FOOD FOR THOUGHT: 'EQUALITY' SHOULD NOT BE JUST A WORD

Danielle Allen, Our Declaration: A Reading of the Declaration of Independence in Defense of Equality (New York: Liveright, 2014) ("What exactly does the Declaration have to say about equality? First of all, the text focuses on political equality. In the twentieth century we came to understand political equality as meaning primarily formal civic rights: the rights to vote, serve on juries, and run for elected office. These political rights are, of course, fundamental, but civic rights are only a part of the story about political equality. The Declaration has much more to say." "As it moves from its opening salvo for divorce to its closing recommitment of the colonists to one another, the Declaration first sets it sights on achieving freedom from domination for the polity as a whole, and for individual citizens. It lays out egalitarian access to the instrument of government as crucial to the pursuit of happiness. There we find the familiar emphasis on civic rights. Then the Declaration moves on to argue for an egalitaratian cultivation of collective intelligence as well as for an associational egalitarianism that establishes norms and practices of genuine reciprocity as the baseline for decent interactions with one's fellow citizens. Finally, the Declaration shows us the egalitarianism of co-creation and co-ownership of a shared world, an expectation for inclusive participation that fosters in each citizens the self-understanding that she, too, he, too, helps to make, and is responsible for, this world in which we live together. That rich and expansive notion of political equality is the ground of independence, personal and political." Id. at 275-276.).

JANE GARDAM

Jane Gardam, Crusoe's Daughter (New York: Europa Editions, 1985, 2012).

Jane Gardam, God on the Rocks (New York: Europa Editions, 1978, 2010) ("'But--Latin. Margaret, you know the verb exquire? To search out? To elucidate?' 'Yes.' 'Well, when I'm dead could you put in on my tombstone?' 'Yes.' 'With a non in front of it?' 'Yes. Why?' 'Because there's a lot it's not wise to fuss over. To prize out. Extract. It is best to just look and be.'" Id. at 193-194.).

Jane Gardam, The Hollow Land (New York: Europa Editions, 2015).

Jane Gardam, Last Friends (New York: Europa Editions, 2013) ("In the train he sat down at once in Herman's reserved seat. 'That,' said Herman, 'is not legal.' 'Justice,' said Fiscal-Smith,' has nothing to do with Law.'" Id. at 23.).

Jane Gardam, A Long Way from Verona (New York: Europa Editions, 1971, 2013) (From the book cover: "Jessica has always known that her destiny would be shaped by her refusal to conform, her compulsion to tell the absolute truth, and her dedication to observing the strange wartime world that surrounds her. What she doesn't know, however, is that the experiences and ideas that set her apart will also lead her to a new and wholly unexpected life. Told with grace and inimitable wit, A Long Way from Verona is a wise and vivid portrait of adolescent discovery and impending adulthood.").

Jane Gardam, The Man in the Wooden Hat (New York: Europa Editions, 2009) ("Directed by Ross, Eddie began to specialise in Bomb Damage Claims, then in General Building Disputes. Almost at once Ross had him in good suits flying about the world on the way to becoming the Czar (as the saying is now) of the Construction Industry. In the Far East, there began the skyscraper boom. . . . But there was no great jealously. The Construction Industry is not glamorous like Slander and Libel or Crime. It is supposed to be easy, unlike Shipping or Chancery. Indeed, it comes dangerously close to Engineering, ever despised in England. It is often referred to as Sewers and Drains. . . ." Id. at 20-21.).

Jane Gardam, Old Filth (New York: Europa Editions, 2004, 2006) ("He thought he needed a Gospel tonight, and turned up one of Christ's ding-dongs with the lawyers." "He wondered, the pages shaking as he turned to them, why Christ had so hated lawyers when He'd have been such a brilliant one Himself. Christ, when you considered it, was simply putting a Case. He may well have been enjoying the lawyers' examination of him. Pilate's was his most respectable interrogation. Pilate had not been a lawyer, but another excellent lawyer manqué. Pilate and Christ had understood each other." Id. at 255.).

Jane Gardam, The People on Privilege Hill and Other Stories (New York: Europa Editions, 2008).

RELIGION, RACE, POLITICS, AND LAW

Robert Wuthnow, Rough Country: How Texas Became America's Most Powerful Bible-Belt State (Princeton & Oxford: Princeton U. Press, 2014) (From the bookjacket: "Tracing the intersection of religion, race and power in Texas from Reconstruction through the rise of the Religious Right and the failed presidential bid of Governor Rick Perry, Rough Country illuminates American history since the Civil War in new ways, demonstrating that Texas's story is also America's. In particular, Robert Wuthnow shows how distinctions between 'us' and 'them' are perpetuated and why they are so often shaped by religion and politics." "Early settlers called Texas a rough country. Surviving there necessitated defining evil, fighting it, and building institutions in the hope of advancing civilization. Religion played a decisive role. Today, more evangelical Protestants live in Texas than in any other state. They have influenced every presidential election for fifty years, mobilized powerful efforts against abortion and same-sex-marriage, and been a driving force in the Tea Party movement. And religion has always been complicated by race and ethnicity.""Drawing from memoirs, newspapers, and history, voting records, and surveys, Rough Country tells the stories of ordinary men and women who struggled with the conditions they faced, conformed to the customs they knew, and on occasion emerged as powerful national leaders. We see the lasting imprint of slavery, public executions, Jim Crow segregation, and resentment against the federal government. We also observe courageous efforts to care for the sick, combat lynching, provide for the poor, welcome new immigrants and uphold liberty of conscience." "A monumental and magisterial history, Rough Country is as much about the rest of America as it is about Texas.").

FOOD FOR THOUGHT ON MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR. DAY

James H. Cone, The Cross and The Lynching Tree (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2011) ("The cross and the lynching tree are separated by nearly 2,000 years. One is the  universal symbol of Christian faith; the other is the quintessential symbol of black oppression in America. Though both are symbols of death, one represents a message of hope and salvation, while the other signifies the negation of that message by white supremacy. Despite the obvious similarities between Jesus' death on a cross and the death of thousands of black men and women strung up to die on a lamppost or tree, relatively few people, apart from black poets, novelists, and other reality-seeking artists, have explored the symbolic connecctions. Yet, I believe this is a challenge we must face. What is at stake is the credibility and promise of the Christian gospel and the hope that we may heal the wounds of racial violence that continues to divide our churches and our society." Id. at xiii-xiv.).

WHAT IS 'LIBERALISM'?

Edmund Fawcett, Liberalism: The Life of an Idea (Princeton & Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2014). From the book's jacket: 

"Liberalism dominates today's politics just as it decisively shaped the past two hundred years of American and European history. Yet there is striking disagreement about what liberalism really means and how it arose. In this engrossing history of liberalism--the first in English for many decades--veteran political observer Edmund Fawcett traces the ideals, successes, and failures of this central political tradition through the lives and ideas of a rich cast of European and American thinkers and politicians, from the early nineteenth century to today.

"Using a broad idea of liberalism, the book discusses celebrated thinkers from Constant and Mill to Berlin, Hayek, and Rawls, as well as more neglected figures. Its twentieth-century politicians include, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Lyndon Johnson, and Willy Brandt, but also Hoover, Reagan, and Kohl. The story tracks political liberalism from its beginnings in the 1830s to its long, grudging compromise with democracy, through a golden age after 1945 to the present mood of challenge an doubt.

"Focusing on the United States, Britain, France, and Germany, the book traces how the distinct traditions of these countries converged on the practice of liberal democracy. Although liberalism has many currents, Fawcett suggests that they are held together by shared commitments: resistance to power, faith in social progress, respect for people's chosen enterprises and beliefs, and acceptance that interests and faiths will always conflict.

"An enlightening account of a vulnerable but critically important political creed, Liberalism will be a revelation for readers who think they already know--for good or ill--what liberalism is."

DIALOGUES ON THE 'BHAGAVAD GITA'

Richard H. Davis, The Bhagavad Gita: A Biography (Lives of Great Religious Books) (Princeton & Oxford: Princeton U. Press, 2015) ("Like many great religious works, the Bhagavad Gita has outlived its own time and place of composition. The work has lived a vivid and contentious existence over the centuries since, though readings and recitations, translations and commentaries that have reinscribed this classical Indian work into many new currents and disputes. Medieval Brahman scholars and Krishna devotees, British colonial scholars, German romantics, globe-trotting Hindu gurus, Indian anticolonial freedom fighters, Western students, and spiritual seekers have all engaged in new dialogues with the Gita." Id. at 6. Also see, generally, Wendy Doniger, "War and Peace in the Bhagavad Gita," New York Review of Books, 12/4/2014.).

THE SECRET PURPOSE OF ART

Jed Pearl, ed., Art in America 1945-1970: Writings from the Age of Abstract Expressionism, Pop Art, and Minimalism (New York: Library of America, 2014) (From "Excerpts from an Unfinished Manuscript Titles 'Art'": "If you examine all existing tapestries of the fifteen century, you will find that they are all beautiful and perfect in every aspect of craft, composition and art. How do you account that today in ten thousand paintings you hardly find one palatable? There must be an explanation. It is because the epoch itself was better, stricter and the craft itself was more rigorous and exclusive, and men were inspired not by 'art' but by a religious fervor or craft fervor. All this is to show that instead of trying for greater so-called 'freedom of expression' or destruction of the world around and of themselves, so-called 'artists' should try to devote themselves to a detached subject and to their own craft, try to convey a message and not to produce a pretty decoration. The purpose of life in society, art and civilization, is: the greater order, discipline, control and inhibitions to produce and organize culture, a culture that functions in concert, like an organism. In Zen, the archer must reach such technical and spiritual perfection as to identify himself to such an extent with the target, that the target becomes himself. Perfection means that the arrow, sent out by the archer, hits the archer himself, square in the solar-plexus, this realizing the perfect Sunburst, because self-immolation is the ultimate aim of archery, and of itself. The Greeks knew it and so did the Egyptians. Hence the secret of Egyptian and Greek statuary is that every male figure of a divinity or warrior is always wide-open, defenseless, ready for the great Ritual Immolation, the secret purpose of all arts, of all endeavor! This heroic task is not for the feeble-minded, soft, scheming, pettyfoggers, doubledealers and scavengers. The artist's job is a Hector's task and nothing less. Those who are not equipped with Hector's heart, aim and perspicacity, should keep their profane hands off the domain of art." Id. at 316, 320-321.).