SOME STORIES ABOUT THE CAPITAL VICES: WRATH (II)

Claire Fontaine in Poblenou

Today, Claire Fontaine wants to talk about one of the capital vices: wrath.

Meanwhile The Grandma is travelling on The Orient Express, Claire Fontaine is elaborating a little study about The AntiChrist and her management in the City Hall. The city is living a horrible nightmare since The AntiChrist took the control of it. She arrived full of vanished promises, impossible plans and a dirty campaign against all her adversaries.

Eighteen months later, the city is a messy place and there are lots of angry and desperate neighbours in all the districts of the city because they're suffering the stupid policies of The AntiChrist and this week the city has experienced a great wave of wrath because The AntiChrist decided to expose some diabolic statues in the downtown of the city, in a place very appreciate and loved by the neighbours. 

Closed streets to avoid traffic without sense; increasing of taxes, decreasing of minimum services, increasing of rent house prices, policies against hotel industry and tourism, refusing of licenses to open bars and restaurants, tolerance with cyclists who drive everywhere without control, obsession to not listening neighbours  or treating them like silly and idiot are only some of the great achievements of The AntiChrist.

It's time for neighbours to resist or serve, and we are going to resist until we win this battle against this diabolic character.

In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage.  

John Steinbeck

SOME STORIES ABOUT THE CAPITAL VICES: HUBRIS (I)

The Grandma arriving to the City Hall

Last week, The Grandma returned to the City Hall to search some information. She's working in two new projects: for one hand, she's searching information about a civil refuge which was built under one of her houses in Barcelona during the Spanish Civil War and for other hand she's trying to have information about the new plans of the City Hall in her suburb. The City Hall wants to build some new buildings in the zone and some people are going to lose their homes in a new expropiation plan. Shame.

As you know, The Grandma is battling against The AntiChrist who is destroying the peaceful lives of the citizens. In her last visit to the City Hall, The Grandma was helped by two nice and kind civil workers who are also affected by The AntiChrist policy. They helped her in all her needs and we must accept that thanks to the enourmous work of these workers, especially in the last year, the City Hall is still alive.

After finding all the information that she was looking for, The Grandma did other burocratic works and she wrote a letter to the councillor. She doesn't hope anything good from because she practises something as old as the Victorian age: the double moral.

The Grandma in front of the City Hall

It is morally wrong to criticize the practices of other people unless one is prepared to be similarly critical of comparable practices when they occur in one's own.

It is morally wrong to criticize the practices of other people unless one's own has eradicated all evils of a comparable kind. 

These two basic rules of double moral are very common in this City Hall, a City Hall that treats its citizens like children, do nothing to improve their lives and disturbs constantly.

HUBRIS

In its modern usage, hubris denotes overconfident pride and arrogance. Hubris is often associated with a lack of humility.

Examples of hubris are often found in literature, most famously in Paradise Lost: John Milton's depiction of Lucifer, who attempts to force the other angels to worship him, is cast down to hell by God and the innocent angels, and proclaims: Better to reign in hell than serve in heaven; Victor in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein manifests hubris in his attempt to become a great scientist by creating life through technological means, but eventually regrets this previous desire; Marlowe's play Doctor Faustus portrays the eponymous character as a scholar whose arrogance and pride compel him to sign a deal with the Devil, and retain his haughtiness until his death and damnation, despite the fact that he could easily have repented had he chosen to do so.

 I think self-doubt, as grim as it can be, makes me a better writer. Stasis and hubris would probably be the death knell for my career.
 

Kristan Higgins

THE HISTORIC ARCHIVE, THE UNFORGETTABLE MEMORIES

Plaça de Sants, Barcelona (1948)

Today, The Grandma has received some news from the City Hall. She’ll finally have permission to enter in the Historic Archive of Sants to search information about the refuges built by the neighbours during the Spanish Civil War. When? She doesn’t know but, at least, the first step has been reached although the battle against the Antichrist continues…

Meanwhile, The Grandma continues preparing new projects without forgetting the old ones. She offers two more chapters of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, the interesting Gothic novel that we’re reading.

Enjoy them!

And the whole huge town of a million people 

was locked in a sort of violent inertia, 

a nightmare of noise without movement. 

George Orwell, Homage to Catalonia