Spinning a tale

Of storytelling, spinning and weaving

Most spiders that survive till autumn are females, because Sir is usually eaten by Madam after the lovemaking. In the West African and Surinamese or Caribbean culture however, the spider Anansi is a male. He is called Kwaku Anansi, a man born on a Wednesday, and in the Twi language of the Akan people of Ghana, the word Anansi literally means a spider.

 

Anansi descending from Heaven

 

In today’s almost incomprehensible world ravaged by power play, inequality, suppression, war and genocide, often it is better to turn to a relaxed theme, such as wondering about the parallels between cultures. Last week I had the pleasure of giving another lecture about the spider Anansi in the African, Surinamese and Caribbean folk tales that play such an important part in my book of the same title: Anansi.

Ovid and Arachne

Where spiders are concerned, I found a parallel between African and Greek-Roman mythology. I recently visited an exposition of art inspired by Ovid’s Metamorphoses in the Dutch National Museum in Amsterdam, together with other members of my Latin study group which is run by our inspiring teacher of classical literature.

 

Ovid (source: Wikipedia)

 

Publius Ovidius Naso was a Roman poet in Augustus’ day, who in his extensive work wrote a great number of stories from Greek and Roman mythology, concerned with enigmatic transformations of people into animals, plants and objects. Often his tales contain a moral warning about the risk of hubris (brashness or presumption) and other human shortcomings. Implicitly, despite his own flamboyant lifestyle, Ovid also addressed the corruption of the Roman elite of his day, including the Imperial family, which eventually would lead to his banishment to a remote place on the Black Sea. Even then apparently, people felt strongly about the excesses of the rich elite.

 

Arachne turned into a spider by Minerva

source: Wikipedia

One of the tales in the Metamorphoses describes the brash over-confidence of Arachne, a young woman who presumes she can challenge the goddess Minerva (Athena in Greek mythology) to hold a weaving contest. Minerva herself is good at weaving, but at the loom she meets her match in Arachne, who, adding insult to injury, wove an image which was a mockery of the gods! Minerva is furious, hits Arachne three times over the head with her weaving shuttle and curses her, changing her into a spider doomed to eternally weave her web. All spiders now are members of an entomological family called Arachnida. 

I wonder if Arachne’s tale, like other stories in Greek-Roman mythology, isn’t an ancient folk tale, the origin of which was lost even before the advent of written history. The wool spindle is said to have been invented 7000 years ago, and the loom as long ago as 5000 years, but in Georgia dyed flaxen thread has been found that was dated 34,000 years ago, and probably used for weaving or knitting. And undoubtedly, in prehistoric days many tales were told after dark at the cooking fire, or during spinning or weaving.

Anansi

This is certainly the case with Anansi, a low-ranking deity in the Akan mythology, the son of Asaase (Mother Earth), who according to legend descended from Heaven on his spinning thread to bring humankind a message from the gods. Asaase must be related to the Egyptian goddess Isis, who was revered in the Nile valley, and like her is the embodiment of the life cycle and the protector of the deceased. Isis originally came from Egypt and Nubia, and the Akan people are thought to have migrated from the Nile valley to West Africa, a thousand years ago.

 

Anansi represented by an Ashanti mask (photo: author)

 

In African culture, Anansi isn’t just a deity, but also a storyteller and a messenger who cannot always be trusted, because he also tells you lies. With his thread he weaves a web of lies so dense that you cannot see through. The English language has a proverb of spinning someone a tale, and spin doctors are professional liars employed by politicians. On the other hand there is the saying spinning a yarn, which means telling a long and involved story that isn’t necessarily a lie.

Weaving a tale

There are more connections between stories, spinning and weaving. Our word textile is derived from the same source as text, i.e. the Latin word textilis, which means woven. Africa even today has a rich storytelling tradition, which during the centuries-long slave trade also ended up in the Americas and the Caribbean. On the plantations, where the white colonists suppressed the dignity and culture of the people kidnapped from Africa, the oral tradition went underground and assumed the role of covert resistance.

Kente cloth made in Ghana (author's photo)

Not just storytelling tells a tale in Africa, but also traditional weaving. The colourful patterns of the Kente cloth woven by the Akan people in Ghana have a meaning. Kente is made in narrow strips on a tiny loom, which are sown together into a cloth. Every pattern in Kente has its unique meaning.

The tradition of conveying a message with textiles has also taken root elsewhere. A woman of the Surinamese Maroons receives a bolt of virgin cotton from her husband at her wedding, upon which she embroiders figures and patterns telling her own story. And then there is the angisa, the traditional headdress of a Surinamese woman, which tells its own message. By its colours and the pattern she folds it into, she tells of her mood, whether she is happy, whether she is grieving, or whether she accepts or rejects a man. This secret language was conceived during slavery, when people were forbidden to speak their own language.

Thus, we can see that text and textiles come together again: both tell their own story.

 

embroidered Surinamese Maroon cloth (author's photo)

 

New book: Contested Land published

Over two years ago, in October 2023, I wrote of my own experience in the Middle East fifty years ago, in response to the (then) recently started retaliation war of Israel against the population of Gaza. At the time I wrote: It could be a theme for a new book - perhaps it will appear at some stage.

Well, the book is there. Contested Land was published on the online platform Bookmundo last month, and a contract with Palmslag Publishers for the Dutch edition Het betwiste land was recently signed: publication is planned in October.

Contested Land saw the light due to my horror and indignation over the slaughter inflicted by the Israeli army. I wrote of it previously.

Meanwhile, following the still-continuing Gaza war, the world has been shaken up further by the American-Israeli attack on Iran, where the previous American blunders in Irak and Afghanistan are being repeated without thinking twice. Israel now extends its brutal campaign in Gaza to Lebanon, once again without Western politics lifting a finger, probably for geopolitical and ideological reasons. And despite ignoring international law, possibly Western politicians are glad to see someone hitting the terror regime in Iran. Until it drags us down into a worldwide recession, but then it will be too late.

 

 

A political thriller with a message

I went back into time to write a political thriller set in the Middle East between 1973 and 1980. It is primarily a story about people, but also contains an underlying message because I don’t mince words about the warring parties: not about the Arabs, nor about Israel.

Although judging from the news one wouldn’t expect it, in the Middle East ordinary people are living like you and me, who have to keep going despite being exposed to extreme violence and terror. Contested Land is about ordinary people: a Dutch sailor, an Israeli soldier and a Palestinian family, about their traumatic memories and about friendship and love. The story is pure fiction, but embedded in historical fact, and also describes the political and diplomatic deception machine running in the background.

I studied the history of the conflict between Israel and Palestine to understand the background of the present-day violence, trying to ignore the ideology that poisons the matter and form an honest opinion. My sources are a range of informative articles on Wikipedia, books written by Palestinians, Lebanese and by Dutch and Israeli journalists and historians, and documentaries about the deeply divided Israeli society. The result of my research is the background of Contested Land.

The new book is available as a paperback and an e-book from my website.

A preview

To give you an idea, here are a few episodes from the book.

1973

We ran into the corridor which was filled with smoke and dust. I almost tripped over a dead body - I recognised the guard who had beaten me days on end. He was stone dead, blood on his face. Further on there was a huge gap in the wall, bent pieces of reinforcing iron pointing into the passage, which was littered with concrete rubble.

Together with the masked men we crawled through the gap, emerging into an alley where more commandos were waiting, armed to the teeth, and a few more prisoners who spoke the same language as my cellmate and the attackers. We ran into the alley with a rearguard of two armed men. Having been in a jail cell for a month, I wasn’t very fit anymore and hardly managed to keep up.

We were in a labyrinth of narrow roads and alleys, an ancient Arabian souk where the commandos apparently knew their way. After about ten minutes we paused and a heated discussion ensued between my cellmate and two of the attackers, who pointed at me. The pilot explained who I was, upon which one of them told me in English that they wouldn’t take me with them because I wasn’t an Israeli soldier. From then on I had to find my own way, he said. The commandos and the released Israelis ran into a side road and left me quite alone in the dark alleyway.

Aimlessly I wandered on - all doors were firmly closed and the few ground floor windows were protected with bars or blinds. The masonry of the buildings was cracked and the stucco flaked and peeling. A stray dog was scrabbling in a pile of refuse and snarled at me as I came by. In the distance police sirens sounded. I heard running feet approach from the direction we had come from and shadows slid along the walls, cast by a street lantern about a hundred yards back. I heard shouting and twice a rifle shot rang out. Luckily it wasn’t very near - they must have been firing at shadows.

Fear gripped my heart - what could I do? I had to make myself scarce as fast as I could, ducked and ran through a maze of alleys, hoping I didn’t run in circles. I turned a corner where a light shone over a doorway. The door suddenly opened, possibly due to the distant upheaval. A heavily made up middle-aged woman peered out. She noticed my utter fear and my battered appearance and spoke to me in Arabic. I shook my head indicating I didn’t understand her, upon which she replied in broken English: ‘Police want you?’

I nodded.

‘Come, quick!’

The woman quickly drew me into the doorway and shut and bolted the door behind us. She preceded me through a long corridor, which opened onto a dimly lit courtyard.

* * *

I wasn’t allowed much time to ponder, because a mile or so short of Bireh Akkar we suddenly stood still. There was a long queue ahead of us, and Hasan, peering along the line of cars, became worried as it dawned upon him what was happening in the distance. Suddenly he looked at us, pointing ahead: ‘kataeb, kataeb, go, quick!’

‘Kataeb?’ Maryam sat upright in shock, looking at me. ‘Kataeb is the falange, the mafia. They hate all Palestinians. We have to get out.’

I didn’t hesitate a second, grabbed our bundle and opened the cab door. We jumped out and dived into the bushes. In the distance along the road someone began shouting.

‘Run,’ I said, pulling her by her arm towards the tree line twenty yards away. A rifle shot rang out, which fortunately missed us.

We were in the trees now, stumbling down through the thick scrub towards the sound of running water. There was a stream, we plunged through ankle-deep water and clambered up the other bank. More bushes plucked at our clothes. On the far side where we had come from, we heard men call to one another and struggle through the bushes. We found a place to hide in a shallow cavity under an overhanging rock, hidden from view by thick undergrowth. I pushed Maryam in, lay down in front of her and drew a fallen branch over us. I heard her gulp deep lungfuls of air, her arm was around me, her heart hammering against my back.

Seven years later

1980

 

I put us back on course and made a note in the watch journal. At ten I did the weather observation: wind, sea, swell, cloud cover, temperature, dew point, barometer reading. The sun didn’t show itself. The watch routine went on - I took a few charts from the drawer in the chartroom, and between keeping the lookout and an occasional check of the radar, I made the latest corrections to the chart. Inked in for permanent changes, in pencil for the temporary ones.

The hallucination of the Oostkerk reared its ugly head again. I had to concentrate. Had to.

At ten-thirty the Old Man came up. ‘Morning, Nick. How is it going?’

‘A little bumpy, Captain. Occasionally we ship a little water, but it hasn’t gone worse since I came on watch.’

‘Even so, let’s hold on to those ninety revs. If we increase speed, we’ll be in for a plastering.’

‘Yes, we’re doing as well as we can.’

‘The first mate told me that you didn’t reply to the telephone this morning. He sent the lookout to call you, but he couldn’t wake you up.’

‘I have nightmares, Captain. I am fast asleep during such an episode, but I seem to yell my head off.’

‘Has it anything to do with that matter of six years ago?’

‘I think so. It seems as if it troubles me more recently. I also have hallucinations in the daytime.’

When I had come aboard and introduced myself to the Old Man, he had told me that he knew Van de Merwe very well, the Captain of the Oostkerk, who had failed his medical due to his injuries and now had become head of the Nautical Department of the company. From him he had heard what happened to us on that fateful morning in Latakia. He said that if I needed to talk with him I shouldn’t hesitate.

Perhaps this was the time to do so.

* * *

The aircraft of Middle East Airlines prepared to land at Beirut airport. We passed low over West Beirut, the sea to our right, and I was astonished at the destruction I saw below me, collapsed and burnt-out buildings, piles of rubble in the streets, even tanks and armoured cars. Suddenly there was a clatter to the side of the plane as if a handful of stones had been thrown against it. The pilot poured on the power and turned away steeply towards the sea.

‘Ladies and gentlemen, we have a security problem and have to take avoiding action. We are going to approach the runway from the other end. Please be calm, there is no danger, the aircraft is all right,’ was the message over the intercom.

A security problem? I was off to a good start then… we were warned to prepare for a rough landing, because we had to land from the south, with the wind under our coat tails.

And indeed the landing was pretty rough as predicted. We bounced over the runway and I heard a bang coming from the right hand landing gear. From the window I saw a tyre fly to shreds. The pilot reversed the engines and gave full power, stopping us safely about 200 yards from the end of the runway. The Lebanese army cordoned off the aircraft and after half an hour a rolling stairway was brought up, and a few buses appeared to take us to the terminal. When I descended the stairs with my hand luggage, I looked aside at the plane. There was an innocent-looking pattern of holes in the side. We had been fired at, apparently by an idiot with a small calibre weapon. That the bullets hadn’t passed right through was a miracle.

Welcome to Beirut.

A taxi cab took me to a cheap hotel in the eastern sector, where I’d stay during my interviews for a temporary job as a logistics manager at the local Field Office of the UNRWA.

That night I heard rifle fire and explosions from the western sector of the city. Sleep wouldn’t come to me.

* * *

Beirut in pre-civil war days (1973)

 

 Transporting humanitarian goods wasn’t without risk. One example was a lorry that arrived with bullet holes in its cab. The driver was spooked as some wag fired at him from behind with an automatic weapon. He had stepped on the gas and made himself scarce double quick. Luckily, his cargo of building blocks had stopped most of the bullets, and his tyres hadn’t burst. He had skirted a Shiite village where recently Iranian troublemakers had arrived to train the local militia. Apparently, from a misplaced sense of fun, they had used his lorry for target practice. The trouble with Iranian infiltrators was on the increase since the Islamic revolution in Tehran, not a year previously. We found a new route for the lorries, which was more roundabout but safer. Exploring safe routes to transport food and building materials became our first priority.

Even driving around in a white car with the letters UN on the side and a blue flag at the antenna didn’t guarantee safety: once I was shot at from a house somewhere along the road. The Lebanese army belonging to the Gemayel government was useless - they only came out of their barracks when the Palestinians or Amal had been shooting.

Supplying the Mar Elias camp in West Beirut was a risky business. West Beirut was an enclave run by the PLO and also known as the Fakhani Republic, after the neighbourhood where the PLO had its headquarters, but Mar Elias had a mainly Christian population. The camp was guarded by falangists, who tried to keep the Palestinians at a distance. Beyond the ‘green line’, the Damascus Road that separated the western sector from the eastern one, the streets were largely ruined, so you had to drive avoiding the piles of rubble. Our lorries didn’t want to run into an obstacle, because those spots were a popular location for snipers lying in wait along the approach route.

If you had to stop, you were at risk of coming under fire. Once the driver of one of our lorries was killed on the way, which resulted in his employer throwing in the towel. Eventually we fitted thick steel sheets to the cabin doors, painted white with the legend UN on it, which hopefully offered the men a little protection from the side.

I had once been to Mar Elias, and I’d rather not remember. On the way, a heavy rocket hit a building not two hundred yards in front of us. The building collapsed - a minute later and we’d have been flattened. The road was blocked, so we turned around like greased lightning, and made ourselves scarce before being shot at.

* * *

During the third return trip to Beirut in Aizdihar we were intercepted by an Israeli patrol boat. We had just left Beirut harbour, when they came tearing up from the south with a great white bow wave, doing at least thirty knots. Just outside the harbour we were ordered in Arabic through the loudhailer, to stop and await a boarding party.

‘Better stop the ship,’ I said to Hakim, who stopped the engine. We rounded up to the slight sea and started wallowing to the waves set up by the Israeli boat, which came alongside and slammed against us with its rubber protection strake.

They came aboard, four men, all armed to the teeth, star of David on their sleeves, helmets, bullet-proof vests, sunglasses, walkie-talkies and a bad attitude.

‘Papers,’ commanded the sergeant leading the men, in Arabic.

‘I suppose you mean papers, please,’ I replied in English. I showed my UNRWA identity card. ‘You are interfering with a humanitarian mission of the United Nations, in Lebanese waters. Who the hell are you, and what are you thinking of?’

They recoiled a little, having expected a Lebanese skipper, not a foreigner who wasn’t intimidated but talked back to them.

‘We are fully authorised by the Lebanese government.’

‘Only for waters south of Tyre,’ I replied calmly. ‘You have no business here. Do you wish your representative at the United Nations to be called to account?’

‘You can say what you like, but we want to know what you are up to.’

‘I will speak to your commanding officer. He is welcome to talk with me.’

The sergeant spoke in his walkie-talkie. The answer wasn’t long in waiting. I was handcuffed and bundled off to the Israeli boat. There I was shoved into a cabin with an armed chap at the door, who kept me at gunpoint as if I were a common terrorist. For a few hours we proceeded south at a leisurely pace, then we lay stopped for a moment before I heard the engines roar and we went off at thirty knots.

Towards evening the boat entered the naval harbour of Haifa. There I was thrown into a police car, carted off to what looked like a police station, and put into a room, my handcuffs removed.

A civilian entered the room, sat behind the table and stared at me without speaking a word.

* * *

Want to read more? The new book is available as a paperback and an e-book from my website.

 

 

Quo usque tandem

Parallels with ancient Rome

I am warped for life, having been taught Latin, ancient Greek and classical history in school. You might call it a privileged education, and I have to thank my parents for sending me there. Even though I didn’t go to University but to sea, it gave me my knack of languages and a wide horizon, including an insatiable interest in history.

I am not the first to see the parallels between Donald Trump and an erratic Roman emperor, nor will I be the last. Search the internet for the combination of names, and you will find many references, such as this one. I had prepared a treatise on Donald Trump and the Roman emperors Caligula and Nero, but to be honest I am so sick of seeing his hateful face in the media, that perhaps I should desist. 

https://claridadpuertorico.com/caligula-trump-y-el-premio-nobel/

So let me write something about ancient Rome, indicate a few parallels and leave you to draw your own conclusions.

The Roman Republic

Rome was founded around 753BC and initially comprised a few settlements around the Palatine hill and surrounding farmland in a region called Latium. The first 250 years it was a kingdom, during which formative years the foundations were laid for the later republic as the settlement developed into a large town. The final king of Rome was Tarquinius Superbus, who ruled as a tyrant. Tarquin's reign, according to the Wikipedia article, is remembered for his use of violence and intimidation to control the population, and his disrespect for Roman tradition and the Senate. In the present-day context it rings a bell, doesn’t it?

After Tarquin was overthrown, the Senate and its elected leaders, the Consuls, were in power. It goes too far to try and describe in a few words the intricacies of the Roman Republic, the class society that Rome was and its complicated political system. The Republic effectively was an elected oligarchy, where powerful families dominated the key positions. They were in a perpetual state of war with their neighbours in the Italian peninsula and everyone else in the Mediterranean. Politics within the Republic had violent traits: some influential politicians didn’t hesitate to silence or murder opponents using armed gangs.

The story of Rome at the end of the Republic was admirably written by Colleen McCullough, who has studied in depth the period from Gaius Marius (another villain) to Emperor Augustus.

Catiline and the lost election of 63 BC

During the final years of the republic, a senator called Lucius Sergius Catilina (Catiline) tried to topple the Consuls and the Senate. One of the elected Consuls, Marcus Tullius Cicero, a famous orator, tackled him in the Senate.

The Wikipedia article on Catiline says the following:

The first speech was given in the senate, where Cicero accused a senator, Catiline, of leading a plot to overthrow the republic; in response, Catiline withdrew from the city and joined an uprising in Etruria. The next two speeches were given before the people, with Cicero justifying his actions as well as relating further news of the conspiracy...

Cicero accusing Catiline in 63 BC

Cesare Maccari from Instagram, via Wikipedia

It all revolved around an electoral issue - in 63 BC, Catiline had run for Consul, promoting a populist agenda, but had been defeated by Cicero and didn’t accept the result (nothing new then!). To all accounts Catiline then tried to overthrow the Republic in the following year. He was killed in an armed encounter in January, 62 BC (note that the BC years are numbered backwards).

Catiline's name became synonymous with treasonous rebellion. Gaius Sallustius Crispus, in his work on the conspiracy (Bellum Catilinae) describes Catiline as an example of the Republic’s moral decline, although not just as a perpetrator but also as a victim of intrigue, perhaps pointing the finger at the system rather than the person.

Quo usque tandem

Years ago, when one of my sons completed a classical education similar to mine, the school arranged an excursion to Rome for interested parents, accompanied by a few of the teachers giving us a wonderful in-depth explanation of ancient Rome. The most hilarious moment was when one of them, with the group gathered round in the Curia, the restored Senate building on the Forum, imitated Marcus Tullius Cicero, roaring the first line of his speech against Catiline:

"Quo usque tandem, Catilina, abuteris patientia nostra?"

 

It fairly echoed around the building, but the security men must have been warned beforehand, because we weren’t arrested. Here are the full opening lines of the speech against Catiline by Cicero in 63 BC. 

Quo usque tandem abutere, Catilina, patientia nostra? 

Quam diu etiam furor iste tuus nos eludet? 

Quem ad finem sese effrenata iactabit audacia?

For how long, Catiline, will you abuse our patience? 

How long is that madness of yours still to mock us? 

When will that unbridled arrogance come to an end?

Mad emperors

The Roman Empire effectively started with the adopted son of the dictator Gaius Julius Caesar, a man named Gaius Octavius, aka Augustus, who won the power struggle following the assassination of Caesar in 44 BC, and founded the Julian-Claudian dynasty of Roman emperors.

The tale of the emperors is well described in I, Claudius by Robert Graves, and the sequel Claudius the God.

The emperors succeeding Augustus in the first Century AD (Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius and Nero) suffered from the madness peculiar to absolute power. Caligula used the motto oderint dum metuant - let them hate me if only they fear me. Well, we know a few others of that type. 

Caligula

source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ny_Carlsberg_Glyptotek 

He is said to have appointed his horse Incitatus as a consul, just because he had the power to, and in doing so ridiculed the Senate and the office of Consul as useless institutions. DOGE avant la lettre? And Nero, after the death of his mother Agrippina who had kept him on a short leash, was susceptible to prodigious flattery. A century previously, Catilina tried to turn an election by rebellion. Throw Tarquin, Catiline and the mad emperors all into one, and you’ll have… exactly, Donald Trump! 

I’m not sure what moves Trump and I don’t think I want to know. In one year he bombed eight countries in three continents, cast his net at Venezuela, Greenland and Mauritius, and whoever opposes him, he blackmails with import tariffs. His latest tantrums are blaming Norway for not awarding him the Nobel Peace Prize (which Norway has no sway in), and letting the EU suffer for not giving up Greenland. Ira principis mors est - the wrath of the Leader means death. Not literally, I hope.

Quo usque tandem, Donald, abuteris patientia nostra?

Sallust seems to implicate that Catiline wasn’t just a perpetrator but also an exponent of the Roman Republican system. That is equally applicable to the United States. Looking at the complicated election system and its almost Roman susceptibility to money and power play, it is no surprise that three times in a row presidents were elected of doubtful capability: Trump, of whom I said enough, Joe Biden, who definitely was past his prime, and now again Trump.

One year down, three to go in this perfect storm, hoping he doesn’t wreck us all. And the one we’ll have to watch is the man waiting in the shadows: J.D.Vance.