Two somewhat unrelated websites have caught my attention recently. The first is Wu Ming (nobody), which was once Luther Blissett, an Italian collective responsible for the great novel, Q (download here). It tells the story of a radical who joins Thomas Müntzer and the Peasants, then the Münster Rebellion, and so on. A thorough and unexpected revival of revolutionary Christian movements, providing slogans and inspiration for the anti-capitalist movement today.
The second is The Leaky Boob. OK, I know some of this stuff is a bit too wholesome, so much so it gets a little cringe-worthy, but deep down I’ve always been in favour of a good breast-feed. I believe I enjoyed it when I was a snowy blond baby (thanks mum), and I reckon all four of my kinds enjoyed it (a few years back now). And I get a good vibe when a mother undoes one side of her nursing bra and lets a bub slurp away – makes the whole situation feel much more relaxed … or is that a sign that the situation is relaxed? So let’em suckle, anywhere, everywhere, anytime.
Come to think of it, I’ve actually sampled some breast-milk in my adult years – expressed and in a glass of course. ‘Twas rather rich. And I remember a morning many years ago when I was woken by a kitten trying – in vain – to get some sustenance from my nipple.
(ht bn)
21 January, 2013 at 12:48 pm
You would approve of Sir John Caius (obit 1573), founder of Cambridge’s Gonville and Caius College, and a physician, who was a renowned adult breastfeeder:
“What made Dr. Cajus in his last sickness so peevish and so full of frets at Cambridge when he suckt one woman (whom I spare to name) froward of conditions and of bad diet; and contrariwise so quiet and well, when he suckt another of contrary disposition; verily the diversity of their milks and conditions, which being contrary one to the other, wrought also in him that sucked them contrary effect”.
The above quotation is from Eating Right in the Renaissance by Ken Albala
21 January, 2013 at 2:32 pm
We really have become very barbarian since those enlightened times.
22 January, 2013 at 6:07 am
Indeed. Apparently Caius’s predilection for dessert at High Table was milk sucked straight from the breast. If the head of Gonville and Caius did that today he/she would probably be tasered and arrested by a police swat team.
23 January, 2013 at 10:23 pm
Oh for the aristocracy, the true bearers of culture.