GAZA STRIP - A Palestinian boy plays with a donkey outside his family's
makeshift home in the Khan Yunis refugee camp. Photo @MahmudHams: image via Frédérique Geffard @fgeffardAFP, 20 April 2017
"Tank man" cousin -- Caracas. [Juan Barreto AFP] Photo @GettyImages @CNNPhotos of the week: image via Reading The Pictures @ReadingThePix, 21 April 2017
#Iraq Iraqis help transport a wounded man lying on a wooden cart in west Mosul during #MosulOffensive @tofsimon #AFP: image via Frédérique Geffard @fgeffardAFP, 22 April 2017
#Venezuela
Demonstrators clash with the riot police during a protest against
Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, in Caracas. Photo @rschemidt: image via Frédérique Geffard @fgeffardAFP, 21 April 2017
GAZA STRIP - Gaza's sole power plant runs out of fuel. Photo @mohmdabed: image via Frédérique Geffard @fgeffardAFP, 21 April 2017
SYRIA - Syria evacuees on move again after 48-hour delay. Photo George Ourfalian: image via Frédérique Geffard @fgeffardAFP, 21 April 2017
#Iraq Children from west Mosul receive aid packages from volunteers on
the eastern side during #MosulOffensive Photo @tofsimon #AFP: image via Frédérique Geffard @fgeffardAFP, 21 April 2017
SYRIA
- A man flattens bread dough using a leftover rocket in the rebel-held
town of Douma, near Damascus. Photo @SameerAlDoumy #AFP: image via Frédérique Geffard @fgeffardAFP, 21 April 2017
WEST
BANK - A Palestinian protester throws rocks towards Israeli forces
during clashes in the West Bank village of Beita. Photo Jaafar Ashtiyeh: image via Frédérique Geffard @fgeffardAFP, 21 April 2017
OTD
in 1952, an atomic test in Nevada became the first nuclear explosion
shown on live network television as a 31-kiloton bomb was dropped: image via AP Images @AP_Images, 21 April 2017
#India Indian men catch fish in the River Yamuna in New Delhi. Photo
@Money_Sharma: image via Frédérique Geffard @fgeffardAFP, 21 April 2017
#Bulgaria People commute in a tram during a cold and wet day in Sofia. Photo @dilkoff: image via Frédérique Geffard @fgeffardAFP, 21 April 2017
SYRIA - Syrian evacuees stuck at site of deadly bombing. Photo @omar_hajkadour: image via Frédérique Geffard @fgeffardAFP, 21 April 2017
#Sri Lanka Sri Lankan workers sorts garbage at a dump in Karadiyana, a suburb of Colombo. Ishara S. Kodikara #AFP: image via Frédérique Geffard @fgeffardAFP, 21 April 2017
#Lebanon As Israel war rhetoric rises, Hezbollah runs border press tour. Photo @JOSEPHEID1: image via Frédérique Geffard @fgeffardAFP, 21 April 2017
#India Farmers separate husk from harvest wheat grain by using a harvester machine in a field on the outskirts of Alwar. Photo @dofaget: image via Frédérique Geffard @fgeffardAFP, 21 April 2017
#Sri Lanka A Sri Lankan worker pulls a cart beside garbage at a dump in Karadiyana, a suburb of Colombo. Photo Ishara S. Kodikar #AFP: image via Frédérique Geffard @fgeffardAFP, 20 April 2017
#Venezuela A demonstrator clashes with the riot police during a protest against Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, in Caracas. Photo @jbarreto1974: image via Frédérique Geffard @fgeffardAFP, 20 April 2017
#Sri Lanka Sri Lankan workers sorts garbage at a dump in Karadiyana, a suburb of Colombo. Ishara S. Kodikara #AFP: image via Frédérique Geffard @fgeffardAFP, 21 April 2017
#Lebanon As Israel war rhetoric rises, Hezbollah runs border press tour. Photo @JOSEPHEID1: image via Frédérique Geffard @fgeffardAFP, 21 April 2017
#India Farmers separate husk from harvest wheat grain by using a harvester machine in a field on the outskirts of Alwar. Photo @dofaget: image via Frédérique Geffard @fgeffardAFP, 21 April 2017
#Sri Lanka A Sri Lankan worker pulls a cart beside garbage at a dump in Karadiyana, a suburb of Colombo. Photo Ishara S. Kodikar #AFP: image via Frédérique Geffard @fgeffardAFP, 20 April 2017
#Venezuela A demonstrator clashes with the riot police during a protest against Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, in Caracas. Photo @jbarreto1974: image via Frédérique Geffard @fgeffardAFP, 20 April 2017
something amusing you probably didn't notice at the Easter Egg Roll
There was a snap from the WH #EasterEggRoll of some kids doodling. I spotted something amusing. I've zoomed in for your pleasure!: image via Restaurant Mom @restaurant_mom, 17 April 2017
Samuel Johnson: On the Death of Dr. Robert Levet
Balloons. Hoxton, East London..: photo by Becky Frances, 24 February 2017
Balloons. Hoxton, East London..: photo by Becky Frances, 24 February 2017
Balloons. Hoxton, East London..: photo by Becky Frances, 24 February 2017
Somovo, province of Voronezh, Russia: photo by alexntor, 2007
Condemn'd to hope's delusive mine,
As on we toil from day to day,
By sudden blasts, or slow decline,
Our social comforts drop away.
As on we toil from day to day,
By sudden blasts, or slow decline,
Our social comforts drop away.
Well tried through many a varying year,
See Levet to the grave descend;
Officious, innocent, sincere,
Of ev'ry friendless name the friend.
See Levet to the grave descend;
Officious, innocent, sincere,
Of ev'ry friendless name the friend.
Yet still he fills affection's eye,
Obscurely wise, and coarsely kind;
Nor, letter'd arrogance, deny
Thy praise to merit unrefin'd.
Obscurely wise, and coarsely kind;
Nor, letter'd arrogance, deny
Thy praise to merit unrefin'd.
When fainting nature call'd for aid,
And hov'ring death prepar'd the blow,
His vig'rous remedy display'd
The power of art without the show.
And hov'ring death prepar'd the blow,
His vig'rous remedy display'd
The power of art without the show.
In misery's darkest caverns known,
His useful care was ever nigh,
Where hopeless anguish pour'd his groan,
And lonely want retir'd to die.
His useful care was ever nigh,
Where hopeless anguish pour'd his groan,
And lonely want retir'd to die.
No summons mock'd by chill delay,
No petty gain disdain'd by pride,
The modest wants of ev'ry day
The toil of ev'ry day supplied.
No petty gain disdain'd by pride,
The modest wants of ev'ry day
The toil of ev'ry day supplied.
His virtues walk'd their narrow round,
Nor made a pause, nor left a void;
And sure th' Eternal Master found
The single talent well employ'd.
Nor made a pause, nor left a void;
And sure th' Eternal Master found
The single talent well employ'd.
The busy day, the peaceful night,
Unfelt, uncounted, glided by;
His frame was firm, his powers were bright,
Tho' now his eightieth year was nigh.
Unfelt, uncounted, glided by;
His frame was firm, his powers were bright,
Tho' now his eightieth year was nigh.
Then with no throbbing fiery pain,
No cold gradations of decay,
Death broke at once the vital chain,
And free'd his soul the nearest way.
No cold gradations of decay,
Death broke at once the vital chain,
And free'd his soul the nearest way.
Samuel Johnson (1709-1784): On the Death of Dr. Robert Levet, 1782
Swan Lake Nature Study Area wetlands, north of Reno, Nevada: photo by Ragesoss, 2007
Sunny Disposition. Peckham, London..: photo by Becky Frances, 11 March 2017
Sunny Disposition. Peckham, London..: photo by Becky Frances, 11 March 2017
Sunny Disposition. Peckham, London..: photo by Becky Frances, 11 March 2017
3 comments:
Samuel Johnson hated being alone. So from middle age onward, and particularly after the death of his wife Elizabeth in 1752, Johnson shared his house with a number of people, a group that included (at various times): Francis Barber, his Jamaica-born servant; Anna Williams, a blind poet who served as housekeeper and habitually stayed up to drink tea with Johnson before he went to bed; Elisabeth Desmoulins, the daughter of Johnson’s godfather who had been a companion to his late wife; and Poll Carmichael, a Scottish-born woman who may have been a prostitute. It was an odd group, united largely in their dependence on Johnson and their mutual dislike of each other, but collectively they maintained Johnson’s household and kept him company.
The longest-standing member of Johnson’s household was Robert Levet (1705-1782), who had a room in Johnson’s house for decades, perhaps starting as early as the late 1740s. What we know of Levet comes primarily from Johnson’s literary friends, who generally found their friendship to be an odd one. Levet was not formally educated, and was by all accounts fairly uncouth; scarred by smallpox, he was physically unattractive as well. James Boswell quoted Johnson as saying that “Levet is a brutal fellow; but I have a good regard for him, for his brutality is in his manners and not in his mind.” Johnson admired Levet’s piety and generosity. Levet had spent some time in Paris, where he waited tables at coffeehouses frequented by physicians. He got interested in medicine; he listened in on conversations and attended some lectures. Upon his return to London in the 1740s, he set up a medical practice among the poor, which he continued to his death. Johnson remarked that Levet’s patients often had nothing to pay him with but some gin, so he sometimes came home quite drunk after making his rounds; “perhaps the only man,” Johnson said, “who ever became intoxicated through motives of prudence.”
After Levet died of an apparent and unexpected heart attack in January 1782, Johnson wrote this moving elegy for his friend. Johnson never intended this poem for the press, but the manuscript made its way to the Gentleman’s Magazine, which published it in August 1783.
-- The Virginia Anthology
"The power of art without the show"---No better compliment than that.
Thanks, Terry. I'm always touched by Johnson's affection for this otherwise obscure man, of whom, without the poem, nothing at all would be known.
The highest function of poetry, to keep the memory green.
Becky Frances' wonderful photos were taken in streets Dr Johnson and Dr Levet may have once walked...
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