"Scorsese considers Powell and Pressburger's run of films through the 1930s and 40s to be "the longest period of subversive film-making in a major studio, ever". But when Scorsese first met Powell, in 1975, that run had come to an abrupt halt. Peeping Tom, Powell's first effort as a solo director, had been released in 1960, and its combination of violence, voyeurism, nudity and general implication of the audience (not to mention the film industry, again) was too strong for the British censors and critics. He hadn't worked since. So he must have been somewhat taken aback to discover that an eager young American director was trying to track him down, and that other young American film-makers were going back to his work."
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"In America today, perfection is highly valued. We dump loads of chemicals on our lawns to try and get rid of every weed, every dandelion. Models and supermodels are tall, impossibly fit, their clothes stylish and wrinkle-free. Images like this tend to change our perceptions, our ideals, until finally they leave us looking around at the peeling paint on our own houses, and our less than fit bodies, and it leaves us wanting. Perfection, I would submit, is overrated. And besides, I like dandelions."
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Outside one of the homes here, for example, there's a shower. The shower is fed by a rainwater catchment on the roof. The runoff from the shower fills the pond, which supports the ducks. The ducks eat the bugs off the strawberries in the garden, which are served for breakfast. The leftover breakfast scraps are dropped into the bin of worms, which are used to feed the fish that maintain the balance in the pond. And the worm's waste, as we already know, is used to fertilize the strawberries. It's a perfect, closed, interdependent system. Man's greatest pleasure. A microcosm of planet earth.
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each pond with its blazing lilies is a prayer heard and answered lavishly, every morning, whether or not you have ever dared to be happy, whether or not you have ever dared to pray. -Mary Oliver
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Cecil Beaton (1904-1980) was essential to the cultural life of Britain and beyond in the twentieth century, both as a creator and a recorder. He was a photographer, painter, illustrator, writer and Oscar-winning designer of sets and costumes.
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Americans believe in two contradictory ideals. The first is the importance of marriage: we are more marriage-oriented than most other Western countries. The second is the importance of living a personally fulfilling life that allows us to grow and develop as individuals—call it individualism.
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Goldman Sachs, one of Wall Street’s most prestigious investment banks, was also among the many banks in 2008 and 2009 to receive billions of dollars in taxpayer money to help it stay afloat. Like others in the securities industry, Goldman Sachs advises and invests in nearly every industry affected by federal legislation. The firm closely monitors issues including economic policy, trade and nearly all legislation that governs the financial sector. It has been a major proponent of privatizing Social Security as well as legislation that would essentially deregulate the investment banking/securities industry. The firm tends to give most of its money to Democrats. A number of high-ranking government officials in recent years have spent part of their careers at Goldman Sachs.
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She began writing poetry as a lonely young wife while her first husband served multiple missions for the Air Force during the Vietnam War. Her first collection, Vesper Sparrows, was published in 1986. Rough Music: Poems (1995) was awarded the Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award. A fiercely devoted mother, Ms. Digges recounted her efforts, in The Stardust Lounge: Stories from a Boy’s Adolescence (2001), to save her then-14 year son from his frightening self-destructive behavior. She opened her home to his gang member friends, listened to their music, and refused to give up. It destroyed her second marriage but she turned her son’s life around. He is now a successful photojournalist in Kenya. His work can be seen in The Stardust Lounge. Sadly, Ms. Digges was unable to save herself. Lost in grief after losing her third husband, Dr. Franklin Loew, who died in 2003, Ms. Digges committed suicide on the campus of the University of Massachusetts. She was just 59. h/t Patti Digh
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NEW YORK, April 9, 2009 - An 11-year-old Massachusetts boy, Carl Joseph Walker-Hoover, hung himself Monday after enduring bullying at school, including daily taunts of being gay, despite his mother’s weekly pleas to the school to address the problem. This is at least the fourth suicide of a middle-school aged child linked to bullying this year.
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Gleaning is a process, dating to biblical times, in which leftover crops are collected or harvested after the farmer has commercially harvested a field or orchard. And Wikipedia notes that “In Nineteenth century England gleaning was a legal right for cottagers. In a small village the sexton would often ring a church bell at eight o’clock in the morning and again at seven in the evening to tell the gleaners when to begin and end work.”
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