10 NEWS People
THE WEEK3August 2019Walking on the Moon
Charlie Duke is one of only
four men alive to have walked
on the Moon, says Mick
Brown in The Daily Telegraph.
As amember of the Apollo 16
mission in 1972, he spent three
days on the lunar surface,
where he weighed just 60lbs in
his space suit. But low gravity
was not as fun as it might look.
“It was easy to lose your
balance, because of the uneven
terrain, and the fact you can’t
see your feet,” he says. He
found that to walk onaflat
surface you had to doalittle
jog, rocking back and forth,
but he nearly cameacropper
when he and John Young
decided to stage an impromptu
Moon Olympics. While
jumping around, he found
himself falling backwards –
and only narrowly avoided
crushing his backpack, which
could have been fatal: “You
lose pressure in your suit, and
you’re gone.” All 12 men who
walked on the Moon were
changed by the experience. But
Duke, now 83, describes it in
more sanguine terms than
some. “Just viewing the Earth
from the Moon wasamoving
experience,” he says. “You
can hold up your hand, and
underneath your hand is the
Earth. From the Moon’s
distance, you can see the polar
regions all white, clouds in the
middle; 70% of the Earth is
water, the oceans, so you see
this crystal blue... It’s a
dramatic view that changes
your perception. But for me
it wasn’t spiritual; it wasn’t
philosophical. You didn’t have
time on the Moon to be saying,‘How did we get here?’, ‘What
is our purpose?’, nothing like
that. My focus was operational
–‘Let’s get the job done.’”My bond with Basquiat
Fred Brathwaite–aka Fab 5
Freddy–was akey figure in
the birth of hip-hop, says
Ammar Kalia in The Guardian.
But art is his passion, and it
always has been. Growing up
in New York in the 1960s, he
discovered the Metropolitan
Museum, and would cut class
to explore its galleries. “I’d
show up and tossanickel in
the admissions box, then spend
the day in fantasy land, going
from English armour to
Renaissance paintings, pop art
to expressionism.” It was an
enthusiasm he couldn’t share
with the “kids on the corner
from the hood”–but it
sparked his career asagraffiti
artist, and led toalasting bond
with Jean-Michel Basquiat,
whom he met in his teens,
and who had spent much of
his childhood in the Brooklyn
Museum. “Finally, there was
someoneIcould talk to about
Caravaggio and Rothko. We
were both so impressed with
the radical nature of modernist
manifestos like futurism. They
gave us–two young, black
kids –the capacity to articulate
what we wanted to say.” Yet
this eloquence perplexed some
members of the art world who
they encountered in the 1980s.
“Gallery people would be
shocked thatIknew who
people like Ad Reinhardt
were,” he says, laughing.
“They just thought we were
grimy criminal kids.”EmilyThornberrywasbornintoarelativelyprosperousfamily–but
shedidn’tgrowupinone,saysRachelCookeinTheObserver.The
shadowforeignsecretary,58,wasjustsevenwhenherbarrister
fatherwalkedout;leftalmostpenniless,hermotherhadtomove
intoacouncilhouse,andatonepointfeltsooverwhelmedthatshe
hadtheircatsputdown.ThingsgotevenworsewhenThornberry
reachedadolescence.Aged15,“Ihadarowwithmymum,andI
wenttolivewithmydad.Andoneday,hewenttoNewYorkand
henevercameback.”Itturnedouthe’dtakenajobwiththeUN,of
whichhelaterbecameassistantsecretary-general.Thornberrywas
tooproudtotellhermotherwhathadhappened,sosheworkedas
acleanerandbarmaidtosupportherselfwhilestudyingforOlevels
andAlevels.“Whenyou’re17,youlivewithit–butwhen Iwasthe
motherofa17-year-oldmyself,Ibecamefuriousaboutit.How
irresponsible!”Bythetimeherfatherfinallycamehome,decades
later,hewassufferingfromdementia–andthethreechildrenhe’d
abandonedfoundthemselveshavingtoberesponsibleforhiscare.
“He’dsayhefelthewasdrowninginthesea,thewavescoming
overhim,thathewasdisappearing.Ihadtogoandseehim,and
tobeginwithIreallyresentedit...Butashedisintegratedinfront
ofme, Ijustfeltgreatpityforhim–andgreatlove.”Viewpoint:
UnfollowingTrump
“A large number of people appear to be
labouring under the illusion that retweeting
President Trump and attachingasnarky
comment constitutes an act of #resistance.
It doesn’t. All publicity is good publicity for
Trump. The same is true for Nigel Farage,
who owes his high profile to the media’s
endless attention. Inarecent interview, he
laughed aboutaNew York Times headline
calling him ‘the most dangerous man in
Britain’. ‘I loved it,’ he said. ‘I’d have paid
for advertising like that.’ It’s easy to feel
helpless about the state of the world. But
there are simple things we can do, and
unfollowing Trump is one of them. Most
of the world isn’t on Twitter, and when his
tweets are elevated into mainstream news,
we’re doing his work for him.”
Arwa Mahdawi in The GuardianFarewell
Beji Caid Essebsi,
presidentofTunisia,
died25July,
aged92.
Jeremy Kemp,film
andTVactor,died
19July,aged84.
Bryan Magee,MP
andphilosopher,
died26July,aged89.
Sir Rex Richards,
scientistwho
pioneeredNMR
spectroscopy,died
15July,aged96.
Russi Taylor,the
voiceofMinnie
Mouse,died26July,
aged75.Book:On Food and CookingbyHaroldMcGee
Luxury:lovelysmellingbathsalts *ChoiceifallowedonlyonerecordCastaway of the week
This week’s edition of Radio 4’sDesertIslandDiscsfeatured
Chief Medical Officer for England Dame Sally Davies
1 Fantasia onaThemebyThomasTallis,performedbyRalph
VaughanWilliamswithSirAndrewDavisandtheBBC
SymphonyOrchestra
2 Brandenburg Concerto No. 3, first movementbyJohann
ChristianBach,performedbyTheSwingleSisters
3 Won’t Get Fooled AgainbyPeteTownshend,performedby
TheWho
4 Killer QueenbyFreddieMercury,performedbyQueen
5*Messiah, Bass Aria: The Trumpet Shall SoundbyGeorgeFrideric
Handel,performedbyAndrewFoster-WilliamswithStephen
LaytonandBrittenSinfonia
6 Là ci darem la manobyWolfgangAmadeusMozart,performed
byLorinMaazel,RuggeroRaimondi,TeresaBerganzaandthe
OrchestraoftheParisOpera
7 The Wings of the WindbyOwainPark,performedbyTheChoir
ofTrinityCollege,CambridgewithStephenLayton