"YOUR PHOTOGRAPHS ARE AS DAZZLING AS YOUR SUBJECTS"

Wednesday, June 29, 2011

MAO ZEDONG, STILL THE CORE OF THE CORE: COMING UP ON THE CHINESE COMMUNIST PARTY AT NINETY

MAO 
THERE AT 
THE BEGINNING 
STILL THE ESSENTIAL 


THE MONUMENT TO THE SEMINAL VICTORY 
AT JINGGANGSHAN (JINGGANG MOUNTAIN) 
 JIANGXI, CHINA, 1928 
WITH A POEM ABOUT THE BATTLE 
BY MAO ZEDONG 
INSCRIBED IN HIS OWN HANDWRITING 

Tuesday, June 28, 2011

TIPTOEING TOWARDS... THE 90TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE CHINESE COMMUNIST PARTY


COMING SOON 
THE 90TH ANNIVERSARY 
OF THE 
CHINESE COMMUNIST PARTY 


THE SHANGHAI 
CHILDREN'S PALACE 
PUTS ON A SHOW, JUNE 198

The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) was officially founded on July 1, 1921, and the People's Republic of China (PRC), of which the CCP is unapologetically the ruling party, is in the middle of a long celebration of the ninetieth anniversary. 

With the above photograph from my first trip to China, in 1981, for comparison, I was rather amused -- or bemused -- to find this photograph of the current celebrations in the New York Times. 

A photograph of the interior of the site of the First Congress of the CCP, the founding Congress, can be found here

A photograph of the most recent Congress, the Seventeenth, in action, can be found here

Monday, June 27, 2011

"FOOD IS THE PEOPLE'S GOD": CHINA THEN AND NOW


MORE 
FOOD SAFETY  
FEARS 
IN CHINA 


MOTHER & DAUGHTER & CHOPSTICKS 
XI'AN, CHINA, 1981 

Barbara Demick has a powerful article in the Los Angeles Times about food safety scares in China today, with this quote from one  Xiao Andong: "We have a saying in China that 'food is the people's god,' so obviously it is very scary for ordinary people when things like this happen" (for details, see here). 

Above, a photograph of the pleasure of eating thirty years ago, at the start of "Reform & Opening Up"; here and here, two samples of one free market in food at the same time (Eat Fresh!  Eat Local). 

one in a series on 
CHINA THEN & NOW 

Sunday, June 26, 2011

"POLLY" AND HER PARROT


PARROT 
TO 
PERSON 


REACHING UP TO 
COMMUNICATE 
WITH ONE'S HUMAN  

Fifth in a Series of  

PEOPLE & THEIR PETS 
AT THE VET'S 

Saturday, June 25, 2011

TRACKING THE CHINESE TRAINS OF THIRTY YEARS AGO


TRACKING 
THE CHINESE 
TRAINS OF 
THIRTY YEARS AGO 


BOY WAITING BY THE TRACKS 
CHINA, 1981 

One in a series 
CHINA THEN & NOW 

More on the railroads here 

Friday, June 24, 2011

HITCHING A RIDE? ONE OF THE CREW? MORE CHINESE RAILROADING OF THIRTY YEARS AGO


AT THE  
STATION 


HITCHING A RIDE?  ONE OF THE CREW? 
PACKAGE TRANSPORT AND PEOPLE 
ON THE PLATFORM 
RAILROADING 1981 

One of a series on 
CHINA THEN & NOW 

Thursday, June 23, 2011

SING A SONG OF CHINESE RAILROADS: AND WHAT THEY LOOKED LIKE BACK THEN


A PAEAN TO 
CHINESE RAILROADS 
(HIGH-SPEED, COMING


AND WHAT SOME OF THEM 
LOOKED LIKE THIRTY YEARS AGO 

(A Chinese Train Photographed 
from a Moving Chinese Train) 

Keith Bradsher's NYT hymn to China'a "steadily expanding high-speed rail network" and the bullet-train bonanza he sees coming can be found here

Wednesday, June 22, 2011

YELTSIN & THE COUP AS TOLD BY YELTSIN INSIDER GENNADY BURBULIS


A YELTSIN'S INSIDER'S 
VIEW OF 
THE COUP OF 
AUGUST 1991 
 

GENNADY BURBULIS (L) & BORIS YELTSIN CLASP HANDS 
ALEKSANDR KORZHAKOV RISES, LOOKS ON 

[under construction; Burbulis's piece on the August, 1991, coup, is here


Tuesday, June 21, 2011

MARSHAL KUTUZOV & WAR AND PEACE: THE 500TH POST


THE FIVE HUNDREDTH POST 


DONALD GRAMM 
as 
MARSHAL MIKHAIL KUTUZOV 
in 
SARAH CALDWELL'S 
production of 
SERGEI PROKOFIEV's 
opera 
"WAR AND PEACE" 
based on 
LEO TOLSTOY'S 
novel of the same name 

Photographed for TIME Magazine 

Another of Caldwell's singers, 
PLACIDO DOMINGO, here 

For a photograph of the production overall, 
see here 

Monday, June 20, 2011

THE LADY WITH THE DOG HAVING A DOWN DAY


THE LADY 
WITH 


THE DOG 
HAVING A DOWN DAY 

This is a veterinary hospital, after all; 
not every pet can come only for a shot 
(or a well-puppy visit?). 

Fourth in a Series of 
People & Their Pets 
at the Vet's 

The Short-Haired Man 
with 
the Short-Haired Dog 

The Long-Haired Lady 
with 
the Short-Haired Dog 

The initial Lady 
with the Dog 
-- and Chekhov's -- 
are here 

Sunday, June 19, 2011

THE MAN WITH THE DOG


THE SHORT-HAIRED 
MAN 


WITH THE SHORT-HAIRED DOG 

Third in a Series of 
People & Their Pets 
at the Vet's 

The Long-Haired Lady 
with 
the Short-Haired Dog 

The initial Lady 
with the Dog 
-- and Chekhov's -- 
are here 

Saturday, June 18, 2011

ANATOLY CHUBAIS IN THE NEWS


IN THE NEWS 


ANATOLY CHUBAIS 

Chief Executive of the 
Russian Corporation of Nanotechnologies 
(quoted by Scientific American on 
"Big Plans for Nanotechnologies in Russia") 

Many Formers: 
First Deputy Prime Minister under Yeltsin 
(with Boris Nemtsov
Chief of Staff for Yeltsin 
[etc.

 

Friday, June 17, 2011

BUD COLLINS b. June 17, 1929


BUD COLLINS
b. June 17, 1929


ARTHUR W. ("BUD") COLLINS, JR.

INDUCTED INTO THE
TENNIS HALL OF FAME, 1994

From the Citation:

"As a journalist and television commentator, as an esteemed historian and a vibrant personality, as a communicator unlike any other in his time, Bud Collins has been at the forefront of tennis since the early 1960s. Collins has covered more major championships than any American reporter, and has always conveyed his voluminous knowledge of the sport with an infectious enthusiasm."

BUD COLLINS' own website here

Photographed for Women's Wear Daily (indoors!); article by Lee Wohlfert (only the first part of the article is shown above).

Thursday, June 16, 2011

KATHARINE GRAHAM b. June 16, 1917


KATHARINE GRAHAM 
June 16, 1917-July 17, 2001 


KATHARINE ("KAY") GRAHAM 

"Legendary" Publisher (of Watergate fame especially) 
and later Chief Executive of the Washington Post 
photographed in the Post's headquarters 
Washington, D.C. 

Winner, Pulitzer Prize for Biography or 
Autobiography, 1998 
for PERSONAL HISTORY (1997) 
Citation here 

Gone almost ten years now 

A sampling of the (rival) New York Times' obituary: 

Mrs. Graham was a socialite mother of four when her husband, Philip L. Graham, committed suicide in 1963. Her father had given Mr. Graham control of The Post and when the latter died, his widow found herself in a mysterious thicket of corporate politics dominated by men unaccustomed to a woman in the boardroom and highly skeptical of her ability to run a newspaper. 
Much more from the New York Times here 
Some appreciations from the Washington Post here 
And from NPR here 
With a bit from Ben Bradlee here 
And one obituary from the other side of the pond here  

Wednesday, June 15, 2011

Tuesday, June 14, 2011

CHINA AS A SEA POWER: AND THIRTY YEARS AGO


CHINA 
AS A 
SEA POWER 


SHANGHAI, 1981 

Thirty years later China appears to be bent on becoming a significant maritime power and not to be shy about letting its ambitions be known. The PLA (People's Liberation Army) Navy is rapidly modernizing and conducting exercises that certainly have gotten its neighbors' notice  (some have said that the South China Sea should be re-named lest China takes the name too seriously as several countries in the area compete for its suspected natural resources). 

A related Shanghai photograph from 1981 here 

Recent photographs of a Chinese navy destroyer and a submarine rescue ship, courtesy of the Japanese Defense Ministry, here 

More details, from the BBC, concerning China and the "maritime arms race," here