William Eaton

Parenting: Infinite Responsibility

May 21, 2014 by William Eaton

Steps toward a larger, if alien view of what parenting involves By William Eaton Click here for PDF version (1) Few parents, and only occasionally, allow themselves to think, It is because of me that my child must suffer. Rather we sometimes think of all the many others and other things—rapists, wars, car accidents, bad teachers, infections—that (though we hope not!) may be our children’s lot. We wish we could save our children from some one pain and from all […]

Categories: Essay, Spring 2014 Issue • Tags: birth, children, Freud, innocence, life, parenting, parents

James Baldwin Today

May 21, 2014 by William Eaton

Notes of a Year of James Baldwin By Rachel Corbman Review of the opening session of the Year of Baldwin, New York Live Arts, April 2014. Click here for PDF version. The definitive James Baldwin documentary, The Price of the Ticket (1989), memorably opens with archival footage from a British television interview that aired shortly before the novelist and essayist’s early death in 1987. “Now, when you were starting out as a writer,” the interviewer queried, “You were black, impoverished, [and] homosexual. You […]

Categories: Review, Spring 2014 Issue • Tags: documentaries, gay lives, homosexuality, James Baldwin, LGBT, race

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Courtney Trouble (with camera), Wolf Hudson (lying down), Zahra Stardust and James Darling in Toronto

Is there such a thing as Feminist Pornography?

May 17, 2014 by William Eaton

Today I offer you an interesting read passed on to me from my grandmother this week. In the piece In Toronto with the world’s feminist pornographers, Daniel Nasaw from the BBC Magazine gives us a behind the scenes look at the global community that shoots, directs, stars in, and theorizes about how pornography would look when (and if) it were feminist. In recent years, feminist porn producers and performers have settled on a rough agreement on how to shoot pornography that […]

Categories: Caterina Gironda, ZiR • Tags: BBC, feminism, pornography

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“That’s the trouble with losing your mind…” Part I of II

May 15, 2014 by William Eaton

This is the first of two reviews of Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods. This review is about Bryson’s use of humor, the second about his concern for the ecology surrounding the Appalachian Trail “That’s the trouble with losing your mind; by the time it’s gone, it’s too late to get it back,” said Bill Bryson in A Walk in the Woods, Bryson’s narrative of his and pal Stephen Katz’s hike on the Appalachian Trail (AT). Bryson was in a “state of […]

Categories: Tucker Cox, ZiR • Tags: travel

“I didn’t even know I was feeling cold”

May 11, 2014 by William Eaton

An extract from an article by D.W. Winnicott has become lodged in my consciousness, and I believe for good reason. Like memories of a dream, Winnicott’s thoughts await events or a moment of inspiration to reveal why they are speaking to me (and perhaps others) now, and what they now have to say. In this article, “The Use of an Object and Relating through Identifications,” Winnicott was speaking to fellow psychoanalysts and psychotherapists, but my sense is that the sentences […]

Categories: William Eaton, ZiR • Tags: Adam Phillips, D.W. Winnicott, psychology, psychotherapy, T.S. Eliot

From Sanitation to Libation: The evolution of Mother’s Day

May 10, 2014 by William Eaton

Having worked in the restaurant industry for the past 10 years, I can say that Mother’s Day is certainly the cash cow of Sunday brunches for all employees. Mimosas are a-flowing and tips are a-plentiful. Today I’ve come across this surprising history of the holiday, worth sharing before we all run off to send out our last minute flowers and hallmark cards! National Geographic writes in Mother’s Day Turns 100: It’s Surprisingly Dark History, of Anna Jarvis, founder of a holiday formed […]

Categories: Caterina Gironda, ZiR • Tags: consumerism, National Geographic

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Falling in Love with a Donkey – Part II of II

May 8, 2014 by William Eaton

This is the second of two reviews. Part I (April 24) is about Stevenson’s desire to travel. In Part II RLS learns to love Modestine, his donkey and comments on religion. In 1878, R.L. Stevenson and Modestine, his donkey, trekked through the Cevennes region of southern France for 12 days, covering 120 miles. Stevenson wrote about their trip in Travels with a Donkey in the Cevennes. It is a classic travelogue, among the first to celebrate hiking and camping. The Kindle edition is currently free on Amazon. To carry his cargo, Stevenson needed something “cheap […]

Categories: Tucker Cox, ZiR • Tags: Robert Louis Stevenson, travel

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There are at least twenty things that are hard for human beings

May 4, 2014 by William Eaton

One of my (and perhaps many others’) favorite texts is the following translation by Chu Ch’an from The Sutra of 42 Sections: The Buddha said: “There are twenty things that are hard for human beings: “It is hard to practice charity when one is poor. “It is hard to study the Way when occupying a position of great authority. “It is hard to surrender life at the approach of inevitable death. “It is hard to get an opportunity of reading the […]

Categories: William Eaton, ZiR • Tags: Buddhism, bureaucracy, sutra

Why we are talking so much about sexual assault on college campuses

May 3, 2014 by William Eaton

My colleague recently brought up the idea of “The Unsaid” as an interesting writing topic; discussing things that are a part of contemporary human experience but that fly under the radar. For a long time, I felt that street harassment and sexual assault fell into this category. It became so quotidian that it was brushed off like a pesky tap on the shoulder. Now, it seems everyone is talking about it all the time. This trend can often cause a […]

Categories: Caterina Gironda, ZiR • Tags: sexual assault

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ZETEO

Zeteo (ζητέω): to challenge, question, dispute, explore the forgotten and ignored

Author Archives: William Eaton

Parenting: Infinite Responsibility

James Baldwin Today

Is there such a thing as Feminist Pornography?

“That’s the trouble with losing your mind…” Part I of II

“I didn’t even know I was feeling cold”

From Sanitation to Libation: The evolution of Mother’s Day

Falling in Love with a Donkey – Part II of II

There are at least twenty things that are hard for human beings

Why we are talking so much about sexual assault on college campuses