'Defending your character is not an interesting intellectual exercise'

A very interesting interview with Ian Buruma in OpenDemocracy.

Even the cows want to leave

From the 'Eastern Approaches' page of The Economist website:

'The Belarus Free Theatre has both talent and courage, as its production of Numbers shows. Miming sketches and theatrical metaphors are enhanced by dry and often bizarre statistics projected on to a wall: 72% of Belarusians find it difficult to define the word "democracy"… every third Belarusian died in the second world war… over 40% of the adult population want to leave the country… on October 15th 2006, 242 Belarusian cows broke through an electric fence, swam over the Bug river and illegally crossed the border into Poland. According to the Polish border guards, this was the first case of such a mass crossing of domestic animals to the EU. Just imagine.'

Camouflage

Vasily Grossman

Thanks to the LRB, an interview with his daughter.