Thursday, March 30, 2006
Ranier and Daphne go digging
Statue of Greek satyr (circa 500 BC)
Archaeological digs seem to have been on naughty Daphne’s mind too (besides “w****” - she means "willy" which sounds a bit Famous Five). “Fertility cults in the information age” kicks off a little sneering romp with this gem:
"Thousands of years after the building of the temples at Hagar Qim and Tarxien, we appear to be intent on creating yet another fertility cult, as if to prove that we are barely out of the Stone Age when it comes to intellectual and spiritual development".
While we tend to agree with Daphne on the general intellectual backwater status of the island, we don’t share her assumption that the fertility cult statues which are being erected (ahem!) in unsuspecting village squares and on innocent roundabouts are necessarily proof of this intellectual backwardness.
We were once informed by a blonde Swedish student (during one of the many good old English language school summers) that the ‘advanced’ Scandinavians have a fertility cult of their own – and it’s a national holiday, to boot. Daphne may want to book a flight and join in the fun. See here and here for more info. It’s called the Midsummer Festival.
We’ll grant Daphne this: it's got a whole different aura to Paul Vincenti cutting ribbons in Naxxar. And it sure looks like more fun than a solitary cock on a roundabout.
¶ 6:40 AM 
Statue of Greek satyr (circa 500 BC)
The new pro-life statue in my home-town of Naxxar (2006 AD) has got our beloved opinion columnists into a bit of a frenzy.
Ranier Fsadni, a nice chap who tries to inject a bit of ‘general culture’ into The Times’ pages, went all sci-fi and H.G. Wells on us today in this piece, projecting Malta into ‘the year 2156’ in a world where things have gone all topsy-turvy. Fsadni imagines a spectacular inversion of roles: after 2013, Malta has become a vociferous pro-choice nation while all other members of the ‘Eurasian Union’ have turned into convinced pro-lifers (possibly due to the massive impact of the Britney and the Wolf monument).
Fsadni fantasises about 'cultural historians' of the future accidentally digging up the Naxxar statue. Ranier pictures them, as if in front of Tutankhamen's sarcophagus, solving the riddle to Malta’s mysterious pro-life u-turn. Only it's not quite an Egyptian mummy they come across but the Fenech Adami/Gift of Life statue. In what may be termed a IOTT (Intellectually Over The Top) moment, Fsadni imagines the poor sods concluding that:
“(the statue's symbolism - a woman standing alone with her foetus) showed clearly that there was a point where the anti-abortion Maltese adopted the unspoken assumptions of pro-choice Euro-America (as it was then).”
As opposed to them, say, just brushing it aside as another crap piece of “ultra-kitch island art”.
Ranier Fsadni, a nice chap who tries to inject a bit of ‘general culture’ into The Times’ pages, went all sci-fi and H.G. Wells on us today in this piece, projecting Malta into ‘the year 2156’ in a world where things have gone all topsy-turvy. Fsadni imagines a spectacular inversion of roles: after 2013, Malta has become a vociferous pro-choice nation while all other members of the ‘Eurasian Union’ have turned into convinced pro-lifers (possibly due to the massive impact of the Britney and the Wolf monument).
Fsadni fantasises about 'cultural historians' of the future accidentally digging up the Naxxar statue. Ranier pictures them, as if in front of Tutankhamen's sarcophagus, solving the riddle to Malta’s mysterious pro-life u-turn. Only it's not quite an Egyptian mummy they come across but the Fenech Adami/Gift of Life statue. In what may be termed a IOTT (Intellectually Over The Top) moment, Fsadni imagines the poor sods concluding that:
“(the statue's symbolism - a woman standing alone with her foetus) showed clearly that there was a point where the anti-abortion Maltese adopted the unspoken assumptions of pro-choice Euro-America (as it was then).”
As opposed to them, say, just brushing it aside as another crap piece of “ultra-kitch island art”.
One awaits with bated breath for an anti-divorce statue to crop up on the B'Kara bypass. That should drive Ranier nuts - just imagine the permutations.
Archaeological digs seem to have been on naughty Daphne’s mind too (besides “w****” - she means "willy" which sounds a bit Famous Five). “Fertility cults in the information age” kicks off a little sneering romp with this gem:
"Thousands of years after the building of the temples at Hagar Qim and Tarxien, we appear to be intent on creating yet another fertility cult, as if to prove that we are barely out of the Stone Age when it comes to intellectual and spiritual development".
While we tend to agree with Daphne on the general intellectual backwater status of the island, we don’t share her assumption that the fertility cult statues which are being erected (ahem!) in unsuspecting village squares and on innocent roundabouts are necessarily proof of this intellectual backwardness.
We were once informed by a blonde Swedish student (during one of the many good old English language school summers) that the ‘advanced’ Scandinavians have a fertility cult of their own – and it’s a national holiday, to boot. Daphne may want to book a flight and join in the fun. See here and here for more info. It’s called the Midsummer Festival.
We’ll grant Daphne this: it's got a whole different aura to Paul Vincenti cutting ribbons in Naxxar. And it sure looks like more fun than a solitary cock on a roundabout.
