the fabulists or animal farm

As a freshman I can recall, in anticipation of reading the Platonic dialogues, that young, new students were warned off early on from drawing parallels of the trial and execution of Socrates and the judgement and crucifixion of Jesus—the comparison disdained as something obvious and sophomoric and rather a dangerous path to pursue. I of course was immediately drawn to the forbidden subject—completely new to me and probably nothing that I would have formulated on my own, but—wisely, I suppose, I kept that to myself.
Academics have come to recognize countless other messianic proceedings, both popularly and privately, and does tend to discourage reading too much into these dockets. One rather indulgent biography, with legendary portions and a lot of embellished and contradictory details of exploits and called a romance, addresses the life and career of a slave in Samos called Æsop, whose fables with personified foxes, lambs, donkeys and other characters are so ingrained and indoctrinating that one would be pressed to fail at making the allusion. The talking animals explore power-relationships and this allegorical device is the only way a slave could possibly mock his social betters in a highly hierarchical society and hope to keep his head—though the allegory is a thinly-veiled thing and I always wondered about listeners not getting the subtext. No tyrant, however flattered and deluded, would exclaim, I think, “what do you I’m not the innocent little rabbit?” The life and times of Æsop outside what is revealed in the fables is not really considered a reliably scholastic piece of work, there being too many versions and it’s mostly just lurid and with a lot of crude humour and misogyny, but the life of Æsop is surprising similar to the two exemplars above—Socrates (also considered endearingly ugly) even composing fables in the style of Æsop (many others have continued this tradition of the past three thousand years) as he’s awaiting his punishment, perhaps thinking that the direct-approach was the wrong way to go about things.
Most versions of the romance agree that Æsop was born into slavery and sold to a wealthy sophist on the Ægean island of Samos and was an extremely physically repulsive individual. Mute and without the power of speech at first, after showing kindness to a temple priestess, despite her being terrified of this ugly man offering help, the goddess Isis (figuring large in Greek culture also at the time) granted him not only the power of speech but also of eloquence. Glossing over the lewd episodes, Æsop’s parables saved him in many situations and allowed him to show up the professors at the philosophical schools. The slave who was never allowed to purchase his freedom in the traditional sense but nevertheless enjoyed much respect and autonomy was himself put to death—on trumped up charges of slander, by being made to walk off a cliff in Delphi after having supposedly slandered Apollo. The gods, echoed by Socrates, have a tendency to mete out their own punishment without human help, and a slighted Apollo did not let offending mortals off that easily.

dies vitiosus

The indispensably brilliant daily chronicler, Doctor Caligari, begins his detailed, far-reaching time-capsule by disabusing us about the pickle hidden in the Christmas tree, which was never some tradition enshrined in German holiday customs until one American retail fairy-tale marketed it as one—which we’ve ascribed to, as well. Incidentally, 5 December also marks the date that the last episode of Monty Python’s Flying Circus was aired in 1974, and further back in 1484 (with allowances for the calendar reform) when Pope Innocent IIX endorsed with papal bull, the auto de fey of the feline variety, including the familiars of witches and their human wards, which resulted in the Black Death and Protestantism. Be sure to consult Doctor Caligari’s Cabinet regularly for what daily ripples we are living with.

daytrip: the rosenau

H and I were in Rödental by Coburg and made a stop at the nearby Schloß Rosenau, referred to apparently in English—as we were about to learn through a litany of intimate connections, as the Rosenau. Owned for centuries by the Knights of Rosenau, the estate passed into the House of Saxe-Gotha after the last impoverished owner became weighted down by more debts incurred by a wonderfully eccentric ornithological hobby that entailed teaching native finches to sing like English pipits and self-publishing a treatise on it. The duke and duchess bore and raised the future Prince Albert in this castle—who would go on to become the husband (consort) of Queen Victoria. The couple lived in and reigned from mostly Windsor of course, but returned often to the Rosenau and the palace in Coburg.
After the outbreak of World War I made the British royal family much more reticent about admitting to their German connections, the property stood empty. As the Russian Revolution displaced other relations, however, the surviving line of the Romanov family and titular empress of the realm—with her ladies in waiting—was allowed to live there in exile, and in relative peace and comfort, having converted the library into an Orthodox chapel, until her death in 1938. Today, the castle and grounds are maintained as a state park and museum, and we’ll surely visit again for a tour and to see the gardens and their follies—ruins, grottoes and an artificial waterfall, in full glory. I knew some of this history beforehand, but it will forever strike me as incredulous that such events took place right down the road and garner little attention or fanfare.

haters gonna hate

5x5

figgy-pudding: a blithe review of the finest, right-proper Christmas carols

ozzmosis: clinical studies into godfather of heavy metal reveals that he is genetically predisposed to survive and thrive decades of sex, drugs and rock-and-roll 

won’t you be my neighbour: Kottke directs us to a caring and thoughtful reflection on TV’s Fred Rogers

simulacraceae: a wildly imaginative piece on 3D printed gardening rooted in an exploration of pollinator-flower geometry

honey trap: farmers in Africa use fences of bee hives to deter elephants from wreaking their crops 

marchons or rearranging the deck chairs

Icelandic artist and activity Ólafur Eliasson working with geologist Minik Rosing have salvaged tonnes of icy obelisks, already doomed to their consummation, from the breaking front of Greenland’s glacial ice sheet and transported to them to central Paris, where delegates attending the crucial COP21 climate conference can witness them melt.
This is a pretty powerful statement and it’s highly recommended you visit the link and see more of Eliasson’s projects, but none to my mind was as stirring as the subdued Paris en Marche, when after the public rally was cancelled due to heightened security concerns and gatherings were banned, thousands brought pair by pair shoes to stand in for the absented protesters.

viennese sandbox: schönbrunn palace

As if the Hofburg was not palatial and accommodating enough, the imperial dynasty of the Hapsburgs also had a summer residence, just on the outskirts—seemingly at least, buffered by the huge, ancient gardens and grounds that include a menagerie of statuary and fountains, a hedge labyrinth and some architectural follies like artificial Roman ruins—and overlooking the city.
This baroque household boasts over fourteen hundred rooms and is crowned from a considerable distance by a structure known as the Gloriette a top a high hill.
The slope where the pavilion (the term means little room in Old French) stands offers an amazing, encompassing view of Vienna below was originally planned as the site of the palace, and was erected as a monument to serve as a focal point, a setting for dining al fresco, and as a dedication to a Just War (jus bellum iustum)—the worthy conflict goes unnamed (possible to honour all righteous indignation) but probably referred to Empress Maria Theresa’s own handiwork that allowed her to retain her power:
the War of the Austrian Succession, a global conflict that broke out on unexpected fronts, precipitating the French and Indian Wars in North America, Prussia and English-Bavaria, Russia and proxy-wars in the Far East.
A top the Neptune Fountain, the Gloriette was constructed from left over materials that went into building the artificial ruin and originally cannibalised from the defensive compound, Schloss Neugebäude, by then already suffering from neglect and disrepair and modelled after and constructed on the site where the Ottoman armies of Suleiman the Magnificent encamped during the first Siege of Vienna.