We are at 103°F plus humidity today, so I’m looking out for my health by going to the swimming pool for an hour first thing in the morning and then hiding in my office and reading 3 books in 15-minute stretches one after another. (It sounds weird to switch between books like this but it’s optimal for my brain.) I read best on my feet, so I roam the empty corridors of my building on campus. Plus, I’m fasting.

It’s ridiculous that I have to treat myself like an invalid but it’s the only way with this climate.

Loved this passage in Santiago Alba Rico’s essay España:

One of Spain’s biggest tragedies is how often people have had to rebel against the poorly thought-out and condescending revolutions organized by the governing elites.

We are experiencing such a condescending revolution right here, so it hits close to home.

P.S. People often mention that when I talk about Spanish literature they begin to wish they knew Spanish. This makes me feel good because my whole professional life is dedicated to bringing books written in Spanish to the notice of as many people as possible.

When you see the word “choice” used 3 times in 2 sentences, you should know that you are reading neoliberal propaganda. The whole purpose of this text – and so many similar ones – is to steal policing as a service from us and give the money, instead, to the people who can afford castles and private armies.

Another dead giveaway is the word “imagine” or its variant “re-imagine.” “Harm” and “harmful” is another pair.

I believe in redemption. I believe it’s possible to realize that you did something terrible and sincerely repent.

But Chimamanda Adichie never apologized for participating in cancel culture mobs. She never apologized for hounding people who were, unlike her, poor and unknown. Driving somebody to attempt suicide. She never tried to rectify the damage. Never apologized, never retracted. She now doesn’t like cancel culture because it touched her. But what she herself did to others for absolutely no reason other than the desire to feel self-righteous remains unmentioned.

Does anybody know the evolutionary explanation of why little kids lie on their backs when they are unhappy? They all do it, and it’s like an instinct. Unhappy, boom, drop down. What’s the mechanism here?

A lot of stuff that little kids do becomes instantly clear when you look at the evolutionary advantage. As I always say, nothing teaches evolution like parenthood.

Since I’m on my Philip Roth kick, I decided to watch this movie based on one of his three best novels.

The movie is very disappointing, my friends. The story is sanitized of all complexity and reduced to “bad guys vs good guys.” This is unfortunate because Roth’s whole thing is that nothing is ever that simple and human beings are deeply imperfect. The filmmakers turned Swede Levov, the main character, into this angelic creature, the perfect father who has no life, no soul, and no existence outside of his love for his daughter. That’s definitely not the Swede of Roth’s novel. And it’s not any human parent on this planet, and thank God for that.

The movie completely erases Swede’s philandering, his second marriage, and anything in him that isn’t utter perfection. You couldn’t possibly find anything more antithetical to Roth’s way of seeing the world. The movie is completely anti-Roth. I have no idea how it’s possible to misunderstand the novel so badly.

I now want to re-watch The Human Stain. I watched it a while ago but was too mesmerized by Anthony Hopkins’ talent to notice much else about it.

I, for one, am very happy to hear that Victoria Secret is finally doing a major re-brand. They used to be a good store until they went in the direction of “a truck stop whore” aesthetic. I haven’t gone into a VS store in over a decade because they look extremely unappealing. Dark, dingy. I’d feel like I’m at that truck stop already.

Whorish underwear was a worldwide trend in the rich 1990s. Since then, things changed, and everybody rebranded, except for VS. This is a good, necessary change.

Here’s a great analysis of the Biden-Putin encounter in Geneva. I have absolutely no idea why it made sense for the US to give Putin this big PR win. Or to give him Nordstream 2. Twenty years of these pathetic meet-ups, and nobody learned anything.

It really bugged me when people acted outraged by every trivial little thing Trump did or said. It bugs me just as much when their opponents do it.

There was absolutely nothing scandalous or “undemocratic” about Biden’s response to the journalist today. Just like there’s nothing shocking about Kamala Harris not “going to the border.” The ritualistic nature of the invocations of this utterly spurious need to “go to the border” is downright embarrassing. There’s no use to be derived from Harris getting photo-ops at the border. And when she does go, you will have wasted all that time and outrage on absolutely nothing.

Wailing to the skies over insignificant little things is the most reliable way to strengthen your opponent’s support. If the worst you can say about Biden is that he snapped at some reporter, the inevitable conclusion is that he must be pretty great.

And since I’m at it, Lilibet is a really cute name. Let’s not become the kind of resentful losers who bitch about baby names. Babies are great, and their birth should be greeted with joy even if their parents are often annoying. The only curious thing about that name is the mother’s complete self-effacement from it. Projections notwithstanding, nobody has a clue what happens inside any marriage except the people who are in it.

Yevgeni Yevtushenko was a famous Soviet poet. In the early 1970s, 100,000 copies of his new book of poetry sold out in a few days. A hundred thousand copies of a collection of poetry is an insane number. There are 2,5 times as many people in the US, and who’s the poet who can sell 100,000 copies? And in under a week?

Of course, Yevtushenko was talented, so people liked his poetry. These are legit good poems. But even great poetry rarely finds that many readers. Only the tiniest minority has the capacity to enjoy poetry, and that’s OK. But the biggest reason why the book sold out like this was that people perceived Yevtushenko as anti-Soviet. This was utterly ridiculous because nobody got published in the USSR who wasn’t approved and promoted by the regime. To get a 100,000-copy publishing contract, you needed to be a huge favorite with the regime. Soviet publishers weren’t expected to make a profit. Their goals were 100% ideological.

Yevtushenko helped the regime channel the protest feelings of the public in a way that allowed people feel subversive while not doing anything against the regime. Each totalitarian society has these little escape valves, these little outlets for popular resentment. And there are always intellectuals who lend themselves to the task of creating an illusion of subversion while eating out of the regime’s hand. You know them by the vagueness, by the “we are all in on the secret” attitude, and the incapacity to say anything that would seriously annoy the regime.