A Humorous Exception in the US Press
A Humorous Exception in the US Press
By Manuel E. Yepe
http://manuelyepe.wordpress.com/
Exclusive for the daily POR ESTO! of Merida, Mexico.
Translated and edited by Walter Lippmann.
For those who are not very knowledgeable about the reality of the U.S. press, it is surprising to learn that in the leading country of world capitalism, that there is a publication with a history of more than 65 years of uninterrupted publication, with an apparent freedom of content and, most exceptionally, without advertising. characteristics that are not found in any other media of that great center of capitalism.
Last week, the current owners of the humorous magazine MAD, the company DC comics, announced that the magazine was about to suspend publication. MAD, which had started as a comic book in 1952, becoming a magazine in 1955, it will cease publication and, according to informed, it will only continue to circulate in its next numbers with reprinted material to meet existing subscriptions, but not including new material.
Born in the turbulent era of McCarthyism, MAD is about to die in another squalid political era, Trump’s. MAD was possibly the largest and most influential satirical magazine in the United States, a strange statement from a large circulation publication that was read, throughout its existence, mostly by teenagers and children.
Its content was often rude, tasteless and childish, which made it even more powerful as a tributary of youth culture. The children that read MAD learned to distrust authority, whether it was political, advertising or journalistic. It was a model that successive generations took seriously. Without MAD, it is impossible to imagine the underground comics National Lampoon, Saturday Night Live, The Simpsons, The Daily Show or Stephen Colbert.
In the history of American culture, MAD is the crucial link between the anarchic humor of the Marx Brothers and the counterculture that emerged in the 1960s. A writing in The New York Times Magazine on the 25th Anniversary of MAD in 1977, said that “month after month and edition after edition, in a relentlessly kind manner, MAD tells us that everything was crooked, that there were lies in advertising, that other comic hooks lied, that television and movies lied and that adults, in general, when faced with the unknown, lied. “
An impressive variety of prominent cultural figures witnessed the molding force of MAD. Gloria Steinem has said:
“There was a spirit of satire and irreverence in MAD that was very important, and it was the only place where that could be found in the 50s. ”Singer Patti Smith made a similar observation more succinct: “After MAD, drugs were nothing.”
Kurtzman, the genius who was the source of MAD, sometimes denied any political intentions. He admitted that he made an exception with McCarthy because he was “so evil that it was like making a satire about Hitler.”
The first years of MAD were extremely dangerous times for Gaines. His business manager was arrested for selling disgusting literature in the form of a comic that parodied Mickey Spillane’s violent police novels. (The story was titled “My Gun is the Jury” and Stuart had to serve a year in jail before the judge dismissed the case.
Besieged by the Senate, the legal system, parent groups, other publishers and distributors, Gaines had to give up the comics. Turn MAD into a magazine that constituted its lifeboat. Initially, Gaines and Kurtzman were friends, although they eventually separated when, in 1956, Kurtzman asked for half the ownership of the magazine.
When they got along, Gaines didn’t even care when Kurtzman’s ad skits bothered advertisers. In fact, after the separation from Kurtzman, Gaines decided to do MAD on his own in 1957, a policy that continued until 2001 (almost a decade after Gaines died in 1992).
MAD’s will to tweak the noses of the powerful won him many enemies. In 1961, retired brigadier general Clyde J. Watts claimed that MAD was “the most insidious communist propaganda that existed in the United States.” In 1979, Bill Wilkinson, Grand Dragon of the Ku Klux Klan, wrote to the magazine saying: “You and the Jewish-communist magazine MAD are obviously trying to wipe out the colors of our flag and promoting radicalism in the youth of this country. ”
Gaines would cite the progressive tabloid PM, which flourished briefly in the 1940s, as a precedent for MAD’s non-advertising policy. “In those days there was no such thing as stopping publishing an anti-cigarette story out of terror about the possibility of losing your cigarette advertising,” Gaines noted.
July 26, 2019.
Trumps’s Imperialist Policy Tools
Trumps’s Imperialist Policy Tools
By Manuel E. Yepe
http://manuelyepe.wordpress.com/
Exclusive for the daily POR ESTO! of Merida, Mexico.
Translated and edited by Walter Lippmann.
Donald Trump’s foreign policy is largely based on the use of the tools at the Empire’s disposal: economic terrorism, threats of war, diplomatic pressure, trade wars, etc. But by resorting to them, Washington isolates itself internationally from its traditional allies and raises tensions on the world chessboard to an unprecedented level.
This is how Professor Federico Pieraccini sees it in an essay published on May 25 by the Strategic Foundation entitled Shielding the World From US Chaos Is No Easy Task.
The blockade against Cuba has been maintained for 60 years, with more or less intense stages of sharpening, together with threats of war against Venezuela, the Democratic Republic of Korea, Syria and Iran that are repeated daily, economic sanctions involving tariffs are, in many ways, comparable to declarations of war, and can be directed against friendly countries or allies of the United States.
China and Russia fight by diplomatic, economic and sometimes military means to promote the emergence of a multi-polar world. They offer Washington’s enemies some kind of shield with which to resist the scandalous attacks of the Trump administration. Beijing and Moscow project their resistance with a view to their long-term goals, given that in the short term they face the implacable hostility of Washington and its lackeys.
The fate of the new multipolar world order depends on how effectively China and Russia can weather the storm that Washington unleashes.
Washington’s European allies are punished for importing Iranian oil, cannot participate in Syria’s reconstruction, are induced to abandon joint projects with Russia (Nord Stream II); are asked to reduce China’s technological imports, and not to get involved in the world’s largest project, the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).
All these demands come at a time when Donald Trump continues to undermine the current globalist world order that his allies had come to rely on to maintain the status quo. U.S. allies are obligated to comply with Washington’s requests, even if it damages their commercial interests and, in the medium and long term, has serious consequences.
This is the main reason the European countries want to diversify their trade and de-dollarize their economies.
With a US administration fragmented into several factions, constant changes in strategy and approach that end up weakening Washington’s international stature, the Pentagon’s military planners fear an open conflict with Iran or Venezuela, more than anything else, for purely propagandistic reasons.
Washington’s formidable firepower would probably be able to defeat any defense Tehran or Caracas could offer, but at what price? The myth of the invincibility of U.S. weapons is being challenged by Moscow’s defensive capabilities deployed in Syria and Venezuela. These same capabilities are readily available to Tehran should Washington decide to attack the Persian country.
But the likelihood of such a war is decreasing and Pentagon military planners fear a much worse scenario for the United States because Iran is three times bigger than Iraq and it would need about 1.2 million U.S. troops to occupy the country permanently.
Iran, moreover, is one of the world’s top 15 powers and Washington for the first time would face a high-capacity opponent, something that Americans have been trying to avoid for decades. They fear revealing the vulnerability of their weapons systems as a result of corruption and misguided strategic decisions. Pentagon planners have no intention of revealing their military vulnerabilities in a war with Iran.
The loss of U.S. military prestige would also demonstrate to countries that have hitherto been under Washington’s control that this dog barks rather than bites, making it even more difficult for the United States to intimidate countries with the threat of future military force.
What seems so difficult for Trump to understand is that his foreign policy is slowly eroding America’s superpower status. Since Trump is not really committed to any war, this will only lead to a humiliating setback.
A commitment to no more wars could be one of the last electoral promises to which Trump wants to remain true.
July 24, 2019.
This article can be reproduced by quoting the newspaper POR ESTO as the source.
Bucanero and Cristal at Way-Too-High Prices
Bucanero and Cristal at High Prices in Private Sector, But Gone From State Stores
By Tay Beatriz Toscano Jerez
July 17, 2019
Translated and edited by Walter Lippmann for CubaNews.
At 200% of your selling price, maybe 250% of your cost price. For someone who didn’t invest a drop of sweat in producing them. Only in Cuba. Photo: September 5.
Surely the high temperatures of these days has evoked thoughts of having a beer to cool off. Perhaps you have decided to have a family reunion and, why not, taste a Bucanero or a Cristal. If you don’t change your brand (and quality), you have a very difficult time.
For some time now, it has been difficult to find the two emblematic beers produced domestically in the chain stores. However, in the private gastronomic establishments, restaurants, bars and/or cafés they are can always be found without problems and at a price that sometimes (according to “cache”) doubles their original price.
It’s really incredible: at 200% of their selling price, perhaps at 250% of their cost price. For someone who didn’t invest a drop of sweat in producing them. Only in Cuba.
What is the source of supply for those private “paladares” if, for example, in the TRD Caribe chain, only two boxes per person are sold (if the regulations were really complied with)? How many times should the waiting lines be or how many should accompany the owner of the restaurant in order to have a sufficient quantity to maintain their supply in a constant manner?
It is worth looking at this phenomenon, especially because it advocates not raising prices and because it causes equitable access to products of all kinds. Let’s remember that the country has already implemented measures of various kinds, including setting up a store for self-employed workers.
For none of us, it is a secret that there are not a few citizens whose livelihood depends precisely on being aware of how much is on sale in the CIMEX stores and the former TRD stores, in order to access as much as possible and then make a profit. Logically, however, they are not “fortune-tellers” nor do they have a particular information system that knows where things are and when.
They have their information system and their source of supply in the stores themselves. If not, how is it possible that they are almost always the first to acquire from an affordable price for the beers that have motivated this comment?
If not, the press will continue to denounce and, unfortunately, things will remain the same. This generates discredit, and not only in us journalists.
This can’t be the never-ending story. Nor does it deserve the disdain or lack of attention of all those who – in acting jointly – can and should close the way to this issue. Far from becoming a solution, has today become a problem since, on the one hand, access to beer is limited and on the other, it impacts strongly in the pocket of those who like the refreshing drink.
It is therefore imperative to enforce what has been ordered; to follow that skein that seeks to suffocate the normal course of the country’s economic and commercial processes and, let us reiterate, the pockets of the people.
It is clear that under no circumstances will the steep rise in prices be allowed; neither of the beers, nor of any other product necessary for everyone. It must not be done by the state or private sector. That is also a way of thinking as a country, thinking like Cuba.
Offended Reps Respond to Trump
Offended Congresswomen Respond to Trump
By Manuel E. Yepe
http://manuelyepe.wordpress.com/
Exclusive for the daily POR ESTO! of Merida, Mexico.
Translated and edited by Walter Lippmann.
“Despite the attempts by the occupant of the White House to marginalize and silence us, know that we are more than four people.”
“We follow the mandate to defend and represent those ignored, excluded and abandoned. Our squad is big. Our squad includes anyone who commits to building a more equitable and just world. This is the work that we want to go back to . Given the size of this squadron and this great nation, no one will be able to silence us.”
That’s how the four U.S. congressmen responded: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar, Ayanna Pressley and Rashida Tlaib, to the campaign of racist epithets launched against them by President Donald Trump who has offended simultaneously with his orders to armed agents to terrorize immigrants in the United States. and communities across the country.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, paraphrasing Trump’s campaign slogan promoting his re-election, accused him of trying to “make America white again (instead of powerful)”.
Trump had tweet with irony: “How interesting to see the “progressive” Democratic congresswomen, who come from countries where the governments are a complete and total catastrophe telling us, with screams and aggressively, how we should exercise our government in the States Why don’t you go back to those places that you’ve completely come to? less and crime-ridden where they come from to help fix the situation, Trump asks them the same way.
“Go back to where they came from? Let it be known that three of the congresswomen attacked by the President were born in the United States. Alexadria Ocasio-Cortez, is a native of the Bronx, in New York. She is the youngest woman elected to Congress; Ayanna Pressley, born in Cincinnati, is the first congresswoman to be born in Cincinnati. She is an African-American) representing the state of Massachusetts. Rashida Tlaib of Detroit is Palestinian-American; together with Ilhan Omar, they are the first two Muslim women to occupy seats in the Congress”.
Omar has been a U.S. citizen for more than a year. Melania, Trump’s third wife and current first lady, is a native of Slovenia.
Trump’s racist tweets have come to unite the fractured Democratic Party and quickly activated a demonstration of support for the four brand-new congresswomen, now collectively being called called “the squad.” Although it was the first formal reprimand of the House of Representatives Representatives to a president in office in more than a century, we must bear in mind that Pelosi blocked a more serious motion that tried to censure Trump.
Trump redoubled his verbal attacks against the four congresswomen whom he accused of being socialists and communists. These were typical attacks of the era of the McCarthyism. This should come as no surprise to anyone, as the first Trump’s attorney was Roy Cohn, who served as a lawyer for Senator Joseph McCarthy in the 1950s, at a time when he destroyed thousands of lives with his policies of anti-communist persecutiopn.
Probably, the use of racist rhetoric to ignite your white electoral base is one of Trump’s campaign strategies. In his book “Black History of the White House,” American University Profesor Clarence Lusane wrote, “For many Americans, the ‘white’ of the White House has implied a great deal. more than the color of the mansion; it has symbolized the tonality and the source of dehumanizing cruelty, domination and exclusion that have defined the long narrative of white people’s relationships with people of color in America.”
Last week, the four congresswomen who so clearly challenged Trump gave a press conference, in which they denounced the racism experienced by them and people of color in the United States. in general, noted the president’s policies on the detention of immigrants, family separation and the threatening raids of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
A major article by journalists and activists Amy Goodman and Denis Moynihan was published on the DEMOCRACY NOW website on July 19 with the title “President Trump redefines the concept of the White House”, provides important elements of analysis of the crucial racial conflict undercurrent that is resurfacing with his “cheerful” twitter and his band of jackals.
June 22, 2019.
This article can be reproduced by quoting the newspaper POR ESTO as a source.
US National Pride Declines Sharply
US National Pride Declines Sharply
By Manuel E. Yepe
http://manuelyepe.wordpress.com/
Exclusive for the daily POR ESTO! of Merida, Mexico.
Translated and edited by Walter Lippmann.
On the eve of their July 4 national holiday celebration, the national pride of the people of the United States fell this year to the lowest rate since the beginning of the 20th century.
According to an extensive Gallup survey, only 70 percent of Americans say they are proud of their nationality and less than half (45 percent) say they are extremely proud of it, marking the second consecutive year that the latter proportion is no longer in the majority.
Those who claim to be supporters of Democrats continue to lag far behind those who, being Republicans, claim extreme pride in their nationality. U.S. scientific achievements in military and cultural/artistic fields are among those of which they are the proudest, while the political system and the health and welfare system are those of which they are the least proud.
Citizens’ extreme pride in their U.S. citizenship has steadily weakened in recent years, and the current reading, according to Gallup’s June 3-16 survey, marks the lowest point to date in such indicators. The latest decline of two percentage points from last year’s 47% is not statistically significant.
The highest proportions in this aspect of the measure were 69% and 70%, respectively, between 2002 and 2004, after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, when the U.S. public expressed the highest patriotic levels and mobilized in support of the U.S. government. However, since the beginning of George W. Bush’s second term in office in 2005, less than 60 percent of Americans have expressed extreme pride in being Americans.
The latest general declines in patriotism have been largely driven by Democrats, whose pride has historically been smaller and has fluctuated more than that of Republicans. The last extreme pride reading of 22% of Democrats is the lowest of the group in Gallup’s 19-year measurement, and is half of what it was several months before Donald Trump’s election victory in 2016.
Interestingly, most Republicans say they remain extremely proud of their country, and the latest reading – which was 76% – is only 10 points below the 2003 high. Even when Barack Obama held the presidency, the Republicans’ extreme pride never fell below 68%.
U.S. patriotism shows itself as another victim of the markedly polarized political climate in the United States today. For the second time in 19 years, less than half of Americans say they are extremely proud of their country. The decline reflects the collapse of pride in the Democrats since Trump took office. This is despite the fact that, among Republicans, it has increased slightly rather than decreased on the basis of nationalist and even chauvinist policies, reflected in the slogan Make America Great Again!
While supporters of both parties agree that they are not proud of the U.S. political system, this can be attributed, in both cases, to President Trump’s low approval rating.
Democrats’ awareness of Trump’s historically low rate of presidential approval in the international community may also be a contributing factor to the decline of patriotism in this latest poll. Gallup data from earlier this year found that only 31% of Americans (including 2% of Democrats) think foreign leaders have respect for Trump.
Politics is affecting Democrats’ overall pride in their country more than in Republicans. The “independents,” that is, those who are not tied to either of the two parties the system admits, have historically manifested less pride in being Americans than the Republicans. Currently, 41% of them express extreme pride, which is the lowest reading of this trend.
Several subgroups that typically identify with the Democratic Party (women, liberals, and young adults) express lower levels of extreme pride in being U.S. citizens.
American patriotism is the latest victim of the markedly polarized political climate in the United States today. For the second time in 19 years, less than half of American adults say they are extremely proud to be Americans. The decline reflects the plummeting pride of Democrats since Trump took office, contrasted with a slight rise among those who declare themselves Republicans.
July 17, 2019.
This article can be reprinted citing Por Esto! as the source.
Thousands protest U.S. anti-immigrant raids
Thousands protest against anti-immigrant raids in U.S.
July 14, 2019
Translated and edited by Walter Lippmann for CubaNews.
Protests for raids against undocumented immigrants. Photo: EFE
Thousands of people crowded Daley Plaza in downtown Chicago on Saturday to protest the undocumented raids ordered by U.S. President Donald Trump.
Artemio Arreola, of the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights (ICIRR), told Efe that the rally held in front of the Mayor’s office could surpass the organizers’ initial estimate of 10,000 people.
Demonstrators unfurled posters reading “close the concentration camps,” referring to facilities where immigrants, particularly children, are held at the border.
Also, “stop deportations now,” while a large sign hanging from the Daley Center building, where the Cook County courts operate, says, “End detentions, welcome immigrants.”
In a rally held in the plaza, Democratic Congressman Jesus “Chuy” Garcia, urged listeners to “tell this racist president that he has to stop the criminalization of the desperate.
The District 4 representative, which includes Latino neighborhoods such as La Villita and Humboldt Park, called Trump’s policies “cruel and inhumane.”
Other speakers demanded the “immediate cessation of attacks on immigrant families” and the “oppressive immigration policies” of the government.
Arreola said Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot did not participate in the protest, and toured several neighborhoods.
Among the participants were several local politicians and councilmen, but some well-known figures from the pro-immigrant struggle were absent, such as Illinois Democratic Senator Richard Durbin.
“We didn’t invite Durbin because the organizers feel he hasn’t faced Trump’s attacks hard enough to get the resources to build the border wall,” Arreola said.
The legislator participated Friday night in a meeting of Communities United, a community group in northwest Chicago.
He said it is “shameful” that the United States has come to the point of rejecting “people who are simply asking for an opportunity to have a better life, and to be part of the future of the country.”
Protests against the raids, which would begin tomorrow in Chicago and nine other cities across the country with large concentrations of immigrants, began Friday night with Liberty Lights vigils in other Illinois cities, including Aurora, Galena, Waukegan and Oak Park.
Prior to today’s rally in the plaza, representatives of the Asian American Immigrant Association met at the Chicago Cultural Center, and other groups held events in neighborhoods in the city’s northwest and southwest.
Due to the heat of 32 degrees Celsius 1, the Municipal Transportation Company parked several air-conditioned buses near the plaza so demonstrators could cool down.
Protests for raids against undocumented immigrants. Photo: EFE
Protests for raids against undocumented immigrants. Photo: EFE
- 6 Fahrenheid ↩
Cubans Benefit from New Chinese RR cars
Cuban population benefits from new Chinese cars
July 15, 2019
Translated and edited by Walter Lippmann for CubaNews
With 13 new and modern cars from China, this weekend the train Havana-Santiago was inaugurated, a service that will benefit the transportation of passengers from the west to the east of the country.
The team’s debut took place this Saturday when they left the La Coubre terminal in the Cuban capital at 4:15 p.m. to complete a route that concluded this Sunday at 9:15 a.m. at the Senén Casas Regueiro Railway Station in Ciudad Héroe.
This destination, one of the most requested by the population has filled with joy and satisfaction to all passengers to be able to enjoy the comfort of the new cars. In this sense, Alexis Guevara, said that the itinerary was very good and said that it is necessary to take care of this new investment made by the Cuban State.
Luis Roberto Rosés Hernández, director of the Business Unit of the Passenger Train Base of the Union of Cuban Railroads (UFC), said that although there were technical defects in the locomotive, the number of services and people to be transported will be doubled with this step.
The executive specified that the capacity of the previous trains was about 450 passengers in a formation of six cars. Now in each trip there will be 776 passengers in 12 of those modern Chinese vehicles.
Rosés Hernandez also cited as other novelties the possibility that the population can purchase tickets 30 days in advance when previously could only book five days.
The reactivation of the national services has been preceded by intense months of work in the commercial, operational and technical areas of the Cuban Railway Union. For this reason, the delivery of each railway worker is imposed in order to improve every day the attention to the passengers who benefit from our means of transport, he concluded. (Text and Photos: Yordanis Blanco Calderín )
The Effectiveness of Capitalist Propaganda
The Effectiveness of Capitalist Propaganda
By Manuel E. Yepe
http://manuelyepe.wordpress.com/
Exclusive for the daily POR ESTO! of Merida, Mexico.
Translated and edited by Walter Lippmann.
When the propaganda of capitalism calls on third-world nations to implement or expand market policies, or to shy away from socialist policies of common benefit, no one knows whether it is a mockery that reflects how much the intelligence of peoples is undervalued or an invitation to become accomplices of the minority segment of the world’s population that exploits the majority.
The manipulation of the media by the empire -including on the Internet- has led most of the citizens of the United States, and of the countries within its sphere of influence and control, to call “democracy” a system as undemocratic as the one presided over by Washington, although Wall Street and the military and industrial complex at the Pentagon’s axis are in fact ruled by it.
The dictatorship that the United States exerts today on the world with the support of the opulent classes of the other countries of the planet, now goes through moments that denote precariousness.
Extreme poverty, marginality, the lack of opportunities for education and decent work, the disintegrating emigration of the family with its sequels of violence and drug addiction, all result from a capitalist system that has been unable to give answers to the pressing problems capitalism has created. The individualistic ethic in which capitalism is rooted is the nourishing mother of all the worst of today’s human societies: corruption, the illegal appropriation of things, speculation, banditry, the exploitation of the work of others, the privatization of social spaces and other “beautiful” things.
According to updated data from the United Nations, there are 7.545 billion people on this planet, of which more than 20 million are chronically malnourished; 2 billion do not have access to medicines; nearly 900 million do not have drinking water; more than 900 million lack housing or live in precarious housing; 1.6 billion do not have electricity; 2,500 million lack drainage systems or sewers; 770 million adults are illiterate; 18 million die each year from poverty (the majority are children under the age of 5); more than 200 million children and young people between the ages of 5 and 17 work in conditions close to slavery as soldiers, prostitutes, servants or in other dangerous or humiliating tasks.
If capitalism could exhibit a world of progress, freedom and justice, it would be easy to sell the system all over the world and have the Third World accompany it in this crisis. But with so much horror in its offerings, every day must spend more and more to sell capitalism as the system the world needs.
Only through lies and the threat of weapons, both fed with gigantic financial resources to the detriment of the real interests of humanity, does this hegemony continue…
See how, in order to obtain military domination, in the midst of the global crisis of capitalism, Washington maintains close to a thousand military bases around the planet. And it wages bloody wars to maintain its occupation of third world countries for the sake of its geopolitical objectives and the strategic interests of the big oil corporations.
But it is becoming increasingly difficult for people to understand that a system that generates so much injustice among human beings and is inept at managing their relations with nature is sustainable for much longer. It is not known if humanity has time to repair, for the sake of its survival, the disaster provoked in the environment by the voracity that moves capitalism, a system that cannot be humanized, because its intrinsic nature is inhuman.
Putting social and solidarity ahead of the greed imposed by capitalism -because it needs them to exist- is the only way humanity can save itself on the basis of its most precious aptitude, intelligence, when applied to its survival instinct.
It has already been announced that the next U.S. crisis will be caused by the health gap between rich and poor. This has widened in the last two decades, according to a study by the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) that shows a “dramatically alarming” lack of progress in health equity in the last 25 years in the USA. Income inequality is the root cause of health inequality, as the costs of health care and a healthy lifestyle are high. The more than five million people examined make this study meaningful.
The root cause of income inequality has been the result of the extreme monetary policies of central banks, which have fuelled asset price bubbles that only enrich those who own them. With home ownership at 1960s levels, and more than 50% of citizens not owning shares, this research suggests that failed policies have led to the implosion of the middle class.
July 5, 2019
This article may be reproduced by citing the newspaper POR ESTO as the source.
Charles Dickens, orThe Adventure of Reading
Charles Dickens, or The Adventure of Reading
It doesn’t matter that Charles Dickens (1812-1870) died so long ago, what he wrote is still alive for anyone who wants to assume the adventure of reading, and during these months the bookstores of the country stimulate the encounter with the English novelist, through difficult times (Editorial Arte y Literatura, Colección Huracán, 2017).
A CubaNews translation.
Edited by Walter Lippmann.
Every summer, inevitably, I associate the season with reading. Since my student days, I’ve been looking forward to those months when, in addition to taking a walk, going to the beach, watching movies or series, reading as much as I wanted and as much as I wanted, without academic demands.
Now, professional life leaves less leisure time, but I still can not conceive of a vacation, not even an obligatory medical rest, without reading some postponed titles. If the book comes in through one door, boredom comes out through the other.
Where literature reigns, the overwhelming and sticky Cuban heat can give rise to the icy feeling of helplessness on a 19th-century English street, with hands terrified by the cold and eyes tarnished by thick factory smoke.
It doesn’t matter that Charles Dickens (1812-1870) died so long ago, what he wrote is still alive for anyone who wants to take on the adventure of reading, and during these months the country’s bookstores stimulate the encounter with the English novelist through difficult times (Editorial Arte y Literatura, Colección Huracán, 2017).
Assuming today those classics where the author does not hesitate to show his “hairy ear” and interrupts the plot to give assessments and question the reader himself, can be a somewhat “strange” experience for those accustomed to contemporary works.
However, there is a singular pleasure in feeling as close to women or men as Dickens, capable of writing more than 400 pages of intelligent and nuanced stories without computers.
In Hard Times (1854) rationality and feeling are confronted; there are no archetypes of good and bad, and few characters are spared the irony with which the author describes a social panorama where money was the center, and the craziest theories were invented -perhaps the great-great-grandparents of fake news- to justify that some had everything and others nothing.
As a good narrator, Dickens avoids clichés and suspicious happy endings, although some crooked beings receive some divine justice and others redemption. It takes advantage of its pages for a defense that is not at all working class pamphletarian, relegated to being born and dying confined to the same spaces, and without even expectations.
Thus, the worker Stephen Blackpool makes a perhaps naive, though accurate, defense of his own: “I do not know how it happens, madam, that the best qualities we have are precisely those that lead us to almost all our difficulties, misfortunes and errors. (…). We are also suffering people and, as a general rule, we want to do well. I can’t think that all the faults are on our side.
Hard Times is a crusade against hypocrisies, which the author mocks mercilessly, and also a powerful reflection on the most despicable human qualities and those essential – among them imagination – to try happiness.
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