[Graphic courtesy of entropy farm]
If you were wondering why Tony Judt didn’t appear on last night’s show, it’s because he got a last minute case of the plague — he called in sick with a high fever at 4:46 pm. Luckily the ever-nimble Chelsea Merz had a great standby guest in the wings. We’ll make good on Judt’s IOU. He’s a wonderful writer and an academic rock star of sorts with a sonorous British voice. If you have the show for which Tony Judt is the perfect guest, let us know.
Nine more pledges rolled through the door. The new OS pledge tally is $24,146. Thanks folks!
This might get you in trouble ( as this subject always does) but Tony Judt wrote a book review of Michael Oren’s “Six Days of War” July 2002 ( The New Republic). Now we are hearing Tom Segev’s account of that same war period as he has a new book out- this as we “celebrate” the 40th anniversaary of that war and the beginning of the occupation. Perhaps Tony Judt has read the new book and would weigh in .
I’d love to hear Judt talk on post-war Europe, the subject of this recent book- huge subject admittedly, but maybe you can focus it.
A very important topic that HAS to be discussed:
Is it too late for a two-state-solution in Israel and Palestine? How does the future look?
Here is an excellent discussion of the topic in The Nation, with an editorial and three excellent contributions from Benveniste, Makdisi and Klug.
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20070618/editors2
Judt has also written a lot about this and has one of the most important insights into the topic.
Just got that issue! Benvenisti is a must read for me always- even when I don’t understand him.
Judt’s article on the Six Days of War for the 35th anniversary:
http://www.hsje.org/six_days.htm
Judt and Israel is well covered out there but apparently he and Hirsi Ali can be quite entertaining. I don’t think they have had a North American debate.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hirsi_Ali
A critical and capable blogger:
http://readingthemaps.blogspot.com/2006/09/tony-judt-leszek-kolakowski-and.html
As a historian, I am much more interested in the recently revived Kolakowski angle and it certainly seems to fit our recent themes!
Judt:
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/19302
Thompson (100 pg PDF):
http://socialistregister.com/socialistregister.com/files/SR_1973_Thompson.pdf#search=%22thompson%20kolakowski%22
Kolakowski (30 pg? PDF)
http://socialistregister.com/socialistregister.com/files/SR_1974_Kolakowski.pdf
A critique of Postwar:
http://www.quadrant.org.au/php/article_view.php?article_id=2117