The Girls and the Money: Reflections on 'The Great Gatsby'

My Grey Walls Press edition of The Great Gatsby, published in 1948 and bought about the same time, came in a dust jacket I never liked. But it's more dust than jacket now, and all I can remember of its design is that it had crude skyscrapers, not the least sharp-edged, on it somewhere, and something red and something green. Or at least I think it did. Yesterday what I picked up was green cloth bound, slim, subdued, plain, not the least bit awkward and garish, hurried and home-made. Those last are qualities I've always associated not only with Gatsby but also with Gatsby, and if being reduced to that plain green is one of the signs that some of the life you held in your hand when you held it new-and it still felt new, in 1948 (to a young man, anyway) -has now been rubbed off, has crumbled away and left bare, the permanent rock, then it's a change I suppose we can do nothing but try to get used to. In its plain monotone, perhaps we can think of the book as more like the jewel Edmund Wilson compared it with and less like the local newspaper. Plain cloth is in any case an improvement over ruffled Robert Redford on glossy paper cover

Reading 'Sons and Lovers'

It is a truism that our sense of the "life" in a work of art seems often to have to do with our sense not only that what the work of art achieves is not the record of a triumph, say, but the exploration of a conflict, but also, and further, that the opposing forces or powers in it are being held not just in balance but in changing balance. It is no less true, but perhaps less a truism, that a special vividness can quicken this sense of "life" as we come to believe that in the work of art we have an account or record of conflict given not only by the artist but also, so to speak, through him; if nowadays we can no longer think comfortably in terms of daemons and Muses, we may nevertheless feel the need of metaphor to express our sense that a work of art, just as a child is the product of its parents but something new too, may be the creature of its artist but have not only a separate but an independent - uncreated, almost - nature and being

Pastoral profits guide, a paddock guide to achieving sustainable livestock productivity

Most pastoralists appreciate the need to deliver an economic, environmental and social \u27profit\u27 from their business. Achieving these profits can be a real challenge given the comparatively low productive potential and the substantial seasonal variation in the WA Southern Rangelands region. This guide was written to assist pastoralists to meet their specific livestock production, financial and range condition objectives through the better alignment of feed demand (stocking rate) to feed supply (carrying capacity). We provide nine basic steps that simplify the process of managing the feed supply, equipping pastoralists with the tools to make· decisions and to critically assess the outcomes. The first part of the guide details the nine steps and worksheets that are used to make the assessment and assist in making a stocking decision. The second part provides reference material

The changing cultural dimensions of biodiversity conservation

Agriculture involves the redirection of wild ecosystems to the production of food. This trade-off between farming and biodiversity conservation is often discussed in terms of land sharing or land sparing and rewilding. However, this choice also reflects the perceptions of ideal landscapes, which are partly based on culture and memory

The UK homelessness epidemic – radical roots needing radical solutions

Using newspaper articles, government and charity reports and other secondary sources, this paper looks at the new problem of widespread homelessness brought about by the UK austerity economic policy after 2010. It assesse the growth of the problem due in particular to the re-engineering of welfare benefits. Looking at those who have fallen through the net, the paper focuses on the ability of local authorities to use the law to decline to support those presenting as homeless, including those released from prison. Addressing punitive measures taken by local authorities and law enforcement agencies, it highlights the difficulties faced by those targeted by such agencies. In the final section I look at two contrasting models of policy vis-à-vis homeless people – those in use in the United States and in Finland. The UK neither officially countenances homeless camps, as in the US, nor offers housing as a right, as in Finland. Drawing on an accusation made by Chris Glover in a December 2018 academic paper, I conclude that Friedrich Engels 1844 concept of social murder has been committed against thousands of people in an act of a term I coin as ‘Classism’. This act of class war against the most vulnerable has made many thousands more homeless and in precarious housing

Epidemia bezdomności w Wielkiej Brytanii – radykalne przyczyny wymagają radykalnych rozwiązań

Bazując na informacjach z artykułów publikowanych w czasopismach, raportów rządowych i organizacji pozarządowych oraz innych źródeł, autor przedstawia problem wzrostu bezdomności spowodowanego brytyjską polityką gospodarki oszczędnościowej prowadzoną od roku 2010. Analizuje ten wzrost szczególnie w kontekście zmian dotyczących świadczeń socjalnych. Przyglądając się przypadkom osób, które wypadły z system pomocy społecznej, autor koncentruje się na wykorzystywaniu przez władze lokalne prawa do odmowy udzielenia wsparcia osobom bezdomnym, w tym osobom zwolnionym z więzienia. Odnosząc się do środków karnych zastosowanych przez władze lokalne i organy ścigania, pokazuje trudności, na jakie napotykają osoby będące objęte działaniami wspomnianych podmiotów. W ostatniej części prezentuje różnice między dwoma modelami polityki wobec osób bezdomnych – modelem amerykańskim a modelem fińskim. Wielka Brytania ani oficjalnie nie przeciwdziała obozowiskom osób bezdomnych, jak w USA, ani nie przyjmuje za Finlandią, że posiadanie miejsca do mieszkania jest prawem. Opierając się na oskarżeniu Chrisa Glovera, autor wyciąga wniosek, że „morderstwo społeczne” (koncepcja Engelsa z 1844 r.) zostało popełnione na tysiącach ludzi w ramach aktu określanego przeze autora mianem „klasizmu”. Ten akt wojny klasowej z najbardziej bezbronnymi spowodował, że wiele tysięcy osób jest bezdomnych i żyje w bardzo złych warunkach