We have created the most stifling and sanitised imaginative space conceivable for children, says teacher Brendan James Murray. Today true imagination has become a radical act
The six children sit together at the waterline in roaring wind. Seagulls dip and strain, beating their wings against the gusts as, far below, waves crest, thump, whisper. A girl, scarcely three years old, stands suddenly and looks out towards that horizon. Striding past them in the distance, his immense feet hidden beneath the rim of the horizon, is a giant.
American artist NC Wyeth painted The Giant in 1923. The low angle emphasises the giant’s immensity, and all the children’s faces are turned away from the viewer. In this way, those children become anyone we care to transpose into this magical scene. What child has not lain in the grass to watch some cloud-image, an animal perhaps, gradually dissolve into the amorphous collection of water droplets that are its banal reality?
Continue reading...House where Monroe died, which hasn’t been occupied in seven years, is in limbo after current owners wanted to demolish it but were stopped by a public campaign
Marilyn Monroe is said to have had more than 50 addresses in her lifetime, but only once, in the final months before she died from a drug overdose at the age of 36, did she have a house she could call fully her own.
The Hollywood star, burned out by the failure of her marriage to the playwright Arthur Miller and by health problems that prompted a year-long hiatus from acting, bought herself a quintessential hacienda-style Spanish bungalow with a pool at the foot of the Santa Monica mountains in February 1962.
Continue reading...With the help of citizen scientists, researchers studying rare humpback ‘jaw-gaping’ believe the move could be a social display
On the coast of Western Australia, a humpback whale is “pirouetting”, sweeping its pectoral fins through the water, its massive jaw hanging wide open. Surrounded by companions, the animal isn’t lunging for a meal: rather, it is putting on a mysterious behavioural display.
This underwater ballet, captured on camera by an onlooker and shared online, is one of the clearest examples of a rarely documented phenomenon known as “gaping”.
Continue reading...Integrated mental health care for maternity services, more perinatal psychiatrists and public awareness of the problem could deliver meaningful change
The modern mind is a column where experts discuss mental health issues they are seeing in their work
When Mia* was referred to me, she was 32 weeks pregnant and had not slept properly in two months. Her GP had told her it was “just pregnancy insomnia”. Her obstetrician said it was normal and suggested she try going to bed earlier with a pregnancy pillow. By the time she sat in my consulting room, hands clenched around a damp tissue, she had been quietly planning how her partner and baby would be better off without her.
Mia is not a real person. She is a composite – an amalgam of the hundreds of women I see each year in my perinatal psychiatry practice. But her story is so common it could be a template. A woman develops psychological symptoms during pregnancy or the postpartum period. She mentions them, tentatively, at an antenatal appointment. She is reassured that what she feels is normal. Weeks or months pass. By the time she reaches specialist care, she is freefalling into a crisis.
Continue reading...DEN HAAG (ANP) - Nederland stuurt maandag opnieuw een vliegtuig naar Tenerife om daar een deel van de bemanning van het cruiseschip Hondius op te halen. Dat laat het ministerie van Buitenlandse Zaken weten.
Een eerste vliegtuig met opvarenden en bemanningsleden is zondag vanaf het Spaanse eiland naar Eindhoven vertrokken. Aan boord zijn volgens het ministerie 26 mensen. Het gaat om alle acht Nederlandse passagiers en achttien buitenlanders.
In het vliegtuig kunnen de passagiers voldoende afstand houden, aldus het ministerie. Er is medische begeleiding aan boord van de chartervlucht. Een deel van de crew blijft op de Hondius om het schip naar de haven van Rotterdam te varen.
GRANDILLA DE ABONA (ANP) - De Nederlandse chartervlucht voor opvarenden van het cruiseschip m/v Hondius is opgestegen vanaf het vliegveld Tenerife Zuid, ziet een ANP-verslaggever ter plaatse. Nadat het van boord halen van de opvarenden iets langer duurde dan voorzien, is tegen 16.52 uur Nederlandse tijd het toestel vertrokken richting Eindhoven. Naar verwachting zal het toestel daar na een kleine vijf uur arriveren.
De Nederlanders aan boord zullen bij aankomst zes weken in thuisquarantaine gaan, is vooralsnog het protocol. Passagiers met andere nationaliteiten zullen worden opgevangen door de GGD, die hen eveneens quarantaine zal bieden.
