The Burning Archive

In this episode of The Burning Archive, Jeff Rich continues his history of our times, and the theme of increasing social fragmentation. If there is more distance between the elites and ordinary people - the 1 % vs the 99 % - then that can lead to conflict, social breakdown, even revolution. But social fragmentation can also be destructive when it occurs among the top 10 % who really, really want to be in the top 1 percent of positions of high social status. What happens to a society when the elites turn on themselves? Conflict, though is not our only choice. We can reach across the fissures of our fragmented society, and build bridges between the separated islands of our society. Along the way, this episode explores the Yellow Vest movement in France, the Occupy movement in Wall St, Jo Scarborough's rant on American exceptionalism, Peter Turchin, Simon Schama, the French and Russian Revolutions, the atrocities of the Vendée, and even protests in London against lockdowns.

Credits:

* The wonderful Kimiko Ishizaka and the Open Goldberg project, for the public domain recording of the Aria from J.S. Bach's Goldberg Variations https://opengoldbergvariations.org/

* Ezra Pound reading from Canto 81.

Read more of my writing at www.theburningarchive.com or buy my new book - Gathering Flowers of the Mind: Collected Poems 1996-2020 in print and e-book editions at major online retailers.

Check out me reading poems from the book at The Burning Archive Youtube channel

In this episode of The Burning Archive, Jeff Rich explores the fourth large theme of the history of our times, that is social fragmentation. Life is better in so many dramatic ways. We are richer, older, healthier, better educated. But something is not quite right.... We enjoy better societies, but worry that we have lost a sense of community.  We seem beset by bitter polarization. Could it be that social progress is slowing, and its old rival, social fragmentation is going to overtake it in the marathon of history?

Credits:

* readings from Emmanuel Todd, Lineages of Modernity: a history of humanity from the Stone Age to Homo Americanus (2017 Fr; 2019)

* Alfred Hitchcock, Psycho (1960), a short excerpt from the famous shower scene

* The wonderful Kimiko Ishizaka and the Open Goldberg project, for the public domain recording of the Aria from J.S. Bach's Goldberg Variations https://opengoldbergvariations.org/

* Ezra Pound reading from Canto 81.

You can read my essay on Emmanuel Todd at The Burning Archive blog, Emmanuel Todd's Lineages of Modernity (16 February 2020)

Read more of my writing at www.theburningarchive.com or buy my new book - Gathering Flowers of the Mind: Collected Poems 1996-2020 in print and e-book editions at major online retailers.

Check out me reading poems from the book at The Burning Archive Youtube channel

When faced with cultural decay and ruined institutions, what is a podcaster to do? In this episode, Jeff Rich turns for hope to the traditions of the Eastern European dissidents of 1960-90 Eastern Europe. Two great Czech dissidents - Vaclav Benda and Vaclav Havel - spoke of the Parallel Polis (Benda), as an alternative culture to build in the face of grey uniformity, and living in truth as the Power of the Powerless (Havel). In these very diverse traditions of samizdat and living authentically - that celebrate everything from Tolkien to the Plastic People of the Universe - the Burning Archive finds hope of a cultural renewal amidst our own time of troubles.

Credits:

* The wonderful Kimiko Ishizaka and the Open Goldberg project, for the public domain recording of the Aria from J.S. Bach's Goldberg Variations https://opengoldbergvariations.org/

* Ezra Pound reading from Canto 81

* the Plastic People of the Universe from Slavná Nemesis

* readings from Vaclav Havel, "Six Asides about Culture" and "A Sense of the Transcendent"

You can read my essay on Havel - "Six Asides about Vaclav Havel" at the Burning Archive blog (originally posted September 2016).

Read more of my writing at www.theburningarchive.com or buy my new book - Gathering Flowers of the Mind: Collected Poems 1996-2020 in print and e-book editions at major online retailers.

Check out me reading poems from the book at The Burning Archive Youtube channel

Cultural decay can breakdown and lead to cultural revolution. Some might celebrate cultural revolution, but in this episode Jeff Rich speaks of his own forebodings while watching the cultural ferment of today that we may be reliving a prequel to the Chinese Cultural Revolution. This episode tells the story of that ferment, chaos and frenzy of cultural destruction and loss. With stories of the Summer Palace in Beijing and the great film, Farewell My Concubine, this episode asks: are the Red Guards coming for us again?

Credits:

* The wonderful Kimiko Ishizaka and the Open Goldberg project, for the public domain recording of the Aria from J.S. Bach's Goldberg Variations https://opengoldbergvariations.org/

* brief audio clip from Chain Kaige (Dir), Farewell my Concubine (1993)

* BBC news clips of the Cultural Revolution (1967)

* Stephen Platt, Autumn in the Heavenly Kingdom: China, the West and the epic story of the Taiping Civil War (2012)

* Frank Dikotter, Cultural Revolution: A People's History, 1962-1976 (2017)

Read more of my writing at www.theburningarchive.com or buy my new book - Gathering Flowers of the Mind: Collected Poems 1996-2020 in print and e-book editions at major online retailers.

Check out me reading poems from the book at The Burning Archive Youtube channel

Cultural decay has been a theme of cultural pessimists for centuries, and in this episode Jeff Rich surveys prophets of cultural doom from Matthew Arnold, Max Weber, Stefan Zweig, and the more witty and balanced Felipe Fernandez-Armesto. Poetry makes an appearance too - with Arnold's "Dover Beach", Yeats' "Second Coming", Jeff Rich's own reading of "The Burning Archive", and lastly a special guest appearance of Ezra Pound reading from his Cantos. Trust me - it all makes sense in the end.

Credits:

* The wonderful Kimiko Ishizaka and the Open Goldberg project, for the public domain recording of the Aria from J.S. Bach's Goldberg Variations https://opengoldbergvariations.org/

* Ezra Pound, reading from Canto 81 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u0wc28wK7S0

* Matthew Arnold, Dover Beach

* W.B. Yeats, Second Coming

Read more of my writing at www.theburningarchive.com or buy my new book - Gathering Flowers of the Mind: Collected Poems 1996-2020 in print and e-book editions at major online retailers.

Check out me reading poems from the book at The Burning Archive Youtube channel

In episode 7 of The Burning Archive podcast, Jeff Rich discusses a possible antidote to political decay; building a strong culture rooted in the ordinary virtues of governing well. Based on traditions of virtue ethics scattered from Confucius (孔夫子;Kǒng Fūzǐ) and Aristotle, to Alasdair McIntyre and Michael Ignatieff these virtues can help us all curb political decay. And we ask, is culture - and simple virtues like humility, talking to strangers and the life of the mind - the best defence against republics in distress?

Credits:

* The wonderful Kimiko Ishizaka and the Open Goldberg project, for the public domain recording of the Aria from J.S.Bach's Goldberg Variations https://opengoldbergvariations.org/

* Vladimir Putin, remarks at St Petersburg International Economic Forum, June 2021 from Russia Today https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZMAP9Ccg2-0&list=WL&index=3

* Michael Ignatieff, Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs, 2017, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z7dm2ER7TpU&list=WL&index=1

Read more of my writing at www.theburningarchive.com or buy my new book - Gathering Flowers of the Mind: Collected Poems 1996-2020 in print and e-book editions at major online retailers.

In episode 6 of The Burning Archive Podcast, we discuss the history of the bureaucracy in the UK, USA and Germany, and its relationship to political decay. And we ask, is the bureaucracy to blame for our republics in distress?

Credits:

* The wonderful Kimiko Ishizaka and the Open Goldberg project, for the public domain recording of the Aria from J.S.Bach's Goldberg Variations https://opengoldbergvariations.org/

* Francis Fukuyama Political Order and Political Decay - Volume 2 From the Industrial Revolution to the Globalization of Democracy

Read more of my writing at theburningarchive.com or buy my new book - Gathering Flowers of the Mind: Collected Poems 1996-2020 in print and e-book editions at major online retailers.

In episode 5 of The Burning Archive Podcast, Jeff Rich goes full-on pessimist to discuss Doom, disaster and decay. We take a quick tour of Niall Ferguson's Doom: the Politics of Catastrophe and Francis Fukuyama's ideas on political decay, and what they tell us about the responses of governments around the world to the pandemic. And the podcast asks what can we do to hold back the decline of governing institutions?

Quick note - I uploaded a recording with amplified audio on 26/5/21. Sorry!

In episode 4 of the Burning Archive Podcast, Jeff Rich asks if America is an empire in decline, then is China the empire or Great State on the rise? And if so, does that mean we are condemned to war between China and America or is a peaceful multipolar world possible after the American empire crumbles?

Read more at www.theburningarchive.com

If America is an empire in denial, could it also be an empire in decline? In this episode of The Burning Archive podcast, Jeff Rich discusses the stories we tell about the rise and fall of empires, how America is in decline, and what that means for the rest of the world. Could a new multipolar and culturally vibrant world emerge in the outer provinces of the American empire in ruins?

Credits for this show go to John Keane (http://www.johnkeane.net/) Dominic Lieven and the Valdai Club (https://youtu.be/f5itYeF9GpI), and, as ever, to the wonderful Kimiko Ishizaka for her playing of J.S. Bach's Goldberg variations (https://opengoldbergvariations.org/).

Please check out more of my writing at www.theburningarchive.com