History
Bread and Puppet Theater Memorial Shrines
Chelsea Edgar writes for Seven Days on the traditions and legacies of the Bread and Puppet Theater, a mainstay of the East Coast (and particularly Vermont) counterculture: A short distance into the pine forest above the circus field, just beyond the remnants of a Baldwin piano that has been left to molder in the elements, … Read moreBread and Puppet Theater Memorial Shrines
“Grief Counseling With Kermit”
Sophie Brickman writes for The Atlantic on the transformative power of The Muppets as she grieves her father: That changed after my father got sick last year, when my daily life became not just a logistical mire—managing therapy appointments, speaking with doctors—but also one of constant dread: about which Dad I’d find when I walked … Read more“Grief Counseling With Kermit”
“As If”
Sam Dresser writes for Aeon: Two puny words shoulder a substantial, if diffuse, philosophical outlook: as if. Epicurus was perhaps the first to put this unexceptional construction to good use. He felt that life was about attaining whatever passing happiness we might find, while avoiding as much pain and suffering as we can. In neither … Read more“As If”
“The bookends of time”
Thomas Moynihan writes for Aeon: Just under 500 years ago, Nicolaus Copernicus initiated a string of discoveries eventually proving our planet is not the centre of a tidy, manageable cosmos. Instead, Earth pirouettes around a mediocre star within an ungraspably vast Universe. It took generations for people to start noticing – and giving names to … Read more“The bookends of time”
The Sicilian Feast of the Dead
A short, informative presentation on the Festa dei Morti traditions of Sicily.
“Radical Mindfulness: Why Transforming Fear of Death is Politically Vital”
Dr. Rowe’s book is available from Amazon and other retailers. Here’s the blurb: Collecting insights from powerful thinkers across multiple traditions―including Black radicals, Indigenous resurgence theorists, terror management theorists, and Buddhist feminists― Rowe argues for the political importance of seemingly apolitical practices such as meditation and ritual. On their own, these strategies are not enough, … Read more“Radical Mindfulness: Why Transforming Fear of Death is Politically Vital”
“No-one built these for 5,000 years… until now”
YouTube documentarian Tom Scott presents this item on the revival of long barrows; Neolithic constructions that might have been churches, graveyards or landmarks, but which are now used as commercial columbaria and as ritual spaces. More at The Soulton Long Barrow and via the Sacred Stones website.
“The Euthanasia Ritual Kept Secret From The Catholic Church in Italy”
A fascinating documentary on the folklore of the Accabadora (’Lady of Kind Death’) in Sardinia, Italy, where – according to rumor – there existed a tradition of compassionate euthanasia carried out by a special class of women.
Alan Moore’s “Grandeur & Monstrosity”
Any readers intrigued by the mostly inchoate phenomenon that I optimistically refer to as Poetic Faith – the notion and practice of creating one’s own religion, as a work of art – should track down Alan Moore’s story Grandeur & Monstrosity, which appears in the graphic narrative anthology “God is Dead: the Book of Acts; … Read moreAlan Moore’s “Grandeur & Monstrosity”