March 8, 2007
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Time’s Labyrinth continued:
Dia de la
Mujer Trabajadora
“Yo es que nací un 8 de marzo,
Día de la Mujer Trabajadora,
y no he hecho más que
trabajar toda mi vida.”For background on Aldecoa,
see a paper (pdf) by
Sara Brenneis:“Josefina Aldecoa intertwines
history, collective memory
and individual testimony in her
historical memory trilogy…”History:The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire in New York City on March 25, 1911, was the largest industrial disaster in the history of the city of New
York, causing the death of 146 garment workers who either died in the
fire or jumped to their deaths.
Propaganda, March 1977:“On March 8, 1908, after the death of 128 women trapped in a
fire at the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory in New York City, 15,000
women workers from the garment and textile industry marched
echoing the demands of their sisters 50 years earlier…”
Propaganda, March 2006:“First of all, on March 8th, 1857, a large number of factory workers in
the United States took to the streets to demand their economic and
political rights. The owners called the police who arrived immediately
and opened fire, engaging in blind repression… Later on, in 1908, the
same date of March 8th was once again a memorable date of struggle. On
this day, capitalist bosses in Chicago set fire to a textile factory
where over a thousand women worked. A very large number was terribly
burnt. 120 died!”
Propaganda disguised as news, March 2007:From today’s top story in 24 HoursTM, a commuter daily in Vancouver published by Sun Media Corporation:
Fight still on for equality
By Robyn Stubbs and Carly Krug“International Women’s Day commemorates a march by female garment
workers protesting low wages, 12-hour workdays and bad working
conditions in New York City on March 8, 1857.Then in 1908, after 128 women were trapped and killed in a
fire at a New York City garment and textile factory, 15,000 women
workers again took their protests to the street.”Related historical fiction:
A version of the
I Ching’s Hexagram 19:
– Katherine Neville, The Eight
“What does this have to do with why we’re here?”
“I saw it in a chess book Mordecai showed
me. The most ancient chess service ever discovered was found at
the palace of King Minos on Crete– the place where the famous
Labyrinth was built, named after this sacred axe. The chess
service dates to 2000 B.C. It was made of gold and silver and
jewels…. And in the center was carved a labrys.”
… “But I thought chess wasn’t even invented until six or seven
hundred A.D.,” I added. “They always say it came from Persia or
India. How could this Minoan chess service be so old?”
“Mordecai’s written a lot himself on the
history of chess,” said Lily…. “He thinks that chess set in Crete was
designed by the same guy who built the Labyrinth– the sculptor
Daedalus….”
Now things were beginning to click into place….
“Why was this axe carved on the chessboard?” I
asked Lily, knowing the answer in my heart before she spoke.
“What did Mordecai say was the connection?”….
“That’s what it’s all about,” she said quietly. “To kill the King.”
The sacred axe was used to kill the
King. The ritual had been the same since the beginning of time.
The game of chess was merely a reenactment. Why hadn’t I
recognized it before?
Perhaps at the center of
Aldecoa’s labyrinth lurk the
capitalist bosses from Chicago
who, some say, set fire
to a textile factory
on this date in 1908.For a Freudian perspective
on the above passage,
see yesterday’s entry
In the Labyrinth of Time,
with its link to
John Irwin‘s essay“The False Artaxerxes:
Borges and the
Dream of Chess.”
Symbols
S. H. Cullinane
March 7, 2007Today, by the way, is the
feast of a chess saint.
