This is a guest post by Homestead: Theatre of Words. When Ezra Pound suggested in How To Read that we should teach poetry using a curriculum that had as its principal features the moments of great innovation in western poetry, he struck one of the most sensitive of Modernism’s nerves: the idea that the strength of an artist lay in originality and novelty. Ever since the … [Read more...]
Archives for April 2011
The Swarm Makes New Recruits
This is a guest post from Homestead: Theatre of Words. New South Wales is a mass of farmland hanging precariously between drought and floods, weeds and mice. Land was heavily over-cleared in the first century of settlement, and painstakingly restored toward health over the century that followed. The balance between environmental health and agricultural usefulness has been … [Read more...]
Maama
This is a guest post by Homestead: Theatre of Words. In 1871, Lesotho (Basutoland) was annexed to the Cape Colony of South Africa, but despite the energy of Colonel Griffith, the Government Agent, power remained in the hands of the chiefs. When the Kimberley diamond mines opened up, many Basotho found work in the diggings and used their earnings to buy guns and ammunition. … [Read more...]
Lithoko
This is a guest post by Homestead: Theatre of Words. In the early years of the 20thC, two French missionaries published this account of a performance they witnessed in the mountain kingdom of Lesotho, isolated in the heart of South Africa: In a large gathering, sitting round waiting to hear a royal message, a man seems suddenly seized by an irresistible devil. He leaps … [Read more...]
Saudi Insurrection
SODOM & GOMORRAH: People in the west may find their gas prises creeping a little higher as unrest reaches their friends in Saudi Arabia. Conservative groups are quick to point out the radical Muslim connections at play in the recent Middle Eastern uprisings. It is true that the Muslim Brotherhood and others are attempting to seize power in the wake of popular uprisings, … [Read more...]