Classic Literature produced by Slaves

The first was Aesop, born in Phrygia Major at about 620 B.C. He was a slave of Xanthus, who favoured him. He left Xanthus for the service of Iadmon, who employed him as a confidential advisor.

Plutarch (of "Parallel Lives" fame) writes that Aesop was also at the court of Croesus, king of Lydia, famed for his legendary wealth. Aesop also visited many places, teaching people by his Fables.

Once King Croesus, sent Aesop as his ambassador to distribute a large sum of silver  to the citizens of Delphi. But the Delphians were so greedy that no plan of Aesop for the equitable distribution of silver suited them. Disgusted, Aesop sent the silver back to the King. The enraged Delphians hurled Aesop from a high cliff. Thus he met his end in about 564 B.C.

About 330 fables are ascribed to him.

Unlike Aesop, who was a historical figure, Uncle Remus was a fictional Black slave created by Joel Chandler Harris. He narrates his tales of Brer Rabbit, Brer Fox & other anthropomorphic animals to the young son of his master. The stories appeared in late 19th Century onwards, set in the deep south of U.S.A & are unique in following the black oral tradition with its special dialect.

There are 185 stories in all & the uniqueness is in Brer Rabbit, being the most vulnerable animal of his predatory community, managing to survive, using his deviousness, much like the blacks of his time surviving, in spite of the odds being stacked against them.

Need of the hour: Culture Shaming

Nowadays, most are familiar with body shaming (unkindness towards obese people), status shaming (looking down on people lower down the social scale), contempt for those with a less paying or less powerful job, or even with those having a less expensive car. All these are only symptomatic of a mean, materialistic mind.

What is needed more in our society, is encouraging people to be more civilised,  cultured & interested in things which makes mankind different from animals. If need be, even culture shaming could be pressed into service into making philistines aware of their cultural inadequacies irrespective of their wealth or even academic education or status.

An example is in Agatha Christie's "Lord Edgware Dies". Lady Edgware, for reasons of her own, wants to dispose of his lordship. So she hires a famous impersonator & mimic to impersonate her at a dinner party (& give her an alibi) while she goes & kills her husband. The problem is one of these identical looking ladies is quite cultured & knows her Homer whereas the other is a philistine & knows Paris only as the city of fashion & not a Paris who abducted Helen of Troy in Homer's Iliad, & makes a fool of herself by exhibiting her ignorance of Homer.

This discrepancy leads eventually to solving the murder. So this shows how important it is to have at least a smattering of culture to be considered civilised.

The Antigone Complex - Ethics & the invention of feminine desire by Cecilia Sjoholm

What if psychoanalysis had chosen Antigone rather than Oedipus? 

Freud's notion of the Oedipus complex had proven to be an inadequate model for the understanding of femininity & feminine desire for many of those engaged in that issue from a social or political viewpoint, & Antigone enables us to discuss some of the most pertinent questions from new angles.

George Steiner, who considers Antigone to be the most canonical text of the West, posed the question. This book traces the relation between ethics & desire in important philosophical texts that focus on femininity & use Antigone as their model. It shows that the notion of feminine desire is conditioned by a view of women as being prone to excesses & deficiencies in relation to ethical norms & rules. Sjoholm explains Mary Wollstonecraft's work, as well as readings of Antigone by G.W.F.Hegel, Martin Heidegger, Luce Ingaray, Jacques Lacan & Judith Butler.

Table of contents:

1.⁠ ⁠Morality & the invention of feminine desire

2.⁠ ⁠Sexuality versus Recognition: Feminine Desire in the ethical order

3.⁠ ⁠The Purest Poem.... Heidegger's Antigone

4.⁠ ⁠From Oedipus to Antigone: Revisiting the question of feminine desire

5.⁠ ⁠Family Politics/Family Ethics: Butler, Lacan, & the Thing beyond the Object.