Talk about "To the Lighthouse"

Interesting Interview about Wirginia Woolf's' To the Lighthouse

Online chat with Reynolds Price '55,Author and James B. Duke Professor of English, and Frank Stasio, Host of the "State of Things".  I've only watched a few minutes and it's quite interesting. I don't know if it's better to watch it now or after reading the book. I think I'll do it while I read the book. To my mind, it can help. Hope you like it.

To the Lighthouse

Virginia Woolf : To the Lighthouse. This link will help you reading this novel. Of course, it doesn't have to do anything with Mandela's Way. I have just started with the first few pages and  find it quite hard to understand it.  Here you have the index. It  can be helpful.

Table of Contents

Context

Plot Overview

Character List

Analysis of Major Characters

Themes, Motifs & Symbols

Summary & Analysis

The Window: Chapters I–IV

The Window: Chapters V–VIII

The Window: Chapters IX–XI

The Window: Chapters XII–XVI

The Window: Chapter XVII

The Window: Chapters XVIII–XIX

Time Passes: Chapters I–X

The Lighthouse: Chapters I–III

The Lighthouse: Chapters IV–VII

The Lighthouse: Chapters VIII–XIII

Important Quotations Explained

Key Facts

Study Questions & Essay Topics

Quiz

Suggestions for Further Reading

How to Cite This SparkNote

Chomsky's summary

Maybe it's a little bit late, but I always forget to put Chomsky's summary on my blog. Here it is.

Summary

Those who control the energy reserves in the Middle East would control the world. Therefore, the US delineated a “Grand Area” within which they would maintain its military and economic supremacy. Moreover, they would ensure the limitation of any exercise of sovereignty by states that might interfere with its global designs.

Hence, there exists the perception in the Arab world that the US and its allies support dictatorships and block democracy and development. If public opinion were to influence policy, the US and its allies would be expelled from the region. Moreover, the US was facing similar problems in the early 19^th century. However, after the World War II the US displaced Britain as global hegemony.

Western power remains hostile to democracy in the Arab world for good reasons. Instability is only caused by those who oppose the US and its allies. First, the Iranian threat: Iran’s potential deterrent capacity and its efforts to extend its influence to neighbouring countries. Second, China’s growing military and commercial power is also a threat. China is expanding its dominant role in Iran’s energy industries and, what is more, it is not impressed by US warnings.

Although, the Grand Area doctrine still prevails the capacity to implement it has declined. Wealth and power have narrowly concentrated. Furthermore, the main architects of the crisis are richer than ever. Therefore, propaganda must seek to blame others: public sector workers, their fat salaries, exorbitant pensions and so on. Immigrants are a fine target, too. This is also happening in Europe, where racism is probably more rampant than in the Us.

Another externality that is dismissed in market systems is the fate of the species. No one will come to the rescue if the environment is destroyed. Business leaders understand full well how grave is the threat. But they must maximize short-term profit and market share. Markets will lead our lives while we are passive, apathetic, diverted to consumerism or hatred of the invulnerable.



Mandela's Way

What do I take from Mandela's book?

That's quite complex; but, don't worry I'm not going to write a book about that. I'll just mention a few things. First, Know when to say know. From my point of view, Mandela is right when he says there's no point in postponing a negative answer: it can be worse. So I'll try to say "no" at the right time. Second, see the good in others. I don't completely agree with him about this idea of the goodness of people.You can sometimes get deceived. Maybe, you can think I'm not a good person, nevertheless I always have in mind the Spanish saying "Piensa mal y acertarás" and it sometimes turns out to be true. For me, it's quite difficult to trust people unless I know them very well. I know this is not a virtue, but we are not perfect; well, at least I'm glad I'm not perfect. Third, I totally agree with him when he talks about self-respect. We have to be proud of ourselves, of the way we are, the way we do things, ... Dignity is a very important concept for me. And we all have the right to be treated with dignity: treat everyone as you'd like to be treated. And... to finish, I would like to comment on the idea of love. Love is a must and it should be important and a necessity for everyone: we should love our family, our friends, our workmates, ... that is, everyone. To my mind, you receive what you give, so if you give love, you receive love or there will be more chances to receive love. But don't forget: love begins with ourselves: we have to love ourselves. I'll end up offering you two pieces of advice: Don't take anything for granted and First think, then act. I really like the book and I hope to get some benefit from the lessons Mandela taught us.

New Year Resolutions

So, are you still working on your 2011 New Year resolution? We all make promises to improve ourselves at the beginning of each New Year. It has become quite a part of our New Year celebration and 2012 is not going to be an exception.

Although 2011 is still in progress, it is not too early to look forward to 2012. At least we can plan ahead on how we are going to improve ourselves in the next year. Hence, let us take a look at the possibilities of planning ahead for the 2012 New Year resolution.

The beginning of every year brings in new hope and enthusiasm. We look forward to a new beginning and hope things to improve from the last year. We like to forget about our pasts and its daunting memories and wish for a new start. Hence, New Year is celebrated with pomp and joy by every race around the world.

New Year brings in new promises. Hence, it can’t hurt to plan ahead for your 2012 New Year resolution which will help you make a better person.


The previous webpage of New Year Resolutions is quite entertaining, but I really like this one written by Rhoda. 'Rhoda: Her First Ninety Years' and 'After Ninety: What' It's worth reading it.

The Muasher doctrine

I've read the lecture given by Chomsky in Amsterdam. I've also listened to it as Emilio has asked us to do. But to do a summary it's not something simple or easy: you can't do it unless you understand it. And I have to admit that Internet is a very potent and interesting tool for everyone. What I mean is that undestanding the text was a deep intensive race I had to run in order to do the summary. I must also admit that I sometimes look over your blogs: some findings are entertaining and amusing and others are really very useful. In this case, as I was having problems with Chomsky's lecture, I decided to have a look at your blogs and I particularly find two of them quite enlightening: Borja's findings about the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and those of Jose Enrique's about the Grand Area,The Strait of Hormuz and Chomsky. Here, what I'm posting is a little brief explanation about something that Chomsky mentions several times in his discourse: The Muasher doctrine. Hope it helps you to understand better this text. It did help me.

AV: Can you describe what you’ve been calling the Muasher doctrine?

Chomsky: What’s been going on in the Middle East, basically—and they don’t want to admit it—is the US and its allies have been supporting really harsh, brutal dictatorships for a very long time. And they’ve known for years, it’s not been a secret, that the population is strongly opposed to US policy. This guy Muasher, he’s a former Jordanian high official, which is a dictatorship of course, and he’s now the Middle East specialist for the Carnegie Endowment, and he was describing the principle that as long as people are quiet and subdued, we don’t really care what they think. Everything is fine.

It works in the United States, too. As long as people don’t make too much of a fuss, we’ll get away with whatever we can. In the Middle East it’s been going on for decades, in fact all over the world. But what’s striking right now is people aren’t quiet, and therefore the US and its allies and Israel are pretty upset, because you can’t count on your favorite dictator to keep everything under control. And of course, since Washington and everyone else is terrified of democracy, they have to find some way to keep the thing under control even if their favorite dictator isn’t there.

Incidentally, this happens over and over. People act as if it’s something new but it’s as old as the hills. You just look through the record: Somoza, Marcos in the Philippines, Duvalier in Haiti, Mobuto in the Congo, Suharto in Indonesia. You support your favorite dictator as long as you can, and if it becomes impossible to continue to support him—like maybe the army moves against him, and you can’t do it anymore—well then, what you have to do is shelve him somehow, put him out to pasture, and pretend that you’ve always been a passionate supporter of the people and of democracy, and then try to reinstall the old regime. Try to make sure that the basic system remains, even with a change of names. And that’s done all the time. There’s nothing new in this.

If you want to read all the conversation go to this link.

Contours of Global Order-Chomsky

Here you have Noam Chomsky giving this deep, interesting talk in Amsterdam. Hope you enjoy it.Noam Chomsky's talk in Amsterdam