What Are We Reading? 24 May 2021

[Andy]

We had a wonderful sunset last night. But otherwise not too much sun, but very little rain, not anywhere near what further south has been getting.
I’ve been over on Egilsay today, where Magnus was executed. I was the only one on the ferry there and back. The island is so quiet, just one farmer and his family these days, sponsored by the RSPB. It was very atmospheric. And, started another Mackay Brown book on the ferry back, Vinland.

[Andy]

Lljones wrote: "Andy wrote: "Currently on the Orkney mainland in the far north west at the Brough of Birsay. A large persuasion into coming here was George Mackay Brown. On the ferry yesterday I fi..."

If only.
Both Magnus, and a couple of Mills’s are amongst my all time favourites..

[Andy]

The Manningtree Witches by A.K. Blakemore.
A good story based on actual events, but certainly nothing special.
With the amount of hype about its release I had been fooled into thinking Blakemore had a different approach here, but in effect, it’s the same ‘witch finder / witch trial’ story that’s been fictionalised many times.

And did anyone catch Alexei Sayle on Desert Island Discs this morning? He is such a funny man. Well worth a listen if you missed it.
As is John Cooper Clarke, who was on a couple of weeks ago.

[AB76]

I have started the Selected Stories of DH Lawrence and already the quality of his writing shines through

In the stories The Miner At Home and The White Stocking we have female figures of strength and determination in the face of society. The tired, harassed miners wife, talking with her husband in South Notts dialect, admonishing him for not realising how her work never fades, strike or not, as she rounds up her offspring, prepares a bowl of water for her man to wash in and discusses the looming strike .

In the other story a series of valentines gifts from an admirer drive a wedge between husband and wife. Her taunting of her husband is frighteningly realistic, she seems unable to see how she may incite violence in the slower mind of the male. She is sparky, gay and vibrant but also cowed and scared as the spectre of physical violence rises. She likes to leave the married hearth to enjoy herself but her husband suspects more....

[AB76]

Andy wrote: "We had a wonderful sunset last night. But otherwise not too much sun, but very little rain, not anywhere near what further south has been getting.
I’ve been over on Egilsay today, where Magnus was..."

summer is arriving down south, expecting 20-24c from tommorow, though today was a bit drizzly at times
How is the midge quota doing Andy?

[Lljones]

Bill wrote: "A question for the Dylan fans who classify his lyrics as poetry: Have you read Tarantula?
"

Yes. Have you?

[Bill]

Lljones wrote: "Bill wrote: "A question for the Dylan fans who classify his lyrics as poetry: Have you read Tarantula?
"

Yes. Have you?"

Not knowing much about Dylan, I'd never heard of the book, but I was at a used book sale the weekend after he'd won the Nobel and saw a copy of it. I took a look inside and determined that, for me, it was pretty much unreadable (an assessment I would pass on most modern poetry books).

Do you consider the poems in Tarantula on the same level as his lyrics? Do you find them as memorable and relatable?

[Robert]

AB76 wrote: "After a run of great diaries for almost 14 months, its come to a bit of a standstill, was enjoying 20th century diaries that mixed philosophical thoughts with everyday lives in an interesting situa..."

Have you tried Rider Haggard's World War One diaries? He was in British Columbia when the war started, took a detour to Oyster Bay, New York, in a blazing hot summer, because he wanted to talk to Teddy Roosevelt, exchanged letters with Kipling, and made private inquiries when Kipling's son disappeared in battle. This was my introduction to the strained political atmosphere in Britain before and during the war (yes, it was as bad as in the US today).

[AB76]

Robert wrote: "AB76 wrote: "After a run of great diaries for almost 14 months, its come to a bit of a standstill, was enjoying 20th century diaries that mixed philosophical thoughts with everyday lives in an inte..."

thanks for the tip....i will have a gander now

i had never been that keen on diaries until 14 months ago, however this constant stream of diaries which i read before bed have become a nice pillar of my reading. the mind clicks back into gear, even as sleep beckons. Collections of letters and auto-biogs are also part of this reading but letters arent my favourite read

One thing i have noticed is that reading at 1100-1130 at night is harder now the lockdowns are over. I was getting used to dead silence before bed...that has changed totally since mid May

[Berkley]

Andy wrote: "And did anyone catch Alexei Sayle on Desert Island Discs this morning? He is such a funny man. Well worth a listen if you missed it.
As is John Cooper Clarke, who was on a couple of weeks ago."

Thanks for the notice, I definitely want to listen to both of those.

On the Dylan question, I'm a pretty big fan but would tend more towards Jayzed's view that song lyrics and opera libretti are a different beast to poetry and I'd say that it's even a little unfair to judge them in isolation from the music they were meant to accompany .

[SydneyH]

Paul wrote: "I think most singer-songwriters tend to write the lyrics first and shape the musical composition around the structure of the poetry.."

Not Bob. He has said that he has a song in his head and then he changes the words. I can't recall where I read that though.

[[deleted user]]

Andy wrote: And did anyone catch Alexei Sayle on Desert Island Discs this morning? He is such a funny man. Well worth a listen if you missed it.

Thanks. Just listened to it. What a character. His selection has to be the wildest I ever recall, from “The Battle Hymn of the Soviet Air Force” to “Bonkers” by dizzee rascal. The book? Alexei said he didn’t follow his (Communist) parents in reading only books that confirmed their world view. He preferred to read something that challenged him So, he chose Evelyn Waugh “who hated the working class” and his Sword of Honour trilogy, much loved here.

[Cabbie]

Russell wrote: "Alexei said he didn’t follow his (Communist) parents in reading only books that confirmed their world view..."

Alexei's childhood memoir Stalin Ate My Homework was very entertaining, as are his Radio 4 comedies "Imaginary Sandwich Bar" and "Absence of Normal". His early 80s "angry Scouser" persona (as I remember it), overpowered his absurd and surreal view of life. I've heard good things about his short stories too, The Dog Catcher

[AB76]

On the topic of lyrics vs poetry, i would suggest that without the music the lyrics are only half the impact, unlike with poetry where the words are everything, with no distraction or heightened impact of a great rolling tune, full of chord changes and swooping melodies and vocals (or in the case of Bob, his unique growl)

[AB76]

Cabbie wrote: "Russell wrote: "Alexei said he didn’t follow his (Communist) parents in reading only books that confirmed their world view..."

Alexei's childhood memoir Stalin Ate My Homework was v..."

loved him in The Young Ones and other shows, a real talent, he must be in his 60s now i think

[scarletnoir]

Georg wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Georg wrote: "I hope I will be forgiven for being OT, I usually try to avoid that.

But it is a sad day when you realise that you might be detained /deported when you attempt to visit ..."

I am truly sorry and disgusted for what has been done by the Brexiters. My wife is French, I lived there for years, and now people from the EU are being discouraged from coming 'over here'... as Stuart Lee explains:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a17du...

My Danish friend has recently been obliged to apply for 'settled status' - she is married to an Englishman, and has two boys, both born in the UK. FFS! Does this make any sense to anyone?

The xenophobes who own, edit, write for, buy and read the Mail, Express, Telegraph, Sun etc. have a lot to answer for.

Of course, none of the owners even pay tax in the UK - they are tax evaders - but it doesn't stop them telling everyone else how to vote...

Rant over.

[Andy]

More Mackay Brown for me.. he makes the perfect tour guide..
Vinland
Published 19 years after Magnus in 1992, this is a similar book in that it’s the story of an Orkney life, this time less celebrated than Earl Magnus, Ranald Sigmundson. Sigmundson is 12 years old when the novel opens, when he goes to sea for the first time with his father. But it is a difficult relationship, and he jumps ship in Iceland, continuing to Greenland and Vinland (Newfoundland) with an Icelandic vessel. The voyage has a lasting effect on his life, and he yearns to return. In subsequent adventures, he develops a strong relationship with the royal court of Norway, partakes in the Battle of Clontarf, marries and has children, and finally retires, disillusioned with humanity, to contemplate the new Christianity and plan a final voyage to the West.
This all takes place in the early 11th century, a couple of generations before Magnus Erlendsson.
Mackay Brown’s writing may have a religious connotation to it, but it is quite underplayed. If it were anything more it would put me off, but it has an important historical content.
Amongst Mackay Brown’s strengths are the historical detail, which is sufficiently diluted for me, and the descriptions of Orcadian life.
This was written at a time when the author’s own health was failing, and the last pages are an interesting contemplation of death.

‘I’m getting to be an old man, and it’s time for me to make preparations for the last voyage. For that, I need silence and a place where I can meditate alone from time to time. I mean no insult to you - you’ve been a loyal wife to me. If I’m not seen for a couple of days, or a whole week maybe, you know that I’m up there in my cell, trying to work out some hard problems that have troubled me greatly this long while.’

[CCCubbon]

scarletnoir wrote: "Georg wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Georg wrote: "I hope I will be forgiven for being OT, I usually try to avoid that.

But it is a sad day when you realise that you might be detained /deported when you att..."

To our shame I do believe that it is older people, my generation and just younger, in the majority who hold these views, buy these papers. Our PM finds it politically expedient to pander to them.
I hate what our country is becoming, an insular, selfish society.

[Bill]

Washington Post: New Bible that includes Constitution creates controversy before it even hits market

A new Bible that includes the U.S. Constitution and the Pledge of Allegiance is generating controversy before it has even hit the market.

The “God Bless the USA Bible” is expected to go on sale in September, in time to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, according to a Nashville-based marketer who will distribute the book.

It has already prompted cries of blasphemy and concerns that the book will promote Christian nationalism, the idea that America is and should remain a Christian nation.

The Bible will also include lyrics from singer Lee Greenwood’s hit song “God Bless the USA,” which topped pop charts after Sept. 11, 2001. Using the historic King James Version, the “God Bless the USA Bible” has about 600 preorders for $49.99 and will ship in September, said Hugh Kirkpatrick, who said he wanted to inspire unity in the country.

[AB76]

CCCubbon wrote: "scarletnoir wrote: "Georg wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Georg wrote: "I hope I will be forgiven for being OT, I usually try to avoid that.

But it is a sad day when you realise that you might be detained /d..."

i feel the same, i'm lucky that where i live and all my friends and family are remainers but i'm disgusted with what the UK has become, or England in particular, as its England that leads the Brexit charge

i loathe seeing flags and populist jingo phrases, its all cheap, pointless and utterly irrelevant to the internationalists among us. "Global" Britain is a joke, as it excludes the EU from its "globe"

[Lass]

JayZed wrote: "scarletnoir wrote: "I have no intention of getting deeply into any discussion (let alone argument) about poetry, as I rarely read it... so what follows is a purely personal view with some questions..."

Georg, I’m so sorry to hear that. We were en route to Cognac, the birthplace of Jean Monnet, co-founder of the E U, when we heard the news of the Brexit vote. Couldn’t believe it. Please keep posting.

[Bill]

The New Republic: What’s Wrong With Bob Dylan’s Biographers? (A review of The Double Life of Bob Dylan: A Restless, Hungry Feeling, 1941-1966)

Certainly, Heylin sets out to elbow past all other comers, making bullying attempts to clear the crowded field of Dylan researchers, biographers, and armchair obsessives. Ian Bell’s Dylan biographies are “pseudo-historical.” An introduction to a book of Dylan photographs written by august rock journalist Dave Marsh is “insipid.” Longtime confidant Victor Mayamudes’s Another Side of Bob Dylan is “thin gruel.” The online resource About Bob Dylan proves only “ostensibly reliable.” Dylan’s own 2004 memoir, Chronicles: Volume One, is “unreliable,” something that even rookie readers took for granted at the time of publication. Readers are meant to be humbled before such pomposities. Here comes Clinton Heylin to hew a path through the trash heap of vacuous biographies and inferior works. Something is happening here, and this guy—and only this guy—knows what it is.

[Georg]

Lass wrote: "JayZed wrote: "scarletnoir wrote: "I have no intention of getting deeply into any discussion (let alone argument) about poetry, as I rarely read it... so what follows is a purely personal view with..."

Ah, well, at least I have the choice to keep out. I fully expect something similar to the Windrush scandal will happen in the near future.
That Augias stable aka the Home Office is rotten to the core. And Patel is vicious to the core. Thats why she got the job. She's cut from the same cloth as the people who ruled Germany you-know-when.

[Georg]

I just finished another "masterpiece".

I really wish that word were forbidden. I get the feeling that, according to the literary critics, in the last 20 years more "masterpieces" were written than in the 500 years before.

[AB76]

what has happened to leathercol?

it seems the Guardian TLS had more regular commentaries from the core gang or maybe some just dont like the GR interface?

[Bill]

Slawkenbergius wrote: "there's a re-edition of Herrmann's soundtracks to be released next month, and I know you're a connoisseur."

Thanks for the notice. I recently listened to the reissued Charles Gerhardt film score series; it contains only one Hermann disc, which includes Kiri Te Kanawa as Salammbô.

[Gpfr]

Dinner with Dylan - BBC radio play
Lass, thank you for recommending this - I listened to it last night & really enjoyed it.

[Lass]

Bill wrote: "The New Republic: What’s Wrong With Bob Dylan’s Biographers? (A review of The Double Life of Bob Dylan: A Restless, Hungry Feeling, 1941-1966)Certainly, Heylin sets out to elbow pas..."

Best not to get me started on this current shameful Westminster crowd. Trying to remain calm and balanced. That said, I will be reading the Observer this morning for further information…possibly to fuel my ire! Listening to the eminently admirable Peter Hennessy on R4 has reminded me that I had meant to look out his “ Having it So Good: Britain in the Fifties” . He was at the Ed Bookfest a couple of years ago, but I hadn’t realised or would have grabbed a ticket.

Speaking of memoirs, I can highly recommend former Home Sec, Alan Johnson’s series, including “In My Life”, which recalls much of what I remember too of the music and fashions of the 60s He’s a lovely chap, and writes very engagingly.

[CCCubbon]

The fifties was an eventful decade and I remember MacMillan making that ‘never had it so good’ speech in 1957. It was true that there was plenty of employment, wages rose a little, but there was still a deal of poverty and countless slum dwellings. There were not so many luxury items, things that would be deemed essential today such as a refrigerator and television, people ‘made do’, As ever it was ‘never had it so good’ for the more affluent.

[[deleted user]]

Lass wrote: Speaking of memoirs, I can highly recommend former Home Sec, Alan Johnson’s series, including “In My Life”, which recalls much of what I remember too of the music and fashions of the 60s He’s a lovely chap, and writes very engagingly.

I haven’t read any of them but have been meaning to for years, because I’ve thought he must be a decent guy ever since I saw him on TV at the time his first book of memoirs came out. He was talking to a group of union people at a small launch party, and in amongst everything else he told a story which went something like this:

“I was going home late one evening in my ministerial car. They give you a driver as well, and as we were going by Clapham Common I asked the driver to stop. I felt like getting out and stretching my legs. After I had been walking up and down the pavement for a couple of minutes, two young police constables came hurrying up to me. One of them said they were going to have to ask me to stay where I was and not leave. They were trying to catch a man who had attacked a woman on the Common and didn’t want any males to leave the area until they had found the suspect. Like an idiot, I said: ‘But I’m a Cabinet Minister.’ The constable said, as smooth as could be: ‘It does not follow, sir, that you are a stranger to criminality.’ So of course I had to stay, and they went off. Then about ten minutes later the officer came back. He said: ‘You can go. We’ve got a description of the suspect. He was young and slim.’”

As you can imagine, the audience loved it.

[Slawkenbergius]

Bill wrote: "I recently listened to the reissued Charles Gerhardt film score series; it contains only one Hermann disc, which includes Kiri Te Kanawa as Salammbô."

I noticed when that box came out, but haven't got the chance to listen to the discs yet.

The only re-recording of Herrmann's film scores that I know of is the excellent florilegium conducted by Esa-Pekka Salonen. Truly great stuff!

[scarletnoir]

Bill wrote: "A new Bible that includes the U.S. Constitution and the Pledge of Allegiance is generating controversy before it has even hit the market.

The “God Bless the USA Bible” is expected to go on sale in September...

I thought all right-thinking people were well aware that the USA was 'God's own country' (the Israelites being just a bunch of unfortunate delusionals)... this is especially important when it comes to winning wars, as your friend and mine Bob Dylan memorably pointed out ;-)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5y2Fu...

[MK]

CCCubbon wrote: "The fifties was an eventful decade and I remember MacMillan making that ‘never had it so good’ speech in 1957. It was true that there was plenty of employment, wages rose a little, but there was st..."

I am halfway through Cristopher Fowler's (Bryant & May mysteries) growing up (1960s) memoir, having just past the point when his preteen home in Greenwich (with outhouse) was bulldozed to make way for a highway. Not the happiest childhood - as much time as possible spent at the movies.

[CCCubbon]

MK wrote: "CCCubbon wrote: "The fifties was an eventful decade and I remember MacMillan making that ‘never had it so good’ speech in 1957. It was true that there was plenty of employment, wages rose a little,..."
Not so many had a television and a weekly visit to the cinema was quite common. Many houses sublet rooms. Common to see a cooker on the landing upstairs to serve another family.

[MK]

A head's up for mystery readers here. I have just finished Belinda Bauer's Exit which I REALLY recommend. My local library has it cataloged as 'fiction' but since i don't know cataloging rules, I say it's a fantastic mystery. It starts slowly with a kind of assisted suicide, then rolls on with twist after turn. It kept me in my chair until the very end.

[Bill]

MK wrote: "(Bryant & May mysteries)"

Somehow, though I read that correctly, I imagined them as "Nichols and May mysteries" - a series I don't think anyone's written yet.

[AB76]

Selected Stories By DH Lawrence is a joy, i just read the early tale "Odour of Crysanthemums" and was transported from a mild sunny late May day, into a dank Nottinghamshire evening.

Miners walk home in the gloaming as a mother and her children await the return of the father figure, from below the earth. The style and the feel is dark, shadowy and unsettling, the grim poverty and the exhausted souls of the inhabitants creep from every page.

A disaster befalls this miner, his dead body laid on a table in the parlour as his mother and pregnant wife wash it, a ritual of old times.There is a tenderness in this section which lessens the looming weight of what the death of a breadwinner means in poverty stricken victorian england.

[MK]

Bill wrote: "MK wrote: "(Bryant & May mysteries)"

Somehow, though I read that correctly, I imagined them as "Nichols and May mysteries" - a series I don't think anyone's written yet.
"

Love it - would be a great snarky series.

[Gpfr]

A few weeks ago, I signed up to the Paris Review Redux email - every Sunday you get a link to an article, a short story and a poem in their archives. Others of you might like to check this out. (It's free)

[Georg]

AB76 wrote: " There is a tenderness in this section which lessens the looming weight of what the death of a breadwinner means in poverty stricken victorian england.

Sorry, AB, but having turned this sentence upside down and downside up it still does not make any sense to me.

[Bill]

scarletnoir wrote: "I thought all right-thinking people were well aware that the USA was 'God's own country'"

I expect that I will soon be in a position to take pre-orders for the "Workers of the World Bible" (aka "The Opiate of the Masses Bible") - an edition of the New Testament and Psalms bound together with The Communist Manifesto. The words of Christ will be printed in (what else?) .

[AB76]

The Channel by Renaud Morieux is a study of the stretch of water that separates Britain from France. Is it the "manche" or the "english channel", he looks at the evolution of naming this body of water through the centuries, alongside the history of how both sides of the channel viewed this narrow waterway

In a very readable but also intellectual book, he looks at what the channel meant to the people who lived either side of it and the political changes that occurred in naming conventions during the 1688-1815 period, where France and Britain were almost constantly in a state of war

The Anglo-French standardisation of distances and depths occurred in the 1780s, in a rare period of peace and saw various French and British cartographers and geographers working together. The French recording that clear weather on the Calais side was so lacking that their work was hampered by the "air".

Reading the work done by french historians not available in english is really informative, especially the early studies in the 16th century, looking at when the channel was formed and the likelihood of Gauls and Britons being of the same racial composition.

[AB76]

2021 has been an average modern fiction year, with only Piglia and Llamazares being a "rated" read and the North Korean novel "Friend" was culturally interesting but not rated. (my classic fiction in 2021 has been of an excellent standard)

my next set of modern novels have potential, they are:

The Red Collarby JC Rufin
The New Sorrows of Young W (not actually modern but delighted to find a new German writer for me)
The Cold Summer by Carafiglio(recommended by Andy)
The Private Life of Trees by Alejendro Zambra

If any of these stall on me, i will hibernate my modern reading but i think this is a good line up

[Bill]

Bill wrote: "Any Rushdie fans here?

I suspected a new book of non-fiction was in the offing when this lengthy opinion piece appeared on the NY Times website."

As I anticipated, the Salman Rushdie piece appeared in today’s NY Times print edition and I was able to read the whole thing in that format. I don’t think that it was worth it though – it’s pretty disorganized and meandering. He starts off with the bit I quoted about books we love making us who we are, but then goes into an extended meditation of the so called “Arabian Nights” and Scheherazade which reads like brainstorming for one of his novels. He then ends talking in a fairly superficial manner about the lure of the fantastic and closes with something like the banal idea of unimaginative adults being saved by children and their sense of wonder. Though he lobs some implicit criticisms at Disney in the course of the piece, this last point seemed to me fairly similar to the pitch Disney uses to sell adults vacation packages to their theme parks.

[Lass]

CCCubbon wrote: "The fifties was an eventful decade and I remember MacMillan making that ‘never had it so good’ speech in 1957. It was true that there was plenty of employment, wages rose a little, but there was st..."

Had the pleasure of meeting Alan Johnson a couple of times. He really is just as you would imagine. Friendly, down to earth. No edge to him.

[Lass]

Bill wrote: "Slawkenbergius wrote: "there's a re-edition of Herrmann's soundtracks to be released next month, and I know you're a connoisseur."

Thanks for the notice. I recently listened to the reissued Charle..."
Glad you enjoyed the play. Great fun, and Eileen Atkins was just perfect.

[AB76]

The Luftwaffe Diariesby Cajus Bekker is certainly contentious on some issues, i am reading it as an artefact from the 1960s rather than a modern view on the situation, however i will need to do some contemporary research on some allegations.

I am very interested, when i get to it, to look at the circumstances of the bombing of Rotterdam in 1940 but right now i am thinking about the bombing of Warsaw in late Sept 1939.

Bekker describes the Warsaw bombing as a confused mixture of different Luftwaffe "wings" merging over a city with poor visibility and a very messy and protracted bombing raid ensued. There is a description of conditions not being conducive to targeted bombing and also that the Polish capital was hardly an open city as the Poles had dug in throughout, with flak guns and troops. Many of the Luftwaffe bombs fell on the advancing Wehrmacht troops as well

Its is appalling to think how the Nazi approach to war reduced all limitations on civilian involvement, though colonial air forces in Iraq and Libya had practiced similar tactics before

[Georg]

AB76 wrote: Its is appalling to think how the Nazi approach to war reduced all limitations on civilian involvement, though colonial air forces in Iraq and Libya had practiced similar tactics before

"The Area Bombing Directive was a directive from the wartime British Government's Air Ministry to the Royal Air Force which ordered RAF bombers to attack the German industrial workforce and the morale of the German populace through bombing German cities and their civilian inhabitants. The directive is contradictory to Article 25 of the Hague Conventions of 1899 and 1907, and sparked international debates if the directive could be classified as a legalization of war crimes against the German civilian population".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Area_bo...

Bomber aka "Butcher" Harris, still a war hero for quite a few people in the UK.

[AB76]

Georg wrote: "AB76 wrote: Its is appalling to think how the Nazi approach to war reduced all limitations on civilian involvement, though colonial air forces in Iraq and Libya had practiced similar tactics before..."

i've always been very cautious about veneration for Bomber Harris and what he did.

Interestingly the Luftwaffe diaries records that in the first months of war in the west Sept-Dec 1940, the Luftwaffe were under strict orders not to attack any British targets where civilians could be killed. So warships at sea were fair game, not in dock. The RAF at the time had a similar reserve and it lasted until early 1940

[Georg]

AB76 wrote: "Georg wrote: "AB76 wrote: Its is appalling to think how the Nazi approach to war reduced all limitations on civilian involvement, though colonial air forces in Iraq and Libya had practiced similar ..."

Harris was only the (more than willing) executioner of what the British government had decided: to kill 900 000 German civilians, mainly children, women and old people. They managed around 600 000.
But you (meaning the Brits in general) do not want to discuss anything that would tarnish your reputation. And nowadays you even try to silence people who think the atrocities that have been committed by your great country should be discussed. Not patriotic at all.

If somebody asked my what we, the Germans, could be most proud of I would say: we have looked into a bottomless abyss and have, on the whole, endured the shame and the the pain that came with it.
But that therapeutic process that is still going on has enabled us to move forward. Not by forgetting, but by remembering.

Have you ever read eyewitness accounts about the bombing of Hamburg, or Dresden? There were, of course, dozens of other towns and cities where the same happened on a smaller scale...