The Centaur
“In the 20th century we have discovered that rational thought by itself leads to disaster. We need to balance our minds with another type of discourse: that of myth” says Mythic Thought Professor Juan José Prat.
Prof. Prat has devoted his academic research to the study of verbal culture, with a special focus on the relation between orality and scripture.
Besides research and his classes on mythic thought, Professor Prat loves music. He has edited guitar pieces by 19th century Spanish composer Fernando Sor, and is currently working on the transcription and adaptation of piano music from the late 19th century for an amateur chamber ensemble comprised of strings, woodwind and guitar.
He is also the author of the only general history of folkloristics ever written. This extensive work, published in 2008 under the title of Bajo el árbol del paraíso (Under the Tree of Paradise), presents an analysis of the various – and sometimes ludicrous – theories formulated since the Renaissance about folklore fact and production by the urban literate world.
As you can see he is quite the walking encyclopedia, but most importantly he is just a really nice person to hang out with!!! He even manages to fit some short stories into this video. Don’t miss the one about the centaur!
A Tale of Two Cities
History Prof. Rolf Strom-Olsen meets at the Hay Festivals in Budapest and Segovia Georg von Habsburg and Lucy Kellaway.
Originally from Canada, history Professor Rolf Strom-Olsen is a man of more than one city. But if we stick to two here, it’s only because we must put numbers and limits to everything we do and say.
Rolf is conversant in various languages and has travelled extensively around the world. However,this is not what makes him a citizen of the world. Rather, it’s that, when speaking with him, one senses that he utterly and wholeheartedly believes in certain universal things; he would, I think, even draw the sword for them. Canadians are a bit like Spaniards in this sense, a bit of a crazy bunch.
In this video, he freely and humorously speaks at the Budapest and Segovia Hay Festivals with Georg von Habsburg and Lucy Kellaway. Georg is undoubtelly full of history and knowledge, but what he does best in this particular video is drive Rolf around Budapest. Lucy is quite simply full of life, wit, and anything you believe makes good company, just like that.
By the way, if you have never been to a Hay Festivals, just check when and where in the world the next one is taking place; because if you don’t go, you are missing something, and I mean it.
“A wonderful fact to reflect upon, that every human creature is constituted to be that profound secret and mystery to every other. A solemn consideration, when I enter a great city by night, that every one of those darkly clustered houses encloses its own secret; that every room in every one of them encloses its own secret; that every beating heart in the hundreds of thousands of breasts there, is, in some of its imagin-ings, a secret to the heart nearest it! “ (A tale of two cities by Charles Dickens).
Photo Professor Rolf Strom-Olsen in theotherphoto.blogs.ie.edu
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When I spoke with Prof. Marie José Garot back in June, I learned that she loves XIXth century French literature and in particular Les Misérables by Victor Hugo. Well, the next thing I knew, I was reading that book all summer at a pace of 3 hours per day till I found myself crying while reading the last page of Jean Valjean’s marvelous story. I just didn´t want it to finish.
I suppose I found a way for it to continue with the shooting of this video, in which Prof. Garot ponders the meaning of Justice and Law, and the European Union, while making reference to Victor Hugo, who was apparently among the first to think about The United States of Europe. Where else to film this video but in the incredible surrounding of Segovia´s former prison?
I leave with you a quote from Les Misérables and the good feeling I had shooting this video with Prof. Garot. Strangely enough I studied law myself, but for longer than I wished. If only I was a student again, I would love to have her as my Professor of Law.
“Have no fear of robbers and murderers. Such dangers are without, and are but petty. We should fear ourselves. Prejudices are the real robbers; vices the real murderers. The great dangers are within us. What matters what threatens our heads and our purses? Let us think of what threatens our souls.”
Going to the Top
Hungarians are the only ones capable of entering a revolving door last and coming out first, the great Billy Wilder once said. Well, it’s not that Hungarian Prof. Monika Hamori plays tricks on you in an attempt to come first, it’s just that it’s inevitable. Once you begin to talk with Prof. Hamori, she will be so full of knowledge and because of that, the only option is to let her go first, if you see what I mean.
When I first spoke with the pilot of the helicopter, I sensed that he was a bit skeptical about who this Professor was and what he business was being in and talking around in his helicopter. But, you guessed it, in the end, it turned out that he and Monika ended up getting along just fine. In fact, they ended up firing questions at each other to resolve issues facing CEOs. Have a look.
She teaches human resources but also has a master’s in Hungarian literature and linguistics. “Few academics combine Hamori’s appetite for “proper” research with such interesting, behaviour-changing conclusions, says Thinker50. And she is among the world’s 40 best business school professors under the age of 40, adds Poets & Quants.
Globe-trotting
When the idea of doing a video of Dean Iniguez occured to me I instantly thought of the book When the Going Was Good by Evelyn Waugh because the guy, the Dean, is always going.
In particular, I thought of one of the essays in the book, “Globe-trotting”, which begins randomly in Aden, then runs through the Zanzibar coast and down into the Congo. This is what Dean Iniguez does. He is always on the go, ready to spread education around the world. In this video you’ ll have the opportunity to see him in China and also in Segovia flying in a balloon, which as he puts it, is “a metaphysical experience”.
