The Tempest, Prometheus Bound, and The Greek Thing

We broke off yesterday from following the drama in Brussels over the Greek Thing and went into town (Albuquerque in this instance) to attend a performance of Shakespeare's "The Tempest," far and away my favorite Shakespeare play.

It was fascinating, really, because the production was done as a summer youth project by middle and high school students, and I thought they carried it off well -- all things considered. In addition, most of the male roles were played by girls, some of them quite young. Prospero in fact was played by a female (which has become something of A Thing in the theater lately).

"The Tempest" was probably Shakespeare's last play, dating from about 1603, and it deals with issues and themes of wrongs done, forgiveness extended, reconciliation, love, freedom and... magic. To me the play is a surprise practically every step of the way because often what you might expect to happen is turned upside down through Prospero's magic, Ariel's intervention, Caliban's frustrations, and so on. The resolution seems rather, pat perhaps even formulaic, but it leaves one with something to ponder, too, that even in the worst of circumstances, one's ability to forgive wrongs done matters more than one's urge toward vengeance.

The characters stare into the abyss, in other words, and the abyss stares back. Rather than fall in, they change.

And that change leads to a new dawn and new reality.

Well, if that didn't have something to do with The Greek Thing and what needs to happen -- but hasn't yet -- I'd want to know the reason why.

On the other hand, in some of the consideration of what's been going on with regard to Greece and Europe, the ancient Greek drama of "Prometheus Bound" by Aeschylus has been mentioned as a type-model for the nearly impossible struggle Alexis Tsipras and the Greek people have been engaged in with the Euro-creeps and Euro-crats.

"Prometheus Bound" is a surprisingly short and quite stunning play, certainly one of the masterpieces of Ancient Greek drama. Breathtaking in its tragic implications for those who would do good in the world and good for mankind.

Prometheus is a Titan who steals fire from Olympus and gives it to humans for their use. This angers Zeus who has Prometheus chained to a rock and sets a harpie to eating out his liver -- which re-grows every night, so the harpie comes every day to eat Prometheus's liver again. Through this torture and sadism -- for that's all it is -- Prometheus defends his actions on behalf of humankind and condemns Zeus and the Olympian gods as usurpers (which they are), hypocrites and deceivers (which they also are).

Here's an interpretation of the drama done in Brussels (how appropriate) in 2010 (in French, a little over an hour long):

Prométhée enchaîné - José Besprosvany from focus live on Vimeo.

And here's another version, animated, only 12 minutes or so, in English:

PROMETHEUS BOUND from Manatee Idol on Vimeo.

"Prometheus Bound" was the first of a trilogy of short plays dealing with the myth of Prometheus, the other two being "Prometheus Unbound" and "Prometheus the Fire-Bringer." The other plays only survive as fragments, but according to scholarship, in the end, Prometheus is released from his chains by Herakles, and he eventually reconciles with Zeus after warning him of danger to his rule of Olympus.

The parallels with the current situation between Greece and the European powers is not exact, of course, but the echoes and necessities are surely there. The most recent iteration of  "negotiations" and an "agreement" between Greece and its creditors have led to a realization that the Euro-project, and potentially the European Union itself, are likely to be extinguished in the not too distant future due to the intransigence, greed, and pure venom of the Germans.

This won't end well, in other words.

But eventually, in both "The Tempest" and the Prometheus Trilogy, a way is found to reconcile.

Will it be found in Europe before a tragic conclusion?

In essence, it must be.

Outrage Fatigue -- And the Question of Exemptions from Surveillance Returns

I watched a bit of the Sebelius hearing yesterday, and oh, my, weren't the bull-Rs in a high dudgeon, though? Geepers, creepers. Ms Sebelius handled it like a pro, but from what I saw of it, the whole thing was pretty scripted for the cameras, there wasn't really much of anything said that wasn't already on the pre-distributed crib sheets and talking points  -- ie: the Propaganda -- from either side, so I got to wondering just what this cock up of a Health Insurance Launch was really all about.

The website is apparently somewhat functional for some people some of the time; there are alternative means of getting coverage, though, so the website issue isn't the biggest deal, certainly not as big a deal as has been made of it since the re-opening of the Government by relenting Rs.

No, the screaming about the website is for show, and it's probably less interesting than the underlying shift that I see going on, the sort of background churning, by which health insurance/health care costs are rising dramatically for many users and customers, while for others costs are being reduced, sometimes significantly. In other words, there is a cost increase and a cost shift going on simultaneously, such that profits will be guaranteed in perpetuity to the carriers and the providers, while costs for users will be distributed "fairly" among the population as a whole.

Frau Merkel's German Europe Projekt

They say she's looking tired lately. I wouldn't be surprised, what with all these EuroFinance Disasters to wrangle year in and year out. But for the life of me, it seems the whole roller coaster ride over there is just careening from one crisis to another -- actually always the same crisis, the banks are running dry of capital again -- and Merkel is riding in the lead car screaming. In other words, apart from the thrill of the ride itself, does she have any idea what she's doing? Or trying to do?

According to Anatole Kaletsky who writes for Reuters, Merkel is embarked on the "German Europe" Projekt, the same project that engaged Germany in some unpleasantness during the 20th Century, as some still alive may recall.

If that's the right analysis, then Germany and Europe and the rest of us have a Problem of which the extractions demanded from Greece, Italy, Spain, Portugal and Ireland (so far) are only the beginning.

The German Europe Projekt as been a fundamental problem of Europe for some 1,800 years as the Alemanni tribes and their precursors and successors spread over the European heartland and beyond, replacing -- in a manner of speaking -- the (Celto-Roman) social and political structures they found in place with their own. 

The Project has been going on ever since generally accompanied by a good deal of unpleasantness indeed.


So here we go again. At least to all appearances.


The question Kaletsky raises -- which has been raised over and over again in these seemingly endless struggles -- is whether the rest of Europe will be able to resist the March From Berlin. Kaletsky suggests the following course:

...At next week’s summit, France, Italy and Spain can turn the tables on Merkel by presenting her with an ultimatum: Led by President Hollande, who has abandoned President Sarkozy’s Gaullist pretensions of parity with Germany, the big three Mediterranean countries could agree on a program that really might save the euro: a banking union, followed by jointly issued eurobonds and backed by ECB quantitative easing. If Merkel tried to block these policies, the others could politely invite her to leave the euro, since Germany’s political pressures evidently made membership impossible on terms its partners could accept – essentially the proposition Merkel put last month to Greece. Without Germany, the euro zone would have much smaller internal imbalances and much more political coherence, with a much weaker currency and higher inflation, both of which would make debts easier to resolve.

In other words, Germany is the problem, Germany is the roadblock, and Germany under Merkel is thwarting any effort to resolve the economic and financial problems of the Eurozone, blocking every move toward a solution, and demanding ever greater levels of sacrifice on the Periphery in order to maintain German "integrity."


It's wrong and unfair to blame it all on Frau Merkel; after all, she has her constituents to consider, and though her party is losing seats in the state parliaments and the Reichstag... er  Bundestag... heh heh... she is still Reich Chancellor... er... and must represent the interests of the German Volk, ja? So a struggle between the interests of Germany on the one hand and everyone else in Europe on the other is simply a matter of each asserting their own rights and privileges, right? A family squabble, eh?


Well maybe not. 


If as it seems Merkel is pushing the German Europe Projekt once again, trampling on the rights and privileges of the rest of the family as it were, then there's something else going on. 


This looks to be an effort by Germany to dominate Europe, this time without troops perhaps, but with nearly as much deliberate and imposed suffering on the subject peoples as ever there was.


Ultimately, there will or there won't be a German Europe. Frau Merkel is intent on pushing her advantage to the limit of the rest of Europe's endurance and beyond, and in this, she is backed to the hilt by the global banksters; the German Europe Projekt is as much their creation as it is that of Germany itself. Americans may feel that they are on the sidelines, but I wouldn't be so sanguine about it. What happens in Europe, just as what happens in Latin America, in the Middle East, in Asia and in Africa, affects what happens here in ways we can't always anticipate or prepare for. 






And don't forget, the ice is melting...