Amidst Summer 2017. A Strange Weighing of Value

"Αν κάποιος παράξενος των αξιών ζυγιαστής με πειθανάγκαζε να διαλέξω αποκλειστικά μεταξύ Παπαδιαμάντη και Καρκαβίτσα θα έστεκα ευλαβικά μπροστά στον πρώτο, θα του φιλούσα το χέρι και θα ψήφιζα τον δεύτερο."
                                                                                                                              Κωστής Παλαμάς

There has not been that much time available for literature in this summer, but after reading and discussing some Karkavitsas (Τα Λόγια της Πλώρης) we cannot but disagree with Palamas' words, our poet who has been sensitive and always hitting the mark in his analyses of other poets. We would do it the other way round: if compelled to choose, we would kiss Karkavitsas' hand, show gratitude to him for his fairy stories and his dreamingly embellished language, turning a deaf ear to his naive nationalism, so characteristic of the end of the 19th century in Greece, and vote for Papadiamantis.

How new London seems to be, or, rather, how delighted I am to discover new corners in it after coming back home. A spirit of discovery and adventure moves my dreams when asleep and my feet when awake: the adventure of feeling at home. How did this perspective emerge?

Pleasure and hedonism is the nutritious meal served on the plate for work for the time being, accompanied by some stimulating comments made by a referee who invites me to think together two aspects I tried to keep separated. So my lacks are being filled. Finally and only one step before despair for culture in the part of the world we live in, a friend and cinephil started screening masterpieces in the small cinema he has created. I had not watched Kurosawa's Seven Samurai. Nor Murnau's Sunrise. Each and every scene in the latter I wished to interrupt and point to it: ὅδε ὁ κόσμος. I did not notice how time passed in the former; I wanted it to continue and wished to watch all his films in a row and without intermission: starting with The Men Who Tread on the Tiger's Tail (like Noh theater, with the addition of the Shakespeare's fool, marching through Japanese landscape: the only type of nationalism that my taste embraces), moving to his Ikiru... Masters of beauty may lead the way; philosophers and non-philosophers.

Remnants of three Ionian windmills
I must discover Canada's spectacular nature, but I always postpone because of spending my leisure swimming in the Greek sea. The lovely loners, the polar bears of Churchill and other places, will have to wait.

No nature for now. Just work and culture. No Wagner at the COC this year, so no risk. I subscribed.