Murder in lala-land

For a week on a lounger, it is necessary to bring a proper detective story. I brought two, and one of them I finished while still under the palmtrees. Jason Goodwin, historian and Byzantine specialist, has written four volumes so far in a series about the eunuch Yashim, and this is the third, "The Bellini Card". I chose it after seeing Goodwin appear in a documentary on Swedish television only a week or so before Christmas, about Topkapi Palace, the old residence of the Sultans. The library had it, and so I packed it.

I just searched my own blog, to see what I had written about the other two, but I can´t find that I have written about this author before. It doesn´t seem that long ago that I read him, but it must be pre-blog, I presume. It really, really doesn´t feel that long. Probably because Yashim and the stories of Istanbul in the 1800´s made an impression on me, and is very much alive in my memory. I have read better books than Goodwin´s last year, that I can hardly remember at all, so there you are: quality and impact is not necessarily linked.

Yashim is not the kind of eunuch you might think of, when you think of a sultan´s palace. He is not fat, soft-skinned, or squeeky-voiced. He was already a young man, well into puberty, when enemies of his father killed his mother and kastrated him. After that, he was sent to the Ottoman Sultan´s court, to be educated and given a place in life. And he has worked for the Sultan since, doing "special services" suited to his talent of being "invisible" and really, really clever. He is like the Sultan´s own James Bond, when he needs to be. When he doesn´t, he is a quiet and peaceful man, mostly interested in cooking. He is such a foodie that he can´t even go on a dangerous mission, without stopping somewhere to make a pilaff or a moussaka. He uses his cooking knife for a weapon, even.

This time, the new, young Sultan wants a painting. This painting, a portrait of a legendary ancestor, is supposedly for sale in Venice. However, an advisor of the Sultan, a pasha, tells Yashim to lay low, that the Sultan is young, inexperienced and that some of his wishes are "like water". Yashim decides to send his best friend, the Polish ambassador Palewski, who is itching to get away from Istanbul for a while (the background story of Palewski is very interesting), to see if the painting can be acquired. He goes disguised as an American art collector, Mr Brett.

Of course, Venitian art dealers turn up dead in the canals of Venice, and Yashim has to come sort things out. And cook a meal. He meets some interesting characters on the way, does some fighting, beds a woman (I know, who would´ve thought - he is a eunuch, isn´t he?) solves the riddle, and in the process the reader has learned quite a few interesting things about Venice´s history.

The one thing that bugs me just a little bit has to do with the tempo. The action scenes just doesn´t feel right in all of this. Yashim is more of a Poirot than a Bond, but Goodwin makes him both. Ok, there is a second thing that isn´t quite ... and that is the sex. Yashim has a very androgynous feel to him, he is considered sexless in Istanbul, and perhaps all that cooking and history also contributes to that. He is called Yashim lala, sort of like "uncle", which is what the eunuchs were called, who had access to the harem, the women´s house, and the Sultan´s private quarters. I can´t really see him make love to... but that would be to spoil it for you. My objections are small, after all, Goodwin is certainly not the only writer who writes crappy sex scenes for no reason at all. And maybe these odd bits that stand out are what makes him so particularly memorable.

The books about Yashim are special. The hero is special, the milieu is special, the plots are well thought out. There is more brain than heart in these books, but what do you expect from an academic? And sometimes (perhaps most of the time), that is just what I want. And I´m not the only one. This series is translated into almost 40 languages.

Holiday Hangover

So, we´re back from Christmas&NewYears vacation, a bit wobbly on our feet. How did we use to do this again? Work? Make our own food? Shovel all the snow from our parking space? Make our own beds? (No, just kidding - I haven´t done that since I moved away from my parent´s house...) We ease our way in to regular life, using restaurants and canned food. I do have ambitions (not resolutions) for the new year, but first I want to regain all my strength. I caught a bug in Spain, and have been a bit under the weather during the first week of the year. I´m not entirely myself yet, but getting there.

I can´t really collect my thoughts to write anything intelligent about my holiday reading, but I will share some snaps of the holiday itself. What we wanted was a rest, nothing more, and there is this hotel, Barceló Corralejo Bay, in Corralejo, Fuerteventura, that I visited with my mother-in-law almost three years ago, in March 2010. Half-board, pretty pools, a pool bar, a lounge bar, a spa, every service you can think of. And still not tiringly posh. The dresscode, "elegant for dinner" just means that gentlemen will not be admitted wearing shorts and/or vests.

I can´t say that I was disappointed, but the level of quality wasn´t the same. The profile chef from before was nowhere to be seen this time, and the buffet wasn´t quite as creative as it used to be. The rooms were clean but the sheets and towels worn threadbare. The daily cleaning wasn´t as ambitious as before. There was staff everywhere, all the time, but the same faces both morning and evening, so I imagine those who do work in Spain, work a lot. You can also see a lot of shops in town having closed, a lot of abandoned building projects, a lot of emptied hotels falling apart from neglect. And a lot of luxury villas and flats for sale. The promenade along the strand and harbour facing Lanzarote wasn´t as upkept as it used to be. A folly we used to walk to had been torn down. Of course I knew what state Spain is in, I have seen enough of reports about it on the news. But so evident a change in financial fortune, it was disheartening to see. I hope things will improve.

However, none of this affected the quality of our holiday. We were there to rest, and we did. Reading, or just being, by the pool, on the balcony, in the lounge, in a café. The longest walk we took was to the national park, Las Dunas, where we had lunch one day. It is made up from sand blown in from the Sahara. The African coast is actually only 90 kilometers away from Fuerteventura. So, Spain, but not really Spain. Geographically, we are in Africa. This beach is one of many popular among the surfing crowd.

There is quite a lot to see on Fuerteventura if you have a car, and we made the tour in 2003, when we came to visit the in-laws, who spent several winters in Spain and two in Corralejo. It´s mainly desert, a lot of volcanos, very windy. Lots of wild goats and rabbits. At first I thought it was ugly, but after a few days I started to see the beauty of it. It was like a proper revelation during a drive, like the landscape just opened up to me and what had been this rocky sameness suddenly filled with colour and diversity. 

The harbour and the ferry to Lanzarote.

Sand art: Nativity Scene. A truly gifted artist!

Killer cat

 
 
I think Fuerteventura has to be my favourite Canary Island. The perfect place to go when you just want to wind down and kick your feet in the sand. I wouldn´t have minded two weeks. But more than that - I don´t think so. If you want to stay longer you need a real project, at least if you´re like me.

And I´m not sorry to be home again, working. That is my life, after all.

And A Happy New Year!

The full moon over our hotel in Corralejo, Fuerteventura. You can see the twin stars, Castor & Pollux, to its left.

Merry Christmas Everybody!

Holiday - Vacation!

Tomorrow we are going away. This year, we will celebrate Christmas in Fuerteventura, Spain. We have been looking forward to this for months, going to visit the Sun in the middle of the longest, deepest, darkest winter months.

I will not be blogging during our time away, but I will certainly post some holiday snaps when I return. We will be walking on sand dunes, lie by the pool and read, eat hearty and healthy meals at the hotel restaurant. I have a Mary Russell&Sherlock Holmes-mystery on the Iriver, a Hashim the Eunuch-mystery in a library book, and Mr Kindle, well, I think I will leave him at home. We will even bring a few films with us.

I suppose I´m not that keen on Christmas anyway. What I like is to spend time with nice, happy people, eat good food, read and rest. Add work to that equation and you pretty much have what I want all the time. The truth is that for many, women in particular, Christmas is the most stressful time of year. There was a long article in today´s paper about how important the BRIS (Children´s Rights in Society) support telephone lines are for children during the holidays, when so many parents with alcohol and drug problems and rocky marriages make their children´s holiday a nightmare rather than a celebration. I wonder if the pain of the distressed isn´t deeper during Christmas because you´re supposed to be so happy. It´s like this mega worship of Quaint Family Happiness blessed by visits from Coca-Cola Santa, rather than, what was it now? something to do with a baby star, and three wise guys? Whatever.

No seriously, I do always try to do some somber reflecting these last days of the year, try to balance the books, so to speak, and form some kind of idea of what I want from the new year. Not exactly resolutions, not any more, but a few questions perhaps, a few focusing sentences that I can return to during the year, to renew my awareness of what I´m doing and what I want to have going on. For this next year, I have indications there is change in the air, work-wise. I´m not keen on it, but not afraid of it either. Unlike so many, I have margins and options.

But for now, it´s all about getting away from it all.

Kindle. My Name is Kindle.

Got my Christmas present today, brought to me by car delivery! To my door! Amazon, you shouldn´t have... The grand entrance was followed up by the smoothest introduction a new piece of gadgetry has ever done of itself. In all my life I have never seen anything like it.

Not a single piece of paper came with it. Just an instruction on the screen that said how to start it. Press the button. And then it guides you through connecting to your wireless, installs your profile with another single press of a button, and you are provided with a very easy-to-read introduction brochure. And with no effort at all, the few kindle-books I have purchased before, (convincing myself that I would read them on the computer, but never do) were down-loaded on this charming reading tablet.

Not that the Iriver Story was particularly hard to get on with, I love it, too, but this was an experience on another level, I must say. Someone has been thinking, and that will win me every time. Even the box it came in was elegant, and so easy to open. And you know what that´s usually like. I can not fault this. The whole process was so darn elegant.

Now, I need to design a cover that is good enough for it. Can´t do another crafty crochet&plastic-solution here. I need something that looks more like... a tuxedo.

A Second Thought

I had just finished my post on Bond, when I read Une Femme´s post on Newtown, and left a comment there (about how we must stop iconizing the archetyp The Lone Gunman). I had barely closed my computer when it occured to me, that perhaps I was being a bit ambiguous about the glorification of violence. I had to think about that.

I think most scientists agree that the capacity for violent behaviour towards other humans is a characteristic that has been evolutionary advantageous. Increasing populations and competition for resources have made those prepared to steal and kill, even wipe other tribes out, survive and pass on their genetic makeup. Perhaps the Neanderthals died out because they were more peaceful than we are. However, this capacity for violence must be controlled, so that it does not become self-destructive.  Going berserk/into a Martian rage has been considered a good thing, but not anywhere, anytime. So, every society must have systems to guarantee inner safety, like tools for socialization (family, school, religion) and control (police, military, hospitals, prisons). Who said that if you want to learn about a society, study it´s prisons and mental asylums? Foucault was one who did.

How do we protect ourselves now? And from what? *

One of the objects of art and science is to expand our consciousness about our nature, and encourage us to ask questions, to ourselves and each other. They can also offer solutions, ways out of ethical and emotional dilemmas. That´s why Bond is so satisfying. Both "Golden Eye" and "Skyfall" is evidently about the enemy being the Warrior/Champion gone awry, becoming a danger to what he has once pledged to protect. He is someone who has turned from the greater good and service of society to a perverted individualism. Actually, the traditional, megalomaniac Bond-villains may be even better examples of that. Like Eliot Carver in "Tomorrow never dies", who I believe was modelled on Rupert Murdoch. He has lately become a posterboy for capitalist mechanisms going ape.

I read somewhere that in the 70´s, child psychologists wanted to remove all the deadly violence from the fairy tales, such as Hans and Greta pushing the wicked witch into the oven. What they found was that this made children feel unsafe. Their reasoning required that the evil one died, they couldn´t grasp the more complex and mature concept of reform and change in an individual that had proved itself evil. And even though we, as adults, can understand that, entertainment violence (Bond kicking ass) wouldn´t be as emotionally satisfying to us if we had really integrated this insight fully. We cheer when the Bond-villain is blown up by the very bomb he intended for us. How many of us can say that we really have empathy with the Evil one? There are signs that some have come that far.

So, can we change our image of the Lone Gunman as a cultural hero? I have no good answer to that. The archetype is like the weapon itself. It depends who is wielding it. (We certainly don´t want to send Bond out there unarmed, even though he assures us, again and again, that weapons of mass destruction is no match for his cleverness. He pushes the wicked witch into her own oven every time.) Also, archetypes work together, in complex patterns, within individuals and societies. The larger, more global and inclusive society becomes, the more difficult it will be to control this part of our psyche and give it an outlet. We are simply running out of enemies. Where do the superfluous warrior go? I understand that if a single cell is removed from the body, and no longer gets signals from other cells that it is needed, it dies. The same goes for humans. Without confirmation from society they will wither away or explode, depending on what their dominant archetype is.

I believe that the next big challenge for human kind is to integrate the separate cultures. You may have heard social analysts and commenters say that the wars of our era are not fought between nations, but between cultures. Perhaps Newtown is another alarmbell going off, that this is not a war that we can win. What if we must channel our energy into changing the way we function, fundamentally, as a species, if we are going to survive? Perhaps we can delete the Lone Gunman from our psyche. Perhaps this will require nothing short of an evolutionary leap. Can we do it?

What´s the alternative? I would hope that future history books mentions Newtown as a turning point, when a new awareness was born, and the seed of a new collective psyche was sown. The dawn of a New world, instead of an apocalypse (another archetype that we are much too fond of). I can at least say that I have become a bit more aware of my own thinking, or lack of it. And as always, change begins with ourselves.

And I also want to say, that I see no reason whatsoever why anyone who is not a soldier, a policeperson, or a licenced and trained hunter, should ever see so much as an inch of a firearm. Ever.

* Södra Åbergsfortet, Boden, 2012.