It’s inventory and round-up time of the year again: time to do some record-keeping and list the most viewed posts here at Fortress of the Mind. The list below is a pure ranking. It includes not only essays, but also podcasts. The first post listed (“A G Manifesto Tweet Reading”) was number one, and is followed sequentially to number ten (“What Did A Roman Triumph Actually Look Like?”) Check out the ones you might have missed, or revisit your favorites.
We recently visited the beach areas of Porto de Galinhas and Maragogi. Porto de Galinhas is a major tourist beach destination, and is located about 60 km. south of Recife, in the state of Pernambuco. Maragogi is a greater distance away; it is located in the state of Alagoas. Both of these places are known for their “natural pools” (piscinas naturais).
Olinda is located in the greater Recife area in Brazil’s state of Pernambuco. It is considered one of the best-preserved of the old colonial cities. We visited the city today, and the result is the collection of photos below. The city is about a 25 minute drive from downtown Recife.
We took a boat ride in Recife last night. It was really just a short ride from one part of the city to the historic downtown area, which was surprisingly alive, considering that it was Christmas Day. I sampled a lot of the street food, as is my usual habit. One interesting thing I noticed was that whenever the boat passed under a bridge, the passengers clapped in unison. I supposed this was a local custom, perhaps having its origin as a way of warding off bad luck, or giving thanks for continued safety. No one I spoke to seemed to know the origin of the custom.
Reading the works of American military pundits and the vast US media commentariat that amplifies their voices often feels like entering an alternate universe. Weaknesses are touted as “strengths”; self-congratulatory propaganda and delusion are seen as substitutes for hard analysis; belligerent, callous jingoism passes as the norm; and American “exceptionalism” is taken for granted almost as a theological truth. Clearly a day of reckoning is coming. It has been coming for some time now.
What is surrealist painting? What are its underlying rationales? In this podcast, I offer a few thoughts on surrealism in painting, and name a few of my favorite surrealist painters. This is a vast subject, but a lot can be gained by looking at the work of the very best artists: Giorgio de Chirico, Yves Tanguy, Joan Miro, Max Ernst, and Pablo Picasso.
The Battle of Zama essentially concluded the Second Punic War, that terrible contest waged by Rome and Carthage for control of the western Mediterranean. It took place in 202 B.C. near the town of Zama in what is now Tunisia. The commanding generals were Hannibal on the Carthaginian side, and Publius Cornelius Scipio on the Roman. The historian Livy (XXX.30) relates a fascinating exchange between these two great commanders that took place on the eve of the battle.
In this podcast we discuss some aspects of Martin Scorsese’s movie The Irishman. This movie seems to divide people into proponents and detractors. I think it is a great film, and very much worth seeing, as long as we approach it from the right perspective.
We spend most of lives in obedience to one form of authority or another. Rarely, if ever, is it counted as a virtue worthy of discussion by us moderns. On the contrary: we are expected to applaud disobedience, disorder, and challenges to authority, as if such disobedience were automatically exempt from scrutiny.
In this podcast we discuss some good movies and programs I’ve seen recently. “Dark Waters” (2019) is a legal drama dealing with corporate malfeasance, and “The Confession Killer” (2019) is a gripping documentary about how the Henry Lee Lucas serial killer investigation was handled. In some ways, the message of both of them is the same: justice does not come automatically, but has to be fought for by courageous people.
Quintus Curtius 
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