Quick Reads: indulge me for a second.... :)
hey all
am really excited about my work and the project i've been working on so thought i'd tell you guys -my friends here are really sick and tired of me talking about it so i need to find a new audience!!! :)
I am excited because:
1. the project is huge and i get to do exciting things like attend the glitzy launch (which was on the 2nd March). Other attendees included Sir Bill Morris, Terry Pratchett (he's really small?!) oh and this prime minister bloke called Anthony Blair was there too -this Anthony Blair chap claimed in his speech that the most important book in his life was a biography of Trotsky but i didn't believe him-
2. i achieved a lifetime ambition in that i appeared on the 'Match of the Day' programme on BBC1 (i was interviewed about the Quick Reads project cos the Premier League produced a Quick Reads book called The Team, which is about football) admittedly when i was a little kid i wanted to appear on MotD playing football and not talking about it!! :)
so apart from having the man-flu i'm really chipper at the moment, hope you guys are the same,
-barry
oh and if yr interested in finding outmore about the project you can do so here: www.quickreads.org.uk
am really excited about my work and the project i've been working on so thought i'd tell you guys -my friends here are really sick and tired of me talking about it so i need to find a new audience!!! :)
I am excited because:
1. the project is huge and i get to do exciting things like attend the glitzy launch (which was on the 2nd March). Other attendees included Sir Bill Morris, Terry Pratchett (he's really small?!) oh and this prime minister bloke called Anthony Blair was there too -this Anthony Blair chap claimed in his speech that the most important book in his life was a biography of Trotsky but i didn't believe him-
2. i achieved a lifetime ambition in that i appeared on the 'Match of the Day' programme on BBC1 (i was interviewed about the Quick Reads project cos the Premier League produced a Quick Reads book called The Team, which is about football) admittedly when i was a little kid i wanted to appear on MotD playing football and not talking about it!! :)
so apart from having the man-flu i'm really chipper at the moment, hope you guys are the same,
-barry
oh and if yr interested in finding outmore about the project you can do so here: www.quickreads.org.uk
posted by Anonymous at 3/23/2006 07:32:00 PM
10 comments
10 Comments:
lol...
if terry prachett was in deperate housewives then i would definitely watch that program... :)
Well, that was fantastic, Barry. The chic's name is hatcher - yes I do watch too much TV.
As for Pratchett, there is a photo of him in most of his books, you know the one with the beard and big hat. Does he possess both in real life?
yes beard and hat were both in place... we all had name badges and Mr. P had jauntily tucked his into the brim of his hat. what a character... :p
Barry, why was Trotsky an inspiration for Blair? What was so special about that biography?
[note to myself: have to figure out a way to way to neatly show all the latest comments]
well, i guess he was saying the book was an inspiration more than Trotsky himself...
but i do know his speech writers must love comments like that cos they make Mr B sound like a left-winger. it reminds people (& many members of his own party) that he began life as a lefty and wasn't always the centre-right christian loon he is generally regarded as being today...
regardless i think Tony was expressing that he might never have entered politics if he hadn't read that biography which was written by Isaac Deutscher - a Polish socialist historian.
I wonder which bit of the biography appealed to him the most. Trotsky did have lead a very unusual life. He was the one who created the Red Army, and then he did a lot of other interesting things as well before getting murdered by that ice axe in Mexico.
i've noticed that trotsky is quite popular in general nowadays...
i assume this has to do with fact he wasn't quite so jumpy[totalitarian] as Mao or Stalin.
personally i don't necessarily think that is much of an endorsement for him though.
I have always thought of him as a cruel bastard. According to wikepedia, he was the guy who came up with the great idea of having specialised army units shoot those who retreated without authorisation.
He was for world communist revolution and not for communism in one country (as opposed to Stalin), so what? I still don't get what was so great about him.
Why do you think he was not as totalitarian? There is no reason to believe that had he come to power, he would have been any better. The reason he failed, is because he was arrogant, and did not consider that rude ill-mannered guy from Georgia a serious enough threat.
well i didn't express myself very well but that's kinda what i meant by 'less jumpy'...
he wasn't paranoid, cruel and arrogant (like Mr Steel) just cruel and arrogant :)
Well, I am not sure if it's fair to bring up Mr Jughashvili's paranoid qualities. I don't think it's too farfetched to assume that paranoia is always part of the job of being a ruthless dictator. Ruthless dictators usually come to power because they were underestimated by those above them. (Hitler is a good example of this). It goes without saying that had their superiors realised what monster they were about to unleash on their countrymen, they would have done something about it, but they did not. Hence I conclude that they did not properly assess the abilities of those dictators in waiting.
Once ruthless dictators come to power, they tend to make sure that they don't make the same mistake as their predecessors. Hence the paranoia. You definitely don't want to underestimate anyone, so you end up killing everyone with even half a working brain cell. Yes, it's tragic being a ruthless dictator, you end up being surrounded by incompetent yes-men like Khrushchev.
Anyway, my point is, had Лев Давидович succeeded in grabbing power, paranoia would have followed in no time.
On the other hand I am not sure if I agree with Stalin being described as arrogant. At least not in the same way as Trotsky. The reason why Stalin won power was because of his ability to be on all the committees, however unprestigeous, he did have excellent social networking skills. This was not something that intellectuals such as Trotsky would stoop down to.
Post a Comment
<< Home