Feldman's Faves: November 4, 2024

GOOD MORNING EVERYONE

This is a very fun and exciting week at Goodmans and on Bay Street– the energy of the recruit is palpable. Please remember to treat everyone you meet during this process with kindness and don’t forget that each and every one of us, at one time, was nervous about our interviews here and our prospects for the future. It is a scary process for them – so be nice.

And let’s not forget about tomorrow, a somewhat consequential day for world I would think. It will be nothing if not interesting.

No theme this week – just topics of interest.

THE SAFE KEEP By: Yael van der Wouden  - The Safe Keep is officially the most interesting book I have reviewed for this group. Wouden’s debut novel has been shortlisted for the 2024 Booker Prize (that will be awarded this month) and it is so very deserving of this recognition. I won’t describe the plot in great detail because there are some many unexpected plot twists that to give any of them away would ruin an incredible experience. While reading the book I kept thinking of the Backstreet Boys classic, “Quit Playing Games with my Heart” every time a new plot twist was revealed. In one sense it is a love story (that you wouldn’t expect), in another sense it is a mystery novel (with a reveal that you wouldn’t expect) and historical fiction (handled in a way that you wouldn’t expect). In addition to the highly creative plot the writing is just outstanding. I know this will sound pretentious but reading this book feels like looking at an Impressionist painting or listening to a Debussy song on the piano. The style is ephemeral and light yet fraught with tension and emotion. As one reviewer notes, “It’s the 1960s in a rural part of The Netherlands and Isabel lives alone in a large, rambling house, her mother dead and her brothers Hendrik and Louis off living their own lives. Always a solitary soul and an outsider, she becomes inextricably linked to the house, its walls and contents all tangible links to her mother. She spends her days obsessively ordering the house, making sure everything is where it belongs.  A childhood of leaving and loss has left Isabel cold and withdrawn but beneath the irritability and anxious need for order is a yearning. When her carefree brother Louis needs to travel for work and asks to leave Eva, his latest in a long line of girlfriends, in the house with Isabel, Isabel is deeply irritated by this invasion of her space. But as irritability turns to something else, Eva’s presence brings a whole new side of Isabel to light, in more ways than one. This is an absolutely striking and enthralling debut. Exploring themes of displacement, loneliness and loss, need, anger and burning desire, childhood memory and the legacies of war, this is an atmospheric, absorbing and highly charged read. Isabel is an intriguing and multi-layered character, and the narrative style, often breathless, adds to the tension, the anxiety, the sense of awkwardness and volatility that pervades both the story and Isabel’s own inner life. She has lived a life of loneliness until someone comes into it, filling a void and unleashing a desire, an all-consuming need for connection, for touch. The writing is atmospheric, with great care given to creating a sense of place, the breezy, creaking house and garden almost becoming a character in itself. With transportive, immersive writing and a plot turn that is absolutely captivating, exploring a particular time in history through the compelling story of one lonely woman, I loved this.” If politics are put aside I am certain this book will win the Booker this year (and it if doesn’t, it should). Here’s a good review from the NYT- https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/25/books/review/safekeep-yael-van-der-wouden.html

TED Talks Daily - Five ways leaders can adapt to shifting geopolitics | Nikolaus S. Lang – In this PODCAST Nikolaus S. Lang describes how the West has been sleeping for the 30 years following the collapse of the Soviet Union and is now just waking up to the realities of a new multi-polar world.  The BRICS summit in Russia last month was a very important milestone in this development and Lang argues that leaders need to learn to adapt to what is coming. He looks at scenarios about the 2030s and beyond. One of which is what he calls a “back to the future” scenario, where we have the liberalization, globalization and democratization of the 1990s – but he believes this one is very unlikely. On the other extreme is a global escalation of conflicts like are already in Ukraine, Middle East and Sudan, with more to come in the Pacific, but this also (he believes) is unlikely.  So he thinks are heading into a new multipolar world that includes the Western Bloc (democracy and open markets, opening of NATO, AUCUS, etc), the New Eastern Bloc (led by China and Russia with others like North Korea and Iran) and the Middle Powers (e.g., India and Brazil) who develop spheres of influence globally. It is in this context that Lang mentions the business leaders need to do five things to thrive in this new world order, namely, (a) build resilient supply chains, (b) prepare for continued inflation and price volatility, (c) design organizations for a fragmented world with regional command centres, (d) prepare for cyber attacks, (e) develop a “geopolitical muscle” (i.e., need people who can develop and think about the dynamic understanding of how to function in this dynamic environment).  Here’s an excerpt from the PODCAST itself, “What will the world look like in 2030? International business consultant Nikolaus S. Lang predicts the evolution of a multipolar world, with multiple emerging coalitions of countries acting in new ways to achieve their economic, technological and military goals. He dives into what this will mean for the global economy, offering five tips for business leaders to prepare for the coming geopolitical landscape.” https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/ted-talks-daily/id160904630?i=1000675244530

Thank you for your ongoing engagement and participation.

And remember to stay safe, stay healthy and to docket daily.

Jon