Svengali

A Svengali is "a person who manipulates or exerts excessive control over another." Curious about the history of this intriguing and rather unusual word, I looked it up and learned that Svengali was a character  in the novel Trilby by George Du Maurier (published 1894). Subsequently the novel was made into several stage plays and movies. The dictionary explains:

I read the Oxford World's Classics edition, which
is unabridged and highly annotated.

"Svengali's maleficent powers of persuasion made such an impression on the reading public that by 1919 his name was being used generically as a term for any wickedly manipulative individual." (Merriam-Webster definition)

Curious about the origin of this intriguing word, I decided to read the novel. What I did not expect: Du Maurier's creation Svengali is a casually antisemitic portrayal of an Eastern European Jew, with a stereotyped appearance, problematic personality, strong accent in both English and French, and lack of humanity. These hateful features were typical of antisemitic writings of the late 19th century, and you may recognize them because they are being reactivated by modern violent white supremacists in our society right now.

I found it very painful to read this book. It was agonizingly familiar to see such descriptions as they were over a century ago and as they are returning to public discourse now. In fact, I regretted deciding to read it. However, because I have done so, I feel that I should look carefully at these stereotypes. First, there's the appearance of Svengali:

"He was very shabby and dirty, and wore a red beret and a large velveteen cloak, with a big metal clasp at the collar. His thick, heavy, languid, lustreless black hair fell down behind his ears to his shoulders, in that musician-like way that is so offensive to the normal Englishman. He had bold, brilliant black eyes, with long heavy lids, a thin, sallow face, and a beard of burnt-up black, which grew almost from under his eyelids; and over it his moustache, a shade lighter, fell in two long spiral twists." (p. 11).

His face and his attitude both bore out these stereotypes: "He was so fond of making fun of others that he particularly resented being made fun of himself— couldn’t endure that any one should ever have the laugh of him." (p. 19). Not to mention his "long, thick, shapely Hebrew nose" (p. 240) and "bold, black, beady Jew’s eyes." (p. 44).

And his devious and disgusting ways: "And here let me say that these vicious imaginations of Svengali’s, which look so tame in English print, sounded much more ghastly in French, pronounced with a Hebrew-German accent, and uttered in his hoarse, rasping, nasal, throaty rook’s caw, his big yellow teeth baring themselves in a mongrel canine snarl, his heavy upper eyelids drooping over his insolent black eyes." (p. 92).

Poster for 1931 film with John
Barrymore. Svengali's features were
left intact, but he wasn't directly
identified as a Jew.

Many features of the character Svengali, especially his skill in manipulating the innocent Trilby, heroine of the novel, were already commonplace racial slurs in the 1890s and have never gone away. By association, Jews were under attack at the time: two notable contemporary events were the Dreyfus affair in France (1894-1906) and the rise of the antisemite Christian Democrats under leader Karl Lueger in Vienna during that decade. Pushback was also beginning, for example the novel Children of the Ghetto by Isidore Zangwill (1892-93) and The Jewish State by Theodore Hertzl (published 1895), but it didn't stop the haters. Antisemitism in word and deed inspired Hitler who was born in 1889 and very much partook of the hatred of Jews expressed in word and deed during the late 19th century.

This post is taken from my food blog, and at this point in my more general review, I discussed the chapters of the novel Trilby that deal with other characters than Svengali, which in fact were far more than half the book. Here, I'm repeating this excerpt, with the additional remark that several other characters in literature have also contributed antisemitic stereotypes, notably Fagin from Dickens' Oliver Twist and Shakespeare's Shylock from The Merchant of Venice. Dickens later regretted the antisemitism embodied in Fagin, and created a more sympathetic Jewish character (though less effective) that attempted to make amends. I don't thing that Du Maurier ever regretted his creation of Svengali. And no one knows any of Shakespeare's thoughts.

Trilby is a very weak novel compared to works of other authors who wrote about society and social issues in the 19th century; for example, Zola, George Eliot, and Dickens. It's quite understandable that Trilby has pretty much been forgotten, except for the character Svengali. The antisemitism in the novel is even more painful when you consider how Du Maurier didn't really take anything seriously, not the characters, not the hateful attitudes, and not the mistreatment of little Trilby.

NOTE: A few interesting articles about the impact of the character Svengali, especially from the point of view of antisemitism.

• Review of 1931 movie: "John Barrymore does forgotten Villain Svengali Proud"
• Recent uses of word Svengali: "How Svengali Lost His Jewish Accent"
• Cultural history of Svengali: "Svengali: The Master Manipulator"

This blog post copyright © Mae Sander for maefood dot blogspot dot com
and for hero-or-antihero.blogspot.com

I Have No Words for Saturday's Massacre

From the New York Times

Four Freedoms

Franklin Delano Roosevelt's January, 1941, State of the Union Address is known for his vision of a better world. He wrote:

"In the future days, which we seek to make secure, we look forward to a world founded upon four essential human freedoms."

How well have we done on accomplishing this in the 76 years since Roosevelt read this text to Congress? Well, the biggest threat to freedom of any kind in 1941 was the Nazi regime in Germany, which was of course defeated with great sacrifice. After the war, Americans committed to a process of honest striving to create a world like Roosevelt envisioned. But these freedoms were never really delivered worldwide.

Norman Rockwell's famous depiction of the Four Freedoms motivated the War Bond campaign in World War II. (Wikipedia)

Today, in 2017, these freedoms are seriously threatened for at least some people who live in America. Specifically, Roosevelt said:

"The first is freedom of speech and expression -- everywhere in the world."

Currently, freedom of speech is threatened for nearly everyone by many new laws that criminalize protest, and by a variety attacks on the press.

"The second is freedom of every person to worship God in his own way -- everywhere in the world."

In recent years, freedom of worship in our country has been limited more and more to Christians. Our executive branch has announced its policy to persecute Muslims, including Muslim Americans. Our President employs in high positions supporters/inciters of terrorists and vandals who burn mosques, paint swastikas on Jewish institutions, destroy Jewish cemeteries, and bully minorities. Official concern for a vision of worldwide freedom of worship has often been reduced to concern for Christian minorities in non-Christian countries.

Further, in the US, this freedom has been corrupted by changing the term from "worship" to "religion" and then extending this "freedom" to the freedom to deny other people rights because they supposedly conflict with someone's religion. Court decisions have upheld the "right" of corporations to violate anti-discrimination laws because of the corporate owners' claimed religious objections.

"The third is freedom from want, which, translated into world terms, means economic understandings which will secure to every nation a healthy peacetime life for its inhabitants -- everywhere in the world."

Freedom from want was never fully accomplished, but many government programs in the last 75 years have been enacted to feed the hungry, provide medical care for the needy, and provide shelter for the homeless. All these programs are now on the chopping block.

"The fourth is freedom from fear, which, translated into world terms, means a world-wide reduction of armaments to such a point and in such a thorough fashion that no nation will be in a position to commit an act of physical aggression against any neighbor -- anywhere in the world."

Freedom from fear is being cancelled in America today for gay people, black people, brown people, immigrants in many minority groups, transsexuals (especially school children), Muslims, Jews, and political dissidents. Our highest leaders encourage mobs to chant threats, look the other way when police are brutal, and make excuses for vandals and terrorists who burn mosques etc. The first federal agencies to be enlisted are the Department of Homeland Security and the INS, with imprisonment of people in airports, raids on homes of immigrants, and direct targeting even of citizens with many generations of ancestors who are American citizens (like Mohammed Ali's son).

Rising militarism and isolationism, along with growing bigotry, is another potential source of fear in American society, as is the looming disaster of rising oceans, terrible storms, and other effects of climate change -- all denied by our leaders.

Roosevelt summed up his hope, which I wish was still our collective hope:

"That is no vision of a distant millennium. It is a definite basis for a kind of world attainable in our own time and generation. That kind of world is the very antithesis of the so-called 'new order' of tyranny which the dictators seek to create with the crash of a bomb."

Roosevelt's speech: http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/fdrthefourfreedoms.htm

The Hate Crime Act as a Crutch for Bigots

The Hate Crime Act is very specific about the evidence needed to accuse and convict an arsonist, a shooter, a stabber, or a vandal under its definitions and terms. This is a perfectly reasonable way for American law to function. However, the result is that the “false flag” argument about crimes against Jewish, Black, or Moslem individuals and institutions are being supported.*

Here are some examples:

• A teenager has been accused of setting a fire to a Mosque in Pittsfield Township, Michigan, but the authorities say they don’t have enough evidence to charge him with a hate crime. The fact that a climate of Islamophobia and hatred for Muslims probably influenced this individual to choose the mosque as his target is important in understanding what’s happening, but the haters on the right claim that the lack of evidence for the specific legal charge means this was a “false flag” – and that it proves something about liberals who discuss the climate of hatred.
• Over 100 bomb threats to Jewish Community Centers – which mainly serve as schools and daycare centers – are interpreted as part of an antisemitic climate and probably as a campaign to create a climate of fear among Jewish people whose children are regularly threatened. Only one person, who made 8 of the calls, has been caught, and his motive was to frame his girlfriend – so it’s not legally a hate crime. Though his choice of actions clearly reflected the antisemitic climate, and was undoubtedly a way for him to magnify the attention he received, the haters interpret this as another example of exaggeration by Jews and others who classify it with antisemitic attacks. Just a “false flag,” another example of Jews exaggerating, they say.
• When police investigating vandalism at Jewish cemeteries said they didn’t know if it was a hate crime, right-wing haters thus dismissed all discussion of the antisemitic atmosphere that clearly inspired the vandals. This dismissal goes to the highest levels of our government.
• For years, police who shoot black teenagers or other black people have been defended by people who say they are justified, and blame the victims. A lot has been written about this, I won’t try to elaborate.

A quote:

"Anti-Semitism doesn’t require individuals who participate in it to hate Jews, or even to care about Jews. Anti-Semitism is a way to structure hate and violence. Once the structure is in place, anyone can participate, whether they are personally invested or not. Prejudice doesn’t require intent. You don’t have to hate Jews to commit anti-Semitic acts." (source: "GamerGate Can Teach Us About Anti-Semitic Attacks" by Noah Berlatsky, March 9, 2017.)

*Note: A “false flag” is a seeming hate crime or act of prejudice whose perpetrator in reality is not motivated by bigotry, and in some cases is said to belong to the attacked group. This hypothetical perpetrator or provacateur acts to obtain sympathy or other advantage for the group. Attacks on minority individuals or institutions (like mosques, Black churches, or Jewish cemeteries) are thus classified as random, “ordinary” crimes, and thus of no importance. The “alt right,” which is now in charge of parts of the US government, has been using the “false flag” accusation for quite a while to dismiss efforts to identify and oppose organized bigotry.

             

Interesting insights into current antisemitism and other bigotry

"The person, or people, responsible for the bomb threats against Jewish Community Centers plan to frighten Jewish people. They also want to make terrorizing Jewish people into a normal, everyday occurrence. Harassment campaigns work in part to lower the barrier for entry to hate. 

"That’s part of why President Trump’s suggestion that the threats were hoaxes intended to damage him proved so dangerous. If the threats are just a hoax, why not prove they’re a hoax by calling in a hoax threat yourself? If hate isn’t serious, people who aren’t serious about hate can participate too."

Vandalized Jewish cemetery in University City, Mo.
where my mother, grandparents, and many other relatives
are buried. But it's not just personal!

This insight into antisemitism seems very useful to me. I am deeply troubled by the recent and rapid spread of antisemitism and bigotry -- as of course are many other Americans. The clear encouragement of such attitudes by the current administration is even more troubling. The article  "GamerGate Can Teach Us About Anti-Semitic Attacks" byNoah Berlatsky, from which this quote is taken, offers a number of insights into what's most problematic:

"Anti-Semitism doesn’t require individuals who participate in it to hate Jews, or even to care about Jews. Anti-Semitism is a way to structure hate and violence. Once the structure is in place, anyone can participate, whether they are personally invested or not. Prejudice doesn’t require intent. You don’t have to hate Jews to commit anti-Semitic acts."

Police investigating a bomb threat at the Jewish Community Center in
Ann Arbor where I live. But it's not just personal!

Great Falls in Solidarity with Whitefish, Montana

In the last few days the Great Falls, Montana, City Commission and Montana's governor, state attorney general, US representative, and senators have all announced that they stand in solidarity with the town of Whitefish, which was threatened by white nationalists. A march against the Jewish community of Whitefish by neo-Nazis was announced for Martin Luther King Day, but as of now the march may not actually take place.

Commissioners read a proclamation January 3 that was met with resounding applause from meeting attendees. The proclamation stated that the commissioners "express our solidarity with our brothers and sisters in the ongoing struggle to free this world of the ideas and conduct that served to undermine a free and virtuous society, and to those who would promote these false ideas long since rejected by civilized peoples, we say and I use the words as they are spoken in Hebrew…never again." The commissioners cited George Washington's letter to the Jews of Newport, Rhode Island promising religious freedom in the newly founded country. (source1, source2: Radio Station KPAX Missoula, and Tablet Magazine.)

Here is the full statement from state officials via KPAX:

December 27, 2016

Dear Fellow Americans,

As we close out this year and look toward the future, we as Montana’s elected leaders are focused on the values that reflect our true character. Therefore, we condemn attacks on our religious freedom manifesting in a group of anti-Semites. We stand firmly together to send a clear message that ignorance, hatred and threats of violence are unacceptable and have no place in the town of Whitefish, or in any other community in Montana or across this nation. We say to those few who seek to publicize anti-Semitic views that they shall find no safe haven here.

We offer our full support to the Jewish community, Montana families, businesses, faith organizations and law enforcement officers as they ensure the security of all our communities. We will address these threats directly and forcefully, putting our political differences aside to stand up for what's right. That's the Montana way, and the American way.

Rest assured, any demonstration or threat of intimidation against any Montanan’s religious liberty will not be tolerated. It takes all Montanans working together to eradicate religious intolerance.

We are encouraged that so many Montanans from a variety of religious backgrounds have joined us in condemning this extreme ideology.

God bless the great state of Montana and the United States of America.

U.S. Senator Jon Tester

U.S. Senator Steve Daines

U.S. Representative Ryan Zinke

Governor Steve Bullock

Attorney General Tim Fox

“Innovate Against Hate” Prize

Between now and February 17, 2017, the Anti-Defamation League is looking for applicants for a $35,000 prize titled "Innovate Against Hate," according to a press release dated January 5.

The prize "will be awarded to nonprofit organizations or individuals such as programmers, students, academics, journalists, artists and social entrepreneurs who devise new approaches to uncovering and countering anti-Semitism and other forms of online hate speech." (source)

Here's the list of types of projects this contest is looking for:

• "Develop positive, constructive efforts to understand, expose and undermine some form of online hate, such as harassment, extremism or cyberbullying;
• "Educate diverse audiences about the contours and dangers of hate online, particularly those that chill the ability or willingness of people to use social media;
• "Build awareness of existing tools available on various social media platforms to tackle hate and encourage not only their active use, but also ways to improve them;
• "Encourage counterspeech initiatives that bring Jewish and other ethnic and religious communities together to speak out against and overwhelm hate speech online."

The Anti-Defamation League has been active since 1913. According to their website, it is "the world's leading organization fighting anti-Semitism through programs and services that counteract hatred, prejudice and bigotry." Co-sponsor of the contest is The Natan Fund. The application form and instructions are HERE.

2016 Wrap-Up and Looking towards 2017

First, I wish all my readers a Happy New Year, and as much hope as possible for the coming year, though some aspects of the future do now seem awfully dark!

At the beginning of 2016, this blog was nearly dormant. I started it as an exploration of "heroes" and "antiheroes" for secular Jews like myself, and I wrote mini-biographies of a few hundred figures from many cultures and many eras, as well as some general cultural thoughts.

"Judaism provides a code of ethical conduct," I wrote in 2010 when I started this blog. "Many secular Jews feel they’ve left all the belief, rituals, and taboos behind but kept the moral code." I continued: "Some of the heroes of secular Judaism aren’t Jewish. For example, Abbe Gregoire, active during the French Revolution, was instrumental in freeing European Jews from discrimination by defining them as human. Buddha and Martin Luther King are heroes to many secular Jews. Their lives have meaning or they are recognized heroes of secular Jews. Conversely, there are lots of anti-heroes: individuals who are intensely not-respected by most if not all secular Jews."

Unfortunately the idea of a hero has become all-too-relevant under the coming administration. Soon after the November election, I started finding new heroes to write about, not so much from the secular Jewish viewpoint, but from the viewpoint that alas, we might need a few heroes to avoid normalizing the coming disaster and directly or indirectly supporting destruction of valued institutions, disruption of efforts to rescue the environment, terrible bigotry including antisemitism, and persecution of minorities. I've been blogging this theme regularly, and feel sure I'll continue to find new material for posts in the new year.

 

To reflect my new approach to writing about heroes, I have adopted a new motto for my blog:

"Unhappy is the land that needs a hero." -- a quote from Bertolt Brecht.

Brecht, of course, reminds me of the lurking parallel between our time and his youth in Germany, where a beautiful era of freedom for the arts and music became a nightmare. I'm trying to avoid overdoing these parallels, and to keep my focus on the here and now and our own heroic potential.

"Normalized bigotry emboldens further bigotry"

Here's the conclusion of a very insightful article from Slate about the way it's easy to confuse satiric stories on the internet with malicious articles on the same subject:

"Regardless of anyone’s self-satisfied “don’t blame me, I was just X-ing,” all actions online have consequences—at least the potential for consequences, intended or otherwise. So for god’s sake, take your own words seriously."

The article, "The Internet Law That Explains Why 2016 Was So Terrible" by Whitney Phillips and Ryan M. Milner begins by citing "Poe's Law" which states that "online, sincere expressions of extremism are often indistinguishable from satirical expressions of extremism." Sometimes, the confusion is even intentional -- and manipulative. I've been very bothered by this exact issue.

The most bothersome example is the claim of some alt-right provocateurs who say they are "just trolling" and that their extremist statements are not somehow serious -- even though they give rise to bigotry, violence, and dangerous laxness about acceptable political speech. The authors state:

"The rise of the so-called alt-right—a loose amalgamation of white nationalists, misogynists, anti-Semites, and Islamophobes—provides a more sobering example of Poe’s law. White nationalist sentiments have metastasized into unequivocal expressions of hate in the wake of Trump’s electoral victory, but in the early days of the group, it was harder to tell. Participants even provided Poe’s law justifications when describing their behavior. A March 2016 Breitbart piece claimed the racism espoused by the 'young meme brigades' swarming 4chan, Reddit, and Twitter was ironic play, nothing more, deployed solely to shock the 'older generations' that encountered it. According to Breitbart, those propagating hate were no more genuinely bigoted than 1980s heavy metal fans genuinely worshiped Satan. The implication: First of all, shut up, everyone is overreacting, and simultaneously, do keep talking about us, because overreaction is precisely what we’re going for."

In other words, they want to have it both ways -- pretending their extremism is just a pose taken to goad people. But actually inspiring belief in the pretend bigotry to the point that gullible people act on the extremist views. Maybe the now-well-known story about child sex-slaves in the basement of a neighborhood pizza place in D.C. began as a joke (or "just trolling") but a weak-brained man with a real assault rifle showed up and started shooting.

The following paragraph from the Slate article summarizes what I've been worrying about without myself being able to frame it so well:

"Perhaps the best illustration of this tension is Pepe the Frog, the anti-Semitic cartoon mascot of 'hipster Nazi' white nationalism. The meme was ostensibly harnessed in an effort to create 'meme magic' through pro-Trump 'shitposting' (that is, to ensure a Trump victory by dredging up as much chaos and confusion as possible). But it communicated a very clear white supremacist message. The entire point was for it to be taken seriously as a hate symbol, even if the posters were, as they insisted, 'just trolling'—a distinction we argue is ultimately irrelevant, since regardless of motivations, such messages communicate, amplify, and normalize bigotry. And normalized bigotry emboldens further bigotry, as Trump’s electoral victory has made painfully clear." (My emphasis.)

Supposedly, Facebook is going to crack down on fake news. I wonder how this challenge of fake fake news will be handled.

Are We White?

The Atlantic online is running two articles by Emma Green:

• Are Jews White -- published yesterday.
• Jews and the Social Construction of Race, -- a response to people who didn't like the headline of the first article.

Both are full of excellent observations of modern society, the particular situation of Jews at this moment of increased antisemitism, and historical material. The author explores just where American Jews have stood as a particular type of minority and how they have progressed from a truly marginal status to a much more mainstream position where Jews hold power -- power that's usually reserved for "white" people. From Are Jews White:

Over time, though, they assimilated. Just like other white people, they fled to the suburbs. They took advantage of educational opportunities like the G.I. bill. They became middle class. “They thought they were becoming white,” said Lewis Gordon, a professor of philosophy at the University of Connecticut. “Many of them stopped speaking Yiddish. Many of them stopped going to synagogue. Many of them stopped wearing the accoutrements of Jewishness.”

Jews think about questions of race in their own lives with incredible diversity. There are many different kinds of Jews: Orthodox, secular, Reform; Jews by birth, Jews by choice, Jews by conversion. Some Jews who aren’t particularly religious may identify as white, but others may feel that their Jewishness is specifically linked to their ethnic inheritance. “If you’re a secular Jew, how are you a Jew? It has to be through your cultural or ethnic identity,” said Gordon. “Whereas if you’re a religious Jew, you would argue that you’re a Jew primarily through your religious practices.” As Jews assimilated into American culture, “ironically, investment in religiosity paved the way for greater white identification of many Jews,” he said, allowing more religiously observant Jews to think of themselves as white, rather than ethnically Jewish.

Both articles are worth reading, and I can't begin to summarize their many insights.

We Live in a Dystopia

A fictional dystopia is a frightening place. Some authors or script-writers have depicted dystopian societies with little or no government -- thus, chaos or control by opportunists or thugs. Other authors envision totalitarian nightmares. Leaders with evocative personalities are often part of these chilling environments. Strange technologies may disrupt normal behavior of the residents; some dystopian fiction is outright sci-fi. Lies supplant truth in many dystopias, and challenge the equilibrium of the characters. Imagined dystopian life often includes an abnormal or overwhelming setting, with too much to look at and nothing to make sense of.

Recently, American life that I see in the newspapers -- and I mean the mainstream press -- is all too much like a fictional dystopia. Here are some examples.

The Ghost Ship

A room in the Ghost Ship: "The Oakland warehouse and
art collective was full of collectibles, instruments and
art projects that had been amassed over its existence
from across the world." -- Rolling Stone.

We learned Sunday of a dreamscape of antique and junk furniture, exotic ethnic artworks, new artworks in progress, artists and musicians creating visionary projects including concerts. The labyrinthine network of artist studios and performance spaces in a former warehouse in Oakland, California, was called "The Ghost Ship." A strange and troubling man was the impresario and creator, and collected money from the residents and concert-goers.

It must have been beautiful. Rolling Stone reports: "Artists lived in the warehouse and built lofts that existed between the first and second floors. Partitions between the lofts were made of pallets, two-by-fours and other types of wood while all the floors were covered in carpet." (source)

But people knew there were problems, according to CNN:

"On November 13, the city received complaints of blight and unpermitted interior construction at the building and sent an investigator to the property on November 17. The inspector verified the blight complaint but could not gain access to the building to confirm the unpermitted construction complaint, leaving the investigation open, the city said.... 

"Most of the time it served as a "live-work" warehouse: part commune, part artists collective. Photos posted online show a space with a ceiling resembling a ship's hull, covered wall to wall with furniture, instruments and tools of the artists' trades." (source)

Until Saturday night, no one seemed to take seriously that all the beautiful artistic atmosphere was accompanied by makeshift construction, rickety stairways, lack of exits, open-flame propane heaters, illegal dwelling places, flammable collections, etc. Residents were afraid to complain, for fear the dream would end with eviction from the illegal space.

Yes, it ended. Headlines for the last two days have described how the Ghost Ship, hosting a concert on the nearly inaccessible second floor, became an inferno. Over 35 people died a terrible death. Utopia became dystopia in seconds.

Attack on a Pizza Parlor

A pleasant neighborhood restaurant in Washington D.C. inexplicably was chosen by bizarre conspiracy theorists as the site where criminal activity was alleged without any. Utterly unfounded accusations included tales of secret tunnels underneath the restaurant's dining room, and fantasies that Hillary Clinton and her associates tortured children there.

Sunday, a self-appointed "investigator" showed up at the D.C. restaurant threatening people with an assault rifle and other weapons, shooting a hole in the ceiling. Somehow the patrons and employees -- all of course completely innocent of the ridiculous fabrications -- escaped being shot, but there was a really horrifying scene while the intruder was being pacified. This violent act "quickly became a symbol of the powerful and dangerous potential impact of rumors and conspiracy theories have taken on during a volatile election." Other businesses were also targeted by the fabulists -- "Business owners initially tried to ignore the false claims, but in recent weeks have been frightened by harassment and violent threats." (source)

"That an insane online conspiracy theory brought violence to a neighborhood business five miles from the White House is mind-boggling. Even worse is that similar fake stories involving Mrs. Clinton and pedophilia have been promoted by Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, President-elect Trump’s choice for national security adviser." (source)

Again, for totally different reasons, a delightful place where families gathered for pizza, ping-pong, and neighborhood get-togethers turned from utopia to dystopia.

Politics -- our dystopian direction

Our politicians have abdicated a commitment to truth as we used to know it. "Post-truth" is even the word of the year chosen by the Oxford English Dictionary. Margaret Sullivan in the Washington Post wrote a column titled "The post-truth world of the Trump administration is scarier than you think." She warns:

"It’s time to dust off your old copy of '1984' by George Orwell and recall this passage: 'The Ministry of Peace concerns itself with war, the Ministry of Truth with lies, the Ministry of Love with torture and the Ministry of Plenty with starvation. These contradictions are not accidental, nor do they result from ordinary hypocrisy: they are deliberate exercises in doublethink.' 

"And be vigilant."

An interview in Vox about the "post-truth" environment puts it this way, beginning with a quote: "'Besides, as the vilest Writer has his Readers, so the greatest Liar has his Believers; and it often happens, that if a Lie be believ’d only for an Hour, it has done its Work, and there is no farther occasion for it. Falsehood flies, and the Truth comes limping after it.' -- Jonathan Swift... As the Swift quote suggests, lies travel faster than truths, which makes the internet a reservoir of misinformation. Because anyone anywhere can propagate a lie at practically no cost or risk, there is really no containing the amount of bullshit percolating online."

Numerous recent articles have summarized the "post-truth" era not only in politics, but also in science, with a reading public eager to be misled about issues of nutrition, vaccines, climate change, and many more areas. Dystopian, yes, but I have no time to expand on this aspect of the situation.

In brief, here are a few more dystopian features of our political situation:

• Pretending to attack "political correctness" provides an excuse for speech and behavior that used to be held unacceptable.
• Police are not held accountable when they shoot innocent people, especially innocent Black people. Acquittal of police officers who have killed seems to be a daily news article. Living in an atmosphere where one can be shot at any time obviously puts Black people in a much worse dystopia than whites.
• A majority of votes does not determine which candidates for office become our elected officials. Most obviously, the losing candidate for President received approximately 2.5 million more votes than the elected candidate, but statewide elections also return large majorities of State and National Representatives of the opposite party to that which received the popular vote, thanks to gerrymandering and other electoral frauds. The certainty of being elected without popular support has enabled totalitarian behavior among many state officials, and appears to be about to enable such behavior nationally as well.

Racism and Antisemitism

Cartoon from L.A.Times

Racist attacks and racially-motivated violence have increased throughout our society, especially in schools. Racism has become "normal" thanks to campaign talk of locking up and/or deporting individuals with specified religions or national origins, another dystopian element of the current political atmosphere.

"Xenophobia" is the word of the year at dictionary.com -- which cited "anti-immigrant rhetoric of U.S. President-elect Donald Trump and the United Kingdom's Brexit vote to leave the European Union as reasons for its choice." (source)

Overt antisemitic statements and gestures have become almost routine, up to and including Nazi salutes. The antisemitic participants in the incoming administration represent a very pressing concern in the areas I've been covering in this blog, which is why I'm writing here.

From the New York Times: "a brick thrown through the window of a Muslim-owned restaurant in Kansas, apartments of Muslim families in Virginia hit with eggs and graffiti, swastikas scrawled on synagogues and in a playground in New York." (source)

From the Southern Poverty Law Center: "In the ten days following the election, there were almost 900 reports of harassment and intimidation from across the nation. Many harassers invoked Trump’s name during assaults, making it clear that the outbreak of hate stemmed in large part from his electoral success." (source)

From Ha'aretz: "The New York Police Department said it has seen a dramatic rise in hate crimes following the election of Donald Trump, with the majority of incidents directed at Jews." (source)

From the L.A.Times: "'The truth is, the alt-right is a new buzzword that made it appear as if these white supremacists have something different to offer,' said Oren Segal, director of the Anti-Defamation League’s Center on Extremism. 'The name is an alternative to "white supremacy." They just want to make it more acceptable, digestible to white people.' Segal added, 'There’s nothing new there.'" (source)

Social Media

The use or misuse of social media (Facebook, Reddit, Twitter, Snapchat...) is held responsible for much of the enabling and inspiring of thuggish elements in our society -- such as the man with the gun in the neighborhood restaurant. In totalitarian nightmare societies of the past plenty of low-tech capabilities allowed this type of destruction of the social contract. Information control by totalitarians is also a frequent element in fictional dystopias.

Author Kenan Malik writes of the new life of lies:

"Lies masquerading as news are as old as news itself. ... In the past, governments, mainstream institutions and newspapers manipulated news and information. Today, anyone with a Facebook account can do it. Instead of the carefully organized fake news of old, there is now an anarchic outflow of lies. What has changed is not that news is faked, but that the old gatekeepers of news have lost their power. Just as elite institutions have lost their grip over the electorate, so their ability to define what is and is not news has also eroded." (source)

"It Can't Happen Here" by Sinclair Lewis

Suddenly last month, Sinclair Lewis's eighty-year-old book It Can't Happen Here became a best seller. I don't know how many of the numerous recent purchasers have finished reading it, but I managed to read the whole thing. It's very depressing, and without giving away the ending, I think I can say it has no brighter side.

Bust of Sinclair Lewis
by Jo Davidson,
National Portrait Gallery,
Washington, D.C.

Paul Krugman says:

"So how bad will the effects of Trump-era corruption be? The best guess is, worse than you can possibly imagine." (Why Corruption Matters)

This could easily be the theme of Lewis's book, which of course did not turn out to be prophetic of his own time. He starts with an imaginary scenario of the American election of 1936, which was the immediate future when he wrote. His scenario takes full account of the current situation in Germany at the time, of America's fragile situation in the Depression, and of America's potential to mirror the escalating Nazi horror show.

It Can't Happen Here projects the election of fictitious candidates in 1936 and the aftermath of this election until around 1940. The candidate, a charismatic demagogue with an even more sinister collaborator, promises prosperity to the masses. He also promises persecution and maltreatment of hated minorities such as Jews and blacks, superpatriotism, glorious conquest of other countries, suspension of civil rights and other rights, and cancellation of democracy by removing the powers of Congress and other means. The candidate is elected by the masses of (white) people, many motivated by his promise to give each of them (the white people only) $5000, which was a lot of money in 1936.

Immediately upon taking office, the new President suspends all democracy by empowering the thugs and rabble as "Minute Men," arming them, and allowing them to terrorize the population. Soon the Minute Men are everywhere, often killing people without consequences. Concentration camps are set up for anyone who objects or belongs to an unwanted race, political party, or ethnic group. The novel is full of vivid descriptions of how this happens, while all along people say "It can't happen here," or more frequently, "It can't be happening here."

The events are seen through the life of one Vermont newspaper owner, Doremus Jessup. Lewis, already a Nobel Prize Winner when he wrote the book, was a fantastic portrayer of ordinary people and had an incredible way of showing how a specific individuals were typical. In reading, one can't help realizing how his characters in one small Vermont town still share so many features of today's Americans 80 years later.

The Jessup family's struggle -- and that of their friends and neighbors -- illustrates the impact of the disaster of totalitarianism and the way that people can be manipulated through their own prejudices and weaknesses. As I said: depressing. I'm sure many others will be or have been writing about this all-too-frightening characterization of American vulnerability and its results. And how much the people can still embrace hatred as an American value. I had chosen some apt quotations from Lewis, but I don't feel as if I need them to recommend this book -- if you want to be horrified, or maybe surprised that maybe we relied on our better nature for so long.

Umberto Eco: "The Prague Cemetery"

Umberto Eco died last month. In remembering him, I decided to read The Prague Cemetery(published 2011). The book is full of fascinating illustrations, using etchings and other contemporary material from Eco's collection. I had the feeling that the author's imagination was stimulated by these images; I have reproduced several of them below.

Actual French journal from time of Dreyfus case.
(From The Prague Cemetery).

Normally I would write about the very large number of food descriptions in the book. The main narrator LOVES food, and describes many meals including French cuisine, Italian and Sicilian cooking. Food of the richest and poorest classes of society illustrate their fortunes and misfortunes. Equally interesting was Eco's vast knowledge of the city of Paris in the 19th century -- the streets, the sewers, the restaurants, the neighborhoods, and more. These descriptions were somewhat spoiled for me by the revolting antisemitism and visciousness of the central character and narrator, Simonini.

Here is an example of Simonini's love of fine French food and its setting in 19th century Paris -- the reader is expected to know the names of the dishes in French:

"The first place I wanted to indulge myself was Le Grand Véfour, in the arcades of the Palais-Royal. Though it was extremely expensive, I had heard it praised even in Turin, and Victor Hugo apparently used to go there to eat breast of mutton with haricot beans. The other place that had immediately seduced me was the Café Anglais, on the corner of rue de Gramont and boulevard des Italiens. It had once been a restaurant for coachmen and servants and now served le tout Paris at its tables. There I discovered pommes Anna, écrevisses bordelaises, mousses de volaille, mauviettes en cerises, petites timbales à la Pompadour, cimier de chevreuil, fonds d’artichauts à la jardinière and champagne sorbets. The mere mention of these names makes me feel that life is worth living." (The Prague Cemetery, Kindle Locations 2196-2202)

At the young-people's hostel.

The simultaneously racist and gourmet Simonini also writes about the terrible food of poor people when he is forced to deal with them. For example, this description of a hostel for poor students:

"As you entered, you were hit by the asphyxiating stench of rancid grease and mildew, and of soup that had been cooked and recooked over the years, leaving tangible traces on those greasy walls— though there was no apparent reason for this, since you had to bring your own food with you, and the house offered wine and plates only." (Kindle Locations 4771-4773)

Or in another passage, where he is entertaining a Russian business acquaintance (more about the business later):

"With a feeling of relief I invited Golovinsky to dinner at Paillard, on the corner of rue de la Chaussée d’Antin and boulevard des Italiens. Expensive, but superb. Golovinsky clearly appreciated the poulet à l’archiduc and the canard à la presse. But someone who came from the Steppes may well have tucked into choucroute with the same enthusiasm. It would have cost me less, and I could have avoided the waiters’ suspicious looks at a customer who masticated so noisily." (Kindle Locations 5717-5720)

Like most of Eco's books The Prague Cemetery is terribly complicated, and made even more challenging by the expectation that the reader would be familiar with a fairly high level of detail about the liberation of Italy, Napoleon III, the 1871 war between France and Germany, the Paris Commune, the Dreyfus affair, and other events of that era, as well as food names in original languages. 

Further, a Jewish reader like me needs a thick skin to handle all the antisemitic stereotypes expressed by Simonini. Eco makes Simonini clearly despicable as well as self-absorbed -- including his utter lack of principles in all the political sides he pretends to take, his hatred of Jews, and several murders that he committed or claimed to have committed in the course of his unsavory life. Some of the illustrations are especially offensive -- the one at right is moderate in comparison. Still, it's a hard book to read.

Umberto Eco-style details add to the challenges. There are at least three narrators, mostly unreliable. In particular, the reader has to deal with the ambiguity of identity of Simonini and his double, a Catholic Abbé. Maybe the Abbé is just another character or maybe Simonini has some kind of split-personality disorder or maybe something else that I missed, though it's all finally explained towards the end (if you believe the explanation). In the final chapter of the book, Eco explains that Simonini is the only fictition of the book: all other events and characters are, he says, closely based on actual history. 

The character/narrator Simonini was ambiguously both Italian and French, having been born in a region on the border that was alternately a possession of each nationality. His profession was being a spy, a double agent, and above all a forger of documents. Among his invented documents he specialized in anti-Jewish and anti-Masonic ones, including a secret meeting of Jewish elders in the Prague cemetery (hence the title); a precursor to the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. This fictitious character then wrote the actual Protocols (which he was selling to the Russian he entertained at dinner). He also forged the papers that incriminated the innocent Dreyfus, and many others.

Obviously the way this fictitious character ties together many of the antisemitic inventions of the century is Eco's clever way of exploring the historic circumstances that created twentieth-century antisemitism, and continues to feed twenty-first century antisemitism. The play between real history and fiction is full of irony and fraught with Eco's knowledge of what happened to Simonini's creations after the end of the book.

Reviewer Rebecca Goldstein wrote the following in the New York Times:

"Umberto Eco’s latest fiction, 'The Prague Cemetery,' is choreographed by a truth that is itself so strange a novelist need hardly expand on it to produce a wondrous tale. Eco forthrightly explains that all his major characters but one are historical figures; but a reader unaware of how close to the truth Eco is hewing might be inclined to award him more points for inventiveness than he earns. This is not to say that Eco doesn’t earn points for inventiveness, nor that a novel can’t succeed on other grounds. It is just to say that sometimes truth is stranger than fiction." Umberto Eco and the Elders of Zion, NYT, November 18, 2011.

The historic "reality" reflected in the book isn't really the main key to what Eco was trying to do, I think. His handling of the details of life (like food, streets, military events, etc.) that would resonate with twenty-first century readers and his constant anticipation of the consequences of the ideas he explores make The Prague Cemetery a very complicated historical novel. All historical novels invent characters, actions, and circumstances to stand against the "real" historical background; this one does it in an exceptional way.

Note: this is also posted at maefood.blogspot.com, my other blog.