{"id":69106,"date":"2020-06-24T15:43:12","date_gmt":"2020-06-24T19:43:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thebookbeat.com\/backroom\/?p=69106"},"modified":"2020-07-17T19:32:05","modified_gmt":"2020-07-17T23:32:05","slug":"i-arrogantly-recommend-vol-2-4-by-tom-bowden","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thebookbeat.com\/backroom\/2020\/06\/24\/i-arrogantly-recommend-vol-2-4-by-tom-bowden\/","title":{"rendered":"I arrogantly recommend…vol.2 ,#4 by Tom Bowden"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>The World\u2019s Poorest President Speaks Out<\/a><\/em>
\nby Gaku Nakagawa and Yoshimi Kusaba
\nEnchanted Lion Books<\/p>\n

Jos\u00e9 Mujica served as Uruguay\u2019s president from 2010-2015. During that time, he donated 90% of his salary to charities, keeping for himself only $1,250 a month. Rather than move into the presidential residence after being elected, he stayed on his wife\u2019s farm, raising chrysanthemums and chickens (all free-range, apparently). Rather than be driven about in a chauffer-driven limousine and a cortege of armed guards, he drove himself to and from the capitol in his ’60s-era VW Beetle<\/a>. Under Mujica, \u201cthe Uruguayan economy . . . post[ed] consistent growth in GDP and per capita GDP while maintaining low unemployment rates.\u201d It also became \u201cthe first South American country to allow abortions up to the 12th week of pregnancy,\u201d and \u201cthe second country in Latin America to legalize same-sex marriage.\u201d However, despite these significant achievements, \u201cMujica was constitutionally prohibited from seeking a second, consecutive term\u201d (Encyclopedia Britannica).<\/p>\n

In 2012, he was invited to speak at the Rio +20 United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development<\/a>. The World\u2019s Poorest President <\/em>begins at the start of Mujica\u2019s day then: working his fields with a tractor; feeding his chickens, then his dogs, then himself; putting on clean clothes; and finally driving off in his Beetle to Rio de Janeiro to give his speech. The text of the book is an edited version of that speech.<\/p>\n

Our civilization is based upon eternal expansion of consumption, he says; and expansion depends upon focusing on how to make more money for ourselves rather than on how to make lives better for everyone. Ultimately, we cannot agree on the terms of sustainability if we live according to the principal of attending to our personal needs at the expense of those worse off than ourselves.<\/p>\n

My message is very simple: Economic growth and progress must add to human happiness: having satisfying relationships with others; raising children; making friends; spreading love in the world.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Note: Although this is a picture book, it is definitely one that will require an older reader for the text. The pictures are great and can be de-coded pretty easily. But the text is (I\u2019m guessing) at the 6th<\/sup> or 7th<\/sup> grade level at least. There is a chance this is really a book for adults gussied up as one for kids: matching the simplicity of the message to the simplicity of the images.<\/p>\n

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\"\"<\/a>Thrust: A Spasmodic Pictorial History of the Codpiece<\/a> in Art <\/em>by Michael Glover<\/a>, David Zwirner Books<\/p>\n

The piece of attire closest to the codpiece in men\u2019s clothing today is the athletic cup. Unlike the codpiece, however, the cup is hidden and meant to protect, whereas the codpiece was visible and meant to provoke\u2014and more:<\/p>\n

What was it used for, then, other than to exaggerate and adorn the mighty male organ of generation? Well, as a pocket for one thing. Or, stuffed with straw or horsehair, for shapeliness\u2019s sake, it could help protect the more beautiful outer surface of one\u2019s stockings against staining from smeary ointment used to treat syphilis. . . It could be used to hang things from. .<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Decorative and practical\u2014who could knock the pragmatism? The fashion trend lasted about 50 years, during the latter half of the 16th<\/sup> century, and was widely depicted in artworks created in the leading nations of the day\u2014Italy and Germany, England and France (the provenances of the artists used to exemplify Glover\u2019s theme). Glover is our docent, and Hans Holbein the Younger, Peter Bruegel the Elder, Titian, and other painters, illustrators, and etchers from the period provide the evidence for his claims. Glover\u2019s wide-ranging historical and artistic references are tempered with a tongue-not-quite-in-cheek narrative that amuses and educates\u2014another pragmatic value.<\/p>\n