Seeing Beyond the Beauty of a Vermeer

"The afternoon I discovered Vermeer, I was passing time by browsing the books and publications piled up on the shelves at home in Lagos. I was 14 or 15. Amid the relics of my parents’ college studies (Nigerian plays, French histories, business-management textbooks), I found something unfamiliar: the annual report for a multinational company. I don’t remember which company it was, but it must have had something to do with food or drink, because on the front cover was a painting of peasants in a rolling field and on the back was a painting of a woman pouring milk. ...”

NY Times (Audio)

2009 September: Vermeer's Masterpiece, The Milkmaid, 2011 February: Vermeer: Master of Light, 2013 October: Vermeer, Rembrandt, and Hals: Masterpieces of Dutch Painting from the Mauritshuis, 2015 December: This Is Not a Vermeer ™, 2017 January: The Art of Painting (1665–1668), 2021 December: Museum rivalry ‘could make Dutch Vermeer show last of its kind’, 2021 December: Okay Cupid: Reopening Vermeer’s love letter to contradiction, 2022 October: A New Brushstroke Analysis Reveals Vermeer...

Detail of “A Lady Writing.”

​The Battle for Bakhmut, in Photos

"Even for those who witnessed the battle for Bakhmut, the longest and likely the deadliest clash of the war in Ukraine, words often failed. Soldiers who fought in the shell-racked city strained to articulate the carnage. The reek of the trenches around the city and the unceasing howl of shellfire, they said, recalled the Battle of Verdun in 1916, which lasted 300 days and was one of the bloodiest of World War I. By the time the Russians declared ‘victory’ on Saturday, relentless bombardment had turned former shops and homes to charred ruins. As Ukraine shifted focus to the fighting on the outskirts, President Volodymyr Zelensky acknowledged that the city was gone, saying ‘Bakhmut is only in our hearts.’ It was an arc of destruction captured by photographers from The New York Times over the past year. ...”

NY Times

NY Times: What’s Next for Russia After Spilling So Much Blood for Bakhmut?

Aljazeera: Ukraine and Russia trade places in battle for Bakhmut (Video)

Guardian: Wagner head warns of revolution after claiming 20,000 fighters killed in Bakhmut

Ukrainian soldiers riding on an armored vehicle in Bakhmut in November.

​The Playoffs: A Dispatch

"These years, the only basketball I watch is the playoffs, but I take them very seriously, because they’re so fleeting, dramatic, and sublime. I love the ever-changing narratives. The pregame handshakes. The postgame interviews. The controversial tweets. The stupid commercials one can’t help but memorize. I love when a player ‘gets hot’ and their teammates keep funneling them the ball. The rarely seen, silent green siren that flashes when a coach uses their challenge to dispute a call. The sudden announcement of a technical foul and the way the mood shifts during the single, solitary free throw. I love catching glimpses of the players’ tattoos of babies, ancestors, dates, signatures, playing cards, angels, lions, phantoms, and crosses emitting sunbeams. ...”

The Paris Review

Rachel B. Glaser, Ref Huddle, 2023.

Turn The Heat Up - Shemekia Copeland (1998)

"The daughter of the late bluesman Johnny Copeland steps up to the plate with this, her debut album for the Alligator imprint. Although only 19 at the time of this recording, Copeland comes to this album with a mature style and vast amounts of assuredness. While comparisons to Koko Taylor and Etta James will be plentiful, Shemekia has enough tricks up her sleeve to make this a disc well worth checking out. Eight of the 14 tunes aboard are co-written by producer John Hahn and strong musical support is summoned up from guitarist Jimmy Vivino, with guest turns from Joe Louis Walker and ‘Monster’ Mike Welch, while the Uptown Horns show up on three tunes, including the title track. ...”

allmusic (Audio)

Discogs (Video)

amazon

YouTube: Turn The Heat Up, Salt In My Wounds, Has Anybody Seen My Man, Married To The Blues

​The longest battle of the Ukraine war might finally be over

"Russia has claimed control of Bakhmut, a city at the center of one of the most prolonged and brutal battles of the Ukraine war. Moscow is declaring it a major victory, but it is one that comes at an astounding cost. And exactly what the city’s capture means for the future course of the conflict is far less clear. Bakhmut holds limited strategic value, though the approximately nine-month-long battle took on political and rhetorical significance for both sides. It also imposed real losses, as the battle for control of the city mutually attrited Russian and Ukrainian forces and firepower. Over the weekend, Russia’s Ministry of Defense announced that Russia had finally taken Bakhmut, and Russian President Vladimir Putin celebrated the ’liberation’ of the city. Both credited the Wagner Group, the paramilitary group tied to the increasingly vocal oligarch Yevgeny Prigozhin, for its role in the operation. ...”

Vox (Video)

***NY Times*** - Bakhmut Is Gone: An Aerial Look at the War’s Destruction

****NY Times **** - Why Bakhmut? It’s a Question as Old as War.

BBC - Ukraine war: Satellite images reveal Russian defences before major assault (Video)

NBC News: Russian forces claim full control of Bakhmut, ending brutal battle that became a symbol of Ukrainian resistance (Video)

NY Times: Russia charges international court officials in retaliation for the war crimes case against Putin.

Drone footage taken by The New York Times captured the scorched buildings, destroyed schools and cratered parks that now define the city in eastern Ukraine.

The stories behind 4 holdout buildings that refused to bow to the wrecking ball

"It’s hard not to cheer on a New York City holdout building. You know holdouts: smaller walkup buildings, usually one-time residences, that somehow managed to remain intact over the past century or so in a city filled with developers who would love to get their hands on them—or at least the land they occupy.Some holdouts are in beautiful shape, a testament to former and current owners who had the means and the will to maintain their original loveliness. This French Renaissance-style holdout, at 612 West 116th Street, began its life in 1906 as the Delta Phi fraternity house for the Columbia University chapter, according to the Landmarks Preservation Commission report for the Morningside Heights Historic District. ...”

Ephemeral New York

The Portable Nietzsche

"The works of Friedrich Nietzsche have fascinated readers around the world ever since the publication of his first book more than a hundred years ago. As Walter Kaufmann, one of the world's leading authorities on Nietzsche, notes in his introduction, ‘Few writers in any age were so full of ideas,’ and few writers have been so consistently misinterpreted. The Portable Nietzsche includes Kaufmann's definitive translations of the complete and unabridged texts of Nietzsche's four major works: Twilight of the Idols, The Antichrist, Nietzsche Contra Wagner and Thus Spoke Zarathustra. In addition, Kaufmann brings together selections from his other books, notes, and letters, to give a full picture of Nietzsche's development, versatility, and inexhaustibility.”

[PDF] The Portable Nietzsche - Walter Kaufmann

amazon

2016 April: Anarchism and Friedrich Nietzsche, 2021 February: Walter Kaufmann’s Classic Lectures on Nietzsche, Kierkegaard and Sartre (1960)

How Russia is creeping back into football Tifo Football

"Since Russia invaded Ukraine, firstly in 2014, but in far greater and deadlier numbers on February 24th 2022 the country has been isolated politically, economically and culturally. And Russia has been suspended from UEFA and FIFA. But they want to qualify for the 2026 World Cup. How could they do that? Would they have to move federations? Well, it has been done before. James Montague explains. Philippe Fenner illustrates.“

YouTube

NY Times: Russian state media celebrates Bakhmut, with a notable omission.

Aljazeera: Why is Bakhmut important in the Russia-Ukraine war? (Video)

What Was the ‘Soviet Century’?, amazon: The Soviet Century

Illustration by El Lissitzky (1890-1941) from USSR Builds Socialism, 1933.

​Victorious

"In the aftermath of SSC Napoli’s league victory, Nigerians descended on the official Serie A Twitter account to protest what they considered to be an unfair (and ‘racist’) attempt to acknowledge someone other than Victor Osimhen as the hero of the club’s successful campaign. And, while other players no doubt played a part in a team’s success, few would argue against Osimhen, born in Lagos, being the standout star of Napoli this season. His composure in front of goal and his dynamic presence leading the line has earned him accolades and has unified a country desperately in need of a rallying point after a contentious election cycle. ...”

Africa Is a Country

W - Victor Osimhen

1969: The Velvet Underground Live – The Matrix, San Francisco

"1969: The Velvet Underground Live is a live album by the Velvet Underground. It was originally released as a double album in September 1974 by Mercury Records. … Spin magazine’s Alternative Record Guide included it in the top 100 alternative albums of all time in 1995. … On October 19, 1969, in the End of Cole Ave. club, Dallas, a fan who happened to be a recording engineer brought along his professional gear; and in November at The Matrix in San Francisco, the band was given permission to use the in-house four-track recording desk. The band were given two-track mixdown tapes from the recordings for reference, but nothing was done with them until 1974, after the band had dissolved and Lou Reed had become well known as a solo artist. …”

Wikipedia

**The Quietus – Low Culture 1: The Velvet Underground Live In 1969***

Discogs (Video)

amazon

YouTube: What Goes On, Beginning To See The Light, We’re Gonna Have A Real Good Time Together, Sweet Jane

In Bakhmut, the Tides of Battle Are Ever Shifting

"Ukrainian soldiers were waiting for just the right moment to attack. Then they received critical intelligence: Russian mercenaries on the other side of the front line outside Bakhmut were about to rotate out and be replaced by other soldiers. It was time to go. ... It was the morning of May 6, the beginning of three days of fighting on the outskirts of Bakhmut that has shifted momentum in the fiercest battle of the war. Soldiers from Ukraine’s 3rd Separate Assault Brigade battled with the Russians across forest belts where the trees rose like scorched matchsticks. They stormed trenches littered with the dead. They followed armored personnel carriers across open fields as the two sides exchanged heavy gunfire. ...”

NY Times

Aljazeera - The battle for Ukraine’s Bakhmut: A timeline (Video)

Guardian: What happened in the Russia-Ukraine war this week? Catch up with the must-read news and analysis (Video)

POLITICO: How Putin Poisoned Eurovision

The 80th Air Assault Brigade of the Ukrainian Armed Forces firing a barrage of rockets in the direction of Bakhmut during a night operation.

​"Be More Radical Than Me!": A Conversation with Béla Tarr

"The Hungarian auteur Béla Tarr bid a farewell to the active filmmaking at the age of 55 with the 146-minute long reckoning The Turin Horse (2011), consisting of 30 takes. His filmography counts nine features that elevated him into the pantheon of world cinema, earning Tarr epithets as legend, master, cult or visionary, among others. ... However, the core of his work features his singular aesthetics and bleak visions of the post-communist landscape, notably in Damnation (1988), the cinephiliac 432-minute long treat Sátántangó (1994), and Werckmeister Harmonies (2000).  His distinctive style stems from black and white, spellbinding photography shot in long takes and meticulously choreographed camera movement hypnotically paced along desolate, melancholic, austere and enigmatic imagery what eventually led to Tarr’s label as a radical filmmaker. ...”

MUBI (2016)

MUBI - Fade to Black: Béla Tarr, the Anti-Mystic (2016)

2012 January: The Man from London, 2012 January: The Turin Horse, 2022 September: Damnation (1988), 2022 September: : Sátántangó (1994), 2023 April: Time and Its Other: The Temporal Landscapes of Béla Tarr

Danton - Andrzej Wajda (1983)

"Gérard Depardieu and Wojciech Pszoniak star in Andrzej Wajda’s powerful, intimate depiction of the ideological clash between the earthy, man-of-the-people Georges Danton and icy Jacobin extremist Maximilien Robespierre, both key figures of the French Revolution. By drawing parallels to Polish ‘solidarity,’ a movement that was being quashed by the government as the film went into production, Wajda drags history into the present. Meticulous and fiery, Danton has been hailed as one of the greatest films ever made about the Terror. ...”

Criterion

W - Georges Danton

French Films

amazon

MUBI: Trailer

Ukraine could join ranks of ‘frozen’ conflicts, U.S. officials say

"U.S. officials are planning for the growing possibility that the Russia-Ukraine war will turn into a frozen conflict that lasts many years — perhaps decades — and joins the ranks of similar lengthy face-offs in the Korean peninsula, South Asia and beyond. The options discussed within the Biden administration for a long-term ‘freeze’ include where to set potential lines that Ukraine and Russia would agree not to cross, but which would not have to be official borders. The discussions — while provisional — have taken place across various U.S. agencies and in the White House. It’s a scenario that may prove the most realistic long-term outcome given that neither Kyiv nor Moscow appear inclined to ever admit defeat. ...”

POLITICO

NBC News: Russian hypersonic missile scientists arrested on treason charges (Video)

NY Times - Another Casualty in Ukraine: Teenage Years

Guardian: Stark before-and-after images reveal the obliteration of Bakhmut

Hundreds of graves where the remains of civilians killed by Russian forces are buried east of the capital Kyiv, Ukraine, Wednesday, May 17, 2023.

International Brigades: Battle of Jarama, Battle of Guadalajara (1937)

"The Battle of Jarama (6–27 February 1937) was an attempt by General Francisco Franco's Nationalists to dislodge the Republican lines along the river Jarama, just east of Madrid, during the Spanish Civil War. Elite Spanish Legionnaires and Moroccan Regulares from the Army of Africa forced back the Republican Army of the Centre, including the International Brigades, but after days of fierce fighting no breakthrough was achieved. Republican counterattacks along the captured ground likewise failed, resulting in heavy casualties to both sides. ...”

W - Battle of Jarama,  W - Battle of Guadalajara 

Jarama: A walk through the valley of death

BATTLE OF JARAMA, TRENCH WAR, HEMINGWAY IN THE BATTLE

W - International Brigades

YouTube: GREAT BATTLES OF THE SPANISH CIVIL WAR - EP. 5 - THE BATTLE OF JARAMA, EP. 6 - THE BATTLE OF GUADALAJARA

2011 July: Spanish Civil War - 75 Year, 18 July, 2012 March: 1984 (For the Love of Big Brother), 2012 June: "The Spanish Earth", Written and Narrated by Ernest Hemingway, 2013 January: The Real George Orwell, 2015 August: Songs of the Spanish Civil War, 2016 September: George Orwell - Homage to Catalonia (1938), 2017 January: Guernica (2016), 2019 September: What Makes Guernica So Shocking? An Animated Video Explores the Impact of Picasso’s Monumental Anti-War Mural

Italy: Autonomia - Post-Political Politics

"The only first-hand document and contemporaneous analysis of the most innovative post-'68 radical movement in the West, the creative, futuristic, neo-anarchistic, postideological Autonomia. Most of the writers who contributed to the issue were locked up at the time in Italian jails.... I was trying to draw the attention of the American Left, which still believed in Eurocommunism, to the fate of Autonomia. The survival of the last politically creative movement in the West was at stake, but no one in the United States seemed to realize that, or be willing to listen. ...—Sylvère Lotringer ...”

MIT Press

Digging Up Autonomia

e-flux - Reading group: AUTONOMIA, OCCUPY, COMMUNISM: LEGACIES AND FUTURES

[PDF] Italy: Autonomia - Post-Political Politics

Ukraine says it shot down Kinzhal missiles, one of Russia’s most advanced weapons.

"Ukraine’s air defense intercepted six hypersonic Kinzhal missiles fired by Russia early Tuesday, Ukrainian officials said. If confirmed, the strikes would be further evidence of Ukraine’s ability to shoot down one of the most sophisticated conventional weapons in Moscow’s arsenal. In one of the largest aerial assaults since early March, Russia also launched nine Kalibr cruise missiles from ships in the Black Sea, three short-range ballistic missiles from land and a number of drones, according to the commander in chief of Ukraine’s Armed Forces. All of the drones and missiles were shot down, the military said. Russia’s Defense Ministry said that at least one Kinzhal was used in the attack, which it claimed was a ‘concentrated strike’ involving high-precision long-range weapons that hit ‘all assigned targets.’ ...”

NY Times (Video)

Guardian: Russia’s most potent hypersonic weapon neutralised, says Ukraine (Video)

NBC News: CIA urges Russians to share secrets with America in new video campaign (Video)

Beyond the Ukrainian Counteroffensive

Russia fired a wave of missiles and drones overnight, many aimed at Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, but all were shot down, Ukrainian officials said.

​Manet/Degas

"This exhibition examines one of the most significant artistic dialogues in modern art history: the close and sometimes tumultuous relationship between Edouard Manet and Edgar Degas. Born only two years apart, Manet (1832–1883) and Degas (1834–1917) were friends, rivals, and, at times, antagonists who worked to define modern painting in France. By examining their careers in parallel and presenting their work side by side, this exhibition investigates how their artistic objectives and approaches both overlapped and diverged. Through more than 150 paintings and works on paper, Manet/Degas takes a fresh look at the interactions of these two artists in the context of the family relationships, friendships, and intellectual circles that influenced their artistic and professional choices, deepening our understanding of a key moment in nineteenth-century French painting. ...”

Met Museum

Friday essay: When Manet met Degas

YouTube: Manet and Degas: Musée d'Orsay explores the friendship and rivalry between two artistic giants, EXPOSITION MANET / DEGAS

Manet, Plum Brandy, ca. 1877 / Degas, In a Café, 1875–76.

Best Music Arrangers: 20 Artists You’ve Heard But Not Seen

"Any musical composition can be reconceptualized – Franz Liszt arranged his own works for piano and transformed Bach’s organ music – and the best music arrangers in jazz, pop, and rock have become world-famous. (Quincy Jones and Nelson Riddle are just two of the absolute modern masters.) Music arrangers can decide which instruments will be used, which notes will be repeated, and what sections of the music are repeated, and in which order. Their subtle changes to the choice of instruments, tempo, key, or time signature can make all the difference to the success of the final record. Here we pick 20 of best arrangers in popular music over the past century. ...”

udiscover (Video)

As Ukraine Makes Inroads in Bakhmut, Devastation Still Reigns

"With the furious battle for the city of Bakhmut raging at their backs, a squad of Ukrainian soldiers tore through an open field, racing to get out of range of falling Russian artillery. But before they could make it to safety, they said, they got a flat tire. The three soldiers — known by the call signs Omar, Chip and Bandit — had spent the day on Friday taking part in Ukrainian offensive operations on the edge of Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine, blasting Russian tanks and armored vehicles. But after surviving another brutal day of battle, they worried that the punctured tire might doom them. Omar, 36, hopped out of the car and used a screwdriver to put a plug in the hole. Within moments, they were off again. ...”

NY Times

Russia’s Victory Day Ain’t What It Used to Be  (Video)

Guardian: What happens when leaders disregard the truth? Putin and Trump are about to find out

NY Times: Zelensky Visits Germany, Praising Weapons Pledge and Seeking Jets

President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine, left, and Chancellor Olaf Scholz of Germany traded compliments in front of reporters on Sunday.

​Iconic RR Neon Sign Returns To Twin Peaks Diner Thanks To Fans Visit

"Last month, a few Twin Peaks fans teamed up with the owners of Twede’s Cafe to create a Kickstarter to allow the fans to gift the neon RR sign to Twede’s Cafe so that fans who visit will be able to enjoy the new sign as a way of bringing a bit of magic to the diner. ... One of the more unique tiers is the ‘Name on Plaque’ tier which entails getting your name added to a silver etched plaque that will be proudly hung inside the restaurant so you can show off to your friends each time you visit. ...”

Welcome to Twin Peaks (Video)

Welcome to Twin Peaks: Twin Peaks VR Lets You Live Inside A Dream (Video)

Twin Peaks Blog: Setting the Stage - Double R Diner Exterior

2020 April: Twin Peaks: Go Down the Rabbit Hole.

The Negro Leagues are major leagues — but merging their stats has been anything but seamless

"On Dec. 16, 2020, Sean Gibson awoke in Pittsburgh to a few inches of freshly fallen snow and a flurry of missed calls from friends and reporters. Major League Baseball had just announced it was formally recognizing seven Negro Leagues as major leagues and adopting the statistics of the more than 3,400 players in those leagues from 1920 to 1948 into the official record. Gibson read MLB’s press release that morning in stunned silence. ...”

The Athletic

Seamheads Negro Leagues Database

2015 March:  Negro league baseball, 2017 May: Negro National League (1920–31), 2019 October: Can the Rebirth of a Negro League Stadium Revive a Distressed City?, 2020 December: A push to recognize the statistics of Black players from baseball’s era of apartheid

​Ukraine claims gains in Bakhmut after Russia denials

"Ukraine says it has recaptured ground in Bakhmut, a rare advance after months of grinding Russian gains in the eastern city. Deputy Defence Minister Hanna Malyar said Ukrainian forces advanced two kilometres (1.2 miles) in a week. The claims signal a momentum shift in Bakhmut - but more widely, there is no clear evidence of the much-anticipated Ukrainian counter-offensive. Russia has denied reports of Ukrainian gains, after claims from both sides. ... However, in a updated statement on Friday morning the ministry claimed Russian troops had changed their position for strategic reasons. It said units of the southern group of Russian forces had taken up a better defensive position in the Maloilinivka area, something which took into consideration ‘the favourable conditions of the Berkhivka reservoir’. Maloilinivka and Berkhivka are both near Bakhmut. ...”

BBC (Video)

Guardian - Ukrainian historian Serhii Plokhy: ‘This may not be the last chapter of the Russian empire, but it’s an important one’

NBC News: Russia denies any Ukrainian breakthrough after gains around Bakhmut spark panic (Video)

NY Times: Ukrainian Soldiers Risk Their Lives to Keep Weapons From the Black Market

​Trump’s Second-Term Goal: Shattering the Norms He Didn’t Already Break

"In little over an hour, Donald J. Trump suggested the United States should default on its debts for the first time in history, injected doubt over the country’s commitment to defending Ukraine from Russia’s invasion, dangled pardons for most of the Capitol rioters convicted of crimes, and refused to say he would abide by the results of the next presidential election. The second-term vision Mr. Trump sketched out at a CNN town-hall event on Wednesday would represent a sharp departure from core American values that have been at the bedrock of the nation for decades: its creditworthiness, its credibility with international allies and its adherence to the rule of law at home. Mr. Trump’s provocations were hardly shocking. ...”

NY Times

NY Times: E. Jean Carroll May Sue Trump a Third Time After ‘Vile’ Comments on CNN

NY Times: Opinion | Trump’s ‘Stupid,’ ‘Stupid’ Town Hall

NY Times: Trump Revives Election Lies and False Boasts in CNN Town Hall

Old Forest

"In J. R. R. Tolkien’s fictional universe of Middle-earth, the Old Forest was a daunting and ancient woodland just beyond the eastern borders of the Shire. Its first and main appearance in print was in The Fellowship of the Ring, especially in the eponymous chapter 6. The Old Forest lay near the centre of Eriador, a large region of north-west Middle-earth. It was one of the few survivors of the primordial forests which had covered much of Eriador before the Second Age. Indeed, it had once been but the northern edge of one immense forest which reached all the way to Fangorn forest, hundreds of miles to the south-east. The vicinity of the Old Forest was the domain of three nature-spirits: Tom Bombadil, Goldberry, and Old Man Willow. ...”

W – Old Forest

W – Treebeard, W – Lothlórien, W – Mirkwood

Lord of the Rings Map Style 

YouTube: The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring | Chapter 6 – The Old Forest

2010 January: The Lord of the Rings, 2018 January: An   Atlas of Literary Maps Created by Great Authors: J.R.R Tolkien’s   Middle   Earth, Robert Louis Stevenson’s Treasure Island & More, 2019 January: The Largest J.R.R. Tolkien Exhibit in Generations Is Coming to the U.S.: Original Drawings, Manuscripts, Maps & More, 2020 January: Hear Christopher Tolkien (RIP) Read the Work of His Father J.R.R. Tolkien, Which He Tirelessly Worked to Preserve, 2020 August: The Complete Guide to Middle-earth - Robert Foster (1971), 2021 September: When the Nobel Prize Committee Rejected The Lord of the Rings..., 2021 October: When J.R.R. Tolkien Worked for the Oxford English Dictionary..., 2022 March: J.R.R. Tolkien Tolkien Estate, 2022 October: One Ring

​Ukraine war: Inside the fight for the last streets of Bakhmut

"In a bunker just outside the city limits of Bakhmut, Ukraine's 77th Brigade direct artillery fire to support their infantry - their last line of defence on the western edge of the city. Ukraine is still clinging to the last few streets here. But the live video feed the artillery gunners watch intently, from a drone flying above the city, suggests that even if Russia can finally wrestle control, it would be little more than a pyrrhic victory. The prize is now a crumpled, skeletal city - with hardly a building left unscathed, and with its entire population vanished. The battle for the eastern Ukrainian city of Bakhmut has been the longest and bloodiest of this war so far. Western officials estimate between 20,000 and 30,000 Russian troops have been killed or wounded here, while Ukraine's military has also paid a heavy price - and it still isn't over. ...”

BBC

NBC News: Ukraine drives back Russian forces around Bakhmut in its first significant gains in months (Video)

What Ukraine Still Needs to Win

Guardian: Soldiers, sirens and a ‘sign of hope’ as Ukrainian opera premieres in Lviv

Singers perform in the opera The Terrible Revenge, based on the story by Nikolai Gogol, at the Lviv National Opera.

​Dear Mother

"In the second half of the seventies, when I was in my twenties, I wrote letters home to Ireland from Barcelona. Early in 1976, for example, from my pension on the corner of Carrer de la Portaferrissa and Carrer del Pi, I described my first visit to the Liceu opera house. Dear Mother, The walls in this small, cheap hotel are thin. The man in the next room listens to opera on the radio. He looks like someone who has seen little daylight, but instead he has seen many operas, as he tried to explain to me in broken versions of several languages. Two days ago, he was waiting for me in the corridor. At first, I thought a fire had broken out or the police had, once more, attacked the people. ...”

The Paris Review

The Gran Teatre del Liceu in Barcelona, ca. 1880.

​Islam’s forgotten bohemians

"I was lying in the dust, staring into the African sun, when their swords came down on me. The crowd was about a hundred strong, all of them Muslims shouting in a sonic blur. First they began slicing my arms. Next, pulling my shirt open, they cut into my torso. My eyes were closed with pain by the time I felt a blade moving hard across my throat. I thought I would die there, in that poor Durban neighbourhood where, despite the warnings of middle-class South Africans, I had decided to go exploring that evening. ...”

Aeon

Sufi men dance inside a tent next to the Al-Ikhlas mosque in Alexandria, Egypt, during celebrations in honor of Sufi saint Sidi Burhan Al-Din Ali Al-Ikhlas Al-Sarkani.

​Trump Is Found Liable for Sexual Abuse and Defamation

"A Manhattan jury on Tuesday found former President Donald J. Trump liable for the sexual abuse and defamation of the magazine writer E. Jean Carroll and awarded her $5 million in damages in a widely watched civil trial that sought to apply the accountability of the #MeToo era to a dominant political figure. The federal jury of six men and three women returned its verdict shortly after 3 p.m. after deliberating for only a few hours. The jury found that Ms. Carroll had not proved, by a preponderance of the evidence, that Mr. Trump had raped her, as she had long claimed. ...”

NY Times

******Vanity Fair: The Stunning Clarity of the E. Jean Carroll–Donald Trump Verdict

******YouTube: Trump's deposition in E. Jean Carroll lawsuit, Trump Lashes Out At Lawyer, Calls E. Jean Carroll "Mentally Sick" During Deposition, FULL VIDEO: Trump deposition in E. Jean Carroll rape trial

****NY Times: Opinion | Michelle Goldberg | The Fury of #MeToo Finally Comes for the Man Who Inspired It

NY Times: New York Law Gave Jurors Three Types of Battery to Consider in Trump Case

NY Times: Read the Filled-Out Jury Verdict Form in the Trump-Carroll Case

CNN: Jury finds Donald Trump sexually abused E. Jean Carroll in civil case, awards her $5 million (Video)

Air raid alerts for Kyiv, two-thirds of Ukraine

"Air raid sirens have been heard in the capital Kyiv and across two-thirds of Ukraine continuing more than a week of a renewed Russian air campaign. Ukrainian emergency services issued air raid alerts for Kyiv and most of central and eastern Ukraine early on Tuesday, extending from Vynnitsya in the west to all eastern regions and south to Kherson and the Odesa region on the Black Sea, the Reuters news agency reported. Officials in Kyiv said the city’s air defences were working to repel the attack. At least four people were killed on Monday as Russia sent a wave of drones and missiles into Ukraine in the early hours of the morning. ...”

Aljazeera

POLITICO: Downbeat Putin slams West at low-key Victory Day parade in Russia

Guardian - Pass the paint and mind the shrapnel: inside Ukraine’s most creative bomb shelter

NY Times: Here’s the latest as Russia marks Victory Day.

The Kremlin Drone Ding and the Wagner Rant

Russia began its latest air campaign against Ukraine at the end of April

Do football managers matter?

"Managers can’t perform magic, although some people seem to think they can. They’re not David Copperfield or Harry Potter. They can’t work miracles or sprinkle some magical dust to make players know how to play football. Spending hours on analysis isn’t very useful. It doesn’t put you in better conditions to win the game. The tactics, the schemes, they’re all bull***t. Of course tactics matter, but players win the game. ... But don’t take my word for it. Everything you just read came straight from the mouths of Pep Guardiola, Jurgen Klopp, Antonio Conte, Marcelo Bielsa, Massimiliano Allegri, Erik ten Hag, Ernesto Valverde, Juanma Lillo and, of course, Sam Allardyce, who’s up there with all of them. ...”

The Athletic