Tag Archives: The Week

How Cleopatra Became a Canvas for Society’s Anxieties

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One more article for The Week ends 2019 for me, a year that has been something of a roller coaster ride. This year I decided to become more serious about freelance writing, and these articles that I have been writing for The Week is the result of that decision.

Please enjoy this investigation into how and why Cleopatra continues to intrigue us more than 2,000 years after she died.

Happy New Year!

How Cleopatra Became a Canvas for Society’s Anxieties.

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Two-thousand years after her death, Cleopatra continues to enthrall us. Earlier this year, the British tabloid The Daily Star reported that a new movie about this last Pharaoh of Egypt was in the works. According to an anonymous source, the movie will be “a dirty, bloody, political thriller told from a feminist perspective,” as opposed to the movie Cleopatra of 1963 starring Elizabeth Taylor, which had been a historical epic.

Our fascination with Cleopatra endures because we know surprisingly little about her. And what we do know is based purely on speculation. This lack of information makes Cleopatra the perfect canvas onto which…

Please click here if you wish to read the entire article.

In the words of my friend, the Australian, I shall return.

What the Moomins Can Tell Us About Fighting Climate Despair

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On November 29, 2019, I published the following piece for The Week. I honestly didn’t expect editor Jessica Hullinger to choose this topic out of the several pitches I sent her, because Moomins are a bit obscure in the US. But I am very happy that she saw the appeal in this alternative reading of the first two books about the Moomins that Tove Jansson ever wrote. Enjoy!

What the Moomins Can Tell Us About Fighting Climate Despair.

What the Moomins Can Tell Us about Fighting Climate Despair | The Week.com | The Boomerang

Climate change is real, no matter what some would have us believe. In this past summer’s heat wave over Europe, the Arctic region of Scandinavia experienced temperatures up to 101 degrees, while the ice cap of Greenland is melting at the rate projected for the year 2070. Meanwhile, Australia is experiencing yet another year of unprecedented drought, at the same time as the American Midwest has been fighting against the overflowing Mississippi River after too much rain. It is becoming increasingly clear that climate change is not a problem we will need to deal with sometime in the future. It is happening now.

Grappling with the magnitude of climate change causes what is known as climate despair, which is the overwhelming sense that…

Please click here if you’d like to read the article in its entirety.

In the words of my friend, the Australian, I shall return.

The Myth of the Viking Warrior Woman

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I’m back on The Week!

The Myth of the Viking Warrior Woman

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In 2017, a team of Swedish archaeologists announced an exciting discovery: They had, for the first time, identified the remains of a Viking woman warrior. A DNA analysis of a Viking Age skeleton previously thought to be male had turned out to be female. The skeleton in question was originally discovered in 1878 in a grave known as Bj. 581 at the Swedish Viking Age trading town of Birka. Lacking the scientific knowledge available today to determine the biological sex of human remains, the 19th-century archaeologists looked at the objects buried with the skeleton — weapons like swords and spears, shields, and even the remains of several horses — and declared the human remains to have belonged to a male warrior. The modern DNA result proved this theory wrong.

The tale of the Viking woman warrior from Birka continues to capture our imaginations. She has even been….

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In the words of my friend, the Australian, I shall return.

Catch me on Australian radio.

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The feeling when your voice has been heard in a place where you have never been is an interesting one. A few weeks back I did an interview with radio host Amanda Vanstone for her radio show Counterpoint on ABC Australia. The topic was my article for The Week about Viking runestones being the original tweets.

You can listen to Amanda’s conversation with me by clicking here. My segment is the fourth segment of the program.

Runestones the First Tweets |The Week |The Boomerang

Runestone Sö 106. Source: Riksantikvarieämbetet/Swedish National Heritage Board.

In the words of my friend, the Australian, I shall return.

I’m on The Week.

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On June 10, 2019, I published the following article on The Week. I had so much fun writing this article. I could talk about runestones all day.

Viking Runestones Were the Original Tweets.

Runestones the First Tweets |The Week |The Boomerang

Runestone Sö 106. Source: Riksantikvarieämbetet/Swedish National Heritage Board.

In the remote Swedish countryside, a 1,000-year-old stone slab stands raised by the side of a road. Chiseled onto it, a message has been carved in runes — symbols that served as letters in the ancient Germanic alphabet. The runes tell onlookers that a man named Alrik commissioned and raised this stone slab in commemoration of his father, Spjut, a Viking famous for destroying and laying siege to fortifications in the west. Alrik basks in the glory of Spjut’s accomplishments: “Alrik raised the stone, son of Sigrid, after his father Spjut, he in the west had been, castle he had broken and conquered. The arts of the siege, he knew them all.”

Thousands of Viking Age runestones like this one dot the Swedish landscape, providing direct glimpses into the lives of the Vikings. The messages are short, self-expressive, and, for us onlookers, very out-of-context. More often than not, they contain the unsolicited opinions of the person who commissioned the stone. In many ways, these ancient dispatches are similar to another, more modern style of communication: tweets.

If you would like to read the article in its entirety, please click here.

In the words of my friend, the Australian, I shall return.