Gore Vidal, American author and essayist whose prolific career spanned six decades, died Tuesday at age 86, reports NPR. He died at home from complications of pneumonia.
"Whenever a friend succeeds, a little something in me dies." RIP Gore Vidal, a great intellectual of our time. No-one did acerbic better
">twitter.com/eDDebiyat/stat…— EdebiyatKültürSanat (@eDDebiyat) August 1, 2012
Translation: Famous novelist, playwright, critic, and politician, Gore Vidal, has died aged 86.
The reading public will remember him as a literary juggernaut who wrote 25 novels — from the historical "Lincoln" to the satirical "Myra Breckinridge" — and volumes of essays critics consider among the most elegant in the English language, writes the Los Angeles Times. He also brought shrewd intelligence to writing Broadway hits, Hollywood screenplays and television dramas says the Los Angeles daily.
"A writer must always tell the truth. Unless he's a journalist." Gore Vidal
Along with contemporaries such as Norman Mailer and Truman Capote, the Chicago Sun-Times remembers, Vidal was part of the last generation of literary writers who were also genuine celebrities — fixtures on talk shows and in gossip columns, personalities of such size and appeal that even those who hadn't read their books knew who they were.
The Chicago newspaper adds that Vidal was widely admired as an independent thinker — in the tradition of Mark Twain and H.L. Mencken — about literature, culture, politics and, as he liked to call it, "the birds and the bees." He picked apart politicians, living and dead; mocked religion and prudery; opposed wars from Vietnam to Iraq and insulted his peers like no other.
Norman Mailer punched Gore Vidal at a party after a bad review. Still on the floor, Vidal declared: "Once again, words fail Norman Mailer."
Vidal was a great man of letters, an author, playwright and groundbreaking essayist on American literature and the world, writes political blogger and Vidal friend John Nichols in The Nation. He was also a bold and unrelenting challenger of Puritanism, which he regarded as the ugliest of American tendencies.
Nichols remembers his friend as a political champion who ran campains for Congress and who demanded that presidents of both parties be held to account for high crimes and misdemeanors.
VIDAL "Apparently, a democracy is a place where numerous elections are held at great cost without issues & with interchangeable candidates'
The grandson of Democratic Sen. Thomas Gore of Oklahoma, Gore Vidal was in 1960, the Democratic candidate for Congress in an upstate New York district writes ABC News. In 1982, Vidal came in second in the California Democratic senatorial primary, losing to incumbent Governor Jerry Brown.
Vidal never shied away from giving his opinion on subjects, especially politics, relates ABC News. In 1968, Vidal squared off with conservative William F. Buckley prior to the 1968 election, accusing Buckley of being a "crypto-Nazi." Buckley threatened to slap Vidal in the face.
I imagine Gore Vidal will get to heaven and find it terribly bland. I hope he somehow sends us back a review
Gore Vidal, American author and essayist whose prolific career spanned six decades, died Tuesday at age 86, reports NPR. He died at home from complications of pneumonia.
"Whenever a friend succeeds, a little something in me dies." RIP Gore Vidal, a great intellectual of our time. No-one did acerbic better
">twitter.com/eDDebiyat/stat…— EdebiyatKültürSanat (@eDDebiyat) August 1, 2012
Translation: Famous novelist, playwright, critic, and politician, Gore Vidal, has died aged 86.
The reading public will remember him as a literary juggernaut who wrote 25 novels — from the historical "Lincoln" to the satirical "Myra Breckinridge" — and volumes of essays critics consider among the most elegant in the English language, writes the Los Angeles Times. He also brought shrewd intelligence to writing Broadway hits, Hollywood screenplays and television dramas says the Los Angeles daily.
"A writer must always tell the truth. Unless he's a journalist." Gore Vidal
Along with contemporaries such as Norman Mailer and Truman Capote, the Chicago Sun-Times remembers, Vidal was part of the last generation of literary writers who were also genuine celebrities — fixtures on talk shows and in gossip columns, personalities of such size and appeal that even those who hadn't read their books knew who they were.
The Chicago newspaper adds that Vidal was widely admired as an independent thinker — in the tradition of Mark Twain and H.L. Mencken — about literature, culture, politics and, as he liked to call it, "the birds and the bees." He picked apart politicians, living and dead; mocked religion and prudery; opposed wars from Vietnam to Iraq and insulted his peers like no other.
Norman Mailer punched Gore Vidal at a party after a bad review. Still on the floor, Vidal declared: "Once again, words fail Norman Mailer."
Vidal was a great man of letters, an author, playwright and groundbreaking essayist on American literature and the world, writes political blogger and Vidal friend John Nichols in The Nation. He was also a bold and unrelenting challenger of Puritanism, which he regarded as the ugliest of American tendencies.
Nichols remembers his friend as a political champion who ran campains for Congress and who demanded that presidents of both parties be held to account for high crimes and misdemeanors.
VIDAL "Apparently, a democracy is a place where numerous elections are held at great cost without issues & with interchangeable candidates'
The grandson of Democratic Sen. Thomas Gore of Oklahoma, Gore Vidal was in 1960, the Democratic candidate for Congress in an upstate New York district writes ABC News. In 1982, Vidal came in second in the California Democratic senatorial primary, losing to incumbent Governor Jerry Brown.
Vidal never shied away from giving his opinion on subjects, especially politics, relates ABC News. In 1968, Vidal squared off with conservative William F. Buckley prior to the 1968 election, accusing Buckley of being a "crypto-Nazi." Buckley threatened to slap Vidal in the face.
I imagine Gore Vidal will get to heaven and find it terribly bland. I hope he somehow sends us back a review
Russia's proxies in Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson, and Zaporizhzhia regions announced that referendums on joining Russia had begun that Ukrainian and Western officials have denounced as shams.
Stay up-to-date with the latest on the Russia-Ukraine war, with our exclusive international coverage.
For four days, "voting" will be held at people's homes "for security reasons," Russian state-controlled news agency RIA Novosti wrote. On the last day of the "referendums," on September 27, locals will be asked to go to "polling stations."
In Zaporizhzhya and Kherson oblasts the question is: "Do you support secession from Ukraine, formation of the oblast as an independent state and incorporation into Russia?" and in the already self-declared independent republics of DNR and LNR: "Are you for incorporation into Russia as a subject of the Federation?”
Concerns grow that by claiming the areas as Russian, Moscow will portray attempts to retake them as an attack on Russia itself. The votes are thus seen as linked to the mobilization Vladimir Putin announced this week to escalate the war.
In the Luhansk region, citizens have been forbidden from leaving the city. Head of the Luhansk OVA, Serhiy Gaidai, wrote on Telegram that "Residents of the occupied Luhansk region are forbidden to leave the cities: If you work, they will force you to vote at work; if you stay at home, the military will come."
According to Gaidai, the Russian media were preparing propaganda stories about a kind of "active participation of local residents in voting." In particular, in Bilovodsk, a business owner announced to all employees that attendance was mandatory. Those who will not take part in the voting will be automatically dismissed from their jobs, and the lists of those who will not appear will be handed over to Russian authorities.
State Duma Speaker Vyacheslav Volodin also addressed the residents of Donbas on his Telegram channel. “Our dear compatriots, make your choice freely. Don't be afraid of anything. Make a decision to become part of the Russian Federation — we will support you, ” he wrote.
Berlusconi Defends Putin With Italy Set To Vote
Silvio Berlusconi attends at the rally closing the election campaign of the center right in Piazza del Popolo
Ahead of Italy’s general election on Sunday, some of the country’s top politicians — including those expected to be part of the winning coalition — have made declarations in favor of Russia.
In the prime time TV show Porta a Porta on Thursday, the final official day for campaigning, former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi, likely to become a government minister after the elections, justified his long-time friend at the Kremlin Vladimir Putin by saying that “ he fell into a very difficult and dramatic situation.”
Echoing Putin’s rationale for his invasion, the 85-year-old Italian billionaire politician said that Russian minorities in Ukraine asked Putin to help them because the Ukraine government was attacking them. “Putin was pushed by the Russian population, by his party and his government ministers to come up with this special operation,” Berlusconi said, using Putin’s euphemism for the war. “Russian troops had to enter Kyiv and within a week to substitute Zelensky’s government with a government of decent people.”
Berlusconi later said his statements were taken out of context and that he believes the “aggression of Ukraine is unjustifiable and unacceptable.”
The exchange came after Berlusconi’s far-right ally and former interior minister Matteo Salvini said that Europe should rethink sanctions against Russia because they are harming the Italian population.
Another former prime minister, Giuseppe Conte, now leader of the 5Star Movement, which has opposed the sending of more arms to Ukraine, also spoke out in favor of Russia. “It is obvious that Russia is moving in a logic that needs to be grasped, not justified, we are talking about the security of a neighboring territory, we are talking about Russian minorities,” Conte was quoted as saying in daily La Stampa.
Giorgia Meloni, whose far-right party Brothers of Italy is the frontrunner in Sunday’s elections in a coalition with Berlusconi’s and Salvini’s parties, has instead backed sanctions against Russia in what seemed a deep crack within the coalition. Observers around the world will be watching the results to see if the EU could potentially lose a key ally in the backing of Ukraine, especially as the economic and energy effects take their toll across the West.
One Million Recruits? Novaya Gazeta Reveals “Secret” Number In Mobilization Decree
Mobilized reservists arrive at a republican recruitment centre.
Stringer/TASS
A secret paragraph of the decree on mobilization allows the Ministry of Defense to call up one million people instead of the 300,000 originally stated by the Russian government, a source in the presidential administration told Novaya Gazeta Europe.
The seventh paragraph of the decree isdesignated "for official use." Later, at a press conference, the President's press secretary Dmitry Peskov said that the classified item referred to the number of reservists who could be called up for military service.
Novaya Gazeta’s source inside the Russian government said “The figure was corrected several times, and in the end, they settled on a million”.
Zelensky Tells Russians To “Protest, Fight Back, Run Away Or Surrender”
Reacting to Vladimir Putin’s announcement of a national mobilization, President Volodymyr Zelensky called on Russians to "protest, fight back, run away or surrender to Ukraine." Speaking in his daily address, he added: "You are already complicit in all these crimes, murders, and torture of Ukrainians because you remain silent. It's time for you to choose, for men to choose to die or to live."
Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk previously said that Russians who don't want to fight should surrender. "If you don't want to return to Russia, then, according to the Geneva Conventions and Ukrainian law, no one will transfer you back to Russia," she said.
Meanwhile, Ukrainian journalist Anna Akage reflects for Worldcrunch on Vladimir Putin’s failure to avoid the nationwide mobilization of new recruits and how this could put his own destiny at stake.
Germany To Welcome Russians As Political Refugees, Kazakhstan Bows To Kremlin
Passengers queue at check-in desks at Vnukovo International Airport
Vladimir Gerdo/TASS
German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser told newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine that Russians who oppose the regime and flee the country could be accepted as those escaping "political persecution."
"Anyone who courageously opposes the regime of President Vladimir Putin and therefore puts themselves in great danger can apply for asylum in Germany […] As a rule, deserters threatened by severe repression receive international protection," Faeser said, adding that granting asylum is a case-by-case decision.
Meanwhile, Kazakhstan's parliament speaker Maulen Ashimbaev has said that the country would not deliver permanent residence permits to Russians without the Kremlin's agreement. After Russian President Vladimir Putin announced his plan of "partial mobilization", many Russians began leaving for Armenia, Belarus, Georgia, and Kazakhstan, where they can enter without visas.
El Periódico- Spain
An Entire Family Exterminated: Die Welt Shows Horror In Izyum
Reporting for German daily Die Welt, Anatoly Shara writes that he needed to wear a breathing mask with a menthol ointment to deal with the smell of decomposing bodies. Regional authorities have said that more than 440 bodies have been buried, with widespread signs of torture that may make the crimes even worse than Bucha, the city near Kyiv that was the site of different massacre last spring.
Shara reports how a team of investigators dug out an entire family. A woman, sobbing, explains: “It's just terrible, it's just terrible. Over there is a whole family: grandfather, grandmother, father, mother and two children. The children's bodies were piled on top of each other and wrapped in some rags."
Independence Commission Confirms War Crimes Committed In Ukraine
War crimes have been committed in Ukraine following investigations conducted in four regions of the country, said the chair of an independence Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine on Friday.
"Based on the evidence gathered by the Commission, it has concluded that war crimes have been committed in Ukraine," Erik Møse told the Geneva-based Human Rights Council.
The commission found a large number of executions, as well as victims of sexual violence and torture Møse said. Even though he did explicitly say who had committed the crimes, the commission’s investigations were focused on areas in Ukraine previously occupied by Russian forces like Kyiv, Kharkiv, Chernihiv and Sumy.
Russia continues to deny deliberately attacking civilians during the war in Ukraine and has previously said that the accusations of human rights abuses are a smear campaign.
Russian Banks Losses Estimated To $25 Billion, Regulator Not Fazed
Maxim Lyubomudrov, who heads the regulator's department that supervises Russia’s largest banks, said this level of losses was “acceptable” and that the government had put in place measures to support Russia’s lenders through the economic crisis.
Finland Seizes Yandex Assets, Other Russian Oligarchs Targeted
Russia's President Vladimir Putin and Yandex CEO Arkady Volozh in 2017
Finnish authorities have seized the holdings of Russia's largest technology company Yandex after the European Union added the company's founder and CEO Arkady Volozh to its sanctions list, Finnish media Helsingin Sanomat reports.
Meanwhile, Russian oligarchs Boris and Arkady Rotenberg, close allies of Russian President Vladimir Putin, who had extensive business interests in Finland, had their assets seized by the state as well.
The city in southern China was put under harsh lockdown earlier this month after just a few positive COVID tests. Then a bus carrying quarantined residents crashed, killing 27. The senseless accident left residents more fearful and suspicious of each other than ever.
Central to the tragic absurdity of this war is the question of language. Vladimir Putin has repeated that protecting ethnic Russians and the Russian-speaking populations of Ukraine was a driving motivation for his invasion.
Yet one month on, a quick look at the map shows that many of the worst-hit cities are those where Russian is the predominant language: Kharkiv, Odesa, Kherson.
Then there is Mariupol, under siege and symbol of Putin’s cruelty. In the largest city on the Azov Sea, with a population of half a million people, Ukrainians make up slightly less than half of the city's population, and Mariupol's second-largest national ethnicity is Russians. As of 2001, when the last census was conducted, 89.5% of the city's population identified Russian as their mother tongue.
The martyrdom of Mariupol
Between 2018 and 2019, I spent several months in Mariupol. It is a rugged but beautiful city dotted with Soviet-era architecture, featuring wide avenues and hillside parks, and an extensive industrial zone stretching along the shoreline. There was a vibrant youth culture and art scene, with students developing projects to turn their city into a regional cultural center with an international photography festival.
There were also many offices of international NGOs and human rights organizations, a consequence of the fact that Mariupol was the last major city before entering the occupied zone of Donbas. Many natives of the contested regions of Luhansk and Donetsk had moved there, taking jobs in restaurants and hospitals. I had fond memories of the welcoming from locals who were quicker to smile than in some other parts of Ukraine. All of this is gone.
Putin is bombing the very people he has claimed to want to rescue.
According to the latest data from the local authorities, 80% of the port city has been destroyed by Russian bombs, artillery fire and missile attacks, with particularly egregious targeting of civilians, including a maternity hospital, a theater where more than 1,000 people had taken shelter and a school where some 400 others were hiding.
The official civilian death toll of Mariupol is estimated at more than 3,000. There are no language or ethnic-based statistics of the victims, but it’s likely the majority were Russian speakers.
So let’s be clear, Putin is bombing the very people he has claimed to want to rescue.
Putin’s Public Enemy No. 1, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, is a mother-tongue Russian speaker who’d made a successful acting and comedy career in Russian-language broadcasting, having extensively toured Russian cities for years.
Rescuers carry a person injured during a shelling by Russian troops of Kharkiv, northeastern Ukraine.
Yes, the official language of Ukraine is Ukrainian, and a 2019 law aimed to ensure that it is used in public discourse, but no one has ever sought to abolish the Russian language in everyday life. In none of the cities that are now being bombed by the Russian army to supposedly liberate them has the Russian language been suppressed or have the Russian-speaking population been discriminated against.
Sociologist Mikhail Mishchenko explains that studies have found that the vast majority of Ukrainians don’t consider language a political issue. For reasons of history, culture and the similarities of the two languages, Ukraine is effectively a bilingual nation.
"The overwhelming majority of the population speaks both languages, Russian and Ukrainian,” Mishchenko explains. “Those who say they understand Russian poorly and have difficulty communicating in it are just over 4% percent. Approximately the same number of people say the same about Ukrainian.”
In general, there is no problem of communication and understanding. Often there will be conversations where one person speaks Ukrainian, and the other responds in Russian. Geographically, the Russian language is more dominant in the eastern and central parts of Ukraine, and Ukrainian in the west.
A daughter of Kyiv
Like most central Ukrainians I am perfectly bilingual: for me, Ukrainian and Russian are both native languages that I have used since childhood in Kyiv. My generation grew up on Russian rock, post-Soviet cinema, and translations of foreign literature into Russian. I communicate in Russian with my sister, and with my mother and daughter in Ukrainian. I write professionally in three languages: Ukrainian, Russian and English, and can also speak Polish, French, and a bit Japanese. My mother taught me that the more languages I know the more human I am.
At the same time, I am not Russian — nor British or Polish. I am Ukrainian. Ours is a nation with a long history and culture of its own, which has always included a multi-ethnic population: Russians, Belarusians, Moldovans, Crimean Tatars, Bulgarians, Romanians, Hungarians, Poles, Jews, Greeks. We all, they all, have found our place on Ukrainian soil. We speak different languages, pray in different churches, we have different traditions, clothes, and cuisine.
My mother taught me that the more languages I know the more human I am.
Like in other countries, these differences have been the source of conflict in our past. But it is who we are and will always be, and real progress has been made over the past three decades to embrace our multitudes. Our Jewish, Russian-speaking president is the most visible proof of that — and is in fact part of what our soldiers are fighting for.
Many in Moscow were convinced that Russian troops would be welcomed in Ukraine as liberating heroes by Russian speakers. Instead, young soldiers are forced to shoot at people who scream in their native language.
Starving people ina street of Kharkiv in 1933, during the famine
Putin has tried to rally the troops by warning that in Ukraine a “genocide” of ethnic Russians is being carried out by a government that must be “de-nazified.”
These are, of course, words with specific definitions that carry the full weight of history. The Ukrainian people know what genocide is not from books. In my hometown of Kyiv, German soldiers massacred Jews en masse. My grandfather survived the Buchenwald concentration camp, liberated by the U.S. army. My great-grandmother, who died at the age of 95, survived the 1932-33 famine when the Red Army carried out the genocide of the Ukrainian middle class, and her sister disappeared in the camps of Siberia, convicted for defying rationing to try to feed her children during the famine.
On Tuesday, came a notable report of one of the latest civilian deaths in the besieged Russian-speaking city of Kharkiv: a 96-year-old had been killed when shelling hit his apartment building. The victim’s name was Boris Romanchenko; he had survived Buchenwald and two other Nazi concentration camps during World War II. As President Zelensky noted: Hitler didn’t manage to kill him, but Putin did.
Genocide has returned to Ukraine, from Kharkiv to Kherson to Mariupol, as Vladimir Putin had warned. But it is his own genocide against the Russian-speaking population of Ukraine.
