Sometimes you have to leave behind the pains of the world, the pressure of work, your responsibilities to all your loved ones and… take a walk! Breathe deeply, take a few steps outdoors and then some more, and yet more, for an hour or two, until, for a few heady moments, you feel FREE… That’s…
Author: Claude Forthomme
Writer, essayist, poet, painter. Columbia U graduate in economics; United Nations expert (25 years in FAO; ended career as Director for Europe and Central Asia). Presently Senior Editor at Impakter Magazine and Deputy Observer Order of Malta at Rome-based United Nations Agencies (FAO, WFP, IFAD)
Writes in English and Italian under various pen names (Nougat for fiction in English; Forthomme for non-fiction). So far, publications include 2 books in Italian (including an award-winning children's book of tales) and 6 books in English (including one non-fiction essay on development aid).
All fiction in English is available on Amazon and major e-platforms, uncer pen name Claude Nougat.
Chasing the Flame…
This week leading to Easter was an authentic Via Crucis for some 300 innocents massacred by demented people: half of them were hapless tourists flying on Lufthansa’s low cost GermanWings, the other half, university students in Kenya who were shot and decapitated because they happened to be Christians. The Pope had unforgettable words on Holy…
How the United Nations Foresees The Future
That is the title of an article I just wrote for Impakter. As I am doing research for my upcoming book about the United Nations (tentatively entitled “Soft Power“), I keep coming across interesting aspects of UN work that are little known to outsiders and I wanted to share these “choice bits” with you on…
Click with Compassion
That’s what Monica Lewinsky tells us in her moving TED talk that has just come out, a talk that is a call for action against our “culture of humiliation”, magnified by the Internet, where, alas, cyber-bullying is too often the order of the day. You can see her talk here: It got a standing ovation,…
My Life without You
To all my friends and those who enjoy reading my blog: please forgive the silence, my mother passed away on 12 March, she was 101 years old. It’s been very painful for her and of course for her family but now at last, she rests in peace. The last time I talked on my blog…
Getting Close to the “Darkest Hour”: Ancient Art Destroyed, Lives Lost, A Voice for Freedom Silenced
We are getting close to Mankind’s “darkest hour”. The Voice for Freedom, silenced in Moscow on 27 February, was that of Boris Nemtsov. It was close to midnight, he was gunned down not far from the Kremlin, as he was walking home from a radio interview in which he had dared to take Putin to…
What’s Wrong with Europe? Ukraine, Greece and Libya: All Unfinished Businesses
Libya is sinking into a fundamentalist Islamic chaos, the cease-fire in Ukraine is breaking down and Greece’s debt problems are far from resolved. Merkel, Putin and Hollande at the Kremlin (2015) And this in spite of the the so-called agreement reached in Minsk between Putin and the Merkel-Hollande couple. And in spite of the news…
France, Taking the Pulse
I spent the past week in Paris and it has opened my eyes. Several widely-held opinions and ideas struck me: 1. I am not Charlie I met NOBODY who evinced support for Charlie Hebdo – now with the killings in Denmark, there has been a revival of that “let’s defend freedom of the press” mood,…
Greece vs. Germany: A Game of Chicken Or Cat and Mouse?
Paul Krugman in the New York Times has called the rapidly unfolding Euro crisis a “game of chicken” (here). I think it’s more like a cat-and-mouse game played by Germany against Greece, in which Germany is a Big Fat Cat trying to immobilize a darting Greek mouse. As I explained in my previous blog post,…
Climate Change and the Collapse of Western Civilization
To anyone living in Europe, it is truly puzzling that Americans continue to deny Climate Change. The anger, recklessness and vehemence displayed by American “climate deniers” are something of a mystery. And their favorite argument is that there is no scientific “evidence” of global warming – in spite of the rising number of “extreme” weather…
“The End of Power”, Mark Zuckerberg’s Choice
Why would the world’s most famous billionnaire, Mark Zuckerberg, pick Moises Naim’s erudite book, The End of Power, as his bedtime reading in January – and at the same time create a book club on Facebook that drew 250,000 members over just two weeks?The first answer is: wow! 250,000 in 2 weeks is surely a…
2015: New Challenges in Publishing
Now that the dust has settled on 2014, we begin to see what 2015 will bring. Is the e-book market crashing? Too soon to say, but there are some worrying signs of trouble. Here are the most likely: 1. A growing glut in books. The fast growth in titles in the Kindle Store will continue…
Claude Forthomme 