Chance*

"It's your chance. Embrace it."
At the Bay's King Street display window
[Photo by KPA]

The Bay department store has removed its Christmas window displays, which entertained many a child (and me too). There is now a display based around a concept it calls "Modernist" in its main windows (about six of them) on Yonge Street, with echoes of Mondrian⁽¹⁾, Man Ray⁽²⁾, modernist graphic design⁽³⁾ and typography⁽⁴⁾.

A single window on the side street (King Street) has the above Chanel perfume poster taking up a whole display wall. It is unrelated to the main "Modernist" theme, although it doesn't detract from it at all. It is more an advertisement for the new Chance perfume. Or an homage to spring.

There is still a delicate drama in the poster above. The rigid grid lines seem to be holding back the giant round, rolling perfume bottles. The light pink color of the bottles suggests that Chance is a soft and feminine perfume. Yet the barbed wire in the poster puts an "edge" to it. The real perfume is neither feminine (unfortunately) nor edgy but rather mild and soapy, and is unworthy of the Chanel label. But edginess and insipidity seem to be the style of our postmodern era. People scorn the strength of femininity.

Finally, there are three actual bottles neatly placed and evenly spaced on simple white elongated boxes standing on a shiny dark surface. A muted pink light, bouncing off the background image, is reflected on the dark base.

The Bay has perfected the art of window display, using a myriad of ideas and techniques to get out of the "mannequins wearing clothing from the store's collections" box. Of course, there are still mannequins wearing store clothing, but as the modernist theme shows, they can be part of a bigger, artistic theme.

"Modernist" at the Bay's Yonge Street display window
[Photo by KPA]

-------------------------------------------------------
1. Piet Mondrian (Gallery of paintings)
2. - Man Ray, Les mystères du château de Dé (Video)

- Man Ray, Résurrection des Mannequins (Series of photographs in a

video slide show)

3. The history of visual communication (Web source)
4. Modern Typography (Wikipedia)

*"...Man Ray embraced surrealism and dadaism, creeds that emphasized chance effects, disjunction, and surprise."
Man Ray: Masters of Photography. Aperture (June 15, 2005)

Commercial Interest as the Bulwark of Liberty

George Washington
The Athenaeum Portrait, 1796.
By Stuart Gilbert

["Forces of Nature" is my post on Gilbert's many portraits of George Washington]

-------------------------------------------------------------------------

Paul Cella, over at What's Wrong with the World has a long article on the commercial republic. These ideas are new to me, but they feel intuitively right. For now, I will just quote the section that left an impression on me. Cella writes:

The framework of thinking and working out constitutionalism set down by Publius is, in my opinion, rightly called a theory of commercial republic. It contrasts with the British system, where republicanism is grafted on to strong remnants of the modified ancient regime. It contrasts with the French system, where republicanism takes on an almost Roman or Rousseauian severity, and the people, having thrown down the crown, do not scruple to take on property as well. French democracy races off toward socialism, while British democracy retreats back, after the initial plunder of the Church, into the arms of a vague but perceptible traditionalism, ever reforming, ever compromising. But in America, the commercial interest itself becomes the bulwark of liberty. How this is accomplished is a complicated matter, which I have only sketched in very brief remarks; but I do think that its practical success bears out historically that a commercial republic is a workable form of government. Publius does not teach nonsense; he teaches that middle class democracy can successfully be made out of the striving and hard-working enterprisers from among the people, toiling under conditions of equality.

I was recently skimming through books on Washington, and what struck me was that he was an accomplished businessman. On the wider world of the web, I found this account (pdf) on his entrepreneurial spirit:

Among his many talents, George Washington was a dedicated businessman who had a great vision for the future of America and his own private affairs based on his hopes for the westward expansion of the nation he helped create. His personal business was agriculture, but he knew how to measure the value of land as a trained surveyor, and invested in related industries such as the manufacture of whiskey and the milling of flour.

We've Come a Long Way

Just a couple of days ago, I placed the above photo of Elizabeth Taylor on my side panel under "blog highlights" and linked to the my blog post "Elizabeth Taylor: Last Icon of Beauty." Yesterday, after reading Geert Wilders's March 25 Magna Carta Speech "The Failure of Multiculturalism and How to Turn the Tide" I replaced it with the photo of the "niqabed" woman.

Such is the multiculturalism that Wilders is talking about.

Geert Wilders's Website

Photo from Geert Wilders's webisite

Geert Wilders has an active website, with many articles and posts in English. Here is the link.

His speech "The Failure of Multiculturalism and How to Turn the Tide" which he presented at the Magna Carta Foundation in Rome on March 25 is reprinted on his site, and discussed at Gates of Vienna. I have also referenced it in my blog post "Modern Day Barbarians."

His refreshing optimism (or should I say, his lack of cynicism) is apparent in his interview with Radio Netherlands Worldwide where he discusses the "unstoppable ‘anti-Islam’ wave." A brief summary in English is posted at Radio Netherlands Worldwide's website, and part of the interview is reprinted in English at the blog Islam in Europe.

Forced to Deal with Islam

I quoted from a long article by Danish writer Nicolai Sennels (posted at Gates of Vienna) on the Islamziation of Europe (and essentially the West) in my previous post.

His website has a list of articles in English on Muslims and immigration in Denmark. He is also promoting his book: Among criminal muslims. A psychologist’s experiences from Copenhagen.

Sennels is a psychologist. He got pulled into Islam when working with young criminals in Copenhagen and found that they are 70 percent Muslim:

On the basis of several hundred therapeutic sessions with muslim teenagers Sennels has reached the conclusion that their anti-social behavior does not stem from personal and social problems alone, but that their cultural and religious background plays a significant role. In the first half of the book Sennels's analyzes the psychology of the muslim culture as it shows itself in Western psychological perspective. In the second half he shows how this knowledge can be used in therapeutic and social work.

I think that this is what will be happening to all of us, at some point in time. We will be forced to deal with Islam, trying to solve its problems (as Sennels seems to be trying to do indirectly), or fighting off its dogmatic, authoritarian and forceful presence.

Whether we sympathize with Islam (and Muslims) or not, our professional and personal lives (even simple things like maneuvering our streets, as I explain in my post "Visceral Reaction") will be filled with confrontations with Muslims and with Islam.

However "liberal" and "moderate" Muslims appear, and however friendly they are, at some point, they will demonstrate that they have no intention of becoming true Westerners, or allying themselves with anything other than Islam. This is the strength of their religion's mandates, as clearly defined in their Koran.

Visceral Reaction

Full Niqab in Full Daylight

There is another, insightful, post on Islam (albeit a little long) at Gates of Vienna, by Nicolai Sennels¹, a writer from Denmark - perhaps the Danes, and Scandinavians in general, are the ones leading the counter-jihad movement. In a section titled "Disadvantages of Islamization [in Western countries]" Sennels states:

Islamization pushes the indigenous people out of the areas where Muslims and Muslim culture dominate. This is because the Muslim culture is so different from the Western that we find it hard to feel at home and comfortable, and because Islam and Muslim culture is racist towards non-Muslims.

This viscerally gets to the point. I have an almost physical/visceral reaction when I see, more and more common these days, a fully "niqabed" Muslim woman. I've written about this at Our Changing Landscape, and here is the full short post titled "Full Niqab in Full Daylight":

This [see above photo] is what I saw crossing the street while stopping at a red light in downtown Toronto. Well, the one I saw was all in black, which was even more frightening.

It was shocking. A small, squat woman, dressed from head-to-toe in this garb. I have never seen anyone come out dressed in full niqab, as it is called, in full daylight in the city.

It shows a tremendous amount of confidence for her to walk out like this, probably the only one in the streets.

But not for long. If one dares to come out like this, there must be hundreds others getting ready to do so. Slowly, like the less intrusive hijab, this full-length dress is being introduced into our landscape.

---------------------------------------------------------------
[1] Nicolai Sennels is a psychologist and the author of "Among Criminal Muslims: A Psychologist’s experiences with the Copenhagen Municipality".

Islam and Modernity

Below is a quote from Bat Ye'or, in an interview by Tundra Tabloids:

"[The Muslim Brotherhood] is very dangerous, for it has adopted a Western language to undermine the West. It aims to Islamise modernity, not to modernize Islam."

This is part of what I was trying to say in my previous post "Modern Day Barbarians":

Our modern day barbarians have risen and are in war mode. Muslims have told us through their holy book, in their mosques, by their historical trajectory, and even in our own sacrosanct institutions of learning and knowledge, that they are getting ready. They are not satisfied with borrowed land and borrowed culture. Most important, though, they will not tolerate our God and our religion.

Tundra Tabloids is a Finnish website dedicated to (from its masthead): 

Keeping tabs on the most outrageous happenings in the Middle East, Islamist extremism, and Islamist hegemony in Scandinavia and on the political correctness that allows them to flourish.

Modern Day Barbarians

Below is a quote from the speech "The Failure of Multiculturalism and How to Turn the Tide" that Geert Wilders recently gave at the Annual Lecture of the Magna Carta Foundation in Rome. The entire speech is posted at Gates of Vienna.

[O]n December 31st in the year 406, the Rhine froze and tens of thousands of Germanic Barbarians, crossed the river, flooded the Empire and went on a rampage, destroying every city they passed. In 410, Rome was sacked.

Bringing down the Barbarians should have been a simple, solvable problem for the formidable Romans. But Rome was weakened from within by the conquered Germanic tribes that had been accepted into Roman lands, and all those other non-Romans who were making Rome a little less Roman, a little at a time.

On that fateful day in 406, nature collaborated when the Rhine froze and allowed the non-Roman Barbarians to move across Roman lands unhindered to unleash their final rampage.

Undoubtedly, Rome would have fallen a little later (still with a whimper, as Wilders says) without the Rhine's great freeze over, but it puts a doomsday immensity to imagine endless, infinite, numbers of rampaging Barbarians hurtling across solid water to seize, unchallenged, the prestigious Roman lands. The gods showed their favor to the Germanic tribes in that one simple act of turning water into land.

The story continues that the Barbarians wrought, out of their unstoppable energy, Western civilization. And they didn't completely destroy Rome, and wisely (not an adverb one usually associates with hordes of savages) used it as a backbone to build their new world.

Wilders is too rational (and an atheist) to extrapolate this apocalyptic scenario into our modern world. God's wrath is real. Water can turn into whatever God wants it to. Civilizations can be destroyed in mere (I don't even know how to count God's time) minutes.

But what of the barbarians of our era? How are we in the West even remotely prepared for the Götterdämmerung that might occur? Like the Romans, we have included alien cultures and peoples into the fabrics of our societies. "Assimilation" was an imperialistic outreach and outstretch for the Romans. Hierarchies were strictly maintained. The Romans were always on top. But we have extended our reception of aliens with liberal notions of equalities and freedoms, and in fact put them on pedestals. We insist that they are better than us and willingly assume subordination. We think this is being civilized.

Immigrants piggy-back on our equality-seeking ethos and brazenly exploit it (and who is to blame them?), happily displacing their hosts and taking the helm themselves. But unlike the era of the Romans, these immigrants have nothing in common with us or with each other (our magnanimity keeps adding disparate groups to our shores, as different from us as they are from each other) and they all compete for the spoils of this new-found treasure chest. When immigration turns to conquest, as the Germanic tribes showed, how will we defend ourselves?

In fact, the time has come when this isn't simply a hypothetical question, or imagining a distant future. Our modern day barbarians have risen and are in war mode. Muslims have told us through their holy book, in their mosques, by their historical trajectory, and even in our own sacrosanct institutions of learning and knowledge, that they are getting ready. They are not satisfied with borrowed land and borrowed culture. Most important, though, they will not tolerate our God and our religion.

In the imaginable scenario that these modern day barbarians succeed with their invasion, what next? Will we see a renaissance of a new world, a new West, as we saw with the Germans? The short answer is "no." Their history of destruction and regression is too long and meticulously documented by the very West they are devastating. We have refused to learn from our own observations. We are ignoring history to our detriment.

White Diamonds "still the best-selling celebrity fragrance of all time."

White Diamonds by Elizabeth Taylor

Elizabeth Taylor's perfume White Diamonds (which I describe here) is: "still the best-selling celebrity fragrance of all time - 20 years after it first launched" according to this article.  I do praise Sarah Jessica Parker's foray into perfumery, but my independent investigation, which involves asking sympathetic perfume ladies in department stores to give me samples, shows that Britney Spears and Jennifer Lopez have nothing on Elizabeth Taylor. Their concoctions are timid and diluted, almost soap-like. Taylor went for the full perfume. One shop assistant described hers as an "old time" perfume when scents were concentrated and strong. But, that makes them sound like some kind of detergent. As Taylor said about creating her last perfume Violet Eyes:

"I love fragrances, and wanted Violet Eyes to make women feel beautiful, sophisticated and sensual. It was a great joy to create Violet Eyes with a bouquet of fragrance notes that I adore, carefully fine tuning every aspect of it."

Elizabeth Taylor: Last Icon of Beauty

White Diamonds for Elizabeth Taylor

Here are the notes for White Diamonds:

Top notes: Aldehydes, bergamot, neroli, orange and lily
Heart notes:  Violet, rose, jasmine, ylang-ylang, Egyptian tuberose and narcissus
Base notes: Oak moss, patchouli, musk, sandalwood and amber

----------------------------------------------------------------

I did a post on Elizabeth Taylor only a month ago. It was mostly about her perfumes, where I wrote:

Her "Diamonds" perfume collection is clearly a labor of love and taste. But, in Taylor's time, celebrities didn't run around in embarrassing outfits confessing all kinds of unmentionable things to callous magazine interviewers who have to take things (gossip and ugliness) up a notch in order to sell their stories. Despite their clearly difficult lives (Elizabeth Taylor was married eight times), there still was an aura of mystique and mystery around these celebrities. This provided them with the shelter to continue with their creative energies. And it gave Taylor room to create her perfumes.

She had been in the news mostly about her readmission into hospital because of her heart. Even for such a trip, she put on her best face and best clothes.

She still had energy to compose one final perfume, Violet Eyes, in 2010, perhaps her most personal.

"I love fragrances, and wanted Violet Eyes to make women feel beautiful, sophisticated and sensual. It was a great joy to create Violet Eyes with a bouquet of fragrance notes that I adore, carefully fine tuning every aspect of it. Everything, down to the last detail, comes from my heart and soul. I send this fragrance into the world with love..." - Elizabeth Taylor -

Elizabeth Taylor: 27 February 1932 – 23 March 2011

Russian Domes by the Eiffel Tower

Russian Orthodox Domes in the Parisian Landscape ¹

Strange and tragic sets of circumstances caused Russia to endure debilitating communism for three quarters of a century. The (short) explanation is that Orthodox Christianity has weaknesses which let through dominating, authoritarian systems. This is part of the reason former Coptic (Eastern Orthodox) Egypt capitulated to Islam. Sections of the former Eastern Orthodox countries in Europe and Anatolia remain Islam after the Muslim invasion which ended by the eighth century (by the fifteenth in Anatolia), but others were able to reclaim their Christian heritage. Orthodox Ethiopia was also temporarily blind-sided by Islam in the 16th century.

Russian culture has given us excellence. The highly disciplined Kirov (now Mariinsky) ballet formed Russia's great dancers Pavlova, Nureyev and Najinsky. The Russian-American icon, Baryshnikov also came from the Kirov discipline. Western music was influenced by Russian composers such as Tchaikovsky, Stravinsky and Scriabin. Painters Kandinsky and Chagall became leaders in Western art once they left Russia. The uniquely Russian art movement Constructivism had some influence in early twentieth century European art. Socialist realism, which grew out of Russian Socialism, found followers in Western Europe. There are too many notable writers to mention, but even popular Western culture is indebted to Boris Pasternak who's novel gave us Dr. Zhivago.

Peter the Great, and later Catherine the Great, tried to culturally unify the sprawling Russian and adjacent lands into an empire, with Christianity at its helm. This again was a manifestation of the empire-enabling Orthodox church's influence. But these rulers also tried to connect Russia with Western culture, avoiding the Far Eastern Chinese and Japanese civilizations, and the slightly closer Islam in the Orient. But eventually, the empire's unmanageable size along with its Orthodox Church's susceptibility to authoritarian regimes (see above) resulted with its capitulation to communism, which really was another form of imperialism. And this was far more authoritarian than anything Russia had seen before, and perhaps far more in line with Islam which the Christian rulers had been assiduously avoiding.

Fortunately, however indecisively, contemporary Communist-free Russia is reforming the cultural, national and religious importance of the Church after decades of state imposed secularism under communism. But, the Church and its believers had never given up on Christianity, and religious ceremonies performed behind hidden doors resumed in the open after the fall of communism, as if uninterrupted by decades of pogroms.

Now France is trying to recreate a little of this Russia in Paris. A Russian Orthodox Church is being built near the Eiffel Tower, close to the Seine on the Quai Branly, steps away from the Esplanade des Invalides (which houses Napoleon Bonaparte tomb), and across the river from the modernist architecture of Palais de Chaillot.

It is not clear why France is building this Russian church besides such recognizable French landmarks, whose round domes are incongruous amidst the elongated spirals of France's Catholic cathedrals and churches. And it goes against France's laïcité laws.

Is it nostalgia for religion? It is safer to bring an alien Christianity from an alien country, as a form of cultural curiosity, rather than to revive the Catholic Church. Or do the French think that Russian church architecture has enough Islamic sensibilities - those onion domes look like the tops of mosques - that it is permissible to erect them in the middle of Paris? But, Russia's Orthodox domes came before Islam. They originated in Byzantine Constantinople, and were elaborations on Roman domes before them. Muslims simply appropriated these domes (without adding any elaborations) from Eastern Christian architecture.

France has been busy building mosques (and even "super" mosques) all over the country for the past few decades, in open contradiction to the laïcité laws established to weaken the Catholic Church. But laïcité applies only to oppressive, racist, exclusive Christianity. This Russian architecture gets the green light because it doesn't look much different, at least to the amateur French eye, from the mosques mushrooming all over the French landscape.

We are seeing, right under our eyes, a once solidly Christian land turning into an Islam sympathizer. Whether the full conversion into a Muslim state will be slow and unconscious, or painful and violent through armed conquest by Muslim armies, is for history to decide. Or, French Catholics will rise and defend their land and religion, setting an example, as they once did, for the rest of us.

------------------------------------
[1] I originally read this story at Gallia Watch, who has a more optimistic outlook.

Self-Authentication

Stella, Joseph
The Skyscrapers, 1920-22
(Cover of John Leonard's book Private Lives in the Imperial City)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------

John Leonard, in his short story "To Dance or Not to Dance" from his 1979 book Private Lives in the Imperial City, writes:

Then came the sixties. In a series of seedy discotheques, to which I went only in the company of Erving Goffman and other dramaturgists, I found that people were dancing without looking at one another. Narcissism was liberating. Energy did not require talent; it was self-authenticating. To be sure, a partner or two complained that a key was needed to unlock my knees, that I lacked soul - but I have always believed, with Descartes, that my soul, if I have one, is in my pineal gland, not in my pelvis or anywhere else south of the tropic of my bellybutton. I could dance, while at the same time maintaining my autonomy, the crux criticorum.
--------------------------------
Private Lives in the Imperial City
"To Dance or Not to Dance" p. 163

I wrote in my blog post Geometry in Pride and Prejudice (I'm reproducing the complete, short post, below):

Jane Austen's novel Pride and Prejudice , also enacted in various movie versions - the 1940 version with Laurence Olivier being a classic - is full of geometry.

During the frequent social dances which bring different families and groups together, dances are a common way for people to interact. Dancers are paired off with diagonally opposite partners, then break loose to join those next to them, and travel down lines with yet another. Partners weave in and out of lines and squares to complete the dance. The music prompts you when to start, stop and change directions and patterns.

Finally, at the very end, like a lovely carpet, all the patterns settle in perfect harmony and geometry. Everyone, and everything, is just where they belong.

Such dances are a microcosm of what happens in society itself. The rules of the game are dictated by subtle meters and melodies, decorum and restraint are required, conversation and interaction with partners and groups are carefully choreographed. And the final outcome is an unobtrusive and polite pairing off of the right couples.

In a short century and a half, social dance (dancing within a group with a specific partner) becomes "self-authenticating" rather than where "groups [and partners] are carefully choreographed" to form a final pattern. Contemporary social dance is like a Jackson Pollock painting of splattered paint. The painting's purpose is to represent the individualized soul of the painter. It is often (always, at least to the uninitiated) incoherent and "patternless." But its purpose is not to relate to others, or even to the world beyond the painting, but to release the energy (idiosyncrasies) coiled within the painter.

I picked up Private Lives in the Imperial City in a second hand bookstore. I had no idea who Leonard was, and still don't know much about him, except that he was an abashed leftist (Wikipedia calls him "an acerbic leftist" and lists one of his activities as "a union organizer for migrant farmers") and a book critic for the New York Times - I'm not sure if the two are related.

Still, subscribing to leftist politics doesn't preclude talent, and I think Leonard had plenty of it. His chapter on dancing is very funny, especially when his "sidekick" refuses to dance during a night out with a group of people, having acquired serious doubts about her dancing abilities. Leonard sympathizes with her insecurity: "I dance like an oil rig myself, all elbows and pumping action." But he believes that such talentless gyrations should be celebrated, unlike his more discerning friend, since they exult the individual, freeing him to fulfill his "self-authentication."

The Majestic Woman

Screen print of a page from Al-Shamikha magazine

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

Muslim women can now read about fashion and Islam in a new magazine Al-Shamikh, translated as "The Majestic Woman." According to England's Daily Mail, Al Qaeda is behind this endeavor:

Al-Qaeda has launched a women's magazine that mixes beauty and fashion tips with advice on suicide bombings...

Dubbed 'Jihad Cosmo', the glossy magazine's front cover features the barrel of a sub-machine gun next to a picture a woman in a veil.

A Canadian and American magazine, Muslim Girl, folded in September 2010 after less than three years of glossy publications. Perhaps a magazine that has both fashion and commentary ambitions cannot really work when part of its fashion features are dedicated to variations of the hijab.

Al-Shamikha is more radical. It doesn't look like there is any attempt to gloss over the coverings that Muslim women are expected to wear. As the Daily Mail explains:

[T]he 'beauty column' instructs women to stay indoors with their faces covered to keep a 'clear complexion'.

They should 'not go out except when necessary' and wear a niqab for 'rewards by complying with the command of Allah Almighty'.

The jihadi nature of Al-Shamikha is explicitly stated, which Muslim Girl never broached so openly. Daily Mail continues:

The first issue's editorial explains that the magazine's goal is to educate women and involve them in the war against the enemies of Islam.

Although the magazine appears to be exclusively in Arabic, and is probably for Middle Eastern Muslim women, Daily Mail's article implies that it can be available for Muslims in non-Muslims countries.

Al-Shamikha's first cover is ideologically driven, unattractive and design-bereft. Muslim Girl at least attempted at some graphic and color cohesion, and many of its covers were aesthetically pleasing. But, the real purpose of Al-Shamikha is not to compete with Vogue and Cosmopolitan, but to provide those Muslim girls other things to think about besides frivolous fashion. This magazine might just last.

Signs of Spring

Photo by KPA

Here are a couple of photos I took.

The first (above) is of a bowl of limes. A guy promoting Corona beers in front of a restaurant pushed a small sac at me (for free) as I was walking by this afternoon. I moved aside and walked on, then I came back seeing the lovely green color, and took it saying: "Just in time for St. Patrick's Day, right?" He didn't know what to say, since that wasn't his purpose, but he agreed anyway. Another guy was wearing a bright green t-shirt. "For St. Patrick's Day?" I asked. He looked confused, then replied he just happened to wear green that day. "Well, you might get the luck of the Irish," I joked. He was too serious.

I continued walking, with my sac of green limes, and finally passed one genuine celebrant, a leprechaun in full regalia, including a green top hat and a fluorescent green jacket lined with black. "Happy St. Patrick's Day!" I said. His answer didn't show any exuberance, perhaps I didn't look Irish enough, but he did reply, "Happy St. Patrick's Day." I spent the rest of the afternoon looking for the bright green color.

Here is the green color explained:

Originally, the colour associated with Saint Patrick was blue. Over the years the colour green and its association with Saint Patrick's day grew. Green ribbons and shamrocks were worn in celebration of St Patrick's Day as early as the 17th century. He is said to have used the shamrock, a three-leaved plant, to explain the Holy Trinity to the pagan Irish, and the wearing and display of shamrocks and shamrock-inspired designs have become a ubiquitous feature of the day. In the 1798 rebellion, in hopes of making a political statement, Irish soldiers wore full green uniforms on 17 March in hopes of catching public attention. The phrase "the wearing of the green", meaning to wear a shamrock on one's clothing, derives from a song of the same name.

I wonder if the green has also something to do with spring? Yes, of course. Green is:

the color of spring, the shamrock, and is connected with hope and nature.

Below is a photo I took many years ago, in New York City. Although I took it in the summer (during a downtown festival - I can't remember what), the buoyant balloons seem to release winter out of our hemisphere, and hopefully soon we will have colorful flowers and warm sunny days, and lots of green.

Photo by KPA
[The street name on the left is "Wall Street." It is much clearer in the print version.]

Ides of March

Soothsayer: Beware the ides of March

Julius Caesar Act 1, scene 2, 15–19

Why Japan?

In my previous post Unleashing the Demons, I wrote that modern technology is allowing us to see unroll, like those giant, glutinous waves, what's going on in Japan. I wrote:

We are seeing a lot of things we are not meant to see in our brave new modern world. We have unleashed many demons. Perhaps it is God's script; that He wants us to see these things. I have been ominous before about the state of our world's affairs. I remain so.

So, I have to ask, why Japan? Biblical disasters, which many people are comparing this to, are preceded by tremendous sin. Even Katrina has been attributed to man's weaknesses by many writers (theologians and non-theologians, priests and laymen alike).

So, this begs the important question which no-one, no pundit or writer, has asked so far: Why Japan?

Screenshot of the latest headlines at Drudge Report

On a related note, a more practical question: Why did Japan build so many nuclear plants on a geography that is so susceptible to earthquakes and tidal waves, which make such plants potentially catastrophic?

Tonight's The Agenda, a current affairs program on Television Ontario (TVO), had on an expert on nuclear energy, Duncan Hawthorne of Bruce Power. Hawthorne said that the plants withstood the earthquake (as they were built to do), but capitulated under the tidal waves. So, in the probability of both a quake and a tidal wave occurring simultaneously, the Japanese plants were unprepared. It is a little worse, though. The chances that a tidal wave would occur after an earthquake of high magnitude are high. An earthquake of high magnitude makes a tidal wave more likely to occur.

This is exactly what happened.

Blacks' Viciousness Coupled with Incompetence

And getting thrown under the bus

Lisa Rinna said "they all threw me under the bus" about her black team-mates
on The Celebrity Apprentice.

Maybe we're getting new imagery and metaphor here. When whites are surreptitiously betrayed by blacks they felt they were close to, they were "thrown under the bus."

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I try not to watch too much pop television, but these days there are enough shows to write a whole PhD thesis on.

Celebrity Apprentice, one of Donald Trump's signature "reality" shows, is the least entertaining, song and music-wise, so I don't usually bother with it. But for some reason, I tuned in this season.

What a revelation this season is.

Two teams are each divided into men and women. Each week, the teams choose their project leaders, who become part team leader, part CEO. Finding the balance can be tricky.

The teams work on assigned projects, and are judged by "professionals". The losing team has to fire a member, usually the project leader.

So far (week two), David Cassidy was eliminated from the men's team on week one. Cassidy wasn't the project leader, whose status went to the sleazy homosexual Richard Hatch, who was imprisoned for tax evasion of money he won at another "reality" show - Survivor. But, Cassidy was no match against Hatch.

And soap opera actress Lisa Rinna who was project leader for the women's team this week was "fired" last night, since her team failed to deliver a winning children's book, the assignment for that week.

There are four black females on the women's team out of a total of eight contestants. They are:

- Dionne Warwick - who knew an older, and one would have thought a wiser, woman, would throw such punches

- La Toya Jackson - her plasticized face looks even worse than Michael Jackson's

- NeNe Leakes - a left over from another reality show, The Real Housewives of Atlanta, and who was evicted from her "mansion"

- Star Jones - fired from The View. She was too much even for that liberal bastion

About Lisa Rinna: she had her lips "botoxed" to a ridiculous size a few years ago. Recently, returning to sanity, she had that procedure reversed, with a somewhat reduced pout. I doubt La Toya Jackson can ever revert to her original, normal state even if she wanted to.

There is one black male on the men's team again out of a total of eight. He is rap music "star" Lil Jon, complete with metal grills - rap "fashion" braces, usually in gold or platinum encrusted with diamonds - on his teeth .

As Lisa Rinna was getting fired, she made a short pitch saying she had never encountered such negativity from women before (with Trump saying "I understand", but "firing" her anyway), and she specifically named Dionne Warwick, La Toya Jackson, Nene Leakes, and Star Jones. Hmm.

Rinna handed over the "creative" parts of writing the story and designing the book to Star Jones and Dionne Warwick. The women's team subsequently lost, and Jones and Warwick attacked Rinna for their loss, saying that she "crumbled under the pressure." Rinna initially agreed. "Yes, I crumbled," she said, to mogul Trump. But fortunately, she still had some spunk left in her when these team players kept the accusations high. "You just threw me under the bus. You wanted me to fail, to get rid of me," were her final words to these "ladies".

It was actually the final product based on Jones's "creativity" and Warwick's "design" that lost the women's team its winning position. Rinna couldn't come out with this at the beginning. I think she felt she was walking on egg shells, trying not to hurt these super-sensitive black women's feelings, or worse, not to appear racist. And it was too late when she regained her spunk. I think she was just in shock at what she was experiencing. She finally let out full steam on her "twitter" page, "Star Jones=Alien Monster," and on radio shows.

And various entertainment news outlets are also reporting that things got "ugly" backstage between Rinna and Jones after the show. And lawyers have gotten involved. Good.

Rinna should be thankful she's out. All the other white contestants concurred with her statements, but were quiet and subdued, at least last night. Some did voice their shock at how Rinna got treated. I don't think they can work peacefully and cooperatively with their black team-members from now on.

What these clueless black women don't understand is that they've made a perfect case for avoidance by whites, employees and acquaintances, in the "real" world. Some shows have already learned this lesson. Case in point: Star Jones, Star Candidate for Barbara Walters's Liberal Love Fest got fired from The View after nine years on the show, and has never completely recovered. A black woman getting fired from The View is history-making! Appearing on Celebrity Apprentice is a definite fall from grace for her; a place where forgotten or discarded television personalities go to try and regain some foothold. But it hardly ever works.

Jones was recently fired from another entertainment show, the second-grade The Insider. Here's the report:

The former View moderator has been ousted from her position as a panelist on the syndicated celebrity newsmagazine after sparring with a show producer over creative differences, according to a new tabloid report. Production insiders say Jones found herself in the middle of a verbal spat with a superior that nearly turned physical and led to the outspoken chatterbox being led out of the studio by security.

Rinna left the Apprentice premises quietly, and I thought with dignity, trumping those women who humiliated her (Donald Trump, take note). She came out the winner in the end.

"Imperial Consciousness"

Allan Wall writes at the View From the Right (Wall has a series of articles on Mexico and immigration at Vdare, and here is his website):

You really got it right when you wrote:

But this is a result of the imperial consciousness I keep talking about. We really think (without putting it explicitly as I am doing here) that America is the only real polity on earth. All other polities are really just incomplete appendages of America, which haven't yet realized their "true" identity and destiny as appendages and members of the one true polity.

A corollary of said consciousness is that, since all other polities are simply "incomplete appendages of America," it follows that all their residents are simply incomplete Americans. Thus we have no right to stop their immigrating to the U.S. to become full-fledged Americans.

So this imperial consciousness, ironically, leads to the emptying out of a particular American identity and the ultimate extinction of America. If everybody's an American, then the term is meaningless.

I came to a similar conclusion, triggered by a 1950s French Bohemian dance skit with Arabic music on Saturday Night Live, that the colonization of France led to French imperialism - bigger than even Napoleon could have imagined, where turning Arabs into Frenchmen became the overriding mission. But Arab Muslims would have none of it. They were not about to give up their culture and religion, but were happy to take what the French had to give.

I wrote, about the SNL skit which cluelessly revels in this one-way "cultural exchange":

SNL is reproducing the French New Wave of the 1950s and 1960s in this act, replete with berets and juke boxes. Yet, Miley gyrates anachronistically to music (1) infused with Arabic rhythm and melody, which had no place in the French popular culture of that era.

But SNL's writers are partly correct. The first of a large wave of Muslim Arabs inundated France in the mid-1950s and 1960s, as French leaders needed their labor to help build up the French economy. This evolved into an acculturation process, to make them as "French" as possible to complete the colonization mission. The ensuing decades saw masses of these North Africans arriving in France even after their economical usefulness had expired. To make matters worse, acculturation didn't work, either in France or back in Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia and elsewhere. Immigrants wanted the comforts and luxuries they could acquire in France, but they were not so willing to give up their culture and religion.

Arab immigration into France started in the 1950s, and continued unabated for several decades. Now, France has to deal with a large and permanent population of virulent, anti-French, anti-Christian, anti-West Arab Muslims, with Mohammed's sword as their guiding hand.

Unleashing the Demons

DÜRER, Albrecht
Dream Vision
1525
Watercolour on paper, 30 x 43 cm
Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna

Above is a milder version of Albrecht Dürer's apocalyptic visions. This is what he writes about his watercolor:

In 1525, during the night between Wednesday and Thursday after Whitsuntide, I had this vision in my sleep, and saw how many great waters fell from heaven. The first struck the ground about four miles away from me with such a terrible force, enormous noise and splashing that it drowned the entire countryside. I was so greatly shocked at this that I awoke before the cloudburst. And the ensuing downpour was huge. Some of the waters fell some distance away and some close by. And they came from such a height that they seemed to fall at an equally slow pace. But the very first water that hit the ground so suddenly had fallen at such velocity, and was accompanied by wind and roaring so frightening, that when I awoke my whole body trembled and I could not recover for a long time. When I arose in the morning, I painted the above as I had seen it. May the Lord turn all things to the best.

From View From the Right:

Warning: you might find this video deeply disturbing. As I was watching it, I felt an anxiety grip my chest, as though at the sight of something outside the order of the world, and I thought, “This is something that human beings are not meant to see, are not designed to see. We are not meant to see our world being torn up from its foundations.” But I was seeing it.

We are seeing a lot of things we are not meant to see in our brave new modern world. We have unleashed many demons. Perhaps it is God's script; that He wants us to see these things. I have been ominous before about the state of our world's affairs. I remain so.

I watched, transfixed, the images of a semi-solid mammoth liquid roll over everything in sight . It was no longer a "wave" by then, having carried with it whatever was in its way, buildings, roads, people.

Sam Solomon Posts

Modern Day Trojan Horse: Al-Hijra, The Islamic Doctrine
of Immigration, Accepting Freedom or Imposing Islam?
By Sam Solomon and E Al Maqdisi (Available at Amazon.com)

Below are my blog posts on Sam Solomon, or that mention his writings:

- How Muslims are Chanaging Our Culture

- Swedish Cartoonist Lars Vilks in Toronto, and Sam Solomon's new book Al Yahud: Eternal Islamic Enmity and the Jews

- The Spiritual Source of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict: Allah vs. God

- Round-up of the Blogs and Misconceptions About Islam

How Muslims are Chanaging Our Culture

Below are my published articles on how Muslims and Islam are changing our culture. I titled my "Islam" blog "Our Changing Landscape" using a painting terminology to show that the roots of our culture are being attacked. It is a clever tactic. Rather than initiate a violent confrontation, Muslims have started their invasion through seemingly benign cultural appropriations and transformations.

For example, the writers at Saturday Night Live blithely use Arabic music to mock French bohemian culture. Yet, France has accepted and incorporated Muslim and Islamic cultural influences into every-day, normal settings, subtly changing French culture and life, and making it more susceptible to violent Muslim incursions, bent on imposing their religion and culture on France. The final goal is of course the Umma.

Here is what Sam Solomon, a former Sharia expert, now a converted Christian, writes about Islamization and the Umma:

The beginning phase of Islamization usually includes activities pivotal to building a physical presence. It consists of public calls to prayer; founding of schools, libraries and research centers; and the teaching of Arabic -- actions that appear to be reasonable and respectable infrastructure requirements necessary to support the presence of a faith. At this point in the Hijra ["immigration designed to subvert and subdue non-Muslim societies and pave the way for eventual, total Islamization"], it is permissible for Muslims to engage in haram, or forbidden actions, out of necessity to establish and empower the umma or Muslim community. Koranic rules such as the prohibition against friendships with infidels are suspended while the objectives of future Islamization are systematically put into place. In its initial phase, the Hijra passes scrutiny by the West whose citizens erroneously view the migration as mainly economic -- a pilgrimage for a better life.

------------------------------------------------------

Articles:

Burqa Prejudice
Frontpage Magazine, 06/15/2010

How Little Mosque on the Prairie Is Aiming at Our Souls
Chronwatch.com, 12/12/2008
American Thinker, 12/13/2008

Stealth Islamic Inroads Into Our Culture
Chronwatch.com, 07/24/2008

French Culture Infused With Arab Culture

Miley Cyrus on Saturday Night Live, as a French
Bohemian who gyrates to Arabic Music

Saturday Night Live often gets it right with accents and idiosyncrasies, but goes its usual leftist direction when it melds politics into its skits. Recent skits featuring Hosni Mubarak are here and here - second link starts at 1:10 point - demonstrate this very well. The Arabic accent and mannerism is very good, as expected, so it is worth watching. Many skits are also over-sexualized - but SNL is an exaggerated version of what happens on regular TV, so that doesn't come as a surprise.

Miley Cyrus was recently on Saturday Night Live. She performs a skit on those bygone French Bohemians, with their romantic/decadent lifestyle, in what looks like the former artists' quarters in Montmartre (on which the basilica Sacré Coeur stands) in the northern region of Paris. Miley and another female are vying for the attention of the same man. SNL is reproducing the French New Wave of the 1950s and 1960s in this act, replete with berets and juke boxes. Yet, Miley gyrates anachronistically to music (1) infused with Arabic rhythm and melody, which had no place in the French popular culture of that era.

But SNL's writers are partly correct. The first of a large wave of Muslim Arabs inundated France in the mid-1950s and 1960s, as French leaders needed their labor to help build up the French economy. This evolved into an acculturation process, to make them as "French" as possible to complete the colonization mission. The ensuing decades saw masses of these North Africans arriving in France even after their economical usefulness had expired. To make matters worse, acculturation didn't work, either in France or back in Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia and elsewhere. Immigrants wanted the comforts and luxuries they could acquire in France, but they were not so willing to give up their culture and religion.

------------------------------------------------

Little Mosque on the Prairie, on Canada's CBC

Stealth Islamic Inroads Into Our Culture
Kidist Paulos Asrat
Chronwatch.com, 07/24/2008

How Little Mosque on the Prairie Is Aiming at Our Souls
Kidist Paulos Asrat
Chronwatch.com, 12/12/2008

Burqa Prejudice
Kidist Paulos Asrat
Frontpage Magazine, 06/15/2010

------------------------------------------------

The following decades displayed a subtle Arabic influence on contemporary French (Parisian) culture, or more precisely, its common culture:

- Kebabs are common street eats, especially in the bohemian Latin Quarter

- The Barbés neighborhood, in the north of Paris (near Sacré Coeur, Montmartre and the famous Moulin Rouge), houses a large number of Arab Muslims

- Whole areas in Barbés are taken up by Muslims, who crouch on the pavements near over-flowing mosques to perform their Friday prayers in the open air, under the nervous presence of police

- It is not unusual to hear Arabic amidst the Parisian French

- There is a distinct Arab-French accent

- Television programs and popular artists combine some element of Arab culture into their acts

SNL is several years behind in detecting the infusion of Arabic culture into French society, but better late than never. We are all in this together. Muslims (and Islam) have an ambitious, Koran-mandated mission for the Ummah, or a world-wide community of Muslims under the Dar-al Islam (the House of Islam). Protesters and resisters are considered to be in Dar-al Harb, or the House of War, and any means, including violent Jihad, will be used to bring them (back) into the Islamic fold.

Seemingly innocuous steps to infuse the mainstream culture with Arabic and Islamic influences are:

- Selling Arabic food in mainstream venues, often following the Islamic dietary law Halal

- Introducing Arabic culture through the popular culture of movies, songs and television

- Muslims changing their attire and appearance - especially women, who are now showing up fully-covered (face included) publicly in the niqab

- I've also recently noticed Muslim men with long beards, dyed red with henna

- Using Arabic script and signs on shops

------------------------------------------------

Halal Restaurant (Halal written in Arabic)
in downtown Toronto

------------------------------------------------

- Requiring special Islamic dietary considerations, i.e. Halal, in public institutions like schools and hospitals

- Mosques ubiquitously appearing in basements and ordinary buildings, with later ambitions of building full-blown mosques using Islamic architecture

SNL is following this prescription, at least in the popular culture category. This fits in perfectly with the peaceful cultural infusion that Muslims are counting on. Muslims really don't have to do anything. They just need to wait, occasionally violently injecting (almost reflexively) their world view, and let society do the rest of the work for them. Until, that is, they feel ready to propagate their own version of the Götterdämmerung, and destroy the world, already weakened by its own foolishness, in order to recreate a new world in the name (and face) of Islam.

------------------------------------------------

Reference:

(1). The song for the SNL skit - "Tekitoi" (T'es qui toi - Who are you?) is by Rachid Taha. Wikipedia says this about Taha:

Rachid Taha...is an Algerian singer. His music is influenced by many different styles such as rock, electronic, punk and raï...

Taha was born in Sig (Mascara Province), Algeria. His father was a factory worker. Taha's family immigrated to France in 1968...

His breakthrough album as a solo artist was Diwân [released in 1998], featuring remakes of songs for the Algerian and Arab traditions...

He covered The Clash song "Rock the Casbah" (in Arabic, as "Rock El Casbah"), which appeared in the 2007 film about Clash frontman Joe Strummer, The Future Is Unwritten...

Based in Paris where he began his solo career after his beginnings as the leader of the French rock band Carte de Séjour [Green Card], he usually sings in Arabic.

"Tekitoi" is a song from the CD of the same name Tekitoi. The CD is released by Wrasse Records, which:

specializes in world music, with artists such as Fela Kuti, Rachid Taha, Ismael Lo, Souad Massi, Angélique Kidjo and Pink Martini.

There is a much longer list of "world music" artists that Wrasse Records represent at the above Wikipedia link. But from the short list above, Souad Massi exemplifies the Algerian/North African diaspora in France, like Taha, which brings with it Arab music and culture and incorporates it into French culture, rather than the other way round.

Also, clearly it is not only the French who have a fascination for these exotic cultures. Wrasse Records (as in reggae's Rastafarians - referring to Ras Teferi?) is a British label and is run (and was founded) by the very British-looking couple Ian and Jo Ashbridge.


Ian and Jo Ashbridge of Wrasse Records

------------------------------------------------

Here is the song track for Rachid Taha's Tekitoi, (music samples at Amazon.com)

1. Tekitoi (Youtube link here for complete song)
2. Rock el Casbah
3. Li Fet Met
4. Hassbouhoum
5. Safi
6. Maftouh
7. Winta
8. Nahseb
9. Dima
10. Mamachi
11. Shuf

Note the incomprehensible Arabic words of all the titles. And there is a big difference between The Clash's "Rock the Casbah" which became

an unofficial anthem for U.S. forces during the first Gulf War, largely on the basis of the line about dropping "bombs between the minarets".

and Taha's interpretation "Rock el Casbah" where he is voicing his gripe at his failed Algerian government, cleverly using a Punk Rock song. Perhaps he was simply using the song to help sell his CD.

Onward!

King George VI after delivering his speech on
September 3, 1939, after Britain's declaration of war
against Germany.
[Photograph: Hulton-Deutsch Collection/Corbis]


"If I am to be King...where is my
power? May I form a Government,
levy a tax or declare a war? No!
Yet I am the seat of all authority.
Why? Because the Nation believes
when I speak, I speak for them. Yet
I cannot speak!"


"Through his broadcasts, George VI
became a symbol of national resistance."


"Onward!"

I took notes (in the dark) while watching The King's Speech. I had already seen the movie once, and came prepared with pen and paper (actually, a notebook) to write down quotes, impressions, dialogs, scenes, set design, etc. I especially tried to link image with dialog, and with sound - there is a subtle, delicate, link between sound (mostly music) and image. At the end credits, my recognition of the sound's quality was rewarded when I learned that Alexandre Desplat composed original music for the film. I had already encountered Desplat's music for Roman Polanski's 2010 film The Ghost Writer, and how well it connected with the images.

I thought it would be interesting to reproduce these notes on my blog, to provide some insight on the film's construction, at least working backwards from the finished product.

Below are the notes, more-or-less in chronological order.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


- King's speech in front of crowd at the Empire Exhibition in Wembley
- Stuttering - drops of notes, jarring violins (like horror film - anticipation?)
- Echo of stutter
-------------------------------


- A doctor gives King George marbles as an Ancient Greek cure for stuttering
-------------------------------


- Foggy in London
- Music more melodious - Queen Elizabeth going to Harley Street therapist
-------------------------------


- Queen Elizabeth visiting speech therapist (Dr. Logue) anonymously
- Describes the King position as "indentured servitude"
-------------------------------


- Logue on a stage, rehearsing "Now is the winter of our discontent" as Richard III, a deformed creature yearning to be King
-------------------------------


- London, exterior scenes - music is melodious
-------------------------------


- Young Princesses Elizabeth and Margaret in play room - King doesn't stutter while playing with them
- Corgi dogs
-------------------------------


- Johnson: King George's name during WWI to detract the enemy
-------------------------------


-Wall in Logue's office - stripped wallpaper
-------------------------------


- King George reads "To be or not to be"
- Beethoven in speakers/headphones - Logue gets him to read with headphones on
- "Simple mechanics" tongue twister - "I am a thistle-sifter..."
- Clumsy Freudian psychology - "mother"/"father"
-------------------------------


- Deathbed of father - music solemn, violins, minor key
-------------------------------


- Logue's office
- "Try singing it" - to avoid stuttering
- "Continuous sound will give you flow"
-------------------------------


- Music - Childhood memories - violins, piano notes
- Abusive nanny
-------------------------------


- Talking of brother - epileptic, retarded
- Music melancholic
-------------------------------


- Balmoral Castle, in Scotland
- To visit Edward and Mrs. Simpson
- Piano - melodic
- Brothers in Scotland
- 1930s dance music background
-------------------------------


- Choosing name as King - Albert to George
- With Churchill
-------------------------------


- Edward's radio broadcast - solemn music
- "Discharge my duty...succeeded by my brother"
-------------------------------


- Logue's home - Art-Deco wallpaper, fan/scale/, triangle and half circle
(below, I have drawn diagram of design):


- Meeting of doctor's wife and Queen
-------------------------------


- View of West Minister Abbey from above, then King is in the frame
- Solemn music
-------------------------------


- Real footage of coronation
- Hitler's speech
- Resignation of PM - "wrong about Hitler"
-------------------------------


- The King's speech
- "Because the Nation believes when I speak, I speak for them. Yet I cannot speak!"
- "Onward!"
-------------------------------


- Beethoven - Speech length of music
- "Conducted" by Logue
- Musical
-------------------------------


- At final credits:
"Through his broadcasts, George VI became a symbol of national
resistance."

Alexandre Desplat's Music for The King's Speech

King George VI after delivering his speech on
September 3, 1939, after Britain's declaration of war
against Germany.
[Photograph: Hulton-Deutsch Collection/Corbis]

Alexandre Desplat wrote the music for the multiple Oscar-winning The King's Speech. His contribution to the film didn't win an Oscar, and instead the prize for Best Original Score went to the less deserving The Social Network.

Desplat wrote the score for Roman Polanski's 2010 The Ghost Writer, which I reviewed here. Below is what I wrote about the sound and music in the film, where I compare Desplat to Bernard Herrmann, who composed the music for many of Alfred Hitchcock's films:

Desplat’s composition for The Ghost Writer skillfully integrates sound with images by introducing themes, accentuating suspense, and exposing emotions as varied as romance and fear...Desplat, who worked closely with the film footage, incorporates many ambient sounds like car horns and clanking iron into his score. Desplat uses this as his resounding motif, producing a melodic sequence that uses the rise and fall of the foghorn’s moans to accentuate the sense of danger.

It is hard not to compare Desplat with Alfred Hitchcock’s prized composer Bernard Herrmann. In Vertigo, Herrmann incorporates a foghorn’s call for danger in his score. Madeleine’s theme song in Vertigo is reciprocated in Desplat’s musical sketch of Lang’s unhappy wife in “The Truth about Ruth.” This composition, at times romantic, at times melancholic, shows us more of Ruth than she herself is willing. Lang also has his own theme song, “Lang’s Memoirs,” which is played at discrete moments when McGregor watches Lang expose his true nature. The soundtrack ironically seem more truthful and authentic than the images, as Hitchcock also frequently showed in his films.

The sound in The King's Speech is less ambitious than in The Ghost Writer. Perhaps Desplat didn't want to detract too much from the images. Although there are motifs that run through the film that musically define characters and scenes for us, they are less pronounced than in The Ghost Writer. I get the feeling that Desplat may have been given less leeway with is craft, and toned down his creativity. But ultimately his signature style is there, and he skillfully combines music (less sound here) and image to give us a sensitive portrait of the stuttering King.

Unlike many soundtracks (and music for film) Desplat's scores stand on their own, and can be listened to separate from the films. His minimalist, delicate (often piano) notes, verging a little on the sentimental, have enough interesting variations to fill a CD.

The King Speech is a well-made film. That sound is an integral part to the film is a testament to its craft. The story is one of redemption, brought about by strength and hard work, the real way, and not through some magical fortuity. King George's speech therapist who coaches him and guides him, tells him, "You have such perseverance, Bertie, you're the bravest man I know."

And the King doesn't disappoint, or falter. At the moment of reckoning, when the whole of England was depending on him, he delivers his radio speech, in a padded room behind a giant microphone, and tells the British people:

We have been forced into a conflict, for we are called, with our allies, to meet the challenge of a principle which, if it were to prevail, would be fatal to any civilized order in the world...

The task will be hard. There may be dark days ahead, and war can no longer be confined to the battlefield, but we can only do the right as we see the right, and reverently commit our cause to God. If one and all we keep resolutely faithful to it, ready for whatever service or sacrifice it may demand, then with God's help, we shall prevail.

Below is the complete speech (and here is a recording):

In this grave hour, perhaps the most fateful in our history, I send to every household of my peoples, both at home and overseas, this message, spoken with the same depth of feeling for each one of you as if I were able to cross your threshold and speak to you myself.

For the second time in the lives of most of us, we are at war.

Over and over again, we have tried to find a peaceful way out of the differences between ourselves and those who are now our enemies; but it has been in vain.

We have been forced into a conflict, for we are called, with our allies, to meet the challenge of a principle which, if it were to prevail, would be fatal to any civilized order in the world.

It is a principle which permits a state, in the selfish pursuit of power, to disregard its treaties and its solemn pledges, which sanctions the use of force or threat of force against the sovereignty and independence of other states.

Such a principle, stripped of all disguise, is surely the mere primitive doctrine that might is right, and if this principle were established through the world, the freedom of our own country and of the whole British Commonwealth of nations would be in danger.

But far more than this, the peoples of the world would be kept in bondage of fear, and all hopes of settled peace and of the security, of justice and liberty, among nations, would be ended.

This is the ultimate issue which confronts us. For the sake of all that we ourselves hold dear, and of the world order and peace, it is unthinkable that we should refuse to meet the challenge.

It is to this high purpose that I now call my people at home, and my peoples across the seas, who will make our cause their own.

I ask them to stand calm and firm and united in this time of trial.

The task will be hard. There may be dark days ahead, and war can no longer be confined to the battlefield, but we can only do the right as we see the right, and reverently commit our cause to God. If one and all we keep resolutely faithful to it, ready for whatever service or sacrifice it may demand, then with God's help, we shall prevail.

May He bless and keep us all.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------

Blog posts at Camera Lucida on film and music:

- Truth and Fiction in Polanski's The Ghost Writer
- As Time Goes By
- When the Moon Hits Your Eye
- Yes Sir, That's My Baby
- Country Strong?
- Blues at The Cotton Club
- Music from You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger
- Gabriel Yared's Soundtrack
- Fellini and Music
- Australia: Whose Land is it Anyway?

Chagall's Bouquets

In anticipation of Spring