“Wir Deutsche fürchten Gott, aber sonst nichts auf der Welt!” Bismarck

When one question becomes many

When I started writing this article, I wanted to offer some views on the debate “growth or austerity?”

As I started collecting material, I realized that there are many more questions.

I therefore opted to expand on the questions, using the french aproach of “problématique”: La problématique est la présentation d’un problème sous différents aspects. Problematic is the presentation of the various aspects of a problem.

Europe is in deep crisis. The European Commission has slashed its growth forecasts for the eurozone, and now believes the single currency region will not return to growth this year.

In its Winter Forecasts, the EC predicted that eurozone GDP wouldshrink by 0.3% during 2013, not manage the 0.1% growth pencilled in previously.

The EC warned that Europe’s unemployment crisis was a desperately serious problem.

Greece is bankrupt, but kept in the Eurozone until the September 2013 elections give a new legitimacy to the patchwork disastrous fiscal austerity measures. The 2013 forecast calls for a 4.4% contraction of the economy, in the 6th year of consecutive contraction. Official unemployment is above 27%. The country is locked into a hopeless situation thanks to a program of fiscal austerity and has no choixes left.

Spain cannot recover from the real estate disaster it has experienced, but also from the structural unemployment that is now over 25%.

Italy is the only country of the European south that appears to still have a choice or more left. Whether this happens will depend largely on the results of the 24 February parliamentary elections.

In the north the situation is not good either. Germany’s growth – and Germany is the strongest of them all – in 2013 will be restricted to 0,5%.

The French services sector shrank in February 2013 at its fastest rate in nearly four years, suggesting it is far from a turnaround. Le Monde and Le Point reported that the commission’s economic experts have reduced their forecast for France’s economic growth this year to 0.1% from 0.4%.

The new French President, Mr. Hollande has been a huge disappointment so far. He was elected on a platform of pushing forward a European policy of growth. Until now though he seems to be totally overwhelmed by the recession in the French economy and the might of Germany.

I could not possibly claim that I can grasp the full magnitude and intensity of the problems.

But I would like to pose some questions, using a framework of already expressed views.

The framework comrises eight components. I will quote each one of them, and then pose some questions and offer comments.

The framework as patchwork

Component 1: In a “Spiegel” magazine article (1) dedicated to the philosopher Juergen Habermas, we read.

“Zur Verfassung Europas” (“On Europe’s Constitution”) is the name of his new book, which is basically a long essay in which he describes how the essence of our democracy has changed under the pressure of the crisis and the frenzy of the markets. Habermas says that power has slipped from the hands of the people and shifted to bodies of questionable democratic legitimacy, such as the European Council. Basically, he suggests, the technocrats have long since staged a quiet coup d’état…. He sees a Europe in which states are driven by the markets, in which the EU exerts massive influence on the formation of new governments in Italy and Greece, and in which what he so passionately defends and loves about Europe has been simply turned on its head.

HA1: “States are driven by the markets”. Are “markets” a singular entity? 

HA2: ” Power has shifted to bodies of questionable democratic legitimacy”. Power does not shift by itself. Who are responsible for this shift?

Component 2: Ivan Krastev in his 2012 article (2) Europe’s Democracy Paradox wrote

Let us state the matter directly: The real crisis in Europe is not a financial/economic one, but a much deeper social/political crisis, of which the financial/economic dimension is just a symptom. That deeper crisis has formed not just because there is a democracy deficit between the center and the parts of the European Union, or because current European leaders are less devoted to genuine federal union than their predecessors. It has formed because of a cumulatively dramatic transformation of the very character of Europe’s liberal democratic regimes. The European Union cannot be saved by its citizens because there is no European demos, but neither can it survive much longer as an elite project because the crisis has sharply escalated the process of dismantling the elite-guided democracies in Europe themselves’

KR1: “…there is no European demos”. Has there ever been one? Or is it the intensity of the crisis that brings this gap so forcefully forward?

KR2: ” …the crisis has sharply escalated the process of dismantling the elite-guided democracies in Europe”. I can see this dismantling of the political system and the corresponding socio-economic elite in Greece. I am not so sure such a dismantling takes place in countries like Germany. In other words, not all countries are alike. We should avoid sweeping generalizations.

Component 3: Anatole Kaletsky wrote back in the Summer of 2012:

“As financial markets slide toward disaster, scarcely pausing to celebrate the “success” of the Greek election or the deal to recapitalize Spanish banks, the euro project is finally revealing its fatal flaw. One country poses an existential threat to Europe – and it is not Greece, Italy or Spain. Every serious proposal to resolve the euro crisis since 2009 – haircuts for bank bondholders, more realistic fiscal consolidation targets, jointly guaranteed eurobonds, a pan-European bailout fund, quantitative easing by the European Central Bank – has been vetoed by Germany, and this pattern looks likely to be repeated next week. Nobody should be surprised that Germany has become the greatest threat to Europe.“

KA1: “…(the existential threat) is not Greece, Italy or Spain”. It could be France, although the author’s point about Germany is in a sense rhetorical.

KA2: “… the euro project is finally revealing its fatal flow”. In an environment without any critical discourse on the problems and issues, it is more likely that sides with opposing views simply throw arguments to each other as stones or bullets. And the most powerful “wins”.

KA3: “…Germany has become the greatest threat to Europe”. See the “in lieu” section at the end of this article.

Component 4: In a Leader of the Economist in November 2012, we read:

“…Yet it ( incumbent parties and governments being kicked out by the voters) will not happen in the most important election of all in 2013: Germany’s, due in September. The significance of the German election was captured in a cartoon before the Spanish election in November 2011, in which one Spaniard asks another who will run the country afterwards and gets the reply: “Angela Merkel”. Ever since she became German chancellor in 2005, Mrs Merkel has been by far Europe’s most important political leader. In the euro crisis, it has been Mrs Merkel, head of the biggest creditor country, who has ultimately decided what to do and how fast to do it.”

EC1: “…the significance of the German election….” In a recent interview, the Greek Prime Minister, Mr. Samaras indicated that Fall 2013 will be a critical milestone for Greece.

EC2: “In the euro crisis, it has been Mrs Merkel… who has ultimately decided what to do and how fast to do it.” Is there a chance that Mrs. Merkel will change her mind? Or that she will not continue to be the sole decision maker without the eurozone breaking up?

Component 5: Walter Munchau, the Financial Times columnist was much more specific in his December article on the then Italian Prime Minister Monti. He wrote that Monti’s bubble had burst as he could not stand up to Angela Merkel. In a January 2013 article in the Business Spectator, Munchau wrote:

But Mario Monti, Italy’s prime minister, did not stand up to Angela Merkel. He did not tell the German chancellor that his country’s continued engagement with the single currency would have to depend on a proper banking union with full resolution and deposit insurance capacity; a eurozone bond; and more expansionist economic policies by Berlin. In his interview with the Financial Times last week, Mariano Rajoy, the Spanish prime minister, demanded symmetrical adjustment – again, rather late, since Germany is already planning an austerity budget for 2014. In view of all political decisions already taken, the option of symmetrical adjustment is slowly receding.

WM1: “Monti’s bubble has burst”. After Monti’s government, Italy appears to be much worse off. The technocrat applied to the iota the policy dictated by Berlin. It will be interesting to see the results of the Italian elections.

WM2: “political solutions are needed”. Apparently the politicians of the South like Rajoy are failing to demand these solutions. Berlusconi though, cannot be accused of such failing. Whether I like him or not, is another story. This morning I heard on the radio an interview of one of Berlusconi’s ministers, who mentioned that if the Euro doesn’t work, there is always the Italian lira.

Component 6 :Sony Kapoor wrote on 22nd February 2013 in Re-Define’s blog:

Instead of a more relaxed fiscal and monetary policy supporting the structural reforms that were necessary, as we have been suggesting for a long time now, the EU has followed a deeply flawed policy of fiscal contraction. This is the result of the application of a ‘small economy mentality’ (that prevails in the German economic debate) to what is the largest economic area in the world. The current economic policy betrays a level of macroeconomic illiteracy that is shocking for an otherwise well-educated policy-making elite.

Instead of focusing on a 5-10 year strategy and a financially, politically and socially sustainable adjustment path for re-balancing, EU leaders have taken a very short-termist view of policy. At the same time that they rant against the short-termism of financial markets, their own policies have been even more myopic. What may be rational for a small country in the short-run, which is the policy lens they have used, will be self-defeating and irrational for the EU-wide economy over a longer time horizon.

Even narrow questions such as ‘what is the best policy to minimise German tax-payer exposure?’, ‘how can we reduce fiscal deficits and bring debt/GDP ratios under control?’ produce very different answers when considered over a 1-year or a 10-year horizon.

SK1: “the time horizon”. Long-term or short-term?

SK2: “the wrong policy”. Let us for the sake of the argument define as wrong a policy that does not work. Can we safely say that Germany’s policies do not work? We can say it for Greece, Portugal, Spain and Italy.

Component 7: In their artcle “Germany as Hegemonic Power: The Crisis of European Integration”, Joachim Bischoff , Richard Detje write (11/2012):

New institutions – such as the EFSF und der ESM – were founded outside of the European Union. These mechanisms, as well as the Euro-group, are dominated by the core European countries, and the latter by Germany. This culminates in a change of European power relations: the financial and state-debt crises have led to a shift of power toward Germany as hegemon. Germany is today stronger than it ever has been in the history of European unity. This is mirrored by a relative weakness of France and Great Britain.

Since a generalisation of austerity policies is neither a sustainable nor socially acceptable way out, and Germany as a hegemonic power is increasingly approaching a political dead end, we are going to experience an ongoing intensification of the political contradictions in the next three months. The incubation of authoritarian, personalist forms of rule will advance. So-called technocratic governments are mere transitional forms. This development can only be stopped when popular majorities reject the prospect of such developments and, by dislodging the power of the financial markets, bring into being a through-going process of the reform of national economies.

However, it is not only changes in the relationship between core and periphery, but also the issue of democracy that can call into question the existence of the EU. Since the Union is proceeding in “negating European democracy”, it is dramatically losing acceptance, and demands for “more Euopre” are becoming more unpopular and always less realisable. A stagnation of the European process of integration and possibly also a retransfer of EU competences to the nation-state level can therefore no longer be ruled out.

BD1: “Germany as hegemon”. This hegemony appears to be resting more on the weaknesses of the other “core” European countries like Frnace and England, rather than on acceptance.

BD2: “technocratic governments are mere transitional forms”. This statement is confirmed by the Monti government in Italy and Papademos in Greece.

BD3: “relationships between the core and periphery”. A huge issue that is not going away, rather the opposite.

BD4: “negating European democracy”. Whoever is repsonsible for what is hapening today in Europe, they do not seem to appreciate and value democracy very much.

Component 8: John Weeks, in his article “A Pact of Folly: Fiscal Madness on the March in Europe”, September 2012, writes:

The economics of the Fiscal Pact is rubbish, enforcing economic mismanagement upon a continent. Bad as the folly of actually forcing and enforcing bad policy might be, a much more serious danger lurks, the consolidation of the German government’s economic and political control over the European Union. It comes as no surprise that the origin the Fiscal Pact is the German government. The same government was the major force behind the austerity policies in Greece, Italy and Spanish. The Fiscal Pact would institutionalize these austerity packages.

One repeatedly reads that the deflationary economic policies of German governments over the last twenty years are a legacy of the hyperinflation of the 1920s. This seems quite dubious to me, not withstanding its repetition. First, it is quite doubtful that any living German can recall an episode that ended 88 years ago. Second, in the late 1920s and early 1930s the number of jobless exceeded six million, which was over 30 percent of the labor force. Why should the hyperinflation trauma persist more than the fear of hyper-unemployment? Third, the implication of this reiterated incantation to fears of hyperinflation is that inflation in Germany since World War II has been extremely low. This is not true.  Through the 1970s consumer price inflation averaged a “raging” five percent in the Federal Republic, and was close to four percent during 1989-1993.

There is a more convincing explanation for the ideology of extreme price stability. It serves the interests of Germany’s capital to manufacture these fears of inflation. Exaggerating the danger of  inflation becomes all the more credible after almost two decades of slowly growing nominal wages.  When pay is not rising we should not be surprised that people notice the impact of prices. In Germany as elsewhere a pay freeze stimulates fears of inflation, whatever may have happened almost a century ago.

The Fiscal Pact would not strengthen or deepen European unity. It would strengthen and deepen German economic domination, first of the euro zone and subsequently of the European Union as a whole. It should be rejected. Save the EU. Say no to the Fiscal Pact.

JW1: “the hyperinflation of the 1920s”. At last, someone has the guts to phrase the obvious. That it is rather ridiculous to call on the Weimar Republic in order to explain or justify Germany’s policies of today.

JW2: “convincing explanation”. I would add arrogance and complete disregard for the perils of the south.

More questions

Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, “The Telegraph’s” International Business Editor in London, poses some interesting questions in his article of April 2012 “George Soros and the Bundesbank’s Patriotic Putsch“

Who is running Germany? Is the Federal Chancellor in charge of the country’s foreign policy and strategic destiny, answering to the Bundestag?

Or is the Bundesbank answering to what it believes to be a higher master – the German constitution and the Basic Law – invoking the rulings of the Verfassungsgericht (Constitutional Court) against the encroachments of EU treaty law (which ultimately has a lower juridical status – indeed – no juridical status at all since it is merely treaty agreement)?

Who here is the legitimate defender of the German sovereign nation, built on the Grundgesetz (Fundamental Law)?

The Economist is more down to earth. In a leader of 22nd February 2013, we read:

 

In lieu of a concluding statement

Winston Churchill in a speech broadcast on the BBC on the 1st October 1939, said:

“I cannot forecast to you the action of Russia. It is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma; but perhaps there is a key. That key is Russian national interest. It cannot be in accordance with the interest of the safety of Russia that Germany should plant itself upon the shores of the Black Sea, or that it should overrun the Balkan States and subjugate the Slavonic peoples of south eastern Europe,  That would be contrary to the historic life-interests of Russia.”

May I remind the reader that the second World War started on the 3rd September 1939, when Great Britain and France declared war on Hitler’s Germany, following the 1st September 1939 invasion of Poland.

Sources

(1) Habermas, the Last European: A Philosopher’s Mission to Save the EU, By Georg Diez, Spiegen, 25 November 2011

(2) Europe’s Democracy Paradox, Ivan Krastev, The American Interest, March/April 2012

(3) Can the rest of Europe stand up to Germany? by Anatole Kaletsky,

(4) Wait for Angela, The Economist, 21 November 2012

A lot has been written about the results of the Italian elections. The ink has not dried yet.

I want to offer a very simple view on the results.

When things don’t work, they don’t work.

The Berlin-Brussels doctrine and policy of fiscal austerity is not working.

The Italian voters have very clearly expressed this.

But the political leaders involved and supporting this, with their entourage, turn their eyes away from this fact, and insist on moving on with their policies that lead Italy – and many other countries – to disaster.

We have  in front of us a new totalitarianism.

I am afraid that the proponents of this are not going to stop at any cost.

We may be entering a very dark period of European history.

Europe has a tradition in democracy.

Democracy was born in Athens, Greece.

However, today democracy is having a really tough time in its own birthplace.

The town of Artemisia (Loutsa) is 20 km east of Athens.

Golden Dawn’s “Spiritual Awakening” Seminars

In this low to middle income sleepy town, the extreme right party of Golden Dawn has started proselytizing children and adolescents, claiming that they teach them history.

“Ta Nea” (The News) newspaper reports today that on Saturday, 23rd February the Artemissia (Loutsa) office of the Golden Dawn party issued a statement that they started a program of “spiritual awakening” that is addressed to children and adolescents.

According to the article written by Yannis Papadopoulos, the program is based on the book “Propaganda – Methodology and techniques of the manipulation of the masses”, written by the Propaganda Minister of the Colonel’s Greek Junta Georgios Georgalas back in 1967.

On the website of the newspaper one can find also interviews with 14-14 year olds who say that “whenever they meet a Pakistani they run after him”. The argument they use is convincing: “If the Golden Dawn (adult) members do it, why shouldn’t we?”

Attacking – and even murdering - ”foreigners with dark skin color” is happening in the country that gave birth to democracy.

Golden Dawn is the third most popular party according to the polls after New Democracy and SYRIZA.

The leaders of the fascist party make open and clear statements regarding their view of democracy and its institutions.

Recently Golden Dawn invited in their offices in the Greek Parliament German Neo-Nazis.

In spite of all that, Golden Dawn is today a legally recognized party that benefits from all the rights of – whatever remains of – the Greek Democracy.

Golden Dawn and German Neo-Nazis in the Greek Parliament

This attitude of tolerance – or rather cowardice – towards the fascists I find as one more sign that Greece is rapidly becoming a society that has lost its democratic bearings. With potentially disastrous implications.

Why New Democracy, PASOK, Democratic Left and SYRIZA do not ask the institutional court of the country to outlaw Golden Dawn?

My question should be read as technical. I am not a constitutional expert. The procedure may be different, but the fact is that if these parties wanted, they could outlaw Golden Dawn.

The fact is that they do not do it.

“We should therefore claim, in the name of tolerance, the right not to tolerate the intolerant. We should claim that any movement preaching intolerance places itself outside the law, and we should consider incitement to intolerance and persecution as criminal.” Karl Popper, Philosopher.

Εδηλωσε σημερα ο Πρωθυπουργος της Ελλαδος κ. Σαμαρας.

Το κακο ειναι οτι δεν ανεφερε απο ποιαν ασθενεια πασχει ο ασθενης.

Εγω προσωπικως προτιμω οταν ειμαι ασθενης να γνωριζω απο τι πασχω.

Μπορειτε να το πειτε οτι ειναι μια προσωπικη διαστροφη.

Αλλα ετσι ειμαι εγω.

Γεωργιος Παπαδοπουλος

Ανεπαισθητως – ισως και συνειδητως – σκεφτομαι τον Γεωργιο Παπαδοπουλο και τον γυψο στον οποιον ειχε βαλει την Ελλαδα απο το 1967 εως το 1973, οποτε παρεδωσε την εξουσια στον Ιωαννιδη, που δεν ειχε γυψο, απλα συνομωτισε για να ανατρεψει τον Μακαριο και χαθηκε η μιση Κυπρος.

Ο Γεωργιος Παπαδοπουλος ειχε την ευαισθησια να μας δωσει ολιγην περισσοτερη πληροφορια σε σχεση με τον κ. Σαμαρα.

Μας ειπε τοτε οτι ειμαστε στον γυψο, αρα κατι εχει σπασει.

Χωρις να γνωριζομε ακριβως τι εσπασε, τουλαχιστον ξεραμε οτι δεν εχομεν μανιοκαταθλιπτικες ψυχωσεις, Δεν πασχομεν απο ψωριασιν. Δεν εχομεν προσβληθει απο αφροδισια νοσηματα.

Κατι εσπασε.

Πολλες φορες δεν ειναι εκεινο που ξερεις που ποναει και δημιουργει ψυχικον αλγος, αλλα εκεινο το οποιον δεν ξερεις.

Εξ ου και οι συγχρονοι επιστημονες και φιλοσοφοι αλλα και οικονομολογοι, πολιτικοι, οπως και οι διαχειριστες των επενδυτικων κεφαλαιων ανεπτυξαν θεωριες περι χαους, θεωριες περι αβεβαιοτητος, περι ληψεως αποφασεων εις περιβαλλον ελλειπους πληροφορησης, και αλλα σχετικα.

Εκεινο που με προβληματιζει εν τω μεσω ολων αυτων ειναι οτι η αγνοια της ασθενειας μου δημιουργει την υπονοια οτι εις πεισμα ολων των επιστημονικων εργαλειων, ουτε οι γιατροι, ουτε οι πολιτικοι, ουτε οι διαχειριστες κεφαλαιων ξερουν τι εχω.

Οταν ημουνα στο στρατο ειχα παθει πνευμονια.

Ο συμπαθης ιατρος της μοναδος μου εδωσε ασπιρινη για δυο εβδομαδες, και μετα με εστειλε για εξετασεις, για να διαπιστωθει – αφου ειχα κινδυνευσει – οτι ειχα περασει βαρυτατη πνευμονια και την ειχα γλυτωσει απο θαυμα.

Μηπως καπως ετσι ειμεθα και τωρα; Με ασπιρινη και ελπιζοντας σε ενα θαυμα.

Υπαρχει ομως και μια αλλη διασταση της ασθενειας.

Η οποια μου δημιουργει αλλου τυπου αναστατωση.

Η αδυναμια μου προς τις νοσοκομες και νοσηλευτριες.

Που ομως μπορει να γυρισει αναποδα, σε αφορητη δυσανεξια.

Διατρεχω λοιπον ως ασθενης οχι μονον τον κινδυνο του οτι δεν γνωριζω οποιαν ασθενειαν εχω, αλλα και την τεραστιου μεγεθους αβεβαιοτητα που πηγαζει απο το οτι δεν εχω ακομη αντικρυσει τη νοσηλευτρια που με περιθαλπει.

Βεβαια με τις περικοπες που εχουν γινει στα νοσοκομεια, ειναι πολυ πιθανο να μην υπαρχει νοσοκομα.

Και κλεινω αυτο το δοκιμιο με τον μεγαλυτερο ολων των κινδυνων.

Ας υποθεσομε οτι καποια μερα γινομαι καλα και ειμαι ετοιμος να βγω εις την κοινωνιαν.

Ποιος μου εγγυαται οτι οντως ετσι ειναι; Οτι ειμαι θεραπευμενος;

Υπενθυμιζω το περιστατικο ανδρος ο οποιος ενοσηλευετο επειδη ενομιζε οτι ειναι καλαμποκι.

Οταν εγινε καλα, και λιγο πριν του δοθει το εξιτηριο, ειχε μια τελευται συναντηση με τον ιατρον του.

Ολα πηγαν καλα, και ο ιατρος ητο ετοιμος να υπογραψει το εξιτηριο.

Τοτε ο ιαθεις εκαμε την τελευταιαν ερωτησιν:

“Γιατρε μου, κατι με απασχολει και θελω να σας ρωτησω. Εγω το ξερω τωρα οι δεν ειμαι καλαμποκι, ομως οι κοτες το ξερουνε;¨

ΥΓ1. Το κακο ειναι βεβαια οτι δεν ειναι μονον ο κ. Πρωθυπουργος που μας απο καλει ασθενεις.

ΥΓ2. Η κ. Καρασαββα, ανταποκριτρια του BBC στην Αθηαν το Δεκεμβριο του 2011, προσπαθουσε να εξηγησει σε αρθρο της “γιατι η Ελλαδα ειναι ο ασθενης της Ευρωπης”.

ΥΓ3. Το 1914, η εκφραση “ο ασθενης της Ευρωπης” (the sick man of Europe) αναφεροταν στην παραπεουσα Οθωμανικη Αυτοκρατορια.

Introduction

Reading H.A.L. Fisher’s “A History of Europe” I stumbled upon the battle of Teutoburg Forrest in 9 A.D. and started reading about it. This article is a compilation of my reading.

“In 6 AD the Roman view of the situation in Europe looked good. Gaul was peaceful and Germany appeared pacified and ready for taxation. Tiberius and Sentius Saturninus stood prepared to attack Rome’s last major European rival, the Marcomanni, led by their king Maroboduus. The attack never came about; rebellion erupted in Pannonia, requiring two thirds of the Roman army to put down and threatened the safety of Macedonia and Italy. Worse was to come. In 9 AD the Germans launched their own rebellion and defeated the Romans at Teutoburg Forest. The German victory at Teutoburg Forest, coupled with the rebellion of Pannonia brought an end to the period of Roman expansion and led to the formation of Roman frontiers.” (1)

Part of the battle site has recently been identified near Kalkriese, about 16 kms north of Osnabruck, in northern Germany.

At Detmold,  believed to be the site of the battle, in 1875 they erected the statue of Arminius, the warrior who defeated Varus and thus sealed the border separating the Roman Empire from what is known today as Germany.

It is interesting to note that at the end of the 3rd – early 4th century A.D. while the Roman Empire was splitting into East and West, most of the soldiers in the Roman legions stationed in the various outposts of the Empire were Germans!

Kalkriese

Varus and Arminius

“Why is there a Germany? Part of the answer goes back to a battle fought in A.D. 9 in the treacherous marshes and dense thickets of Teutoburg Forest, near modern Osnabrück. As described by the Roman historian Tacitus, three Roman legions led by Quinctilius Varus had crossed the Rhine from Gaul, intent on incorporating the vast area known as Germania into the empire. They were ambushed and annihilated by German tribes under the command of a warrior named Arminius. It was one of the worst military disasters the Romans ever suffered.” (4)

Varus was appointed as governor of Germania, probably in the autumn of 6 CE. The office of governor of Germania had been created in the years 16-13 BCE, when the Romans had organized the strip of land along the Rhine and Danube as a military zone. (The legions guarding the Rhine had, until then, served as occupation force in Gaul; the fact that they were now transferred to the river proves that Gaul had become a thoroughly romanized area.) The fortresses along the Rhine had served as base for the conquest of the east bank of the river.(7)

Varus himself committed suicide as his command was massacred around him, with few escaping. The emperor Augustus’s dying words were: ‘Varus, give me back my legions.’

When Roman power was advanced from the Rhine to the Elbe, Arminius had initially accepted the situation. He graduated to Roman citizenship – in those days a considerable honour – and a military command in the imperial auxiliaries. But by 9 AD, he was disgusted by what he saw as Roman oppression and secretly organized a revolt, which involved contingents from a large number of Germanic tribes. Even after this huge victory, Arminius won only temporary allegiance from his people. In the face of the Roman counterattack and his own aspirations to kingship, support melted away from him and towards his uncle Inguiomerus. First his family was taken captive and then he himself was eventually killed by his own people. (8)

In the modern era, he was turned anachronistically into a symbol of triumphant German nationalism, but the monument erected to him at Detmold in 1875 is 70 km south of the real battlefield.

Hermannsdenkmal in Detmold, near Bielefeld

Parenthesis: the discovery of the site

Tony Clunn is a retired major in the British Army. In the summer of 1987, he was attached to the Royal Tank Regiment in Osnabruck, Lower Saxony, in Germany. His hobby was to search for Roman coins with a metal detector. He asked Wolfgand Schlutter, the resident Archaeologist in Osnabruck, where to go. Schlutter suggested to try an area 20km north of Osnabruck. The site was first suggested by 19th-century historian Theodor Mommsen, one of the “founding fathers” of modern research into ancient history. Tony Clunn went ahead and discovered the site of the battle. His metal detector did a very good job indeed!

(Mommsen decreed in his 1899 will: “What I have been, or what I was supposed to have been, is nobody else’s business.”)

Wolfgang Schlutter

A battle that changed the course of world history

“According to accounts by two great chroniclers of Rome, Tacitus and Cassius Dio, in A.D. 9 a chieftain named Arminius led a mas-sive army of Germanic warriors—”barbarians” to the Romans—in the annihilation of some twenty thousand Roman soldiers. It was one of the most devastating defeats suffered by the Roman army The effects of this catastrophe were profound. It ended Rome’s designs on conquest farther east beyond the Rhine and resulted in the emperor Augustus’s decision to expand and strengthen a series of military bases along the Rhine frontier, creating a densely militarized zone in the middle of Europe. As the bases grew, towns were established near them, many of which became major centers of medieval and modern Europe, includ-ing Bonn, Cologne, Mainz, and Strasbourg. Furthermore, the Rhine remained the political and cultural boundary of the Roman world throughout the succeeding four centuries of the Roman Empire, and it has continued as a cultural, and often a political, boundary for the past two thousand years. The psycho-logical effect of the crushing defeat on Augustus and his successors contributed to their ending the policy of military expansion not just in Europe but in Africa and Asia as well. This battle truly changed the course of world history. “(2)  

Roman Cavalry Mask recovered in Kalkriese

The military perspective

James Venckus, a US military analyst, summarizes the battle:

“Eighteen thousand Romans died as a result of their commander‘s mistakes.The Roman commander, Publius Quinctilius Varus, misunderstood his Germanic enemy and the operational environment. Varus negligently assumed a lax marching order. He also failed to adjust to his situation and recognize multiple factors from terrain to weather, which negated his legions abilities and placed them in a vulnerable position, resulting in the Roman massacre.” (3)

During the autumn of 14 A.D., the army of Germania Inferior unexpectedly invaded “free” Germania. The cause was probably that the soldiers were unquiet after the death of Augustus and the accession of Tiberius, and Germanicus, commander of the army and  son of Tiberius’ brother Drusus, wanted to give them something else to think about. Tacitus describes Germanicus’ entry in Germania:

“Part of the cavalry, and some of the auxiliary cohorts led the van; then came the first legion, and, with the baggage in the center, the men of the twenty-first closed up the left, those of the fifth, the right flank. The twentieth legion secured the rear, and, next, were the rest of the allies.” [Tacitus, Annals, 1.51.2;tr. A.J. Church & W.J. Brodribb]

It is quite interesting to note how careful Germanicus was with protecting his flanks, something the Varus – most likely – failed to do.

Map

Germanicus in Teutoburg 

In the passages that follow, Tacitus recounts Germanicus and his men surveying the wasted battlefield of the Teutoburg Forest.

“Therefore a desire invaded Caesar (Germanicus) to pay the final honours to the soldiers and their general, and the whole army who was present there was moved to pity at the thought of their relatives and their friends, and finally at the thought of the vicissitudes of war and the lot of humanity. Once Caecina had been sent ahead in order to explore the hidden passes and to raise bridges and ramparts over the watery swamps and the deceitful plains, they went forth into the sorrowful places, mutilated in their look and in their memory. Here was the first camp of Varus, with its wide circumference and the measurements of its headquarters showing the toil of three legions; then, from the half-ruined tower and the meagre ditch, it became clear that only the remnants of the army had taken up position there: in the middle of the field were whitening bones, scattered or piled up in the places where the men had fled or had resisted. Shattered remains of weapons and the limbs of horses were lying all around, and there were also human heads, nailed to the trunks of trees. In the nearby groves were barbarian altars, at which they had slaughtered the tribunes and the centurions from the first rank. And the survivors of that massacre, who had escaped the battle or their chains, were relating that here the legates had fallen, there the standards had been captured; here was where Varus had received his first wound, there he had found death by his unlucky right hand and his own blow. They pointed out the mound at which Arminius had harangued the soldiers; how many gibbets for the captives there were; what the pits were; and how, in his arrogance, Arminius had mocked the standards and the eagles.

Tacitus

And so the Roman army, present there six years after the massacre, began to bury the bones of the three legions, although no-one knew whether he was burying the remains of someone unknown or of his own relative but, as they buried them all as though they were their close friends or their relatives, their rage against the enemy rose; they buried the men whilst sorrowing and hostile at the same time. Caesar was the first to place the turf on the raised mound, as a most gratifying honor to the dead and as an ally to the present grief. However, this act was forbidden by Tiberius, whether because he wanted to criticize all of Germanicus’ acts or because he believed that the sight of the slaughtered and unburied men would make the army more slow to battle and more frightened of the enemy; and he thought that a general who was endowed with the office of the augurate and with its very ancient ceremonies should not have polluted himself with the funeral rites.” (6)

Teutoburg and Napoleon

In the nineteenth century, the battle became a powerful national symbol. In 1806, the French army of Napoleon Bonaparte decisively beat the armies of the German states. The humiliation was too big for the Germans, who started to look to the battle in the Teutoburg Forest as their finest hour. As Napoleon spoke a romanic language and presented himself as a Roman emperor, it was easy for the Germans to remind each other that they had once before defeated the welschen Erbfeind - an untranslatable expression that refers to the Latin speaking archenemies of Germany. The Teutoburg Forest became the symbol of the eternal opposition between the overcivilised and decadent Latin and the creative and vital Germanic people, between old France and new Germany.

Tacitus’ Germania and the Nazis

‘The Romans had been bedeviled for years by the motley tribes they lumped together as Germans. Tacitus set out to describe them. In his telling, the Germans possessed “fierce blue eyes, tawny hair, huge bodies.” They prized freedom, scorned luxury and esteemed military courage above all else. They were a people of sturdy values for whom “good laws” were no substitute for “good habits.” In the land of the Germans, Tacitus writes, “nobody laughs off vice; and to corrupt and to be corrupted is not called ‘modern times.’ ” Pointedly, he observed that the Germans were “not tainted by intermarriage with any other nations” but rather existed “as a distinct unadulterated people that resembles only itself.”

In 1924, the young Heinrich Himmler read “Germania” while on a train trip. In his diary he evoked “the glorious image of the loftiness, purity and nobleness of our ancestors.” He vowed, “Thus shall we be again,” adding the ominous note, “or at least some among us.” The Nazi Party convention held in Nuremberg in 1936 featured a “Germanic Room” with Tacitean quotations. In 1943, Himmler sent troops to a palazzo in Italy where he believed the oldest manuscript of “Germania” was preserved. They didn’t find it. The manuscript made its way to Germany eventually — in 2009, for an exhibition marking the 2,000th anniversary of Arminius’ victory.’ (4)

Sources

1. Nolan Doyle, Rome’s Bloody Nose. The Pannonian Revolt, Teutoburg Forest and the Formation of Roman Frontiers.

2. Peter Wells, The Battle that stopped Rome

3. JAMES L. VENCKUS, LCDR, USN, ROME IN THE TEUTOBURG FOREST

4. Cullen Murphy, The Idea of Germany, From Tacitus to Hitler, The New York Times, June 10 2011

5. Teutoburg Forest, LIVIUS, Articles on Ancient History

6. Tacitus Annals 1.61-62 (contributed by Sophie Mansell), The Classical Anthology

7. Publius Quinctilius Varus, LIVIUS, Articles on Ancient History

8. Arminius, ruler of the Cheruscans, BBC

Επερχομενης καλπαζουσης της Καθαρας Δευτερας, αποδιδομαι ελευθερως εις περιηγησιν εις τον γλωσσο-εννοιολογικον μετα-σημασιολογικον χωρον, εναγωνιως αποζητων την αποδομητικην αποκαταστασιν της απολυτης ανεπαρκειας του γλωσσικου εργαλειου. Και να τονισω μετα στεντοριου φωνης οτι κατεληξα εις το συμπερασμα οτι δεν μου αρεσει ο Βιτγκενσταιν.

Καθαιρω = απαλλασσω απο κατι βλαβερο.

Συνωνυμος ο εξαγνισμος.

Δυστυχως δεν αρκει το να πατε σε χαμαμι δια να εξαγνισθειτε.

Αν υποθεσομε οτι ειναι εφικτος ο εξαγνισμος σας.

Σας θυμιζω οτι οσοι καηκαν στην Ιερα Πυρα της Ιερας Εξετασεως επασχαν απο την ουτοπικη ελπιδα οτι μπορει να εξαγνισθουν. Ερχοντουσαν λοιπον οι καλοι ανθρωποι της Εξετασεως και τους ελεγαν “που πατε πουλακια μου; δεν εχει δρομο για σας, δεν εχει οδο, στην Πυρα!!!!!”

Χαμαμ – Λουτρο με ατμους

Καθαρτηριος ο τοπος στον οποιον θα πεταξωμεν τους χαρταετους. Αλλα και ο χωρος εις τον οποιον συντελειται καθαρσις.

Καθαρτηριον = τοπος εις τον οποιον συνανων, ωστιζονται ψυχες προσδοκουσες οτι θα εισελθουσιν εις την Βασιλειαν των Ουρανων, ηγουν οτι εις τον Παραδεισον.

Ομως αφελεις συνοδοιποροι, που βαδιζετε;

Με τι προσοντα θα πατε στον Παραδεισο;;;

Για την Κολαση ειμαστε οι περισσοτεροι.

Φαγωμεν πιωμεν….

Καθαρση = η πραξη ή το αποτελεσμα του να απαλλαξομε τον τοπον, την χωραν, τους εαυτους μας, απο κατι βλαβερον. Αβεβαιως αλλα αμετανοητως,  ο νους συνειρμικα ακουμπα την υπεροχον εικονα της Ελλαδος ανευ Μνημονιου. Καθαρσις, Εγερσις, Αναστασις!!!!!

Καθαρτικον = ουσια ητις υποβοηθει την κενωσιν του οργανισμου.

Τουτων ρηθεντων, ποια η διαφορα καθαρσεως και απολυμανσεως;

Εις ποιον βαθμον κινδυνευομεν απο τα μιασματα;

Μιασμα = μολυσμενος αερας

Θεωρια μιασματος = η θεωρια συμφωνα με την οποια η πανουκλα, η χολερα και λοιπες μολυσματικες ασθενειες ωφειλονται εις τον μιασματικον αεραν.

Μιασματα = εις την μετεμφυλιακην Ελλαδα. Οι κομμουνισται, οι συνοδοιποροι, τα κομμουνια, οι ανταρτες, οι σλαβοφιλοι. ΜΑζι με αυτους πανε πακεττο και οι ομοφυλοφυλοι, οι αθιγγανοι, οι Εβραιοι, οι αλλοθρησκοι, γενικως και ειδικως οσοι δεν ειναι ακριβως ιδιοι με την ¨καθαρη” ελληνικη φυλη.

Με ποια ερμηνευτικα εργαλεια θα προσεγγισομε την παραλληλον πορειαν της καθαρσεως της χωρας και της απολυμανσεως που κηρυσσει η Χρυση Αυγη;;;;;

Ειναι απλο. Η καθαρση προϋποθετει επιγνωση αμαρτιας και οικειοθελους παραστρατηματος.

Θεοδωρος Παγκαλος

Ενω η απολυμανση αποτελει διαδικασια που ειναι τυφλη.

Πορευομεθα λοιπον ως τυφλοι προς την Καθαραν Δευτεραν;;;;;

Η πορευομεθα με αυτογνωσιαν και αυτοσυντριβην;;;;;

Παιδιά, ήρθε η ώρα να αντιμετωπίσετε την Αλήθεια.

Ποτε δεν ειναι αργα.

Και οποια – διερωτωμαι – η σχεισις της καθαρσεως με την εξομολογησιν;;;;;;

Αμαρτια εξομολογηθεισα αμαρτια ουκ εστι.

Μετανοειτε αμαρτωλοι!!!!!

Η κρισις της Ελλαδος αποτελει ευκαιριαν δια ομαδικην εξομολογησιν και καθαρσιν.

Καλη Καθαρη Δευτερα, και μην ξεχνατε!!!!! Με τον ειναι ή τον αλλο τροπο, οι συντριπτικα περισσοτεροι οδευομεν προς την κολασιν.

Εμπιστευτικες πληροφοριες αναφερουν οτι οι ιθυνοντες ελαβαν τον Νομο του Παρετο και απο 80/20 τον εκαναν 1/99.

Οποτε χαλαρωστε, και απολαυστε τον αμαρτωλον βιον!!!!!

But how dare they?

It all started in the early hours of Saturday 16 March, when the Eurogroup announced its decision regarding the bail-out of Cyprus.

According to the decision, out of the 17 billion Euros needed 10 billion will be provided by the lenders – the Eurozone states – and 5.8 billion will be the result of a bank deposit haircut. According to the plan, the bank deposit funds would be seized before Tuesday 19 March as Monday was a public holiday in Cyprus.

The Financial Times has reported that the hard liners who pushed this through the Eurogroup are not the usual suspects alone. In Germany it is not Angela Merkel’s CDU alone. It is also the SPD (socialdemocrats) and the Greens.

The “arguments” are more frightening  than the haircut itself.

Cypriots are standing on weak moral ground! 

They are letting the Russians and other “bad” people bring in their “dirty” money and now they want to be left untouched!

Banks in Cyprus is that they are too big compared to the islands economy!

Why should the hard working tax payers of the North bail out the lazy bastards of the South?

Is this the way towards a united Europe? Hardly so.

This unanimous Eurogroup decision had to be ratified by the Cypriot Parliament.

The Parliament vote was initially to be taken on Sunday, but was postponed for Monday.

Mr. Anastassiades, the newly elected President of Cyprus,  addressed the Cypriots on Sunday evening, saying that there was no other solution. It was either this or bankruptcy.

Later, the Monday vote was rescheduled for Tuesday.

As I write this, the Cypriot PArliament has rejected any haircut on deposits as “decided” by the Eurogroup.

This means that the an alternative has to be found. It also means that Cypus has said “no” to the Eurogroup, the IMF, the European Central Bank.

Talking to Cypriot friends yesterday, I had a premonition about hte “no”.

The mood on the island was and is not exactly a mood of solemn acceptance of Eurogroup’s dictates.

It is clear that this is a fiasco from which the Eurozone will be hard hit.

It is also a time when some politicians in Greece should reconsider their conduct and approach.

The small island of Cyprus could be showing another way.

On Tuesday 19th March 2013 the Cypriot Parliament said “no” to the 16 March 2013 Eurogroup decision to apply a levy on the bank deposits in Cypriot Banks.

This vote has triggered multiple questions and I want to try and address some of them. Mostly by posing more questions.

I would like to start from the North – South divide of the Eurozone and the European Union overall.

It is quite clear that the divide is getting bigger by the minute.

Cyprus though has an additional problem compared to the other countries of the South.

For unknown reasons, the Germans have decided to shrink the Cypriot Banking Sector, and they thought that the best way to do it is by providing dis-incentives to depositors out of Cyprus.

What best dis-incentive than the haircut of the deposits?

What makes this much worse, is that it is not only the CDU – the Christian Democrats – of Germany behind all this. They are in full agreement with the SPD – the Social Democrats – and the Greens!

And this is developing in the context of the German post-election scenario of an alliance between the CDU and the SPD.

The Financial Times reported that the Germans were rather unmoved by objections to the deposit haircut decision. They allegedly pointed out that Cyprus is so small an economy, that if this doesn’t work, they will try something else. Trial and error. No need to worry about repercussions to other parts of Europe.

There have been many scenarios about the Russians in Cyprus.

The Finance Minister of Cyprus has flown to Moscow to explore deals with the Russians.

One should take into account that Germany is one of the best trading partners of Russia and the second largest investor in the country.

Are the Russians stupid enough to put their relationship with Germany in jeopardy for Cyprus’ sake?

For now it suffices to say that the Cypriot Banks will not re-open until Tuesday 26th March 2013. This is the latest information that I have.

In any case, the Cypriot Banks today still have access to the European Central Bank’s Emergency Liquidity Assistance (ELA), which is keeping them alive.

The ECB’s governing council will meet again on 21st March (tomorrow) to decide on extending ELA to the Cypriot Banks.

In passing, I would like to note that the problem of recapitalizing the Cypriot Banks could have been easily solved by using the European Stability Mechanism’s funds (500 billion Euros).

But Germany objects to that, citing “legal” reasons. This provides a sort of “proof” for the design behind all this.

The Americans are keeping quite about all this.

They will not get involved.

After the enthusiasm of the “no” vote, a cloud of uncertainty looms over the island of Cyprus.

And the problem is that there is no forecast for a weather improvement.

Introduction

The American guru of investing Warren Buffet has called derivatives “Weapons of Mass Destruction – WMDs”.

The world’s second-richest man made the comments in his famous and plain-spoken “annual letter to shareholders”, back in 2003.  Mr. Buffett  argued that such highly complex financial instruments are time bombs and “financial weapons of mass destruction” that could harm not only their buyers and sellers, but the whole economic system.

The subprime crisis of 2008 may have already vindicated him. But the WMDs are still out there. In spite of all the rhetoric, projects, programs and so on about risk management, governance and other fashionable managerial speak, the “deadly” instruments are at work, as JP Morgan found out in 2012.

On 15 March 2013 a US Senate Subcommittee published its report on a case named “the London Whale Trades”.

Senator Carl Levin is the chairman of the subcommittee which is looking into the JPMorgan Chase Whale Trades

“JPMorgan Chase & Company is the largest financial holding company in the United States, with $2.4 trillion in assets. It is also the largest derivatives dealer in the world and the largest single participant in world credit derivatives markets. Its principal bank subsidiary, JPMorgan Chase Bank, is the largest U.S. bank. JPMorgan Chase has consistently portrayed itself as an expert in risk management with a “fortress balance sheet” that ensures taxpayers have nothing to fear from its banking activities, including its extensive dealing in derivatives. But in early 2012, the bank’s Chief Investment Office (CIO), which is charged with managing $350 billion in excess deposits, placed a massive bet on a complex set of synthetic credit derivatives that, in 2012, lost at least $6.2 billion.” (1)

“The Senate subcommittee’s damning report on the London Whale debacle raises serious questions about JPMorgan’s risk management and crisis management, painting a picture of executives who were clueless about the risks the London Whale was taking on, and then desperately tried to hide the true size of the problem from investors and regulators.” (3)

This article is about the “London Whale” trades and their consequences.

JPMorgan’s “London Whale” trade, as the series of corporate-credit derivative trades that led to at least $6.2 billion in losses last year have come to be called, “provides a startling and instructive case history of how synthetic credit derivatives have become a multibillion-dollar source of risk within the U.S. banking system,” the 301-page report issued by the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations said. (12)

JPMorgan shares fell by about 33%, shaving around $51 billion off the firm’s market value. JPMorgan shares have since recouped those losses.

I will start by presenting the Chief Investment Office, then provide an overview of the financial instruments involved, and conclude with the “London Whale” trades.

The Chief Investment Office (CIO)

JPM is the biggest – 2,4 trillion USD assets – US Bank.

JPM’s Chief Investment Office, or CIO, manages $350 billion in excess bank deposits.

Ina Drew was the Chief Investment Officer (CIO). She resigned after the loss became known, ending her 30-year career.

CIO Org Chart

Bruno Michel Iksil was the head of the credit desk in the London unit of JP Morgan’s chief investment office, reporting to Javier Martin-Artajo. A graduate in engineering from the École Centrale in Paris 20 years ago, Iksil had become so well known in the opaque $10tn market for credit default swaps – a complex type of insurance product – that he was nicknamed the “London Whale” and also known as Voldemort, after Harry Potter’s nemesis…Iksil was part of team based in JP Morgan’s London head office, which was supposed to hedge – or insure – the risks the bank was running. (4)

Julien Grout a trader who joined JPMorgan Chase (JPM.N) in 2009, reported to Mr. Iksil.

Achilles Makris was Mr. Martin-Artajo’s boss, running the London unit of CIO.

Iksil was fired in July, 2012, along with Macris, Martin-Artajo, and Julien Grout was suspended. The bank clawed back as much compensation as it could from all of them, which it said “amounts were roughly equal to two years’ worth of the person’s total compensation”. Grout left the Bank in December 2012.

The financial instruments: Credit Default Swaps (CDS)

The financial instruments deployed in the “London Whale” incident were credit default swaps, which are a type of credit derivatives. Lets have a quick overview of them.

A derivative is a security in which the price depends on or is derived from one or more underlying assets. Therefore, a credit derivative is a security in which the price is dependent on the credit risk of one or more underlying assets.

The credit derivative, while a security, is not a “physical” asset. As such, derivatives are not simply bought and sold as bonds are. With derivatives, the purchaser enters a contract that allows him or her to participate in the market movement of the underlying reference obligation or physical security.

A Credit Default Swap is a  is a type of credit derivative. It is a financial swap agreement, linked to a reference entity, and involving two parties, the buyer and the seller, also known as the investor. The buyer makes a sequence of payments to the seller (premium, fee or spread) for the duration of the contract and in exchange receives a pay off in the event of a predefined credit event, or default.

The credit events that trigger payment to the protection buyer are now clearly defined in the International Swaps and Derivatives Association (ISDA) credit derivatives definitions.

In simpler terms, a CDS is an insurance contract. The reference entity, a corporation or a government, is not  a party to the contract. The are single-name CDS, involving only one reference entity, and index CDS, covering many entities.

A CDS index contract is an insurance contract covering default risk on the pool of names in the index. Index contracts differ slightly from single-name securities. The main difference is that a buyer of protection on the index is implicitly obligated to pay the same premium, called the fixed rate, on all the names in the index. In addition, index contracts restrict the eligible types of credit events to bankruptcy or failure to pay.   In the case of a credit event, the entity is removed from the index and the contract continues (with a reduced notional amount) until maturity. (6)

In 2012 the total market for CDS’s was estimated at 10 trillion USD.

The Synthetic Credit Portfolio (SPC)

JPM told the Senate Subcommittee that the SCP was originally established to function as insurance or a “hedge” against certain credit risks confronting the bank.  The 2006 New Business Initiative (NBI) that formally authorized the CIO to engage in credit trading said the purpose was to address the bank’s “cyclical exposure to credit.” In particular, according to JPMorgan Chase senior officials, the SCP was intended to provide the bank with protection during the financial crisis: it was a “macro” “anticipatory” hedge against “tail events.” (1), (10)

The graph below shows the portfolios of JPM’s Chief Investment Office. The “London Whale” trades were made in the synthetic credit portfolio (SPC). SCP sprung into being in 2007 with credit derivatives based on mortgage securities (ABX and TABX).

In 2008 JPM’s net notional synthetic credit portfolio was valued at 4 billion USD. In 2012 it was valued at 157 billion USD.

Total SCP 2011 revenue was 453 million USD, 400 out of which came out of the default of AMR, the parent of American Airlines. The SCP had bought high yield credit derivatives tranches resulting in the profit they made when AMR went bust. (11)

At the beginning of 2012, the ideal scenario for CIO would be to replicate the AMR gain. Was this possible?

From 2007 to 2011, Messrs. Martin-Artajo and Iksil generated billions in profits on a portfolio that featured bets on certain corporate credit indexes. In late 2011, they were asked by the bank’s executives to reduce the positions, but instead put on other trades that increased the size of the overall portfolio, according to the bank. At first, their move was profitable. But losses began to mount in mid-March, and Mr. Iksil had trouble explaining why, according to someone close to him, believing that market prices didn’t reflect underlying value. Mr. Martin-Artajo was exasperated. “These marks just don’t make sense,” he said, according to a trader who heard the comment.

The trades

The gist of all the stories is that the CIO was selling protection on the CDX.NA.IG.9 (going long) to balance out the tranches on the high yield index that they’d bought (going short, which turned out to be profitable when Dynegy and AMR Corp defaulted). (8)

The particular index (CDX.NA.IG.9) at the heart of this, according to the coverage, is the Markit CDX.NA.IG.9. It was launched in September 2007 with 125 investment grade names. Four have since defaulted, hence removed from the index: Fannie, Freddie, CIT Group, and WaMu.  The index “rolls” to a new series every six months. Why then Mr. Iksil chose to focus on Series 9 of the index? One reason might be that Series 9 was the last index before the financial crisis properly hit, and it had high liquidity for structural reasons — it was ”baked” into a number of structured products.(13)

According to The Wall Street Journal, Iksil turned his attention to the index earlier this (2012) year and took large positions in January and February before he stopped selling the contracts around the end of March. He is said to have made paper profits for the bank through the first two months of the year with a bullish stance on certain US companies and sold CDS offering insurance against those companies defaulting. The Wall Street Journal reported that hedge funds bought the protection as a way to bet against any rise in US corporate defaults and hedge against any downturn in the economy. But JP Morgan sold so many of the index swaps that the cost of protection on those companies dropped. Consequently, it had become much cheaper to buy CDS through the index than buying protection on the individual companies (7)

In April 2012 CIO’s trades in the CDX.NA.IG family of credit derivative indices were so large that hedge funds were complaining that they were distorting that entire market.

In an earnings conference call on 13 April 2012, as part of JPMorgan’s award-winning investor relations, CEO Jamie Dimon dismissed the London Whale story as a “tempest in a teapot.” Determining accurate prices for infrequently traded investments such as the bets made by Mr. Iksil can be difficult, and J.P. Morgan routinely reviewed the valuations made by traders. The oversight process by the bank’s so-called valuation control group includes input from outside pricing companies and brokers, which the group uses to set what it considers an appropriate range for various investment positions. The arrangement is a common risk-management practice among large banks…In Mr. Iksil’s case, though, the high valuations didn’t sound any alarm bells, according to people familiar with the internal investigation. The reason: The values claimed by the trader were within the broad range set by the oversight group, so it approved the valuations. (5)

Interestingly, the loss started at 800 million USD, then became 1,2 billion, then 2 billion, then 3 billion and ended up above 6 billion. This raises the ever important question of how the positions in index CDSs are valued.

Boaz Weinstein, manager of Saba Capital, was on the other side of this trade, while JPM incurred losses exceeding $6 billion, Weinstein pocketed millions in profits. In the hedge fund game, a business in which ruthlessness is prized and money is the ultimate measure, Mr. Weinstein is what is known as a “monster” — an aggressive trader with a preternatural appetite for risk and a take-no-prisoners style. He is a chess master, as well as a high-roller on the velvet-topped tables of Las Vegas. He has been banned from the Bellagio for counting cards. (2)

Were the derivative trades a proprietary bet aimed at producing profits, or a hedge of the bank’s exposure? “I think it’s pretty clear from the Senate paper that it was not a hedge, it was a bet,” Mr. Weinstein said at a conference in New York on 21st March 2013. (2)

“The whale trades also demonstrate how derivative valuation practices are easily manipulated to hide losses, and how risk controls are easily manipulated to circumvent limits, enabling traders to load up on risk in their quest for profits.” (1)

Postscript: A Salomon Brothers Whale

In 1987 Craig Coats Jr. was Salomon’s head of government-bond trading. After the stock-market crash in October 1987, Gutfreund, Salomon’s CEO and Coats decided to buy $2 billion worth of the newly issued 30-year United States Treasury bond. It turned out it was the wrong thing to do. It cost the firm 75 million USD in losses and was aptly named “the whale”.

Sources

(1) JPMORGAN CHASE WHALE TRADES: A CASE HISTORY OF DERIVATIVES RISKS AND ABUSES, Majority and Minority Staff Report, United States Senate, 15 March 2013

(2) The Hunch, the Pounce and the Kill, How Boaz Weinstein and Hedge Funds Outsmarted JPMorgan, by Azam Ahmed, The New York Times, 27 May 2012

(3) JPMorgan Chase Wins Actual Award For Its Handling Of The London Whale Debacle, Mark Gongloff, Huffington Post, 22 March 2013

(4) JP Morgan trader ‘London Whale’ blows $13bn hole in bank’s value, Simon Neville and Jill Treanor, The Guardian, 11 May 2012

(5) J.P. Morgan ‘Whale’ Was Prodded, The Wall Street Journal, 3 August 2012

(6) CDS index tranches and the pricing of credit risk correlations, Jeffery D Amato and Jacob Gyntelberg, BIS Quarterly Review, March 2005

(7) Chart of the Day: London Whale trading, Farah Khalique, Financial News, 11 May 2012

(8) The high yield tranche piece, FT Alphaville, 17 May 2012

(9) JPMorgan Chase and the London Whale: Understanding the Hedge That Wasn’t, Ron Rimkus, Enterprising Investor, 17 May 2012

(10) It’s purpose limited only by one’s imagination, Lisa Pollack, FTAlphaville, 19 March 2013

(11) Humongous credit derivatives cake proves inedible,  Lisa Pollack, FTAlphaville, 19 March 2013

(12) Senate Report Blasts JPMorgan Executives, Including Dimon, Over ‘Whale’; Kate Kelly, CNBC, 14 March 2013

(13) Thar she blows! Lisa Pollack, FTAlphaville, 18 April 2012

Σαλεπιτζης στην Πολη

Λατρευω το σαλεπι.

Το Σαλέπι είναι ένα ρόφημα θερμαντικό, προέρχεται από «αλεύρι» που λαμβάνεται από τους ξηρούς κονδύλους της ορχιδέας γνωστής ως Orchis mascula. Στις ορχιδέες αυτές και στις θεραπευτικές ιδιότητες τους, αναφέρεται ο Ιπποκράτης, αλλά και ο Ασκληπιός.

Η ορχιδέα αυτή φύεται και καλλιεργείται στα ψηλά βουνά των Βαλκανίων και της Μέσης Ανατολής.

Λέγεται ότι τό σαλέπι από τό βουνό Κόζιακα Τρικαλων, κοντα στο Νεραϊδοχώρι,  είναι τό καλύτερο.

Τά παλιά τά χρόνια οι σαλεπιτζήδες τής περιοχής έφταναν μέχρι Κωνσταντινούπολη γιά νά τό πουλήσουν.

Αντιστοιχα λεγονται και για το σαλεπι απο τον Ολυμπο.

Σαλεπιτζης στην Κατερινη

Το σαλεπι είναι γνωστό από την αρχαιότητα, καθώς κατά την  ελληνική μυθολογία ο Ορχις ήταν γιος μιας νύμφης και ενός σάτυρου. Κατά τη διάρκεια των εορτών προς τιμήν του Βάκχου, διέπραξε ιεροσυλία, επιχειρώντας να βιάσει μια ιέρεια. Η τιμωρία του ήταν να κατασπαραχθεί από άγρια θηρία και να μεταμορφωθεί σε ένα αδύνατο και σεμνό φυτό.

Στο σαλεπι αποδιδονται και  ιδιότητες αφροδισιακές, γι’ αυτό και εχει περασει στη λαϊκή παράδοση ως Σερνικοβότανο.

Εις τα ετη της νεοτητος μου καταληγαμε ως παρεα στην πλατεια Ομονοιας τις πρωτες πρωϊνες ωρες.

Μετα τον πατροπαραδοτο πατσα ή τα ποδαρακια σουπα, το ροφημα που θεραπευε το σωμα απο την κραιπαλη τα οινοπνευματα τις νικοτινες και ολα τα αλλα ηταν η κολλωδης ουσια που ονομαστηκε σαλεπι.

Οι πωλητες ητανε κομματια κι αποσπασματα της εμπειριας.

Προσωπογραφιες του Ρεμπραντ της Ανατολης, χαραγμενα προσωπα μουστακαλιδικα, ανεκφραστα, με μια προσηλωση στο εργο του σερβιρισματος και το βλεμμα στην ασφαλτο.

Σαλεπιτζης

Ειχα την τυχη να προλαβω τα γυαλινα ποτηρακια που – με αγνωστο τροπο – σερβιρανε την πλειαδα των πελατων.

Εζησα ομως και την μεταβαση στα πλαστικα, που αποτελει και το τελος μιας εποχης.

Πιο υγιεινα μεν, απροσωπα δε.

Καποια στιγμη θα πρεπει να γραψω και για το προσωπο ενος ποτηριου.

Νεραϊδοχώρι Τρικάλων

Εχει σημασια.

Η τελευται φορα που γευτηκα το υπεροχο ροφημα ητανε στην Πολη, πριν απο τεσσερα χρονια.

Ειδυλιακον περιβαλλον….

Αντι Εισαγωγης

Αρχικα θα πρεπει να αναφερω οτι ειμαι εθνικα υπερηφανος καθοσον “εγκουγκλαρα” (αλα τις … τς…. τς…. τς…..)  την λεξη “κοτοπουλοσκυλαδικο” και ελαβα τον … πουλον, ηγουν οτι το παντοδυναμον διαδυκτιον στερειται της λεξεως!!!!

Δηλαδη υπαρχει ακομη μοναδικοτης, υπαρχει ακομη ενας θυλακας ζωης – ή εστω αναμνησεως – που δεν εχει καταληφθει απο το οργανον της επικυριαρχιας των τεχνολογων, της τεχνικης, της απροσωπης επικοινωνιας, της σειριακης παραγωγικης διαδικασιας των εξαθλιωμενων Ασιατων, της επικυριαρχιας των …

Προστρεχω εις την αμεσον καταγραφην του μοναδικου – και αφανισθεντος – κοτοπουλοσκυλαδικου, καθοσον η μνημη αποτελει το καλυτερο οπλο για την αντιμετωπιση της λαιλαπας που εχει επισκυψει εις την ημετεραν πατριδα.

Ψησε, ψησε, στο τελος κατι θα μεινει!!!

Τι ειναι (ηταν) το κοτοπουλοσκυλαδικο

Το κοπτοπουλοσκυλαδικο ητανε μια θερινη ταβερνα – με κηπο και πιστα απο μπετον στην Αττικη την δεκαετια του 1980.

Μεχρι τα μεσανυχτα ητανε γεματη οικογενειες, που απολαμβανα ενα λιτο γευμα με κοτοπουλο στη σουβλα ή τη σχαρα.

Μετα τις 12 ανεβαινε στην πιστα πο μπετον η ορχηστρα,

Και αρχιζε η μεταλλαξη.

Πορεια προς το υπερπεραν.

Μπουζουκι μου γλυκόλαλο

Πως ανακαλυψα το κοτοπουλοσκυλαδικο

Το ανακαλυψα  κανοντας παρεα στον Κυριακο, τσιφτη και καραμπουζουκλη, γλεντζε και αλανιαρη μαγκιτη. Καλη του ωρα.

Ελπιζω να ειναι καλα και να την κανει τη βολτα του στην αλανα….

Τον “Κ’ τον ειχα γνωρισει απο τον παμμεγιστο “Μ”, που μιλησαμε προσφατα και τα ειπαμε και αναπολησαμε τα ετη της δεκαετιας του 1980.

Δεν μπορουσε να υπαρχει πιο αταιριαστη παρεα.

Ο “Κ’ οικογενειαρχης, στελεχος σε εταιρεια, και φραγκατος, με σπορ κουπε αυτοκινητο που εβγαζε ματι, ο “Μ” κι εγω αλάνια, ξεφραγκοι, χρεωμενοι μεχρι που δεν επαιρνε, δεν ειχαμε ουτε βενζινη να βαλουμε.

Ενα βραδυ, αφου ειχαμε πιει μια κασα ουϊσκια, ο “Κ” μας προτεινε να παμε στο “κοτοπουλοσκυλαδικο”.

Κι ετσι ανοιξε ενα αξεχαστο κεφαλαιο της ζωης μου.

Η τελετουργια…

Η ωρα αφιξεως ητανε αροσδιοριστη, αλλα σιγουρα πριν απο τις 12 τα μεσανυχτα.

Βασικη προϋποθεση της τελετουργιας ητανε να βιωσω το “οικογενειακο” μερος, οταν η ταβερνα ητανε γεματη οικογενειες που απολαμβαναν το βραδυνο κοτοπουλο στη σουβλα, με τα παιδακια να παιζουνε τριγυρω, και η τσιμεντενια πιστα να ειναι αδεια, μονο με τα οργανα.

Καθως πλησιαζανε μεσανυχα, η “κανονικη” πελατεια αραιωνε. Τα παιδακια γλαρωνανε και μπαινανε στο πισω καθισμα των αυτοκινητων για να κοιμηθουνε.

Μεσα απο το ημιφως μια αλλη πελατεια ερχοτανε.

Ανθρωποι σκυφτοι, μοναχικοι, ξερακιανοι, κοιλαραδες, ξεμπαρκοι, αντροπαρεα.

Η εξαιρεση ητανε καποια ζευγαρια που σαφεστατα δεν ειχανε χορεψει απο κοινου τον Χορο του Ησαϊα.

Κρατιοντουσαν απο το χερι, τα σιροπια ξεχειλιζανε, η γυναικα κοιτουσε αλλου κι ο αντρας την κοιταζε γλυκερα και της ελεγε πως ….

Στην αρχη ανεβαινε στην τσιμεντενια πιστα η ορχηστρα κι επαιζε ενα δυο ορχηστρικα.

Οποιος κι αν ητανε ο ρυθμο ομως, κυριαρχουσε μια θλιψη, ενας καματος της ζωης, που οσο κι αν ηθελε δεν μπορουσε να ξεμυτισει απο την τεραστια χαβουζα με τα βασανα και να γελασει.

Μετα ανεβαινε η πρωτη τραγουδιαρα.

Ναυαγιο της ζωης, περασμενα τα σαραντα, με μια τουαλεττα σαν στολη αποκριας, και ματια βυθισμενα.

Κι αρχιζε ετσι το “προγραμμα”.

Που μονο προγραμμα δεν ητανε, αφου οι παραγγελιες πεφτανε συννεφο, κι οι καλλιτεχνες εκαναν το παν να ανταποκριθουνε.

Ανεβαιναν σιγα σιγα οι μοναχικοι και φερνανε βολτες, λιγο μετα και οι καψουρηδες με τις γκομενες κι αυτοι για να ξεσπασουνε.

Ητανε ομως μια συνυπαρξη ειρηνικη, ο καθενας στροβιλιζονταν στον κοσμο του.

Δεν υπηρχε η γνωστη επιθετικοτητα των μπουζουκομαγαζων που επεφταν μαχειριες για να χορεψει καποιος μοναχος.

Στο κοτοπουλοσκυλαδικο υπηρχε χωρος για ολους.

Και σεβασμος.

View of Marathon from the hills of Kalentzi

Today’s dish came out of a gift.

I have always liked beef kidneys and my  good butcher brought me some as a present. Apparently no one in Greece today eats beef kidneys, so the wholesale meat merchants give them away to the butchers who ask for them.

After returning home I got down to the important task of deciding what to cook with them.

Beef kidneys

I had some chuck steak and decided to make a kidney and steak pie, emphasizing the kidney and using the steak as second fiddle.

For the first time, I decided to use olives , capers and balsamico vinegar in the filling. I also decided to marinate the kidneys in red wine, and grill the steak rather than fry it. It is in this respect that this is a mediterranean version of the recipe.

Chopped marinated beef kidneys

I marinated the kidneys for 24 hours  in red wine, onions, rosemary salt, crushed red chilli peppers,  capers and a bit of garlic.

After the kidneys were marinated, I seared them in a hot pan and chopped them.

I grilled the chuck stek steak and chopped it.

Chopped grilled beef chuck steak

I then put the marinade in a pot, added chopped carrots, more rosemary, a bit of chopped parsley and coriander,  and brought it to a robust boil that reduced the liquid to a thick paste.

Rosemary, parsley, coriander

I then chopped some green olives and added them to the paste, along with balsamico vinegar, and the chopped kidneys and steak. The pie filling was now ready.

Chopped green olives

While all of this was happening, the dough for the pie’s pastry was resting.

Open kidney and steak pie

I use butter for the pastry, and just a pinch of baking powder. I do not use puff pastry first of all because it is too heavy and secondly because it takes too much time to make. The butter based pastry that I prepared took no more than 15 minutes. After it was prepared, I let it rest in the fridge for one hour or so.

s  Kidney and steak pie, ready to bake

After covering the pie, I bake it for 45 minutes in 200 centigrade.

Baked kidney and steak pie

I let it rest for 15 minutes and then serve it with a nice green salad and brown home made bread.

Steak kidney and steak pie – served

The taste was rich, spicy and the meats juicy and full of flavor. The capers, the olives and the balsamico gave the filling the acidity that is necessary to counterbalance the richness of the kidneys’ flavor.

Enjoy the dish with a robust red, preferably the one you used in the marinade.

Pablo Picasso, Head of a Woman (Fernande), bronze, autumn 1909, Art Institute of Chicago

During a visit to Chicago I viewed the Picasso Exhibition at the Art Institute of Chicago. Prominent amongst the exhibited artwork, was the sculpture “Head of a Woman (Fernande)”.

It is not a simple sculpture. It is an adventure. Every angle opens new dimensions, interpretations, and insights into what the head might be. 

This sculpted head gave me the inspiration to write this article.

Pablo Picasso, “Portrait of Fernande Olivier”, 1906, Gouache on Paper, private collection, Stockholm

Picasso and Fernande Olivier met on a rainy day in August 1904.

Fernande became reportedly Picasso’s first known long-term relation & subject of many of Picasso’s Rose Period paintings (1905-07).

Their romance lasted until 1909, but continued to be together as friends until 1912.

Pablo Picasso, Fernande with a Black Mantilla (Fernande à la mantille noire), Paris, 1905–06. Oil on canvas. Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, Thannhauser Collection,

Picasso’s portrait Fernande with a Black Mantilla 1906, is a transitional work. Still somewhat expressionistic and romantic, with its subdued tonality and lively brushstrokes, the picture depicts Fernande Olivier wearing a mantilla, which perhaps symbolizes the artist’s Spanish origins. The iconic stylization of her face and its abbreviated features, however, foretell Picasso’s increasing interest in the abstract qualities and solidity of Iberian sculpture, which would profoundly influence his subsequent works. Though naturalistically delineated, the painting presages his imminent experiments with abstraction. (Source: Guggenheim Museum).

Head of a woman, 1906

Another 1906 picture “Head of a woman (Fernande)”, is totally different in style. Space and perspective are somehow distorted. The angular aspects of the face are prominent.

As we approach 1907 “Les Demoiselles d’ Avignon” cleared the way to cubism, as John Richardson comments in his “A Life of Picasso”.

Pablo Picasso, Les Demoiselles d’Avignon. Oil on Canvas, 1907, MOMA, New York

Two years later, Picasso paints Fernande in the “Head of a Woman” as a multi-level distorted face.

Pablo Picasso, Head of a Woman, summer 1909, oil on canvas, Art Institute of Chicago

“Woman with Pears” has the same style.

This is one of several portraits Picasso painted of Fernande, during the summer of 1909, a period that the couple spent in Picasso’s native Spain. While the pears in the background are modeled in the round, Picasso radically reconfigured Oliviers head and bust, fragmenting them into geometrical segments. This fracturing of solid volumes offered an alternative to the traditional illusionistic and perspectival approach to depicting three–dimensional space on a two–dimensional surface and suggests the direction Picasso’s process would take in the development of Cubism. (Source: MOMA).

Pablo Picasso, Woman with Pears (Fernande), summer 1909, oil on canvas, MOMA, New York

The slices carved into the figures neck and the diamond recesses of her eyes are replicated in the sculpture Womans Head (Fernande), which Picasso created in the fall of that year.

‘My greatest artistic emotions were aroused when the sublime beauty of the sculptures created by anonymous artists in Africa was suddenly revealed to me’ Picasso told the poet Apollinaire. This sculpture is of his companion Fernande Olivier. Its flat, planed surface relates the work to his cubist paintings of the same period. Picasso made two plaster casts of the head, from which at least sixteen bronze examples were cast.

Pablo Picasso, Head of a Woman (Fernande) 1909, Plaster, Tate Gallery, London

One of the plaster casts is today at London’s Tate Gallery.

“One of only two plasters made by Picasso from which at least sixteen bronzes were cast, this version is completely white, unlike Tate Modern’s version which has been toned in a brownish finish (presumably to emulate bronzes cast from it). The point of Cubism was to disregard one-point perspective in painting—long held since the Renaissance—breaking down the picture plane, the prison of two dimensions, enabling the artist to show the object or figure in the round.” (Culture Spectator, PABLO PICASSO AT MFA HOUSTON UNTIL THE 27TH MAY 2013)

Pablo Picasso, 
Head of a Woman (Fernande), 1909
Plaster Raymond and Patsy Nasher Collection, Dallas, Texas, USA

The other plaster cast is in Texas.

We now come to the bronze sculptures. The one I saw in Chicago was donated by Alfred Stieglitz to the Art Institute in 1949.

Pablo Picasso, Head of a Woman (Fernande), autumn 1909, bronze, Art Institute of Chicago

“Like Rembrandt’s most intimate portraits, it is about the mystery of being close to another human being. Picasso makes you recognise this by inviting your eye down into those channels and crevices, until you feel you are inside Fernande’s head.

This is one of the seminal works of cubism, and in the state that Picasso liked it best. He moulded Fernande’s head in clay, then made two plaster casts from which he authorised a series of bronzes. He never liked the bronzes as much as this raw plaster version. It is a key work in the development of cubism because it was the first time Picasso realised he could translate his new kind of painting into three dimensions this is one of his paintings from that time given solid form.”

(Jonathan Jones, Head of a woman, The Guardian)

Pablo Picasso, Head of a Woman (Fernande) c 1909, bronze, Art Gallery of Ontario

In 1909, over a ten-month period, Picasso was inspired to create more than sixty Cubist paintings, sculptures, and drawings of women that bear a striking resemblance to his paramour at the time, Fernande Olivier. Although few of these works could be considered traditional “portraits,” they do form a unique group within his oeuvre that shows him working with unusually singular focus. This bronze head of Fernande was modeled in autumn 1909 in Paris after the couple returned from a summer trip to Spain (Horta de Ebro), and represents Picasso’s first Cubist sculpture. Like his early Cubist paintings, the shape of her sculpted head is faceted into smaller units. Fernande’s hair, which she wore up in a rolled do, is here a series of crescent blobs, while her contemplative face is more sharply chiseled into flat planes. Intended to be seen in the round, the composition changes form when viewed from different angles, and the head’s slight tilt and the neck’s sweeping curves give the allusion of movement as if she were about to look over her shoulder. (Source: Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York).

Head of a Woman, 1909, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

Pablo Picasso, Head of a Woman (Fernande), detail – autumn 1909, bronze, Art Institute of Chicago

Pablo Picasso, Head of a Woman (Fernande), autumn 1909, bronze, Art Institute of Chicago

Pablo Picasso, Head of a Woman (Fernande), detail – autumn 1909, bronze, Art Institute of Chicago

Pablo Picasso, Head of a Woman (Fernande), signature – autumn 1909, bronze, Art Institute of Chicago

Σημερα ειναι ημερα περηφανιας για την οικογενεια του Παναθα μας!!!!!!

Για να θυμουνται οι παληοι και να μαθαινουνε οι νεοι!!!!!

Λεωφ.ΑΛΕΞΑΝΔΡΑΣ,πρίν ἀπό 42 χρόνια (28 Ἀπρ.1971).

Δειτε ενα καταπληκτικο βιντεο για την μεγαλη νικη που μας εστειλε στο Γουεμπλεύ.

Θερμες ευχαριστιες στον “ΑΒΕΡΩΦ“!!!

Στις 14 Απριλιου 1971 ο Παναθηναϊκος χανει στο Βελιγραδι απο τον Ερυθρο Αστερα με 4-1.

Διαβαστε το σχετικο αρθρο στην Πρασινη Ζωνη. (Με θερμες ευχαριστιες).

Δυο εβδομαδες αργοτερα, στισ 28 Απριλιου 1971, ο ΠΑΟ των ονειρων μας συνετριψε τον Ερυθρο Αστερα Βελιγραδιου στη Λεωφορο με 3-0 και προκριθηκε στον τελικο του Γουεμπλεϋ.

Στις 2 Ιουνιου 1971 πατησαμε το χορταρι στο Γουεμπλεϋ! ΠΑΟ ΟΛΕ!!!!

Με την ευκαιρια, να θυμηθουμε και τον υμνο της ομαδαρας μας, μαζι με ενα κολαζ φωτογραφιων απο την ιστορικη Λεωφορο.

Chicago, a poem by Carl Sandburg (January 6, 1878 – July 22, 1967)

I have written in the past about “Antica Macelleria Cecchini” in Panzano, Tuscany, where my good friend Dario Cecchini transforms butchering into the poetry of every living.

I like meat markets, I like butcher shops.

It is not only the products but the atmosphere.

Driving west to Elburn

Today I want to share a totally different experience in a meat lover’s paradise in Illinois, USA: Ream’s Elburn Market.

Elburn is a small town, some 60 miles west of Chicago, in the middle of Illinois fields.

Ream’s Elburn Market is a family meat market that attracts meatlovers from the Chicago and suburbs area, also known as Chicagoland.

Randy Ream, (right) owner of Ream’s Meat Market, with his son, Joel (Elburn Herald, 2011)

Lynn Meredith, of the Elburn Tribune, wrote in her April 2011 article:

“Ream’s Meat Market keeps on bringing home the bacon when it comes to making Elburn a destination for Chicagoland carnivores in search of the best in meats and sausages. Ream’s recently made the list of “Best Chicagoland Places to Eat,” by the LTH Forum, a Chicago-based culinary chat site whose 9,000 members make it their business to identify small, out-of-the-way eateries and resources for all things food.”

Ream’s Elburn Market (Photo Credit: Bruce’s 08 Daily Photo Blog)

As you enter the store you are impressed by the awards on the walls, and some cans of lard from older days.

The meats, sausages, jerkies, smoked meats, fresh meats, and other products inside the store are more than a blog article can cover.

A lot more!

“I like to call it the shotgun approach,” Ream explains. “When you walk in the door, you are overwhelmed by so many meat selections that you don’t know where to go first.” (Source: Upbeat in Elburn, by Steve Krut)

By necessity, I will confine myself to some representative selections, starting with sausages.

I could not resist to start with the tailgater brats with bacon and blue cheese.

Tailgate parties are a staple of US food culture and fun.

Bacon and Blue Cheese Tailgater Brats

In addition to the US style sausages, there are a lot of European origin, like the Hungarian style sausage.

Hungarian Sausage

No sausage tray would be complete without a white sausage from Bavaria.

True to their calling, the Ream family produce one of the best weisswursts outside Bavaria.

We prepared them with sauerkraut and they were delicious!

Munich White Sausage

Italy has very strong presence in the US culinary scene. Here are some Mild Italian Sausages.

Mild Italian Sausage

I conclude the sausage section with another American sausage: Jalapeno and cheese.

I wish I could have tasted them all on the spot, but I couldn’t!

Jalapeno and cheese stix

Moving on to the smoked products, I would like to start with the salmon.

I bought some and was handsomly rewarded. It was juicy, moist and with a subtle smoky flavor.

Smoked Salmon

Bacon is next.

Dry cured bacon

Dry cured bacon and Hungarian style.

Hungarian dry cured bacon

The bacon was so good, I cooked it for breakfast in a “Bacon and eggplant omelette”.

Bacon and eggplant omelette

Jerkies are one of the reasons why Ream’s Elburn Market is so famous.

“Jerky is lean meat that has been trimmed of fat, cut into strips, and then dried to prevent spoilage. Normally, this drying includes the addition of salt, to prevent bacteria from developing on the meat before sufficient moisture has been removed. The word “jerky” is derived from the Spanish word charqui which is from the Quechua word ch’arki. which means to burn (meat). All that is needed to produce basic “jerky” is a low-temperature drying method, and salt to inhibit bacterial growth.”   (Source: Wikipedia).

Buffalo Jerky

In principle, jerky is similar to the Turkish and Middle-Eastern pastirma, although pastirma is not sliced in advance, but only before it is consumed.

California heat beef  jerky.

California heat beef jerky

And – of course – Elburner beef jerky.

“In the competitive meats arena, Ream hasn’t excelled…he’s exceeded. He has directed Elburn Market products to grand championship awards in 15 separate product classes at the American Cured Meat Championships (ACMC), something never done by any processor. His small shop has garnered an incredible 235 awards in cured meat competition!”  ((Source: Upbeat in Elburn, by Steve Krut)

Elburner beef jerky

I now want to refer specifically to the cooked ham, which we bought and enjoyed on multiple occasions.

Cooked Ham

In the US the prime part of leg of pork, the ham, is sold also cooked. You do need to add anything to it, just warm it gently, slice and serve. In case of a high quality product, like the one we bought at Ream’s, you do want to taste the meat, rather than all the spices, sauses, and so on.

Sliced ham

This top quality ham is moist, sweet, tender, it melts in your mouth and leaves a very subtle aftertaste.

It is time to have a look at the fresh meats on offer.

I start with my all time favourite, the T-bone steak. Look at the marbling of the meat!

T-bone beef steak

More steaks are on offer. The rib eye comes next.

Rib eye beef steak

And a bone-in rib eye, thick and marbled to perfection. I perfect the bone-in because of the added flavor and the thickness of the cut.

Gourmet bone in rib eye

I get hungry only by looking at the beautiful display.

Boneless pot roast (beef)

There are also some prepared “composite” meat dishes, to cook and serve.

I start with a beautiful beef roulade, or pinwheel in American English.

“The word roulade originates from the French word “rouler” meaning “to roll”  Typically, a roulade is a European dish consisting of a slice of meat rolled around a filling, such as cheese, vegetables, or other meats. A roulade, like a braised dish, is often browned then covered with wine or stock and cooked. Such a roulade is commonly secured with a toothpick, metal skewer or a piece of string. The roulade is then sliced into rounds and served.”  (Source: Wikipedia).

Popeye Pinwheel

The popeye pinwheel has – of course spinach.

The classic bacon wrapped pork filet is another temptation.

Bacon wrapped pork filet

And another pinwheel, less colorful.

Beef flank steak pinwheel

The emperor of meat cuts. the beef tenderloin concludes this representative sample of goods in Ream’s Elburn Market.

Beef tenderloin

But may be not. As I was approaching the cash register, I saw the absolute delicacy, smoked porks ears. But they were not meant for human consumption. the sign clearly said: “For Dogs”. May be next time I will have my dog with me.

Pig’s ears for dogs

Today I cooked something for the Easter fast.

Octopus

I got a nicely sized octopus, boiled it and then seared it in the pan with red wine.

Lentils

In the meantime, my lentils were boiling with green herbs, a dash of red wine and chopped tomatoes.

Tentoura

I added a little bit of a Greek liqueur called “tentoura” to the pot of lentils, for extra flavor. Her name, a registered trademark of our company, originates from the Latin word “tinctura”  and the French teinture, which means tincture and extract.

Octopus with lentils, rucola and red peppers

The rucola I collected from my vegetable garden.

The red peppers I bought already roasted.

Octopus with lentils, rucola and red peppers – detail

I love capers, so I added some in the spaces between the rucola leaves and the sliced red peppers.

After serving and decorating the dish I added some olive oil.

Enjoy it with a medium – bodied red wine. I had it with the greek variety of Agiorgitiko.

Introduction

Crucifixion is the subject that attests to the fragility, the futility, the horror and at the utter impossibility of life.

Live is an everyday miracle that we somehow take for granted.

The supreme depiction of Crucifixion as a “state” of being, is in Grunewald’s Isenheim Altarpiece.

Isenheim Altarpiece, The Crucifixion Panel

After Grunewald’s Crucifixion, come the depictions by Francis Bacon.

A self-professed atheist, he has painted over and over again the subject of Crucifixion, two of which I have already presented in Crucifixion II.

Today I extracted from his “Sylvester Interviews” (1) material relevant to the Crucifixion and present it dressed with relevant pictures.

Georgia O’Keefe, Black Cross, New Mexico, 1929, Oil on canvas, Art Institute of Chicago

Interview 2

David Sylvester (DS): Is it a part of your intention to try and create a tragic art?

Diptych with the Virgin and Child Enthroned and the Crucifixion, 1275/80, Art Institute of Chicago

Francis Bacon (FB): No. Of course, I think that, if one could find a valid myth today where there was the distance between grandeur and its fall of the tragedies of Aeschylus and Shakespeare, it would be tremendously helpful. But, when you’re outside a tradition, as every artist is today, one can only want to record one’s own feelings about certain situations as closely to one’s nervous system as one possibly can.

Francescuccio Ghissi, The Crucifixion, c. 1370, Tempera on panel, Art Institute of Chicago

DS: There is of course, one great traditional mythological and tragic subject you’ve painted very often, which is the Crucifixion.

Jacques de Baerze, Corpus of Christ from the Altarpiece of the Crucifixion, 1391–99, Walnut with traces of polychromy and gilding, Art Institute of Chicago

FB: Well, there have been so very many great pictures in European art of the Crucifixion that it’s a magnificent armature on which you can hang all types of feeling and sensation. You may say it’s a curious thing for a non-religious person to take the Crucifixion, but I don’t think that that has anything to do with it. The great Crucifixions that one knows of – one doesn’t know whether they were painted by men who had religious beliefs.

Lorenzo Monaco, The Crucifixion, 1390–1395, Tempera on panel, Art Institute of Chicago

DS: But they were painted as part of Christian culture and they were made for believers.

German (Rhenish?), Triptych of the Crucifixion with Saints Anthony, Christopher, James and George, c. 1400, Tempera and oil (estimated) on panel, Art Institute of Chicago

FB: Yes, that is true. It may be unsatisfactory, but I haven’t found another subject so far that has been as helpful for covering certain areas of human feelings and behavior. Perhaps it is only because so many people have worked on this particular theme that it has created this armature – I can’t think of a better way of saying it – on which one can operate all types of level of feeling.

Taddeo di Bartolo, The Crucifixion, 1401/04, Tempera on panel, Art Institute of Chicago

DS: Of course, a lot of modern artists in all the media faced with this problem have gone back to the Greek myths. You yourself, in the Three Studies for Figures at the Base of a Crucifixion, didn’t paint the traditional Christian figures at the foot of the Cross, but the Eumenides. Are there other themes from Greek mythology that you’ve ever thought of using?

Austrian or Bavarian, The Crucifixion, 1494, Oil on panel, Art Institute of chicago

FB: Well, I think Greek mythology is even further from us than Christianity. One of the things about the Crucifixion is the very fact that the central figure of Christ is raised into a very pronounced and isolated position, which gives it from a formal point of view, greater possibilities than having all the different figures placed on the same level. The alteration of level is, from my point of view, very important.

Martin Schongauer, The Crucifixion with the Holy Women, St. John and Roman Soldiers, n.d, Engraving on paper, Art Institute of Chicago

DS: In painting a Crucifixion, do you find you approach the problem in a radically different way from when working on other paintings?

Albrech Durer, The Crucifixion, from The Large Passion, 1498, Woodcut on cream laid paper, Art Institute of Chicago

FB: Well, of course, you’re working then about your own feelings and sensations, really. You might say it’s almost nearer to a self-portrait. You are working on all sorts of very private feelings about behavior and about the way life is.

Lucas Cranach the Elder, The Crucifixion, 1538, Oil on panel, Art Institute of Chicago

DS: One very personal recurrent configuration in your work is the interlocking of Crucifixion imagery with that of the butcher’s shop. The connection with meat must mean a great deal to you.

Francisco de Zurbaran, The Crucifixion, 1627, Oil on canvas, Art Institute of Chicago

FB: Well, it does. If you go to some of those great stores, where you just go through those great halls of death, you can see0 fish and meat and birds and everything else all lying dead there. And, of course, one has got to remember that there is this great  beauty of the color of meat.

Boetius Adams Bolswert, The Crucifixion, 1631, Engraving on ivory laid paper, Art Institute of Chicago

DS: The conjunction of the meat with the Crucifixion seems to happen in two ways – through the presence on the scene of sides of meat and through the transformation of the crucified figure itself into a hanging carcass of meat.

Marc Chagall, White Crucifixion, 1938, Oil on Canvas, Art Institute of Chicago

FB: Well, of course, we are meat, we are potential carcasses. If I go into a butcher’s shop I always think it’s surprising that I wasn’t there instead of the animal. But using the meat in that particular way is possibly like the way one might use the spine, because we are constantly seeing images of the human body through X-ray photographs and that obviously does alter the ways by which one can use the body.

Francis Bacon, Crucifixion, 1933, Tate Gallery, London

Postscript 1

Bacon had spoken of how people come away from the Grünewald Isenheim altarpiece ‘as though purged into happiness, into a fuller reality of existence.’ Whether this was true for him too as he faced the last months of his life, we may never know. In the last triptych he painted in 1991, he steps off the earth into the darkness of one of his black rectangles, looking out from a reflective, haunted self-portrait. ‘You don’t know what it’s like to be eighty and alone at midnight,’ he said to his godson Francis Wishart. But it cannot be insignificant that, knowing he was critically ill, he chose to be admitted to a Catholic convent where he died with a crucifix hanging on the wall behind his bed. He was cremated to taped Gregorian chant, in a coffin with a metal cross on the lid. (2)

Francis Bacon, Crucifixion, 1965

Postscript 2: Bacon’s Three Studies for Figures at the Base of a Crucifixion c. 1944

When this triptych was first exhibited at the end of the war in 1945, it secured Bacon’s reputation. The title relates these horrific beasts to the saints traditionally portrayed at the foot of the cross in religious painting. Bacon even suggested he had intended to paint a larger crucifixion beneath which these would appear. He later related these figures to the Eumenides – the vengeful furies of Greek myth, associating them within a broader mythological tradition. Typically, Bacon drew on a range of sources for these figures, including a photograph purporting to show the materialisation of ectoplasm and the work of Pablo Picasso. (4)

Francis Bacon, Three Studies for Figures at the Base of a Crucifixion c.1944, Tate Gallery, London

Second Version 1988

Part man, part beast, these howling creatures first appeared in Three Studies for Figures at the Base of a Crucifixion, which Bacon painted during the Second World War. One critic described that picture as a reflection of ‘the atrocious world into which we have survived’. Bacon identified his distorted figures with the vengeful Greek Furies, while the title places them in the Christian context of the crucifixion. In this version, painted in 1988, Bacon changed the background colour from orange to blood red, and placed more space around the figures, plunging them into a deep void.

Francis Bacon, Second Version of Triptych 1944 1988

Postscript 3: Bacon’s Final Triptych, 1991

In Bacon’s final triptych, made at the end of his career, a composite figure steps in and out of stagelike spaces. Seemingly nailed to the canvas are closely cropped headshots of Bacon’s face, at right, and, at left, that of a Brazilian racecar driver, placed above muscular lower bodies. The triptych form is rooted in Christian religious painting; the center panel is traditionally reserved for the object of devotion. Here, an abject mass of flesh spills forth from the black niche. Bacon said his triptychs were “the thing I like doing most, and I think this may be related to the thought I’ve sometimes had of making a film. I like the juxtaposition of the images separated on three different canvases.” (3)

Francis Bacon, Triptych, 1991, Oil on canvas, The Museum of Modern Art, New York

Postscript 4

For me the Crucifixion is the agony and ecstasy of life. I do not have much time for Resurrection. This is like the good ending of a Hollywood film. It is not the miracle that I do not buy in. It is the modern day interpretation that,  after all, there is a good ending in life, that there is life after death.

Sources

(1) David Sylvester, Interviews with Francis Bacon, Thames and Hudson

(2) ‘A TERRIBLE BEAUTY’ Francis Bacon: disorder and reality – Ingrid Soren

(3) Triptych, MOMA

(4) Three Studies for Figures at the Base of a Crucifixion, Tate Gallery

Christ has risen! Χριστος Ανεστη!

Το φετεινο Πασχα το περασα στους Ωρεους Ευβοιας, μαζι με τα αγαπημενα μου ξαδερφια και ανηψια.

Καθε Πασχα ειναι μια ξεχωριστη γιορτη, με σταθερες που κρατανε αιωνες.

Μια απο τις σταθερες αυτες ειναι και το ψησιμο του αμνοεριφιου στην υπαιθρο.

Goat, lamb, and kokoretsi

Μαζι με το απαραιτητο κοκορετσι, φτιαγμενο με τα εντοσθια και τα εντερα των αμνοεριφιων που σφαγιαζονται.

Φετος η ψησταρια του ξαδερφου ειχε ενα αρσενικο κατσικι, ενα θηλυκο αρνι και το πατροπαραδοτο κοκορετσι.

Κι απο κει ξεκινησε μια συζητηση περι  νοστιμιας.

Locally grown lettuce salad

Ποιο ειναι πιο νοστιμο;

Παραλληλα τεθηκε και το θεμα της τρυφεροτητας του κρεατος.

Ισχυει αυτο που λενε μερικοι οτι οσο πιο νοστινο το κρεας τοσο πιο σκληρο; Και το αντιστροφο, οτι δηλαδη οσο πιο τρυφερο τοσο και πιο αγευστο;

Kokoretsi

Το αρσενικο κατσικι ή το θηλυκο αρνι;

Ειναι φανερο οτι υπεισερχονται παραγοντες που καθιστουν την συγκριση δυσκολη, καθοσον εχομε πολυπαραμετρικη αναλυση: αρνι-κατσικι και αρσενικο-θηλυκο.

Στη συνεχεια θα προσπαθησω να επεξεργαστω αυτο το θεμα, χωρις ομως να υποσχομαι οτι θα δωσω οριστικη και αμετακλητη απαντηση.

Kokoretsi – detail

Κατοπιν επισταμενης ερευνης και μελετης, προσδιορισα τις ακολουθες παραμετρους νοστιμιας στο κρεας των αμνοεριφιων. Τις παραθετω μαζι με τις σχετικες υποθεσεις περι νοστιμιας.

Hard white goat cheese from the village of Kokkinomilia

1. Η τροφη. Το τι τρωγει το ζωο τις τελευταιες εβδομαδες πριν απο την σφαγη του εχει μεγαλη επιπτωση στη γευση του. Θυμαμαι οταν ειχα παει στη Χιο που ειχα “τσακισει” νταλα καλοκαιρι τα κοκορετσια και τα παιδακια, αφου η νοστιμια δεν λεγοτανε.  Οι ντοπιοι μου λεγανε οτι τα αρνακια βοσκανε στα βραχια πανω απο τις παραλιες, οπου ολα τα φυτα ειναι νοτισμενα με την αρμυρα της θαλασσας. Αυτην την εμπειρια ομως την αναφερω χωρις επιστημονικη τεκμηριωση.

Goat

2. Ο τροπος σφαγης. Το αγχος που μπορει να προκληθει στο ζωντανο απο την διαδικασια της σφαγης εχει μεγαλη επιπτωση στο pH, που ειναι ισως ο σημαντικωτερος παραγοντας ποιοτητας του κρεατος. Το υψηλο αγχος στο ζωντανο ανεβαζει το  pH σε υψηλα επιπεδα, και κανει το κρεας πιο σκληρο και πιο στεγνο.

Lamb

3. Ο τροπος ωριμανσεως (σιτεμα). Η ωριμανση ειναι απαραιτητη για να μετατραπει το γλυκογόνο των μυών σε γαλακτικο οξύ. Μελετες εχουν δειξει οτι η ωριμανση του αρνισιου κρεατος ειναι σημαντικος παραγοντας για την τρυφεροτητα του. Κρεας που εχει σχεδον μηδενικη ωριμανση, συγκρινομενο με κρεας με 12ημερη ωριμανση εχει σχεδον διπλασια σκληροτητα. Οι ιδιες μελετες δειχνουν οτι περαν των 12 ημερων, η ωριμανση του αρνισιου κρεατος δεν εχει καμια σχεδον επιπτωση στην τρυφεροτητα του. Εδω θα πρεπει να παρατηρησω οτι στην Ελλαδα – και ιδιαιτερα τις μερες του Πασχα – τα αρνια και τα κατσικια δεν τα αφηνουμε να ωριμασουνε (σιτεψουνε) σχεδον καθολου. Δεν ειναι ασυνηθες να σφαζουν το αρνι το Μεγαλο Σαββατο το πρωι και να το σουβλιζουνε την Κυριακη του Πασχα.

Goat

4. Η ηλικια και το βαρος. Δεν μπορεσα να βρω μια γραμμικη σχεση σε οτι αφορα το pH. Καποιες μελετες εδειξαν οτι τα αρνια βαρους 12 κιλων εχουν λιγωτερο pH απο προβατα βαρους 24 κιλων, κατι που ομως δεν ισχυει στα πιο βαρεια προβατα. Η νοστιμια ομως του κρεατος αυανει με την ηλικια, φτανει σε ενα ζενιθ και μετα αρχιζει να πεφτει.

Goat

4. Το μερος του σωματος: Το μπροστινο θεωρειται πιο νοστιμο απο το πισινο. Ισως εχιε να κανει με την περιεκτικοτητα σε λιπος, οπως και το ειδος του λιπους. Εν πασιε περιπτωσει, δεν μπορεσα να βρω σχετικες μελετες και ερευνες.

Tomato and cucumber salad

5. Το φυλο: το αρσενικο θεωρειται πιο νοστιμο απο το θηλυκο. Ειναι ομως; Ας ξεκινησουμε απο το pH. Το αρσενικο εχει υψηλωτερα επιπεδα επειδη ειναι πιο νευρικα. Συνολικα ομως, η διαφορα δεν ειναι πολυ μεγαλη. Σε οτι αφορα την τρυφεροτητα, το αρσενικο εχει πιο σκληρο κρεας λογω της τεστοστερονης, που αυξανει το κολλαγονο των μυων. Σε ζωντανα μεχρι 12 μηνων ομως, δεν βρεθηκαν ουσιωδεις διαφορες στη νοστιμια.

Goat

6. Ο ευνουχισμος: θεωρειται οτι ενα “αρτιμελες αρσενικο” ειναι πιο νοστιμο απο ενα “ευνουχισμενο”. Αυτο το αναφερω εντελως περιστασιακα, καθοσον νομιζω οτι στην Ελλαδα δεν ειναι συνηθης η πρακτικη του ευνουχισμου.  Στην περιπτωση του Πασχαλινου τραπεζιου στους Ωρεους, ομολογω οτι γευτηκα ενα ημισυ αμελετητου το οποιον ητο εξαιρετικο.

Goat – the best part

Ευτυχως που ο βοσκος και ο χασαπης διετηρησαν την “ακεραιοτητα του ζωου!

Ελπιζω οι ανωτερω επισημανσεις να αποτελεσουν την απαρχη ενος ωριμου διαλογου επι του θεματος.

Roses

Συνοψιζοντας την γευστικη εμπειρια του φετινου Πασχα, εχω να σημειωσω τα  ακολουθα:

α. Το κοκορετσι εξαιρετικο, ισως ομως θα περεπε να βγει απο τη φωτια 15 λεπτα νωριτερα.

β. Η σαλατα μαρουλι αποτελει πιατο υψηλης γαστρονομιας ανα τους αιωνες. Η ποιοτητα των μαρουλιων ειναι τετοια που ανασταινει! Ευγε στην εξαδελφη που ξερει να αξιοποιει τα υπεροχα μαρουλια!

γ. Το σεμνο αμελετητον απεσπασε το χρυσο βραβειο γευσης και υφης.

δ. Το σκληρο κατσικισιο τυρι απο την Κοκκινομηλια, ενα χωριο περιπου 20 χιλιομετρα νοτια των Ωρεων, το γευομαι εδω και 20 χρονια τουλαχιστον, και αποτελει υμνο στην ποιοτητα του γαλακτος και της τυροκομικης τεχνης του παραγωγου. Μαθαινω ομως οτι η γυναικα του εχει βαρεθει τη ζωη της, και προσπαθει να πεισει τον παραγωγο να παρατησει τα τυρια και τα κατσικια και να απολαυσουν τη ζωη. Ελπιζω να μην την ακουσει.

ε. Το κρεας του εριφιου και του αμνου ηταν εξαιρετικο! Και το ψησιμο του εξαδελφου μου κορυφαιο!

Ευχαριστω θερμα τα ξαδερφια μου για τη φιλοξενια και ευχομαι τα καλυτερα!

Some time ago I wrote about “A crouching Aphrodite in London“, a sculpure I saw at the British Museum. It is Roman, 2nd century AD; a version of an original from Hellenistic Greece.

Crouching Aphrodite, British Museum. London

Today I want to introduce “The crouching Venus” (1702) of John Nost the Elder, which I saw at the Victoria & Albert Museum in London.

Crouching Venus, V&A Museum, London

I quote form the Museum’s website:

“The Crouching Venus is a remarkable instance of John Nost the Elder’s assured carving, and is a rare surviving example of a classical subject by the artist in marble. The sculpture’s scale and accomplishment give it a grandeur and presence which were truly exceptional at that date in Britain. Like the antique prototype, Venus is depicted ineffectually attempting to cover her nakedness, her gesture only succeeding in drawing attention to her sensual body. The goddess is thought to be bathing, or possibly adjusting her hair, and caught unawares. Nost’s sculpture suggests the sophisticated level of patronage of the wealthy gentry in Britain at the start of the eighteenth century, and tantalisingly evokes the way in which interiors of eighteenth-century country houses were adorned with sculpture.”

Crouching Venus – detail

I must confess that I did not know of the artist before I saw the crouching Venus.

What attracted my attention to it was that it looked very similar to the crouching Aphrodite I Saw at the British Museum. As a matter of fact, it seemed to me that it was a copy of the Roman-Hellenistic sculpture.

(Quite interestingly, there is no mention of such likeness in the V&A description.)

Crouching Aphrodite – detail

Let us start from the left arm and the band around it.

Crouching Venus – detail

The head is the next area of examination.

Crouching Aphrodite – detail

The face, the hair style and the expression are the same. However, Aphrodite turns to her far left her face and looks down, while Venus just turns and looks straight.

Also, Venus clinches loosely her right fist, while Aphodite’s right hand’s fingers are straight.

Crouching Venus – detail

Venus is slightly slimmer than Aphrodite.

Crouching Aphrodite – detail

Aphrodite’s figure is sumptuous.

Let us now have a look at the left hand.

Crouchnig Venus – detail

The hand in both sculptures is “locked” between the thigh and the elbow.

Crouching Aphrodite – detail

The only difference appears to be the angle to the thigh and the fingers. One should point out though that quite obviously, Aphrodite’s fingers are reconstructed, as they were broken in the sculpture’s journey through the centuries.

Finally, the back side.

Crouching Venus – detail

This may be the final and concluding observation regarding the hypothesis that the V&A Venus is a copy of the British Museum Aphrodite.

Crouching Aphrodite – detail

The posture of the body, the support of the jug, the tension of the muscles.

It seems that Venus is a copy of Aphrodite after all! 

Which of the two do I like best?

Seventy years ago, a middle-aged man walked into a BBC radio studio in London to record the first of a series of talks that would radically change the way mothers thought about parenting. The 50 or so broadcasts made by paediatrician and psychoanalyst Donald Winnicott between 1943 and 1962 on a wide range of subjects – from feeding and weaning to jealousy and stealing – popularised his psychoanalytic thinking on the relationship between babies and their mothers to such an extent that some of his catchphrases, such as the good enough mother and the transitional object, have entered everyday speech. (Anne Kampf, The Guardian, 19 April 2013)

Donald Winnicott

David Winnicott (1896 was a-1971) was a British paediatrician and psychoanalyst. Today I pay tribute to the “Good enough Mother”, a concept he introduced in 1953, on the occasion of Mother’s Day 2013. Paul Wadey writes:

“His theories are primarily concerned with abandoning psychopathology in favour of the quality of emotional development of self, and the therapeutic process itself.  In these senses, Winnicott’s theoretical landscape can be simply understood in the form of two overlapping modalities: the first concerning the sense of reality, personal meaning, and selfhood as a distinct and creative centre of ones own experience; the second concerning the ‘use of the transitional object’ in the transitional process from the ‘subjective omnipotence’ of the infant toward a more mature appreciation of objective reality.”

Know your Child

I was introduced to the “Good enough Mother” by my friend Christina in the early 1980s.

The idea of imperfection as something positive was stunning to me.

Winnicott wrote: “There is no such thing as a baby; there is a baby and someone”.

In his introduction to “Human Nature”, Winnicott writes:

“The reader is entitled to know how it is that I come to be able to write about psychology. My professional life has been spent in paediatrics. Whereas my paediatric colleagues mostly specialized  on the physical side I myself gradually veered round towards specialization on the psychological side. I have never left general paediatrics, for it seems to me that child psychiatry is essentially part of paediatrics.”

Mary Cassatt: Under the chestnut tree

BBC Radio 4′s “Woman’s Hour” introduces the concept like this (in 2005):

“Fifty years ago the analyst and parenting expert Donald Winnicott first documented his idea of the ‘good-enough mother’; the mother who wasn’t perfect and was free, to some extent, to fail. His writings were revolutionary because he argued that failing was in fact a necessary part of parenting, and through the failure of the parent the child realises the limits of its own power and the reality of an imperfect world. “

Winnicott wrote in a way that made him easy to understand. Here is a sample (My thanks to “The Present Participle“):

“The good-enough ‘mother’ (not necessarily the infant’s own mother) is one who makes active adaptation to the infant’s needs, an active adaptation that gradually lessens, according to the infant’s growing ability to account for failure of adaptation and to tolerate the results of frustration. Naturally, the infant’s own mother is more likely to be good enough than some other person, since this active adaptation demands an easy and unresented preoccupation with the one infant; in fact, success in infant care depends on the fact of devotion, not on cleverness or intellectual enlightenment.  The good-enough mother, as I have stated, starts off with an almost complete adaptation to her infant’s needs, and as time proceeds she adapts less and less completely, gradually, according to the infant’s growing ability to deal with her failure.  The infant’s means of dealing with this maternal failure include the following:

1. The infant’s experience, often repeated, that there is a time-limit to frustration. At first, naturally, this time-limit must be short.

2. Growing sense of process.

3. The beginnings of mental activity.

4. Employment of auto-erotic satisfactions.

5. Remembering, reliving, fantasying, dreaming; the integrating of past, present, and future.

If all goes well the infant can actually come to gain from the experience of frustration, since incomplete adaptation to need makes objects real, that is to say hated as well as loved. The consequence of this is that if all goes well the infant can be disturbed by a close adaptation to need that is continued too long, not allowed its natural decrease, since exact adaptation resembles magic and the object that behaves perfectly becomes no better than a hallucination. Nevertheless, at the start adaptation needs to be almost exact, and unless this is so it is not possible for the infant to begin to develop a capacity to experience a relationship to external reality, or even to form a conception of external reality”.

Pablo Picasso: Mother and Child

Jennifer Kunst, wrote in “Psychology Today”:

“Winnicott’s good enough mother is sincerely preoccupied with being a mother. She pays attention to her baby. She provides a holding environment. She offers both physical and emotional care. She provides security. When she fails, she tries again. She weathers painful feelings. She makes sacrifices. Winnicott’s good enough mother is not so much a goddess; she is a gardener. She tends her baby with love, patience, effort, and care.

What I like about Winnicott’s picture of the good enough mother is that she is a three-dimensional human being. She is a mother under pressure and strain. She is full of ambivalence about being a mother. She is both selfless and self-interested. She turns toward her child and turns away from him. She is capable of great dedication yet she is also prone to resentment. Winnicott even dares to say that the good enough mother loves her child but also has room to hate him. She is not boundless.  She is real.”

Simcha, in Seatlle’s Psychotherapy blog gives a pretty good description of what the “Good enough Mother” does:

Winnicott spoke of the “good enough” mother who adapts to her baby, and in so doing – gives it a sense of control and comfort.  “The good-enough mother,” wrote Winnicott in 1953, “starts off with an almost complete adaptation to her infant’s needs, and as time proceeds adapts less and less completely, gradually, according to the infant’s growing ability to deal with her failure.” It is the mother’s responsiveness to her baby’s cries for food or comfort that allows the baby to know he exists, to believe he is in control; he believes in his early months that his mother is, in fact, merely an extension of himself.

Gradually, as the mother begins to present objects to the baby and the baby interacts with these objects, he comes to understand that they have an existence outside of himself – that there is in the universe such a thing as “me” and “not me” (objective reality).

In time, the mother begins to move away from her state of total and constant preoccupation with and instantaneous gratification of the baby.  She begins to offer small doses of “optimal frustration” to  her child, just enough to create a proper environment for the child to learn and build his character (“I will come bring you the cookie shortly, sweetie, as soon as I finish my phone conversation”).

Possibilities and Limitations

In an article, Sarah Liebetrau notes:

It is reassuring to note that Winnicott concluded, “almost all mothers are effective and do not have to meet any one’s definition of perfection to be so.”  It is better for us as parents to accept ourselves as we are, and to do the best we can, than to attempt to be ‘perfect’ and then, necessarily, fail. Winnicott seemed to be trying to move away from the popular idea at the time that there was one set, agreed-upon way to raise children, and if you didn’t do it that way, you were a ‘bad’ parent. Winnicott wanted to do away with the notions of ‘good’ and ‘bad’ parents as they are abstract concepts that cannot apply to real people. Instead there is only ‘good enough’ or ‘not good enough’.

Donald Winnicott

I conclude this brief review with a statement that opens the door to a key aspect of Winnicott’s work. The development of the true-self personality, and creativity.

‘Winnicott envisioned the infant as born with the potential for unique individuality of personality (termed a True Self personality organisation), which can develop in the context of a responsive holding environment provided by a good-enough mother.’ Thomas Ogden (1990) (My thanks to Paul Wadey)