THE STRANGE DISAPPEARANCE & ABDUCTION OF ADULTS

Today, The Grandma wants to share this following story by Roger Ballescà i Ruiz, and extends it not only to adults but also to teenagers who only live on social media; who base their self-esteem on the number of views they have; who have no criteria of their own because they don't make the effort to consider whether what they see or read is true or not; who let go of all their insecurities and complexes by writing toxic messages against other people; who have no ethical or moral respect for the lives of others; who have enormous emotional and social shortcomings that they believe they can make up for with followers and opinion groups; and who, without realizing it, are social prey for a future that will ignore them when they don't know how to recognize themselves beyond a tweet, a post or a like.

Several Mental Health projects nowadays treat these young people, already addicted, and the diagnoses are mainly grouped into 'the culture of the perfect image', 'body shaming', anxiety, depression, FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out), different eating disorders and body dysmorphia.

The challenge is great because as teachers or health personnel, we can only guide and advise these young people, but they must be the first to be aware of the situation and their families, the main ones involved in avoiding these situations and, if they are already real, in working to reverse them.

Social Media or AI are not bad per se, but it is the use that is made of them that determines their positivity or negativity: teenagers addicted to screens, famous people in their sectors who do not know how to control their degree of exposure to social media, companies that take advantage of easy customers to place their products to an audience hungry for content, or simply, adults who have begun to disappear...

 

No one knows exactly how or when it started happening, but one day, the children realized that the last of the adults had disappeared and that, definitively, they were alone as owls.

It was not a sudden or spectacular disappearance. No sirens, dramatic headlines or committee of experts. They did not all disappear at once in a big puff of smoke. They disappeared little by little, with a subtle, almost imperceptible discretion.

The first to fall were those abducted by the screens. They took up space, breathed and even said things. But their gaze escaped into a parallel universe of notifications, emails and cat videos. The children spoke to them but the words bounced off them softly.

Then the ones swallowed up by work disappeared. Adults with their agendas as a natural extension of their bodies who always promised to be there "soon", "in a while", "maybe tomorrow..." Adults in a state of promise.

Others disappeared when they decided to stop setting limits. They confused education with "do whatever you want but don't yell". They decided that children would self-regulate and would know how to decide for themselves what was best for them.

There were also those who dissolved into educational protocols, into documents full of arrows and boxes. Some were transformed into algorithms, others into international diagnostic manuals, where each discomfort found an appropriate label.

Finally, the most disturbing of all: adults who became children. They dressed the same, talked the same, wanted to be colleagues and called you "bro".

When the children noticed this, they celebrated with enthusiasm. Chocolate, unsaturated fats and screens without stopping. Not a single "no" in sight. Absolute freedom with sugary taste and video game music.

For a while everything seemed magnificent. But then things started happening.

Some children didn't know when to stop. Others didn't know what to do when there was nothing to do. Anxieties appeared without an instruction manual, sadness that was difficult to explain, anger that shot out in any direction. Without adults, no one helped put words to what was going on inside and give it meaning. No one said: "this is not right", "this is scary but it happens".

They discovered, with perplexity, that freedom without limits does not always liberate. That growing up without guidance is dizzying.

Some children began to play the role of adults, with little trace and little success. Others showed symptoms in the body, thought or behavior. Still others, sadly, faded away, without making a sound.

And the adults? Well, no one really knows where they are. Maybe they're still looking at a screen. Maybe they're working overtime. Maybe they're "on a random schedule."

The thing is, the children are still alone like owls, looking around and waiting for someone to play the adult again. And with each passing day, the question becomes more uncomfortable:

What if the disappearance of the adults wasn't a passing accident, but the natural state of things?

Roger Ballescà i Ruiz

Psychologist and psychotherapist

Centre de Salut Mental Infantil i Juvenil de Martorell

 

The challenge is great, enormous, colossal, but from the teaching and training point of view we do not give up despite being fighting against everything and everyone, despite suffering an enormous lack of prestige, despite always being the bad guys in all the stories, but we will continue working to reverse these situations and help train people of present and future generations because it is our profession, and therefore, our obligation as teachers and as citizens of the society in which we have to live.

More information: University of California

 It is okay to own a technology, 
what is not okay is to be owned by technology. 
In an overwhelming attempt to capture memories, 
people have forgotten to make memories.

Abhijit Naskar

AMALIE SKRAM, NATURALISM & NORWEGIAN LITERATURE

Today, The Grandma has been preparing new educational projects. After an intense morning of work, content creation and planning, this afternoon, she has decided to relax a bit with a good read and has chosen Scandinavian literature because she is a fierce admirer of its authors.

 

If we look at Norway and ask about its most recognized authors, they will probably tell us about The Four Greats: Henrik Ibsen (1828-1906), Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson (1832-1910), Jonas Lie (1833-1908) and Alexander Kielland (1849-1906), who was born on a day like today, but The Grandma wants to talk about an author who was contemporary with these four writers, Amalie Skram, the most important female writer of the Modern Breakthrough.

Amalie Skram (22 August 1846-15 March 1905) was a Norwegian author and feminist who gave voice to a woman's point of view withher naturalist writing. 

In Norway, she is frequently considered the most important female writer of the Modern Breakthrough (Det moderne gjennombrudd). 

Her more notable works include a tetralogy, Hellemyrsfolket (1887-98) which portray relations within a family over four generations.

Berthe Amalie Alver was born in Bergen, Norway. Her parents were Mons Monsen Alver and Ingeborg Lovise Sivertsen. She was the only daughter in a family of five children. Her parents operated a small business, which went bankrupt when Amalie was 17 years old. Her father emigrated from Norway to the United States to avoid a term of imprisonment. Her mother was left with five children to care for.

Her mother pressured Amalie into a marriage with an older man, Bernt Ulrik August Müller, a ship captain and later mill owner. Following thirteen years of marriage and the birth of two sons she suffered a nervous breakdown, in part attributed to his infidelity. After several years in a mental hospital, she was divorced from Müller. Together with her two sons, Jacob Müller (born 1866) and Ludvig Müller (born 1868), she moved to Kristiania (now Oslo) and began her literary activities. There she met the bohemian community, including writers Arne Garborg and Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson, with whom she remained in contact for many years.

In 1884, Amalie Müller married again, this time the Danish writer Asbjørn Oluf Erik Skram (1847-1923), a son of railroad director Gustav Skram. She moved to Copenhagen, Denmark with her new husband. They had a daughter, Ida Johanne Skram (born 1889), from this union. Her obligations as housewife, mother and author as well as the public's limited acceptance for her then-radical work, led to a further breakdown in 1894, after which Amalie lived in a psychiatric hospital near Roskilde. In 1900 her second marriage was dissolved. She died six years later in Copenhagen and was buried at Bispebjerg Cemetery.

In 1882, Amalie Skram debuted (as Amalie Müller) with the short story Madam Høiers leiefolk, published in the magazine Nyt Tidsskrift. An excerpt from her first novel, Constance Ring, was first published in the magazine Tilskueren in 1885.

Her works continued until her death. She dealt with topics she knew well. Her work can be divided into three categories:

-Novels concerning marriage, which explored taboo topics such as female sexuality, and the subservient status of women in that period. These works were perceived by many as overly provocative and resulted in open hostility from some segments of society.

-Multi-generation novels, which dealt with the fate of a family over several generations. With these she explored the social institutions and conditions of the time and campaigned for change.

-Mental hospital works such as Professor Hieronimus and Paa St. Jørgen, which dealt with the primitive and brutal conditions of such institutions of the period. Her novels created a major stir in Denmark and precipitated improvements in these institutions.

She is recognized as an early and strong proponent of what has come to be known as the women's movement, setting the early European trend. Her works, which had been generally forgotten with her death, were rediscovered and received strong recognition in the 1960s. Several of her works are currently available in recent translations to English.

The Amalie Skram prize is a travel stipend that has been awarded annually since 1994 to Norwegian authors who show exceptional skill in addressing women's issues. 

The street Amalie Skrams Allé in the Valby district of Copenhagen is named after her.

A statue of Skram by Maja Refsum was unveiled at Convent Garden (Klosterhaugen) in Bergen 1949. A bronze bust by Per Ung was installed in Bispebjerg Cemetery in Copenhagen in 1996. A marble bust by Ambrosia Tønnesen is in Bergen Public Library.

More information: The History of Nordic Women's Literature

 

Hva ville det egentlig si å være sinnssyk? 
Man kunne jo glatt vekk kalle hinannens særegenheter 
og mer eller mindre brysomme

eiendommeligheter for sinnssykdom.

What would it really mean to be insane?
 One could easily call each other's peculiarities 
and more or less troublesome

peculiarities insanity.

 

Amalie Skram 

CORTO MALTESE. LIFE IS A JOURNEY, NOT A DESTINATION

Anyone who knows The Grandma even a little knows about her passion for literature, art, history, sports, nature and graphic novels. And anyone who knows her well knows that her platonic love is an enigmatic sailor born in Valletta, with no future line in his hands and a tremendously attractive life.

Today, the postwoman has brought a very special package to The Grandma. It was a shipment from Joseph de Ca'th Lon from Italy and upon opening it, she has gone crazy with love to find there books, stickers and a puzzle of his beloved sailor, the incomparable and mysterious Corto Maltese. Thank you very much, Joseph, for always thinking of her despite the distance. Next Saturday you will meet again and share hobbies and emotions as always.

Le sere azzurre d'estate, andrò per i sentieri,
Punzecchiato dal grano, a calpestare erba fina:
Trasognato, ne sentirò la freschezza ai piedi.
Lascerò che il vento mi bagni il capo nudo.

Non parlerò, non penserò a niente:
Ma l'amore infinito mi salirà nell'anima,
E andrò lontano, molto lontano, come uno zingaro,
Nella Natura, -felice come con una donna.  

Corto Maltese is a series of adventure comics following the eponymous protagonist, an adventurous sailor. 

It was created by the Italian comic book creator Hugo Pratt in 1967. The comics are highly praised as some of the most artistic and literary graphic novels ever written and have been translated into numerous languages and adapted into several animated films.

The series features Corto Maltese, an enigmatic sea captain who lives in the first three decades of the 20th century. Born in Valletta on the island of Malta on 10 July 1887, the son of a sailor from Cornwall, and a gypsy from Seville.

In his adventures full of real-world references, Corto has often crossed with real historical characters like the American author Jack London and his nurse Virginia Prentiss, the American outlaw Butch Cassidy, the German World War I flying ace Red Baron, and many others.

The character debuted in the serial Ballad of the Salty Sea, one of several Pratt stories published in the first edition of the Ivaldi Editore comics magazine Sergeant Kirk in July 1967. The story centers around smugglers and pirates in the World War I -era Pacific Islands. In 1970, Pratt moved to France and began a series of short Corto Maltese stories for the French comics magazine Pif Gadget, an arrangement lasting four years and producing many 20-page stories. In 1974 he returned to full-length stories, sending Corto to 1918 Siberia in the story Corto Maltese in Siberia, first serialised in the Italian comics magazine Linus.

In 1976, Ballad of the Salty Sea was published in book format and was awarded the prize for best foreign realistic comic album at the Angoulême International Comics Festival.

Pratt continued to produce new stories over the next two decades, many first appearing in the eponymous comics magazine Corto Maltese (published between October 1983 and July 1993), until 1988 when the final story Mu, the Lost Continent was serialised, ending in June 1989.

Corto Maltese is a laconic sea captain adventuring during the early 20th century (1900-1920s). A rogue with a heart of gold, he is tolerant and sympathetic to the underdog. Born in Valletta on July 10, 1887, he is the son of a British sailor from Cornwall and an Andalusian–Romani witch and prostitute known as "La Niña de Gibraltar". As a boy growing up in the Jewish quarter of Córdoba, Maltese discovered that he had no fate line on his palm and therefore carved his own with his father's razor, determining that his fate was his to choose. Although maintaining a neutral position, Corto instinctively supports the disadvantaged and oppressed.

The character embodies the author's skepticism of national, ideological and religious assertions. Corto befriends people from all walks of life, including the murderous Russian Rasputin (no relation with the historical figure, apart from physical resemblance and some character traits), British heir Tristan Bantam, voodoo priestess Gold Mouth and Czech academic Jeremiah Steiner. He also knows and meets various real-life historical figures, including Jack London, Ernest Hemingway, Hermann Hesse, Butch Cassidy, James Joyce, Gabriele D'Annunzio, Frederick Rolfe, Joseph Conrad, Sükhbaatar, John Reed, White Russian general Roman von Ungern-Sternberg, Enver Pasha of Turkey and Sergei Semenov, modelled after Grigory Semyonov. His acquaintances treat him with great respect, as when a telephone call to Joseph Stalin frees him from arrest when he is threatened with execution on the border of Turkey and Armenia.

Corto's favourite book is Utopia by Thomas More, but he never finishes it. He also read books by London, Lugones, Stevenson, Melville and Conrad, and quotes Rimbaud.

Corto Maltese stories range from straight historical adventure to occult dream sequences. He is present when the Red Baron is shot down, helps the Jívaro in South America, and flees Fascists in Venice, but also unwittingly helps Merlin and Oberon to defend Britain and helps Tristan Bantam to visit the lost continent of Mu.

Chronologically, the first adventure, Corto Maltese: The Early Years, happens during the Russo-Japanese War. In other albums he experiences the Great War in several locations, participates in the Russian Civil War after the October Revolution, and appears during the early stages of Fascist Italy. In a separate series by Pratt, The Desert Scorpions, Corto is said to be missing in action in Spain during the Spanish Civil War.

More information: Corto Maltese

Par les soirs bleus d'été, j'irai dans les sentiers,
Picoté par les blés, fouler l'herbe menue:
Rêveur, j'en sentirai la fraîcheur à mes pieds.
Je laisserai le vent baigner ma tête nue.

Je ne parlerai pas, je ne penserai rien:
Mais l'amour infini me montera dans l'âme,
Et j'irai loin, bien loin, comme un bohémien,
Par la Nature, -heureux comme avec une femme. 

 

Arthur Rimbaud 

SAILING HOME AGAIN, STORMY WATERS TO BE FREE...

I am sailing, I am sailing
Home again cross the sea
I am sailing, stormy waters
To be near you, to be free

I am flying, I am flying
Like a bird cross the sky
I am flying, passing high clouds
To be near you, to be free

Can you hear me? Can you hear me?
Through the dark night, far away
I am dying, forever crying
To be with you, who can say?

Can you hear me? Can you hear me?
Through the dark night, far away
I am dying, forever crying
To be near you, who can say?

We are sailing, we are sailing
Home again cross the sea
We are sailing stormy waters
To be near you, to be free

Oh Lord, to be near you, to be free
Oh Lord, to be near you, to be free
Oh Lord

More information: Sail World 

 I love what I do.

Rod Stewart

GAIÀ ESTUARY PRESERVE & ROMAN VILLA OF ELS MUNTS

Today, Claire Fontaine and The Grandma have visited the Gaià River Estuary Wildlife Preserve and the Roman Villa of Els Munts in Altafulla.

Both are passionate about birds and history, so in the same day they have been able to visit the Roman past of the region and enjoy its protected natural spaces where life has flourished unmovably since times even older than the Romans.

Tomorrow morning, if the sea and wind cooperate (which according to the forecast they will), they will return to Port Ginesta. Claire will return to Barcelona and The Grandma will stay in the neighbouring town of Castelldefels where tomorrow afternoon she has a training session with future trainers.

The mouth of the Gaià river is located by Altafulla and has areas that are permanently flooded with fresh water and attract numerous bird species, especially migratory birds. Different educational activities related to the environment are organised here.

This is an area of small dimensions, which follows the Gaià river along its last stretch into the sea. It forms an island of natural landscape made up of riverside vegetation and marshland; a contrast to the dry farmland and touristic and recreational areas around it. Some parts of the area are permanently flooded with fresh water and are a refuge for different animal species, as well as a place of rest for numerous migratory birds.

The association Hort de la Sínia organises multiple environmental education activities. Hiking and beach activities are popular here.

This area is remarkable from an ornithological point of view thanks to the presence of species such as the Kentish plover, the little ringed plover, the little grebe and the kingfisher, to name just a few. Moreover, it also provides a place of rest for some species that stop to rest and/or feed during migration, such as the purple heron, the little bittern, the squacco heron, the European golden plover and the sand martin, among others. Among the mammals, it is worth mentioning the badger, and among the reptiles, we can find species like the pond turtle, the ocellated lizard and the Mediterranean tree frog.

More information: Birding Places

The villa of "Els Munts" is a residential Roman villa built during the 2nd century C.E. The villa is located 12 km away from Tarraco in the municipality of Altafulla in Catalonia. 

Scholars have regarded the villa of Els Munts as noteworthy for its mosaics and exceptional state of preservation. As a part of Tarraco, the villa of Els Munts is a UNESCO World Heritage site.

The villa of Els Munts contains several components including a bath, gardens, and temple. In total the villa had a garden, semi-basement corridor with cistern for Caius Valerius Avitus, peristyle, water cistern known locally as La Tartana, a more extensive water reservoir, dining room (triclinium), the Mithraeum -a temple dedicated to the god Mithras, porticoed corridor. The baths had a reception with an atrium and alcover stone slab floor. There were heated rooms: caldaria, tepidaria, and furnaces with hypocaustum, and cold rooms (frigidaria). A furnace, praefurnia, heated the hot rooms from below. Lastly, there were latrines which excess water from the baths used to remove the excrement.

The ancient people known as the Iberians were early inhabitants of the region. The Roman historian Livy mentions Tarraco in describing part of the origins of the Second Punic War. The villa was initially built in the 1st century CE, on top of which the remains preserved today were built in the middle of the 2nd century CE. Sometime after 175 CE but before 200 CE, a fire burned at villa of Els Munts, and the inhabitants abandoned it.

The owner of the villa was Caius Valerius Avitus, a duumvir for the Roman province of Tarraco. A wall painting at the site indicates this information.

The villa of Els Munts is located in the municipality of Altafulla. Approximately 12 kilometers from Tarraco, modern day Tarragona and near the mouth of the Gayà River, the villa of Els Munts sits atop the western slope of a coastal hill which is part of Cap Roig, the origin of which is the Miocene era. It overlooks the Mediterranean Ocean and is near the Via Augusta.

The villa of Els Munts is part of a museum open to the public.

More information: MNAT

 When you arise in the morning, 
think of what a precious privilege it is to be alive 
-to breathe, to think, to enjoy, to love.

Marcus Aurelius

FROM PORT GINESTA TO ALTAFULLA, MEDITERRANEANLY

Today, with the forecast for good weather, Claire Fontaine and The Grandma got up early, had a hearty breakfast, got on their bikes and pedaled from Barcelona to Port Ginesta. It is a distance of 20 km that they covered at a sporty pace that allowed them to arrive in just under 90 minutes.

There, they had breakfast again before taking Claire's boat, loading their bikes and starting their sea crossing to Altafulla where they plan to spend this weekend.

The crossing was calm and at a speed of 6 knots they arrived at the Port of Torredembarra just in time to have lunch in the same port before taking their bikes and pedaling towards the Gran Claustre d'Altafulla.

After resting a bit in the Gran Claustre and writing this post, Claire and The Grandma have been talking to Joseph de Ca'th Lon and Alessandra, who are in Cortina d'Ampezzo where they have enjoyed the Olympic curling this morning. This evening, all of them, despite the distance, will watch the semi-finals of the French Cup, a very special football match for the Northern Star.

Tomorrow, Claire and The Grandma plan to visit the Gaià River Estuary Wildlife Preserve and the Roman Villa of Els Munts, the main reasons for this visit to Altafulla.

Altafulla is a municipality in the comarca of the Tarragonès in Catalunya. It has a population of 5,870.

The town of Altafulla has a beautifully intact old quarter crowned by the Castle of Altafulla, and an old fishing quarter dating back to the 18th century along the beach, called Baixamar or Les Botigues de Mar.

An additional medieval castle on a small promontory overlooking the sea, the Castle of the Marquises of Tamarit (private) is often thought as part of Altafulla, but it is actually located in the neighbour municipality of Tarragona. Beyond the castle is one of the last remaining forests stretching along the sea in Catalonia, part of which is a small nature preserve, under the Tamarit-Punta de la Móra Special Environmental and Landscape Protection Plan.

Altafulla is also home to the remains of the Roman villa of Els Munts, which is included in a larger UNESCO World Heritage Site. The Gaià River empties into the sea here, its last stretch being a small nature preserve and haven for songbirds (Reserva Natural de Fauna Salvatge de la Desembocadura del Gaià-Gaià River Estuary Wildlife Preserve), though due to damming upriver, it carries very little water at this last section, forming a tiny salt marsh separated from the sea by a bar of sand. This wildlife preserve is run by L'Hort de la Sínia, an ecological agriculture, learning and activities centre.

Altafulla has one of the highest median household incomes in the province of Tarragona. 

More information: Visit Altafulla

To sail successfully, you need to observe with great care. 
You need to identify what the wind 
and the water are telling you a
nd then find a way to execute, 
to reach whatever goal you've set, 
be that simply making it home or winning a race.

Diane Greene

ALEKSANDR SOLZHENITSYN & ‘THE GULAG ARCHIPELAGO’

After a windy day, today has been a day of heavy rain, so heavy that The Grandma has had a bout of laziness and has decided to stay home rereading The Gulag Archipelago, a masterpiece written by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, the Russian writer, winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature.

Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn (11 December 1918-3 August 2008) was a Soviet and Russian author and dissident who helped to raise global awareness of political repression in the Soviet Union, especially the Gulag prison system.

He was awarded the 1970 Nobel Prize in Literature for the ethical force with which he has pursued the indispensable traditions of Russian literature. His nonfiction work The Gulag Archipelago amounted to a head-on challenge to the Soviet state and sold tens of millions of copies.

Solzhenitsyn was born into a family that defied the Soviet anti-religious campaign in the 1920s and remained devout members of the Russian Orthodox Church. At a young age he became an atheist and embraced Marxism–Leninism. While serving as a captain in the Red Army during World War II, Solzhenitsyn was arrested by SMERSH and sentenced to eight years in the Gulag and then internal exile for criticizing Joseph Stalin in private correspondence with another field officer. As a result of his experience in prison and the camps, he gradually became a philosophically minded Eastern Orthodox Christian.

During the Khrushchev Thaw, Solzhenitsyn was released and exonerated. He started writing novels about his experiences and repression in the Soviet Union. In 1962, he published his first novel, One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich -an account of Stalinist repressions- with approval from Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev. His last work to be published in the Soviet Union was Matryona's Place in 1963.

After Khrushchev lost power, Soviet authorities unsuccessfully tried to discourage Solzhenitsyn from writing. His novels published in other countries included Cancer Ward in 1966, In the First Circle in 1968, August 1914 in 1971 and The Gulag Archipelago in 1973.

The last novel outraged authorities and, in 1974, he was stripped of his Soviet citizenship and flown to West Germany. He soon moved to Switzerland and then, in 1976, to Vermont in the United States with his family. 

He continued to write and his Soviet citizenship was restored in 1990. He returned to Russia four years later and remained there until his death in 2008.

Solzhenitsyn was born in Kislovodsk (now in Stavropol Krai, Russia). His father, Isaakiy Semyonovich Solzhenitsyn, was of Russian descent, and his mother, Taisiya Zakharovna (née Shcherbak), was of Ukrainian descent.

His educated mother encouraged his literary and scientific learnings and raised him in the Russian Orthodox faith.

The Gulag Archipelago was composed from 1958 to 1967, and has sold over thirty million copies in thirty-five languages. It was a three-volume, seven-part work on the Soviet prison camp system, which drew from Solzhenitsyn's experiences and the testimony of 256 former prisoners and Solzhenitsyn's own research into the history of the Russian penal system.

It discusses the system's origins from the founding of the Communist regime, with Vladimir Lenin having responsibility, detailing interrogation procedures, prisoner transports, prison camp culture, prisoner uprisings and revolts such as the Kengir uprising, and the practice of internal exile.

On 8 August 1971, the KGB allegedly attempted to assassinate Solzhenitsyn using an unknown chemical agent (most likely ricin) with an experimental gel-based delivery method. The attempt left him seriously ill, but he survived.

Although The Gulag Archipelago was not published in the Soviet Union, it was extensively criticized by the Party-controlled Soviet press.

On 19 September 1974, it was approved a large-scale operation to discredit Solzhenitsyn and his family and cut his communications with Soviet dissidents.

In a series of writings, speeches, and interviews after his return to his native Russia in 1994, Solzhenitsyn spoke about his admiration for the local self-government he had witnessed first hand in Switzerland and New England. He praised 'the sensible and sure process of grassroots democracy, in which the local population solves most of its problems on its own, not waiting for the decisions of higher authorities.'

Solzhenitsyn died of heart failure near Moscow on 3 August 2008, at the age of 89.

More information: New Criterion

There is nothing that so assists the awakening 
of omniscience within us as insistent thoughts 
about one's own transgressions, errors, mistakes.

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn