Libya

I just came back from Libya! I had been upset, for a long time, that my wife, Jane, had managed to make it to China in the mid-70s, when it was still, I guess we could say, a socialist country. But now I've gone to Libya. And Libya claims to be a 'socialist' country! So I can die now, content. Qadaffi, the leader of so many years here, wanted to be and wants to be a pan-african in the socialist tradition. His time, it could easily be argued, has passed, but he has not. His picture is in most places in Libya. If you go to a hotel, there's a picture of Qadaffi. We went to this one museum, which was world class, absolutely stuffed with high-quality Roman and Greek statues and other artifacts, but included was Qadaffi's light-blue Volkswagen Beetle. The actual original car. The actual original car in which he did what? Drove around talking up the revolution, that's what! And so now it's in a museum otherwise completely dedicated to Roman and Greek statues -- and again I tell you that this, and not only this, museum, was just very well done. The powder-blue volkswagen bug added a strange contrast. Oh! If I could post a picture.

Not of the powder-blue VW; I don't imagine anyone needs that. But of some of the ruins. These Greek-Romans had some ideas about living. How about an open air theatre with a beautiful blue ocean as a backdrop? Have a nice couple of glasses of wine, watch a comedy or a drama, part of which includes a ship 'docking' behind the stage where, in fact, there is an exquisitely beautiful blue ocean? And how about if that theatre is three stories high?

Are we really in possession of original buildings dating that far back? Well, in fact, Mussolini was a big believer in unearthing and reconstructing Roman ruins -- he thought of this activity as an important element of his propaganda (a word he was not afraid of) concerning the 'fate' of the Roman people; of Italy. Italy treated Libya like a colony; like Britain treated its colonies. That is, Italy actually sent people to live there -- which was the original idea of a 'colony.' But looking at the dictionary I am not able to see that this term goes back as far as the Romans or Greeks. Instead, it is a medieval term: "a body of people living in a new territory but retaining ties with the parent state", says Merrian-Webster. But the Greeks certainly did that, didn't they? That's exactly what Mussolini did: communities of Italians went to live in Libya. They reformed the education system and taught Italian. They built a lot of Italian fascist-futurist-modernist buildings. Thus, when we were in Libya we would come across older people and some not-so-old who spoke Italian fluently (we were on an Italian-language trip, travelling to Libya from Italy where I am currently stationed), just as if you go to some French former colonies lots of people speak French. And part of what Mussolini wanted people to do in these 'colonies' was to find and then reconstruct Roman sites that spoke to the earlier glory of the Roman Republic and Empire -- primarily Empire. Whatever we might think of Mussolini, he did actually assign intelligent, competent people to some of these tasks, and there are some positive results, as seen in the Roman forum in Rome and certainly some of these incredible sites in Libya, most of which were buried under sand for centuries until Mussolini's architects and archaeologists came to town. These 'sites' are now the hope for Libya as soon as (a) the oil runs out or (b) people stop using oil so much. Now don't think I've gone all soft on Mussolini! I haven't gone all soft. Not 'all' soft. Not even close to soft. Very unsoft. I look forward to discussing more on Hume-Adorno-postmodernism in the very near future.

Comments

[Matt]

As do we; welcome back:)

[Jamie]

Whatever this is it makes no sense and its the gayest thing i have ever read.

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