The Greatness of Churchill

From Nobility:

Allied propaganda often presented him alongside the other two – Roosevelt and Stalin – as if trying to level them. But that effort was futile and even counterproductive. Framed between the old Yankee president with common looks and an unimpressive, standard smile on one side, and on the other side the sinister Soviet dictator under whose hirsute eyebrows sparked two ignorant and threatening eyes, and under whose thick mustache were lips better suited to slander and drink than to speak, Churchill’s extremely expressive physiognomy stood out in a way that one would almost call splendid.

 Obviously, being very expressive is not enough for a person to shine. He also needs to express something worthwhile. The old English lion did so abundantly. His bald head reflected a vigorous and subtle diplomatic thought. His eyes – there would be so much to say about them! – expressed successively fascinating depths of observation, reflection, humor and aristocratic gentleness. His broad muscled cheeks lost nothing of their vigor with age. They looked like two facial buttresses, vigorously framing his highly intellectualized physiognomy. And they gave his face something that displayed an almost perpetual resoluteness and stability, an expressive symbol of the centuries-old strength of the English monarchy. His lips, thin and uncertain in their contour, seemed to accompany the movement of his eyes and thus were always ready to open up to utter an ironic saying, a slogan, to make a monumental speech … or smoke a cigar. (Read more.)

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"Let Them Eat Cake" Revisited

Once again we explore the question. To quote:

Executing Marie-Antoinette at the age of thirty-seven and leaving her two children as shivering, heart-broken orphans in the terrifying Temple prison, suggested that the Revolution was a lot more complicated than its supporters like to claimed. However, if Marie-Antoinette is painted as stupid, deluded, out-of-touch, spoiled and selfish, then we're likely to feel a lot less pity when it comes to studying her death. If that was the republicans' intention, then they did a very good job. Two hundred years later and the poor woman is still stuck with a terrible reputation, and a catchphrase, that she certainly doesn't deserve. (Read the entire post.)

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Sheherazade

One of my favorite tales is about a clever woman who saved her life through her story-telling. (Via Hermes) According to the legend:

The main frame story concerns a Persian king and his new bride. Upon discovering his wife's infidelity, the king, Shahryar, has her executed and then declares all women to be unfaithful. He begins to marry a succession of virgins only to execute each one the next morning. Eventually the vizier, whose duty it is to provide them, cannot find any more virgins. Scheherazade, the vizier's daughter, offers herself as the next bride and her father reluctantly agrees. On the night of their marriage, Scheherazade begins to tell the king a tale, but does not end it. The king is thus forced to postpone her execution in order to hear the conclusion. The next night, as soon as she finishes the tale, she begins (and only begins) a new one, and the king, eager to hear the conclusion, postpones her execution once again. So it goes on for 1,001 nights.

The tales vary widely: they include historical tales, love stories, tragedies, comedies, poems.... Numerous stories depict djinn, magicians, and legendary places, which are often intermingled with real people and geography, not always rationally; common protagonists include the historical caliph Harun al-Rashid, his vizier, Ja'far al-Barmaki, and his alleged court poet Abu Nuwas, despite the fact that these figures lived some 200 years after the fall of the Persian Empire in which the frame tale of Scheherazade is set. Sometimes a character in Scheherazade's tale will begin telling other characters a story of his own, and that story may have another one told within it, resulting in a richly layered narrative texture.

The different versions have different individually detailed endings (in some Scheherazade asks for a pardon, in some the king sees their children and decides not to execute his wife, in some other things happen that make the king distracted) but they all end with the king giving his wife a pardon and sparing her life.

The narrator's standards for what constitutes a cliffhanger seem broader than in modern literature. While in many cases a story is cut off with the hero in danger of losing his life or another kind of deep trouble, in some parts of the full text Scheherazade stops her narration in the middle of an exposition of abstract philosophical principles or complex points of Islamic philosophy, and in one case during a detailed description of human anatomy according to Galen—and in all these cases turns out to be justified in her belief that the king's curiosity about the sequel would buy her another day of life.

The Arabian Nights is available HERE. And Rimsky-Korsakov's symphonic suite is magical, too.

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A Winner!

The Shadow of the Bear by Regina Doman has inspired an award-winning drama, HERE. According to the press release from Chesterton Press:

Based on the book by Regina Doman, The Shadow of the Bear audio drama has won the Sonic Society’s 2009 Uni Award for Best Audio Drama Show.

The Sonic Society (www.sonicsociety.org) is a Broadcast/Podcast out of Halifax, Nova Scotia Canada. It showcases the very best of Modern Audio Drama from around the world. On their show during November 2008 the Sonic Society featured the entire 4-hour audio drama of The Shadow of the Bear, produced by Andrew Schmiedicke and written and directed by Regina Doman of Chesterton Productions (www.chestertonproductions.com).

At the end of May 2009, the Sonic Society invited its 50,000 listeners world wide to nominate their favorite show for its 2^nd Annual Uni Awards. The finalists in seven different categories were chosen by popular vote and announced on the Sonic Society’s blog on June 9. The listeners then voted on the finalists. After all the votes were in, Jack Ward of the Sonic Society said, “The Shadow of the Bear won by a clear majority the "Best Audio Drama Show".

“I couldn’t be more delighted,” said Regina.

“So many people helped to make this happen,” said Andrew. "It was like God brought all these people together so it could happen."

Joe Miller donated the production studio and sound equipment. Most of the cast came from Christendom College, Front Royal, Virginia; but there were also some from Canada, and Leonardo Defilippis of St. Luke Productions (www.stlukeproductions.com) played both the villain and the victim in the show. The band Scythian (www.scythianmusic.com) gave permission for their performance of the “Drums of Belfast” to be used as the opening and closing music for the drama, and Johnny Doman (www.johnnydoman.com) and Francis Fast wrote and performed most of the music used within the drama.

Ken Fast of Northern Rain Studio in Canada (www.northernrainstudio.com) handled all the post-production. After receiving the digitized recordings of the actors and actresses, Ken and his team edited and mixed the performance with music and sound effects. “I think it’s a great example of how we can all work together no matter where we are,” Ken said. “Through the power of the internet we can transfer it, and way up here in Alberta, we can do the sound track.”

And the result of this cooperative work is fantastic. Not only did The Shadow of the Bear win the “Best Audio Drama Show”, it was also a finalist in 4 other categories:

1. Best Sound and Editing by Northern Rain Studio
2. Best Script by Regina Doman (www.ReginaDoman.com)
3. Best Actress for Theresa Ford Fisher’s performance of Blanche Brier
4. Best Actor for Alex Fedoryka’s performance of Bear

The Shadow of the Bear is about a mysterious young man, who lands on Blanche and Rose Brier's doorstep in New York City. The two sisters have conflicting opinions on whether or not he is dangerous. Even as Blanche learns to trust him, her fears that Bear's friendship threatens their family prove terrifyingly true. A modern retelling of the classic Brothers Grimm fairytale, “Snow White and Rose Red”. For more information about this story and its sequels, visit www.FairyTaleNovels.com.

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