| The Unusual Mind of Clarice Lispector |
[03 Aug 2015|01:05am] |
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http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/books/2015/08/clarice_lispector_s_complete_stories_reviewed.html “Behold us nearly here, coming down the long path,” Clarice Lispector writes in the story “The Burned Sinner and the Harmonious Angels.” “An angel’s fall is a direction.” For almost all of New Directions’ remarkable new Complete Stories, brilliantly translated by Katrina Dodson, I felt wrapped in flame. I might as well have been burning up on re-entry trying to follow strange angels, receiving ecstatic signals, sometimes from afar and sometimes very near.
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| How Ferguson Changed America |
[03 Aug 2015|01:38am] |
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http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2015/08/the_ferguson_anniversary_michael_brown_s_death_12_months_ago_led_to_america.html On Aug. 9, one year ago, Officer Darren Wilson shot and killed Michael Brown after a brief scuffle in the middle of a small street in Ferguson, Missouri. There wasn’t any video of the encounter, but many bystanders and local residents saw the aftermath. For four hours, Brown’s body sat in the summer sun, slumped and face down, blood pooling in the street where he was killed. Neighbors, shocked at the violence and the police’s disrespect for Brown’s corpse, took photos and shared video. “They killed him for no reason … they just killed this n—er for no reason,” said one man in a video recorded just after shooting. “Do you see a knife? Do you see anything that would have caused a threat to these motherf—kin’ police? They shot that boy because they wanted to shoot that boy in the middle of the motherf—kin’ day in the middle of the motherf—kin’ street.”
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| Raw Emotion |
[03 Aug 2015|10:03pm] |
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http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2015/08/joe_biden_s_emotional_appeal_and_authenticity_won_t_win_the_white_house.html A discussion about whether Vice President Joe Biden should run for president gets deep pretty fast. Any talk about ambition, a life’s purpose, and the end of a career must take into account of all the woe Biden has had to face in his life. At age 30, a few weeks after he was elected to the Senate, his wife and 1-year-old daughter died in a car accident. Eighteen days later, he took the oath of office standing at his 3-year-old son Beau’s hospital bedside, where he was being treated for injuries sustained in the crash. In 1988 Biden had two surgeries to address the effects of cranial aneurysms with only a 50 percent chance of success. Two months ago, he buried his 46-year-old son, Beau, the victim of brain cancer. It is supposed to be the other way around. Sons are supposed to bury their fathers.
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