A Dill Story- Shubit

Dill Folklore: To the Greeks the presence of dill was an indication of prosperity. In the 8th century, Charlemagne used it at banquets to relieve hiccups and in the Middle Ages it was used as a love potion and to keep witches away^[4].

In Semitic languages it is known by the name of Shubit. The Talmud requires that tithes shall be paid on the seeds, leaves, and stem of dill. The Bible states that the Pharisees were in the habit of paying dill as tithe;^[2]Jesus rebuked them for tithing dill but omitting justice, mercy and faithfulness^[3]

Dill (Anethum graveolens) is a short-lived perennial herb. It is the sole species of the genus Anethum, though classified by some botanists in a related genus as Peucedanum graveolens (L.) C.B.Clarke.

This afternoon,I walked from Chinatown to Union Square.There I found a stand in the Greenmarket that sold herbs and flowers.I noticed

the dill foliage and could not resist. I still have a little s[ace on my window sill,which already has five small clay pots  ,one with a jasmin,a mint,an eucaliptus and a lavender.My garden!!!

It grows to 40–60 cm (16–24 in), with slender stems and alternate, finely divided, softly delicate leaves 10–20 cm (3.9–7.9 in) long. The ultimate leaf divisions are 1–2 mm (0.039–0.079 in) broad, slightly broader than the similar leaves of fennel, which are threadlike, less than 1 mm (0.039 in) broad, but harder in texture. The flowers are white to yellow, in small umbels 2–9 cm (0.79–3.5 in) diameter. The seeds are 4–5 mm (0.16–0.20 in) long and 1 mm (0.039 in) thick, and straight to slightly curved with a longitudinally ridged surface.

Its seeds, dill seeds are used as a spice, and its fresh leaves, dill, and its dried leaves, dill weed, are used as herbs.

Contents  [hide] 1 Origins and history 2 Name 3 Uses 4 Cultivation 5 External links 6 References

[edit]Origins and history

The eucalyptus oil story

The eucalyptus oil story began in 1788 with the arrival of the First Fleet and Surgeon-General John White. Within a few weeks of arriving, White recorded in his diary the presence of olfactory oil in the eucalyptus; the genus being named eucalyptus by the French botanist L’Heritier in the same year. Governor Philip sent a sample to Sir Joseph Banks. Surgeon-General White distilled a quart of oil from the "Sydney Peppermint", Eucalyptus piperita Sm., which was found growing on the shores of Port Jackson, where Sydney now stands.When the oil was tested in England, it was reported to be "much more efficacious in removing all cholicky complaints than that of the oil obtained from the well known English peppermint, being less pungent and more aromatic". Following this discovery other people extracted eucalyptus oil, including the pioneer, Dr Officer in Tasmania, and the pastoralist Charles Armitage, but none of them exploited it.Baron Ferdinand von Meuller, the Government Botanist in Victoria, encouraged Joseph Bosisto, a Victorian pharmacist, to investigate the essential oils of the eucalyptus on a commercial basis. Joseph Bosisto was a Yorkshireman who had qualified as a Pharmacist in Leeds and London. He arrived in Adelaide in 1848 at the age of 21. In 1851 he moved to Victoria in search of gold, but instead opened a pharmacy in Richmond, where he built a laboratory to investigate the chemical and medicinal properties of Australian plants.As a result of the collaboration with von Meuller the essential oil industry of Australia began in 1852, when Bosisto commenced operations in a small, rudely constructed still at Dandenong Creek, Victoria, using the leaves of a form of E. radiata (then known as E. amygdalina) which grew profusely in the district. Bosisto soon built other distilleries at Emerald, Menzies Creek and Macclesfield.

Property

Eucalyptus has a clear, sharp, fresh and very distinctive smell, is pale yellow in color and watery in viscosity.The Australian Blue-gum can sometimes reaches a height of 100 meters (300 feet), making it one of the highest trees in the world.

Sampaguita

Sampaguita (Jasminum sambac) is a sweetly scented tropical flower. Belonging to the wide genus of Jasmines (Jasminum), Sampaguita is the common name of the species Jasminum sambac. Sampaguita is also known as Philippine Jasmine, Arabian jasmine, Pikake in Hawaii, Grand Duke of Tuscany, Kampupot, and Melati .

Kingdom

Plantae

Division

Magnoliophyta

Class

Magnoliopsida

Order

Lamiales

Family

Oleaceae

Genus

Jasminum

The species Jasminum sambac is native to southern Asia, in India, Myanmar and Sri Lanka. Sampaguita is serving as the National Flower of for two countries - Philippines and Indonesia.. The beautiful ornamental Sampaguita blooms cover the glossy green leafed bushed type ever bloomer. The Sampaguita is also well known in Asia for its use in teas and religious offerings, symbolizing divine hope.

Sampaguita grow on a woody vine or semi-climbing shrub, which reaches a height of 1,2 meters. The leaves are ovate or rounded in shape and 6 to 12 cm long. The leaves and Sampaguita flowers grow on short stalks. The Sampaguita flowers bloom either singly or as bundles of blossoms at the top of the branches. Blooming all through the year, Sampaguita are pure white, small, dainty, star-shaped blossoms. The flowers open at night and wilt in less than a day. The Sampaguita flower has about 8-10 calyx teeth that are very slender, and 5 to 8 mm long. The Sampaguita's corolla tube is slender and 1 to 1.5 cm long, the limb is usually double and 1.5 to 2 cm in diameter. The 2 stamens on the Sampaguita are included with a 2-celled ovary.

Sampaguita's distinct sweet, heady fragrance is its unique feature. The essential oil from the flowers is similar to jasmin (Jasminum grandiflores). Sampaguita flowers do not bear seeds, therefore the plant is cultivated by cuttings. Sampaguita was imported into the Philippines in the 17th century from Himalayan areas. The Sampaguita is a native part of the Philippine landscape for centuries. The plant is originally from India and is grown throughout India today. About eight cultivars are generally listed for Sampaguita.Some varieties of Sampaguitas can grow as large as small roses in India.

Varieties of Sampaguita

There are three varieties of Sampaguita, commonly referred to as Single Petal, Double and Double-Double. The double layered Sampaguita are called 'kampupot,' which are less fragrant. The three major varieties: 'Maid of Orleans', 'Belle of India' and 'Grand Duke' - differ from each other by the shape of leaves and flowers structure. The fourth popular variety Mysore Mulli, a variation of the 'Belle of India'.

• Maid of Orleans: Single with five rounded petals
• Belle of India:Semi-double or single (single and double flowers on the same plant) with elongated petals
• Grand Duke of Tuscany: clusters of flowers (sometimes single flower). Only the central flower is truly double-rossete. Side flowers are semi-double, and like miniature roses

Facts About Sampaguita

• Sampaguita is considered a symbol of fidelity, purity, devotion, strength and dedication.
• In the Philippines, the Sampaguita is called by various names: sambac, sampagung, campopot, lumabi, kulatai, pongso, malur and manul.
• The name Sampaguita is a Spanish term that comes from the Philippino words "sumpa kita," which mean 'I promise you.'
• The Chinese emperor of the Sung dynasty had Sampaguita growing in his palace grounds to enjoy its heavenly fragrance.
• Even the kings of Afghanistan, Nepal and Persia had Jasmine planted, in the 1400s.
• Since ancient times, Jasmine has been cultivated for its essential oils.
• Varieties of Jasmine, like J. grandiflorum, are especially used in perfumes.
• Though, Sampaguita (unlike other Jasmine varieties) is not a key ingredient in top-price perfumes, its scent and makeup have given it important uses.
• Sampaguita has been used for hair ornamentation in India, China and Philippines as well.
• Malaysians scent the hair oil from coconut with Sampaguita scents.
• Sampaguita is also used medicinally. Its perfume is believed to relieve a many ailments including headaches and promotes a feeling of well being.
• Sampaguita roots were used to treat wounds and snake bites. The leaves and the flowers have antipyretic and decongestant properties
• Sampaguita flower extract acts as a deodorant.

Growing Sampaguita

• Sampaguita plant cuttings are easy to root. More plants means more blooms at one given time and the more fragrance!
• Plant them in 3 gal pots. The plants are both full sun or shade tolerant.
• Use a good potting soil (with lots of organic matter like peat moss and humus).
• If the plant is exposed to certain conditions for a long time it gets used to them, and may get stressed after the conditions change significantly. However, gradual change should be fine.
• The smaller the plant, the easier it gets adjusted to new conditions.
• The potting mix must be well-drained. Never use top soil or garden soil for potting to avoid rotting in roots.
• All Sampaguita plants need lots of light for blooming. Bright light along with regular fertilization will encourage blooming.
• Move the plant into a larger pot every spring or when the plant overgrows the pot.

Sampaguita Plant Care

• Fertilize the plants monthly with a balanced fertilizer from spring through fall.
• The stems should be tied to supports and keep the soil evenly moist through the growing season.
• Pruning of sampaguita should be taken up after flowering to keep the plants thinned and shaped.
• Protect from frost in temperate regions.
• As a tropical plant, the Sampaguita loves heat, it grows best when the soil around it stays moist but not soggy.
• Do not over-fertilize or over water.
• Bigger flowers need plenty of sun.

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References Used - Thanks:

• Exotic Tropicals: Flowering Plants and Trees
• Sampaguita
• Sampaguita in Philippine's History

Interesting information on this topic

• Tropical Flowers by Charles- Exotics From The Garden Island
• Hawaiian Tropical Flowers
• Hawaiian Leis
• Jasminum sambac - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
• Books: Tropical Flowers of Southeast Asia
• Filipinos in Hawaii
• Books: Tropical Flowers (Periplus Nature Guides)
• Tropical Wedding Assortment
• Tropical Flower Bouquets
• Jasminum sambac
• Pacific Island Ecosystems at Risk (PIER) - Jasminum sambac
• Confusing varieties of Jasminum Sambac

About Obama: Chega de Tristeza

A Brazilian journalist comments on Obama's election,underlining that his victory happened mostly by sheer luck.
Well ,luck WE NEED, but mostly the world had so far an overdose of Anger and Hate,which resulted from greed and injustice,a domino effect after the Depression and Hitler's horrible reign and consequences.
Change,We Need,and all of us are needy for a respite and co-exist.
After all,if not were should not call ourselves Homo or Femina Sapiens,but rather Plain Beasts.
If we do some introspection and stop a little to understand our role on Earth vis a vis Nature,we immediately can find the so called answers to our mysteries.
We are all on the same boat,navigating in the same waters or as I remember the playwright
Braulio Pedrosos" Viemos todos na mesma caravela"........
Here the text from Brazil.which I do not aggree with in its entirety.
And Yes, CHANGE ,WE NEED,for the better, coomon sense and a conscience.
So Sarava, Eliane!

George W. Bush foi um dos presidentes mais populares dos EUA, com índices de aprovação que chegaram a bater em 90% depois do 11 de setembro, mas sai da Casa Branca pela porta dos fundos, com uma crise financeira internacional sem precedentes, com as contas dos EUA de pernas para o ar e com a biografia para sempre manchada por ter invadido o Iraque em cima de uma mentira --a das armas químicas, afinal inexistentes-- e passando por cima da ONU. Quantos soldados americanos pagaram e quanto a economia do país pagou por isso?

Barack Obama, o senador negro, nascido no Havaí, filho de queniano, é um salto histórico enorme. Um salto de qualidade, pela simbologia, pela concretização de uma mudança profunda que é política, social e cultural. Mas é também um salto no escuro. Aos 47 anos, é bastante jovem para o desafio, jamais ocupou cargos executivos de ponta e era um desconhecido não apenas no mundo, mas dentro do próprio EUA, até sair da cadeira de senador e bater a então imbatível Hillary Clinton nas primárias do Partido Democrata.

Para fazer um bom governo, um governo tão extraordinário quanto sua eleição, Obama conta com fatores objetivos e subjetivos. O mais objetivo de todos é a força política: ele venceu com uma margem expressiva e surpreendente de votos, contrariando as sempre apertadas eleições americanas (vide a do próprio Bush...), vai unir um democrata na Casa Branca com uma sólida maioria democrata no Congresso, contrariando a tradição, e chega ao poder da maior, ou única, potência, com uma simpatia internacional poucas vezes vista.

Além disso, Obama se beneficiou do "timing" da crise: ela se alastrou pelo mundo e foi aguda durante a campanha, mas está ficando sob controle e tende a amenizar por gravidade no início do seu governo. Ou seja: a crise de certa forma prejudicou as pretensões do republicano John McCain, correligionário de Bush, e favoreceu Obama, que é democrata e baseou o discurso na "mudança", na capacidade de tirar o país do atoleiro. E ele, ao assumir em 20 de janeiro de 2009, já deverá encontrar um ambiente econômico muito mais sereno, ou pelo menos muito menos assustador. E poderá capitalizar indiretamente o clima do "pior já passou".

Seu desafio será recolocar as contas públicas, o balanço de pagamentos e os indicadores macro-econômicos americanos no lugar. Mas sem o desespero da crise de setembro e outubro. Não será fácil, e o risco de frustração realmente existe, mas é possível e bem provável que a situação no início do seu governo esteja muito melhor do que no fim do mandato Bush. O primeiro passo é acertar na equipe, com os homens e mulheres certos nos lugares certos.

Tudo somado, temos que Barack Hussein Obama, além de todos os predicados concretos, tem também aquele que é fundamental: sorte. A expectativa é que assuma justamente quando o pior da crise já tiver passado, prontinho para fazer o que é preciso fazer e colher no final os louros.

Se a fase aguda da crise parece estar passando, isso vale também para o Brasil, onde Lula mantém seus 80% de popularidade, os indicadores da indústria ainda não acusaram o golpe e tudo indica que, entre mortos e feridos, a campanha de Dilma Rousseff em 2010 vai muito bem, obrigada.

Lá nos EUA, como aqui no Brasil, Obama e Lula têm muitas coisas em comum. Uma delas é essa: sorte, uma incomensurável sorte. Ótimo. Que isso reflita positivamente para os EUA, para o Brasil e principalmente para o mundo.

Eliane Cantanhêde é colunista da Folha, desde 1997, e comenta governos, política interna e externa, defesa, área social e comportamento. Foi colunista do Jornal do Brasil e do Estado de S. Paulo, além de diretora de redação das sucursais de O Globo, Gazeta Mercantil e da própria Folha em Brasília.

P. S.
I worked for the Folha in 1967- 69.
Marguerita
http://.thepoignantfrog.blogspot.com

Paula Toller & Rital Lee - Desculpe o auê

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WY5qbMNG0Ws

Jozef Szaina:“Today I have a name; then I was a number”

By Dennis hevesi

Published: June 30, 2008

Jozef Szajna, a Polish playwright, set designer and theater director who through often nearly wordless productions evoked the beastliness of humanity, the suffocation of individuality and the oppressiveness of dictatorship — gaining acclaim even during the Communist era — died on Tuesday in Warsaw. He was 86. His death was announced by the Warsaw Academy of Arts, according to Agence France-Presse.

Mr. Szajna (pronounced SHY-nuh) was a Roman Catholic who survived five years in the Auschwitz and Buchenwald concentration camps.

“Today I have a name; then I was a number,” he once said.

In 1976, a production of Mr. Szajna’s play “Replika” was staged at the Brooklyn Academy of Music. As the curtain rose, a smoldering mass appeared: garbage, tattered shoes, human limbs. It stirred. A begrimed hand reached out, touched a remnant of bread and dragged it below. Soon after, a crawling figure lunged at a mangled mannequin, crying out, “Mama, mama.”

Those were among the few words uttered by the four survivors, later joined by an aggressor, as they grunted and groaned through the heap of remnants of a once-flourishing civilization.

“It is a protest against war; it says, ‘Look at what we make of ourselves,’ ” Mr. Szajna told The New York Times, adding: “All the kings and queens, presidents and premiers should see ‘Replika.’ All of them at the United Nations. Maybe even your politicians before one becomes president.”

In Poland, Mr. Szajna circumvented Communist censors by presenting his work as abstract expressions of opposition to fascism and to passivity in the face of repression: his productions were eloquent in their near-silence by speaking wordlessly.

Among his other plays are “Rejoinder,” “Reminiscence” and “Dante,” the latter based on the journey through the realms of the dead in the 14th-century “Divine Comedy” but laced with Mr. Szajna’s depictions of 20th-century hellishness.

“The primary accent in this type of theater falls on visual expression,” Malgorzata Kitowska-Lysiak, a professor of art history at the Catholic University of Lublin, Poland, wrote in a 2003 profile of Mr. Szajna.

Pointing out that Mr. Szajna never disregarded the actor “with his individual gestures, or the word,” Ms. Kitowska-Lysiak said, “Nevertheless, the most important role in his theater is allotted to visual signs and imagery: expansive scenery and often grotesquely oversized props.”

Mr. Szajna called his work, with its harrowing frozen moments, “visual narration.”

Off stage, Mr. Szajna spoke out through individual artworks: sculptures, paintings, prints and collages, many of which incorporated objects like worn strips of leather, chunks of rubber, fragments of fabric, body parts from dolls, lists of concentration camp survivors and barbed wire.

Mr. Szajna was born in the southeastern Polish city of Rzeszow on March 13, 1922. At 16, he won a national diving championship. At 18, while fighting with the Polish resistance, he was arrested by the Nazis. After a foiled attempt to escape from Auschwitz, he was sent to Buchenwald.

“Waiting for execution brought me closer to the problems of eternity,” he later wrote. “All that we believed in — races, classes, political views — were not important anymore.” His death sentence was commuted by a new commander at Buchenwald, and he spent the rest of the war as a slave laborer.

He then turned to art. Mr. Szajna graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts in Krakow, with a degree in graphics, in 1952. A year later, he earned a degree in stage design at the academy. For the next nine years, he taught there. At the same time, he designed scenery for many productions in Poland, particularly as one of the founders, managing director and artistic director of Teatr Ludowy (the People’s Theater) in Nowa Huta.

In 1971, Mr. Szajna was chosen to open a new venue in Warsaw, the Teatr Studio, housed within the Palace of Culture, a huge Stalinist-era building that was originally supposed to be headquarters for Soviet intelligence agencies.

“Our theater,” Mr. Szajna told The Times in 1981, “speaks against terror, against threats to man’s humanity, against the loss of individualism and independence.”

Though he was not Jewish, Mr. Szajna was cited by the Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies at the University of Minnesota as “the most important theater director and artist in Poland whose work deals with the memory of the Nazi period and the Holocaust.”

The number on Mr. Szajna’s arm was 18729.

NYTimes

SZAJNA Józef (ur. 1922)

Józef Szajna, Zapomnienie, 1968

malarz, scenograf, reżyser, dyr. teatru; w czasie wojny więzień hitler. obozów w Oświęcimiu i Buchenwaldzie - przeżycia tego okresu odbijają się w twórczości Sz.; łącząc techniki malarskie z kolażem i asamblażem, tworzył dramatyczne obrazy oddające nastrój zniszczenia, zagłady, przemijania (Epitafium I, Dramat III); 1953-55 scenograf w Teatrze Ziemi Opolskiej, skąd z K. Skuszanką i J. Krasowskim przeniósł się do Teatru Ludowego w Nowej Hucie, gdzie jego opracowania plastyczne w wyraźny sposób wpływały na kształt przedstawień (m.in.: Księżniczka Turandot C. Gozziego, Myszy i ludzie wg J. Steinbecka, Jacobowsky i pułkownik F. Werfla, Burza Szekspira, Radość z odzyskanego śmietnika wg J. Kadena-Bandrowskiego, Dziady A. Mickiewicza); współpracował sporadycznie z innymi teatrami; 1962 był współtwórcą Akropolis S. Wyspiańskiego w reżyserii J. Grotowskiego; 1963-66 dyr. Teatru Ludowego w Krakowie, debiut reżyserski (Rewizor M. Gogola, 1963); 1972-82 dyr. Teatru Studio w Warszawie, gdzie rozwijał teatr zdominowany metaforyką plastyczną, w którym aktor sprowadzony został do roli nadmarionety; autonomiczna kreacja rzeczywistości ukazywała cywilizację upadku (jako wysypisko żelastwa i zbiorowisko kalekich postaci): Witkacy; Gulgutiera (współautor scenariusza - M. Czanerle), Replika (kolejne wersje), Dante, Cervantes; twórca environments (np. Ściana butów w galerii Zachęta w Warszawie, Reminiscencje - pamięci artystów straconych w Oświęcimiu oraz happeningów (np. Deballage w Nicei); od lat 70. maluje obrazy o charakterze metaforycznym; (2003) dr h.c. Uniw. Śląskiego
.http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.teatry.art.pl/portrety/szajna/wariacjet.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.teatry.art.pl/portrety/szajna/teatrj.htm&h=246&w=300&sz=24&hl=en&start=15&sig2=t6NGl_cSEIWRW9u48-LwJA&um=1&tbnid=7M9JvrJyOXAvcM:&tbnh=95&tbnw=116&ei=K-doSIiGGIHIef3Toc0P&prev=/images%3Fq%3DJozef%2BSzajna,%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DN
http://www.ejpress.org/article/28263

George Bush & Co's Accomplished Mission

Iraq-Father kissing his dead son- June 17 2008- photo by Karim Kadim AP

Luigi Pirandello: (1867-1936)

Luigi Pirandello (1867-1936)

Italian author, who was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1934 for his "bold and brilliant renovation of the drama and the stage." Pirandello's works include novels, hundreds of short stories, and c. 40 plays, some of which are written in Sicilian dialect. Typical for Pirandello is to show how art or illusion mixes with reality and how people see things in very different way - words are unrealiable and reality is at the same time true and false. Pirandello's tragic farces are often seen as forerunners for theatre of the absurd.

Luigi Pirandello was born in Caos, near Girgenti, on the island of Sicily, which was to be the inspiration of his writings. "I am a child of Chaos and not only allegorically," he said in his biographical sketch; his family spent vacations at a house called Chaos. Pirandello's father, Stefano Ricci-Gramitto, who had fought with Garibaldi, owned a prosperous sulfur mine.

His childhood Pirandello spent in modest weath in Girgenti (today called Agrigento) and Palermo, surrounded by nurses and servants, and enjoying the adoration of his mother. From his teens Pirandello showed literary talents, but he first studied law. His father intended his son to become a businessman. In 1887 Pirandello entered the University of Rome, from where he was expelled for offending a Latin professor, and then transferred to the University of Bonn, Germany, receiving his doctoral degree in Roman philology in 1891. Pirandello's dissertation, written in Germany, dealt with the dialect of his native region.

After having a liaison with his cousin Linuccia, which his father did not approve, Pirandello started his career as a writer. "Blessed is he who can stop halfway and before old age comes on can marry illusion and preserve it lovingly," Pirandello wrote in 1887 in a letter of his future plans. In Rome, where he had settled with a montly allowance from his father, Pirandello translated Goethe's Roman Elegies, wrote ELEGIE RENANE (1895), and published two collections of poetry, and a collection of short stories, AMORI SENZ' AMORE (1894). In 1898 he became a professor of Italian literature at a teacher's college for women, and worked there for 24 years. L'ESCLUSA (1901) was Pirandello's first full-length novel. In the ironical story the protagonist suspects that his wife is unfaithful and takes her back after the adultery has actually occurred.

Pirandello had married in 1894 Antonietta Portulano, a fellow Sicilian and the daughter of his father's business associate. She suffered mental breakdown in 1904. When her condition steadily worsened - she became insane with a jealous paranoia - the illness deeply influenced Pirandello's writing. During World War I, both of Pirandello's sons were captured as prisoners of war. After his wife's illness got worse, Pirandello was forced to place her in 1919 in a mental institution.When the collapse of the sulfur mines destroyed the family business, Pirandello had to turn his writing into a financially profitable activity. In 1904 Pirandello gained his first literary success with the novel IL FU MATTIA PASCAL. Its antihero, Mattia Pascal, is mistakenly declared dead. Offered an opportunity to start life over again, he escapes from his family. In Monte Carlo Mattia wins a fortune, but his newly found freedom turns sour and he must return to his hometown, to his past he had hoped to leave behind. "I can't really say that I'm myself," he thinks. "I don't know who I am. . . . I am the late Mattia Pascal." In the following decades the questions "who am I?" and "what is real?" became central in Pirandello's fiction. UNO, NESSUNO E CENTOMILA (1925-26, One, None, and Hundred-Thousand), a story about husband's descend into madness, owed more to Freud than Gogol. His despair starts when his wife comments a slight defect on his nose - it tilts to the right.

Pirandello started to write plays as early as in the 1880s, but he first considered the stage insensitive medium compared to the novel. After 1915, Pirandello concentrated on the theater and wrote until 1921 sixteen dramas. LA RAGIONE DEGLI ALTRI (1915) was Pirandello's first three-act play. It did not gain much understanding, but through the performances of the actor Angelo Musco (1892-1937) his work started to attract attention. His ideal female lead Pirandello found in Marta Abba, for whom he wrote several plays, among them DIANA E LA TUDA (1926, Diana and Tuda), L'AMICA DELLE MOGLI (1927, The Wives's Friend), and COME TU MI VUOI (1930, As You Desire Me). Pirandello also engaged her for his own company, the Teatro d'Arte di Roma, and formed a relationship with her, documented in Pirandello's Love Letters to Martha Abba (1994).

COSI È (SE VI PARE) (Right You Are - If You Think You Are), published in 1918, marked Pirandello's interest in the examination of the relativity of truth. The story was about a woman whose identity remains hidden and who could be one of the two very different people. SEI PERSONAGGI IN CERCA D'AUTORE (1921, Six Chracters in Search of An Author) asked the question, can fictional characters be more authentic than real persons, and what is the relationship between imaginary characters and the writer, who has created them.

Six Characters in Search of an Author consists of roles-within-roles. In rehearsal preparations of a theatrical company are interrupted by the Father and his family who explain that they are characters from an unfinished dramatic works. They want to interpret again crucial moments of their lives, claiming that they are "truer" than the "real" characters. "How can we understand each other if the words I use have the sense and the value I expect them to have, but whoever is listening to me inevitably thinks that those same words have a different sense and value, because of the private world he has inside himself too. We think we understand each other: but we never do," says the Father. He tells that he has helped his wife to start a new life with her lover and the three illegitimate children born to them. The Wife claims that he forced her into the arms of another man. The Stepdaughter accuses the Father for her shame - they met before in Mme Pace's infamous house, and he did not recognize her. She was forced to turn to prostitution to support the family. The Son refuses to acknowledge his family and runs into the garden. He shots himself and the actors argue about whether the boy is dead or not. The Father insists that the events are real. The Producer says: "Make-believe?! Reality?! Oh, go to hell the lot of you! Lights! Lights! Lights!" and The Stepdaughter escapes into the audience laughing maniacally.

Six Chracters in Search of An Author created a scandal when it was first performed in Rome, but it was hailed as a masterpiece in Paris, innovatively produced by Georges Pitoëff. G.B. Shaw praised it as the most original play ever. ENRICO IV (1922, Henry IV, known in the United States as The Living Mask), premiered in Milan, received much better reception. The play told about a man who has fallen from his horse during a masquerade and starts to believe he is the German emperor Henry IV. To accommodate his illness his wealthy sister has placed him in a medieval castle surrounded by actors dressed as eleventh-century courtiers. The nameless hero regains his sanity after twelve years, but decides to pretend he is mad.

With the trilogy Six Characters in Search of An Author, in which the characters of the title are called into existence by a writer, CIASCUNO A SUO MODO (1924) and QUESTA SERA SI RECITA A SOGGETO (1930), Pirandello revolutionized the modern theatrical techniques. A second trilogy, LA NUOVA COLONIA (1928), LAZZARRO (1929), and I GIGANTI DELLA MONTAGNA (1934, The Mountain Giants) moved from the limits of truth-telling to the reality outside of art. The Mountain Giants was left unfinished. It portrayed a magician, who lives in an abandoned villa. A theatrical company decides to perform at a celebration given by the 'Giants of the Mountain'. The barbaric audience tears two of the actors to pieces and kills one of the directors of the company.

Pirandello once said: "I hate symbolic art in which the presentation loses all spontaneous movement in order to become a machine, an allegory - a vain and misconceived effort because the very fact of giving an allegorical sense to a presentation clearly shows that we have to do with a fable which by itself has no truth either fantastic or direct; it was made for the demonstration of some moral truth." (from Playwrights on Playwriting, ed. by Toby Cole, 1961) Pirandello's central themes, the problem of identity, the ambiguity of truth and reality, has been compared to explorations of Henrik Ibsen and August Strindberg, but he also anticipated Beckett and Ionesco. One of the earliest formulations of his relativist position Pirandello presented in the essay 'Art and Consciousness Today' (1893), in which he argued that the old norms have crumbled and the idea of relativity deprives "almost altogether of the faculty for judgment." A central concepts in his work is "naked mask", referring our social roles and on the stage the dialectic relationship between the actor and the character portrayed. In Six Characters the father points out, that a fictional figure has a permanence that comes from an unchanging text, but a real-life person may well be "a nobody". Pirandello did not only restrict his ideas to theatre acting, but noted in his novel SI GIRA (1915), that the film actor "feels as if in exile - exiled not only from the stage, but also from himself."

In 1923 Pirandello requested membership in the Fascist party and obtained Mussolini's support in founding the National Art Theatre of Rome (Teatro d'Arte di Roma). However, the company was closed in 1928 on grounds of financial problems. In 1934 Pirandello's libretto for Gian Francesco Malipiero's opera The Fable of the Changeling was criticized by the Fascist authorities. Pirandello had first seen in Mussolini a man committed to the facts rather than theory, but later he described Mussolini as "as top hat, and empty top hat that by itself cannot stand upright". Remaining critical towards the regime, he did not support the Ethiopian invasion by Italy. Pirandello died in Rome on December 10, 1936.

Pirandello's influence can be seen on such European and American writers as Jean Anouilh, Jean-Paul Sartre, Samuel Beckett, Eugène Ionesco, Jean Genet, Eugene O'Neill, and Edward Albee. In Latin America, Jorge Luis Borges's questioning of the nature of identity have much in common with Pirandellian themes. Several of Pirandello's works have been adapted to screen, including As You Desire Me (1932), starring Greta Garbo, L'homme de nulle part (1937), based on the novel The Late Mathias Pascal and directed by and Pierre Chenal. Kaos, directed by Paolo and Vittorio Taviani (1984), was based on the author's four Sicilian stories.

For further reading: Characters and Authors in Luigi Pirandello by Ann Caesar (1998); Luigi Pirandello, 1867-1936, His Plays in Sicilian by Joseph F. Privitera (1998); Luigi Pirandello: The Theatre of Paradox, ed. by Julie Dashwood (1997); Ars dramatica: Studi sulla poetica di Luigi Pirandello by Rena A. Lamparska (1997); Understanding Luigi Pirandello by Fiora A. Bassanese, James N. Hardin (1997); Pirandello & Film by Nina Davinci Nichols, et al (1995); A Companion to Pirandello Studies, ed. by John Louis Digaetani (June 1991); Moments of Selfhood by James V. Biundo (1990); Luigi Pirandello by S. Bassnett-McGuire (1983); Luigi Pirandello: an Approach to his Theatre by O. Ragusa (1980); Dreams of Passion: The Theater of Luigi Pirandello by R, Oliver (1979); Introduzione alla critica pirandelliana by A. Illano (1976); Pirandello: a Biography by G. Giudice (1975); Pirandello fascista by G.F. Vené (1971); Luigi Pirandello by G. Giudice (1963); L' arte di Luigi Pirandello by F. Puglisi (1958); Playwrights on Playwrighting, ed. by Toby Cole (1961); Luigi Pirandello by L. Ferrante (1958); Luigi Pirandello by L. Baccalo (1949); L' Uomo segreto by F.V. Nardelli (1944); L'opera di Luigi Pirandello by M. Lo Vecchio Musti (1939) - Suomeksi Pirandellolta on käännetty useita näytelmiä ja esseekokoelma Uusi teatteri ja vanha teatteri (1934).

Selected works:

• LAUTE UND LAUTENTWICKLUNG DER MUNDART VON GIRGENTI, 1891 - The Sounds of the Girgenti Dialect, and Their Development (trans. by Giovanni R. Bussino)
• MAL GIOCONDO, 1889 - Painful Joy
• PASQUA DI GEA, 1891
• MARTA AJALA, 1893 (republished as L'esclusa in 1901)
• AMORI SENZ' AMORE, 1894 - Loves Without Love
• ELEGIE RENANE, 1895
• L'EPILOGO, (published in 1898, produced in 1910 under the title La Morsa)
• L'ESCLUSA, 1901 - The Outcast (trans. by Leo Ongley)
• IL TURNO, 1902 - The Merry-Go-Round of Love (trans. by Frances Keene)
• LE BEFFE DELLA VITA E DELLA MORTE, 1902
• QUAND' ERO MATTO, 1902
• BIANCHA E NERE, 1904
• IL FU MATTIA PASCAL, 1904 - The Late Mattia Pascal (trans. by William Weaver) - Mennyttä miestä (suom. Liisa Ryömä) - films: 1925, Feu Mathias Pascal, dir. by Marcel L'Herbier; 1936, L'homme de nulle part / The Man from Nowhere, dir. by Pierre Chenal, starring Pierre Blanchar; 1985, Le due vite di Mattia Pascal, dir. by Mario Monicelli, starring Marcello Mastroianni
• ERMA BIFRONTE, 1906
• LA VITA NUDA, 1908
• L'UMORISMO, 1908 - On Humor (trans. by Antonio Illiano and Daniel P. Testa)
• ARTE E SCIENZA, 1908
• SCAMANDRO, 1909
• SUO MARITO, 1911 - Her Husband (translated by Martha King and Mary Ann Frese Witt)
• LUMÍE DI SICILIA, 1911
• TERZETTI, 1912
• CECÈ, 1913
• LE DUE MASCHERE, 1914
• LA TRAPPOLA, 1915
• LA RAGIONE DEGLI ALTRI, 1915
• SI GIRA..., 1915 - Elämän filmi
• ERBA DEL NOSTRO ORTO, 1915
• SE NON ROSI, 1916
• ALL'USCITA, 1916 - At the Gate
• LA MASCHERA E IL VOLTO, 1916 - The Mask and the Face
• E DOMANI, LUNEDI?..., 1917
• L'INNESTO, 1917
• PENSACI, GIACOMINO!, 1917 - Better Think Twice About It
• IL PIACERE DELL' ONESTÀ, 1917 - The Pleasure of Honesty
• LIOLÀ, 1917 - trans.
• COSI È (SE VI PARE), 1918 - Right You Are, If You Think You Are (trans. by Stanley Appelbaum) - Niin on (jos siltä näyttää)
• UN CAVALLO NELLA LUNA, 1918
• LA PATENTE, 1919
• IL PIACERE DELL' ONESTÀ, IL GIOCO DELLE PARTI, 1918 - The Rules of the Game (translated and adapted by David Hare)
• IL CARNEVALE DEI MORTI, 1919
• TU RIDI, 1919
• MA NON È UNA COSA SERIA, 1919
• IL GIUOCO DELLE PARTI, 1919
• L'UOMO, LA BESTIA, A LA VIRTÙ, 1919
• BERECCHE E LA GUERRA, 1919
• MASCHERE NUDE, 1919-1922 (4 vols.) - Naked Masks: Five Plays (ed. by Eric Bentley)
• TUTTO PER BENE, 1920 - All for the Best
• IL BERRETTO A SONAGLI, 1920 - Cap and Bells
• COME PRIMA, MEGLIO DI PRIMA, 1921 - films: 1956, Never Say Goodbye, dir. by Jerry Hopper; 1945, This Love of Ours, dir. by William Dieterle starring Merle Oberon, Claude Rains
• L'INNESTO, 1921
• SEI PERSONAGGI IN CERCA D'AUTORE, 1921 - Six Chracters in Search of An Author (translators: John Linstrum, Mark Musa, Eric Bentley, Edward Storer) - Kuusi henkilöä etsii tekijää
• ENRICO IV, 1922 - The Living Mask / Henry IV (trans. by Julian Mitchell) - films: 1943, dir. by Georgio Pastina. Cast: Enzo Biliotti, Clara Calamai, Rubi D'Alma, Lauro Gazzolo, Augusto Maracci, Umberto Melnati, Luigi Pavese, Giorgio Piamonti, Francesco Rissone, Oswaldo Valent; 1985, dir. by Marco Bellocchio
• NOVELLE PER UN ANNO, 1922-37
• LA SIGNORA MORLI UNA E DUE, 1922
• Three Plays, 1922
• VESTIRE GLI IGNUDI, 1923 - Naked (trans. by Nina daVinci Nichols) / To Clothe the Naked
• LA VITA CHE TI DIEDI, 1924 - The Life I Gave You (translated by Frederick May)
• CIASCUNO A SUO MODO, 1924 - Each in His Own Way (trans. by Arthur Livingston)
• SAGRA DEL SIGNORE DELLA NAVE, 1924
• LA GIARA, 1925
• L'ALTRO FIGLIO, 1925
• QUADERNI DE SERAFINO GUBBIO, OPERATORE, 1925 - The Notebooks of Serafino Gubbio, Cinematograph Operator (trans. by C.K. Scott Moncrieff) - Elämän filmi (suom. Anna Silfverblad
)
• UNO, NESSUNO E CENTOMILA, 1925-26 - One, None, and Hundred-Thousand (translated and introduced by William Weaver)
• DIANA E LA TUDA, 1926 - Diana and Tuda
• L'IMBECILLE, 1926
• L'UOMO DEL FIORE IN BOCCA, 1926
• L'AMICA DELLE MOGLI, 1927 - The Wives' Friend (trans. by Marta Abba)
• The One-Act Plays, 1928
• BELLAVITA, 1928
• LA NUOVA COLONIA, 1928 - The New Colony
• O DI UNO O DI NESSUNO, 1929
• LAZZARO, 1929 - Lazarus
• SOGNO (MA FORSE NO), 1929
• COME TU MI VUOI, 1930 - As You Desire Me (trans. by Marta Abba) - film 1932, dir. by George Fitzmaurice, starring Greta Garbo, Melvyn Douglas, Erich von Stroheim
• QUESTA SERA SI RECITA A SOGGETTO, 1930 - Tonight we Improvise (translated by J. Douglas Campbell and Leonard G. Sbrocchi) - Tämä iltana improvisoimme
• TROVARSI, 1930 - To Find Onself (trans. by Marta Abba) - Löydänkö itseni
• QUANDO SI È QUALCUNO, 1933 - When Somebody Is Somebody
• Better Think Twice About It, and Twelve Other Stories, 1934
• The Naked Truth, and Eleven Other Stories, 1934 (trans. by Arthur and Henrie Mayne)
• I GIGANTI DELLA MONTAGNA, 1934 - The Mountain Giants
• LA FAVOLA DEL FIGLIO CAMBIATO, 1934
• NON SI SA COME, 1935 - No One Knows How (trans. by Marta Abba)
• NOVELLE PER UNO ANNO, 1937-38
• The Medals and Other Stories, 1938
• Four Tales, 1939
• NOVELLE PER UN ANNO, 1956-57 (2 vols.)
• TUTTI I ROMANZI, 1957
• MASCHERE NUDE, 1958 (2 vols.)
• OPERE, 1958-59 (5 vols.)
• Short Stories, 1959 (trans. by Lily Duplaix)
• SAGGI, POESIE, SCRITTI VARII, 1960
• The Rules of the Game; The Life I Gave You; Lazarus, 1960
• To Clothe the Naked and Two Other Plays, 1962 (trans. by William Murray)
• The Merry-Go-Around of Love and Selected Stories, 1964
• Pirandello's One-Act Plays, 1964 (trans. by William Murray)
• Short Stories, 1964
• On Humor, 1974
• Tales of Madness: A Selection from Luigi Pirandello's Short Stories for a Year, 1984 (trans. by Giovanni R. Bussino)
• Eleven Short Stories / Undici Novelle, 1994 (translated and edited by Stanley Appelbaum)
• Oil Jar and Other Stories, 1994 (translated by Stanley Appelbaum)
• Lettere a Marta Abba, 1995 - Pirandello's Love Letters to Martha Abba (edited and translated by Benito Ortolani)
• Luigi Pirandello, 1867-1936: His Plays in Sicilian, 1998 (2 vols., trans. by Joseph F. Privitera)
• Three Major Plays, 2000 (trans. by Carl R. Mueller)

Memory of the Camps

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/camp/view/.
http://pedrodoria.com.br/2008/06/15/alfred-hitchcock-e-seu-documentario-sobre-o-holocausto-na-europa/#comment-193399

For everyone that asks me where is my family?
This documentary answers the pain I feel on my skin.
And now I am being evicted on June 17th.Have no place to go.
Marguerita

Yves Saint Laurent: Je t'aime toujours

“The clothes incorporated all my dreams,” he said after the show, “all my heroines in the novels, the operas, the paintings. It was my heart — everything I love that I gave to this collection.”http://www.parismatch.com/parismatch/video/culture/anne-marie-corre-raconte-yves-saint-laurent

photo from Film Yves Saint Laurent by David Teboul
I always loved Yves Saint Laurent.
When he created the Mondrian dress,my mother who was a very sophisticated woman, recreated with her dressmaker, a version of the same.Both were in tune with Mondrian.
So as a little girl I remember him and always loved his vision of life.
I can,as an artist,understand his sadness.
People like him are not understood by the common world.
His work will be admired and talked about,but his persona will never be understood by the average ones.
Artists and thinkers see life in another dimension.A greater one ,where words are insufficient to translate. One can only get there through passion and openness of the spirit to the Beauty of Life.It will never be measured or attained by Money or Power,which unfortunately are the only mediums to sustain in the society we live in.Nonetheless, that vision is a troubling one,as we are critical of ugliness, of moral turpitude and oppression.
Saint Laurent,exercised his political vision through fashion. -
He was as Jean Cocteau once called such creatures, "L"enfant du paradis" ...
Marguerita


“Yves Saint Laurent invented everything, revisited everything, transformed everything to the service of a passion, to let woman shine and to free her beauty and mystery.”
-François Pinault, founder and former CEO of the fashion group PPR
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/02/fashion/02laurent.html