Southern Cross Review

"Adam and Eve"

Roger François (1928 – ) Roger Francois was born in Petite Riviere, on the Artibonite plain of central Haiti. He began as a wood sculptor and still carves occasionally. He has been painting as well since the early sixties. He loves to paint and sculpt Haitian women, both nudes and market women with baskets and braids. Besides women, M. Francois paints animals: cats, dogs, horses and owls, and in the early 1990’s, began painting sun and moon heads on human bodies. He also does an occasional surreal voodoo painting. His style is robust, bold and always fresh and new. A painting of his hangs in the National Museum, Brussells, Belgium and another was exhibited in the show of Geoffrey Holder’s collection, “Spirits” at the Katonah Museum of Art, (NY) in May 1991. His work has appeared in books and museum shows internationally.

Editor's Page SouthernCrossReview endorses Barack Obama for President of the United States of America - as do 80% of the rest of the world's adult population. So wake up and shape up, Americans! SouthernCrossReview apoya a Barack Obama para presidente de Los Estados Unidos de America - al igual que el 80% del resto del mundo. Así que despierten Estadounidenses y pongense las pilas. The Threefold Commonwealth by Frank Thomas Smith Charles Dickens, no lover of aristocrats and a staunch defender of the oppressed, paraphrased the French Revolution'a motto as Liberty, Equality, Fraternity...or Death. The Terror which accompanied the revolution wrote with a finger dipped in blood, and was what the ruling classes of all Europe were to expect if the social question was not resolved. In 1830 the barricades were raised in Paris, there were uprisings in Germany, Poland and Belgium. They were suppressed, but the sufferings of the peoples continued and revolt simmered below the surface. In 1848 revolutions swept Italy, Vienna, Budapest, Berlin and, again, Paris. In England in 1815 and 1832 riots of hungry workers broke out and Habeas Corpus was suspended for the first time in history... Continue Book Review Captain Corelli's Mandolin by Louis de Bernières - Review: F.T.S   Corelli's Mandolin  While researching for a recent article about the relationship between Germany and Greece in the Euro-zone mess, I came across a reference in Wikipedia to the book “Captain Corelli's Mandolin”, and remembered having seen the movie based on it with Nicholas Cage and Penelope Cruz a number of years back, and having enjoyed it. On impulse I ordered the book from Amazon. Why not – despite having being written by a Brit with a French name I'd never heard of. Continue Fiction They Call Me Jackie Robinson in Brazil by Frank Thomas Smith Sometimes I woke up and didn't know where I was and what language I should say good morning to the maid in. I'd eat breakfast, usually alone, sometimes with my mother if she didn't get to bed late the night before, and head for school in a bulletproof, chauffeur-driven limousine with my two bodyguards. In case you didn't know, the United States is a big, unloved country that likes to throw its weight around so American companies can buy the world and the so-called Third World is full of assholes who think they can change everything by kidnapping the American ambassador's son... I Continue Me llaman Jackie Robinson en Brasil A veces me despertaba y no sabía dónde estaba ni en qué idioma le debía dar los buenos días a la empleada doméstica. Tomaba el desayuno, generalmente solo, a veces con mi madre cuando no se había ido a dormir tarde la noche anterior, y me iba al colegio en una limusina blindada, con chofer, acompañado por mis dos guardaespaldas. Por si no lo saben, los Estados Unidos son un país enorme y poco querido al que le gusta hacer valer su peso para que las compañías norteamericanas puedan comprar el mundo, mientras que el así llamado tercer mundo está lleno de idiotas que piensan que pueden cambiar todo secuestrando al hijo del embajador... Continuar Axolotl by Julio Cortázar There was a time when I thought a great deal about the axolotls. I went to see them in the aquarium at the Jardin des Plantes and stayed for hours watching them, observing their immobility, their faint movements. Now I am an axolotl.I got to them by chance one spring morning when Paris was spreading its peacock tail after a wintry Lent. I was heading down tbe boulevard Port-Royal, then I took Saint-Marcel and L'Hôpital and saw green among all that grey and remembered the lions. I was friend of the lions and panthers, but had never gone into the dark, humid building that was the aquarium. I left my bike against tbe gratings and went to look at the tulips. The lions were sad and ugly and my panther was asleep. I decided on the aquarium, looked obliquely at banal fish until, unexpectedly, I hit it off with the axolotls. Continue Axolotl (Español) por Julio Cortázar. Anthroposophy 2012 and World Pentecost by Robert Powell    The Mayan Calendar  A central theme of the book is the year 2012. This point in time is the end date of the Maya Long Count Calendar. This calendar is coming to an end at the winter solstice of the year 2012, specifically on December 21, 2012. Many books have been written about this date. Some authors are prophesying a variety of catastrophes. Others are saying that we are going to wake up on December 22, 2012 and find ourselves in a kind of paradise, with all the terrible things occurring here on the Earth finished (“over and done with”). These are two extremes, and obviously it is not so simple... Continue Esoteric Lessons for the First Class of the School for Spiritual Science at the Goetheanum - Lesson Seven by Rudolf Steiner    The First Goetheanum  Quite a large number of new members of this School are present, and I am therefore obliged to again say a few words about its principles. First of all, this School represents the impulse of the anthroposophical movement which was renewed here during the Christmas Conference at the Goetheanum. Previously there were several esoteric circles. All these esoteric circles must be gradually absorbed into this School, because with the Christmas Conference a new spirit was introduced into the anthroposophical movement... Continue Karmic Relations, Volume II, Lecture 6 by Rudolf Steiner    Island of the Dead We have considered a series of karmic relationships in the historical development of mankind, and have observed how one or other relationship flows over from one earthly life into another. We will now pass on to the consideration of karmic relationships from a fresh point of view, and you will find that it is one which leads still more directly into life. For the study of karma has real value only when it flows into the moral character of our life, into the whole mood and tenor of our life and soul; so that in taking our place in the world as human beings we can experience through the study of karma an invigoration as well as a deepening of our life... Continue History of the Anthroposophical Movement - 2. The Unveiling of Spiritual Truths by Rudolf Steiner   Helena Blavatsky  When we discuss the history and position of anthroposophy in relation to the Anthroposophical Society, any such reflections have to take into account two questions. First, why was it necessary to link the anthroposophical movement to the theosophical movement in the way they were related? And second, why is it that malicious opponents still equate the Anthroposophical Society with the Theosophical Society? The answers to these questions will only become clear from a historical perspective. Yesterday I said that when we talk about the Anthroposophical Society, the first thing of relevance is that of the people who feel the need to pursue their path through an anthroposophical movement. I have tried to describe the sense in which the souls who come into contact with anthroposophy in order to satisfy their spiritual yearning are homeless souls in a certain respect. There were more of them about than is normally suspected, because there were many people who in one way or another tried by various means to develop their more profound human qualities. Continue Poetry The Panther and other poems by Rainer Maria Rilke His vision, from the constantly passing bars, has grown so weary that it cannot hold anything else. It seems to him there are a thousand bars; and behind the bars, no world. As he paces in cramped circles, over and over, the movement of his powerful soft strides is like a ritual dance around a center in which a mighty will stands paralyzed. ... Continue Mahatma Malala by Eric G Muller Mahatma Malala what details of the day did you discuss as you stepped on the bus surrounded by the chirp & giggle of other girls? Mahatma Malala what must you have thought when a masked man who roared up on a motorbike, drew the green drape aside and stuck his head into the back of the dusty van? Continue Letters to the Editor I really relate to this poem, having grown up in Brooklyn and then having been an expatriate for many, many years. In Paris for about a year and then elsewhere, where one certainly did fry. The uncashed pension check reminds me of a memoir in the New Yorker a few weeks ago by a short story writer who kept waiting in a foreign land for the check to arrive so she could cash it and buy  some juice of the grape and more important something to eat ...continue Click on the donkey to browse in the SCR E-book Library You can find us under the Southern Cross constellation in the Traslasierra Valley, Province of Córdoba, Argentina. Visitors always welcome. Just follow the sign that reads: La Cruz del Sur. Frank Thomas Smith, Editor JoAnn Schwarz, Associate Editor Contact us Authors' Guidelines Archives so we can advise you when the next issue is ready. Many people are switching to Gmail. If you do, please advise us so we can change your subscription address. For back issues, use the issue number, For example: http://southerncrossreview.org/79/index79.html will deliver SCR number 79. WWW Southern Cross Review Tell a friend: Click to join steiner12