Southern Cross Review

Review of fiction, education, science, current events,
essays, book reviews, poetry and Anthroposophy

Number 79, November - December 2011



Girl with Guitar by Anders Zorn - Sweden 1860 - 1920

Anders Leonard Zorn (February 18, 1860 � August 22, 1920) was one of Sweden�s foremost artists who obtained international success as a painter, sculptor and printmaker in etching.


Editor's Page

Is Unemployment Here to Stay? by Frank Thomas Smith

  
It was 15 years ago in Helsinki, Finland. I was attending a conference of the Association for Social Development, an international group of anthroposophically oriented organization development consultants. A Danish consultant gave a talk which I will never forget. An attractive woman in her forties – I guessed – she smiled once upon being introduced (I forget her name, so I'll call her Ingrid.) and once at the end of her talk. What she said in between was serious indeed. She specialized in unemployment – not how to avoid or overcome it, but what to do, as an employer, when it happens. And, as far as we as consultants were concerned, what to advise the employer to do when he must fire someone...Read more


Features

One Citizen’s Misadventure in Securityland by Ann Jones

  
Where did I go wrong? Was it playing percussion with an Occupy Wall Street band in Times Square when I was in New York recently? Or was it when I returned to my peaceful new home in Oslo and deleted an email invitation to hear Newt Gingrich lecture Norwegians on the American election? (Yes, even here.) I don’t know how it happened. Or even, really, what happened. Or what it means.  So I’ve got no point -- only a lot of anxiety. I usually write about the problems of the world, but now I’ve got one of my own. They evidently think I’m a terrorist...Read more

Swiss parliament to discuss cow horns by Ruth Zbinden

  
While the rest of world is worried about terrorism, the Greek default and unemployment, the Swiss Parliament will shortly have to deal with the question of whether cows should keep their horns or not. An initiative by Swiss citizens has recently put forward a draft parliamentary bill dealing with this issue, which has been signed by an astounding number of people. They are campaigning for the introduction of a form of husbandry which takes account of the true nature of the animals and are no longer willing to accept the rise in the mutilation of cows. According to the bill, farmers who allow their animals to keep their horns should be reimbursed one Swiss franc per cow per day by the government. ... Read more



Fiction

Streetcars and Green Stockings by Frank Thomas Smith

  

A lecture wasn't exactly what I had in mind for the evening, but there we were, Katrina and I, approaching the hall where it was to take place. A full moon shone into the narrow cobblestoned street. Its presence more or less guaranteed that there would be no more snow that night. That same day, I think it was early afternoon, I had boarded a streetcar and found a spot among the standees, when the clasp on my briefcase somehow opened as we rounded a sharp curve and the books and papers tumbled out. I bent to retrieve them and fell against another standee, knocking her over and falling almost on top of her. Her long skirt hitched up somewhat and I noticed that she wore green stockings... Read more




The Chess Player by Herman Hesse

  
This seemed to me to be worth looking into and I went in at this door. I found myself in a quiet twilit room where a man with something like a large chessboard in front of him sat in Eastern fashion on the floor. At first glance I thought it was friend Pablo. He wore at any rate a similar gorgeous silk jacket and had the same dark and shining eyes.
�Are you Pablo?� I asked.
�I am not anybody,� he replied amiably. �We have no names here and we are not anybody. I am a chess player. Do you wish for instruction in building up your personality?�... Read more



Anthroposophy


Esoteric Lessons for the First Class of the School for Spiritual Science at the Goetheanum -
Lesson One
by Rudolf Steiner

Introduction:
During the re-founding of the Anthroposophical Society at Christmas 1923, Rudolf Steiner also reconstituted the “Esoteric School” which had originally functioned in Germany from 1904 until 1914, when the outset of the First World War made it's continuance impossible. However, the original school was only for a relatively few selected individuals, whereas the new school was incorporated into the School for Spiritual Science at the Goetheanum in Dornach, Switzerland.
...Read more


Karmic Relations, Volume 1, Lecture 12 by Rudolf Steiner

Yesterday I gave you pictures of two or three personalities. In order to allow for the possibility of proof and confirmation, at least as far as external details are concerned; it is necessary to choose fairly well-known personalities and in describing them to you I have pointed in each case to characteristic qualities which can afford clues for the spiritual scientific investigator and help him to follow up the karmic relationships. This time I have chosen subjects which will also enable me to deal with a problem that has been put to me by members of our Society. Simply stated, it is as follows. Constantly, on every suitable occasion, reference is made — and of course correctly — to the fact that in very early times there were Initiates possessed of a lofty wisdom and at a high stage of development, and the question arises: If human beings pass through repeated earth-lives, where are these highly-initiated personalities? Where are they today? Are they to be found among the human beings who have been led to reincarnation at the present time? I have accordingly chosen examples which will enable me to deal with this very problem... Read more


Poetry

Hungry Ghosts and other poems
by Claudia Grinnell

  
Night drapes the bayou where cats raise a ruckus over bone
Meal. Fresh fish preferred over vegetable alternatives. What a cat does
Out of sight remains a secret to those who prefer to think
They exercise power connected to ownership. Ownership valued above all
Other forms of control. The point of the pyramid is control: the all-seeing
Eye. The eye reaches up your skirt, over your hose, fondles your secret Benchmark. Just us blind people may be held back at certain primary levels...
...Read more

She Walks in Beauty (and more) by Lord Byron

   
SHE walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that's best of dark and bright
Meet in her aspect and her eyes:
Thus mellow'd to that tender light
Which heaven to gaudy day denies...
  Read more



Letters to the Editor

  
Comment about the Steiner karma lecture: The story of Garibaldi's love is just slightly inaccurate, as if small details matter. Anita's father had already passed away for years when Garibaldi spotted her in his telescope (it seems to be true), she lived then with her first husband, who she abandoned to follow Garibaldi. It was a really bad thing to do back then so her story was somewhat modified to omit it in the history books.
Couldn't you have 'like' buttons and comment boxes in SCR? :)) Read more




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Frank Thomas Smith, Editor
JoAnn Schwarz, Associate Editor
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