Lsst Thursday I noted: “I subscribe to Tim Snyder’s Substack and yesterday he gave the first of ten lectures on successive Wednesdays as described here.  I watched the first 90 minute segment and it was worth the time.   If you have an interest and can access the program, you may find it very worthwhile.”  NOTE: Lecture 2 is Wednesday, July 22

SAK followed through.  Here is his review of the first segment:

Well thanks ever so much for that Mr Bernard!

I looked prof Snyder up & he was born in 1969 into a Quaker family – love those peaceful Quakers! I also knew Quakers had founded a couple of banks & other major companies in the UK but it turned one or more started . . . Barclays & Lloyds banks, Cadbury, Amnesty International, Sony, Bethlehem Steel, Western Union, Johns Hopkins University . . .

Another connection: a cute film I enjoyed recently was set in freezing Quebec & had its main character called Paul Snyder (or Sneijder?) who is fed up with money, business, negotiations . . . & decides to become a dog walker.

I digress, apologies!

Well Tim, or Timothy, Snyder taught me quite a few things like the past is still with us & one can see this all round. Divisions in the US, Sunni-Shi’ite divisions in Islam, racism, China & “the west” & Japan . . . According to him the past hasn’t happened but is happenING. And he adds: nobody really knows what is happening now.

I recall something by William Faulkner that went like: the past is not dead, it’s not even past. T.S. Eliot in his Four Quartets wrote:

“Time present and time past
Are both perhaps present in time future,
And time future contained in time past.
If all time is eternally present
All time is unredeemable.
What might have been is an abstraction
Remaining a perpetual possibility
Only in a world of speculation.

Tim Snyder said similar things but he insisted that history is written not in poetry – as Borowski would have wished, being a poet – but in prose. Still Mr Snyder said something that resonates in T.S. Eliot: that what happened must have been possible because it happened. He mentions concentration camps & mass murder as examples. One could add that this president would be elected etc.

When politicians talk about past they are not telling actual history – it’s not so simple or clear.

When a politician says we are going back to some golden period, Tim Snyder says:

1-That is impossible, history does not repeat

2- The politician has decided which period is the good one

3- We are thus dis-impowered since for a start we did not choose the time to go back to

Snyder agrees with Borowski that we, none of us, are just victims or just executioners. That reminded me of Albert Camus’ little book “Neither Victims nor Executioners” which I typed years ago – I was that impressed, still am with Camus. I might have sent it to you as a word document.

He says there is no document that reveals the truth – one goes from one document to another .  .  .  Always need more primary sources. I learnt about the craft of the historian, about primary & secondary sources. How we look to the first to contradict – go against the grain – while we look to the secondary ones going with the grain. Interesting!

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Thanks again. [Question] How do we listen to the second lecture!?  [Dick: First, to your last sentence: The programs are every Wednesday.  I think the drill is he wants a subscription which can be no cost.  He mostly wants to share his information, and he has always come across as a very credible source.  He has a lot of interest in Ukraine, specifically.  Anyway, you know his substack, and just check out how to access by this Wednesday, July 22.]

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SAK: I would like to add that although Mr Snyder says the past is still with us, we are not determined by it. He mentions that many lines run from the past & some continue on. It is up to some of us to support the lines we feel are the better ones. This is how I perceive your field work & writings Mr Bernard: giving a hand to the liberal lines of peace & justice. If I may also say this is also how I see the work of the last two Popes!

It parallels the fable you had on your website those years ago & which was my introduction to your Thoughts Towards A Better World!

A grandfather (or a native American?) is talking with his grandson.

The grandfather says, “In life, there are two wolves inside of us which are always at battle.

One is a good wolf which represents things like kindness, bravery, and love.

The other is a bad wolf which represents things like greed, hatred, and fear”.

The grandson stops and thinks about it for a second then he looks up at his grandfather and says, “Grandfather, which one wins?”

The grandfather replies, “The one you feed.”

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Sorry I am taking too much of your time! but I just found out about a sad piece of news: Edward Stourton, a journalist I liked who most recently was the BBC’s presenter of Sunday, a programme about religious issues has passed away at the young age of 68.

& connecting with Tim Snyder & the topic of history:

Stourton’s “last book, written to coincide with the 250th anniversary of the American Declaration of Independence, was “Made in America: the Dark History that Led to Donald Trump.”

The book confirms Tim Snyder’s idea about lines of history & how some carry on . . . & on . . .

The riveting new exploration of American history – and how it has led to the era of Donald Trump – from the award-winning political broadcaster.

‘A well argued and elegant answer to the question, ‘how did America get to this place?’‘ Justin Webb, presenter of Americast (https://www.bbc.com/audio/brand/p07h19zz)

‘Pithy, entertaining and informative’ Guardian

Trump’s second term, even more than his first, is often called ‘unprecedented’. But history shows that Trump and his policies are as American as apple pie…

Much of what Donald Trump does seems maverick and even mad. His actions and policy pronouncements are a stark rupture from the American style of leadership that we have lived with all our lives. Plenty of people – on both sides of the Atlantic – have argued that he will destroy his country’s democracy.

But whether we like them or not, his trade tariffs, his determination to deport tens of thousands of people, and his apparent contempt for the rule of law are deeply rooted in American history.

Made in America shows how the ideal of liberty has been tested in past generations, from the first intolerant Pilgrims to the brutal invasion of Mexico, and reveals the dark side of the American Dream in order to offer urgent lessons to our turbulent present.

WILDFIRES

Coincident with this post we are dealing again with the consequences of wildfires north of us, including in the Boundary Waters area.  This was a serious problem last summer, and is again.

Within the last few days, in one of my perpetual quests to stay keep things reasonably well organized, I came across a rolled up poster from the Busch farm.  I unrolled it, got it somewhat flattened out, and here it is:

My Uncle and Aunt kept a lot of things, but not everything.  But for whatever reason, this poster was one of the keepers.  They were very conscious of the prairie environment of which they were a part.  This poster originated as a work of art by Augusta I Corson Metcalfe for Security State Bank, Cheyenne OK.

This is just a reminder that there is a strong undercurrent of environmental awareness. that long precedes us.