David Aaronovitch has a fantastic piece in The Times today on the propensity for British critics of Israel such as Ken Livingstone, George Galloway and Brian Eno, to equate Gaza with the Warsaw Ghetto. After rolling out a list of statistics showing that the two situations are world’s apart (never mind the fact that Israel is not systematically wiping out a population, 500,000 Gazans would have to die for the comparison to be meaningful), he goes on to criticize the “binary thinking” that afflicts most of us, between ‘good and evil’ ‘victim and perpetrator,’ when trying to parse such terrible events.

Then, he pivots on the recent movie, The Reader, about a female concentration camp guard called Hanna, which has been criticized by leading US reviewers for humanizing those who took part in the Holocaust. Far from condemning the film too, Aaronovitch believes critics have failed to appreciate that what they so hate in the movie–the fact that it explores how an everyday person could be complicit in such heinous crimes–is actually one of its greatest strengths. He concludes:

It has always seemed to me that the most awful question raised by the Holocaust is not about victimhood, but about being the perpetrator, and how that declension can take place. And in that context I want to ask Brian Eno, whether he has ever - in a recording break - watched Hamas TV and thought to compare it to the propaganda, much earlier, of those who later gave the Hannas their jobs?

Hamas or Hannas, they’re not black and white (The Times)

The Forth Road Bridge, South Queensferry, Scotland

A belated Happy New Year to all of you. We returned from Europe late on January 1 after a hectic month spent visiting family (and friends) in London, Leeds, Edinburgh and Denmark. It was a somber occasion, for obvious reasons. But one bright spot was a brief stop in South Queensferry, just outside Edinburgh, where Sofie and I got married almost five years ago.

Not much to add for now. Except to thank you for your patience as I continue to fiddle with the blog. I’m beginning to think I may have made a bit of a pig’s ear of things!

I’ll be heading to Copenhagen this evening and then off into the wilds of Jutland for Christmas. I hope you have fun, whatever you are celebrating. (Video by Ben Baruch, edited by A Brooklyn Lad.)

I’m toying with the idea of making some changes to the blog layout, particularly making use of some more screen width. Any thoughts?

A little late for a Christmas recommendation I know, but I recently finished Douglas Century’s biography of the boxer Barney Ross and I cannot praise it highly enough.

Ross was perhaps one of the most unlikely of Jewish heroes: the first lightweight, junior welterweight, and welterweight champion in boxing history. He went on to be awarded the Silver Star for heroism during the Second World War at Guadalcanal, and in later years overcame an addiction to morphine.

Century writes at a brisk pace, with enough information to produce a vivid portrait of Ross’ life but not so much as to make the book stodgy. He has some wonderful anecdotes about Ross’ tough Chicago childhood, his turbulent personal life, and his connections with Al Capone and Jack Ruby, as well as some great background on other Jewish boxers of the day. The story is brought particularly to life by interviews he conducts with Ross’ sole surviving brother George.

Well worth adding to the Christmas shopping list, even if it is just as a treat for yourself.

Barney Ross (Jewish Encounters)

While I was in London last week I had a couple of hours to kill, so I took myself off to Tate Britain, at Millbank, just around the corner from this sculpture Jeté by Enzo Plazzotta. Since the Bacon exhibition is coming to the Met next year, and since I have very little time for the Turner Prize, I decided to explore the permanent collection (on Sofie’s recommendation, of course).

I always consider a trip to a gallery a success if I come away having discovered a new artist or artwork. And my trip to the Tate, though short, was particularly successful as it introduced me to a number of new works. I particularly enjoyed Sir William Coldstream’s portrait of Inez Spender and James Tissot’s The Gallery of HMS Calcutta. The walk back over Vauxhall bridge was equally impressive.

Cultural Tourism as Creative Tourism from Klewel video on Vimeo.

Many thanks to those who wrote in the past week. The family bereavement was my wife’s stepfather, Richard, who died suddenly and very unexpectedly at the age of 56 on November 30. The past weeks have been very tough for my mother-in-law and for Sofie. The one bright spot, if it can be called that, is the mass of well wishes my mother-in-law has received from people, particularly academics (Richard was a professor of tourism at the University of Strathclyde), around the world.

I will always remember Richard as a convivial, larger-than-life character. It was only last month that I was telling friends of the time at the Saatchi Gallery in London when Richard, sitting cross-legged on the floor reading the Guardian, was mistaken by a couple of visitors for a sculpture by Duane Hanson. I actually watched for a good thirty seconds while they pondered how lifelike Richard looked before being given an awful shock when he turned the page.

It was ironic really because Richard was in fact one of the most animated people I have ever met, particularly around the dinner table over a good meal and a bottle of wine. Indeed, his lively tableside manner only really made sense the other day, when Sofie sent me a link to the above video of a lecture which Richard gave a couple of months ago. He was exactly the same in everyday conversation as he was at the lectern. He will be very greatly missed.

Professor Richard Prentice (Scotsman)