Ashram at Wardha, India (July, 1939)

Just over a month before Germany invades Poland (on 1 September 1939, seventy years ago this month), therewith triggering World War II, the great Mahatma Gandhi writes the first of two letters to Adolf Hitler in an attempt to prevent the oncoming war. This particular letter never reaches Hitler, due to an intervention by the government… letter found here; more information here; a transcript of the typewritten letter above follows (Note: knowing a bit about Gandhi, I’d suggest that his sign-off “Your sincere friend” is rhetorical [and more than a wee bit passive aggressive]):

As at Wardha
C. P.
India
23.7.’39.

Dear friend,

Friends have been urging me to write to you for the sake of humanity. But I have resisted their request, because of the feeling that any letter from me would be an impertinence. Something tells me that I must not calculate and that I must make my appeal for whatever it may be worth.

It is quite clear that you are today the one person in the world who can prevent a war which may reduce humanity to a savage state. Must you pay that price for an object however worthy it may appear to you to be? Will you listen to the appeal of one who has deliberately shunned the method of war not without considerable success? Any way I anticipate your forgiveness, if I have erred in writing to you.

I remain,

Your sincere friend

M. K. Gandhi

HERR HITLER
BERLIN
GERMANY.

If you like ephemera and old letters (as I very much do), you’ll find the website Letters of Note to be a treasure trove.

Thanks for the link, Gregor!

1000 words’ worth of insight by Riber Hanssen of Stockholm

London, U.K.

The young ex-pat Israeli illustrator/designer Noma Bar is exceptional at “saying a lot with a little” when it comes to visual language. Learn more about his talent and his minimalist graphic approach here; see more of his works here.

Thanks to my friend Juan Manuel Sepúlveda del Toro (in Madrid) for putting Noma on my radar.

Sydney, Australia

This is a very tasty and flavourful promotional approach for next month’s Sydney International Food Festival. The images shown are by photographer Natalie Boog (details from a series of posters featuring national flags rendered on platters, here). Ah—what a fine way to savour the vexillology of Italy, Switzerland, Japan… among many others.

Bon appétit!

Kaunas, Lithuania

Emma Goldman, a political activist who played a pivotal role in the development of anarchist philosophy in the first half of the twentieth century, was born 140 years ago in Kovno (now Kaunas). An outspoken writer and lecturer on anarchist philosophy, women’s rights, and social issues, Goldman was imprisoned several times after emigrating to the U.S. for “inciting to riot,” illegally distributing information about birth control, and for conspiring to “induce persons not to register” for the newly instated draft (in 1917). Eventually she was deported to Russia (where she initially supported the Bolshevik revolution—later she opposed the Soviet use of violence and repression of individual voices), and then lived in England, Canada, and France.

During her life, Goldman was lionized as a free-thinking “rebel woman” by admirers, and derided by critics as an advocate of politically motivated violence and anarchistic revolution. Her writing and lectures spanned a wide variety of issues, including prisons, atheism, freedom of speech, militarism, capitalism, marriage, free love, homosexuality, and gender politics. Following decades of obscurity, Goldman’s iconic status was revived in the 1970s, when feminist and anarchist scholars rekindled popular interest in her life.

Some quotables she left us with:

+  +  +

Before we can forgive one another, we have to understand one another.

No one has yet realized the wealth of sympathy, the kindness and generosity hidden in the soul of a child. The effort of every true education should be to unlock that treasure.

All claims of education notwithstanding,
the pupil will accept only that which his mind craves.

Every daring attempt to make a great change in existing conditions, every lofty vision of new possibilities for the human race, has been labeled Utopian.

Idealists are foolish enough to throw caution to the winds.
They have advanced mankind and have enriched the world. 

The strongest bulwark of authority is uniformity;
the least divergence from it is the greatest crime.

The individual whose vision encompasses the whole world often feels nowhere so hedged in and out of touch with his surroundings as in his native land.

Heaven must be an awfully dull place if the poor in spirit live there.

Puritanism, in whatever expression, is a poisonous germ. On the surface everything may look strong and vigorous; yet the poison works its way persistently, until the entire fabric is doomed.

When we can’t dream any longer, we die.

Someone has said that it requires less mental effort
to condemn than to think.

The most unpardonable sin in society is independence of thought.

The most violent element in society is ignorance.

If voting changed anything, they’d make it illegal.

If I can’t dance, I don’t want to be part of your revolution.

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Images: from archival police mug-shots of Emma Goldman taken in Philadelphia (1893) and Chicago (1901).

Kleine Scheidegg, Switzerland

Tammy and bro-Phil have done it! Under perfect weather conditions (the dusting of snow from the night before had melted by the time they reached the 2000 meter plateau) all seven in their running group successfully finished the grueling Jungfrau Marathon. I had posted about the challenges of this spectacular race a week ago…

I guess maybe it’s time for me to start running again too… the last of the seven Marathons I have completed was in Melbourne, ten years ago this week. Is a decade long enough to rid the body of painful memories?  :-|

Winnipeg Beach, Manitoba

There’s something about full-moon nights like this that make me oh-so-thankful to be living in such a wonderful place as Canada… if last night was a hint of things to come, our local coyotes will be serenading again (in exuberant, go-for-broke, multi-part harmony) around 03:00 or so…

Here’s a lovely tune by a truly fine Canadian chanteuse (finessing a piece written by the inimitable prairie-child, Joni Mitchell).

Starting on the Polish border, then spreading almost everywhere…

The start of World War II took place on 1 September 1939 with the German invasion of Poland, followed by declarations of war on Germany by most of the countries in the British Empire and Commonwealth, and by France. The war was the most widespread in history, a global military conflict involving a majority of the world’s nations and the mobilization of over 100 million military personnel. Over seventy million people were killed (the majority of whom were civilians) making this the deadliest conflict in human history.

Interlaken, Switzerland

My brother Phil and his sprightly wife Tammy are preparing for the scenic but grueling Jungfrau Marathon this weekend. Billed as “the most beautiful marathon in the world,” the 42-km race starts to the blare of alpenhorns in the lakeside city of Interlaken with a relatively flat first half before gaining a total of 1800(!) vertical meters and an alpine finish on the Kleine Scheidegg across from the famous north faces of the Eiger, Mönch, and Jungfrau.

Best wishes… and congratulations (in advance)!