Nepenthe

I may have posted this already, if so, well, sue me :p Illusion and Reality Cozy Up at Tate Modern in its Turbine Hall: a smoke and mirror extravaganza of fog machines and a fake sun (yellow lights behind a semicircular screen beneath a mirrored ceiling).

F. Catal?-Roca

Christopher Hitchens on the latest events in Spain

Virtual We had virtually finished our book on e-mail and other virtual writing before we gave much thought to the origins of the word virtual. In its latest incarnation (used like digital, e- and cyber- to describe something existing in the electronic ether), virtual is even more ubiquitous than Elvis memorabilia on eBay. It was probably inevitable that scientists in the last half of the 20th century would seize on virtual to mean simulated or carried out by means of computers. Long before Univac -- since the mid-17th century, in fact -- virtual had come to mean existing in effect rather than in reality. And the adverb virtually meant something akin to ''practically'' or ''almost,'' as in ''virtually everyone knows Pepys.'' But virtual has a much older meaning, and you can forget those nerdy, computer-jock associations. Vir comes from an ancient Indo-European root meaning ''man'' (think ''virile'...

Poe's tortured heart still beats in today's literature [I just had to use this new font - for me - Blackadder :-D]

The Maiden Name Debate in the States

Pizarro and Atahuallpa "The prudence, fortitude, military discipline, labors, perilous navigations, and battles of the Spaniards, vassals of the most invincible Emperor of the Roman Catholic Empire, our natural King and Lord, will cause joy to the faithful and terror to the infidels. For this reason, and for the glory of God our Lord and for the service of the Catholic Imperial Majesty, it has seemed good to me to write this narrative, and to send it to Your Majesty, that all may have a knowledge of what is here related. It will be to the glory of God, because they have conquered and brought to our holy Catholic Faith so vast a number of heathens, aided by His holy guidance. It will be to the honor of our Emperor because, by reason of his great power and good fortune, such events happened in his time. It will give joy to the faithful that such battles have been won, such provinces discovered and conquered, such riches brought home for the King and for themselves; and that such...

for the sheer aggressiveness of colour :-)

When you have nothing more to say, just drive For a day all around the peninsula. The sky is tall as over a runway, The land without marks so you will not arrive But pass through, though always skirting landfall. At dusk, horizons drink down sea and hill, The ploughed field swallows the whitewashed gable And you're in the dark again. -- Seamus Heaney

Once I had the rarest rose That ever deigned to bloom. Cruel winter chilled the bud And stole my flower too soon. [...] Let me be the only one To keep you from the cold Now the floor of heaven's lain With stars of brightest gold

My dearest Literature and Film professor on The Passion of the Christ : O coelho esfolado As representações cinematográficas da figuras de Cristo pautaram-se durante muito tempo por uma imagem icónica muito próxima dos "santinhos", daqueles de colocar entre as páginas de um missal. O principal responsável por essa fixação foi Cecil B. De Mille, o paladino do "peplum" bíblico, cujo "O Rei dos Reis" (1927) não só dissolvia a sua primeira aparição numa aura nebulosa e mística de milagreiro, mas também construía para as cenas fulcrais da ressurreição um significativo aparato de cor, em primitivo technicolor - o perfeito endeusamento em "image d'Épinal". No entanto, para as gerações posteriores, as marcantes aparições crísticas, no momento em que o cinema se voltara de novo para os "blockbusters" históricos e bíblicos, com o objectivo de enfrentar o inimigo televisivo, surgem na década de 60: "O Rei dos Reis" de N...

Un blog español premiado.... nice design

This is for you: Sunrise sunrise Looks like morning in your eyes But the clocks had nine fifteen for hours and Wakin' up without you I can hardly speak at all (...) In the mornin' Baby in the afternoon Funny how my favorite shirt Smells more like you than me Bitter traces left behind Stains no one can see

Come away with me in the night Come away with me And I will write you a song Come away with me on a bus Come away where they can't tempt us With their lies I want to walk with you On a cloudy day In fields where the yellow grass grows knee-high So won't you try to come Come away with me and we'll kiss On a mountaintop Come away with me And I'll never stop loving you And I want to wake up with the rain Falling on a tin roof While I'm safe there in your arms So all I ask is for you To come away with me in the night Come away with me

Naufragium , trilingual blog (the ones that matter to both of us :-) about shipwrecks and the sea , the sea ... (Last meal)