Liberal-oriented columns, commentary and archived articles on national and international news, politics, and the communication arts--with emphasis on China--by Joseph Bosco, author, journalist, director and actor; Professor of Drama and Communications at Beijing Foreign Studies University. 

Friday, September 28, 2007

Gone to New Orleans

We're going to New Orleans and the Mississippi Gulf Coast to meet my first grandchild, Joseph Allen Bosco; leaving on a jet plane today. Home, it's been a long time coming. It will be a short visit, though, only a week, spanning the National Day Holiday. I won't be posting during the trip; we return to Beijing Saturday, October 6.
 


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Sunday, September 23, 2007

He's a Saint

He is a handsome fellow, no doubt; he is the brightest light in any room he enters. In short, he is a living, breathing Saint. Don't take just my word for it; the picture proof is below.

While the New Orleans Saints stumbled out of the gate at 0 - 2, Baby Joseph Allen Bosco is no tidewater front-runner; he knows that patience and optimism are two of the necessary ingredients for success.


Away-game party time in the Bosco home in New Orleans. Number 25 is the center of attention, of course. P.S. I believe that's Baze's left arm down-left forefront.


The Saints took another licking, but Baby Joseph worries not; he knows the morning will bring a new day.


He is also enjoying the Pennant Race and getting ready for the MLB Playoffs and World Series.


Baby Joseph with his beautiful mother, Michelle, my very special Daughter-in-law.


The Boscos


Baby Joseph with my Number 2 Son, Ronnie "Scoop" Jackson.


Portrait of a star


The two Josephs, father and son, at play.


"I love ya, dad, but ya gotta keep up, okay? Dad...?"
Baby Joseph, we will see you in less than 5 days! What joy awaits us.
 


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Thursday, September 20, 2007

Hear WOW's Journalists Talk About Zhao Yan

Take a moment and listen to an NPI The World, Jocelyn Ford interview with three of the original authors of the Journalism and the State series on WOW.

Anita -- Beryl -- Lucy
These three students are First Year MA Candidates in Beiwai's Graduate School of Journalism and International Communications. Most of the dozen or so other authors are scattered across America as First Year MA Candidates in some of its top Graduate J-Schools.
 


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Monday, September 17, 2007

Another Thought Or Two About O. J.'s Current Troubles

It is premature to speculate overmuch about the eventual disposition of O. J. Simpson's recent arrest and incarceration in Las Vegas. But, since I will not cover the case as a journalist, I suspect I'm free to muse a bit in public.

Surely Mr. Simpson would not want to put this in front of a jury, no matter how weak--or strong--the case against him might be. Although nothing about the murders of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman would be allowed into evidence (unless his attorneys made some incredibly egregious mistake, and even then it would almost surely be 'reversible error' on the part of the judge that let it come in) can you imagine the inner pressure on that jury to convict? Regardless of the evidence? Regardless of what they might have said about objectivity during voir dire?

On second thought, this could be a fascinating phenomenon if it does go to trial; perhaps I shouldn't be so hasty to say I won't cover it. Jury nullification in reverse? Without a word of it being mouthed? In court, that is.

The 'public' process has already begun. The Clark County District Attorney David Roger is following the model then Los Angeles D.A. Gil Garcetti set in quicksand in the early hours of Mr. Simpson's arrest in Los Angeles in 1994. While Mr. Garcetti's quick-draw mouth came back to haunt his vaunted prosecution team at trial, it was not his intent. And neither is it the intent of the premature but revealing words of the Las Vegas D.A., to wit, from the A.P.:
The district attorney, meanwhile, said he expected Simpson to ultimately be charged with seven felonies and one gross misdemeanor.

If convicted of the booking charges, Simpson would face up to 30 years in state prison on each robbery count alone.

"He is facing a lot of time," said Clark County District Attorney David Roger.
Rather subjective words coming from a district attorney before all of the facts are in and suspects questioned. But he has history working for him. Mr. Garcetti had it working against him.
 


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O. J. Is In Jail. Apparently He Is That Stupid

Just this weekend, in these pages, I said that nothing about the never-ending O. J. Simpson saga could ever surprise me again. I was wrong. I did not believe O. J. could be stupid enough to actually expose himself to the risk of being locked up without bail facing armed robbery charges that could land him in a state prison for a number of years.

Mr. Simpson is no rocket scientist, but he is not anywhere near the dummy that so many people like to think he is. At least he wasn't way back when. Now, I don't know. The irony of O. J. Simpson possibly doing serious prison time for stealing his own memorabilia with a firearm after being acquitted in October 1995 of double homicide is so obvious and rich it needs no further comment. The bizarre 'facts' of the case at this point are in the The New York Times article excerpted and linked to below.
Simpson Arrested and Charged With Felonies

By STEVE FRIESS
Published: September 17, 2007

LAS VEGAS, Sept. 16 -- O. J. Simpson was charged Sunday with six felonies in connection with a reported armed robbery of sports memorabilia in a Las Vegas hotel room on Thursday night, the Las Vegas police said.

Mr. Simpson was booked into the Clark County Detention Center and charged with two counts each of robbery with a deadly weapon and assault with a deadly weapon, as well as one count each of conspiracy to commit burglary and burglary with a firearm, Lt. Clint Nichols of the Las Vegas police said. A judge ordered Mr. Simpson held without bail pending arraignment this week in Clark County Justice Court, possibly via video.

The top two charges carry sentences of 3 to 35 years each and, by state law, would have to be served consecutively, so Mr. Simpson faces 6 to 70 years on those alone, the authorities said.

A group of six people that included Mr. Simpson are accused of storming into a room at the Palace Station Hotel and Casino a mile from the Las Vegas Strip about 8 p.m. Thursday. Another member of the group, Walter Alexander, 46, of Mesa, Ariz., was arrested late Saturday and was charged with the same counts. He was released early Sunday on his own recognizance, said his lawyer, Robert Rentzer.

The police are seeking the other four members of the group and have identified three of them: Clarence Stewart, 53, of Las Vegas; Michael McClinton, 49, of Las Vegas; and Tom Scotto, age and hometown unavailable.
Please Continue reading at The New York Times.

The photograph above was published in The New York Times and was shot by Jae C. Hong/Associated Press.
 


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Saturday, September 15, 2007

O. J. Just Can't Keep Himself Out of the News

It's amazing. From out of the blue, the traffic to these pages will sometimes abruptly double or even triple. It always puzzles me at first. But very shortly I almost always learn the reason why: O. J. Simpson is in the news, again. In this instance, he is reported to be a suspect in an "armed robbery" case.

It amazes me because I have not spoken with Mr. Simpson since 1998; and I have not published anything concerning O. J. in the commercial press for at least as long.

It seems that the Simpson sordid saga is somewhat akin to The Arabian Nights--a story without end. For those who still care about it, you will find an article from The New York Times excerpted and linked to below.

Sports Memorabilia Dealer Implicates O.J. Simpson in Hotel Room Robbery

By STEVE FRIESS
Published: September 15, 2007

LAS VEGAS, Sept. 14 -- O.J. Simpson, the former football star who was acquitted of murdering his wife, was under investigation Friday in what the police said might have been an armed robbery of sports memorabilia from a room at the Palace Station Hotel-Casino here.

Mr. Simpson denied that any crime had taken place. Instead, he told The Associated Press, he and some people he had met at a cocktail party staged a "sting operation" on Thursday night intended to retrieve memorabilia, including Mr. Simpson's Hall of Fame certificate, from a dealer he said had stolen it.

Capt. James Dillon of the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department said that Mr. Simpson, 60, was cooperating with investigators and that charges, if any, would not come until at least Monday, after the Clark County district attorney's office reviewed the case. The investigation "is in its infancy," Captain Dillon said.

Captain Dillon would not describe the items involved other than to characterize them as "sports-related products." Some, he said, were in police custody.

The dealer, Alfred Beardsley of Glendale, Calif., told detectives that Mr. Simpson and four other men, including two with guns, entered his room at the Palace Station around 8 p.m. Thursday and left with a trove of memorabilia including photographs and books signed by Mr. Simpson, lithographs of the San Francisco 49ers quarterback Joe Montana and Mr. Beardsley's cellphone.

"I couldn't believe it," Mr. Beardsley told TMZ.com. "For him to come and do this sort of thing, I don't know what's wrong with O.J."
Of course, Mr. Simpson has a much different story of events; if you wish to know more, please continue reading at The New York Times.

P.S.: Is it only a coincidence that the alleged "robbery" and the selling of O. J. memorabilia took place on the same day that the book "If I Did It," which the Goldman family was successful in wresting away from O. J. and repackaging towards their view of things, was released? I must note that nothing, absolutely nothing, surprises me any longer in this story that never ends.
 


2:30 PM / Editor / permalink    0 comments  




Zhao Yan Is Released!

Zhao Yan is free at last. Please read the article by Jim Yardley in today's The New York Times, excerpted and linked to below.

Zhao Yan, center, is greeted by friends and relatives after he was released from the state security prison in Beijing.
China Releases Jailed New York Times Employee

By JIM YARDLEY
Published: September 15, 2007

BEIJING, Saturday, Sept. 15 -- Zhao Yan, a Chinese researcher for The New York Times, walked out of a prison here shortly after 8 a.m. Saturday after serving three years on a fraud conviction that prompted international outrage and criticism of China's legal system.

Mr. Zhao was greeted with hugs by a gathering of family and friends. He looked relieved, noticeably thinner and a little shaken.

"I would like to thank my family, friends and my employer for their steadfast concern and support," he said in a statement released on Saturday morning. "These three years I have missed my family very much, especially my maternal grandmother, who is now more than 100 years old. For that reason, I want some time to reunite with my family."

Mr. Zhao, 45, said he would issue a fuller statement "at some point in the near future."
Please continue reading at The New York Times.

The photograph above was published in The New York Times and was taken by Claro Cortes IV/Reuters.
 


1:50 PM / Editor / permalink    2 comments  




Zhao Yan Will Be Free In The Morning!

Glory be! Only a quick note and a brief article before I sleep. There is nothing I can say to add to the joy of this moment, so I won't. I believe a short news piece by Jim Yardley of The New York Times says it all for now.

China to Free Jailed New York Times Employee

By JIM YARDLEY
Published: September 14, 2007

BEIJING, Sept. 14 -- Zhao Yan, a Chinese research assistant for The New York Times, is expected to be freed Saturday morning after serving three years in prison on a fraud conviction that sparked international outrage and brought criticism on China's legal system.

Prison officials in Beijing told Mr. Zhao's older sister that he would be released before 9 a.m. on Saturday. The sister, Zhao Kun, said today that her brother, who suffered health problems during his incarceration, planned to undergo a physical examination in Beijing before leaving the city to attend a family wedding in northeastern China.

"We are very happy," she said after arriving in Beijing from her home in the northeastern city of Harbin.

Bill Keller, executive editor of the Times, also expressed satisfaction about Mr. Zhao's pending release. "We're looking forward to welcoming Zhao Yan," Mr. Keller said in a statement.

Mr. Zhao, 45, completed his full sentence. His case was marked by legal irregularities and at one point a Beijing court even withdrew all charges against him.

But Mr. Zhao was never released, and the charges were reinstated without explanation. President Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice lobbied on his behalf with President Hu Jintao of China.

Human rights groups and journalism advocacy organizations criticized his arrest as politically motivated and without merit.

Mr. Zhao has strongly maintained his innocence. At an appeal held before the High Court of Beijing last December, witnesses said Mr. Zhao retorted sharply when asked by the judge if he had anything to say.

"What kind of judge are you?" Mr. Zhao replied, according to witnesses. "Is this how you use the power the country gave you?"

Mr. Zhao was working as a researcher in the Beijing bureau of The Times when State Security agents detained him in September 2004. He would eventually be charged with disclosing state secrets to The Times, an accusation linked to an exclusive Times article about the inner workings of China's top leaders.

The Times denied that Mr. Zhao ever disclosed any state secrets. Months later, investigators would add a lesser, unrelated fraud charge dating from 2001 when he worked as a reporter for a Chinese magazine.

He was tried on both charges in June 2006, and Mr. Zhao's lawyers were not allowed to call witnesses on his behalf.

Two months later, the Beijing court issued a split verdict: The more serious state secrets charge was dismissed, in a rebuke to the State Security agents handling the case. But the court convicted him on the fraud charge.

Mr. Zhao had earned a national reputation as a muckraking journalist before he joined The Times in April 2004. The fraud charge involved accusations by an official in Jilin Province who asserted that Mr. Zhao promised to use his position as a journalist, as well as his political influence, to help the official in a legal matter. In exchange, the official accused Mr. Zhao of accepting a cash payment.

At the trial, Mr. Zhao's lawyers were not permitted to cross-examine witnesses for the prosecution. In an unorthodox motion, Mr. Zhao asked the court to subject himself and witnesses against him to a polygraph test. The court refused.

Mr. Zhao's sister said court officials had given her no indication if any restrictions would be placed on her brother upon his release.

On Thursday, Reporters Without Borders, the journalism advocacy group, said Mr. Zhao should face no restrictions after his release.

"Mr. Zhao should have all his rights restored, including the right to work as a journalist," the group said in a statement. "The government showed no clemency towards Zhao, who was a scapegoat in an affair of state in which he was not involved."

Mr. Zhao remains an employee of The Times's Beijing bureau.

I and my students, current and former, will have more to say in the days and weeks to come. Tonight, we simply rejoice in the freedom of a good and brave man, a dedicated journalist who inspired many Chinese journalism students throughout his ordeal, along with his family, and the family that is The New York Times Beijing Bureau.
 


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Sunday, September 09, 2007

So Capitalism and Democracy are the Righteous Twins For a Better World? Think Again...

While more folks than not think I am far too left of the pragmatic mean necessary to be effective in editorial persuasion, in truth, I like being free to do whatever I damn well please every bit as much as that happy-go-lucky fellow over there waiting for a bus with a grin on his unshaven mug. I also like the things that having a surplus of bucks in my pocket can buy me, and even some of same to leave behind for my loved ones when I'm in that eternally private hole in the ground (fat chance, unfortunately; but I am trying).

True, when push comes to ideological shove, I identify myself as some form of social democrat, primarily because I think there should be a 'floor' through which no living soul on earth should be allowed to fall. However, the label of 'democrat'--and I don't mean party, although I am a registered member of that 'yellow dog' entity in the U.S.--is getting more and more tricky to stay glued to. Gracious sakes alive, where is there a nation of any size or substance that is more than a lip-service 'democracy' according to any number of definitions of the term? Can't think of one? Don't fret, neither can anyone else. A Republic or two? Yes. But even that moniker is getting dicey to stick on with conscientious certainty.

What is all of this more than a little precious narrative leading to? I want you to read a provocative article by a fairly accomplished fellow in political 'Democracy' and capitalism (even "Supercapitalism," as you will learn).

I will excerpt the first few paragraphs of an article I believe you must read in its entirety. It is published in Foreign Policy Magazine, a publication that can exhilerate you or infuriate you, often at the same time, which I subscribe to; however, this particular article is free (you may or may not need to register, depending upon the vagaries of the Internet and links between my computer and yours).

How Capitalism Is Killing Democracy
By Robert B. Reich

September/October 2007

It was supposed to be a match made in heaven. Capitalism and democracy, we've long been told, are the twin ideological pillars capable of bringing unprecedented prosperity and freedom to the world. In recent decades, the duo has shared a common ascent. By almost any measure, global capitalism is triumphant. Most nations around the world are today part of a single, integrated, and turbocharged global market. Democracy has enjoyed a similar renaissance. Three decades ago, a third of the world's nations held free elections; today, nearly two thirds do.

Conventional wisdom holds that where either capitalism or democracy flourishes, the other must soon follow. Yet today, their fortunes are beginning to diverge. Capitalism, long sold as the yin to democracy's yang, is thriving, while democracy is struggling to keep up. China, poised to become the world's third largest capitalist nation this year after the United States and Japan, has embraced market freedom, but not political freedom. Many economically successful nations-from Russia to Mexico-are democracies in name only. They are encumbered by the same problems that have hobbled American democracy in recent years, allowing corporations and elites buoyed by runaway economic success to undermine the government's capacity to respond to citizens' concerns.

Of course, democracy means much more than the process of free and fair elections. It is a system for accomplishing what can only be achieved by citizens joining together to further the common good. But though free markets have brought unprecedented prosperity to many, they have been accompanied by widening inequalities of income and wealth, heightened job insecurity, and environmental hazards such as global warming. Democracy is designed to allow citizens to address these very issues in constructive ways. And yet a sense of political powerlessness is on the rise among citizens in Europe, Japan, and the United States, even as consumers and investors feel more empowered. In short, no democratic nation is effectively coping with capitalism's negative side effects.
Please continue reading at: Foreign Policy.
 


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Thursday, September 06, 2007

Justice Delayed, Is Still Justice; Even In Mississippi

None of my regular readers will be surprised that I believe the short news piece below about a racist murderer finally getting his due from hell is worth a bravo and a job-well-done--along with a snort of, 'It's about Goddamn time!'--even though its subject is not something that should be accompanied by applause or even an ounce of joy, but only with the comfort that some things are changing and being set right in the State I call home, Mississippi. It is from The New York Times.

However, just below that piece, is an article, also from The New York Times, that perpetuates my universal sadness and should remind us all that the time for due vigilance in these matters of justice corrupted and perverted is still very much at hand--in Mississippi.

The victims long ago passed from this life. They can be hurt no longer. That cannot be said for their families. It cannot be said for the men and women wrongly convicted of killing those victims who passed from this life with the taint of misjustice scarring their memory. It also cannot be said about our collective conscience, which should suffer the metaphorical pain of burning flesh until all of the virulent wrongs have been adjudicated in a court where law is the rule, not an arena of humankind's unholy penchant for prejudice against any class or race that makes the lesser of us feel greater by their dehumanization.

Ex-Klansman Is Sentenced To Life for Killings in 1964

By JERRY MITCHELL AND BRENDA GOODMAN
Published: August 25, 2007


Calling the crime "unspeakable because only monsters could inflict this," a federal judge on Friday sentenced a former member of the Ku Klux Klan to three life terms
in prison for his role in the 1964 kidnapping and murder of two black teenagers in Mississippi.

The case was one of several that focused a spotlight on white supremacist violenceduring the civil rights era.

The victims, Henry H. Dee and Charles E. Moore, both 19, were hitchhiking in Meadville, Miss., when a group of Klansmen, including James Seale, picked them up and took them to a wooded area, where they were beaten and their weighted bodies thrown into the Mississippi River. Both young men drowned.

Their bodies were not recovered until later that year in a high-profile search for three civil rights activists whose deaths generated widespread revulsion against the racial violence in Mississippi

"The pulse of this community still throbs with sorrow," Judge Henry T. Wingate of Federal District Court said as he imposed the sentence, which will effectively keep Mr. Seale, who is 72 and has cancer, behind bars for the rest of his life.

Judge Wingate asked Mr. Seale, who was shackled and dressed in an orange jumpsuit, if he wished to comment, but Mr. Seale declined. His lawyer, Kathy Nestor, said her client planned to appeal his conviction on kidnapping and conspiracy charges.

The main prosecution witness, a former Klansman who was granted immunity, testified. at Mr. Seale's trial that the defendant had told him he killed Mr. Dee and Mr. Moore. Mr. Seale was not charged with murder.

At Friday's sentencing, Mr. Moore's brother, Thomas, of Seattle, who has pushed for justice in the case since 1998, was given the opportunity to address Mr. Seale.

"When you took away Charles Moore, you took away my best friend," Thomas Moore said. "I cried when I thought about how hard they suffered at your hands."

Mr. Dee's sister, Thelma Collins, said her brother's killing "hurt us so bad I had to get a psychologist."

At a news conference after the sentencing, Assistant Attorney General Wan J. Kim said that some 100 cold cases from the civil rights era were awaiting investigation and possible prosecution, including 30 in Mississippi.

Judge Wingate said that he took into account Mr. Seale's advanced age and poor health. "But then I had to take a look at the crime itself, the horror, the ghastliness of it," he said, adding that he would agree to the defense recommendation that Mr. Seale serve his sentence at a medical facility.

The New York Times
The following article from The New York Times, excerpted and linked to, is why I and more than a few others say, 'No, we cannot forget or forgive!'

Kennedy Brewer was locked up for 15 years even though DNA tests in 2002 failed to show his DNA on a rape victim. Such cases are usually dropped. He greeted his mother after leaving jail.

Despite DNA Test, Prosecutor Is Retrying Case
By SHAILA DEWAN
Published: September 6, 2007

MACON, Miss., Aug. 31 -- The scene in the tiny Noxubee County jail on a rainy afternoon has become almost commonplace. Kennedy Brewer, sentenced to death and locked up for 15 years for the rape and murder of a 3-year-old, was released on the strength of a DNA test showing that the semen in the rape kit was not his.

The bail bondswoman snapped a Polaroid.

Mr. Brewer's sister, Martha, smiled and said, "I ain't got to mow the lawn no more."

Back home on Highway 388, two of Mr. Brewer's nieces sketched out a T-shirt design to read "Welcome Home Kenny."

But Mr. Brewer is not free and clear. He is only out on bail.

In a move that appears to be novel, prosecutors intend to retry him for the crime.

Virtually no effort has been made to find the man who raped the girl, Christine Jackson, and dumped her body in a creek in Noxubee County, one of the most rural in the state.

This is the first time prosecutors have sought a new capital murder trial after a conviction was overturned by DNA evidence, said Peter Neufeld, director of the Innocence Project, a legal aid group based in New York that has used DNA testing to exonerate the wrongly convicted since 1992. Usually such cases are simply dropped.

But prosecutors are not convinced of the innocence of Mr. Brewer, a black laborer who is mildly retarded. Forrest Allgood, the district attorney who first tried the case, said his theory then was that Mr. Brewer, who was the boyfriend of the victim's mother, acted alone.

At the trial, Mr. Allgood argued that the couple's bedroom was "the killing field," although traces of human blood found there were so small that they could not be tested.

His view has changed.

"I perceive that Kennedy Brewer assisted someone else in the killing of the child," Mr. Allgood said. "Whether he actually penetrated that child or not functionally doesn't make any difference if he was aiding, assisting and encouraging in her death."

Mr. Allgood declined to offer a new theory of what occurred the night Christine disappeared, saying only that Mr. Brewer was the baby sitter that evening and that there was no sign of forced entry at the house. [. . .]

The state's star witness was Dr. Michael West, a dentist from Hattiesburg who had become a controversial expert in the identification of bite marks. Dr. West's findings have been contradicted by DNA evidence in at least two other cases.

At the time of the trial, Dr. West had been suspended from the American Board of Forensic Odontology and had resigned from the American Academy of Forensic Science and the International Association of Identification, pending expulsion.

He testified that he had found 19 human bite marks on Christine's body, all made just by upper teeth, and that at least five of them were made by Mr. Brewer.

A defense expert, Richard Souviron, testified that the wounds were not human bite marks.

"Have you ever bitten off a piece of meat with just your top teeth and not used your bottom teeth?" Dr. Souviron asked. "t doesn't make any sense at all."

In 2005, Mr. Allgood informed the defense that a jailhouse informer had come forward, saying Mr. Brewer had told him that he was forced at gunpoint to bite Christine.

Please read the rest of this important story in The New York Times.

Note: It is journalistically prudent that I mention that Barry C. Scheck and Peter J. Neufeld, the founders of The Innocence Project, are friends of mine whose work in such cases I greatly admire.
 


1:15 PM / Editor / permalink    0 comments  



Tuesday, September 04, 2007

A Dream Realized Humbles Greatly

How does anyone truly express the fruition of a lifetime dream? Even if one is a writer by trade? Indeed, expressing the culmination of this particular dream is more difficult if one is a writer by profession and lifelong calling. Because every writer in the English language, no matter his relative achievements in books published, screenplays written and sold, articles and essays published, with critical or commercial success, for over 400 years has grown up with, has lived with, and writes with the certainty that he can only compete for second place regardless of the merits of his prose or poetry, fiction or creative nonfiction. Mr. William Shakespeare is so far ahead in first place that the gap will not grow smaller in another 400 years, or I venture even 4,000.

In early August, 2007, through the abundant beneficence of the Chinese Universities Shakespeare Festival and its so very generous sponsors, this writer was finally able to kneel in long, prayerful silence at the grave of William Shakespeare within a small, beautiful old church in Stratford-Upon-Avon. I prayed to no god, because I no longer believe in any--but I did pray. The words of my silent prayer will forever be known only to me; and that is as it should be. To give them voice would be an act of arrogance beyond measure.

Yes, I and the three so very talented student-actors who traveled with me to London, Stratford-Upon-Avon and beautiful old Oxford as reward for winning first prize in the Third Chinese Universities Shakespeare Festival, visited many grand and wondrous places within the cradle of so much of Western history, thought and ideals. We saw and experienced with awe and wonderment Westminster Abbey, the Tower of London, the National Gallery, the British History Museum, St. Paul's Cathedral, the Victoria and Albert Museum, Kensington Palace, Buckingham Palace, (sans the Queen, she was traveling) a boat ride down the Thames, Shakespeare's Globe, magnificent, humbling Oxford University and its lovely village, and several memorable pubs with an abundance of Bells Whisky, great ales, beers, and marvelous Fish & Chips (but alas not a single good restaurant anywhere; I now better understand Great Britain's once insatiable need for colonies--it was in quest of chefs and cuisines).

But for me there was nothing even remotely comparable to those sublimely humble moments on my knees in Holy Trinity Church before the stones under which lay the bones of the greatest wordsmith who ever lived.




Thank you CUHK and the Chinese Universities Shakespeare Festival.

The gentleman pictured with the BFSU troupe in the photograph at the top of this post is Patrick Spottiswoode, Education Director for Shakespeare's Globe. Except for that candid snapshot, the other photographs were taken by Cui Xinyu and Liang Xingyi
 


1:57 PM / Editor / permalink    0 comments  



Monday, September 03, 2007

The Moor is a Winner in Hong Kong (Redux From May, With Photos*)


We won it all, folks! First Place in the Third Chinese Universities Shakespeare Festival, hosted by the Chinese University of Hong Kong. We are going to London and Stratford-Upon-Avon for the Shakespeare tour as only one of the several wonderfully generous awards bestowed upon Beiwai's "Othello." I cannot even begin to tell you how proud I am of the three BFSU student-actors--Othello (Cui Xinyu), Desdemona (Li Jing) and Emilia (Liang Xingyi)--who gave this rapidly aging director a chance to finally get "Othello" right after almost four decades of trying in one form or another.

I am almost as excited and happy that I can again post to these pages. It's been six weeks or so since "New" Blogger glitches bit us in the ass the moment Blogger arbitrarily switched us to the "improved" format, and kept us the hell off the Internet. While that was undoubtedly a boon to my many detractors, it just about drove me off a cliff, for two primary reasons: I could not post the dramatic, day-by-day events and lunacies that culminated in Hong Kong last Wednesday night (May 23*) as "Beijing Foreign Studies University" was finally pronounced by CUHK Professor Jason Gleckman at the zenith of an achingly slow ascending order of "winners" from 4th runner-up to...to...to...us!


And, surely as importantly, I could not post new pictures of Baby Joseph A. Bosco, my first grandchild. Now that I suddenly can again, I will post much more--photos and article links--on both joys very soon. I now have to rush off to rehearsals for "The Crucible."

There wasn't even a day for us to rest upon our laurels. In theatre, like almost all of the commercial fine arts, What have you done for us lately? is the operative dictum. And it should be.

But, for the moment (belatedly, for certain; it took awhile for me to gather the pictorial evidence) we will relish the memory with photographs from that wondrous time in May 2007, when clocks and calendars stopped, and theatre and its unique camaraderie held sway for 9 days in Hong Kong.

Liang Xingyi, (Emilia) chose the order of our appearance over the three days of final performances--she picked a winner.

Cui Xinyu (Othello) delivering the opening remarks for the BFSU troupe at the feast which began the festivities.

Li Jing (Desdemona) and her "Othello" on opening day getting camera-ready for whatever was to come their way.

The finale group picture of all winners (there were no losers, regardless of prizes declared).


Loading us up with awards (Li Jing was at Immigration Bureau; red tape follows us everywhere).

"I need a Scotch," I said; and it was soon forthcoming, in abundance.

Opening day in the theatre lobby with impressive competitors from Chinese universities hallowed and normal: Fudan University, Qujing Normal University, Yunnan, and BFSU.

Fudan University accepting 3rd Runner-up Award; if we had not won, I believe their performance of "Macbeth" should have won First Prize.

Fudan and BFSU troupes together at awards dinner.

For reasons unknown to me, performance photos for the winning troupes are not yet available.
 


5:55 PM / Editor / permalink    6 comments  



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Previous Posts

A Worried Mind...
Happy Birthday, Linda
It's Time to Get Over It, Bosco...
"Home"...
When Can We Be Free to Tell? (Redux)
Gone to New Orleans
He's a Saint
Hear WOW's Journalists Talk About Zhao Yan
Another Thought Or Two About O. J.'s Current Troub...
O. J. Is In Jail. Apparently He Is That Stupid

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