Attention is the rarest and purest form of generosity — Simone Weil
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The dark lustre of a Golden Age
Last year, I visited the Hague in the Netherlands and stopped by the Mauritshuis art museum where the products of some of history’s worst crimes are exhibited. The collection at the Mauritshuis mostly comprises paintings from the Dutch ‘Golden Age’, including works by Vermeer, Rembrandt, Steen and Holbein the Younger. As in any era where…
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Iran and the nature of power
The story of Iran is difficult to disentangle. When I told my friends and family I was going to visit the country, many of them gave me one version: Iran is ruled with an iron fist by an evil Islamic dictator – it was not safe for me to go there, and I was simply…
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The Nazi Inspiring the Atlantic
In December 2020, the Atlantic published an article titled ‘The Nazi Inspiring China’s Communists’. The key fact behind the story was this: Chinese law professors, from its most prestigious universities – Tsinghua University, Peking University and others – have been inspired by the work of Nazi legal theorist Carl Schmitt. And the author argues that…