Fear: Are you being followed by a moon shadow?sappiamo tutto capiamo poco

drawing collage by marguerita

Scientists generally define fear as a negative emotional state triggered by the presence of a stimulus (the snake) that has the potential to cause harm, and anxiety as a negative emotional state in which the threat is not present but anticipated. We sometimes confuse the two: When someone says he is afraid he will fail an exam or get caught stealing or cheating, he should, by the definitions above, be saying he is anxious instead.
But the truth is, the line between fear and anxiety can get pretty thin and fuzzy.
http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/01/22/anatomy-of-fear/?ref=global-home

Of Tempus,Temporis......

presentum	barcala	appropinquatio
De nihilo nihil	undique	decumana

drawing by marguerita

So time has passed?
You are getting older?
It just means that a certain number of homogenous moments (seconds, minutes, hours, and so on) have succeeded one another in a linear fashion: tick, tack, tick, tack…
Now look in the mirror!
At least since the introduction of the pocket watch in the 16th century brought exact time measurement into everyday life, modern agents have found themselves increasingly encased in a calculable and measurable temporal environment.
We measure and organize time as never before, and we worry about not “losing” or “wasting” time, as though time was a finite substance or a container into which we should try to stuff as many good experiences as possible.

http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/01/01/on-modern-time/

)f Soul,Brains, Neuroscience,Consciousness....You (are your brain).

drawing /collage by marguerita

The idea that a person is a functioning assembly of brain cells and associated molecules is not something neuroscience has discovered. It is, rather, something it takes for granted.
You are your brain.
Francis Crick once called this “the astonishing hypothesis,”
because, as he claimed, it is so remote from the way most people alive today think about themselves.
But what is really astonishing about this
supposedly astonishing hypothesis is how astonishing it is not!
The idea that there is a thing inside us that thinks and feels.
What we do know is that a healthy brain is necessary for normal mental life, and indeed, for any life at all. But of course much else is necessary for mental life.
We need roughly normal bodies and a roughly normal environment.
We also need the presence and availability of other people
if we are to have anything like the sorts of lives that we know and value. So we really ought to say that it is the normally embodied, environmentally- and socially-situated human animal that thinks, feels, decides and is conscious.
But once we say this, it would be simpler, and more accurate, to allow that it is people, not their brains, who think and feel and decide.
It is people, not their brains, that make and enjoy art. You are not your brain, you are a living human being.

http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/12/04/art-and-the-limits-of-neuroscience/

Of Sonnets, E.B.Browning Sonnets from the Portuguese

photo by marguerita

From a little book of sonnets by E.B.Browning.
Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806-1861)

This book belonged to my mother.She got it in Paris,in 1948.

I thought once how Theocritus had sung
Of the sweet years, the dear and wished-for years,
Who each one in a gracious hand appears
To bear a gift for mortals, old or young:
And, as I mused it in his antique tongue,
I saw, in gradual vision through my tears,
The sweet, sad years, the melancholy years,
Those of my own life, who by turns had flung
A shadow across me. Straightway I was 'ware,
So weeping, how a mystic Shape did move
Behind me, and drew me backward by the hair;
And a voice said in mastery, while I strove, ---
'Guess now who holds thee?' --- 'Death,' I said. But, there,
The silver answer rang, --- 'Not Death, but Love.'

Rupert Murdoch,Freud,I Did it My Way and The Jimmy&Roops WE KNEWS

drawing by marguerita

In a voluntary outburst on Tuesday, Rupert told the parliamentary committee
that he "was brought up by a father who was not rich, but who was a great journalist"
and who left him a small newspaper
"saying that he was giving me
the chance to do good".

Little Red Riding Hood

by brothers Grimm

Once upon a time there was a dear little girl who was loved by everyone who looked at her, but most of all by her grandmother, and there was nothing that she would not have given to the child. Once she gave her a little riding hood of red velvet, which suited her so well that she would never wear anything else; so she was always called 'Little Red Riding Hood.'

One day her mother said to her: 'Come, Little Red Riding Hood, here is a piece of cake and a bottle of wine; take them to your grandmother, she is ill and weak, and they will do her good. Set out before it gets hot, and when you are going, walk nicely and quietly and do not run off the path, or you may fall and break the bottle, and then your grandmother will get nothing; and when you go into her room, don't forget to say, "Good morning", and don't peep into every corner before you do it.'

'I will take great care,' said Little Red Riding Hood to her mother, and gave her hand on it.

The grandmother lived out in the wood, half a league from the village, and just as Little Red Riding Hood entered the wood, a wolf met her. Red Riding Hood did not know what a wicked creature he was, and was not at all afraid of him.

'Good day, Little Red Riding Hood,' said he.

'Thank you kindly, wolf.'

'Whither away so early, Little Red Riding Hood?'

'To my grandmother's.'

'What have you got in your apron?'

'Cake and wine; yesterday was baking-day, so poor sick grandmother is to have something good, to make her stronger.'

'Where does your grandmother live, Little Red Riding Hood?'

'A good quarter of a league farther on in the wood; her house stands under the three large oak-trees, the nut-trees are just below; you surely must know it,' replied Little Red Riding Hood.

The wolf thought to himself: 'What a tender young creature! what a nice plump mouthful - she will be better to eat than the old woman. I must act craftily, so as to catch both.'

And a parallel:

Lucian Freud

He was interested in presence, and not only human presence: a lightbulb's glare, a dog's leg, a horse's arse, a frayed bit of carpet. The language with which he described people and things, animals and lovers, atmosphere and futility, was a frightening construction. I believe he shared more with his psychoanalyst grandfather than he liked to admit.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/2011/jul/22/lucian-freud-adrian-searle

In the Pursuit of Incongruity or in Praise of the Absurd

photos by marguerita

The incongruity theory is the reigning theory of humor, since it seems to account for most cases of perceived funniness, which is partly because “incongruity” is something of an umbrella term. Most developments of the incongruity theory only try to list a necessary condition for humor—the perception of an incongruity—and they stop short of offering the sufficient conditions.

In the Rhetoric (III, 2), Aristotle presents the earliest glimmer of an incongruity theory of humor, finding that the best way to get an audience to laugh is to setup an expectation and deliver something “that gives a twist.”

After discussing the power of metaphors to produce a surprise in the hearer, Aristotle says that “[t]he effect is produced even by jokes depending upon changes of the letters of a word; this too is a surprise. You find this in verse as well as in prose. The word which comes is not what the hearer imagined.”

These remarks sound like a surprise theory of humor, similar to that later offered by René Descartes, but Aristotle continues to explain how the surprise must somehow “fit the facts,” or as we might put it today, the incongruity must be capable of a resolution.

In the Critique of Judgment, Immanuel Kant gives a clearer statement of the role of incongruity in humor:

“In everything that is to excite a lively laugh there must be something absurd (in which the understanding, therefore, can find no satisfaction).

Laughter is an affection arising from the sudden transformation of a strained expectation into nothing” (I, I, 54).

Arthur Schopenhauer offers a more specific version of the incongruity theory, arguing that humor arising from a failure of a concept to account for an object of thought. When the particular outstrips the general, we are faced with an incongruity. Schopenhauer also emphasizes the element of surprise, saying that “the greater and more unexpected [. . .] this incongruity is, the more violent will be his laughter” (1818, I, Sec. 13).

As stated by Kant and Schopenhauer, the incongruity theory of humor specifies a necessary condition of the object of humor.
Focusing on the humorous object, leaves something out of the analysis of humor, since there are many kinds of things that are incongruous which do not produce amusement.
A more robust statement of the incongruity theory would need to include the pleasurable response one has to humorous objects.

FORMIGA POWER: A tale of a rebellious Brazilian Ant by Miriam Portela and Marguerita Bornstein

In Proverbs, King Solomon had some advice for those rushing into print with ill-informed opinions: "Go to the ant, thou sluggard; consider her ways, and be wise."



drawings by marguerita
all rights reserved 2011.

For many years I am fascinated by insects.I like to draw,create sculptures and jewels.
The Ants in particular become of great interest to me, so through time,I got books, The Journey to the Ants- a story of scientific exploration- and The Insect Societies by Edward O.Wilson,among other books on the subject.
Recently,by coincidence,Miriam Portela, a Brazilian children's book writer,proposed me to illustrate her story about a rebellious ant,who craves for fun and joy and wants to take part of stopping the reigning ongoing chaos on Earth.
The Rebellious Ant, in spirit turns out to be a dreamer,as all rebels seem to be,she loses herself in reveries,wonders in her thoughts and of course does not fit like in like the everyday ant.
Somehow,she sounds quite like some humans.
The interesting side here is,borrowing from The Importance of Social Insects,are the parallels to be drawn and why we study these insects?
Because, together with man,hummingbirds, and the bristlecone pine,they are among the great
achievements of organic evolution.
Their social organization- far less than man's because of the feeble intellect and absence of culture,of course,but far greater in respect to cohesion,caste specialization and individual altruism- is non pareil.
The biologist is invited to consider insect societies because they best exemplify the full sweep of ascending levels of organization, from molecule to society.
Among the tens of thousands of species of wasps,ants,bees and termites, we witness the employment of social design to solve ecological problems ordinarily dealt with by simple organisms.
The insect colony is often called SUPERORGANISM, because it displays so many social phenomena that are analogous to the physiological properties of organs and tissues.
A second reason for singling out social insects, is their ecological dominance on the land.
In most parts of the Earth ants in particular are among the principal predators of other invertebrates.
Their colonies,rooted and perennial like woody plants,send out foragers which comb the terrain day and night.
Their biomass and energy consumption exceed those of invertebrates in most terrestrial habitats.
Social insects are specially prominent in the tropics.
In the seventeenth century,Portuguese settlers called ants the "king of Brazil" and later travelers referred to them with such phrases as " the actual owners of the Amazon Valley" and "the real conquerors of Brazil."
So, Viva! Formiga Power!

Edward O.Wilson is Frank B.Baird Jr. Professor of Science and Curator in Entomology at the Museum of Comparative Zoology,Harvard University.He is the author of Sociobiology: The New Synthesis,Biophilia,On Human Nature, which won the 1979 Pulitzer Prize in general nonfiction, and The Diversity of Life. He is coauthor with Bert Holldobler of The Ants, which won the 1991 Pulitzer Prize in general nonfiction. His many awards include the National Medal of Science in 1977 and the Tyler Prize for Environmental Achievement in 1984.

Oscar Wilde,Clematis and I

photo by marguerita

To drift with every passion till my soul
Is a stringed lute on which all winds can play,
Is it for this that I have given away
Mine ancient wisdom, and austere control?
Methinks my life is a twice-written scroll
Scrawled over on some boyish holiday
With idle songs for pipe and virelay,
Which do but mar the secret of the whole.
Surely there was a time I might have trod
The sunlit heights, and from life's dissonance
Struck one clear chord to reach the ears of God:
Is that time dead? lo! with a little rod
I did but touch the honey of romance —
And must I lose a soul's inheritance?

Note: Apropos clematis

Though there are some types of clematis that have a bushy habit, most of them are born to climb.

Like other climbing plants, the growing end of a clematis vine is searching for something to grab onto, and if it can’t find anything, it will stop growing. Make sure you provide it with something to climb on from day one.

A clematis vine does not climb by twining around something, as a pole bean or a morning glory does.

It climbs by wrapping its leaf stems around something. Because these leaf stems are not very long, anything that’s more than about 1/2 inch in diameter is too wide for the leaf stem to twist around. The easiest things for a clematis to grab onto, are twine, fishing line, wire, thin branches, wooden dowels or steel rods. The more grabbing opportunities you offer, the better, so even if you have a nice trellis, consider adding some twine “helper” lines, or covering your trellis with a grid of trellis netting.

Depending on the vigor of the plant and the type of trellis you have, you’ll probably need to do some “trussing” during the season to help support the vines and keep them attached to the trellis. Both fishing line and twine work well for this job.

Et Tu Cucumber?

drawing by marguerita One can't be absolutely certain about anything....
One of the problems with growing crops is that they grow.
You can't switch them off like you could a baked bean factory: they just keep coming.
There has already been a considerable drop in demand in Germany, where authorities are advising consumers not to eat salads because they still have not pinpointed the cause of the outbreak. This is affecting the area around Hamburg in particular; the rest of Europe appears to be OK. But the knock-on effect is that orders for cucumbers from Spain and Holland have been cancelled altogether, or at best reduced. For cucumbers from Holland, the obvious place to look is in the UK – we already take large volumes of cucumbers at this time of the year. Extra cucumbers will be "dumped" here rather than marketed, and this will drop the price paid to the grower. These price reductions, if they occur, are unlikely to affect the price in the shops but they do have a massive effect on the price paid to growers in the UK.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/jun/01/cucumbers-e-coli-germany?intcmp=239

IMF,DSK and I Like to Come in America avec Tocqueville

drawing by marguerita I don't know anyone who takes a shower with his clothes on, do you? Where it goes from there is dicey, and the details get murky.


I like to be in america
ok by me in america
everything free in america
for a small fee in america
i like the city of san juan
i know a boat you can get
on hundreds of flowers
in full bloom hundreds
of people in each room
automobile in america
chromium steel in america
wire spoke wheel in america
very big deal in america
i'll drive a buick in san juan
- if there's a road
you can drive on
i'll give my cousins a
free ride
- how you fit all
of them inside
immigrant goes to america
many helloes in america
nobody knows in america
puerto rico's in america
when i will go back
to san juan
- when will you shut up
and get gone
i'll give them
new washing machine
- what have they got there
to keep clean
i like the shores of america
comfort is yours in america
knobs on the doors in america
wall to wall floors in america
i'll bring a tv to san juan
- if there's a current to turn on
everyone there will give big cheer
- everyone there
will have moved here

lyrics by Trini Lopez

Tocqueville's impressions of American religion and its relationship to the broader national culture are likewise notable: "Moreover, almost all the sects of the United States are comprised within the great unity of Christianity, and Christian morality is everywhere the same
. In the United States the sovereign authority is religious, and consequently hypocrisy must be common; but there is no country in the whole world in which the Christian religion retains a greater influence over the souls of men than in America, and there can be no greater proof of its utility, and of its conformity to human nature, than that its influence is most powerfully felt over the most enlightened and free nation of the earth.
Pour le journal britannique de centre gauche The Guardian, cette nouvelle affaire de mœurs soulève "la question gênante dans les médias français et la politique de deux monde parallèles : ce qui est imprimé, et ce qu'il y a derrière ; les commérages, et ce qui doit rester officiellement les non-dits."

Hume argued that “reason alone can never be a motive to any action of the will.” Desire, for example, “arises not from reason.”

photo by marguerita

Hume was most concerned with the nature of knowledge, morality, causality .

The Nature of Ideas

In this part, first David Hume divides all perception into ideas and impressions. He then argues that the simple impressions cause simple ideas, and from simple ideas form complex ideas, either restricted to the same order of the corresponding complex impressions (which are memories) or re-arranged in a new form (which is imagination). Descartes claimed that the only cause to the idea of God must be God himself, but according to Hume, God is a complex idea formed from simple ideas caused by simple impressions. Therefore, the idea of God neither requires God nor proves his existence.

Then Hume argues that general ideas are nothing but particular ideas attached to a certain word that gives it a wider application and makes it recall other individuals that are similar to it, for example we first see a particular man, then have an idea of this particular man, attach a word to this idea and then recall it when we see something similar (another man). Hume defends this view by 3 arguments - one of them is that the mind cannot think of a certain quality without the degree of that quality, such as a line without a length attached to it. Hence all ideas must have their particular degrees of qualities that therefore must be particular.

According to Hume it is through thinking of the resemblance of something with something else different in other aspects, for example we can consider the color of something only by thinking of the resemblance it has with something else of a different shape. Hume gives the example of a white marble globe and a black marble globe, one can think of the distinct shape by thinking of the resemblance between these two marble globes.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Treatise_of_Human_Nature#The_Nature_of_Ideas

About :

This book is a treatment of human cognition. It includes important statements of Skepticism and Hume's experimental method. Part 1 deals with the nature of ideas. Part 2 deals with the ideas of space and time. Part 3 deals with knowledge and probability. Part 4 deals with skeptical and other systems of philosophy, including a discussion of the soul and personal identity.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/07/opinion/07zaretsky.html?_r=2&scp=2&sq=hume&st=Search

Obama: It's Complicated ,High Noon versus Habeas Corpus

drawing by marguerita

By the time Pakistani soldiers lifted the cordon around Osama bin Laden's house in the garrison town of Abbottabad, triggering a media stampede, the most obvious traces of its infamous resident had been effaced.

The American soldiers who had swept in aboard four helicopters on Sunday night had scoured the three-storey building, taking away computer hard disks and a trove of documents – as well as Bin Laden's bloodied body, which was later buried at sea.

The following day, Pakistani intelligence – angered at not having been informed of the raid, and embarrassed that it took place under their noses – made a second sweep. Tractors carted away furniture and other belongings. But it was impossible to erase every trace of the drama that ended the manhunt.http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/may/03/osama-bin-laden-death-raid

Baudelaire et Moi: Paysage - Les Fleurs du Mal

drawing by marguerita
Je veux, pour composer chastement mes églogues,
Coucher auprès du ciel, comme les astrologues,
Et, voisin des clochers écouter en rêvant
Leurs hymnes solennels emportés par le vent.
Les deux mains au menton, du haut de ma mansarde,
Je verrai l'atelier qui chante et qui bavarde;
Les tuyaux, les clochers, ces mâts de la cité,
Et les grands ciels qui font rêver d'éternité.
II est doux, à travers les brumes, de voir naître
L'étoile dans l'azur, la lampe à la fenêtre
Les fleuves de charbon monter au firmament
Et la lune verser son pâle enchantement.
Je verrai les printemps, les étés, les automnes;
Et quand viendra l'hiver aux neiges monotones,
Je fermerai partout portières et volets
Pour bâtir dans la nuit mes féeriques palais.
Alors je rêverai des horizons bleuâtres,
Des jardins, des jets d'eau pleurant dans les albâtres,
Des baisers, des oiseaux chantant soir et matin,
Et tout ce que l'Idylle a de plus enfantin.
L'Emeute, tempêtant vainement à ma vitre,
Ne fera pas lever mon front de mon pupitre;
Car je serai plongé dans cette volupté
D'évoquer le Printemps avec ma volonté,
De tirer un soleil de mon coeur, et de faire
De mes pensers brûlants une tiède atmosphère.

Descartes and Moi:Les passions de l'âme,body,mind,emotions and spirit

drawing by marguerita

In the treatise Passions of the Soul (Les passions de l'âme), the last of Descartes' published work, completed in 1649 and dedicated to Princess Elizabeth of Bohemia, the author contributes to a long tradition of theorizing "the passions." The passions were experiences often equated with or labeled as precursors to what are commonly called "emotions" in the Modern period. However, significant differences exist between what a passion putatively was and what an emotion allegedly is. For example, the passions, as suggested by the etymology of the word, were passive in nature; that is to say the experience of a passion was always caused by an object external to the subject. An emotion, as it is commonly rendered in both contemporary psychological discourse as well as popular culture, is usually explained as an event internal to, or taking place within, a subject. Therefore, an emotion is produced by the subject while a passion is suffered by the subject.

In the Passions of the Soul, Descartes defines these phenomena as follows: "perceptions or sensations or excitations of the soul which are referred to it in particular and which are caused, maintained, and strengthened by some movement of the spirits." The "spirits" mentioned here are the "animal spirits" central to Descartes's account of physiology. They function similarly to how the medical establishment now understands the nervous system. Descartes explains that the animal spirits are produced by the blood and are responsible for stimulating the body's movement.

By affecting the muscles, for example, the animal spirits "move the body in all the different ways in which it can be moved." from Wikipedia

P.S En passant, I remember watching an interview with Artur Rubinstein by Jim Lehrer on Channel 13,many years ago,when Jim asks the pianist,how much he practices and his thoughts about contemporary musicians: " I hardly practice,when I play make many mistakes, but I play avec l'âme" was his response.

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/aboutus/bio_lehrer.html

On a clear day, thoughts and dreams:"La arte es el faro salvador de muchas de mis tormentas".

drawing by marguerita

Sweet &Funky series : Life is a Splendorous Thing

drawing/collage by marguerita
currently at the http://www.kentlergallery.org/pages/11Benefit/2011benefitArt.html

By ratnaveera

Cithaerias Phantoma

http://tolweb.org/Cithaerias/70731

Owl Butterfly

Blue Morpho

Amazon rainforests are the home for more than 25 millions of different species of insects. Warm climate with heavy rainfalls result into abundant vegetation in most part of the region make favorable conditions for the growth and reproduction of millions of species of insects. It is estimated that one acre of Amazon rainforest contains more than 70,000 species of insects. Even a single tree of the forest may contain about 50 number of different species of insects. The 100 million year old rainforest is the reason for being most biodiverse on the earth.http://hubpages.com/hub/SOME-IMPORTANT-SPECIES-OF-INSECTS-IN-AMAZON-RAINFORESTS
http://www.learnaboutbutterflies.com/Amazon%20-%20Cithaerias%20phantoma.htm

Color me Blue

watercolor by marguerita
photo by marguerita

Penso che sogno così non ritorni mai più, mi dipingevo le mani e la faccia di blu, poi d'improvviso venivo dal vento rapito, e incominciavo a volare nel cielo infinito. Volare ho ho cantare ho ho hoho, nel blu dipinto di blu, felice di stare lassù, e volavo volavo felice più in alto del sole ed ancora più sù, mentre il mondo pian piano spariva laggiù, una musica dolce suonava soltanto per me. Volare ho ho cantare ho ho hoho nel blu dipinto di blu felice di stare lassù. Ma tutti i sogni nell'alba svaniscon perchè, quando tramonta la luna li porta con se, ma io continuo a sognare negl'occhi tuoi belli, che sono blu come il un cielo trapunto di stelle. Volare ho ho cantare ho ho hoho, nel blu degl'occhi tuoi blu, felice di stare qua giù, e continuo a volare felice più in alto del sole ed ancora più su, mentre il mondo pian piano scompare negl'occhi tuoi blu, la tua voce è una musica dolce che suona per me. Volare ho ho cantare ho ho hoho nel blu degl'occhi tuoi blu, felice di stare qua giù, nel blu degl'occhi tuoi blu, felice di stare qua giù con te..

Penso che sogno così
non ritorni mai più,
mi dipingevo le mani
e la faccia di blu,
poi d'improvviso venivo
dal vento rapito,
e incominciavo a volare
nel cielo infinito.

Volare ho ho
cantare ho ho hoho,
nel blu dipinto di blu,
felice di stare lassù,
e volavo volavo
felice più in alto del sole
ed ancora più sù,
mentre il mondo
pian piano spariva laggiù,
una musica dolce suonava
soltanto per me.

Volare ho ho
cantare ho ho hoho
nel blu dipinto di blu
felice di stare lassù.

Ma tutti i sogni
nell'alba svaniscon perchè,
quando tramonta la luna
li porta con se,
ma io continuo a sognare
negl'occhi tuoi belli,
che sono blu come il un cielo
trapunto di stelle.

Volare ho ho
cantare ho ho hoho,
nel blu degl'occhi tuoi blu,
felice di stare qua giù,
e continuo a volare felice
più in alto del sole
ed ancora più su,
mentre il mondo
pian piano scompare
negl'occhi tuoi blu,
la tua voce è una musica
dolce che suona per me.

Volare ho ho
cantare ho ho hoho
nel blu degl'occhi tuoi blu,
felice di stare qua giù,
nel blu degl'occhi tuoi blu,
felice di stare qua giù
con te..

The Mind: Where are You?

drawing by marguerita Nondeliberate emotion, perception and intuition are much more important in shaping our lives than reason and will.....?

The main idea is that there are two levels of the mind,
one unconscious and the other conscious,
and that the first is much more important than the second in determining what we do.
It must be said immediately that Brooks has a terminological problem here. He describes the contents of the unconscious mind as “emotions, intuitions, biases, longings, genetic predispositions, character traits and social norms,” and later he includes “sensations, perceptions, drives and needs.”http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/13/books/review/book-review-the-social-animal-by-david-brooks.html

Montaigne:Judge yourself

drawing collage by marguerita

Like Socrates, Montaigne claims that what he knows best is the fact that he does not know anything much.
To undermine common beliefs and attitudes, Montaigne draws on tales of other times and places, on his own observations and on a barrage of arguments in the ancient Pyrhonian skeptical tradition, which encouraged the suspension of judgment as a middle way between dogmatic assertion and equally dogmatic denial.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/13/books/review/montaignes-moment.html?hp

Of DeProfundis,Soul ,a Monologue d'apres Wilde

photos by marguerita

I, and such as I am, have hardly any right to air and sun. Our presence taints the pleasures of others. We are unwelcome when we reappear. To revisit the glimpses of the moon is not for us.

Our very children are taken away.

Those lovely links with humanity are broken. We are doomed to be solitary, while our sons still live.
. We are denied the one thing that might heal us and keep us, that might bring balm to the bruised heart, and peace to the soul in pain. . .

.I must say to myself that I ruined myself, and that nobody great or small can be ruined except by his own hand. I am quite ready to say so. I am trying to say so, though they may not think it at the present moment.
Terrible as was what the world did to me, what I did to myself was far more terrible still.