Hello! Today: the history of coffee, a Senegalese film from the 60s, short stories about the lives of Malaysian women and free access to academic books and journals. 

Article: Capitalism's Favourite Drug: The dark history of how coffee took over the world by Michael Pollan, published in The Atlantic in April 2020
This article starts as a generic appreciation of coffee as a cultural artefact, but quickly turns into a fascinating review/recap of Coffeeland, Augustine Sedgwick’s study of the creation of coffee capitalism and how it came to be used to increase productivity. At the centre of Sedgwick’s book is James Hill, a Manchester textile salesman who went to Central America in 1889 and became a coffee magnate in El Salvador by luck, exploitation, and by using hunger as a tool against the local indigenous population. The history of coffee, just like the history of most food and drink, is a history of violence and oppression; in this case, it is also the history of a tool used to make people work more and better: as it turns out, the history of the American coffee break – enshrined in law – originates from a Denver company that instituted it to increase productivity via caffeine. 

Film: La noire de... by Ousmane Sembène (1966)
At the beginning of this striking black-and-white film, Diouana, a young Senegalese woman, arrives at the Côte d'Azur. She is picked up by a white Frenchman and driven to the flat he shares with his wife, who explains Diouana's tasks to her. It soon becomes clear that Diouana is to be a domestic servant and not a nanny, her role with the family when they lived in Dakar. Sembène shifts between scenes showing Diouana's life in Dakar and her increasing despair, confined to the small flat in Antibes and faced with demands, microagressions and racism from her employers. In a memorable final scene, a symbol of the colonial past pursues the French employer as he attempts to leave the suburb of Dakar where Diouana's mother lives. Created six years after Senegal's independence from France, this was Sembène's first feature film; it's rich in allusions and symbolism, beautifully shot and scripted, and perfectly paced (it's a brisk 55 minutes long). La noire de... is based on one of Sembène's short stories by the same name, which I'm excited to read.
Note: Please check content warnings before watching this film. I watched La noire de... on youtube, where it is available in the original French with Portuguese subtitles.

Book: Lake Like A Mirror by Ho Sok Fong, translated from Chinese by Natascha Bruce (2019)
Occasionally, you anticipate and look forward to the publication of a book for years. Lake Like A Mirror was such a book for me. I first read one of its stories, "The Wall", in late 2016 and was so struck by the tone and voice and themes I just wanted more. In nine stories, Ho Sok Fong writes about women's lives in Malaysia, shaped by religious and racial divisions and rules, often stuck in situations not of their own making. Ho's style and Natascha Bruce's translation are some of the best, most evocative writing I've read in the last year, but since I don't know how to write about style, I'll let you draw your own conclusions: "If she'd swerved any harder, she would have crashed right into the lake. In the eerie twilight, the deer seemed to come out of nowhere, darting silently into the road. Of course she'd been startled. And for a few seconds all she'd wanted was to run – throw caution to the wind, shake off gravity, be gone." You can read the rest of this story here.
Note: Read an interview with Ho Sok Fong by YZ Chin here.

Other: Project Muse
Until last year, I was lucky to spend many weekends in a university library with an open shelving system, where browsing in the history, religious studies and political science section often led to lucky encounters. I now have access to a university library again and am excited to make use of it; just about the only thing that hasn't changed in the last 15 or so years is my burning interest in (academic) history. If you don't have access to the ivory tower of academic libraries, Project Muse is a good place to know about. Currently, a significant amount of the journals and books featured on the website are free to access. They are also offering a focus feature of free scholarship, including books and articles, on structural racism in the United States.

A final thought: I started writing this newsletter as a distraction from and alternative to the pandemic news during quarantine. Where I am, that time is now firmly over. I will continue sending this letter, but I can't say it feels right to offer up more escapism, nor is it what interests me when I'm not living in pandemic-and-anxiety-induced isolation from the news and the real world. I'm very wary of contributing to a Biedermeier-ification of contemporary life. In future letters, there might be more on global affairs, foreign politics and history; there might not be. We'll see! 

That's it for now. Take care!