Thursday, August 12, 2010

Humour and tragedy explained

Break a thing into a frame made of its underpinning assumptions.
Turn one of the assumption on its head. That is humour.
Remove one of the assumptions. If the frame still stands, that is tragedy.

Monday, August 02, 2010

The never-ending cycle

Maharashtra Navnirman Sena chief Raj Thackeray has blamed migrants for the outbreak of malaria in Mumbai.



In 1348 there appeared in Europe a devastating plague which is reported to have killed off ultimately twenty-five million people. By the fall of that year the rumor was current that these deaths were due to an international conspiracy of Jewry to poison Christendom. It was reported that the leaders in the Jewish metropolis of Toledo had initiated the plot and that one of the chief conspirators was a Rabbi Peyret who had his headquarters in Chambéry, Savoy, whence he dispatched his poisoners to France, Switzerland, and Italy.