Stanza 21 of the first edition of Edward FitzGerald’s translation of The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám continues with the theme of the shortness of life and the finality of death, but introduces new emotions, of grief for lost loved ones and nostalgia for the past. These poignant lines have sometimes made me cry. We get […]
Ypsilanti, named for a Greek Freedom Fighter against Tyranny, Rallies against Trump on “No Kings” Day
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – In the 1820s Greece waged a successful war of independence against an authoritarian king, the Ottoman Emperor Mahmoud II. The American public, enthralled with this saga of a quest for liberty, idolized the revolutionaries, who were led for a few years by Demetrios Ypsilantis. They took his name for the […]
Infectious Diseases “Spiraling out of Control” in Gaza as Israel Cuts Aid Entry in Half
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The terms of the Trump ceasefire in Gaza required Israeli authorities to allow 600 trucks of food and medical aid into the Strip daily, in a full court press by the United Nations and NGOs to flood the zone with nutrition after the Israeli blockade provoked famine in parts of […]
Terror from the Skies in the Middle East: Israel and the Ghost of Bomber Harris
Here is my essay for this week’s Tomdispatch.com . Check out the great Tom Engelhardt’s introduction at that site, where he reminds us of the eerie similarity of today’s Washington strategy toward the Middle East, of intensive bombardment, to that of Nixon-Kissinger in Southeast Asia. For people of my generation, it raises the sad question […]
“Ah, my Belovéd, fill the Cup that clears:” FitzGerald’s The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám 1:20
Stanza no. 20 in in the first edition of Edward FitzGerald’s The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám celebrates wine as a means of escaping lingering shame and the dread of an unknown future. It is about, as the hippies used to say in the 1960s, “being here now,” with a little help from a mind-altering substance. […]
Syria’s Parliamentary Election Results look Alarmingly like Iraq 2005, which produced a Civil War
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Syria’s parliamentary elections on October 5 raised alarm flags for me on several grounds. First, they were not conducted on the basis of a direct vote. Sixty “constituencies” were established to elect 121 members of the People’s Assembly of Syria (only 119 were actually elected). Another 70 members will be […]
Wind and Solar Provide 40% of Brazil’s Electricity for first time
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – This month Brazil’s National Electric System Operator estimated that wind and solar are now producing nearly 40 percent of the country’s electricity. It was just in August of this year that the country’s wind and solar installations hit the milestone of generating over a third of the country’s electricity (some […]
Israeli Government Votes to Implement Trump Peace Plan for Gaza as Hamas Pledges to Uphold it
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – According to the Israeli newspaper Arab 48 , the Israeli government on Friday approved the ceasefire in Gaza and the hostage exchange, and agreed to begin withdrawing troops from the west of the Strip. The approval came after the arrival of President Donald Trump’s Middle East envoys Steve Witkoff and […]
“From what once lovely Lip it springs unseen:” FitzGerald’s The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám 1:19
With no. 19 in in the first edition of Edward FitzGerald’s The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám, the theme turns away from the glory of kings as a flash-in-the-pan to the impermanence of life for everyone. One of the tropes common in the subsequent poems, already used in no. 18, is that we are clay and […]
© 2025 All Rights Reserved