La alcaldesa

La joven política by Manuela Carmena
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Este libro me encantó, en dos niveles: 1º, Manuela Carmena es un encanto de persona, cuya generosidad de espíritu es evidente en lo que dice y la manera de decirlo; y 2º, su experiencia como alcaldesa y cara y símbolo de una coalición electoral de tendencia pendenciera, hace especialmente valiosas sus reflexiones y propuestas respecto a los obstáculos estructurales para que la democracia realmente responda a las necesidades y los deseos del pueblo.
Su larga experiencia como abogada laboralista — empezada en los años de Franco y su represión — y luego como juez no la había preparado por las contiendas feroces entre facciones políticas, con sus insultos y descalificaciones, exageraciones y hasta mentiras que ya son costumbre conocida por los políticos más veteranos. Pero aguantó, y hasta hizo gestos importantes para fomentar un ambiente más cordial y productivo, por ejemplo, el invitar a los de los otros partidos a desayunar con ella en su oficina con sus famosas magdalenas (Carmena incluye las receta para sus magdalenas en el libro).
Pero lo que encontró más inaceptable y seguramente el origen de gran parte de las ineficiencias de nuestro sistema electoral era la férrea lealtad y disciplina que exigen los partidos, con el único objetivo de alcanzar el poder. Lo que se podría hacer para la ciudad con ese poder es de menor importancia; lo realmente importante es preservar el partido como organización y asegurar puestos pagados para sus miembros más activos y leales. Eso explica la tendencia de los voceros de la oposición de oponerse a toda propuesta del consistorio, sin contemplar una colaboración para mejorar la propuesta.
Sin embargo, pudo empezar algunos importantes cambios en la ciudad, En 2018, a pesar de todas las frustraciones,

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Time of the wolves: Germany, post WWII

Aftermath: Life in the Fallout of the Third Reich by Harald Jähner
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Aftermath (original title: Wolfszeit, “Wolf Time,” 2019) is about the Germans in 1945-1955, recovering from the war, their huge and humiliating defeat, the destruction of most of their cities and production facilities, and their own conflicted consciences. Not surprisingly, most popular was the interpretation of themselves as “victims” rather than perpetrators of the terrible violence that not only killed millions of people but displaced even more millions of survivors. The sequels of the Ukraine war are going to be of similar scale, as we can already see with the millions of refugees, destruction of agrarian and industrial productivity, and the terrible losses of life. How the Russians are going to deal with it, and their own consciences if at least some of them acknowledge the evidence, …?
The war and the rapid collapse of the Nazi regime in 1945 altered the structure of all Europe — as will Russia’s current war on Ukraine. What had been the greatest economic and military power on the continent was now divided into four zones governed respectively by the French, the British, the U.S., and the Soviets. National boundaries were redrawn, so that much of what had been German became Polish, leading to expulsion or (more-or-less voluntary) mass migration of German speakers westward, to lands they had never seen before and whose dialects and accents were unfamiliar — and where they had no prospects for making a living.
“In the summer of 1945 about 75 million people lived in the four occupied zones of Germany. Some 40 million, far more than half of them, were not where they belonged or wanted to be.” (p. 39)
The hardship and misery in the destroyed cities induced the German self-pity mentioned above, their view of themselves as “victims”, and an utter lack of concern about the missing millions of Jews, even among those Germans (a minority) who accepted German responsibilty for the destructive war. Finding ways to survive — often by theft, frequently accompanied by violence over a precarious shelter or a fragment of bread in a bombed out city — and the abuses by the occupying forces, including house-breaking and rapes by barely-controlled Soviet soldiers — earned this period the label “Wolfszeit”, or “time of the wolf”, the ferocious monster of German folklore.
But it also inspired creativity and ingenuity of many Germans, sometimes in ways that contributed to the rebuilding of economy, production and even culture. Among the exceptional personalities that Jähner highlights are the now-famous writer and poet Hans Magnus Enzensberger, a creative capitalist as a child in the black market of Bavaria; the beautiful and daring actress Hildegard Knef, portraying women taking sometimes brutal control of their sex-lives — a scandalous departure from pre-war German mores; Rudolf Hernnstadt, a Jewish Communist journalist who established new newspapers in the Soviet zone; Hans Habe, “[t]he most glittering among” the German Jews (though he was actually of Hungarian origin) serving the U.S. occupiers — handsome, clever, pretentious and “highly efficient” at establishing newspapers to counter the lingering ideology of the Nazis; the famous author Alfred Döblin; pilot and sex-education popularizer Beate Uhse; and Heinrich Nordhoff, the “general” who got Volkswagen back in production.
Very clearly written and bristling with dramatic incidents, this book is necessary for understanding the Germany that emerged from its “wolf’s time” to become, this time in very different form, the great economic power it is today.

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 Thoth Writers Collective

We are six writers across two continents, from Spain to California, who collaborate via Zoom, e-mail, etc., to encourage one another and improve our writing —from interpersonal and gender dilemmas, global conflicts to myth. We take our name from Thoth, the ibis-headed god who introduced writing to the ancient Egyptians.

 

Jan Alexander, based in New York, writes both fiction and non-fiction that reflects how globalism and technology are changing everything, in good ways and bad. Her books include Ms. Ming’s Guide to Civilization (novel, Regal Publishers 2020); Getting to Lamma (novel); Bad Girls of the Silver Screen (with Lottie Da; nonfiction).  https://www.janalexander.com/portfolio-category/books/

 

Peter de Lissovoy is a writer and free-lance editor living in New Hampshire; besides his nonfiction memoirs of his days as a civil rights activist with SNCC in Georgia (The Great Pool Jump), his works include the novels Invisible Car Dealer; Wisconsin; Rita; Melusina; The Angels of Zimbabwe; and Feelgood: A trip in time and out: https://www.amazon.com/-/es/Peter-de-Lissovoy/e/B06XPRQ21X?ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_1&qid=1649153619&sr=8-1

Geoffrey Fox, based in Spain and New York, is the author of the novels Rabble! A Story of the Paris Commune (2021) and A Gift for the Sultan (2008) and the short-story collection Welcome to My Contri (1988; augmented e-book 2017) --“This frequently powerful collection of short stories enters Latin America as if through the rickety back door of a burlesque house" NYTimes Book Review). His best-selling sociological work is Hispanic Nation: Culture, Politics and the Constructing of Identity (University of Arizona Press, 1997). https://geoffreyfox.com/

 

Karla Huebner is a novelist and professor of art history at Wright State University, Dayton, Ohio, and author of Magnetic Woman: Toyen and the Surrealist Erotic (art history, University of Pittsburgh Press), In Search of the Magic Theater (novel, Regal House 2022) and other works. https://www.karlahuebner.com/

 

Margaret C. Murray lives in the San Francisco East Bay with two dogs and a cat. She is the author of novels Sundagger.net, Dreamers, Spiral and Pillow Prayers. Margaret is a small press publisher and teaches From Heart to Paper Writing Workshops. Presently she is fine-tuning her upcoming fifth novel Deer Xing. See https://writewordspress.com/.

 

Dirk van Nouhuys writes novels, short stories, experimental forms, and occasionally verse.  He has a BA from the Stanford creative writing program and was minor pioneer of what later became the internet. He has published a book on Macintosh applications, and a translation of two Flemish novels, The Danger and The Enemy.  He publishes fiction regularly in literary and other magazines to a total of about 95 items.   http://www.wandd.com/Site/Publications.html.