Our March Author: Marisa Silver

kMary Coin: A Novel 

Dorothea Lange: A Life Beyond Limits

Marisa Silver: Interviews
Marisa Silver

Rights Reel: The Mexican Suitcase

Who doesn't love a lost treasure story? As a film supplement to our reading of Rebecca Pawel's Watcher in the Pine, a mystery set in the aftermath of the Spanish Civil War, I'd like to recommend the documentary The Mexican Suitcase. The film tells the story of three lost boxes found in a closet in Mexico City in 2007. The boxes, misplaced in the chaos at the start of WWII, contained many of the Spanish Civil War negatives by the legendary photographer Robert Capa and fellow photographers Gerda Taro and David "Chim" Seymour.  The film traces the path of the negatives from Spain to France to Mexico and highlights the role Mexico played in the civil war and its significance for refugees from Spain. The film also examines the attitude of today’s Spaniards towards the fate of their ancestors who lost their lives in the war. You can stream it on Netflix or Amazon Instant.

You can also learn more and browse through a gallery of photos at the International Center for Photography website and the story and photos are also available in book form.

Journey to North India

The imagery in Kiran Desai's The Inheritance of Loss is vivid enough without visual aids, but just for fun, check out this 'North India and Sikkim' slideshow from photographer Matt Reichel.

... We'd emerge to the tops of monasteries limpet to the sides of the rock, surrounded by chortens and prayer flags, the white facades catching the light of the sunset, all straw gold, the mountains rugged lines of indigo... Buddhism was ancient here, more ancient than it was anywhere else, and we went to a monastery that had been built, they said, when a flying lama had flown from one mountaintop to another, from Menak Hill to Enchey, and another that had been built when a rainbow connected Kanchenjunga to the crest of the hill. Often gompas were deserted because the monks were also farmers; they were away at their fields and gathered only a few times a year for pujas and all you could hear was the wind in the bamboo. Clouds cam through the doors and mingled with the paintings of the clouds. The interiors were dark, smoke-stained, and we'd try to make out the murals by the light of butter lamps... (page 169)

Intro to Eritrea

As a little incentive for our September book, Michela Wrong's, I Didn't Do It for You : How the World Betrayed a Small African Nation, I offer this gorgeous photoset by photographer Eric Lafforgue. Mostly portraits, some street scenes and a camel or three! For a preview look for the Flickr badge in the sidebar or go directly to a slideshow!

Tags: Michela Wrong, Eritrea, photography

Burma: Human Rights Links

More follow-up to our discussion of Finding George Orwell in Burma;
 
Burma Project -Voices of '88 commemorates the 1988 demonstrations and includes photos, cartoons and poetry.  Burma- Grace Under Pressure is a slick multi-media presentation of photography from contemporary Burma that guides you through the basic human rights issues facing the country. (I quite enjoyed the soundtrack!)

Larkin mentions the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners as her source for information on the experiences of Burmese prisonsers of conscience.  I recommend browsing "Learning Behind Bars" in the Photo Gallery.

Also from Larkin's acknowledgments, here are links to BurmaNet and The Irrawaddy News Magazine Online Edition for more in depth news about Burma.

Last but not least!  Take action:  sign the petition for Ma Khin Khin Leh!

Some background on Sebald

We had an excellent discussion of Sebald's Austerlitz and yet there is so much more to be explored! Some follow-up:

A little background on the author is available in this Guardian profile.

Here's an interview that touches on Wittgenstein, 9/11, architecture and the art of translation. A snippet about the role of photography in his work:

Q: Photographs and documents interrupt your books. What part do they play in your writing process?

A: They often precede it. If there's an image you want to use, you often write toward it or away from it. The writer's curse is that he doesn't work with tangible matter of any kind, and this is a little device that helps. It certainly encouraged me to write a novel in the first place.

The cover image [of "Austerlitz"] is one I've had for a long while and always felt I needed to write about. It has a haunting quality that wouldn't leave me alone.

I begin by surveying things I've accumulated: notes, documents, bits of transcribed interviews. When you talk to someone aged 80, invariably the photo album comes out. It's the generation that first had access to cheap cameras.

I've always liked image-text relationships. In the '70s there were very interesting things written about photography by Susan Sontag, Roland Barthes, John Berger. I felt a direct rapport with things said in these essays.

Q: Are the photographs meant to manipulate the reader's visualization?

A: I don't do that deliberately. But what the image always does is arrest the text.

The narrative moves in time and slides toward its own ending. The visual arts have the capacity to lift you out of time, and since all disasters happen in time, they offer some consolation in lifting you out of it.

Sometimes pictures do contain a high density of information. There is an image in [his 1992 novel] "The Emigrants" of a Jewish family in Germany. They're in lederhosen and dirndl skirts. That picture, if you know how to read it, tells you more about Jewish assimilation than any text could.

KCRW's Bookworm has this audio interview including moths inspired by Virginia Wolff, narrative devices inspired by Thomas Bernhard, the conspiracy of silence and more.

Brazil: Photography

Robb highlights the work of several Brazilian photographers in A Death in Brazil. First there is the war photography of Flavio de Barros including this haunting image described in the book. Robb compares this image to the work of Sebastião Salgado. Here is a gallery of this work on the Landless Movement: Terra and here are the photos he refers to depicting workers "like ants." Finally, at the very end of the book there is a reference to Pierre Verger, who has his very own Foundation with lovely online photo albums. I'm a sucker for the Bolivian masked dancer.

For Women's Day: Too Much Time

In honor of International Women's Day I'd like to highlight Amnesty's new report Abuse of Women in Custody: Sexual Misconduct and Shackling of Pregnant. The report surveys laws, policies and practices in all 50 states, the District of Columbia and the U.S. Bureau of Prisons regarding custodial sexual misconduct and the shackling of inmates who are pregnant or giving birth. If the report is too dry for you, skip to the multimedia presentation, Too Much Time, featuring the photography of Jane Evelyn Atwood and if you're short on time, skip the intro and go to part two of the presentation and just view the photos and listen to the commentary on "Vanessa's Baby." California residents can breathe a sigh of relief that our legislature just passed a law barring the shackling of women in labor, but its just appalling that it took this long... or that it would be necessary in the first place! Note: Atwood's photojournalism is also available in book form- Too Much Time: Women in Prison

Sudan: Eyewitness to speak in Pasadena

Another local opportunity to get an update on the situation in Sudan. Brian Steidle, an eyewitness to the genocide in Darfur, will speak from 5 to 6:30 p.m., March 1 in the Forum at All Saints Church (132 N. Euclid Ave., Pasadena). To see an exhibit of Brian's photography from Darfur and his written account to the Washington Post, visit the Holocaust Memorial Museum site -- but be warned, it is grim. Steidle was also featured in an NPR report this morning.

Meanwhile, stop by the Million Voices for Darfur site and add your voice to the list!

Nigeria, Oil and Ken Saro-Wiwa

In November we commemorate the ten year anniversary of the execution of Nigerian author and environmentalist, Ken Saro-Wiwa by reading Ken Wiwa's moving memoir of his father, In the Shadow of a Saint. Here are a few background links:

RememberSaroWiwa is the UK-centric 10-year memorial site for KSW:

Price of Oil is a joint project of Amnesty-USA, PEN, Earthrights Intl and Sierra Club, among others. (I tried to get our discussion listed on the site, but its not showing up, at least not yet.) Be sure to check out the slideshow.

Recent NPR series on oil in Nigeria

Recent National Geographic Articles (check out the related links on these too)
Singing Songs for Freedom
African Oil: Whose Bonanza?