Traveller’s Comments (group member since Jan 14, 2015)

Traveller’s comments from the On Paths Unknown group.

Derek (Guilty of thoughtcrime) wrote: "When I got married, I had no body hair (OK, I had three hairs...) So the gorilla is not the guy she married. "Myself" is not a hairy guy [ancient rock musicals begin playing in the background...]"

Interesting! So you must have had an increase in testosterone since you got married, Derek, since of course testosterone encourages hirsutism. (I shall say nothing further ... ;););) )

Ok, but seriously, if you feel that it's not you, I suppose you could consider electrolysis or hair creams. Let me just warn you - waxing can be DARN painful! I suppose we should be doing our hair-raising discussion in the "anything goes" thread. As if hair removal is not a horror story! Ha ha ha ha.

Yes, well, especially since the first sentence in the post I was quoting, was stated as fact. No matter, each person is entitled to their own views of course - and as long as any strong views remain in this section of the forum, I suppose it doesn't matter if they're stated as fact.

Greg wrote: "Thank God for Orwell. 1984 is strongly anticlerical, and therefore excellent."

Hmm. I smelled something from under bridges from the start. Methinks some game is underfoot!

Greg wrote: "Books are a sin against God. Books distract us from the Truth. But, as they say, Beware the man of one book."

Really? Those are rather extreme views for a secular book discussion group of this nature... why bother joining a book club then, that is clearly dedicated to open views, to discussing secular books, and to tolerance across the board?

Well, they say tolerance is actually a misnomer; an impossibility, for "tolerance" does not really tolerate the intolerant very well, and if not, the tolerant becomes intolerant per se; so I am well aware of that little conundrum.

No doubt a situation which could be causing entertainment to onlookers.

Yes? Symbolic of what?

Yes, of course. Sounds like an interesting book.

Thanks Amy!
...and since I like both Dunsany and Faulkner, I think I'd like to try and scrunch those in as well, perhaps a bit later on in mid-November. Please remind me to make a thread for them in association with our Yellow King threads if you get to read them before I do.

I am starting to get a feeling that The Yellow King needs a folder of its own. Don't worry, I can simply migrate this thread into it, so no worries that any posts will go missing. :)

Okay.

To the VERY essence right into the genes? Hmm, now that suddenly poses a huge new question, I must admit, and that is to wonder about the genetic make-up of Jesus. Of course, there are authors who claim that Jesus had children. But rumors like that start entire conspiracy theories!

Hmm, now I'm trying to figure out what Jesus and Lamarckism have to do with one another...

Amy (Other Amy) wrote: "Edited to add: That would be "The Repairer of Reputations," "The Mask," "In the Court of the Dragon," and "The Yellow Sign". ."

Okay, will do threads for those then. Thanks for all the info!

Amy (Other Amy) wrote: "I also am wondering if anyone else can shed light on the organization of the book. The first four stories are interconnected and surround the King in Yellow, then there are two apparently independent stories, then another quartet of four interconnected stories with no relation to any of the previous stories. Is it just random, or is there a pattern from music or some such? "

I admit I haven't done my homework on this yet. Just finished a work project for the first time in about a month, so been trying to catch up with Carmilla and City of Saints (The latter on which I have posted quite a lot today, btw, if you'd care to throw your eye over it...)

Amy (Other Amy) wrote: "I'm curious if anyone else has read the Dunsany or Faulkner stories? I wanted to for my read of this book, but I didn't have time."

Which specific Dunsany/Faulkner stories would that be?

Speaking of Dunsany, I have been looking for The Charwoman's Shadow for the longest time. Anybody know where I can grab a reasonable copy?

Oh, and are we going to read just the titular story, or did you people want to read all of them? (In which case I had better do a thread for each one.)

Jonfaith wrote: "Okay, just bought it online."

Er... just mentioning that this is a book for free in the public domain by now, but I suppose you wanted an actual paper book (treebook)? Let me re-paste the link to a free ebook copy for those who don't mind e-books: http://www.feedbooks.com/book/1376/th...

Did you watch the TV show True Detective, Jonfaith?

Since King in Yellow snuck up on me a bit, let me at least just make an opening thread for it for now, and then I'll post a bit more on it later.

Opening thread for KiY here: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

Opening thread for discussion of The King in Yellow by Robert W. Chambers.

...so... his father sold his mother and then beats Dradin with the strap if the latter has anything to say about it. What an a-hole!

Interesting thoughts on sanity and insanity there, and on the attainment of it and also the treatment of the insane.

Ok, so Dradin is a damaged person who had a highly traumatized childhood.

"Morrow’s University of Arts & Facts" - isn't that delightful?

Mmm, it looks like his mother felt repressed and full of rage for a long time - she sings 'full of rage'.

Earlier, Dradin had mentioned that he himself felt trapped in their house, and now he sees the old house on the hill "with the shutters like eyes stitched shut." Wow, powerful imagery there...

....so... the tumble in the mud with Tony seems pretty unambiguously homoerotic to me, right? ...so... how does that fit into context with his later apparent hetero-ness? Maybe what happened with his mother, which he seems to conflate with what happened with Tony, caused a lot of guilt with him? Maybe he felt, in a way, that he had caused his mother's situation and that it was a punishment brought upon him?

I was thinking that this might be why he became a priest? To seek redemption?
...and maybe he is seeking a distant, unattainable woman because he is actually a repressed gay?

Any thoughts?

Right, been reading through this thread again, and Michele asked for a spoiler thread for the mid-part of the story, so let's do one for where Dradin's flashback to his family situation starts.

Since I have an ebook for this, I don't know the page, but it's about a page or two after the bits in bold that he reads from the book he had bought; after these bits: "BEING CHAPTER ONE: THE MYSTICAL PASSIONS  The most mystical of all passions are those practiced by the water people of the Lower Moth, for though they remain celibate and spend most of their lives in the water, they attain a oneness with their mates that bedevils those lesser of us who equate love with intercourse. Surely, their women would never become the objects of their desire, for then these women would lose an intrinsic eroticism.

Thread is here: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...