Death, Thou Shalt Die - Last Photos

With the net overflowing with image collections of every form and fashion, the Tale of Sir Bob has given these a wide berth. However, traditions are there to be broken, and by presenting this collection of photos, being the last known photos taken of well-known people alive, this departure from my own beaten path seems justified.

However, true to the blog's own particular idiom, this is not merely a cavalcade of sombre photos. John Donne, the English Renaissance poet, probably wrote his Holy Sonnet X in 1609 and it was published in 1633, two years after his death. This Petrarchan sonnet is one of the most moving and consoling poetic reactions to death in existence, and beautifully accompanies and complements these pictures.

There is something tremendously poignant about this collection of photos. Knowing that the people in the photos had sometimes only minutes left to live, makes one appreciate the enormous value of human life and the privilege of experiencing that of others. There is also a sad beauty to the transitory nature of life, and seeing these outstanding human beings; artists, politicians, athletes and more at their last should remind us to live life to the fullest.

Or as Oscar Wilde put it through his character Lord Henry Wotton in The Picture of Dorian Gray: "make life burn with the hardest flame."

Abraham Lincoln, 1865

DEATH be not proud, though some have called thee

Mighty and dreadful, for, thou art not so, 

Mark Twain, 1910, Amelia Earhart, 1939,
Anne Frank and Franklin D. Roosevelt, 1945

For, those, whom thou think'st, thou dost overthrow,

Die not, poor death, nor yet canst thou kill me.

Mahatma Gandhi and Babe Ruth, 1948
Albert Einstein and James Dean, 1955

For, those, whom thou think'st, thou dost overthrow, 

Die not, poor death, nor yet canst thou kill me. 

Marilyn Monroe, 1962, John F. Kennedy, 1963
Jim Morrison, 1971 and Martin Luther King Jr., 1968

From rest and sleep, which but thy pictures be 

Much pleasure, then from thee, much more must flow, 

Jimi Hendrix, 1976, Elvis Presley, 1977,
Keith Moon, 1978 and John Lennon, 1980

And soonest our best men with thee do go, 

Rest of their bones, and souls' delivery.

Bob Marley, 1981, Freddie Mercury, 1991,
Kurt Cobain, 1994 and Tupac Shakur 1996

Thou art slave to Fate, Chance, kings, and desperate men, 

And dost with poison, war, and sickness dwell, 

 George Harrison, 2001, Ronald Reagan, 2004,
Heath Ledger, 2008 and Steve Jobs 2011

And poppy, or charms can make us sleep as well, 

And better then thy stroke; why swell'st thou then; 

One short sleep past, we wake eternally, 

And death shall be no more; death, thou shalt die

Sources: as given and Pics

The Quality of Copies

I have a question for you. If availability and price were not an issue, which would you choose:

1. An original painting or a reproduction?
2. A concert with your favourite band or a local cover band?
3. The Twilight/ Lord of the Ring trilogy or the films based on them?
4. An Armani suit/ Louis Vuitton bag or a Chinese copy?
5. Attending Woodstock in August 1969 or hearing your parents talk about it?

My guess is you chose the first alternative more often than not. Also, I wager your argument for doing so was that the first is better, but why is that? What makes an original better than a copy, and is the original really what you think it is?

Original and Copy

When a painting is being made, it represents reality. When your local cover band performs, they play already existing songs. The films adapt the readily available books, the Chinese copies mimic the originals and your parents tries to present reality as it was in 1969. The arts' role in representing reality emphasises the distinction between original and copy and Graham Allen, professor of literal and cultural theory at University College Cork, examines the nature of this relationship in Intertextuality in reference to Walter Benjamin's seminal essay The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction:

In an age before the mass publication of books, possession of an individual text was extremely rare and of enormous value. The prices still paid for original classic paintings also attest a residual attachment on contemporary society to the aura of the original work of art. Technological society, however, is dominated by reproductions of original works. The signed copy of the novel may be preferable to the unsigned copy, an original painting by Van Gogh may seem priceless, attendance at a dance performance may seem preferable to viewing it on video, but in contemporary society our experience of these and all other arts are generally of their technological reproductions. New artistic media of the twentieth century such as film, video and television, are, indeed, based on technological methods of reproduction. The aura which surrounds The Mona Lisa or the eight-century Book of Kells in Trinity College Library, Dublin, is unavailable to, and indeed an irrelevance for, these kinds of art forms (i). 

Allen, of course, neglects to mention that by their very nature the original painting by Van Gogh, the Mona Lisa, the Book of Kells and even the dance performances are themselves reproductions. Each of them mimics either natural entities, persons, stories probably already in existence, a dance script or an earlier performance.

Not original

With licence to copy (©)

Dance, by accompanying and illustrating originals such as music, narration or in hunter gatherer societies the movement of animals, necessarily has to imitate an original through body movement (ii). The hunter gatherer would accompany the rhythm of a primitive drum and dance to give a representation of his genesis myth through body movement. He might also dance to mimic the hare which he caught earlier. In these cases, the hunter gatherer tries to adapt cultural expressions like music into another art form, reproducing music and myth narration as dance, or he is imitating the world, reproducing the movement of its animals.

Still not original

The signed copy of a novel is arguably just that, a copy. The Mona Lisa is a static reproduction of the visage of a real person and the Book of Kells is a reproduction of Christian sacred documents and a summing up of contemporary religious discourse.

The basic argument still stands, though, because in the original-reproduction dichotomic relationship the original is the source from which the reproduction borrows and as such truly original within that relationship. Likewise, by being a part of a cultural context, the original appears as a segment of reality, however many earlier sources it may have imitated. Thus, art is always to some extent a copy of reality and it is this copy which is generally encountered in contemporary society.

Copy of Kells

This, in a simple and applicable form, is exemplified by news media. As soon as we do not experience an event first hand, we miss reality because any other way of becoming aware of the event after its passing has to be through a reproduction. This could be in terms of someone having experienced the original event and then reproducing it by narrating his or her experience. Alternatively, it could be in terms of a newscast reporting a real event, its content and form edited and adapted in order to be presentable through a different medium, film (iii). As representative for an age of multi-media, this latter case is symptomatic for the emergence of the field of adaptation where narratives are adapted into new technological modes of expression.

"Do I have an original thought in my head?"

So if everything is inspired by something and nothing is original, does that mean that everything is of poorer quality than some mythical source?

Well, it depends on how you look at it.

A pessimist would say that you cannot create anything new and original and by borrowing, willingly or unwillingly, you make a patchwork which is less coherent and less consistent and therefore of lower quality. Since you cannot help drawing your inspiration from your experience, you are doomed to reproduction and, at best, repetition. The pessimistic approach is expertly exemplified in the opening monolgue of Adaptation:

The pessimist would say that the film takes what you read in the book, leaves out the bits it finds irrelevant and adds bits it thinks should be there, like music or moving images. The chances of these corresponding with what you would think appropriate are slim to none and the rest of the audience faces similar odds. Because of this gap between priorities and between expectations, any new cultural product would in fact be a poorer one.

An optimist, on the other hand, would argue that the novelty is in the combinations. By combining cultural products, like film music, moving images and a story from a novel, the new film could be so much more than each individual product could. You would understand the book differently, listening to the song would never be the same again and seeing that actor play out his part would modify the way you look at both him and other films in which he has appeared.

The optimist would say that because everything is a copy and because you cannot do anything without copying several other copies, you make something original. There are so many elements which inform your creation process, that the likelihood of all those elements having been put together before is as small as the pessimist's priority odds.

An original copy

Let us revisit the list we started with.

1. The reproduction would be more than a poorer imitation of the painting. It would include all the colours, all the interpretations and experiences of the reproducing painter and all the history of the original painting.
2. The cover band concert would update the original song and give it a local flavour. It would reflect not only each musician, but also the musical tradition of the area in addition to what were there "originally".
3. The trilogies could only communicate through symbols or the occasional static image. The films, on the other hand, can tell you things through the sequence of images, through what's in these images and through sound (which includes music, noises, dialogue, voiceover etc.). These would give you experiences you could never create based on just the text.
4. The Chinese imitations would use different materials, different techniques and would probably be more affordable and available. This combination would greatly expand the impact and implications of all these products.
5. By combining the Woodstock experience with all their history after the event, nostalgia and modern sensibilities, your parents will have created a new Woodstock, one which is different from the one they actually experienced. In time, you might tell your children about Woodstock and your story will, with almost complete certainty be a different one.

Oh no! That cannibal from Sin City, Jonathan Safran Foer, has got the ring!

The copy, therefore, is original because it is a combination which did not exist before. Considering it as a poorer version just because it is based on something else might have more to do with the psychological fear of being wrong, of having backed the wrong thing. Psychologist Elliot Aronson wrote:

Far from being a sign of intellectual inferiority, the capacity to err is crucial to human cognition. Far from being a moral flaw, it is inextricable from some of our most humane and honorable qualities: empathy, optimism, imagination, conviction, and courage. And far from being a mark of indifference or intolerance, wrongness is a vital part of how we learn and change. Thanks to error, we can revise our understanding of ourselves and amend our ideas about the world (iii).

So next time you catch yourself thinking that someone has destroyed your favourite book or piece of music, keep Aronson's words in mind and then ask yourself what you have lost, why it was precious and what you have gained.

What do you think? 

How do you react to copies like a film adaptation of your favourite book? Is a copy always poorer than the original? Does the knowledge that you probably are not creating anything new as such take the fun out of creative work? If so, why? Is the alternative that we stop producing cultural expressions or should we open the floodgates and create for the lowest common denominator? Make your contribution to the discussion!

Comments on The Tale of Sir Bob are always welcome!

Sources: (i): Graham Allen: Intertextuality, 2nd edn (Oxford and New York: Routledge, 2011): 176
(ii): Ann C. Albright and Ann Dils (eds.): Moving History/ Dancing Cultures: A Dance History Reader (Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 2001): 119-120
(iii): Elliot Aronson: The Social Animal (New York: Worth, 2012)
Pic1, Pic2, Pic3, Pic4

Bad Sex in Literature

In 1993, the British magazine Literary Review started handing out an award out of the ordinary. Nowadays, with the horrors of Fifty Shades of Grey stalking the literary landscape, it seems particularly relevant. Yes, it is the

Bad Sex in Fiction Award

Awarded to the author who produces the worst description of a sex scene in a novel, the award aims to to "draw attention to the crude, tasteless, often perfunctory use of redundant passages of sexual description in the modern novel, and to discourage it". Here is a short film showing the nomination process:

Seems tailor made for Fifty Shades of Grey, does it not? The only problem is that pornographic or erotic fiction is excluded, and rightly so, since part of the impact of the sex scenes are their situation in mainstream literature. The internet has reeled at the exclusion of J.K. Rowling's The Casual Vacancy from the shortlist, but Jonathan Beckman, literary editor of the Literary Review explains in an interview with The Guardian that it simply was not bad enough, despite being filled with rape, casual sex and pedophilia. That says something of previous awardees. 

Previous winners have bestowed phrases like "Like a lepidopterist mounting a tough-skinned insect with a too blunt pin he screwed himself into her" (Rowan Somerwille: The Shape of Her) and "Moan moan moan moan moan went Hoyt as he slithered slithered slithered slithered and caress caress caress caress went the fingers" (Tom Wolfe: I am Charlotte Simmons) upon the world. More bad sex in fiction can be found here.

This year's award ceremony is on Tuesday 4th of December, and so it is up to you, dear reader, to decide whether any of the nominees are worthy heirs to these devastatingly squalid contribution to the canon:

Rare Earth by Paul Mason: “She breathed hot into his neck and he plunged three rough fingers down the front of her jeans, making her squeak. She had never tried wu-wei in this situation before and Khünbish, hairy and slightly paunchy, she noticed now that he had his shirt off, was generating slightly more karmic energy than she had anticipated.”

Noughties by Ben Masters: “We got up from the chair and she led me to her elfin grot, getting amongst the pillows and cool sheets. We trawled each other’s bodies for every inch of history. I dug after what I had always imagined and came up with even more. She stroked my outlines in perfect synchrony until I was febrile in her hands, willingly guided elsewhere.”

Infrared by Nancy Huston: “He runs his tongue and lips over my breasts, the back of my neck, my toes, my stomach, the countless treasures between my legs, oh the sheer ecstasy of lips and tongues on genitals, either simultaneously or in alternation, never will I tire of that silvery fluidity, my sex swimming in joy like a fish in water…”

The Adventuress: The Irresistible Rise of Miss Cath Fox by Nicholas Coleridge: “In seconds the duke had lowered his trousers and boxers and positioned himself across a leather steamer trunk, emblazoned with the royal arms of Hohenzollern Castle. ‘Give me no quarter,’ he commanded. ‘Lay it on with all your might.’”

Back to Blood by Tom Wolfe: “Now his big generative jockey was inside her pelvic saddle, riding, riding, riding, and she was eagerly swallowing it swallowing it swallowing it with the saddle’s own lips and maw — all this without a word.”

The Yips by Nicola Barker: “She smells of almonds, like a plump Bakewell pudding; and he is the spoon, the whipped cream, the helpless dollop of warm custard. She steams. He applauds, his tongue hanging out (like a bloodhound espying a raw chop in a cartoon).”

The Divine Comedy by Craig Raine: “And he came. Like a wubbering springboard. His ejaculate jumped the length of her arm. Eight diminishing gouts. The first too high for her to lick. Right on the shoulder.”

The Quiddity of Wilf Self by Sam Mills: “Down, down, on to the eschatological bed. Pages chafed me; my blood wept onto them. My cheek nestled against the scratch of paper. My cock was barely a ghost, but I did not suffer panic.”

What do you think? 

Which contribution do you think will receive this year's Bad Sex in Literature Award? Are there other candidates whom you think should have been included? If so, why? Feel free to include representative excerpts and do not forget to keep an attentive eye at the Literary Review webpage next Tuesday!

Comments on The Tale of Sir Bob are always welcome!

Source: Text

The Importance of Soaking in Politics

Having previously covered singing heads of state, the time has come to have a look at the role of bathing and bath-houses in politics. At first glance, one would not expect these inconspicuous activities and rooms to be of any consequence but they might in fact be partially responsible for the end of the Cold War.

Water Wings

Nikita Khrushchev was fat and ungainly. He had had no more than four years of school education and was thought to have survived Stalin's purges mainly because no one found him a threat. Still, following Stalin's death in 1953 this inconspicuousness was what allowed him to maneuver to the top of Soviet Russia.

Before this, in 1949, the massively self-centered and -confident Chairman Mao had been slighted at Stalin's 70th birthday. He was treated as just another of the many guests, was granted very little time with the Soviet leader and later relocated to a remote villa outside Moscow for several weeks where there was nothing to do except playing table tennis at a broken table. (This was before table tennis was outlawed on the belief that it damaged players' eyesight.)

Naturally, Mao was seething with resentment and when Khrushchev came for a state visit in 1958 he was put up in a fairly worn down hotel with no air conditioning in the hot China summer. During the following talks, Mao chain-smoked in spite of Khrushchev's intense hatred for smoking and talked down to him, but suddenly he seemed to change his ways and invited him to his private residence at Zonghanhai.

Mao Swimming. He was said to have been aided in this venture by his profuse fat

When Khrushchev turned up the following day, he suspected trouble. Mao greeted him wearing slippers and a bathrobe and insisted he join him in the pool. Mao was an proficient swimmer, but the 200 pound Khrushchev had never learned to swim. Soon, Mao was doing laps and talking incessantly, interpreters running up and down along the pool while Khrushchev was standing awkwardly at the children's end of the pool. The humiliation was not complete yet, however. A pair of water wings were produced and with Khrushchev paddling like a dog or simply bobbing up and down, Mao ducking and diving the talks progressed amidst splutters and discomfort.

Khrushchev in happier times

Needless to say, the stunt did nothing to improve Sino-Soviet relations. By 1966, their border conflict almost escalated into open war and this allowed Kissinger to reestablish American-Chinese relations. This further pressured Soviet to withdraw their aid to the North-Vietnamese which led to disengagement, SALT and 1989. Therefore, interestingly, the Cold War was ended, at least in part, by water wings.

The Ugandian Swimming Champion

Uganda's dictator Idi Amin also considered himself quite the swimmer. He used to boast that he was the Ugandian swimming champion. However, as this video shows, there was not much competition as competitors swimming past him were bound never to swim again.

Finnish Sauna Diplomacy

After the war, Finnish President Jushi Kusti Paasikivi and his successor Uhro Kekkonen navigated the Cold War skillfully through the policy of "active neutrality". By doing this, they could have dealings with both the Soviet and the West and especially Kekkonen had a secret tool for this purpose; cultural diplomacy.

Kekkonen would invite foreign digitaries to join him in his sauna and there, he would start negotiating, hammering out a deal. The sauna would take its toll, softening the visitors up for compromise. Often, Kekkonen would not let them leave until an agreement had been reached and dignitaries who have met with this treatment include Soviet Premier Khrushchev and former UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon. On one occasion, in 1960, after sweating in the sauna until five in the morning Khrushchev issued a statement supporting Finland's desire to integrate with the West.

Khrushchev never noticed the wicked gleam in Kekkonen's eye

Finnish sauna diplomacy is still being used. All Finnish diplomatic and consular missions have their own sauna for the purpose, and Finnish soldiers are known to build saunas wherever they go. There is, however, a danger to sauna diplomacy. Olli Rehn of the European Commission economic and monetary affairs was recently accused of sexism after an attempt at sauna diplomacy.

What do you think?

Do these tactics rock your belief in the solidity of your political system? Are they morally sound or do, perhaps, the ends justify the means? A well known business tactic is to give visiting businessmen awkward flights and have a liason professional keep them busy until his meeting. This makes them tired, unable to make good decisions and more likely to aggree to the business' demands. Is this justifiable, in your opinion?

Comments on the Tale of Sir Bob are welcome, as ever!



Sources: "Water Wings", "The Ugandian Swimming Champion" as shown, "Finnish Sauna Diplomacy", Pic1, Pic2, Pic3

A Philosopher, an Economist, a Psychologist and a Physicist Walks into the Unknown - Four Takes on Souls and Soul Mates

With my background from the arts and particularly literature studies, I have been fascinated with the soul. Remember, this is what Faust sold to Mephistopheles or the devil in Marlowe's The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus and Goethe's Faust. It is also what Dorian Gray pledges in order for Basil Hallward's picture of him to age and be marred instead of him in Oscar Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray. Most religions recognise some sort of human spirit and many major philosophies as well. I follow neither, but I am curious about how the soul works if it exists. Is it, for instance, possible to sell one's soul, making a deal with the devil and what about soulmates? Do they exist or is it true what Emily Dickinson wrote, that "the soul selects her own society, then shuts the door"?

The reason I am writing about this now is that I recently came up with a plan. Atheists do not believe in a soul because it cannot be scientifically proven to exist. So, I figured taking inspiration from the Freakonomics podcast, what's to stop me from buying it off one of them and selling it on in a crossroads at midnight like blues guitarists like Robert Johnson claimed to have done? Imagine, I could get Faust's knowledge and pleasures of the world, Dorian Gray's eternal life and beauty and Johnson's guitar skills and not lose my own soul (if it exists)!

The plan proved trickier than I thought. I couldn't find any Atheists willing to sell their supposedly non-existent souls. I thought it would be like getting money for nothing for them, but no, they seemed reluctant to part with it.

Cue the philosopher and the economist:

The Philosopher and the Economist:

Michael Sandel and Stephen Dubner

Michael Sandel

Sandel: Well, it strikes me…The first thing that strikes me about it is that it’s a very old idea. It’s not new. Think of the indulgences of the medieval period. And it was after all the sale of indulgences, which is pretty close. Is there a difference between selling your soul and buying salvation? If you can buy a person’s soul, it’s pretty closely akin to buying salvation, which was, you remember that was the practice that was carried out in the Catholic Church at the time that Martin Luther rose up against indulgences, against the buying and selling of salvation.


In the above mentioned podcast, economy journalist Stephen Dubner co-author of the Freakonomics blog and books, talked to Sandel, a political philosopher at Harvard University. The background was a case where someone had actually managed to buy another person's soul for $50.

Stephen Dubner

Dubner: [...] if I offered to buy your soul for fifty dollars what would you say? [...]Let’s say that I feel that you are not exercising it properly, that you are not taking seriously enough for my taste and my moral code the responsibility of this spiritual entity known as a soul, and I therefore am willing to pay dollars in order to better curate that soul because I do believe in the sanctity of the soul, and rather than see you not tend yours properly I’m willing to pay the price to take over that responsibility.

The two ponders this for a while. If it is possible to buy one soul, why not buy many? I could, for instance, buy a great amount of souls and sell them on to a religious church for a profit. As Sandel pointed out, medieval Christians bought abstract products like salvation. We buy the feeling of safety when we buy insurance and a feeling of self when we buy new clothes or other items. Dubner suggests that when a church converts followers of different faiths, they should pay a fee for each follower's soul.

Sandel: A market economy is a tool; it’s a valuable tool. It’s an instrument for achieving economic wealth, affluence, and prosperity. It’s a tool that we use, that we put to our purposes. But as markets and market thinking come to inform all aspects of life, as everything becomes available for sale, we become a market society, which is a way of thinking and being, an unreflective way of thinking and being that just assumes that all the good things in life can in principle be up for sale. And that, I think diminishes a great many moral and civic goods that markets and market relations don’t honor, and that money can’t or shouldn’t buy.

So, the morality of buying and selling on a soul would be problematic. What, then, if I knew someone really lonely and wanted to give him or her a soulmate? Imagine I had bought a guy's soul and I found someone who I thought would go really well together with him. Could I make him fall in love?

Cue the psychologist:

The Psychologist

Jeremy Nicholson

Jeremy Nicholson, M.S.W., Ph.D, is a doctor of social and personality psychology who focuses on persuasion and dating and calls himself "The Attraction Doctor". He writes for Psychology Today:

Jeremy Nicholson

Nicholson: [...]according to a January 2011 Marist poll, 73% of Americans believe that they are destined to find their one, true, soul mate. The percentage is a bit higher for men (74%) than women (71%). The notion is also higher among younger individuals, with 79% of those under 45 believing in soul mates (as opposed to 69% of those over 45).

Nicholson refers to the researcher Knee, who found that people who believe in romantic destiny or soul mates almost never finds what they are looking for. They think they do, though, and for a while all is well.

Nicholson: In all relationships, however, disagreement, conflict, and incompatibility will arise. Ultimately, no one is perfect - or a perfect fit for a partner. It takes work, growth, and change to keep a relationship going and satisfying over time. When that happens, soul mate believers often become upset, disillusioned, and uncommitted.

They then break off the relationship and goes on in search for the next, "real" soul mate. In other words, I wouldn't have much luck pairing them up, at least based on the idea of soul mates. This idea is beginning to look more and more like a fallacy. Maybe the Atheists are right and the soul doesn't exist, or perhaps souls just don't match.

Nicholson: People who believe in romantic growth primarily look for someone who will work and grow with them, resolving conflicts as they arise. [...]they are motivated to solve them and stay committed to their partner. As a result, their relationships tend to be longer and more satisfying over time. Rather than rejecting a partner for minor disagreements, they work together, evolve, and grow a satisfying relationship. In the end, it is a bit of a cruel joke. A belief in soul mates may prevent individuals from finding the very relationships they think they are destined to have.

In any case, what is the likelyhood of finding two souls to match? Are the soul mate fans really doomed?

Cue the physicist:

The Physicist

Randall Munroe

Looking for a soul mate

Munroe: For starters, is your soul mate even still alive? A hundred billion or so humans have ever lived, but only seven billion are alive now (which gives the human condition a 93% mortality rate). If we’re all paired up at random, 90% of our soul mates are long dead.

Randall Munroe is an introvert physics graduate from CNU who used to work for NASA. He figures that in addition to most of your soul mates being dead, many of them aren't born yet, not of your sexual preferance or in your target age group. Munroe calculates that that leaves you with around half a billion potential matches. Then, of course, you will have to meet.

Munroe: Let’s suppose you lock eyes with an average of a few dozen new strangers each day. (I’m pretty introverted, so for me that’s definitely a generous estimate.) If 10% of them are close to your age, that’s around 50,000 people in a lifetime. Given that you have 500,000,000 potential soul mates, it means you’ll only find true love in one lifetime out of ten thousand.

 So, you will need a lot of time to find the soul mate. In addition, they will need a lot of time to find you. Therefore, if you believe in soul mates, the chance of finding yours before you die is 1: (10.000*10.000) or ONE IN 100 MILLION! 

What to do with insubstantial property?

This means that if I bought a soul, assuming it exists and assunimg has a mate, I would have to try to pair it with a hundred million times more souls that I would ever meet in a lifetime. It seems that the idea of a soul mate is fundamentally flawed, unhealthy and should be buried. No use in buying a number of souls and setting up a dating agency. In the end, it turns out that Wilde and Goethe were right. It seems it's only the good and bad forces of religion and their representatives here on Earth who would find any value in a soul. If I ever get a few to spare, it seems I would be best off selling or donating them on to whichever I find most deserving.

Rembrandt's Faust having a bad idea

The danger is that if there should happen to be an afterlife and I would get there after I die, I would be saddled with whatever souls I couldn't sell off for all eternity. 

Alternatively, if reincarnation is the thing....

I might get merged!

Cue dramatic suspense music.

What do you think? 

Do you believe in souls and soul mates and do you think belief is a central element here? If souls do exist, should we have moral qualms in buying and selling them like Sandel suggests? Also, soul mates aside, both the psychologist and physician are fairly dismissive of short, frequent relationships. Are they right in being so? 

Comments on The Tale of Sir Bob are always welcome!

Sources: 1, 2, 3, images as given

PIFs - The Tattered Past of Public Information Films

PIFs, or Public Information Films, seems to be a thing of the past. Nowadays, people get their share for fearmongery through fantastically animated cgi-documentaries but before these were of any real quality image-wise, governments had to rely on patronising, blatant truisms which any sensible person today would take for granted. It is, however, exactly these properties which makes the PIFs either amusing or quite creepy to us today. As a challenge, one of the PIFs below is a fake. Can you spot it?

Following the war, new threats loomed...

and new solutions.

Later, with death tolls rising to seven-digit numbers per annum, kite safety had to be addressed.

You would think this had become common knowledge by the 80s, but

They never listen to the sensible kid. That's why they introduced the twice shy cat:

And they say cats are clever. However, this 1973 film depicting dark and lonely water as an active agent is just ridiculously creepy.

His brother, it seems, was less malicious though just as creepy and righteous.

Life was indeed harder in the 70s. Even a rug could kill you.

Or a chair...

Even man's best friend could be a killer.

Felt worse for the dog, really. In any case, in the 90s, some PIFs focused more on being grisly than which message came across. In this PIF it's clearly better to hit a child at 30 mph than at 40mph.

Luckily, though, there were Hale and Pace.

Which brings us around to our fake. The fairly easy to spot spoof here was of course the chair and fries skit from the Armstrong and Miller show. (More from them here.)

Sources: As given

A Proper Curse

In Laurence Sterne's Tristram Shandy, Dr. Slop cuts his finger in the presence of Tristram's father and his Uncle Toby. Since "small curses [...] upon great occasions [...] are but so much waste of our strength & soul's health to no manner of purpose" (chapter II) Tristram's father produces "FIT FORMS of SWEARING suitable to ALL CASES" and the good doctor reluctantly reads a proper curse aloud:

"

'By the authority of God Almighty, the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, and of the holy canons, and of the undefiled Virgin Mary, mother and patroness of our Saviour.' I think there is no necessity, quoth Dr. Slop, dropping the paper down to his knee, and addressing himself to my father—as you have read it over, Sir, so lately, to read it aloud—and as Captain Shandy seems to have no great inclination to hear it—I may as well read it to myself. That's contrary to treaty, replied my father:—besides, there is something so whimsical, especially in the latter part of it, I should grieve to lose the pleasure of a second reading. Dr. Slop did not altogether like it,— but my uncle Toby offering at that instant to give over whistling, and read it himself to them;—Dr. Slop thought he might as well read it under the cover of my uncle Toby's whistling—as suffer my uncle Toby to read it alone;—so raising up the paper to his face, and holding it quite parallel to it, in order to hide his chagrin—he read it aloud as follows—my uncle Toby whistling Lillabullero, though not quite so loud as before.

'By the authority of God Almighty, the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, and of the undefiled Virgin Mary, mother and patroness of our Saviour, and of all the celestial virtues, angels, archangels, thrones, dominions, powers, cherubins and seraphins, and of all the holy patriarchs, prophets, and of all the apostles and evangelists, and of the holy innocents, who in the sight of the Holy Lamb, are found worthy to sing the new song of the holy martyrs and holy confessors, and of the holy virgins, and of all the saints together, with the holy and elect of God,—May he' (Obadiah) 'be damn'd' (for tying these knots)—'We excommunicate, and anathematize him, and from the thresholds of the holy church of God Almighty we sequester him, that he may be tormented, disposed, and delivered over with Dathan and Abiram, and with those who say unto the Lord God, Depart from us, we desire none of thy ways. And as fire is quenched with water, so let the light of him be put out for evermore, unless it shall repent him' (Obadiah, of the knots which he has tied) 'and make satisfaction' (for them) 'Amen.

'May the Father who created man, curse him.—May the Son who suffered for us curse him.—May the Holy Ghost, who was given to us in baptism, curse him' (Obadiah)—'May the holy cross which Christ, for our salvation triumphing over his enemies, ascended, curse him.

'May the holy and eternal Virgin Mary, mother of God, curse him.—May St. Michael, the advocate of holy souls, curse him.—May all the angels and archangels, principalities and powers, and all the heavenly armies, curse him.' (Our armies swore terribly in Flanders, cried my uncle Toby,—but nothing to this.—For my own part I could not have a heart to curse my dog so.)

'May St. John, the Praecursor, and St. John the Baptist, and St. Peter and St. Paul, and St. Andrew, and all other Christ's apostles, together curse him. And may the rest of his disciples and four evangelists, who by their preaching converted the universal world, and may the holy and wonderful company of martyrs and confessors who by their holy works are found pleasing to God Almighty, curse him' (Obadiah.)

'May the holy choir of the holy virgins, who for the honour of Christ have despised the things of the world, damn him—May all the saints, who from the beginning of the world to everlasting ages are found to be beloved of God, damn him—May the heavens and earth, and all the holy things remaining therein, damn him,' (Obadiah) 'or her,' (or whoever else had a hand in tying these knots.)

'May he (Obadiah) be damn'd wherever he be—whether in the house or the stables, the garden or the field, or the highway, or in the path, or in the wood, or in the water, or in the church.—May he be cursed in living, in dying.' (Here my uncle Toby, taking the advantage of a minim in the second bar of his tune, kept whistling one continued note to the end of the sentence.—Dr. Slop, with his division of curses moving under him, like a running bass all the way.) 'May he be cursed in eating and drinking, in being hungry, in being thirsty, in fasting, in sleeping, in slumbering, in walking, in standing, in sitting, in lying, in working, in resting, in pissing, in shitting, and in blood-letting!

'May he' (Obadiah) 'be cursed in all the faculties of his body!

'May he be cursed inwardly and outwardly!—May he be cursed in the hair of his head!—May he be cursed in his brains, and in his vertex,' (that is a sad curse, quoth my father) 'in his temples, in his forehead, in his ears, in his eye-brows, in his cheeks, in his jaw-bones, in his nostrils, in his fore-teeth and grinders, in his lips, in his throat, in his shoulders, in his wrists, in his arms, in his hands, in his fingers!

'May he be damn'd in his mouth, in his breast, in his heart and purtenance, down to the very stomach!

'May he be cursed in his reins, and in his groin,' (God in heaven forbid! quoth my uncle Toby) 'in his thighs, in his genitals,' (my father shook his head) 'and in his hips, and in his knees, his legs, and feet, and toe- nails!

'May he be cursed in all the joints and articulations of the members, from the top of his head to the sole of his foot! May there be no soundness in him!

'May the son of the living God, with all the glory of his Majesty'—(Here my uncle Toby, throwing back his head, gave a monstrous, long, loud Whew— w—w—something betwixt the interjectional whistle of Hay-day! and the word itself.—

—By the golden beard of Jupiter—and of Juno (if her majesty wore one) and by the beards of the rest of your heathen worships, which by the bye was no small number, since what with the beards of your celestial gods, and gods aerial and aquatick—to say nothing of the beards of town-gods and country- gods, or of the celestial goddesses your wives, or of the infernal goddesses your whores and concubines (that is in case they wore them)—all which beards, as Varro tells me, upon his word and honour, when mustered up together, made no less than thirty thousand effective beards upon the Pagan establishment;—every beard of which claimed the rights and privileges of being stroken and sworn by—by all these beards together then—I vow and protest, that of the two bad cassocks I am worth in the world, I would have given the better of them, as freely as ever Cid Hamet offered his—to have stood by, and heard my uncle Toby's accompanyment.

—'curse him!'—continued Dr. Slop,—'and may heaven, with all the powers which move therein, rise up against him, curse and damn him' (Obadiah) 'unless he repent and make satisfaction! Amen. So be it,—so be it. Amen.'

I declare, quoth my uncle Toby, my heart would not let me curse the devil himself with so much bitterness.—He is the father of curses, replied Dr. Slop.—So am not I, replied my uncle.—But he is cursed, and damn'd already, to all eternity, replied Dr. Slop.

I am sorry for it, quoth my uncle Toby.

Dr. Slop drew up his mouth, and was just beginning to return my uncle Toby the compliment of his Whu—u—u—or interjectional whistle—when the door hastily opening in the next chapter but one—put an end to the affair.

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On the left, the curse as drawn by Martin Rowson in his graphic novel version. Click the image to zoom.

For those of you keen to read this in latin, the preceding chapter provides the curse in that lingo.

Sources: Text, Graphic novel