WORLD WORLDWIDE FRANCE News Journal Update - (en) France, Monde Libertaire: THE BLACK RAT HARVEST. SEPTEMBER 2023, A GOOD CRU... (ca, de, fr, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

 At the beginning of September, back to school with the Black Rat! Greek

history lesson to start: Memoirs of Yannis Makriyannis. Then, Natural
Sciences, in the company of Elisée Reclus and the History of a Stream.
Small historical leap into Philsterburg (Germany) in the 1930s, with the
young resistance fighter Jacques Decour. Recreation with The Great Life
of the Ineffable Jean-Pierre Martinet. History of Roma and Sinti art;
Gypsies; Manouches and other travelers. A little ultra-fun break: the
priceless women's thriller to enjoy: Zorro's Bride by Nicolatta
Vallorani. Philo, with The eco-ethics of Tomonobu Imamichi. And finally,
Between hatred and tenderness: the moving confidences of Natacha Pierre.

Vampire woman, Psyri district (Athens), photo Patrick Schindler , 2023

" Gluttony is the strongest passion of children and old people. The
first enjoyment of man, that which delights him from birth until his
last hour " Charles Fourier

Yannis Makriyannis: Memoirs

In the preface to General Makriyannis, Memoirs ( ed. Albin Michel,
translation Denis Kohler ), Pierre Vidal-Naquet paints a portrait of
Greece at the time of Makriyannis. Populated then by Rouméliotes, Vlach
shepherds, Albanians) and of course the Ottoman occupants. Before the
new Greek territory was invaded, after the revolution of 1821, by
Western powers. The "Xenocracy", replaced by the "Bavariocracy" of King
Otto. The latter, obsessed with the urban model from Paris, London and
above all, Munich, but completely incapable of solving the problem of
languages (between the learned Katharévousa and the popular Dhimotiki)
and of fully understanding the differences between the ancients fighters
of the revolution.
In his turn, in his preface, Denis Kohler attempts to situate
Makriyannis within this explosive context. Mariyannis, Rouméliote
fighter of 1821, " but, second rate ", however, stood out twenty years
later, as one of the investigators of the coup d'état of September 3,
1843. And this, until his imprisonment, his conviction and his too late
rehabilitation. Makriyannis " one of the rare self-taught Greek
scholars, passionate about the history of his country, its victories and
its failures ".
Moreover, Georges Séféris added that these Memoirs made Makriyannis the
" master of modern Greek prose ".
They were also considered one of the founding texts of popular language
literature.

His story is also a real soap opera. Finally, Makriyannis takes up the
pen! He begins by telling us that he only wrote his memoirs " with the
aim of telling only the naked truth ". But he begins by telling us " in
complete objectivity», his years of youth, until the Greek revolution.
His childhood in a poor and large family in Roumélia, practically
reduced to the status of slavery by the all-powerful Ali Pasha, in the
region of Ianina. After the death of the father and three siblings, the
survivors fled with their mother to Livadia. Aged 7, the boy was
"placed" to work and left, seven years later, for Arta where he would
learn about Hetairia.
An interesting passage is devoted to this revolutionary secret society.
Thanks to his first-rate testimony, we will also penetrate to the heart
of the forces and alliances which oppose or bring together Greeks,
Albanians and even the few Turks opposed to the autocracy of Ali Pasha.
He tells us about the tragic destinies of the Capetan heroes of the 1821
revolution, (including that of Gogos " this honest man, courageous and
generous patriot ") during the eight long years of the " War of
Independence " which took place in Rumelia. , in the Peloponnese and in
Attica. All this under the curious eye of the English, French, Austrians
and Bavarians.
Madriyannis will tell us how he miraculously managed to get out of this
quagmire " where the Greeks carried out the same sadistic acts as the
Turks "! Rapes, heads cut off and exposed in public " I am sickened to
be Greek, seeing what cannibals we make»! His story is just as edifying
when he exposes us further on, the oppositions which separate the
members of the executive government (the Kolokotronis, Metaxas, etc.)
and the legislative members, (Katepans, magnates and large landowners).
Manipulations, shenanigans of all kinds " a band of politicians,
informers and crooked officials who seek to divide the combatants, spend
treasures on trickery, make their pelota of goods looted from the Turks
and reduce the people to terror and misery. The shit finds its shovel
and our country was reduced to being no more than a floorcloth for
scoundrels ". It has the merit of being frank!
It should be noted that Makriyannis never (or very little) talks about
his private life. On the other hand, he in no way hides his sexist and
anti-Semitic convictions (equivalent to those uttered in the medieval
West, according to a footnote, "Epoque oblige"?! ... In short, we are
going to follow the adventures that await Makriyannis after
the In particular, during the recapture of the Acropolis from the Turks,
etc. Makriyannis does not resume his narration until the election of
Capodistria, as Governor of Greece in 1827 "dark period of shenanigans
at all levels , while the Roumeliote population is persecuted, under the
complicit eyes of Western powers and Russia". What solution while
waiting for the arrival of the king? This is how we arrive at the
beginning of the reign of King Otto, under the jealous gaze of the other
powers who are only waiting for the opportunity to regain control. Aside
from these historical moments, we also learn a lot about the different
traditional Greek identities, religion and the general context in Greece
at that time. Makriyannis then examines the years of "Otto's funny reign".
He devotes a long passage to presenting to us his project to constitute
125 illustrations, representing the "key moments" of the Greek
revolution " in order to leave in image, only the truth against
historical untruths ".
Then we come to the famous uprising of September 3, 1843 (to demand from
the king a constituent monarchy and justice for the combatants): the
climax of Mariyannis' adventures. First-hand historical document: his!
But will all the latter's efforts succeed in opposing the rivalries
between the different factions of Greek society? What about the
religious question and language, once again brought to the table.
Mariayannis also focuses, for a time, on the "Philorthodox Society"
which takes up the fantasy of the "great idea", or the reconquest of the
old Hellenic empire, particularly in Asia Minor. Then, we witness the
last battles of Makriyannis, at the risk of his life, threatened several
times.

In his conclusion, he takes stock of his life which he summarizes as
follows:I am just a simple citizen who cultivates his garden. I wrote
all this without passion so that the truth could be known and so that
people would stop wrongly accusing our unfortunate homeland. Yes I also
made mistakes, I still do! I am a man and it is a duty to report his
faults as much as his qualities!

If this review turned out to be so long, it is because we wanted to show
the full extent of the episodes evoked by Makriyannis, from an era as
troubled as that of the Greek revolution and its aftermath. Memories
essential to try to see a little more clearly! This is confirmed by
Dinos Christianopoulos[note]in Parallel Lives , one of his texts from
the collection La Mal Pente" Makriyannis desired no literary glory, he
only desired to teach us 'firsthand' what monsters ruled and ruined
Greece[...]Historian Vlahoyannis discovered his manuscripts in 1907 at a
grocer's who used them to wrap its anchovies![...]No one other than
Makriyannis has so vividly reported to us about 1821, the Bavarian
kingship and the sufferings of our people. His memoirs little by little
won over the most severe specialists "...

Elysée Reclus: Story of a stream

Elisée recluse was born in Gironde in 1830, into a Protestant family and
under the influence of a pastor father. Very early on, he found it
difficult to tolerate religious education and then became interested in
politics. Communard, anarchist theoretician, member of the First
International , he joined the Jura Federation after the exclusion of
Michel Bakounine. With Pierre Kropotkin and Jean Grave, he participated
in the newspaper Le Révolté . Vegetarian, naturist, supporter of free
union and Esperantist, in October 1894, with other resigning professors,
he created the New University in Brussels. Precursor of social
geography, geopolitics, geohistory, ecologism, Elisha is not only an
innovative pedagogue, but also a prolific writer. His major works are
The Earth (in 2 volumes), his Universal Geography (in 19 volumes), Man
and the Earth in (6 volumes!), as well as his most concise, History of a
stream and History of a mountain . He wrote around 200 geographical
articles, 40 articles on various themes and 80 anarchist political
articles...

In the introduction to History of a Stream by Elisée Reclus ( ed. Le
Pommier ), Valérie Chansigaud tells us the fascinating path of this
little booklet, published in 1869, in fact, a sub-part of her work La
Terre , published in 1861. This new version with a strong ideological
dimension (anarchist), is written in the form of a popular science but
not exempt from numerous passages of pure poetry!

Central theme: the influence of water in the construction of societies.
The story begins "naturally" at the source, " which has always been the
symbol of moral purity and innocence in poetry". From the Aryans of Asia
to the Hellenes, all paid homage to him, explains Elisée Reclus, until
the times of the Middle Ages. We learn a lot along the way about the
history of these regions and the legends of the ancestors of these three
"races of the ancient world". Reclus deals in a separate chapter with
the history of water in desert countries (Arabian peoples, Sahara, South
American plateaus, etc.) " For those who live there, oases are almost
prisons, so that for those who see them from afar and who only know them
through imagination, they are a paradise ."
Among many other questions, Reclus wonders, among other things, why many
rivers have disappeared from Africa and Arabia.
On very beautiful pages, he then sings of the charm of mountain torrents
" which rush in cascades and bathe the grass with its scattered drops ".
Like the music of a ballet or, " like the snake that slides through the
grass, unwinding its coils "". Mysteries of the caves, " refuge of our
ancestors which branch out in the depths of the mountain, sculpted by
underground water ". Some childhood memories, here and there: " a few
steps from the plowed fields, the charm of the ravines where a multitude
of animals and critters glide and, protected from the sun, plants
grouped freely, following their affinities and the nature that carry
them, like a federation where each existence is safeguarded by the
alliance of all". Abandoned fishing boats, a favorite playground for
truant kids.
After these beautiful lyrical flights, the geologist details the
innumerable varieties of substances, solid and gaseous, which spring
from our fountains. Floods and collapses: flash floods flooding the
gorges of the mountains " foamy masses advancing at the speed of a
galloping horse only calming down with the declivity of the plains, but
which gains in height and width ". The modification of banks and islets
or, " the slow work of chance ".
Magnificent passage on the charm of walks along the water "magic of the
water spider, an unsinkable skater who goes upstream in sudden bursts.
Long hairs of bundles of grass waving in serpentine curves under the
force of the current. The pleasure of bathing in the mountains or
becoming a triton again like our ancestors were ."
Critical considerations on mass fishing and apology for the "unhappy
solitary fisherman"!
Reflections on "modern times": the stream as an auxiliary of the
agricultural worker, of the millers, but powerless victim of landowners
and other factory owners who cause disasters due to their selfishness.
Very informative passage on wood floating, " an activity today relegated
to the gorges of the high mountains ".
The journey ends with beautiful images of maritime ebbs and flows,
cycles of the waters which " in another form end up circumnavigating the
planet ". Symbol of immortality?

The second short text in the collection is entitled Du sentiment de la
nature dans les societies modernes , dating from 1866.
First theme addressed: the relationship between men and mountains from
antiquity to the present day, as well as a comparison between the
different approaches of European peoples since the Middle Ages.
This is followed by considerations by Elysée Reclus on the accumulation
of population displacements, migrations and already anticipating the
"specter of desertification". The essay ends on a more optimistic note:
European exceptions, in Lombardy, certain British and Irish regions, etc.
And this last word given to Rumford: " One always finds in nature more
than what one looked for there ."

Jacques Decour: Philisterburg

Daniel Decourdemanche (known as Jacques Decour), was born in 1910 in
Paris. He studied in Paris where he studied law, but quickly turned to
German literature and became the youngest professor of German in France.
At the very beginning of the 1930s, he was appointed French assistant in
Prussia, at the Magdeburg high school. This is where he wrote
Philisterburg, a story that describes the rise of Nazism and racism.
Back in France, he joined the Communist Party and was appointed to the
Lycée Rollin in Paris (which took its name after the Liberation).
Mobilized in 1939, he joined the Resistance and created with Georges
Politzer and Jacques Solomon, the most important clandestine publication
of occupied France. In February 42, he was arrested by the French police
and handed over to the Germans. He was sentenced to death and shot on
May 30, 1942.

October 1930. We are on the train which takes the young Jacques Decour
(22 years old) to Philisterburg (East Prussia), where he is appointed
assistant professor of French.
 From the first lines, we are won over by his particularly pleasant
style which imposes itself in what is then for him, only a newspaper "
Journal which watches over me and bores me, worries me, always there,
contemptuous and mocking ." This is why Decour promises to " expose only
the particular facts, to avoid clichés and forget the image that the
French have of the Germans."". Easy to say! However, he cannot resist
describing with raw realism the bankers and then the mute pacifist, who
share his compartment. Arriving at his destination, he tells us of his
first disappointments. The discomfort of German beds, the food more than
mediocre, just like the city... The first contact with the director of
his establishment is also worth its weight in gold: " He talks a lot.
His mobile teeth over which he is no more master than his saliva which
falls in a long firmament on the lapel of his jacket .
Decour then discovered, with amazement, the fundamentals of Prussian
education: method, seriousness, discipline and "gentle" domination over
the students! Young Jacques quickly realizes that outside the
establishment, it is more or less the same " in this small town where
the gravity of Goethe prevails over the smile of Heine ". Nothing
escapes his scrutinizing gaze. Uniforms and titles high-sounding like
sideburns. And on the other side of the mirror, exploding unemployment,
the financial crisis, anti-Semitism at school, windows exploding under
National Socialist propaganda, permanent brawls between communists and
Nazis, consequences of a Treaty of Versailles poorly digested. In short,
this Germany so well described elsewhere, by Christopher Isherwood or
Klaus Mann[note], etc. Germany of war widows who rent their unoccupied
rooms to foreigners, etc. Jacques Decour gives us here, a little gem of
intimate scenes between his landlady, his unemployed and alcoholic son
and his tenants, including an activist of the National Socialist party
"with a mind defined like a field of raves, his opinions made to the
mold in the toughest brass and "male " morality! Sometimes the young
Jacques gets angry (rarely). Above all, and this is the whole point of
his story, he is fascinated by the different ways of teaching on both
sides of the Rhine.
One thing leading to another, he ends up making a most interesting
comparison of nationalisms, German and French, " both so noisy that we
can practically hear only them.". The legendary mutual incomprehension
between the two peoples and their impossible reconciliation. " In the
meantime, the workers are dying of hunger, giving their votes to the
extreme parties and it is among the pacifists that there are naturally
the Jews whom Hitler will most likely have shot or expelled and who here
burn with a faint patriotism. " ..

Prophetic if ever there was one! This captivating journal, which Jacques
Decour revised in France two years later, is supplemented by a short
text: Goethe and German youth . To quote just one sentence that
perfectly sums up this little essay: "If he saw today the teenagers with
swastikas walking through the streets singing war songs, Goethe would
retire into an ivory tower. In Germany today he would be riddled with
bullets by the two antagonistic parties who abandoned him and threw him
overboard ."
The small volume ends with the poignant and final letter that Decour
sent to his parents, dating from a certain... May 30, 1942, at 6:45 a.m.!

Jean-Pierre Martinet: The high life

Jean-Pierre Martinet was born in Libourne (Gironde) in 1944. His father,
a Spanish teacher, died very early, leaving a widow "on the verge of
madness", with three children, two of whom were mentally retarded.
Jean-Pierre Martinet will keep sad memories of it, not without some
after-effects! In 1978, after the publication of his novel Jérôme, he
left his post at the ORTF and took refuge in Tours, where he bought a
small newspaper kiosk; but he goes bankrupt. He published two novels in
1986. Claiming to want to stop writing, he nevertheless continued, but
the following years were those of decline, during which Martinet sank
into alcoholism before dying at the age of 48 from a cerebral embolism,
alone and poor. His works are marked by absolute darkness and a deep
pessimism in the face of the "economic miracle", " the moral degradation
and neuroses of a small people disoriented and desperate by the changes
in society ". He did not spare himself in passing since in his own
biographical note, he had noted: " Starting from nothing, Martinet
accomplished an exemplary trajectory: he arrived nowhere.»

In La grande vie ( reissue L'arbre vengeur ) by Jean-Pierre Martinet,
the narrator will meet, or rather "will be forced to meet" Madame C.,
concierge on rue Froidevaux. Street bordering the Montparnasse cemetery
in the 14th arrondissement. His concierge therefore, " a force of
nature, almost two meters tall, more than a hundred kilos ", cannot
stand his tenants. She holds them " in tenacious contempt, reproaching
them for living in this rotten hovel, with its Turkish toilets in the
courtyard into which she has a phobia of falling, one day" .
The narrator now. He lives on the same street,with his sullen head,
almost always sleepy, 1.40 m, 38 kilos and who wears very high heels so
as not to look like a dwarf from Snow White" . His rule of life: " Live
as little as possible to suffer as little as possible "!
A Vichy policeman father, a mother denounced (probably by him) and
deported to Auschwitz... Our narrator, on the other hand, works in a
funerary articles store and watches from his window over his father's
grave "so that she does not is desecrated by dogs, even though they are
forbidden to stay there . He loves his job "I felt funny in front of the
20-year-old widows. I wanted to drink their tears. If they buried their
husband, I imagined they had poisoned him ."
But, reluctantly, he will form a relationship, dispassionate on his
part, but torrid on the part of Madame C. who, tyrannical, will wrap
herself around him, if not outright swallow him!

Jean-Pierre Martinet warns us straight away: " There is no drama among
us, gentlemen, nor tragedy, there is only burlesque and obscenity ". We
have been warned. What follows is an inappropriate, truculent,
unmissable and delicious story!

Barvalo: Roma, Sinti, Gypsies, Manouches, travelers

The "trigger" of the Barvalo initiative ("proud" in Romani!), then of
the edition of the eponymous album, proposed by the Mucem (Museum of
European and Mediterranean Civilizations) and Anamosa editions , was the
letter from the American anthropologist, Jonah Steinberg, received at
Mucem, in Marseille. The latter pointed out to the management of the
museum that, two years after its creation, it did not include any
reference to the Romani and affiliated communities, such as the Doms.
The latter are also absent from commemorative monuments (notably of the
Shoah) and just as much as in school textbooks and their languages not
recognized internationally.
Alerted, the Mucem then launched into long-term collaborative work with
the Etiac (European Institute of Roma Arts and Culture) and Roma and
non-Roma artists. The first objective was to overcome the feeling of
victimization, of misery, as well as the clichés and fantasies to which
the Romani populations are frequently referred. In the Barvalo catalog,
Jonah Steinberg first describes the conditions for setting up the team,
their investigations in the field and other collections of objects
(heritage, transmission of knowledge).
Thus, the first part of the book is devoted to gypsy objects (including
their promotion even in Ikea stores!). Works of art made by hand by
tinsmiths and other professions "whose versatility is acquired over a
lifetime .
Focus on Turkey, where several million Roma still live today, although
they have lived there for more than a millennium, despite successive
historical stigmatizations. Waste pickers, traditional musicians, wool
and carpet work, etc.
In France, short report on the Roma specialized in harvesting jasmine
and roses in Grasse for the perfume industry.
We then leave for Spain where, after the fall of the dictatorship, the
Roma community found a new lease of life, after the fierce repression
which began in the 16th century in the peninsula.

We now approach the " Gadjo" part.of the Mucem or otherwise called "the
reversal of the mirror", which consists of reversing the gaze of the
non-Roma visitor, with strong use of humour, derision and self-mockery:
a success!

Another aspect carried by Barvalo: telling the history and evolution of
the ten or so surviving languages of the Roma populations of Europe
(around 12 million individuals). But also to the "antagonisms" existing
between the groups which claim their belonging to India, which they left
at the end of the 1st millennium (Roma, Sinti, Manouches and Gypsies)
and the groups which support their "total" belonging to the anchor
country. A sensitive subject which is not without sparking numerous
controversies, the causes and consequences of which are explained to us.
We learn a lot in passing about the slave condition imposed on the
Moldavian and Romanian Roma in the 14th century. Another aspect evoked
throughout these magnificent pages (prodigiously well illustrated): the
fantasies around the "beautiful gypsy", especially in the 1960s,

Delaine Le Bas, " The World of Gypsy romance ", 2009.

The following pages are devoted to the many centuries marked by acute
anti-Gypsyism, practiced in particular by the French police in the early
1930s, and which reached its climax with Nazi eugenics .
In return, a good part of the exhibition and therefore of the catalog is
devoted to war heroes and resistance fighters (1870/1940), of course, to
the victims of the Nazi holocaust (in Rom Samudaripen), and this,
Supported by numerous family documents. Traces of segregation still
present in France (campsites prohibited for dogs and gypsies!),
reception areas too often located between recycling centers, polluting
factories, railway lines, cemeteries, nuclear power plants and so on.
Testimonies from Hungarian, Romanian, Bulgarian, Czech, Dutch, Spanish,
French, Italian, etc. Roma. Finally, a beautiful space is dedicated to
the dynamics of activist associations and collectives (the example of
LGBT queer Roma) and their actions on the environment, for schooling,
against everyday racism, etc.

To close this magnificent journey, a few portraits of "Barvalos"
(including the icon of gypsy jazz, Django Reinhart) and other details,
in particular on the annual pilgrimage to Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer.

Nicolatta Vallorani: Zorro's Bride

Nicoletta Vallorani, Italian novelist of feminist detective novels and
science fiction, was born in 1959, in the Marche region. With a degree
in English and a specialist in Anglo-American literature, she was for a
time a collaborator at the University of Milan. A translator, notably of
science fiction short stories, and an English teacher, she began as a
writer in 1992, with a science fiction novel. As for his first three
noir novels, they take place in a disturbing Milan, mixing fantasy,
science fiction and detective intrigues. They were all published in
France in the Série noire.

Zoé, the typical anti-heroine, lives in a Milanese squat. She is
bulimic, fat (and knows it): " I hate gyms. You sweat there, you get all
shiny and sticky and in the end, you drag yourself to the locker room
like slimy monsters, wishing no one noticed you ." Looseuse, her first
job is garbage collector, " an environment that she loves, full of
surprises "!
But she is also, on occasion, a private investigator, in order to put a
little parmesan in her pasta. Above all, "she doesn't show off", doesn't
have too many illusions about herself (" I have a little trouble in my
relationships with authority"), but above all drags a hell of a group of
broken arms behind her, whom we will get to know throughout this caustic
thriller.
Starting with his two dogs, Ugo, " all askew and decidedly blind " and
Cicoria, " deaf as Beethoven and about as old ". Then Ariana, his sister
" who arrives every time at the wrong time with the perverse precision
of the evil eye ". So, the day she comes to tell him that one of her
many ex-lovers has been murdered. " Given the situation ," she said to
Zoé, she cannot take care of the little ones. What small ones? Ariana's
three daughters, Zoé's nieces, therefore: "three little monsters
disguised as little girls, as furious as their mother. I loved them when
they weren't there. As is often the case with tormented passions ."
In addition to the well-crafted story, the real charm of this thriller
lies in Zoé's personality, her frankness, her outspokenness.
Some good examples. From one of the protagonists of the affair: " The
first thing I noticed was her calves, which were a little strong, as if,
despite her elegant appearance, she had used her legs too much ." From
another: " She had teeth that seemed aligned by her own will ." From yet
another: "She looked like a transvestite: a big baby without a willy and
when she got angry: like a crocodile in heat ." From a protagonist,
during the investigation: " He turned around, eyes, nose, teeth, and
military seriousness ". From another: " A face shaped like a sugar bowl,
ears like handles ." From one of his sister's lovers: " He is there
without being there, like many men who have been in love, but are no
longer in love and fly away, solitary towards another destiny. That they
chose. I held out my hand to him. He grabbed it and brought it to his
lips. I don't know why I thought he wanted to bite her. I became
frightened and quickly removed what belonged to me, leaving him stunned ."
If Zoé is not tongue-tied, Nicoletta Vallorani uses her heroine to
impart some geopolitical truths to us in passing: " In Morocco when we
turn our backs on the last inhabited city, in front, there is only the
desert ". Sometimes sociological: " Intellectuals sit around a table and
develop a left-wing policy in memory of some battles they fought when
they were young, but above all according to the enormous amount of
reading they have do. Intellectuals are snobs ." Feminist caricatures: "
She was of an undeniable feminism which claims that women are always
right, and that, by dint of being right, they have tangled their
neurons, forgetting the passing of time" .
Which doesn't take anything away from this story full of good words and
a more than infectious good humor!

Tomonobu Imamichi: eco-ethics

Tomonobu Imamichi was born in 1922, in Tokyo. Japanese philosopher, he
was a specialist in Chinese philosophy and founder of eco-ethics. Close
to many French and European philosophers, such as Paul Ricoeur, Mikel
Dufrenne and Peter Kemp, he taught in Europe and Japan. He translated,
among other things, Aristotle's Poetics into Japanese.

In the foreword to The eco-ethics of Tomonobu Imamichi, ( ed. du Sandre
), PA Chartel and B. Reber explain to us that the philosopher's main
concern was to develop a dialogue between Far Eastern philosophers and
Westerners, " in order to contribute to the development of an eco-ethic
". That is to say, relying on a field of reflection, ranging from
aesthetics to ethics and integrating in an original way a questioning of
technological novelty, (which Gregory Bateson and Felix Guattari had
already expressed before time).
Thus, Tomonobu Imamichi gathered around him, to produce this volume, a
dozen philosophers from all over the world. However, he opens the ball
by trying to respond, according to three axes of reflection.
Should we invent new values or new virtues? What about invention, at a
time of globalization of communication and exchanges? And finally, what
about the task of art and aesthetic experience in today's times?
Imamichi will thus take us along the slope of ideas from their birth to
the present day and ends by advising us "to acquire a minimum of
technical language, in order to maintain a distance with machines, with
the help of the arts, to prevent any technocratic drift, both
politically and ethically" .
Michel Dufrenne takes up the pen again and insists on the ambiguous
notion of " oikos " (environment, habitat of a determined hope), in
order to make us reflect on what, in principle, " should introduce
homogeneity on our planet (circulation of people, goods and
information), limited parameters because sometimes even prohibited in
certain places on the planet ". His conclusion on art joins that of
Imamishi.
For her part, Noriko Hashimmoto explores with us the extent of
Imamishi's philosophical principles (often provocative) and of course,
his relationship to art "the only one capable of freeing humans from
their fascination with material things ". He then establishes, according
to Imamichi's theory, a comparison between Eastern aesthetics and
Western aesthetics.
Marco M. Olivetti is interested in the link that exists " between
eco-ethics and the third millennium, for a European ", particularly
based on the theories of Husserl, Heidegger, etc.).
In the only English text (untranslated), Peter Mc Cormick explores the
eco-ethical concept, as a "new ethics".
Peter Kemp discusses the link between history and nature. This from
Aristotle to its most modern forms (Bergson, Baudrel, Delort, Walter, etc.).
As for Jean Ladrière, he is interested in the relationships between
human (natural) and technical (established) ethics.
Pierre Aubenque, in turn, deciphers the Aristotelian model " expressly
rejected by Kantian morality " to end with this beautiful definition of
art: " which imitates nature and completes it or fills in its gaps ".
Francis Jacques makes us reflect on the chances of success of a
contemporary ethics, with the help, among other things, of very explicit
diagrams.
Bernard Reber closes this fascinating collective file, with this
question: " Is eco-ethics a new moral theory or a meta-ethical
proposition, that is to say capable of claiming the rank of new theory
in the moral philosophy?»
Ready for this exciting journey?

Natacha Pierre: Between hatred and tenderness

Can a nightmare turn into a fairy tale? Natacha Pierre would probably
respond with: " No "! On the other hand, by reading the fifty pages of
her little autobiography, Between hatred and tenderness ( ed. Wooz ),
Natacha will prove to us that, " only tenacity and a raging confidence
in life are capable, against all odds, to overcome the worst circumstances .
And since her early childhood spent in the Rouen region, the
circumstances, it is an understatement, have accumulated! So much so
that we wonder: " How did she manage to get out of this obstacle course
without too much damage?»
The message that Natacha gives us at the conclusion of this story
(written without pretense and without any false modesty), is in fact
that of a true fighter: "If tomorrow I want to be happy on earth with my
people, now, it I will have to get started with all the oppressed
people. Submission should no longer be the order of the day. There is no
fatality, there are only weak people. Every human being on this earth
must be respected as a human being. For my part, I had to break the wall
of silence, stop feeling guilty and above all never remain silent again
in order to reveal all this violence that too many women suffer .
What can we add to this, if not start by reading this epic, barely
imaginable, and yet lived?...

Patrick Schindler, individual FA, Athens

https://monde-libertaire.net/?articlen=7423&article=Les_vendanges_du_rat_noir_Septembre_2023_un_bon_cru
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