Childhood Memories

 In this very short interview Sir Tery Pratchett (a famous British writer) talks about a childhood memory. Notice the use of "would"?

Jesse Eisenberg

Jesse Eisenberg has been all over the news in Spain these last few days because of what he said when he was interviewed by Conan O'Brien. If you look for the videos on youtube you'll find a lot of angry people writing comments, either because they hate the Spanish show or because they hate the actor. I actually think that both groups are partially right: the host of the show (Pablo Motos) has an ego the size of Jack Nicholson's, and he normally uses his guests to make himself look good. However, Jesse Eisenberg was completely wrong when he thought that Spain carries a grudge towards the USA because of WWII. First: Spain was not involved in World War II (that's not entirely true, Spain was having enough problems after its own civil war, so it was officially neutral, even if it somehow tried to help the Germans) Secondly: because it was a dictatorship, it did not receive any American help, so, my dear friend, no American "ships and planes full of help" arrived in Spain. Get your facts straight before speaking.
And finally, because this blog is for a language class (an English class): don't be so proud about being linguistically incompetent! Learning is always a positive thing, even if it is learning foreign languages!

Mozart

Since we were reading a text about Mozart last week, I would like you to have a look at his biography:

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works. He is among the most enduringly popular of classical composers.

Mozart showed prodigious ability from his earliest childhood in Salzburg. Already competent on keyboard and violin, he composed from the age of five and performed before European royalty; at 17 he was engaged as a court musician in Salzburg, but grew restless and traveled in search of a better position, always composing abundantly. Visiting Vienna in 1781 he was dismissed from his Salzburg position and chose to stay in the capital, where over the rest of his life he achieved fame but little financial security. His final years in Vienna yielded many of his best-known symphonies, concertos, and operas, and the Requiem. The circumstances of his early death have been much mythologized. He was survived by his wife Constanze and two sons.

Mozart always learned voraciously from others, and developed a brilliance and maturity of style that encompassed the light and graceful along with the dark and passionate—the whole informed by a vision of humanity "redeemed through art, forgiven, and reconciled with nature and the absolute". His influence on all subsequent Western art music is profound. Beethoven wrote his own early compositions in the shadow of Mozart, of whom Joseph Haydn wrote that "posterity will not see such a talent again in 100 years"

Adapted from wikipedia

Anti-Paparazzi Law

California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has signed an anti-paparazzi bill making it easier to sue media outlets that use photos that invade celebrities' privacy.
Paparazzi photos are sold for incredible amounts of money, for example, a photo of Princess Diana and Dodi Al-Fayed sold for over 3 million dollars. This has created a lot of controversy, as photographers usually wait outside celebrities' homes to take photos or interview them. Sometimes they intrude into private properties or pay people for information.
Do you think Schwarzenegger is right making a harder law against paparazzi? Do you think he is just angry because, as a celebrity, he has suffered them?