Obama himself, if victorious, would not just be an agument for the traditionally “right” value of the individual’s embracing opportunity to succeed on one’s own terms, but an ultimate manifestation of it - one of the greatest public manifestations, in modern American history.
In that context, it is particularly interesting to see three more postings on Obama from Europe at Watching America.com, seeming to support the latter part of this thesis.
Specifically, the British right are loving the Obama rise, as evidenced by this piece from Britain’s most right-wing broadsheet, The Telegraph, and by this summary of the right-wing press in the (also British) Guardian. Moreover, the French paper, l’Express, modeled on the American Time Magazine, and traditionally also right-of-center, writes positively of the Obama candidacy.
For the world’s views about Obama, the other presidential candidates of any stripe, and the political culture of the U.S., visit Watching America.com
Has Barack Obama single-handedly transformed America’s political landscape - giving it back the “passion and hope so squandered by the the last two administrations?” According to this op-ed from Spain’s most widely read newspaper, El Pais, ‘The doomsayers have already begun to sow doubt about how long his star will shine … But whatever happens from now on, Obama has already triumphed. His name will forever be written in the history books as the African-American that saved the political class at a crucial moment.’
By Antonio Caño, Translated By Fernando Uribe, January 5, 2008
Spain - El Pais - Original Article (Spanish)
In life it seems that each moment of hope is offset by doomsayers that remind us that logic always triumphs, that the strong always prevail, and that dreams are just that, dreams. This is also the case in politics. Those lights that sometimes ignite spontaneously here and there are almost always snuffed out by the power of those that count most: the machinery of the political parties or other interests. Last Thursday a new star was born in the United States, but the doomsayers have already begun to sow doubt about how long that star will shine.
They are correct in that this is a long race in which Barack Obama isn’t supported by any of the main centers of power in the Democratic Party, that he is far behind in the polls in Florida and New York, that he hasn’t generated enough trust among Hispanics to win California, and that it will take a lot to convince voters in the White racist states of the south. Read the rest of this entry »
January 5th, 2008 by SWARAAJ CHAUHAN, International Columnist
The reigning King Juan Carlos I of Spain, who was baptized as Juan Carlos Alfonso Víctor María de Borbón y Borbón-Dos Sicilias, has turned 70. What was he doing on the eve of his birthday? “There was no pipe and slippers for this grandfather over Christmas,” reports the BBC.
“Instead, just days shy of his 70th birthday, King Juan Carlos paid a surprise New Year’s Eve visit to Spanish soldiers serving at a base in Afghanistan. The visit was typical of a king who has always taken pride in an action-man image. A love of skiing, sailing, karate, fast cars, motorbikes and helicopters figure prominently on the royal CV. Getting old quietly does not.
“How many other reigning monarchs would publicly tell Venezuela’s President Hugo Chavez to ’shut up,’ as Juan Carlos did during last November’s Ibero-American summit in Chile?
” ‘There’s a deep-rooted feeling of gratitude for the king’s role in the transition to democracy,’ explains Charles Powell, a historian and royal biographer. ‘Polls show that he is the individual to whom democratisation is most closely attributed, and the sense of gratitude cuts across class and ideological lines’.”
On 22 November 1975, two days after the death of Francisco Franco, Juan Carlos was designated King according to the law of succession promulgated by Franco. He successfully oversaw the transition of Spain to a democratic constitutional monarchy. Polls from 2000 show that he is widely approved of by Spaniards.
Juan Carlos’s titles include that of King of Jerusalem (disputed among others), as successor to the royal family of Naples. He is also a descendant of Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom through his grandmother, Victoria Eugenie; of Louis XIV of France through the House of Bourbon; of the Emperor Charles V, who belonged to the Habsburg dynasty of the Holy Roman Empire; of the House of Savoy of Italy; etc. More here…
So what is better — Tradition and Experience….Or Just CHANGE…???
November 11th, 2007 by DR. CLARISSA PINKOLA ESTÉS, TMV Columnist
Just the point of view of a Latina mestiza:
In Spanish, as in other languages, words and phrases often carry subtext. And as we joke amongst ourselves, in Spanish, we have ‘five versions of yes that mean no,’ and ‘three versions of no, that mean yes.’
So, when a person with the diplomatic skills of a man like King Juan Carlos unleashes an epithet; it carries far more nails and broken glass flying than just the words alone.
Viz: The King’s words to Chavez were, “¿Por que no te callas?” which can certainly be translated as “Why don’t you shut up?” likely from callarse, meaning ‘to hold one’s tongue,’ ‘to be suddenly made silent,’ and yes, ‘to shut up.’
But, more so, in Spanish, as in English, such a phrase carries the intent of a warning snarl. Not with aim to kill. Yet. It is the equivalent of the claws unsheathed and poised… but it is not the powerful downward slash. Yet.
“Por que no te callas?” has several subtexts: One is: ‘Basta, Enough! with your blather.’ Others are, ‘What do you know, you who have never suffered/ experienced?’ … and ‘Stop trying to wear an honor you have never earned nor paid for.’
Moreover, amongst many Spanish-speaking people, (and there are many versions of Spanish) this phrase also refers to the condition of being el gordo, obese. “Por que no te callas?”is then also meant as a double entendre, meaning, not just ‘Close your mouth,’ but also something like this: ‘Look at you, why don’t you stop eating so much… for surely the grease has drowned your brain.’
Amongst many Spaniards/ Spanish blood people, there are some acceptable gestures to show public displeasure when people violate not a genteel protocol, but a protocol of character. That King Juan Carlos vacated the room leaving Chavez to speak to the air, is the equivalent of ‘invisibilizing’ a person. It is on par with the far less elegant spitting to the side, or giving the kiss of betrayal, or passing a note with a black dot in the middle.
King Juan Carlos was not vacating the room out of exasperation or pique, but to show the displeasure of the Spanish Delegation with Chavez’s grandstanding and lack of ability to conduct himself as a person at the table, instead of a pindejo dancing on the table.
On this day, in the world of the mysteries of Spanish character and protocol, King Juan Carlos doesn’t exist as an anachronism, but as an exemplar.
November 10th, 2007 by JOE GANDELMAN, Editor-In-Chief
When I lived in and wrote from Spain between May 1975 and December 1978, I had the supreme pleasure of a lifetime, to live in a wonderful country that, before my astounded journalistic eyes, made a peaceful “evolution without revolution” transition to democracy from the dictatorship of General Francisco Franco.
And most Spaniards agreed there was one seemingly-quiet and above-the-fray man who had the guts to help make it happen — perhaps more than anyone else.
To this day, he still doesn’t get the credit that so many Spanish journalists and foreign diplomats (who would talk about it privately from 1975-1978) gave him. He navigated his country, and what some felt was a reluctant and potentially resistant military, through the dangers of shifting a nation and its establishment towards democratic elections and to until-then-taboo more relaxed social values.
And the bottom line is that King Juan Carlos, handpicked by Franco (who was widely believed to have thought KJC would be pliable to the kind of establishment he had in place when he was living) risked it all. He stood at the middle of an incredibly-dramatic and dangerous period of democratic evolution and never blinked in the face of rightist and leftist resistance (sometimes manifesting itself in sporadic violent acts).
When I was there everyone knew that the easiest way to halt the democratic evolution would have been for someone to rub “El Rey” out.
But the King was a toughie. He persisted, and democratic Spain had a man on the inside who could have resisted the change but instead quietly did what he could do to encourage and consolidate it.
And now, at a time when some eyebrows are being raised about the monarchy in Spain, there’s this report that shows his low tolerance for polarizing political polemics and his respect for Spanish politicians of various parties:
The Ibero-American summit ended on an unusually heated note Saturday, when an angry verbal spat culminated with the king of Spain telling Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez to “shut up.”
Chavez, the outspoken leftist leader who called U.S. President George W. Bush the “devil” on the floor of the United Nations last year, triggered the exchange by repeatedly referring to former Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar as a “fascist.”
Aznar, a conservative and a close Bush ally who backed the U.S.-led war in Iraq, “is a fascist,” Chavez said in a speech to leaders from Latin America, Spain and Portugal. “Fascists are not human. A snake is more human.”
Spain’s current socialist prime minister, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, responded during his own allotted time by urging Chavez to be more diplomatic in his words and respect other leaders despite political differences.
“Former President Aznar was democratically elected by the Spanish people and was a legitimate representative of the Spanish people,” he said, eliciting applause from the gathered heads of state.
Chavez repeatedly tried to interrupt, but his microphone was off.
Spanish King Juan Carlos, seated next to Zapatero, angrily turned to Chavez and said, “Why don’t you shut up?”
And so, a new legend was born and a quote has emerged that’ll be used in all future bios of the Spanish King because it reveals a bit of his attitude: that he has tried to make his institution above the partisan political fray and isn’t a fan of political demonization.
The Venezuelan leader did not immediately respond, but later used time ceded to him by his close ally Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega to answer Zapatero’s speech.
“I do not offend by telling the truth,” he said. “The Venezuelan government reserves the right to respond to any aggression, anywhere, in any space and in any manner.”
To no one’s surprise, Chavez’s comments were supported by….Cuba’s Fidel Castro.
According to one account, the King’s comment came amid Spain having a tough time at the conference:
Spain’s King Juan Carlos had never left a session at the Iberian American Summit early and annoyed, despite attending the gathering 16 times, but he did just that Saturday in Santiago, in a move that symbolizes the bad time Spain had at this year’s meeting.
First, talks broke down Friday in a bilateral conflict between Argentina and Uruguay - over the installation of a paper mill on the Uruguayan bank of a common river. Spain had been serving as a mediator in the conflict.
One day later as the summit came to a close, Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero and Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez got into a heated argument that led to Juan Carlos leaving the meeting.
The summit could have served as a break for Juan Carlos, after a complicated visit to Spain’s North African territories, Ceuta and Melilla, earlier this week and the resulting anger of Morocco.
But things turned out quite differently, when he got involved in the disagreement between Zapatero and Chavez. Juan Carlos, who is the only leader who has never missed an Iberian American summit since the gatherings started in 1991, showed his annoyance with Chavez and broke all protocol.
Chavez had been spicing up the summit since Friday, when he accused Spanish businessmen of having backed the 2002 coup against him in Venezuela, and Saturday included former Spanish prime minister Jose Maria Aznar in the accusation.
Zapatero then told Chavez that a basic rule of public life is ‘to refer to others in a respectful way, even if they are one’s ideological opposites.’
That’s when Juan Carlos decided to verbally crown Chavez.
Meanwhile, the political context is also important: the King uttered the words many world leaders and Americans would like to say to Chavez at a time when his monarchy is under fire in some parts of Spain.
After all, King Juan Carlos — far more than Chavez of Ortega — had lived among real fascists in what had been a fascist nation apparatus adapted by Franco to the General’s and his country’s own economic and cultural situations.
In the United States the phrase “fascist” is sometimes thrown around as easily as the verbal tic “well, ya know.”
But Juan Carlos KNOWS what REAL fascists were like.
And he sat there at the conference with his country’s Socialist Prime Minister and just decided he could hold his royal tongue no further.
And so, by leaving, he stood up and stuck up for the concept of democracy as being a system that respects differing views and doesn’t consider a party that is out of power to be the evil enemy.
It’s a story worth pondering by partisans in the United States as Americans head into what promises to be a bitter, divisive, demonizing election year.
Kudos to the king of Spain. Evidently, the King of Spain does not worry about Political Correctness. I so truly wish and strongly desire that our politicos would have the moral courage to conduct themselves in the same manner.
–Barcepundit (who writes from Barcelona, Spain, is Spanish and offers editions of his blog in English and Spanish):
I’M NOT PRO-MONARCHY in the sense that I don’t believe that any office should be hereditary, including the head of state. But I can’t help but cheer on king Juan Carlos today…
This is one of those stories that just make you grin. King Juan Carlos of Spain literally told the red-shirted dictator-to-be of Venezuela to ’shut up’ at a conference in Santiago, Chile…..About time somebody told Chavez that. I know absolutely nothing about the king, but he’s already on my good side for this one.
October 22nd, 2007 by DR. CLARISSA PINKOLA ESTÉS, TMV Columnist
Like the Burmese presently, like other innocent groups risking their lives for true liberty just to be allowed to live in free and decent ways without governmental oppression… in 1956 the Hungarian young, middle-aged and elderly, took to the streets to rail against the Soviets, fighting for freedom for Hungary.
When the marchers were met in the streets by Russian soldiers in iron tanks, the Hungarians fought with rocks, with wine bottles filled with benzene lighter fluid and stuffed with doilies made by the old women. When the people ran out of their munitions, they fought the tanks with their hands.
President Bush issued a proclamation honoring the 1956 Hungarian Revolution… “The story of Hungarian democracy represents the triumph of liberty over tyranny. In the fall of 1956, the Hungarian people demanded change, and tens of thousands of students, workers, and other citizens bravely marched through the streets to call for freedom. Though Soviet tanks brutally crushed the Hungarian uprising, the thirst for freedom lived on, and in 1989 Hungary became the first communist nation in Europe to make the transition to democracy.”
THE TELEVISION WARRIOR
My foster father is Magyarok, a Hungarian born Hungarian. He came to ‘Amereeka’ with a sewing machine under his arm. And now, he is in the living room yelling at the television again. He thinks the people inside the TV can hear him.
Hollering is a form of Hungarian aerobics;
it’s kept Dad strong all these years.
He immigrated to the USA before World War II.
Afterwards, the small ancestral farm still worked by
his mother and brothers and sisters in Hungary,
was confiscated by Germans, then Soviets.
The men dragged onto freight rollers,
the women, their children held like empty rifles,
were marched to Russian labor camps,
the rest forced from Hungary to Germany.
No children survived. Dad found
his people in the camps, brought the tiny band
one by one and oh so filled with bad night dreams,
to ‘Amereeka’.
My much older cousin had fallen in love with a man
she’d met in the refugee camps.
They’d married in secret there and she was now pregnant.
Now, in ‘Amereeka’, the old people watched over her round belly
as though a ghost Bread of Life
was baking there. A child, a child, they all
sighed, and said hope makes people cry harder than hurt.
In 1956, so distraught was he seeing the first news reels of Russian tanks in the streets of Budapest, and the young and elderly Hungarians trying to fight the iron tanks with rocks and bare hands, that Dad waved his arms like windmills and threw himself down on the living room rug, daring the tanks to come run over him, “Come get me, you cowards, Come! Get! me!!â€
In the ‘60s it was missiles in Cuba and these last many years he has had a yell-fest with apartheid and ayatollahs. He warned Ortega, “Hah! Roll yourself in a tamale, let the comunistos eat you. May they all suffer indigestion.†To the lone student in Tiananmen Square, he waggled his finger, “Ya, ya, I told you so. Ve haf seen dis before. So run him over already!
Get it over with! Dere are no living heroes.†Dad’s eyes watered and watered — he said — from sitting too close to the TV screen.
Last year when Dad was 80 years old, he went hoarse from indicting the televised Ceausescu.
“He vants to bulldozing 7,000 farm villages?
You vant to tear people away from their trees??
You craze man! You want to stack them like chickens?? Read the rest of this entry »
September 27th, 2007 by JOE GANDELMAN, Editor-In-Chief
Yesterday we carried a post on reports about leaked Spanish memo that reportedly showed that in a private conversation President George Bush indicated he wanted to invade Iraq no matter what to take out Saddam Hussein.
But a new translation indicates that was a bad translation and that was not the case. The Spain-based Barcepundit reports:
MUCH IS BEING MADE of the scoop by pro-Zapatero’s daily El PaÃs, in Madrid, of the transcript of the memo of a conversation between Bush and Spain’s former PM Aznar in Crawford in March 2003 as the Iraq war was about to start. Editor and Publisher has a machine translation, which is quite atrocious. If you can read Spanish, the full text is here. I’ll try to have a proper translation asap, but I am really short on time, so I don’t know how soon I’ll have it ready.
But what the transcript doesn’t say, no matter the headlines, is that Bush was going to invade even if Saddam complied. What it says is that the US would be in Iraq in mid-March whether there was a second UN resolution or not, one that Bush said he would try to get by all means, which is an entirely different matter. As everybody knows, there’s certainly a debate on whether the first resolution was enough or not -many reputable experts think it was, though there’s not unanimity on this, certainly. But the issue is different.
Further down he writes:
If anything, the transcript proves precisely the opposing point that critics want to make. The conversation shows both Bush and Aznar trying to avoid war; that they were concerned of its human toll, and that Saddam wanted to flee with money… and WMD information. I guess all the people who are trumpeting this will stop saying now that Bush lied and mislead us on the WMD issue. Won’t hold my breath, though.
Read the post in its entirety (he offers parts in Spanish as well) and judge for yourself.
Note: I lived and wrote from Spain for 4 years. A translation can indeed alter the meaning significantly of the original statement or document.
Another view on this (that takes a swipe at the magazine that reported the original) comes from Jules Crittenden.
September 26th, 2007 by JOE GANDELMAN, Editor-In-Chief
Here’s an item that will spark much debate — not just among partisans, politicos but also perhaps among historians:
El Pais, the highest-circulation daily in Spain, today published what it said was the transcript of a private talk between President George W. Bush and Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar on February 22, 2003, concerning the coming U.S. invasion of Iraq. It took place at the ranch in Crawford, Texas.
The conversation took place on the President’s ranch in Crawford, Texas. The confidential transcript was prepared by Spain’s ambassador to the United States, Javier Ruperez, the paper said.
Bush purportedly said he planned to invade Iraq inf March “if there was a United Nations Security Council resolution or not….We have to get rid of Saddam. We will be in Baghdad at the end of March.”
He said the U.S. takeover would happen without widespread destruction. He observed that he was willing to play bad cop to British Prime Minister Tony Blair’s good cop.
Aznar pleaded for patience and replied that it was vital to get a U.N. resolution, noting that public opinion in Spain was strongly against the war.
This report will have credence because so much has come out since indicating that some key administration members were chomping the bit to invade Iran right after 911 (or before).
August 22nd, 2007 by JOE GANDELMAN, Editor-In-Chief
Once upon a time, on the the Iberian peninsula, in what is now southern Spain, Jews, Muslims and Christians lived in harmony, and the mild tension between them led to creativity. It became a kind of garden for the flowering of art, architecture, business, ideas, music, a (often grudging) respect for other religions — and a nest for the Renaissance.
People lived side by side, living under Islamic rule for some 7 centuries. But then it soured.
Suddenly, it was Muslim faction against Muslim faction. The Pope deciding to try and clear Spain of Muslims. Key cities were burned to the ground. Whole libraries burned. Thousands died. And so did this early example of what can happen when there’s diversity and tolerance. Meanwhile, what happened to the Jews towards the end of that period was a mini-foreshadowing of what would happen in the 20th century under Germany’s Adolph Hitler.
Is this a fairy tale? Something perhaps about a parallel universe?
Not at all — and today at 9 p.m. (but check your local listings since it may be shown at a different hour) you can see that such a place existed, in another simpler, yet in some ways more complex era.
The place: PBS. The event: the national premiere of “Cities of Light: The Rise and Fall of Islamic Spain” (check your local listings as times may vary). The production company: Unity Productions Foundation, which gave us “Muhammad: Legacy of a Prophet” in 2002.
Award-winning director Rob Gardner (Islam: Empire of Faith) has crafted a superb, compelling true tale about another world — one so long ago…but one that provides some warnings to the present world. Because he shows how when there was diversity, creativity flowered and the various communities coped, lived side by side, and blossomed. If it was not quite the quintessential consensus society, it wasn’t a constantly confrontational society, either.
But once the absolutists stepped in — an early version of “my way or the highway” (with the stab of a sword cut in) — the result was upheaval and everyone lost something.
When I received the screener of Cities of Light a documentary about Islamic Spain, it was also mentioned to me that if I wanted to ask questions to one of the producers, I could. After watching it - and writing the review published yesterday - I decided that I could not let this opportunity pass, so I send out an e-mail, got in contact with Michael Wolfe - executive producer ofCities of Light - and we did an interview. Meanwhile, do not forget to watch the documentary about Islamic Spain - tomorrow (Wednesday August 22nd), at 9PM on PBS.
MvdG: Where did the idea to make a documentary about Al-Andalus come from?
MW: We’re history buffs at Unity Productions. We’re always reading, constantly searching for great stories in the past that will make exciting films modern people can learn from.
MvdG: Why did the subject appeal to you?
MW: The true story of an Islamic state in Medieval Western Europe where Jews, Christians, and Muslims lived together for centuries is both fascinating in itself and pertinent to our times.
MvdG: How did you prepare for it and how did you study the subject?
MW: I read a few dozen books and then started talking at length with an initial handful of brilliant scholars. In particular, James Monroe at the Berkeley to start with. Then I lunched many times with Brian Catlos, of the University of California at Santa Cruz. A prize-winning author and Medieval historian, Brian speaks all the languages and lived for many years in Spain. He gave guided tours as a student there and later wrote guidebooks for travelers. He has both immense erudition and real, hands-on experience on the ground. Talking with him and other scholars like Tom Glick, at Boston University, was enormously inspiring at the outset. It also kept me from making dumb assumptions about this extremely complex period that lasted more than seven centuries.
MvdG: How long did it take to prepare for the documentary and how long did the actual filming take?
MW: We started planning and then researching the film in 2002 and 2003. Raising money took a long time. The filming went more quickly. As I recall, we filmed abroad twice over an 18 month period—once for about a month and once for about two weeks.
MvdG: As mentioned in my review, the tolerance of Al-Andalus was a rare in that day and age. I wonder, was the entire Muslim world as tolerant as, for instance, Abdul Rahman III, or was Al-Andalus also an exception for Muslims? I wonder about this, because of the fact that Istanbul (or Constantinople) also was a multicultural society for several centuries.
MW: Al-Andalus was unique in Europe, though the region of Sicily and southern Italy had a similar experience of sorts, for a shorter period of time under Muslim rule and the so-called Turbaned Kings. The multi-faith aspect was as true in Baghdad under the Abbasid rulers as it was in Cairo under the Ismaili sultans like Mustansir as it was in Cordoba under Hakim II. The great Jewish philosopher and author Maimonides was physician to the Muslim sultan in Egypt. Jews held high office in many Muslim courts, including Cordoba.
MvdG: Where did the leaders of Al-Andalus get the idea of tolerance from?
MW: It’s all derived from the Qur’an and the story of Muhammad’s life. What made this possible in Medieval Spain was a strain of religious and legal thought in Islam in those days that treated Christians and Jews as faiths related to and so socially in synch with Islam. Tolerance as we understand it was not an active concept in those times. The process by which this occurred in Spain later acquired the name “Convivencia,†living together. In Spain, the wisest regimes recognized that the most productive route to a thriving country was through utilizing the strengths of the different faith groups, not by pitting them against each other. That came later, as themes like ethnic purity, the Crusades/and Jihad, and religious exclusivism won out over notions of pluralism and inclusion. Spain commenced as an experiment in pluralism. It ended in the Inquisition and expulsion or conversion of two-thirds of its population, the Jews and the Muslims.
MvdG: Is it fair to say that the Muslim Empire - at least the ones in Andalus / the Ottoman Empire were de facto the heirs of ancient Greece and perhaps even Rome and - at that moment - not the European Kingdoms?
MW: I don’t think so. These were very different experiments in organizing territory and living together. They are not really inter-related, though of course the Roman Empire did re-package the Greek ethos in many ways and refashion its culture. I would say that Al-Andalus was an historical period and a place that partook of Western European and Middle East culture and values and forged a unique civilization out of them.
MvdG: As mentioned in the documentary, the Muslims studied the ancients and added to it. Could you explain to the reader what they exactly added to these works?
MW: The best scholars, for example Ibn Rushd (aka. Averroes in the West), didn’t just make word for word translations of Aristotle. They wrote commentaries that viewed the work of Aristotle in terms of then-modern monotheism. There were real philosophers among this group. They did what the great Catholic writers would do later: that is, bring science into line with religion. The difference is that the Catholics did it largely on paper, while Islam as a culture proved actively friendly to scientific dialogue and discovery in a way that was not so often fettered by organized religion. There were periods of book burning among strains of Muslim culture, even in Spain, but they didn’t dominate to the degree that the Roman Office of the Inquisition dominated and fettered scientific practice and knowledge in the Middle ages and Pre-Modern period. That is why the circulatory system was discovered hundreds of years earlier in Islamic science than in the West, and why optics and medical knowledge in general was so advanced that Arabic text books were cornerstones of Western medicine for centuries.
MvdG: Is what’s known as “Mevlana” (or Sufism) - the peaceful almost Buddhist like Muslim philosophy taught by Rumi influenced by the culture of Al-Andalus?
MW: Not directly, that I know of. Religions of all kinds, and particularly the mystical variety, tends to share a lot of common ground. The Peace That Passeth Understanding is as much a part of Judaism as Christianity and Islam, in the form of Sufism. But the person Rumi was a Persian, not a Spanish Muslim, who relocated to the west of his father’s country, and worked in a cultural style that was quite different from the Andalusian. That said, there are many giants of Sufism who happened to hail from Muslim Spain, including Ibn Arabi, whom many consider, intellectually speaking, the Giant of them all.
MvdG: A question about poetry. In the documentary poetry plays quite an important role: every now and then a part of a poem about Al-Andalus is read by the narrator and important poets of Al-Andalus are highlighted in the documentary as well. This led me to conclude the following: if one wants to know whether a given society is progressing (and civilized) one needs to look at the level and importance of poetry. Do you agree with that and if so, what does this tell you about Western and Middle Eastern civilizations / societies today?
MW: Poetry is important in Middle Eastern societies today. Many people can recite their favorite works, by their favorite poets, and there are some poets writing in Arabic and Urdu and many other languages who are both Muslim and gifted poets. I think the same is true of poets in the West, though our “society†appears to give them less weight and importance. I don’t know how the future will judge western or middle eastern cultural production. Good poets speak to eternal themes while speaking of their times.
MvdG: 11) When watching Cities of Light, one gets the impression - as the experts said as well - that society can only flourish if it is open and open-minded. Isolated societies, on the other hand, stagnate. Could you explain that a little bit more?
MW: Societies and civilizations go down for different reasons. Greece disappeared under Alexander, because he literally took off, spreading its culture from Ionia to Egypt to Baghdad to Persia and India but in the process dissolving the borders of a very tiny, integrated geography of inventive city states. Self-Isolating societies, on the other hand, cut themselves off and, as you say, stagnate. Spain in the end committed a kind of act of schizophrenia, divesting itself of two-thirds of its cultural and spiritual psyche at just the moment when it became a unified “nation.†In a sense, this is what Cervantes is writing about and making fun of—a society steeped in old codes of chivalry that no longer apply, with a tradition it no longer understands, and a dilemma it can no longer define because its cultural basis—Judaeo-Islamo-Christian—had been willfully shattered. For the sake of ethnic Purity, Catholic Spain cast two-thirds of being to the winds.
MvdG: Lastly, a reasonably negative question two actually: you do not address in Cities of Light how to behave (tolerance wise) when one of the religious groups falls hostage to fundamentalists and grows, therefore, increasingly intolerant. Furthermore, one can also wonder whether any multicultural society can last. When we look at history, we see examples of multiculturalism, and Al-Andalus is a prime example of it, but if we look at the fate of these societies and especially Al-Andalus, is it not fair to conclude that perhaps – sadly – multicultural societies are doomed to failure because, in the end, man becomes intolerant since intolerance (evil) is in our nature?
MW: Got me! The institutions of our society today are so very different from the institutions of Spain under Abdul Rahman I, or III, or again under Ferdinand and Isabella…
MvdG: Thank you for giving me the chance to ask you some questions.
MW: Thank you for the chance to think about them.
We ran this post a few days ago about a free speech issue raging in Spain. Now the beset magazine has run a…unique…retraction. Read THIS POST and be sure to click on its links.
A judge has removed copies of a satirical magazine depicting an (quite definitely) adult cartoon featuring Spain’s royaty. Details (and WARNING a copy of the offending magazine cover) are HERE.
July 4th, 2007 by DR. CLARISSA PINKOLA ESTÉS, TMV Columnist
These are the list of reasons the men who decided that the 13 colonies shall become states, separated from the self-acclaimed ‘Decider’ who ruled by fiat, spying on his own people, planting enmity between groups in America, who would unleash wars on several nations all at the same time… all from 3,950 miles and an entire ocean away from America.
It is true, this cogent and most poignant line, egregiously did not include people who were slaves which included Africans and peoples of the Caribean and Mexico, nor those who were Native American, nor those who were Mexicans, Asians, Jews, Catholics, or any heritages other than Caucasian, and sometimes disincluded Caucasians who were suspected to be of mixed blood or were poor; women were excluded also: We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.
To my mind, as a Latina belonging to five of the 1776 ‘not yet included groups,’ given the history of the United States since this Declaration of Independence was written and signed, it is astonishing that anyone, anywhere, of that time, that zeitgeist, had clarity of mind and vision to lay a basis of what was so very much right, even though it would take 200 years and then another 200 years more from this day in 2007 forward, to live up to We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal. From your lips you writers of the Declaration 231 years ago, from your lips to God’s ear…. in our lifetime. Next week would not be too soon.
The ‘he’ referred to in our Declaration of Independence is ‘the mind of George III’ who went insane, literally, and episodically, throughout his adult life, and who opened up a war with America that he pledged would be ‘eternal,’ while forcing more and more ‘tribute’ from Britain’s subjects, and opening a war with France and Spain also, keeping the gyre whirling.
The George of that time and the George of our time, seem in some ways, interchangeable, both liked to play militaristic dress-up…which is an ancient fashion that Kings affected, themselves rarely having ever ridden into battle. This fashion of the ancient kings, has sometimes, strangely, been taken up by modern humans, who are most definitely not kings… but the psyche can turn into a complex and odd tangle when self-imposed limits of reason and decency with equanimity, are not set around it.
Excerpted from, The Declaration of Independence 1776
1. He has refused his assent to laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
2. He has forbidden his governors to pass laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
3. He has refused to pass other laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of representation in the legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
4. He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
5. He has dissolved representative houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
6. He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the legislative powers, incapable of annihilation, have returned to the people at large for their exercise; the state remaining in the meantime exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
If you thought terrorism was helping the world go to pot, you are right — but you might also have that a bit reversed:
Cannabis smokers are unwittingly funding Islamist extremists linked to terror attacks in Spain, Morocco and Algeria, according to a joint investigation by the Spanish and French secret services. The finding will be seized on both by campaigners for a harsher clampdown on cannabis and by those who argue that legalisation is the only way to end a petty dealing trend that is dragging growing numbers of teenagers into crime.
And the fact that this is a conclusion reached by officials in two countries is likely to give this conclusion more credibility than if if came from just one source.
The investigation by the Centro Nacional de Inteligencia and the Renseignements Generaux was launched after Spanish police found that the Islamists behind the March 2004 bombings in Madrid bought their explosives from former miners in return for blocks of hashish. The bombings claimed 191 lives.
Spain’s role as a transit point for drugs was highlighted last week when Madrid hosted the US Drug Enforcement Agency’s annual conference. Experts heard not only that North African hashish was funding terrorism in Europe, but also that West Africa had become a new hub for South American cocaine shipments bound for Europe.
Morocco is the world’s leading cannabis exporter, with an annual crop … Last month, the Moroccan navy seized three tonnes of Europe-bound hashish off the Mediterranean port of Nador. The same week, Spanish coastguards seized 4.3 tonnes of Moroccan resin off Ibiza.
The joint secret service investigation finds that hashish is part of a ‘complex financing network’ serving the Algeria-based Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat, affiliated since last year to al-Qaeda. The group claimed responsibility for two bombings in Algiers on 11 April that killed 30 people and left 200 injured.
But, the piece that originally appeared in the Guardian, also quotes French terrorism expert Dominique Thomas as noting that this connection between illegal drug sales and Islamic terrorism isn’t new. In fact, there’s a split between those who believe it’s no-holds-barred to win and those who believe that drugs and Islam are not compatible.
May 7th, 2007 by DR. CLARISSA PINKOLA ESTÉS, TMV Columnist
In a time of war, of such loss of life of the young, or no end in sight, to see dignitaries bowing and laughing and joking, surely a long, serious table grace is called for.
SEED CORN SHALL NOT BE GROUND Seed corn: The best qualities of each green living thing, kept for seed so the next generation on earth will flower.
I first worked at the VA as an aide
and I saw them come back from hell…
Hell! Hell was still smoking inside them:
Front line men, artillery, tank and tail,
helicopter, hand to hand,
med evac, nurses, chaplains, photographers.
But too often, civvies, media, politicians wanted â€war stories,“ from them,
to somehow share a suck at what they thought of as the heroic tit.
They wanted battle-frayed soldiers to say they were okay,
that the war enchantment cast over them by others
had magically worn off just because someone said ‘war’s over, go home,’
that the soldiers had magically returned to their pre-war selves:
just a boy, just a girl, magically looking forward
to settling down with a nice girl or boy somewhere near trees and water.
But the soldiers’ eyes said,
Still at Inchon,
Still at the Ardennes
Still at the Tet
Still in Cambodia.
Forever.
Governments tried to erase all images and words about the wars,
but, the real eye-witness reports ran every night on the dream newsreels.
There, in their own beds, the men and women dreamt Honor and Horror
were dressed as innocent children,
who played time and again with the unspent money
of shells and mines so deadly pretty.
And outside the VA, the sexual lustre of war
continued to swell the hearts
of so many who never saw war up close.
At the VA, the soldiers walked the halls
wearing crowns of thorns made of missiles
and unspeakable memories on fire.
And anyone who saw them, helped them,
soothed them,
anyone who had a heart
left hanging by even one hinge
wondered,
Isn’t there such a thing as patriotic anger?
Is it not true that there is such a thing as patriotic sadness and sorrow?
What about patriotic resistance? Can there be patriotic regret?
And, oh by the way, when did patriotic reluctance to kill
change from a holy thing to a hated one?
And what does war shatter besides bone?
And how can secret regret deserve so much public praise?
How can the maiming of human life, life that all say is so precious,
be given so much remembrance, as though to be harmed and die
is hard sought treasure
instead of so unbearably tragic?
How can anything be more valued, more memorialized, than those who still stand
with earned valour shining,
with eyes that say:
Still walking from Bataan
Still in Saigon
Still in Seoul
Still deployed into cold waters
under hundred pound packs
and struggling toward shore.
Forever.
Seed Corn shall not be ground,
else the next generation of miracles, dies.
The visionary demands:
Seed corn shall not be ground!
April 1st, 2007 by SWARAAJ CHAUHAN, International Columnist
Bodies of dead Iraqi civilians stored in a refrigerated truck.
It seems the world has gone off to sleep so far as killings, murder and mayhem in Iraq is concerned. Years are flying by and ordinary men, women and children continue to be slaughtered.
Why? Is there anyone left to attempt an honest answer?
America is allowing its valiant soldiers to be sacrificed at the altar of personal whims and expediency of the present US administration/business.
The UN and member states have even forgotten to mumble routine cliches about human rights, violence, forcible occupation of a country by foreign troops, crime against women and children…The list is too long.
And the United Nations’ members, and its bloated bureaucracy, refuse to wake up from its slumber.
Do you know (or does it matter to you at all) that the U.S. military death toll in March, the first full month of the security crackdown, was nearly twice that of the Iraqi army? The Associated Press count of U.S. military deaths for the month was 81. While the Iraqi military toll was 44.
There have been 3,504 coalition deaths — 3,246 Americans, two Australians, 134 Britons, 13 Bulgarians, six Danes, two Dutch, two Estonians, one Fijian, one Hungarian, 32 Italians, one Kazakh, three Latvian, 19 Poles, two Romanians, five Salvadoran, four Slovaks, 11 Spaniards, two Thai and 18 Ukrainians — in the war in Iraq as of March 30, 2007, according to a CNN count.
At least 24,314 U.S. troops have been wounded in action, according to the Pentagon.
Now we come to the hapless civilians. At least 100,000 Iraqi civilians may have died because of the U.S. invasion. For details please click here…
The following statement typically reflects the dehumanized world: “Pentagon officials say they do not keep tallies of civilian casualties, and a spokesman said yesterday there is no way to validate estimates by others.”
Did I hear someone say that the hanged dictator’s rule was much better than the one imposed by a foreign power as far as ordinary Iraqis are concerned?
Go ask an Iraqi women or child…
Two quotations come to mind…
“During times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act” - George Orwell
————– “Patriotism is supporting your country all of the time - AND YOUR GOVERNMENT, WHEN IT DESERVES IT”- Mark Twain
![[Het Parool, The Netherlands]](http://worldmeets.us/images/hillarynewhampshire_hetparool.gif)
These are the list of reasons the men who decided that the 13 colonies shall become states, separated from the self-acclaimed ‘Decider’ who ruled by fiat, spying on his own people, planting enmity between groups in America, who would unleash wars on several nations all at the same time… all from 3,950 miles and an entire ocean away from America. 
