My friend and colleague Paul Verhaeghen is a truly talented individual indeed. Paul is a renowned psychologist, specializing in cognitive aging: what happens to older peoples’ working memory and long term memory as they age (OK, I copied this straight from his web site). This is all well and good, and I would normally be delighted to have talented colleagues, and not at all threatened by their accomplishments. Paul also plays a crucial role as co-organizer of Cafe Scientifique Syracuse, which is wonderful and also unthreatening, since I’m also involved in that.
But there’s this other thing. Something that just eats away at me, particularly given my love of contemporary literature and my secret writings that will never see the light of day. You see, Paul is an author. And not just any old author; Paul is an award winning author who critics have compared to David Foster Wallace – a favorite of mine (when I can get past the footnotes). Damn you Verhaeghen!!!! At least he’s not a nice guy with cool glasses, or this could really start to bother me.
In January, Paul accepted the Flemish Culture Award (Cultuurprijs) for Fiction – roughly the equivalent of the National Book Award in America, but given out once every three years. His winning novel, Omega Minor, was therefore considered to be the best work of Flemish fiction published between 2003 and 2005.
Unfortunately, my own linguistic limitations mean that I’m going to have to wait for the English translation, which Paul is doing himself and is due in 2007. This also means I can’t tell you much about the novel here, although you can read about it in this Syracuse University News article.
But there’s another aspect of Paul winning the Cultuurprijs that’s worth telling you about, and that’s his extraordinary acceptance speech. I won’t provide commentary, but here it is
Ladies and Gentlemen,
At the end of the nineties, when I started working on this book, I thought I was writing historical fiction. A story about the rise of fascism, a story about the totalitarian regime in the German Democratic Republic, a story about the horrors of war. A historical novel. It all happened a long time ago.
This is 2006.
When I was writing Omega Minor, I would never have guessed that the country I live in, the United States of America, would ever resemble Germany in the 1930s. Now there are concentration camps for presumed enemies of the regime — more than 83,000 people have been detained since 9/11, and 14,000 are still ‘in custody’ –, and just like the Nazis, who exported the horror to Poland, the American government detains these people in Iraq and Afghanistan, in Egypt, on Cuba, and in countless other places. There are again torture rooms, and eager torturers, and the architect of the legal underpinnings of torture is now attorney general.
In Omega Minor, I wrote: “What if the terrorist networks and the political reality overlap? What if the violence of the new state is the same as the violence of the vanquished Reich? What if those who liberated the camps fill them up again with ideological adversaries?” We have seen pictures of shiny happy torturers in Abu Ghraib, and hazy photographs of cages in Guantánamo Bay. We have heard the persistent rumors of secret CIA prisons in Romania and Poland, and with a signing statement the president of the United States of America has kept the door wide open for the use of torture against non-citizens — pushing aside both the Geneva convention and the laws of his own country.
The invasion, occupation, and destruction of Iraq was unnecessary, senseless, barbaric, and immoral. However one looks at it, the 28,293 Iraqi civilians — men, women, children — who died in war and the 2,247 American soldiers who gave their loves for a political lie that only served to keep a political dynasty in power are not a worthy monument for the three-thousand civilian victims of 9/11. Bring this up and you will be denounced as un-American.
Ladies and gentlemen, I have made the calculation. If I would accept the 12,500 euros associated with this award, about five-thousand dollars would flow into the American Treasury. I could pretend that this money will be used to finance public schools or medical care, or will help to alleviate the suffering of the forty million Americans who live below the poverty line. But who would I be kidding? The president just asked Congress for an extra 120 billion in emergency funds for the war. I gladly accept the award, but the money — no, that I cannot accept. This money would be paid for in human blood.
Omega Minor, very last sentences: “The world ever ends. It never ever ends.” When I wrote those words, they were meant to inspire hope. Now I am not so certain that the eternal recurrence of the same leaves any room for hope.
Friends. This world belongs to us; to all of us. Be vigilant. Do the right thing.
May you fare well.
– Paul Verhaeghen, Brussels, February 6, 2006 –
March 7th, 2006 at 12:20 am
We as a Western society are finally in a position to ask deep, powerful questions and determine their real world answers. How do we spend our $billions, personal and State? We gorge the infinitely hungry gullets of genetic, developmental, and behavioral trash; reproductive warriors, hind gut fermenters, drug addicts, Enviro-whiner Luddites; the stupid, the pathetic, and the Officially Sad.
Implicit to the task is jackbooted State compassion redistributing income, executing warrantless searches and seizures at airports, denying scholar students scholarships and even university admission – diversity!… The productive must be punished for their productivity.
It has already been the death of us. There do not remain time and physical resources to pull ourselves out of the death spiral. 2015 will see 100 million Baby Boomers demanding their free $1200/month Social Security plus unlimited free medical care. 1/3 of the US will be retired and Welfare parasites consuming but not producing; 1/4 of the US will be non-productive youth. There isn’t that much “discovered” money on the whole planet. It is already over.
March 7th, 2006 at 1:59 am
Wow, I hope Paul is able to return to his home in the US (at least assuming he wants to). This administration is not going to be happy about his speech. I will now have to go out and buy and read the book. Those were strong woirds and clearly felt very deeply.
March 7th, 2006 at 8:29 am
The detainment of suspects in concentration camps without charge, and their torture, is tolerated simply because American government is elected and trusted by and large. The same could be said about the German people trusting a leader and electing him in 1933, and later operating his concentration camps in the belief it is all for the best.
But Prime Minister Tony Blair should win the big crackpot prize for his “dodgy dossier” about Saddam having the power to wipe out London within 30 minutes. I don’t think politicians should have complete control to distort and corrupt scientifically based intelligence for propaganda purposes, to defend going to war. That’s in the category of Hitler’s abuse of genetics to support anti-semitism.
March 7th, 2006 at 11:04 am
extraordinary, yes–and pathetic. To have those opinions is one (perfectly respectible) thing; to voice them in an acceptance speech for a *literature* prize is simply rude. It is a mark of that particular intellectual arrogance shared by so many of today’s extremists that they are so convinced of their own righteousness that they will offer their politics as truth in any setting they please. A comment on how today might resemble to book scnario (whatever it is) would not be out of place. But making an entire acceptance speech just direct political criticism is disrespectful to the audience, the giver of the award, and to literature in general. What is most sad about this is that the audience and award giver–given that europeans in general seem to have decided that these sorts of statements are indeed truth, not opinion–probably didn’t even mind. But literature did. And Plato is rolling over in his grave.
March 7th, 2006 at 11:12 am
Sam,
“All it takes for evil to flourish is for good men to do nothing.”
These are extraordinary times.
Not only appropriate but heroic IMHO.
Elliot
March 7th, 2006 at 11:40 am
Sam, don’t fool yourself. They’ll be coming for you too. No-one can maintain the level of credulity and dictator-worship that are required as proof of loyalty.
I left S. Africa for many reasons, inter alia that same one that Paul cites: the taxes I paid were going to support torture, done in my name. I thought the US would be different, but here we are again. My Congressmonster responds back to my pleas on torture with weaselly little screeds that maintain the right of Bush the Younger to torture whoever he pleases.
I can read Flemish, so I’ll check out the book..
March 7th, 2006 at 12:25 pm
Science, I’m as big an opponent of the invasion of Iraq as the next person. However, I worry sometimes when I see others quote “facts” about the war which are clearly and demonstrably incorrect. Blair *did not* suggest that Saddam could “wipe out London” in 30 minutes. What he actually claimed was that Saddam possessed biological weapons which could be mobilised against targets in the region in 45 minutes. He most certainly did not say what you claim he did.
I also find your comparison between Blair and Hitler to be utterly juvenile. Sam Gralla’s undergraduate thinking is little better.
March 7th, 2006 at 12:47 pm
I think you have to understand how leadership of the United States played the role in leading other countries to do what has been done.
Nobel Prize speeches provide the opportunity for some really good wisdom shared.
The Canadian/American relationship was hurt very badly, when Canada did not desire to join. The speech and declaration as to the intensive purposes and recogniton of those who hold the ideas best were announced, while it’s neighbor Canada, was sourly missed.
We do not condone terrorism of any kind or we would have reminded you Americans that we had taken the White House once, we can do it again?
Could countries have differences of opinion, that you might say that, “either you are with us or you are against us?” That you would alienate those who sit on your northern frontier?
There are deeper principles for some of us Canadians embued in the thinking about equality which many strive to remind in the growth and strengths of democracies.
About it’s peoples. The language of it’s constitutions.
Since when did “oil” rate up their with the standard of Gold and Silver of Wisdom?
March 7th, 2006 at 12:53 pm
March 7th, 2006 at 12:56 pm
Canadians always like to bring up the burning of the White House, but somehow always fail to mention the utter defeat at New Orleans in the same war, materially assisted by the Acadians the British had ethnically cleansed from Canada.
March 7th, 2006 at 3:38 pm
So the guy is a standard issue run of the mill Leftist complete with the tendency to politicize every occasion. Is this supposed to be surprising for an academic in the social sciences?
March 7th, 2006 at 4:48 pm
dictator-worship?
I hate Bush. I just have respect for other people’s opinions, and the humility (i.e., lack of the ridiculous arrogance you have) to realize that I might be wrong–that other’s opinions might count for something–and therefore restrict my criticism of Bush, or discussion of any other political issue, to appropriate forums, where people have come expecting such discussion. If I had offered a literary prize to an author, for a piece of literature I had liked, I would want to hear about literature from him, and only politics insofar as it was important for understanding the literature or its genesis. I would be gravely disappointed, and insulted, if his acceptance speech were just a political diatribe like this one.
But dictator-worship? Not me, lol… But congratulations for stereotyping me! (since I presume you hate stereotypes, as a liberal.)
As for the quote from the Republic:
I certainly agree that Bush would not fit Plato’s standards for the good ruler. If any one part of Bush’s soul is in control, it is the spirited (glory-seeking) part. But Plato would also highly disapprove of this acceptance speech. Perhaps his greatest fear in a government was the mixing of poetry (i.e., the arts) and politics. But that’s a bit of an aside–I don’t want get in to just what Plato meant by kicking out the poets. The point is is just that it’s possible (and I’d certainly say desirable) to hate both Bush and this speech. One because you think Bush has done bad things, and the other because there are thoughtful intelligent people out there who think those things were good. If there is a large body of comparatively educated people who disagree with you (and believe me, there is for Bush, even if there is a larger body of uneducated people), and you are sure that they’re all wrong or idiots or evil, then that is when I call you intellectually arrogant. Have some respect for other people.
March 7th, 2006 at 4:53 pm
Belizean,
I guess it isn’t surprising. I had forgotten that he was in the social sciences as I wrote, I think. Because he was getting a literature prize I assumed in the back of my mind that he was somehow in literature, I guess, and therefore would be expected to have a bit more respect for it.
-Sam
March 7th, 2006 at 5:53 pm
damtp_dweller:
Rt. Hon. Tony Blair: ‘The assessed intelligence has established beyond doubt that Saddam has continued to produce chemical and biological weapons, that he continues in his efforts to develop nuclear weapons, and that he has been able to extend the range of his ballistic missile programme.’ – http://www.spiked-online.com/Articles/00000006DA63.htm
The hard-hitting claim Blair used to sell the war was that within a matter of minutes (45 minutes sounds very a nice precise number, very impressive) a large number of people could be killed by Saddam’s regime either by nuclear, biological or chemical weapons, delivered by terrorists or by ballistic missiles with extended range. Look, I like some of the Labour Party policies, but I think it is immoral and unethical for Blair to sell a war on information which was known to be dodgy. Blair edited out the strong caveats in the draft. These are the facts.
I do think Blair is the best leader around for Britain, it is just sad that ‘all power currupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely’. It is the lack of any half-decent alternative that gives Blair near dictatorial power as PM.
March 7th, 2006 at 5:59 pm
Fair enough Hektor.
Harry Bridges 1901 – 1990
Sam,
There are good leaders out there. They paid a price for social change. A upheavel was needed. Writers like Mark is showing speak their mind, are part of a larger social fabric. Seeds, for change. A mother, who had lost a son.
March 7th, 2006 at 9:04 pm
Bush is Hitler. Got it. That’s original or insightful or brave or something. Not.
March 7th, 2006 at 9:22 pm
Sam Gralia (#13). I would have thought that writing a major award-winning novel would firmly place one as “in Literature”, no matter what other qualifications or occupations one had.
March 8th, 2006 at 12:17 am
Mark:
I guess you’re right. I was feeling combative when I wrote that. He certainly has more to his resume in terms of being ‘in literature’ enough to understand it than I do. All the same, I think his message was out of place–and it sure would have pissed me off, if I were there. And again, for the record, I strongly dislike Bush.
-Sam
March 8th, 2006 at 1:30 am
The context of History is litered with counter-histories?
Here in the UK, many people observe history as it unfolds and form misgiuded opinions. The IRAQ-IRAN war for instance:1979 Shah disposed from IRAQ, “fundemental” students dictate gruond rule inside Iran..1980 U.S backs/handwaves? Saddam Hussain to instigate long standing border issue’s trying to nip-in-bud radical, and “Un-American values” that is percieved in West, U.S/Hussain insurgents formed and dispatched to U.K, insurgents/terrorists take over Iranian Embassy in Princess Gate U.K:
http://www.hkpro.com/hkembassy.htm
There are still people today in the U.K who actually believe that the Iranian Embassy Hostage crises was acted out by IRANIAN-TERRORISTS!..infact these were U.S/IRAQI terrorists formed specifically to function in a single operation, the Iranian Embassy, the target was actually picked in the U.K due to the obvious fact that no “terrorist” would escape and devulge groups purpose.
Thus the joint U.S/IRAQI/U.K coalition begins, this was a ground breaking era as far as excercising forward “global” planning goes.
Following outcomes:Foreground = Iraq-Iran war, background
U.S backs Saddam Hussain whilst Russia backs Iraq (cold, really cold war?).
U.S arms Saddam Hussain whilst there is a worldwide arms embargo against IRAQ and IRAN, Russia arms Iraq.
U.S allows Gerald Bull to progress with his “supergun” dream..Russian arm supply to Iran starts to wane as their are fighting “two-fronts” Afghanastan..Iraq gets upper hand against Iran..realizing the casualties back home are effecting those governing their nation, Russia withdraws from Afghanastan..Saddam Hussain declares himself the victor in Iraq-Iran war (really the Iranian army has lost its major supplier as Russia withdraws home).
On the world stage, the Iraq Iran war is declared over, seeing Saddam Hussain and his troops proclaiming to be the saviours of the Middle East, U.S brokers for the return of all its military hardware supplied to Hussain all through the 8O’s, Saddam Hussain refuses to return a single bullet.
U.S realizes that Saddam Hussain is now a major liability to middles east Oil Supplies, and basically they have Armed one of the most wayward gunslingers ever!
U.S cannot ask outright for their military hardware, as as far as the world is concerned, the Arms Embargo was maintained under UN mandate of the 80′s, so they “need” an incident to occur, “handwave” Saddam towards Kuwait, stressing they would not intervene.
The rest is History! or civilization as we “think” we know it?..the Russians have learn one or two things about forward planning:
http://www.theadventuresofchester.com/archives/2006/02/the_saddam_tape.html
Timeline:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/january/16/newsid_2530000/2530475.stm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1980
but then again it’s all counterfactual ?
March 8th, 2006 at 1:40 am
Most “world” events are ‘tit-for-tat’ excercises, example this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruhollah_Khomeini#Hostage_crisis
event sparked this event:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iranian_Embassy_Siege
just a couple of months between them, and directly related.
March 8th, 2006 at 2:23 am
“His winning novel, Omega Minor, was therefore considered to be the best work of Flemish fiction published between 2003 and 2005.”
Is there a prize for the best work of literature written in Cornish between February and March 2003?
March 8th, 2006 at 4:57 am
‘Bush is Hitler. Got it. That’s original or insightful or brave or something. Not.’ – Lee
Lee, the Iraq war death toll is now ~ 30,000 http://www.iraqbodycount.net/index.php
This is similar to the scale the fascists had achieved until 1939, depending on the death toll we accept for Hitler’s 1937 involvement in the Spanish Civil War (repeatedly “accidentally” bombing a lot of civilians in cities). His propaganda was distorting genetic facts to support a theory to excuse German problems in WWI as being due to Jews. Up until 1939, he was warmly supported by large sections of the media, who reported his cure for unemployment (military spending), the world’s first freeway/autobahn, his proposed 25-year peace pact, and ironically the non-aggression pact he signed over tea at Munich with the UK Prime Minister.
Politicians who cynically distort scientific facts to start wars are approaching the early (1920-30s) Hitler model. The politician can’t make a convincing case for war using the facts, so he distorts the facts to “justify” a war in which tens of thousands die.
March 8th, 2006 at 5:17 am
The parallels between Hitler’s Germany and how Hitler and his cronies garnered more and more power, and the present U.S. (mis)administration are quite frightening. Also, how the “American Taliban” are gaining more control of public policy (think South Dakota and Missouri), imposing their viewpoints on everyone. These people could easily be placed in Eric Hoffer’s book about true believers.
March 9th, 2006 at 8:18 am
In case you think everyone reading this blog thinks otherwise, let me say that I found the speech to be completely fatuous and undergraduate (in the worst possible sense) in its historical comparisons and its moral reasoning. The only thing that gives me mild pleasure from it is that such hyperbole does not win over the hearts of minds of sensible voters.
March 10th, 2006 at 12:00 pm
As an Indian, I faced (and still face) very tough choices. When I applied to graduate school in the US, I KNEW (through friends in the Indian Intelligence community) that the US actively sponsors terrorism in India via Pakistan. About half a million Hindus have been killed in Kashmir in the last 15 years, and more continue to be killed, and about a million Kashmiri Hindus have become refugees in their own country in the worst case of ethnic cleansing I have seen.
I know that my tax dollars sponsor the killing of my own people. But I never had a choice in the matter, obviously because I am not well-known. However, it isn’t just me – this cause is not well-known either. It isn’t fashionable, and it hurts me to see that no one is ever willing to even talk about this.
Not that I am against anything said here; all I am trying to say is that the tyranny of the US extands far beyond Iraq, Guantanamo Bay and Abu Ghraib.
March 20th, 2006 at 9:37 am
As a concerned American, I utterly oppose Sam’s
comment: “To have those opinions is one (perfectly respectible) thing; to voice them in an acceptance speech for a *literature* prize is simply rude.”
Leadership requires saying the truth as you see it,
whether or not that is considered “rude” or if your
opinions have not yet been accepted by the mainstream.
To be “polite” is to accept and implicitly endorse the status quo.
Our current situation is indeed very dangerous– unchecked presidential power used for the advantage of corporate interests, and short range interests at that. How can we look the other way when
we know our government is torturing people, at this very moment? When Bush repeats his judgement that pre-emptive war is a fine thing? when he says that his judgement overrules laws passed by Congress? The last remaining check on his power is the Supreme Court which they are now packing with their supporters.
Even Sandra Day O’Connor, retired Supreme Court justice
is concerned that we are slipping towards dictatorship:
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/20/opinion/20mon1.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin
“The retired Justice Sandra Day O’Connor observed in a recent speech that the framers created three separate and equal branches of government because they knew that preserving liberty requires that no single branch or person can amass unchecked power. According to NPR’s Nina Totenberg, who heard the speech, Justice O’Connor cited Republican court-stripping efforts as an example of dangerous overreaching. “It takes a lot of degeneration before a country falls into dictatorship,” Justice O’Connor said, “but we should avoid these ends by avoiding these beginnings.”
The president seems to forget that and Congress clearly will not remind him. The nation cannot afford for the Supreme Court to forget as well.
”
As well as the death and destruction that this administration is causing, they are undermining
all the civilizing institutions that have taken
years to build, the Geneva conventions foremost,
and are pushing world civilization towards barbarism.
Not only that, while the US has nearly doubled our
national debt through tax breaks to the rich and our
efforts to dominate the entire planet (ever hear of
“full spectrum dominance”?)
We world citizens are
being seriously endangered with climate change and
the cost of oil going ever higher as the supply runs
down. The sane policy would be to devote massive effort to developing clean energy alternatives immediately.
We are running out of time! I praise and respect Paul Verhaeghen’s speaking out–
May 25th, 2006 at 6:59 pm
The Guardian Science Podcasts
For the last couple of months, The Guardian has been producing a weekly science podcast, in which the Guardian science team discusses various topics and interviews experts on the issues of the week.
Some examples are
An interview with David Bodani…
June 29th, 2006 at 10:00 am
[...] An interview with David Bodanis, who recently won the Aventis science book prize for his book How Electricity Switched on the Modern World (Incidentally, it is worth either listening to or reading about what he did with his prize money, which reminded me of what my friend Paul did with his). (This week’s episode, May 22) [...]