I've just had a look at my 2010 Reading Resolutions, and I can't say I'm doing spectacularly. But a recent crisis of confidence has inspired some reading that could have been a resolution in its own right, and I think partly fulfills my intention to read something that I think couldn't possibly interest me. Someone recently asked me what would happen to the Prime Minister if there was a hung parliament - would he stay in office? I was also asked about why the new healthcare bill in the US might be considered fascist. I couldn't answer either of these questions, and I panicked. Now, I know that neither British politics nor domestic policy in the States is my 'area,' but since I have two degrees in political science and a third one in progress, I felt unbearably guilty for being so uneducated. Perhaps it comes down to insecurity, in the sense that political science is a wide field and I have a different set of interests within it. But I ran right out and bought some introductory texts on British politics and fascism - and one on Communism, for good measure. And to my surprise, what started as an attempt just to sound smarter became truly educational, in the sense that I find myself more genuinely interested in these topics than I thought I would be. For example, I'm less inclined to skip the nitty-gritty articles on the election campaign in Britain when I read The Guardian each morning, and I definitely understand more than I used to. I'm actually following the campaign now because I want to, because I find it increasingly fascinating, rather than just because I'm afraid someone might ask me something I won't be able to answer. This is a good feeling. So what's next? Well, since I've started with three books in Blackwells' Very Short Introduction series, I think I'll continue with it - I'm eyeing the Scotland volume, having just spent a long weekend there, and I know I could brush up on Northern Ireland and The American Presidency. But (almost) any topic is fair game...luckily they're 3 for 2!

Now as to the politics of memory, Russian and Polish leaders will for the first time mark the 70th anniversary of the Katyn massacre together...questions about the fate of Raoul Wallenberg, a Swedish diplomat who saved tens of thousands of Hungarian Jews during the Holocaust, are raised again...and memories of the Prague Spring are influencing Czech citizens' perceptions of the new arms control treaty between Russia and the US.

In the near future, look out for some musings on the press coverage of the recent Moscow metro bombings, and by extension, on views of the Chechen wars in general...