Top of the weekend to you all. Feels like artificial intelligence has been everywhere this week, with mixed returns. Generative AI in the media? Bad. Isolating John Lennon’s vocals for a “new” Beatles track? The jury’s out.
I prefer my technology with a human touch, à la Sofia Kourtesis’ outstanding debut LP of organic electronica. Give it a spin. Let me know if my music taste is dreadful/on point. And have a read of these gems.
1. George Harrison: sexual buccaneer?
Regrets? I’ve had a few. But none quite so public as those of the rock biographer Philip Norman, whose obituary of the Beatle’s death in 2001 dubbed him “a miserable git”. The fury was swift and ongoing.
Norman is attempting a do-over with a new biography on the so-called “quiet one”. Takeaways? Harrison was a man of contrasts, whose acid tongue and sexual buccaneering coexisted alongside mantras and prayer wheels.
British cinema’s saviour: Harrison’s HandMade Films bankrolled classics like Life of Brian and Withnail and I. But the company folded in acrimonious fashion when it was discovered his business partner, “Lying O’Brien”, was neck-deep in skulduggery.
How long will it take to read: Six minutes.
2. ‘We may see other unexpected deaths’
When hundreds of elephants were found dead in Zimbabwe and Botswana within a matter of months in 2020, speculation around the cause was fierce. Three years later, the mystery has finally been unravelled – and global heating has scientists concerned the threat could spread to other species.
Conducting an elephant postmortem: It takes a team of people four hours to peel off the skin, break into the ribs and brain with an axe and extract samples of key organs. And it has to be done in the first 24 hours after death.
How long will it take to read: Three minutes.
3. How we became obsessed with wellness
When Katherine Rowland couldn’t get a mystery illness diagnosed via conventional medicine, she found herself “tripping down the garden path of wellness”. The answers she found there were many and varied: heavy metal poisoning, motherhood, hidden but newly awakened traumas.
Wellness is an estimated $6.8tn global industry variously described as “religious dogma” and “THE single most powerful consumer force”. The relentless demands of modern life and retreat of organised religion are just two reasons proffered for its rise.
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“Perhaps it is far healthier to agitate against the circumstances making us sick and miserable than it is to latch our hopes to another glossy promise.” Katherine Rowland, whose nameless malady persists.
How long will it take to read: Six minutes.
Further reading: Our new Well Actually section focuses on living a good life in a complex world. Exhibit A: six ways to take care of yourself (and others).
4. Reassessing The Kiss
You’ve seen The Kiss a million times, on tattered posters and coffee mugs. But have you ever really looked at it? Some argue there’s more than meets the eye.
“At first glance it seems romantic and joyful,” Eliza Goodpasture writes of Gustav Klimt’s masterpiece. “But the longer you look, the darker it gets.”
Alternative view(s): “She looks peaceful,” offered one colleague of the painting’s female subject. And the commenters below the line have their own thoughts.
How long will it take to read: Three minutes.
Further viewing: The article is pegged on a new documentary: watch the trailer here.
5. Nicky Winmar on his 1993 ‘Black and proud’ moment
You’ve seen the photo a million times: Nicky Winmar, defiant, pointing at his skin in the face of sustained racist abuse from Collingwood fans.
That act of courage defined the AFL hall of famer’s legacy, but Jonathan Horn learns there’s more to the Winmar story: from a WA teenager attacking the Sherrin “like my ancestors hunted kangaroos” to bayside Melbourne, where “you were more likely to spot a Tasmanian tiger” than another Aboriginal person.
The long road to healing: Collingwood, led by Magpies captain Darcy Moore, finally apologised for the incident this year. “It was an amazing experience,” Winmar confides. “My dad was a Pies supporter, can you believe that?”
How long will it take to read: Five minutes.
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