瓦尔特保卫萨拉热窝

A cinematic masterwork in its own right, the film by director Hajrudin Krvavac, premiering just over a half century ago in mid-April, Walter Defends Sarajevo, stands on its own merits with intrigues, betrayals, complex characters, action sequences and an overarching message of triumph and defiance aligned with the Yugoslav ideal of harmony and inclusion in a multi-ethnic state, the film tells the story of heroic resistance to occupation in a plot to foil the Nazi forces 1945 attempt to withdraw from the Balkans and regroup, based loosely on the sacrifice of partisan leader Vladimir Peric who fought under the code name and whose real identity was unknown to the enemy, and has the distinction of being a real contender for the most viewed production of all time. Its release coinciding with the gradual introduction of foreign films and during a time of tensions between the Soviet Union and China, the censors began admitting select works—mostly documentaries from Romania, Hungary and the Yugoslav Republics—but Walter Defends Sarajevo was unique among this class and unlike what most in China had experienced beforehand. Previewed as a radio-play a generation committed the dialogue to heart before the screenings began, playing to a billion individuals over the course of a year in theatres, schools, factories and village squares. Spoiler alert: the operative of the Sicherheitsdienst deployed to capture and kill ‘Walter’ muses during the film’s iconic ending why he was never able to find his nemesis and comes to the realisation—“Sehen Sie dieses Stadt? Das ist Walter!” Still shown to the this day, its influence can be seen in the Chinese film industry.

orbital resonance

Though the Octave of Easter refers to a specific eight-day celebration in connect to the Paschaltide, our

word week itself (via the German Woche) derives from the same root as octave and that one out-of-cycle unit of time—that is, seemingly the sequence repeated for countless generations not determined by the motion of the Heavens or our perception of them but nonetheless in most Western and Eastern traditions named for the astronomical objects visible to the unaided eye. The ordering does not accord with the classical model of the Cosmos—the “Chaldean order” that describes the apparent overtaking and retrograde motion relative to the Earth—nor hierarchy of the pantheon, however, but rather the seven strings of the Mesopotamian lyre with which the celestial spheres were thought to harmonise: (4) Sunday ☉, (1) Monday ☽, (5) Tuesday ♂ (Mardi in French), (2) Wednesday ☿ (Mercoledì), (6) Thursday ♃ (Donnerstag), (3) Friday ♀ (Venres) and (7) Saturday ♄. Vexed somewhat by the onerous and complicated Roman subdivision of the days and the planetary officer appointed to each hours, the order of the weekdays seemingly recapitulates musical theory and progression through the major scale. More at the links above and in this video adaptation below from Sara de Rose.

🐎

Whilst we wouldn’t forget that .horse is a viable web domain owing to the landing-page of the excellent Carrie Poppy (see previously), we appreciated being referred by Web Curios to this compendium of all websites registered with this particular suffix and anthology to explore. Unfortunately many are re-directs or seem to be moribund but that just means that a lot are still available, though sadly not cheese.horse.

dmsmh

Celebrated as Dianetics Day in the Church of Scientology (previously), today marks the 1950 anniversary of the first sales of the foundational book by L Ron Hubbard subtitled The Modern Science of Mental Health. Colloquially and canonically referred to as “Book One,” it outlines the system developed by the author out of personal experience, his understanding of some tenants of Eastern philosophy and the psychoanalytic traditions of Sigmund Freud. Despite outright rejection by the community of medical and mental health professions and most critics who compared the repetitious and immature tautologies to the works of Wilhelm Reich, it was a best-seller and found an audience as well as an attendant religious movement, which number their years relative to its publication—this year being 72 AD—that is, after Dianetics.

himmelsscheibe

Coming home from Saxony we took a detour and finally got the chance to check out the Arche Nebra—a museum and planetarium near the archeological site where the prehistoric skydisc was discovered. The actual artefact is usually kept in Halle and was presently on loan to the British museum as part of an ancient astronomy exhibit that couples it with the megalithic timepieces like Stonehenge and the nearby counterpart, the Goseck circle, a solar observatory from neolithic times—but there were plenty of detailed replicas on hand to study and gain an appreciation in situ of this rather overwhelming tool. From the perspective of the promontory where it was discovered (Fundort), the golden bands ringing the edge form an arc precisely corresponding with the Sun’s pendular journey between the peak of the Brocken and the peak of the Kyffhäuser in the Harz rising and setting at the spring and autumn equinoxes and indicating by the appearance of the New Moon and its proximity to the Pleiades (see above) when to plant and whether the year will be a common year or will need an intercalary month inserted to keep the stars aligned with the cycle of the seasons, this earliest known representation of the Cosmos features no gods or heroes, only the calendar of the night sky. In the area, we also stopped at the village of Zingst on the Unstrut river to inspect this manor house by the road that looked like it had seen time conscripted as a factory with the addition of an industrial smoke-stack and the vista of the largest medieval castle complex—similar in scale and composition to the Wartburg—in middle Germany, Burg Querfurt, something to see another day.

why do i find it hard to write the next line?

Reaching the top spot of the UK charts on this day in 1983, the song by English New Wave, New Romantic group Spandau Ballet by member Gary Kemp attempting to write a tribute to his inspirations, Marvin Gaye and Al Green, narrating his difficulty with the creative process—called blue-eyed soul at the time before we had the more accurate conflict of cultural appropriation, reclaimed to a degree when sampled by PM Dawn for “Set A-Drift on Memory Bliss” in 1991, from setting out for such a standard to hit all the same notes. Nonetheless the number, despite and because of its intentions, was hugely popular and enduring.

all-seeing or the eyes have it

Though apparently gregarious with most of the village as well, a young peacock—we thought it was a peahen but learned it was young one and the signature plumage and dimorphism does not develop until they reach three years of age—has adopted H and I and roams our yard and roosts in various spots on the balcony and the front stoop, friendly in guest territory but possibly territorial in his own backyard. He belongs to a neighbour and is called Charlie and often appears before the French doors and jarringly at times at the kitchen window sill. Apparently this behaviour in peafowl, congregating before glazed façades, is to examine themselves in the glass, like a mirror. I held up my cell phone display in front of Charlie to reflect back his image and he regarded it with interest, rather than destructive pecking at the screen and my hand. I remember the controversy a few years back over an airline passenger trying to board with their therapy peacock and at the time siding with those who condemned the act as performative and over-the-top but getting a sense of their calm demeanour and engagement, I have come around to the other side in thinking these are legitimate therapy animals, tail-feathers and all. We are looking into getting our own. The collective term for a group of peafowl is an ostentation.

blitzcrete

Via the always intriguing Things Magazine, we quite enjoyed this introduction to the architectural vernacular of John Outram with news of his long overdue revival. Active since 1974 and producing a series of polychromatic public spaces that reference the temples of Antiquity. Commissions include the Pumping Station on the Isle of Dogs, projects for Cambridge and Rice University in Houston, Texas, the refurbished Old Town Hall of the Hague plus an unrealised shopping promenade for Battersea Power Station.