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What are we reading? 19 December 2022
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Berkley wrote: "...seeing the headlines in the Guardian every day - and that's all I see.."I have zero interest in the royals and would prefer the UK to have an elected ceremonial president instead, maybe like the Irish Republic.
As for the 'Guardian' - TBF, it is just about the only paper which hasn't had banner headlines about this trivial kerfuffle in the last few days, with more important stuff (e.g. the NHS crisis) being given more prominence. The right-wing papers love this stuff, as it means they don't have to report what a mess the government is making of 'running' the country - mainly by sitting on their hands and doing nothing. (The BBC and the Guardian have a 'today's headlines' section every day where you can 'enjoy' this spectacle.)
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As for the 'Guardian' - TBF, it is just about the only paper which hasn't had banner headlines about this trivial kerfuffle in the last few days, with more important stuff (e.g. the NHS crisis) being given more prominence...."
It's been very prominent on the website.
Gpfr wrote: "It's been very prominent on the website."I didn't say that it wasn't on the front page - the Guardian has readers who take an interest in this stuff, no doubt.
I DID say that AFAIK it wasn't the MAIN headline on any day, unlike the Mail, Sun, Express and even (I think) Telegraph and Times.
Today's MAIN website headline is about Sunak and the possibility of talks on the nurses' pay. Other headlines have the same prominence as the 'royals' story.
https://www.theguardian.com/uk
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-the-...
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-the-...
Compare and contrast!
AB76 wrote: "Berkley wrote: "Regarding Harry and Meghan (and how I resent having to refer to them on this first name basis), their relentless publicity campaign is having the rebound effect of making me feel mo..."The book was intended to be released before she died!
@giveI was interested in your comment about disappearing posts in the G recently and thought that I would test it out. Posted a very rare one on WWR which stayed, a politics one which stayed but the one today vanished - didn’t think it was anything naughty said just about embracing life.
Ah well, won’t bother again
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I didn't say that it wasn't on the front page - the Guardian has readers who take an interest in this stuff, no doubt.
I DID say that AFAIK ..."
Today, sure, but on previous days it's been the top story on the website which I find annoying.
Prompted by Spare, I was reflecting on how it is not simply past experiences which shape us, but who we get entangled with along the way. How a relationship can push us in one direction, when given other circumstances or people, we could have been pushed in an entirely different one. I just finished a psychology book written by Frank Tallis (author of the Vienna Blood series) called The Act of Living (What the Great Psychologists can teach us) and there is one part where it is stated how little control we have over the decisions we make, and which we think we are making in all rationality. I have given that a lot of pondering over the New Year in the light of my own past experiences and have concluded that to be, sadly, absolutely spot on!Plus, think Succession, think the Murdochs, think any rich family, think innumerable families and Harry’s whinging about being a Spare can be seen in context. He certainly isn’t the only “spare”. Which raises the question for me, why does anyone ever have more than one child?
Gpfr wrote: "Today, sure, but on previous days it's been the top story on the website which I find annoying."Not that I noticed - and I check in every day, more than once - unless it differs according to geographical location? Certainly not the case for the paper version, which is (I think) mirrored by the website.
I have noticed that the French are even more interested in the royals than us Brits... I'm often asked about the 'latest' and given an update on the latest scandals over there. Very odd.
(I am, of course, the wrong person to ask about this topic.)
Storm wrote: "Which raises the question for me, why does anyone ever have more than one child?"
Well it doesn't seem to have been a problem for most families, including royal families throughout the world. Margaret was a spare and whatever you think of her lifestyle she never slagged of her family. Likewise Anne, Andrew (whatever you think about him) and Edward have managed to find their own niche and get on with their lives without whinging about it. Think of the Dukes who were the Queen's cousins, Kent, Gloucester, etc. Did we ever hear them complain?
I also like the fact that Sophie has made it plain to her kids that they will probably have to go out an own their own livings.
H&M – The sad thing for me is that I used to think he was a decent bloke, with a sensitive side, giving well-merited support, for example, to the Invictus Games, where the participants knew him and liked him. He could have gone on forever in that sort of role. Now, it seems to me, he doesn’t make a single move without previously calculating the effect with his PR advisers, and nothing he and M do seems genuine or spontaneous. I definitely will not be reading the book.
CCCubbon wrote: "@giveI was interested in your comment about disappearing posts in the G recently and thought that I would test it out. Posted a very rare one on WWR which stayed, a politics one which stayed but t..."
i think many of us are now deeply cynical about bothering with WWR, unlike Glad and Mach who seem to the main contributors over there. I seem to find no rhyme or reason in the censorship and i guess it usually depends on which woke apparatchik of the Guardian has had too much coffee with their oatmilk
Russell wrote: "H&M – The sad thing for me is that I used to think he was a decent bloke, with a sensitive side, giving well-merited support, for example, to the Invictus Games, where the participants knew him and..."i hope he sees the error of his ways, this whining and complaining looks very bad and self centered. Clearly he has a lot to write about the loss of his mother and people are genuinely interested in that but being rude about his father and brother, without any self-awareness is remarkably stupid and short-sighted.
AB76 wrote: "Russell wrote: "H&M – The sad thing for me is that I used to think he was a decent bloke, with a sensitive side, giving well-merited support, for example, to the Invictus Games, where the participa..."He also seems to forget that two sons lost their mother that day, and previously William was used by his mother as a sounding board which is rotten for a teenager to have to cope with. I think that Harry has been indulged for most of his life as the spare and never been held to account for his behaviour.
I have no opinion about any of the Royals to speak of, they do not interest me enough to give them more than a fleeting thought. Having avoided most of the G's articles about the airing of dirty linens in public I caved in with the "William attacked me" headline.
Now I have an opinion about Harry: an attention-seeking, whingeing, spoilt, entitled brat, peddling his "poor little rich boy" shtick.
What I find interesting is the thought behind it, because I do not understand what it is. Does he expect sympathy? Damage the Monarchy with his much ado about nothing "revelations"?
It seems to me to be a stupid move that will likely backfire. Analogous to "love treason, hate the traitor" he might find that the public love the muck, but not the muckraker.
A grown-up man behaving like a petulant child looks pathetic. He needs a good therapist imo.
About Spare, I won't be reading the book, but, in a way, I do empathize with both of them. I've lived where there is racial hatred and disdain which is still prevalent both here (US) and the UK. As 2nd child (7 years younger) who never got along with here older sister, family dynamics can really play a role without having to answer to any number of outside, paid people who have their own axe to grind.So I'll otherwise keep my mouth shut as their shoes are not my shoes.
CCCubbon wrote: "@giveI was interested in your comment about disappearing posts in the G recently and thought that I would test it out. Posted a very rare one on WWR which stayed, a politics one which stayed but t..."
I was quite pissed off when they deleted my recommendation of Mascha Kaleko's poetry on WWR. A waste of my time, even if it only took 10 or 15 minutes to write.
Still testing the waters every now and again, with short comments I wouldn't care about if they were deleted.
About two years ago I was so puzzled about a deletion on politics live that I e-mailed the mods. It was not a comment at all, I just linked a Guardian article. Why am I modded for linking a Guardian article? The answer "probably off-topic" (it wasn't, it only offered a different view of (to?) the "plate de jour")
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I said it a few days ago and while not wishing to be disagreeable, I'm afraid I'm going to say it again: the use of "woke" as a casual term of abuse really bothers me.
Here’s a few comments on books I’ve read in the last few days.. Gringos by Charles Portis
Portis maybe best known for True Grit , which I actually still have yet to read, but I very much enjoyed his The Dog of the South and Norwood .
This has a lot in common with the former, in that it’s a story of an Arkansas native in exile, Jimmy Burns, and amateur archaeologist, and with the latter, in the colourful set of characters he is surrounded by, and the imminent danger that he doesn’t realise he is about to face.
The protagonist, Burns, lives in the Yucatan, as a sort of tour guide, for the jungle and the Mayan ruins, and he also dabbles in a little illicit dealing of Mayan antiquities.
A bunch of threatening hippies arrive into town with the word on the street that they are involved with a recent kidnapping in the US, and on the run. Jimmy Burns’s life is about to change markedly.
Portis maybe be best known for True Grit, but his other work, and there is far too little of it unfortunately, is every bit as good.
The Pachinko Parlour by Elisa Shua Dusapin translated from the French (Swiss) by Aneesa Abbas Higgins.
An ethnic Korean student from Switzerland, Claire, arrives in Tokyo to visit her grandparents and take them to visit to Korea for the first time since they left when escaping from the civil and way fifty years previously. Since not long after their arrival in Tokyo they have managed a pachinko parlour, which is now somewhat rundown. pachinko parlor of the title. While preparing the trip, Claire signs up to tutor 10 year old Mieko in French.
It’s a break in Claire’s otherwise busy schedule and gives her a chance to reflect on her life.
This is a beautiful book from Dusapin, another in which plot-wise, not a lot happens. It’s very much character driven as it explores the relationships between the four women involved, Claire and her 80 year old grandmother, and Mieko and her mother.
Young Mieko is fascinated by the pachinko parlour and at every chance begs Claire to take her there. Claire is more wary, and for a while puts her off, but their relationship matures, though chiefly due to the 12 year old’s efforts.
The efficiency of language that was a trait of Dusapin in Winter in Sokcho is evident again here, as is the attention to detail. But this is darker, more complex due to its ambiguity, and a more satisfying read.
Food for Life: The New Science of Eating Well by Tim Spector
This stands well as a companion to Dan Saladino’s Eating to Extinction: The World's Rarest Foods and Why We Need to Save Them, which won the Wainwright Conservation Prize last year, 2022.
Both books are by their nature very comprehensive. Both seek out to discuss all types of food, though approaching them from different angles, Saladino with a view to our environment, and Spector with a view to health. Understandably there are quite a few areas of overlap.
Spector is a medic turned professor of epidemiology, though his writing is always clear and hits that balance between not over-complicating the science, nor using language aimed at beginners.
This isn’t by any means a book on dietary regimes, but it provides the latest evidence from respected academics on all areas of food that enable the reader to make informed choices.
I found Saladino’s book more interesting, but so it should be, by the nature of his premise.
I came away from this with probably 20 little revolutions I can use to improve my own diet. And it is the sort of book that bears reexamination.
Georg wrote: "CCCubbon wrote: "@giveI was interested in your comment about disappearing posts in the G recently and thought that I would test it out. Posted a very rare one on WWR which stayed, a politics one w..."
Similar thing to me, I emailed and questioned a mod of an innocuous comment of mine. A couple of months later I am still on pre-mod so don't bother posting at all.
Georg wrote: "I have no opinion about any of the Royals to speak of, they do not interest me enough to give them more than a fleeting thought. Having avoided most of the G's articles about the airing of dirty l..."
$$$$$$
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I've put it in Special Topics and you can put the answers there later.
Gpfr wrote: "Tam wrote: "A Christmas loosely themed Quiz (you can tell that I am feeling at a loose-end, and looking for distractions from lingering lurgyness!) Gpfr, I'm not sure this is the right place to put..."Ok... Thanks...
The Pigeon by Patrick Süskind translated from the French by John E. Woods.
This is a strange and intense little novella, set over a 24 hour period in the life of a Frenchman in Paris, whose every action and emotion is expressed in graphic, visceral prose.
Any character trait of the protagonist is obscured by paranoia, the vivid emotions he experiences, and his focus on the tiniest and most irrelevant of details.
Though it has some outstanding paragraphs, it is in a way a victim of its own success, in that it’s just a bit too strange to adhere together into anything coherent.
There’s a feeling of relief after finishing it, similar to resurfacing for breath after a long period underwater. Conversely, it’s not something I regret reading; Suskind’s writing style is one I have rarely come across before.
and, The Whispering Muse by Sjón translated from the Icelandic by Victoria Cribb.
Set in 1949, this concerns Valdimar Haraldsson, an eccentric Icelander with controversial ideas about how fish consumption influences life in Scandinavia. As part of his studies, he invited to join a Danish merchant ship on its way to the Black Sea.
Inventively, one of the crew is the mythical hero Caeneus, in disguise as the second mate. Every evening after dinner he regales his fellow travellers with stories of how he sailed with the Argo on its quest to retrieve the Golden Fleece.
There are some interesting and contrasting tales lying within here, but I don’t think they gel together as a novel. Contrast, in that some of the anecdotes are humorous, and others quite morally directed, in a curious sort of mix.
It would probably be appreciated more with a better knowledge of Classical Greek, which I do not have.
giveusaclue wrote: "Georg wrote: "CCCubbon wrote: "@giveI was interested in your comment about disappearing posts in the G recently and thought that I would test it out. Posted a very rare one on WWR which stayed, a ..."
was it this bad before, or have we got used to GR? I think its possibly worse, over moderated with a smaller turnover in passers by, i am genuinely suprised that so many have gone over to the G and left GR
Lljones wrote: "Bill wrote: "I was quite disappointed to discover that Spare is not a book about bowling..."I can't remember - did I ever talk you into reading
?"It's been on my radar since it was announced, but the initial reviews caused me to delay reading it. The reviews weren't bad notices: they just did not seem to describe a book I was eager to read. Still theoretically on my TBR (local library has a copy), but I have apparently lost all desire to read any fiction.
My reading in general is only a shadow of what it was, though I'm probably reading more newspaper and magazine articles than I ever did. But books, not so much.
I'm making my way through Conversations with Goethe at the rate of a few pages a day - it may take me until summer or beyond to finish it at that rate. Also reading some Jack Kirby comic books from the 1960s, about one 20-page issue per day, more or less.
AB76 wrote: "giveusaclue wrote: "Georg wrote: "CCCubbon wrote: "@giveI was interested in your comment about disappearing posts in the G recently and thought that I would test it out. Posted a very rare one on ..."
I think that WWR is a mere shodow of TLS. The introductions seem perfunctory and somehow "loveless", a far cry from what Sam Jordison did . And the whole thing is relegated to a place where no passer-by could find it after the first day,. Whereas this:
https://www.theguardian.com/books/202...
has been on the main page under "What to read" for almost a year now. FFS (sorry).
Anyone here who cannot get enough of spy books might want to check out this link - https://spybrary.com/When I have time, I'll listen to the Dan Fesperman interview there.
In today’s NY Times Magazine, a “Letter of Recommendation” for The Worm Ouroboros.This is essentially the same observation Ursula K. Le Guin made in her wonderful essay “From Elfland to Poughkeepsie”:
As I watched last fall’s showdown of TV’s big-money epic fantasy franchises, I was wincingly reminded that language is the most underrated special effect. Unforced errors of word choice — loose talk of “focus” and “stress” in HBO’s “House of the Dragon,” for example — kept pulling me down from my fantasy high and into the diction of emails from human resources. Case in point: “I have pursued this foe since before the first sunrise bloodied the sky,” says the elf warrior-princess Galadriel in Amazon’s “The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power.” “It would take longer than your lifetime even to speak the names of those they have taken from me.” She’s adrift on a life raft with a mysterious stranger after a sea-monster attack, and certain dark intimations suggest that eldritch evil draws nigh. So far, so OK, but then her speech reaches its climax: “So letting it lie is not an option.”
Clangalang! Descending from a tagline fashioned by writers of the movie “Apollo 13” from something a NASA flight director said, “X is not an option” has become a staple of business-speak and coach-talk. The writers of Galadriel’s speech couldn’t have killed the buzz any deader if they’d followed up with, “I’m all about laserlike focus 24-7 on getting some closure on this whole Sauron thing.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/04/ma...
(This gift link should allow you to avoid the Times’ paywall for this article.)
Andy wrote: "and, The Whispering Muse by Sjón translated from the Icelandic by Victoria Cribb. Set in 1949, this concerns Valdimar Haraldsson, an eccentric Icelander with controversial ideas about how fish consumption influences life in Scandinavia. As part of his studies, he invited to join a Danish merchant ship on its way to the Black Sea.
Inventively, one of the crew is the mythical hero Caeneus, in disguise as the second mate. Every evening after dinner he regales his fellow travellers with stories of how he sailed with the Argo on its quest to retrieve the Golden Fleece.
There are some interesting and contrasting tales lying within here, but I don’t think they gel together as a novel. Contrast, in that some of the anecdotes are humorous, and others quite morally directed, in a curious sort of mix.
It would probably be appreciated more with a better knowledge of Classical Greek, which I do not have."
The Voyage of Argo, or Argonautica, by Apollonius of Rhodes is available in several different English translations. I found it very enjoyable.
My favourite modern re-telling (i.e. not a translation of Apollonius) of the story is John Gardner's verse novel Jason and Medeia. This is the same Gardner who wrote Grendel and by these two examples I think he was very good at this kind of re-imagining of ancient myth or legend. I wish he'd done even more in the same line.
Bill wrote: "In today’s NY Times Magazine, a “Letter of Recommendation” for The Worm Ouroboros.As I watched last fall’s showdown of TV’s big-money epic fantasy franchises, I was wincingly reminded that language is the most underrated special effect. Unforced errors of word choice — loose talk of “focus” and “stress” in HBO’s “House of the Dragon,” for example — kept pulling me down from my fantasy high and into the diction of emails from human resources. Case in point: “I have pursued this foe since before the first sunrise bloodied the sky,” says the elf warrior-princess Galadriel in Amazon’s “The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power.” “It would take longer than your lifetime even to speak the names of those they have taken from me.” She’s adrift on a life raft with a mysterious stranger after a sea-monster attack, and certain dark intimations suggest that eldritch evil draws nigh. So far, so OK, but then her speech reaches its climax: “So letting it lie is not an option.”
Clangalang! Descending from a tagline fashioned by writers of the movie “Apollo 13” from something a NASA flight director said, “X is not an option” has become a staple of business-speak and coach-talk. The writers of Galadriel’s speech couldn’t have killed the buzz any deader if they’d followed up with, “I’m all about laserlike focus 24-7 on getting some closure on this whole Sauron thing.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/04/ma...
(This gift link should allow you to avoid the Times’ paywall for this article.)"
One reason I've avoided the Rings of Power series is an article I came across talking about the background of the show's creators and writers: they were all from American television and had all worked on modern-day dramas where the kind of clunky dialogue Le Guin talks about would be the norm. Glad I gave it a miss.
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Books mentioned in this topic
The Worm Ouroboros (other topics)The Whispering Muse (other topics)
The Worm Ouroboros (other topics)
Conversations with Goethe: In the Last Years of His Life (other topics)
Bowlaway (other topics)
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Sjón (other topics)Sjón (other topics)
Patrick Süskind (other topics)
Tim Spector (other topics)
Dan Saladino (other topics)
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Haritos' family life. ..."
You may see their marriage differently when/if you get to the later books ..."
Thanks - just saw this, after writing my previous comment.