#this was the hardest known novice title to man

[elvenferretots]

We did it.

[rupertgayesarchive]

Title: l’ours et le roi Pairing: Michael/Ryan Summary: A year after King Haywood’s faithful knight is presumed dead, the only thing that rouses him from his sadness is the strange appearance of a bear he finds while out hunting. A very well behaved bear, at that. A/N: Based on the medieval French story called ‘Bisclavert’ by Marie de France (this version is only slightly more homoerotic than the original, just so you know). I wanted to write this in the style of a fairy tale, which is why there’s a lot of narration and other stylistic differences. Also - this was done for Myan Week 2017 - Minecraft/Kings! au

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Once upon a time in a faraway land there lived a loyal knight by the name of Michael Jones. He was considered unparalleled amongst his peers; youthful, fiery, and beloved, especially by the country’s sovereign, King Haywood. The Lord loved his knight dearly, and his affections were clearly displayed; through every acre of land he added to Michael’s home; every jewel encrusted along his sword hilt; every kiss he placed upon his brow, it was no secret that Michael was his favorite.

Some viewed Michael with respect, others fear, and still others envy; but Michael was careful, and any true threat to him was easily exposed to the King. He knew, for example, that a novice knight had been upset with him after accusing Michael of escaping the castle grounds several nights a month; Michael had retaliated by drawing his sword, and the jealous knight had merely fled, cementing his own cowardice to the rest of the castle.

Despite the technical victory, Michael grew worried, because knight’s accusations were founded in truth: he had snuck out of the castle for several days each month. He never revealed the reason why he did this, not even to his precious King. Even worse, his time to flee outside the castle’s walls was fast approaching, and he doubted that disagreeable knight would soon forget Michael’s insult to him.

Still, on the next clear night, Michael crept out of his room. He had gotten exceptionally good at sneaking down the corridors without being spotted, and once he had bypassed the common guards and entered the royal garden, he assumed he was free. However, unbeknownst to him, he was being watched. A dangerous mix of curiosity and spitefulness prodded that jealous knight into following Michael on such an evening. He hid around corners and behind statues until he too had gotten outside. He reached the edge of the garden just as Michael began climbing its tall stone wall, which was covered in thick ivy vines. He went up with the ease of a cat before jumping to the other side. The knight began climbing up himself, not nearly as easily. When he finally reached the top of the wall he looked down to see Michael undressing in the dark. Perhaps he was meeting a lover then, the other knight thought sourly. Michael tucked his pile of clothes beneath a flower bush and walked several paces towards the large forest that acted as a barrier against prospective invaders, or sometimes hunting grounds for royal parties. Now, however, he saw Michael hunch onto the ground, as if wounded by an invisible force.

Michael twitched and rolled, and his form grew exponentially in size and became covered in dark hair. The other knight watched, disgusted and perplexed, until finally the transformation was complete, and where a human man had once been a monstrous brown bear was instead. It moved its head to the left and right before walking into the dense woods, disappearing from sight.

The knight was revolted, truly – to have a beast hiding in their midst! To have stolen the King’s attentions with his skills as a fighter when in reality he had attained everything through magic. He hopped down onto the other side of the wall. Now, as a suspicious man, the knight had always known a bit about transformations, lycanthropes, and so on, and he suspected that as in other cases, Michael needed his human clothes to turn back into a man. So, thinking himself very clever, the knight gathered up the tunic, belt, sword, and shoes into his arms and took them back to the castle. The very next day, the knight bundled up the clothes and gave them to a courier to send to his home in the country to ensure Michael would never find them again.

After three days and three nights with no sign of Michael, King Haywood began to grow distraught. He asked the knights and gentlemen of his court if they had seen the man, but no one had. After a week, a search was called, and every able man and woman searched high and low for Michael – even the knight who had succeeded in banning him. In fact, he searched hardest of all, calling for parties through the woods he knew the beast would go to. And after a month of fruitless searching, the knight was satisfied to report to King Haywood that Michael was missing forever, if not deceased already. With a heavy heart, King Haywood gave the same knight – who seemed nearly as motivated as himself to find Michael – Michael’s own land and home as a reward for his dedication, to which the knight happily retired to, reveling in fortunes he didn’t earn.

As for the King, he found himself to be more depressed and more inconsolable with each passing month. Without his skilled warrior – without his dear friend, Michael, what was he to do? He mourned eccentrically; commissioning a monument of Michael Jones in the town square, and his portrait in the royal gallery, so that the young man’s image could stare across at his own. He locked and boarded up the fallen man’s chambers and hung one of his diamond swords above his own bed. As the year drew on, and the King’s sadness only deepened, his advisers grew worried, and his other knights scared. Something must be done.

-

A year passed. Perhaps spurned by the anniversary, King Haywood announced a hunt should take place; the knights and advisers rejoiced, and so the King and other gentlemen went walking one day through the dense forests behind the castle. The dogs they brought were large and bred for sniffing out animals, and soon they caught trace of a sizeable creature – “A wolf?” a man asked, “A boar?” his friend supposed; suddenly a beast broke out from the underbrush and ran off, dashing through the trees with a line of dogs barking at his heels, the men following afterwards. “A bear!” King Haywood shouted. “I saw it and it’s definitely a bear! The largest I’ve ever seen.” They spent hours following the dogs, this way and that, nearly losing them several times, and every once in a while catching a glimpse of the large beast’s movement through the vegetation.

By the late afternoon, the dogs had trapped the bear, forcing it towards the end of a cliff edge. Without anywhere to go, the men drew their swords and bows, waiting for their King’s call. King Haywood took his place at the front of the crowd, taking in the size of the beast. It peered around desperately, and seemed to lock eyes with the men.

Suddenly it leapt forward, towards the King; before anyone could signal the dogs, the bear reached for the King’s hand, grasping it, the beast kissed his leg, then his foot. It then looked up at him with ink colored eyes; they were glassy and rounded, almost like buttons. And yet, the King saw a spark in the depths of the creature’s gaze; an undeniable human quality within them. He pushed past the fear he felt – for the beast still had a claw curled around his limb – because surely the thing would have decimated him by now, if its plan was to strike out. But it remained still, looking up at Ryan, its face set in what he had to label as a pleading expression.

His knights surrounding him murmured fearfully, as frozen as the King was, and only the bark from one of the hounds snapped King Haywood back to reality.

He put a hand out. “Stop! This is no ordinary animal – look how he kneels, like he’s begging for mercy.” Ryan swallowed, watching the bear carefully. “It would be inhumane, possibly dooming to kill him. Our hunt ends here.” Still anxious for his safety, he placed a hand on the bear’s head; the thing was unbothered, tilting its head upwards, leaning into his touch. The bear’s fur was soft and warm from the beast’s body heat and the sun beams that shone down onto the forest floor. “You have my word, noble… bear, that no harm will come to you.”

“Sir,” one of the knights said. “What shall we do now?” King Haywood glanced at his men, then at the still kneeling beast. After a moment, it moved its face, nuzzling his snout gently into Ryan’s palm. The King laughed out of surprise – the beast was more tempered than he had thought.

“I suppose we shall take the bear and place him in the castle. He hasn’t harmed me, or any of you. Something with such a human demeanor deserves to live like a human.”

The bear seemed to understand the King’s words, and it stood on all fours; it towered over all of the men in the clearing, and dwarfed the hounds, who sniffed him curiously. King Haywood sheathed his sword – the other knights did the same – and they all proceeded in a line out of the forest, the King in front, and the beast to his side.

Imagine the surprise of the rest of court, seeing the King and his knights return with a bear the size of a cottage, walking on all fours in time with his genial captor. The whole scene caused quite a stir, and some members of court wondered if their King had been knocked in the head while hunting; for King Haywood talked to the beast, and let it wander around the castle freely; there were no chains holding it, not even a leash. Luckily, the bear seemed fond of the King, and typically stayed by his side, following dutifully behind like a pup. The most disruptive the creature got was when it would nose at the King’s hand until the man would pet its head, or scratch its chin, and the bear would let out soft growls of contentment.

There were nobles who complained, of course, but even the residual grievances of the kingdom’s nobles were quelled when a pair of children – brought into court one day by their blueblood mother – had shaken themselves from her grip and began to crawl on top of the bear, who had been laying by the King’s throne. Everyone, especially the lady who had brought her children, watched in fear, waiting for the beast to roar and attack. Instead, it merely walked over to the hysterical woman, and let her pick her precious babies from its back before wandering back to where the King sat; from then on, the bear had irreversibly won the hearts of everyone in the castle.

For lack of a name, the King merely referred to him as Bear, or ‘noble beast’; he saw the creature as a treasure to the kingdom, a natural blessing to the country he ruled, and he made a public decree that no harm should befall the bear; it was given the best food, a large tub to be bathed in, and was brushed daily until his fur shined.

The King allowed the bear to roam through the castle grounds, and it followed the King everywhere he went, even to his own bed chambers! Ryan would attempt to talk the beast into leaving his rooms at night – for the bear must have understood human speech to some extent – but it never budged, and no amount of men could push such a large animal somewhere it didn’t want to go, so the King was resigned to keep the bear with him while he slept; he in bed, the beast curled up by the fireplace (though on occasion he would climb into Ryan’s bed while the man was asleep, and the King would wake, nearly falling onto the floor as the beast snored contentedly on top of the covers.)

The constant companionship worked wonders on the King’s temperament; while he was a generous and cunning ruler, everyone in the castle knew he had been pushed into a great sadness upon the death of his beloved warrior, Michael. His unexplained disappearance seemed like a crushing weight the King could never rise up from. And yet, in a matter of weeks it was as though the King was back to his old self; his laughter flowed throughout the halls like music; his smiles appeared often and easily; his posture no longer bent anxiously, and his steps took on a renewed confidence. It was only when his cherished bear came to stay with him that everyone could see the King was previously living as a shadow of his former self; and for that alone, the bear became a sacred symbol.

Perhaps the bear was magic, or at least a divine miracle. Even the King himself had noticed his own happiness had been found again. One night, nearly half a year after having found his companion, he sat in a chair by his bedroom window, the bear resting its head in the King’s lap. From where he sat, the King could see the capital’s green, surrounded by stout brick houses, their chimneys letting out gentle wafts of smoke into the sky. “Bear,” he murmured, and the beast lifted its head. Ryan pointed out the window. “You can’t see it from here,” he said, “But down below there’s the statue of our nation’s best warrior, a dear friend of mine. His name was Michael –” The bear moved suddenly, raising itself up on its hind legs to peer out the window. “I said you can’t see it!” Ryan said, laughing, tugging gently at the beast’s fur until it settled again. “In any case, he went missing over a year ago now.” The King sobered, and sunk both hands deep into the bear’s mane. “I don’t know which thought is worse – that he went out into the wilderness and died, or that he ran away for some other reason, instead. We were very close, you know; I knew nearly everything about him. But he would vanish for days at a time, and he would never say why.”

The bear chuffed softly and slid its head off Ryan’s lap. It used its mouth to tug gently at the King’s pant leg, a familiar gesture which told Ryan to stand up. He obeyed, and followed the bear to his bed. He worked his way under the covers, and blew out a candle that was placed by his bedside table. The bear’s dark eyes watched him as he situated himself, before the beast sat down on the floor by Ryan’s side. “I’m a blessed man to have found you, my friend,” he murmured in the darkness. A paw came up and touched the King’s hand, and Ryan let it drop off the mattress. He felt a wet tongue lick at his fingers, then a warm nose against his palm. The King smiled, resolute, and fell asleep with a hand on the noble beast’s head.

Many more months passed, and the King took a ride through the countryside of his kingdom – the bear naturally accompanying him. While the leisurely pace he traveled was like that of a vacation, his true purpose was to visit the various nobles who remained in the country permanently, collecting taxes from the farmers and villagers working on their property. This brought him to a large stretch of property that had once belonged to Michael himself, but was now ruled over by the very knight who condemned him to a life trapped inside a beast’s form.

Michael had since grown used to his new body, and perhaps could have gone on as such for the rest of his life; but when he caught sight of the retired knight’s face, a wave of rage came over him, and he leapt from the behind the carriage where he had been walking beside the King. He gave a roar full of carnivorous animosity and swiped at the human, watching with pleasure as he crumpled to the ground, blood blooming across his face.

There was a flurry of movement – the King jumped from his horse, caught between helping the baron or the bear, while the knight cursed and spat at the beast; “It’s crazed!” he shouted, knights flanking him and pulling him up onto his feet. “It’s going to kill all of us if we don’t strike it down first!” The King paled, watching with fear as what he thought was his tame beast growl dangerously at the baron. “Get it away from me!”

“I don’t understand,” one of the knights said frantically. “He’s lived with humans for more than a year, and he hasn’t even growled!”

“It’s a wild beast!” The baron shouted. “Kill it!”

Thinking frantically, the King spoke: “Could it be… that you offended it?” All the men stared at the King.

“How would I offend this thing?”

“He’s been nothing but polite, as though he were a person all this time. The only reason such a creature would act so out of character must be some sort of offense on your part.” The knight’s face flashed with fear, though he tried to conceal it. But Ryan was shrewd, a necessary component of a King, and he nodded to his guards. “If he won’t admit anything, then we can bring him back to the castle and hold him there until he confesses. I’m not above torture, if necessary.”

“You’re mad! He’s just as insane as that monster!” The baron wriggled in the grip of the knights, to no avail.

“Insulting your King? It’s you who must be crazed. Let’s tie his hands to the horse’s saddle and make him walk back to the castle –” As the baron was pulled, his hands tied at the wrist, he yelped and broke down. Not a strong man in physicality or feeling, he admitted his crimes.

“Alright, I’ll tell you! Just let me go.” Hesitantly, the knights stepped away from him. The King watched him warily. “The truth is, that beast used to be a man. A man you all knew very well. A man you thought was dead!” The King paled, and sent a horrified look at the bear, who was intent on watching the knight, its dark eyes flashing.

“Do you mean, Michael?” The King asked.

“He humiliated me!” The baron roared, fighting his binds. “He was a nuisance! Disappearing all the time to turn into that – that beast and back again! And yet you still admired him the most. Oh, I wish I could have killed him, but I thought I’d never see him, as a man or a bear, ever again.”  

“Then… he can be turned back into a man?” The King asked.

“Is that your only concern?” The baron spat, making the bear – Michael – growl again and step protectively in front of the King.

“Michael, whether a man or a beast, has been more useful to me than you have ever been.” The King straightened his stance and squared his shoulders. “I hereby ban you from your kingdom, for your crimes against a fellow knight.” He directed two of his men to hoist the baron onto a horse, and take him far outside the kingdom’s borders with no regard as to where he was left. The man could go to a new land or starve for all he cared, he just knew he wanted the man far away from him, or from Michael.

The baron attempted to fight, to curse the King and his knights, all while travelling down the road and slowly out of sight. Ryan turned his attention back to the bear. “Well, surely you must know how to change back?” he asked hopefully. Michael dipped his head, and began walking towards the house that had once been his.

Ryan opened the doors, and Michael walked through, snout high in the air as he sniffed. Passing from room to room, the King’s hopes slowly dimmed like a dying candle – whatever Michael was searching for, could he find it? What if that baron had already gotten rid of whatever it was Michael needed to turn back to a man? He fretted and frowned, dutifully following Michael and opening any closed doors the creature wished to inspect.

Eventually, they found the baron’s own bedchambers. Michael nosed around, focusing on the man’s wardrobe and pawing at the door. Ryan opened it, staring into its contents. Once again, Michael began to paw at something, and Ryan took out a wooden box that sat on the bottom of the wardrobe. Opening it, he found now musty pair of nightclothes. “Are these… yours?” Michael nodded, the gesture looking quite strange on him. “Well! Put them back on and we can take you home a man!” Michael merely stared at him, and sat back on his haunches. “Michael?” The bear let out a huff, and ducked down, delicately taking the clothes into his mouth and wandering out of the room, and out of the house entirely. He deposited the clothes in a knight’s arms and began walking down the road, the way they had come. The knights asked what the King’s orders were, and though he had no idea what Michael was waiting for, or what he was meant to do, he declared that they were going back to the castle in order for Michael to transform into himself properly.

When they reached the castle, Michael took the clothes back into his mouth and found his boarded up bedchamber. The King ordered for it to be opened and prepared, desperately wishing that his guesses were correct.

Once the bedchamber was in a clean state, Michael wandered inside, and, before the King or any curious servants or knights could follow, he nosed the door shut.

“Does he want privacy, perhaps?” One of the knights supposed.

“Why would a bear need privacy?” Another asked.

“I suppose Michael always had some secrets,” The King said. “I will check on him in a few hours. And, God willing, he will be a man by then.”

Hours passed at a torturous pace, and the poor King thought he would go mad before the end of it. Michael, dear Michael, alive and living under their nose for so long! Would he even be able to transform back? He took a seat by the window in his chambers overlooking the town. He watched the sun crest, then fall, and sink beyond the sky. Then he finally rose and found his way to Michael’s room.

He quietly opened the door and nearly shouted in surprise – for there wasn’t a beast on the floor, but a man asleep in his bed!

The King quickly ran to his side and held him close, pressing a dozen kisses to his beloved knight’s face to wake him up, then another dozen more when he saw the familiar brown eyes open, and the fondly remembered mouth turn up into a smile.

“It’s you,” the King said, unable to catch his breath or still his heart. Michael did not speak at first, instead wiping the tears from his King’s eyes, and pressing a kiss to his lips.

“It is,” Michael replied, voice faint and raspy from so little use. “I’ve returned to you, my King, and this time I won’t be leaving so easily.” They shared a grin, and Ryan held Michael even tighter, promising the return of all his land, and treasures, and more gifts that could be named.

“Does this mean we’ll have to remove my statue in the town square?” Michael kidded.

“My dear,” the King said, “not only will we keep it, but we shall have entire days of celebration to honor you – and your beastly form.”

And so with the King and his knight happily reunited, the kingdom prospered, and moreover, Michael never had to hide his beastly nature from the kingdom again, and no matter what form he took on, he was always regarded as a joy for all to see.

The End.

[how2to18]

SOME OF US want to be rock stars or rocket scientists when we grow up, while others want to be actors or athletes. Marcus Aurelius, though, wanted to grow up to be a Stoic. That, at least, is the impression Marguerite Yourcenar gives us in her novel Memoirs of Hadrian. This brilliant reimagining of the Roman imperial period is cast as a letter written by the dying Hadrian to the teenage Marcus Aurelius he has chosen to succeed him. While Hadrian admires his “dear Mark,” he also chides him. He was, Hadrian recalls, an “almost too sober little boy” who had grown into a young man a tad too zealous in his practice of “the mortifications of the Stoics.”

What would Hadrian — or, at least, Yourcenar’s Hadrian — have made of our current craze with Stoicism? While it is too late for many of us to grow up to become Stoics, more than a few of us want to finish up as Stoics. Princeton University Press’s new edition of Epictetus’s Encheiridion and selected Discourses, titled How to Be Free: An Ancient Guide to the Stoic Life, is the latest entry in a wave of works, both popular and scholarly, on Stoicism. Massimo Pigliucci’s How to Be a Stoic: Using Ancient Philosophy to Live a Modern Life and Donald Robertson’s Stoicism and the Art of Happiness are fresh additions to the former category, while A. A. Long’s classic Stoic Studies and Pierre Hadot’s La citadelle intérieure: Introduction aux Pensées de Marc Aurèle are notable examples of the latter category.

How to Be Free seeks to bridge the worlds of both kinds of readers. Translated and introduced by Long, a renowned scholar of Stoicism and classics professor at UC Berkeley, the work presents the Greek text and English translation on facing pages. While the original text is, well, Greek to me, Long’s translation is sharp and straightforward — qualities always associated with Epictetus’s teachings. Like Socrates, Epictetus did not write down his words; it is thanks to his student Arrian — who became one of Hadrian’s closest aides — that we have the Encheiridion (or “handbook”) and Discourses. But whereas, in Plato’s writings, Socrates often serves as a proxy for his student’s own philosophical agenda, Arrian’s transcription of this freed slave’s words seems free of invention.

Most important, Socrates and Epictetus — though separated by more than four centuries — are alike in the coherence between their convictions and actions. One of the few, and certainly best known (if not substantiated) of episodes we have from Epictetus’s life occurred when he was still a slave. In a fit of rage, his master began to twist his leg. In a calm voice, the slave warned him that the leg would break. The master, ignoring the warning, broke Epictetus’s leg, prompting the maimed man to declare in an even voice: “Did I not tell you it would break?”

It is not clear whether Epictetus’s lameness was a result of his master’s inhumanity or, more prosaically, the consequence of arthritis. What is clear, though, is that Epictetus’s experience as a slave shaped his philosophy. The term philosophy now generally brings to mind an academic discipline, whose practitioners publish peer-reviewed journal articles and academic monographs that reexamine questions ranging from epistemology and ontology to linguistics and metaphysics or, more broadly, reassess the history of their profession. As anyone familiar with this world can report, its language and concerns are often difficult and demanding. This is not, by itself, a problem: readers of Joyce and Woolf, Dickinson and Faulkner, treasure the moments of luminous truths and insights these writers conjure in their difficult and demanding works.

But I am not alone, I suspect, in thinking that academic philosophers, with a few important exceptions, are mostly wanting when it comes to lasting truths or insights. All too often their present world seems light-years distant from the world in which I live and for which I would welcome the wisdom their profession supposedly offers. As Hadot declared in a series of interviews with the American philosopher Arnold Davidson: “The historian of philosophy must cede her place to the philosopher — the philosopher who must always remain alive within the historian of philosophy. This final task will consist in asking oneself, with unflinching candor, the decisive question: ‘What is it to philosophize?’”

In his revelatory writings on ancient Greek and Roman schools of philosophy, Hadot argues that it is not what passes for philosophizing nowadays. Rather than offering, as do modern philosophy departments, a smorgasbord of courses in various sub-disciplines, the ancient philosophical schools offered what Hadot calls “spiritual exercises” — namely, the means to change the way you saw the world and the power to change your very self.

While there was no shortage of such schools — Epicureans, Stoics, Skeptics, Platonists, and Aristotelians all had their shingles out — they all promised not only to inform their students about a particular philosophy, but also to transform them by it. In this sense, a novice’s choice of a particular school was existential. The urgency of, say, Albert Camus’s voice in The Myth of Sisyphus — no one, he reminds us, “ever died for the ontological argument” — had been sounded more than two millennia earlier by the Roman statesman, writer, and philosopher Seneca. Berating those philosophers who busied themselves batting around theoretical questions, he roared: “There is no time for playing around […] You have promised to bring help to the shipwrecked, the imprisoned, the sick, the needy, to those whose heads are under the poised axe […] What are you doing?”

As we learn from the Encheiridion, Epictetus was not one for playing around. He warned his students:

Do you suppose you can go in for philosophy and eat and drink just as you do now or get angry and irritated in the same way? You are going to have to go without sleep, work really hard, stay away from friends and family, be disrespected by a young slave, get mocked by people in the street, and come off worse in rank, office, or courtroom, everywhere in fact.

For Epictetus, Stoicism was not a pastime, but instead it was a set of rigorous practices. With the goal of rebooting one’s life, it is far more demanding, at least from a practical perspective, than the more recondite philosophical schools that have followed. If the Stoics had recruiters, they would have warned that philosophy is the hardest job we’ll ever love.

In both its original Hellenistic and subsequent Roman iterations, Stoicism fastened onto reason’s decisive role in our lives. The compass of our rational faculties allows women and men — Stoicism, along with Epicureanism, was exceptional in its refusal to relegate women to an inferior position — to navigate a world in which we are carried aloft by vast and immovable forces. We cannot master these circumstances, but we can master our attitude toward them. These happenings, for Stoics, are identified mostly as “things indifferent” — namely, events and facts that, in and of themselves, are neither intrinsically bad nor good.

Things indifferent cover those things we tend to care about, but on further reflection reveal themselves to be inconsequential, like the color of my car or the color of my skin. But, more provocatively, things indifferent also cover my social or legal status. What if my skin color condemns me to a life of slavery? As a former slave, Epictetus’s answer is blunt: physical enslavement, as anyone who has attained Stoic wisdom knows, is a thing indifferent. The Stoic knows she must “remove goodness and badness from the things not up to us and ascribe it only to the things that are up to us.” Nearly everything that is external to us — the world’s unfolding warp and woof — is not up to us, but instead to nature.

Crucially, what is up to us is our outlook. By dint of our reason, we can grasp and assent to the way of the world. Though it requires a lifetime of effort to scale these philosophical heights, once I scramble to the summit I will see that mere material and physical things cannot breach what Marcus Aurelius calls the “inner fortress” of my self. And it is within that fortress, whether I am a senator or slave, rich or poor, a centurion or courtesan, that I cultivate what the Stoics called ataraxia, or serenity.

That Stoicism held such great appeal for a certain class of Romans is hardly surprising. Not only did it reflect and reinforce the battery of values, or mos maiorum, that defined the life of a proper thinking Roman, but it also provided a modicum of agency and freedom in a world of imperial domination. Equally unsurprising is that Stoicism now enjoys a revival with a certain class of Americans. In our world of institutional bureaucratization, social fragmentation, and political polarization, the therapeutic promise of Stoicism holds much attraction. It is telling, in this regard, that the founders of cognitive behavioral therapy like Albert Ellis and Aaron Beck were deeply influenced by the ancient Stoics.

Yet there is darkness at the heart of Stoicism — a darkness that, in Yourcenar’s novel, Hadrian glimpses. While he admires the example set by Epictetus — the crippled old man, Hadrian reports, seemed to “enjoy a liberty which was almost divine” — the emperor tells Marcus Aurelius that he nevertheless refuses to embrace either the man or his philosophy. Epictetus, Hadrian muses, “gave up too many things, and I had been quick to observe that nothing was more dangerously easy for me than mere renunciation.” The emperor is on to something. The reach of Stoic renunciation, unflinchingly acknowledged by Epictetus, is much further than most of us would ever wish to go. In one of his prosaic similes, he compares the Stoic’s life to a voyage on a ship commanded by nature. Just as a voyager on a real sea voyage might disembark at a port to gather “a little shellfish and vegetable,” he must be prepared to drop these things and return to the ship at a moment’s notice. So, too, on the ship of life, the Stoic, during a port of call, might gather “a little wife and child.” Ah, but don’t treasure these souvenirs, for “if the captain calls you, run to the boat and leave all those things without even turning around.”

In the Encheiridion, Epictetus — a childless bachelor, mind you — multiplies such examples. Should I want my wife and children to live, not to mention flourish, he lectures me for being “silly” because I want things to be up to me that are not up to me. Should one of my children or wife die, I must never say “I have lost” them. They were never mine in the first place, which is why I should instead say that they have been returned. Classicists like Martha Nussbaum and Richard Sorabji rightly question the consequences and costs of Stoic renunciation. Not only is it good to have attachments to those we love, but it is also necessary; without these attachments, we might enjoy greater security and even serenity, but we would also experience less humanity. We would be, quite simply, less human.

There are other big questions raised by this small handbook. Does not Stoicism, which tells us that economic, political, and social issues are things indifferent, thus encourage forms of political resignation? Is there not the danger that Stoics, in the wide swath they cut with the blade of things indifferent, are in fact conspiring with forms of slavery we could and should resist? Is it really silly to wish with all your heart that your children not only survive you, but flourish as well? Once you put down Epictetus, you might wish to ask yourself whether you side with Hadrian, who accepted his own vulnerability and mourned the loss of his beloved Antinous, or “dear Mark,” who sought to evince his vulnerability by instead loving mere humanity.

¤

Robert Zaretsky teaches in the Honors College at the University of Houston. He is the author of numerous books and articles on French intellectual history. His new book, Catherine & Diderot: An Empress, A Philosopher and the Fate of the Enlightenment, will be published this winter by Harvard University Press.

The post Almost Too Sober: On the Appeal of Stoicism appeared first on Los Angeles Review of Books.

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[that-one-friend-no-one-like-blog]

Bullying Programs Forever. Today I UNDERSTAND Due To The Fact That It Was ME! .

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An associate marketing training program will certainly also instruct you effective techniques of marketing such as search engine optimization, advertisement words, making an appealing site as well as more. Our services could give you with picture banners, as well as message web links, which you can consequently offer to those associated with your affiliate advertising program.|They have no knowledge about the products they advertise. They begin their service through affiliate programs as a result of two essential reasons: it's very easy to set up and it is completely free to establish and also run. If so, that is fine, as long as the affiliate programs belong to, or come from the exact same particular niche.|Associate advertising is a marketing version that attaches sellers with independent marketers that want to spend money and time to offer a vendor's products. This way you have total control of your web site and your service and also you can after that join five or six internet home based business associate programs that match each other and also add them to your web site as well as market them completely to develop multiple streams of recurring earnings. Associate advertising permits you to suggest services and products from other business and also be paid a commission if somebody gets the product as the outcome of your referral. Ppc: Merchant uses money every single time a site visitor sent from your website gos to merchant's site. One of the most typical and also strongly suggested Online marketing ideas is generating income by blogging. The Online program sector is taking the globe by storm and also instructors are making use of partnerships as well as associates to branch out the earnings streams. You will certainly want to educate your consumers the advantages of the product and also the negative aspect of the item if you have an item to advertise. For authors as well as affiliates it is discovering the right balance and also mix of merchants that will be around for the foreseeable future as well as not close their programs. Although i make a lot of my cash from associate products (mainly CPA deal), asking for reimbursement price never ever even crossed my mind. Good affiliate program administration generally involves some type of affiliate advertising and marketing training. After discovering an item that supplies a good solution to a trouble, join an affiliate program that offers that particular item and also start to market to your target audience. The network will certainly run the affiliate program and also every little thing that this includes on behalf of the company. If an affiliate makes use of unsavory ways to bring customers to his website and offer the vendor's products, the merchant will certainly also need to contend with doing a little troubleshooting on his track record. Your associate site design could be based off writing reviews about different services or products. In Google Adsense, Google work as the intermediary between the associates and also the merchants. There are a number of variables required to attain an efficient affiliate marketing program. Well-off Associate College offers a wide variety of Advertising Training tutorials and video clips that will aid any marketing expert develop a successful online company. Visualize if there was some enchanting source that can grant your every dream when it pertains to affiliate marketing as well as enhance your earnings 10 layer! Picking an affiliate advertising product could in some cases seem like choosing supplies. All I had to do was make use of the several existing design templates to replicate and paste the numerous niche items as well as promote them, and also I was making affiliate payments on the exact same day I got going. Well, it's the practice of suggesting a companies product and services to potential customers, producing a sale as well as making a payment in return. So, you do not really have to have a blog for affiliate advertising - however it undoubtedly assists. Affiliate marketing entails an established service or product, which associates sign on in order to help cost a part of the earnings. Offer affiliates a tiny compensation, and your items will appear in targeted locations across the internet. Whatever after that becomes self-supporting in your very own web home business website which started out as an opportunity to make extra earnings online. You want an affiliate whose service is equivalent or comparable to your item. You can start producing multiple streams of residual revenue by promoting just a few of these items. There are variety of much better methods, you could utilize to advertise an affiliate marketing product and the most convenient one is by producing an evaluation site.

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Charlie Edwards: Daring to be Great

Charlie Edwards: Daring to be Great

 Like 2 Box gym is the new home of young and talented prospect Charlie Edwards. A skilled and well-schooled fighter bred from the gritty hard knock life of amateur boxing, now making his way in the glamorous but somewhat ruthless world of professional game. Recently making a big career move to sign with the coveted trainer, Adam Booth. A man who has etched his name into the boxing records with great British fighters of all weights including, David Haye, George Groves and more recently the likes of Ryan Burnett and Andy Lee. It has to be noted that there are not currently many more talented stables than that of the current Booth regime. Upon walking into the gym, Booth has Charlie on the pads working meticulously to get a combination of movement and striking, whilst Ryan Burnett works alongside with another trainer on pads and Andy Lee is going through the motions on the heavy bag. Success breeds success and you really get the feeling that right now in the Booth camp, that’s exactly what’s on the horizon for what is a mixture of experienced world level fighters along with young and hungry prospects.

  “Hungry” being a word that sums Charlie up to a tee and a word he uses a lot. A fighter that knows where he comes from and appreciates the opportunity that he has been given through boxing but wants more than to just rest on his laurels. When discussing this new approach through Adam, Charlie touches up on how quickly the two have gelled: “It’s going really well, we’re gelling great, his style suits mine down to the ground. There’s a few things he’s really changing about me and I think you’ll see a different me over the coming months”. Charlie adds, “Adam’s a great trainer and I respect everything he says”. You really get the sense that Edwards has found a home with Booth, albeit early days, there’s a connection forming between the two: “You really have that Bond with Adam, he really looks after you. He gives you 100% but equally he expects 100%. He’s your coach in the gym and your mate outside the gym and it’s kind of like that father son relationship”.  Charlie has grown throughout his career with his dad by his side and therefore you feel to have that relationship with his trainer can be nothing but positive moving forward with his career. Edwards also touches up on what a great tactician Booth is and how he is looking forward to seeing the positives effects that he has on his style of fighting: “I wish I could fast forward and see the difference that his one to one training will have on my work in the ring, I’m already seeing massive changes already. Adam’s a real perfectionist”. Adam Booth clearly reciprocates the respect and prospect of their partnership: “He’s got a great attitude, I think he’s got huge potential, he’s a smart fighter and he’s very determined. These are great ingredients for a coach to work with”.

           Experience is key in the game known as the sweet science and the crop currently training alongside Edwards are as good as they come. With the WBO Middleweight champion, a stable mate of Charlie’s for some time under the MGM (soon to be MTK Global) banner Billy Joe Saunders training closely alongside, Edward admits his admiration for Saunder’s style of fighting: “Billy Joe has got a lovely style that I’ve always liked, I’ve been around him a lot out in Marbella and we’ve always got on really well”. Another fighter that is in a similar position to Edwards is the heavily touted Ryan Burnett. A young man from Belfast who has done just about everything in the amateurs and is set to the poster boy of Irish boxing with the likes of Frampton and the Conlan brothers. “Ryan Burnett is a top fighter who’s knocking on world title doors”. With a wry smile Charlie adds, “We fought in the amateurs and he beat me. I just remember him being one of the hardest punchers I’d faced. It’ll be interesting sparring him again”. With the camp around him, Edwards clearly understands the importance of sparring and mentions the trio of himself, Burnett and Lucian Reid another young prospect (5-0) and how well they bounce off each other.

 Edwards has had a lucrative amateur career, where he spent the best part of 6 years working with Great Britain’s most successful boxing team, training alongside what are now household names such as Anthony Joshua and Luke Campbell. “I loved my amateur career, it was great. I met a lot of great people and worked with a lot of good coaches. I travelled all over the world and won titles from schoolboy all the way up to the European championships”. Unrivalled experience had at amateur level no doubt, the young flyweight makes it clear that he is now looking forward to the pro game: “The pros are for me, I’ve always felt that I am a better fighter over rounds and that my style suits the pro game”. A young man who clearly lives the life and is incredibly fit and athletic, I agree that it benefits Charlie to go rounds. His relentless style of fighting lends itself to breaking down opponents over time, rather than a one punch knockout artist.  A relative novice in the game he has already gone past 10 rounds on three separate occasions and therefore shows a promising tank at an early age.

  Eddie Hearn has really got behind Charlie Edwards from the start of his career and he seems to be somewhat of the Matchroom sweetheart being placed on some huge cards. The O2 Arena staged his debut against Craig Derbyshire in front of 20,000 on the Mitchell v Estrada card. Since then he has continued to be thrown into the deep end on high-octane nights of British boxing: “I’ve been spoilt really. Golovkin Brook, Crolla Perez (1 & 2) and Frampton Quigg, so some really big events. It’s just been great to get around the country and showcase my skills”. It’s clear being associated with the highest grossing and most popular promotion company has its perks and Charlie seems very positive about working with Eddie Hearn and the rest of the Matchroom team: “Eddie is really behind me as is Barry and has been from day one and it’s been great to have that support”. Charlie goes onto to express that Hearn invests a lot of time in his fighters: “On my comeback fight after Casimero, Eddie put me on at 4:00pm to settle my nerves and take me away from the spotlight, but he was still there watching on at ringside”. Hearn has been touting his young prospect since signing him and does hold him in high regard, saying back in 2015: “The sky’s the limit for this kid, he’s got talent in bundles”.

         Fighters are often mollycoddled at the beginning of their professional career, with their records padded to gain momentum, sometimes without substance. Edwards however showed his courage when taking a huge world title clash against two-weight world champion, John Riel Casimero 10th September 2016. A fight in which he would put up a brave performance but ultimately fall short. The fight would take place on the biggest night of the British boxing calendar in 2016, Golovkin v Brook on Sky Sports Box Office: “The fight made sense. It made sense career wise and money wise. The exposure I got for taking a world title fight in my ninth fight was huge. Imagine I’d won that. You have to dare to be great.” It’s very refreshing to see a fighter take a fight of that magnitude so early and really grab the bull by the horns and have that attitude to “dare to be great”. Fighting on such a huge platform in the early stages of your career is incredibly valuable for the mental side of boxing; a trait that many say is more than half the battle. “Even now, the best moment of my career so far is walking out on the main stage of a Sky Sports Box Office bill. It was an unbelievable experience.” It was clear that experience played a massive part in the fight and it seemed that Charlie just lacked the boxing nous to adapt to the constant pressure of the heavy hitting Philippine: “He could really bang. From the very first round his clipped me round the back of the head and it was if he had two horse shoes in his gloves.” After a difficult start to the fight, Edwards had some success in the middle rounds and began to show that he could mix it up at world level: “I felt that I was finding my way back into the fight and started to feel comfortable and got too confident. I threw a reaching left hook and was caught with a peach of a left hand.” The shot was a devastating left hook that knocked Edwards off of his feet and was the final nail in a coffin that Casimero had been building over 10 rounds. To Edward’s credit, he showed experience enough to take a knee and wait until 8 before making his way to his feet: “I can’t even remember the shot, I remember being completely dazed on the floor. As I went to get up, I could see no one else but my brother, Sonny. He gestured to me to take a knee and wait till 8. I still don’t know

how I made it up.” The writing was on the wall and Charlie made it up on shaky legs only for the ref to stop the fight in the 10th round. In an age where the “0” in boxing seems to be paramount it is often said that you learn more from your losses than you do your wins and you really get the sense that Charlie knows this adding, “It’s a learning curve and I will take a lot from the fight moving forward. After I’d lost the fight I wanted to hide away, I couldn’t look people in the eye when they mentioned the fight. After a while I dusted myself down and realised what I had achieved competing in a world title fight”.  

           It seems the talent for boxing runs in the family with Charlie’s younger brother, Sunny now also making his way through the pro ranks at bantamweight. The two brothers, who are both managed by MTK Global, are a clearly close and have a vested interest in each others careers: “Sunny’s doing really well, he’s up in Sheffield now training with his old amateur coach Grant Smith at the Steel City Gym and he’s waiting to release some big news on his promotion moving forward.” I joke that Eddie has got his claws in and looking to sign him over to Matchroom Promotions, to which Charlie shrugs and smrks “We’ll see.”

 Both 2015 and 2016 have proved to be whirlwind years for this down to earth young lad from Croydon and he’s fully aware how far he’s come: “When you think two years ago I was losing at the Commonwealth games as an amateur and since then I haven’t looked back, I’ve pushed on and I understand that you only get one shot at this”. 2017 proves to be another huge year for Charlie Edwards who is looking to potentially capture a European title and is also eyeing up a tasty domestic clash with the skilful Andrew Selby, younger brother of current IBF Featherwright Champion, Lee Selby. “I want to fight Andrew. I know it’s a fight the British public want to see and it’s a fight I’m really confident that I can win, I know I’ve got the tools to beat him.” The classic saying goes, ‘Styles make fights’ and it’s hard to see his fight being anything other than a classic with two young prospects, both with slick styles clashing under the lights in a mouth-watering battle. The European route is another option for Edwards who also has the potential to move up to Super Flyweight to hone his skills: “We are keeping an eye on the European title and there is that option, or I can move up to Super Flyweight and compete for the British title so we’ve got plenty of inroads.” There’s clearly real excitement in the Edwards camp and he’s got huge ambition to put his foot on the gas, he admits he must take a step back: “It’s time for me to let my promotional team guide my career, I’ve previously been so desperate to do everything at 100mph, but with their guidance and with Adam behind me I really think they can take me all the way to world title honours”.

 Edwards, who is still only 23 has got a long career ahead of him. An experience head on a young body, he’s proving to be a bright spark on the British boxing scene. He has an infectious attitude and his willingness to learn and hunger to move forward is refreshing to see. A world title does not seem too distant for this young lad daring to be great.