Ersatz TLS discussion
note: This topic has been closed to new comments.
Weekly TLS
>
What are we reading? 15/01/2024
Gpfr wrote: "giveusaclue wrote: "Now lying in bed at 0.50 a m. being kept awake by the howling wind...Does anyone else have bouts of binge reading a series?"
Or binge reading an author-- I binged Steinbeck as a teen. As an old lady I've binged Philip Kerr, Le Carre, Alan Furst, Philip Roth who is not exactly bingeable, bingeing great Roth sentences, Dick Francis overseas when I had only Brit Council as a library.
MK wrote: "Ruby wrote: "I have a really shitty phone--it's free, priced for income. Now I have the chance to buy a tablet for $10. I have never been able to download anything b/c my computer is no-frills. The..."Thanks MK, but charger comes with tablet.
Gpfr wrote: "@giveusaclueNo need to apologise for keeping us up to date with your walking progress — I think we're all glad to hear it!"
ditto.
Erring on the Side of a Very Brambly Hedge, in the Betting Stakes https://i.postimg.cc/RFMSZ4Hy/downloa...I finally had my ear operated on, this Sunday. Having had a bramble thorn stuck in the top part of it for two and a half years or so. I had been wrestling with cutting back overgrown footpaths in the centre of the village. Various nurses, when I questioned them about it, had said it would work its own way out over time. But it didn’t. I kept picking at it, I suppose in the hope that it would hurry it out. Anyway, the hospital agreed, eventually, though I don’t think that they took my bramble story that seriously, that there were two points on the rim of the ear where the cartilage was inflamed and that it needed treating.
On the morning of the op I hung around the bathroom and swiped him indoors as he passed by, catching his jumper and pulling at it. “What are you doing?” he cried. I replied with ‘I must be part bramble by now so I’m just practising my bramble moves, as all the atoms must have got truly mixed up by now, using Flann O’Brien’s ‘The Third Policeman’ as my blueprint for how this stuff works.’ He sniggered a bit, but didn’t look that impressed!...
Anyway, a half-hour op on a Sunday morning and the cartilage was repaired. It was an odd place, Milton Keynes hospital, on a Sunday. Only a tiny amount of random people in what felt like a ghost ship, as sparsely attended as a ‘local’ Anglican church for some ‘Sunday worship’, at least around here... They didn’t find the thorn, but this led me on to thinking that I must have dissolved it, internally, over the years and that, in effect, I was even more bramble than I thought I was.
I took a little walk down to the footpath where the assault occurred, and there indeed was a newly sprung bramble in its prime, and I could have sworn that I actually saw it wink at me, and then a little bow, in the wind, as if one must pay some obeisance to one’s fellow kind, I think. I had wondered whether I would closely resemble Van Gogh in the bandage stakes, after the op, but I found, instead that I had a white pointed cone on the top of my ear, and could now do a passable impression of Spock, from Star Trek, at his most ‘logical’ point making... “Logic is the beginning of wisdom, not the end of it.” I heard a voice say. And, oh yes, it was!... A very philosophical, and talkative plant, had waved me G’day, mate...
The Missing Year of Juan Salvatierra by Pedro Mairal is a wonderful modern novel, about memory, loss and a missing mammoth section of a frieze by Senor Salvatierra Its set in the Entre Rios region where a few modern Argie novels are also set, dry dusty, rural places on the Uruguay river and its so much more than its short length, Mairal has a wonderful way with words
Mod
What do you mean by this? Examples?
I'm always surprised, AB, that you use "woke" pejoratively — this is normally a right-wing trope.
Tam wrote: "Erring on the Side of a Very Brambly Hedge, in the Betting Stakes https://i.postimg.cc/RFMSZ4Hy/downloa...I finally had my ear operated on, this Sunday. Having had a bramble thorn stuck in the ..."
I imagine you having one of those cones round your neck, like when a dog has been treated,, to stop scratching. I hope your ear problem is solved now Tam.
giveusaclue wrote: "Tam wrote: "Erring on the Side of a Very Brambly Hedge, in the Betting Stakes https://i.postimg.cc/RFMSZ4Hy/downloa...I finally had my ear operated on, this Sunday. Having had a bramble thorn s..."
No collar for me just a little pointy cone on the top of my ear. It comes off tomorrow, so hopefully normalcy will arrive, but I still have the result of the 'bigger biopsy' to wait for at the end of the month. The most trying thing for me at the moment is doing my tax return!... also due by the end of the month. I wish I could get back into books, but they are still eluding me, at the moment. Enjoy your new found hip mobility. Old age has its trials it seems....
Tam wrote: "giveusaclue wrote: "Tam wrote: "Erring on the Side of a Very Brambly Hedge, in the Betting Stakes https://i.postimg.cc/RFMSZ4Hy/downloa...I finally had my ear operated on, this Sunday. Having h..."
Oh no, not a tax return too! Fortunately I don't have to do one of those, they take all they want without! I certainly will enjoy the enormously increased mobility and am already looking for holiday cottages!
giveusaclue wrote: "Funnily enough the book I am reading now had am chopped up murder victim who is going to be identified by the serial number of their hip transplant".I nearly spat my coffee out when I read that!
Tam wrote: "Erring on the Side of a Very Brambly Hedge, in the Betting Stakes https://i.postimg.cc/RFMSZ4Hy/downloa...I finally had my ear operated on, this Sunday. Having had a bramble thorn stuck in the ..."
Wow, what was in the anaesthetic? I want some of what Tam is having (without the bramble)!
Fuzzywuzz wrote: "giveusaclue wrote: "Funnily enough the book I am reading now had am chopped up murder victim who is going to be identified by the serial number of their hip transplant".I nearly spat my coffee ou..."
🤣 Well, if my skeleton is found I know they will be able to identify me now!! I made a comment like that to my lovely surgeon when I went for my first consultation. He had a real laugh.
The journalism of Charles Dickens has been a real gem to read in last 20 days or soPenguin collated Selected Journalism 1850-70 in the late 1990s and i read half of this volume a good decade ago, returning to the second half this month. Right away i was seeking something different, the quality of his written english, his descriptions of how london lived and the details of Victorian life.
A lot of what we know of Victorian London comes from his novels and the numerous adaptions on tv, film and theatre. With the shorter journalistic pieces one can see the building blocks for his novels and the Victorian mindset at work.
His travels to insane hospitals, workhouses, childrens hospitals and some factories are fascinating. He describes the Stoke pottery factories over 80 odd years before Priestley did the same in English Journey
Victorian England had such a rich mix of journals and pamphlets to read, like the ones Dickens wrote for and it would be nice for Penguin or another publisher to release some compendiums i think.
Ran across an old entry asking for recommendations for a Czeslaw Milosz novel. Belated response: The Seizure of Power, set in Poland shortly after the end of the Second World War.
Cataract operation tomorrow. Second one in two weeks. Fingers crossed.
In the meantime, Don Juan continued excellent to the end. I made notes as I went along.
Cantos 3 and 4 give us the idyll of Juan and Haidée and how it is brought to an abrupt end by her pirate father, unexpectedly returned from roving the sea. Most notable are the long passages describing the delight and sorrow of the young lovers, an effortless sensuous flow that seems just to pour out of Byron. It is these passages, no mere superadditions to the comical rhymes and the diverting satire, that are the proof of his poetic genius.
With Cantos 5 and 6 we are into a more narrative section, as Juan is transported to the slave market in Constantinople, and then to the Sultan’s palace, where he is obliged to dress as a woman and lodge in the harem, with apparently fatal consequences. It is all witty, cultured and stimulating. The atmosphere continues to be somehow suggestive, even though nothing happens lewder than a kiss.
Cantos 7 and 8 bring another change of scene. The Russians are besieging the Turkish fort of Ismail on the Danube. Young Juan, after disappearing for 60 verses, makes a sudden reappearance and has a leading part in the assault. The Russian military was introduced earlier with a couplet that made me blink. Their victories “had recently increased”
In Catherine’s reign, whom glory still adores,
As greatest of all sovereigns and whores.
Canto 9 takes us to St Petersburg. It can’t actually get going until Byron has relieved himself of the full depth of scorn he feels for tyrants and their sycophants and enablers (Castlereagh, Wellington, even Voltaire) on the one hand, and demagogues and the mob on the other. In the second half, his lash is laid on Catherine. When she receives a young officer arrived from Ismail with the dispatch announcing victory, her amatory disposition is stirred. “…Her prime of life, just now in juicy vigour...” You can’t help laughing. It is of course Juan, the beauteous boy.
The courtiers stared, the ladies whispered and
The Empress smiled. The reigning favourite frowned.
Canto 10 is similarly digressive. Then, after some final barbs aimed at “Russia’s royal harlot”, Juan departs on an official mission to the Court of St James. As his coach races through the princedoms of Europe, sharp observations are thrown out left and right. Suddenly we have passed the Cliffs of Dover and are standing on Shooter’s Hill surveying the smoky metropolis. Mrs Fry is castigated for preaching in Newgate when she should be addressing the real sinners in Carlton House. Surely it’s their turn now.
As Berkley has observed, the voice of the ottava rima is less interior, and this seems particularly so with these cantos, where (trying to put words to my response) it is as if Byron in the person of the narrator is addressing an amused and attentive audience, in a circle before him, leaning forward to catch the profusion of his gifts.
In Cantos 11 and 12 not a lot actually happens, save that Juan transpierces a footpad. The narrator surveys the state of the English marriage market, the current field of poets and literary hostesses, and the virtues of being a miser. Amid the comically caustic observations (not always dismissive – he later calls Scott “the superlative to my comparative”) there are sober reflections on life in middle age. Byron was now 34. The one surprise is an unreserved encomium to the young Prince of Wales:
He had then the grace too, rare in every clime,
Of being without alloy of fop or beau
A finished gentleman from top to toe.
With Canto 13, comprising 111 stanzas composed in one week, we seem at last to be getting down to business with an English love interest for Juan (who is no rakish Don Giovanni), when all at once we are off again on another delightful diversion, about the heavy responsibility that Cervantes bears for ending chivalry in Spain. It is also in this canto that we find Byron’s aphorism:
The English winter, ending in July
To recommence in August, now was done.
Done, because the parliamentary session has finally ended (reference to “an orator” making a fine maiden speech), and everyone flees town for the country. Lady Adeline (“the glass of all that’s fair”) and her husband Lord Henry take a large party down to their Gothic pile. Much evoking of Newstead. Juan himself disappears for another 80 verses while the narrator merrily dissects some thirty members of the smart set.
In Cantos 14, 15 and 16 we are taken on another delightful ramble around the byways of love and marriage, with pauses to contemplate all manner of instances ancient and modern. Even the chaste Lady Adeline wavers. She “loved her lord or thought so” –
Their union was a model to behold,
Serene and noble, conjugal, but cold -
and as a result, while endeavouring to protect Juan from the designing Duchess of Fitz-Fulke, begins herself to fall under his spell, for:
His manner was perhaps the more seductive
Because he ne’er seemed anxious to seduce.
But now a sincere and grave young beauty enters the scene, Aurora Raby. Will the lovely Haidée no longer be the sole possessor of his heart? We never find out. Canto 17 is a fragment. Byron just stopped after 14 verses. The revolt of the Greeks took over his life, and within a year he was dead.
There is much more to absorb in this wonderfully satiric anti-epic than can possibly be digested in a single reading, and I see myself re-visiting one canto at a time, ample for an evening. The externalities may be worlds apart, 200+ years after it was written, but the determinedly un-elevated tone and outlook still feel well suited to life today. The reflective passages in the later cantos have a distinct appeal for me as an older reader, compared to when I was young.
If there is a disappointment it is that we never make the visit to the Underworld that had been promised for Canto 12. Digressions got the better of him.
In the meantime, Don Juan continued excellent to the end. I made notes as I went along.
Cantos 3 and 4 give us the idyll of Juan and Haidée and how it is brought to an abrupt end by her pirate father, unexpectedly returned from roving the sea. Most notable are the long passages describing the delight and sorrow of the young lovers, an effortless sensuous flow that seems just to pour out of Byron. It is these passages, no mere superadditions to the comical rhymes and the diverting satire, that are the proof of his poetic genius.
With Cantos 5 and 6 we are into a more narrative section, as Juan is transported to the slave market in Constantinople, and then to the Sultan’s palace, where he is obliged to dress as a woman and lodge in the harem, with apparently fatal consequences. It is all witty, cultured and stimulating. The atmosphere continues to be somehow suggestive, even though nothing happens lewder than a kiss.
Cantos 7 and 8 bring another change of scene. The Russians are besieging the Turkish fort of Ismail on the Danube. Young Juan, after disappearing for 60 verses, makes a sudden reappearance and has a leading part in the assault. The Russian military was introduced earlier with a couplet that made me blink. Their victories “had recently increased”
In Catherine’s reign, whom glory still adores,
As greatest of all sovereigns and whores.
Canto 9 takes us to St Petersburg. It can’t actually get going until Byron has relieved himself of the full depth of scorn he feels for tyrants and their sycophants and enablers (Castlereagh, Wellington, even Voltaire) on the one hand, and demagogues and the mob on the other. In the second half, his lash is laid on Catherine. When she receives a young officer arrived from Ismail with the dispatch announcing victory, her amatory disposition is stirred. “…Her prime of life, just now in juicy vigour...” You can’t help laughing. It is of course Juan, the beauteous boy.
The courtiers stared, the ladies whispered and
The Empress smiled. The reigning favourite frowned.
Canto 10 is similarly digressive. Then, after some final barbs aimed at “Russia’s royal harlot”, Juan departs on an official mission to the Court of St James. As his coach races through the princedoms of Europe, sharp observations are thrown out left and right. Suddenly we have passed the Cliffs of Dover and are standing on Shooter’s Hill surveying the smoky metropolis. Mrs Fry is castigated for preaching in Newgate when she should be addressing the real sinners in Carlton House. Surely it’s their turn now.
As Berkley has observed, the voice of the ottava rima is less interior, and this seems particularly so with these cantos, where (trying to put words to my response) it is as if Byron in the person of the narrator is addressing an amused and attentive audience, in a circle before him, leaning forward to catch the profusion of his gifts.
In Cantos 11 and 12 not a lot actually happens, save that Juan transpierces a footpad. The narrator surveys the state of the English marriage market, the current field of poets and literary hostesses, and the virtues of being a miser. Amid the comically caustic observations (not always dismissive – he later calls Scott “the superlative to my comparative”) there are sober reflections on life in middle age. Byron was now 34. The one surprise is an unreserved encomium to the young Prince of Wales:
He had then the grace too, rare in every clime,
Of being without alloy of fop or beau
A finished gentleman from top to toe.
With Canto 13, comprising 111 stanzas composed in one week, we seem at last to be getting down to business with an English love interest for Juan (who is no rakish Don Giovanni), when all at once we are off again on another delightful diversion, about the heavy responsibility that Cervantes bears for ending chivalry in Spain. It is also in this canto that we find Byron’s aphorism:
The English winter, ending in July
To recommence in August, now was done.
Done, because the parliamentary session has finally ended (reference to “an orator” making a fine maiden speech), and everyone flees town for the country. Lady Adeline (“the glass of all that’s fair”) and her husband Lord Henry take a large party down to their Gothic pile. Much evoking of Newstead. Juan himself disappears for another 80 verses while the narrator merrily dissects some thirty members of the smart set.
In Cantos 14, 15 and 16 we are taken on another delightful ramble around the byways of love and marriage, with pauses to contemplate all manner of instances ancient and modern. Even the chaste Lady Adeline wavers. She “loved her lord or thought so” –
Their union was a model to behold,
Serene and noble, conjugal, but cold -
and as a result, while endeavouring to protect Juan from the designing Duchess of Fitz-Fulke, begins herself to fall under his spell, for:
His manner was perhaps the more seductive
Because he ne’er seemed anxious to seduce.
But now a sincere and grave young beauty enters the scene, Aurora Raby. Will the lovely Haidée no longer be the sole possessor of his heart? We never find out. Canto 17 is a fragment. Byron just stopped after 14 verses. The revolt of the Greeks took over his life, and within a year he was dead.
There is much more to absorb in this wonderfully satiric anti-epic than can possibly be digested in a single reading, and I see myself re-visiting one canto at a time, ample for an evening. The externalities may be worlds apart, 200+ years after it was written, but the determinedly un-elevated tone and outlook still feel well suited to life today. The reflective passages in the later cantos have a distinct appeal for me as an older reader, compared to when I was young.
If there is a disappointment it is that we never make the visit to the Underworld that had been promised for Canto 12. Digressions got the better of him.
I’ve also been enjoying The Oxford Book of Scottish Short Stories, edited by Douglas Dunn. So far, the ones by Eric Linklater, Shena Mackay, AL Kennedy, James Hogg, John Buchan and JM Barrie (very un-Pan-like) have been good, and the one by Ronald Frame was outstanding. All of them tight, purposeful, complete. The one by James Kelman was the opposite, and I couldn’t see the point of it at all.
Tam wrote: "giveusaclue wrote: "Tam wrote: "Erring on the Side of a Very Brambly Hedge, in the Betting Stakes https://i.postimg.cc/RFMSZ4Hy/downloa...I finally had my ear operated on, this Sunday. Having h..."
Glad the ear was fixed, Tam.
Just a thought re no books
I have really enjoyed the nine Quirke books by John Banville in fact they have quite spoiled others which seem inferior. There is another due out later innthe year. Anyway, I found a dvd series made in 2014 of the first three books which is pretty true to the books ( a little deviation in second and third) - I think you might enjoy them. I had to pay for the series but there is a trial offer for Britbox where you could watch. Cheers
Russell wrote: "I’ve also been enjoying The Oxford Book of Scottish Short Stories, edited by Douglas Dunn. So far, the ones by Eric Linklater, Shena Mackay, AL Kennedy, James Hogg, John Buchan and JM Barrie (very ..."sounds like a future purchase for me Russell. I have always loathed Kelman, Gray and many of the modern scots authors
Mod
Hope all goes well!
Russell wrote: "Cataract operation tomorrow. Second one in two weeks. Fingers crossed.In the meantime, Don Juan continued excellent to the end. I made notes as I went along.
Cantos 3 and 4 give us the idyll of ..."
good luck with the cataract op!
On the subject of woke, i would put foward the opinion that while i loathe the right wing view, i do feel that identity politics and wokery lead to censorship and a closing of debate. Not from the GB news style opinion where offensive views are seen as part of "free speech" but more along the idea of simple free enquiry and debateHaving said that the witch hunt into Claudine Gay, at Harvard, appalled me, she was badly prepared it seemed for the Congress appearence over the Gaza crisis(which suprised me and shows how silo'd wokery can become within unversities) but how the right then piled in and forced her to stand down, though still part of the faculty i think., was shameful
Ruby wrote: "Maybe the tablet will enable me to access books..."I have only recently become aware of a wonderful resource online - perhaps it was suggested by one of you? I don't recall...
Anyway, it is an online archive where you can borrow all sorts of stuff - books, audiobooks, music, video, software etc. - for free, though you can make a donation if you wish. I started using this about a week ago to read a book which is out of print and unobtainable otherwise. The only downside (so far) is that you have to 'renew' the book every hour, and in theory if someone else jumps in and borrows the book and there aren't enough 'copies' you might have to wait to finish it - but it hasn't happened even once, yet.
Recommended, so far anyway. Here is the link:
https://archive.org/
Gpfr wrote: "
I'm also re-reading Dorothy L. Sayers' Busman's Honeymoon. Harriet Vane has finally agreed to marry Lord Peter Wimsey, but their honeymoon isn'..."And why not? My 101-year-old mother no longer wants to read anything new; this is one of the titles she has re-read (as an audiobook) multiple times... 'Gaudy Night' even more often!
giveusaclue wrote: "Does anyone else have bouts of binge reading a series?"Oh, absolutely... especially when tired or stressed, as I have been recently (arranging for replacement of boiler and heating system in ancient mother's home, then ATM welcoming her into our home for a week - which now looks as if it'll be 10 days!). This is why I've been quiet recently, and no doubt will be again for a few days.
Recent series: Arkady Renko (Martin Cruz Smith); Lew Archer (Ross Macdonald); several India-set series (1910s-1950s); 'Slow Horses'... etc.
Good to hear your hip is doing so well.
Diana wrote: "the older you get, the more you realise how quickly our lives have changed!.."Absolutely. My grandmother (b.1887) could remember the first time she saw a motor car...
Mod
But I don't see what differentiates your usage from "the right wing view", where 'woke' and 'wokery' are used as portmanteau terms to denigrate progressive ideas.
Anyway, it's probably better to go no further with this.
Gpfr wrote: "AB76 wrote: "On the subject of woke, i would put foward the opinion that while i loathe the right wing view, i do feel that identity politics and wokery lead to censorship and a closing of debate. ..."i just dont think its progressive to close discussions down, to no platform people and to make some perfectly reasonable opinions almost illegal. A lot of wokery i firmly agree with but intelligent exploration of ideas is severely lacking in the higher education and publishing world due to woke silo's
We need progressive approaches to debate, not regressive trigger warnings and bans
Mod
I think our disagreement is about language rather than substance — I don't think there is anything "woke" about those things. And I think you're falling onto the trap of ultra right-wing users of the term.
Gpfr wrote: "AB76 wrote: "i just dont think its progressive to close discussions down, to no platform people and to make some perfectly reasonable opinions almost illegal. ..."I think our disagreement is abou..."
i certainly dont think its woke in a good sense to shut discussion down, no-platform people and to make some opinions illegal but clearly its going on and many people who identify as "woke" relish the chance to act like this.
The left are just as bad as the right on this and its a shame there couldnt be more middle ground. The difference between me and the ultra right wingers is that i support a lot of woke platforms and ideas but i feel that it needs to be more open minded about debates and how it treats people it percieves as transgressors.
AB76 wrote: "Gpfr wrote: "AB76 wrote: "i just dont think its progressive to close discussions down, to no platform people and to make some perfectly reasonable opinions almost illegal. ..."I think our disagre..."
I'm going to take a different tack. I live in the hometown of the University of WA which is a state university. As our part-time legislature is now is session, I am sure that representatives from UW are also there - that's where a decent portion of their funding comes from (oops preposition!). In addition both UW and Washington State University (a land-grant instution) rely heavily on our elected representatives in Congress - at least to keep an eye out for opportunities. Both may also have paid lobbyists. WSU certainly has contacts with the Dept. of Agriculture I think because of land grant specifics like plant botany.
The opposite - I believe - is true of well endowed universities such as Harvard. What to they need government for? Instead, government is probably seen as a busy-body they would much rather not have to deal with (the exception being getting grants for specific research).
However, the upper echelons of a private university (President, Board, Deans, etc.) appear to be oblivious to the machinations of especially, the far right in Congress. Even I know a set-up when I see one.
Those University Presidents were lambs to the slaughter for the likes of Elise Stefanic and cohorts. All the right wanted was shame and sound bites for a future election. They got a lot more.
Here's a spy-thriller that didn't disappoint -The Helsinki Affair. It's main characters are CIA, but the story would be nothing without the GRU and FSB. Like spy fiction? Time to add to your TBR list.At first I was disappointed in its ending, but, on reflection, I'm fine with it.
I've really started a clean out. It feels good. Thanks to Ruby I remembered that long unused laptop (why does everything get hidden under a mass of paper at my house?) and now am on the hunt for someone to give it to. So far not so good on that front.
AB76 wrote: "Gpfr wrote: "AB76 wrote: "i just dont think its progressive to close discussions down, to no platform people and to make some perfectly reasonable opinions almost illegal. ..."I think our disagre..."
Just because someone doesn't agree with the ultra woke brigade doesn't automatically make them far right or even right wing.
MK wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Gpfr wrote: "AB76 wrote: "i just dont think its progressive to close discussions down, to no platform people and to make some perfectly reasonable opinions almost illegal. ..."I thin..."
very good summary MK of them being "lambs to the slaughter", i was suprised they werent aware of the right wing republican tactics in any hearing, which are generally quite aggressive and incurious.
Mod
I'm sorry I started this now.
I know AB76 isn't right wing. I'm not actually talking about ideas but about language, objecting to this use of the word 'woke', which is typically used as an accusation by right wing politicians.
That's all from me on the subject.
Gpfr wrote: "giveusaclue wrote: "Just because someone doesn't agree with the ultra woke brigade doesn't automatically make them far right or even right wing...."I'm sorry I started this now.
I know AB76 isn't..."
its cool GP...i get your point!
My reading of the Francis Stuart classic novel The Pillar of Cloud has led me into researching the Zone Francaise aka the French occupation zone of Germany in 1945, where the novel is set.The French zone was mostly rural and under-populated covering the Palatinate, South Baden, Wurtemburg and the Saar, about 5 million people lived there. Frenh documents via the Gallica website have shown me a lot, on various levels.
It seems that the French regime was criticised from within France for having a number of ex-Vichy officials running aspects of the Zone Francaise. The most notorious is Maurice Sabatier, who was the boss of Maurice Papon in the Gironde. If Sabatier hadnt died in 1989, he would have faced a bigger trial than Papon did
The section on the German politicians emerging in the zone led to me finding some interesting back stories, there was:
- an ex Wehrmacht Colonel, interned at Trent Park, who held out at Le Havre during D Day against the Allied forces. Assessed as anti-Nazi, he became a Housing Minister in the Adenauer govt
- a christian socialist lutheran pastor who fell foul of the attempted Nazi strangehold on the church and was imprisoned but who became, incredibly, a communist religious politician in the Zone Francaise
- a promising lawyer who studied penal reform but refused to swear the Hitler oath in 1933. he became the Burgermiester of Freiburg and transformed the cultural scene in that city, the second largest in the Zone
Mod
And why not? My 101-year-old mother no longer wants to read anything new...
I often read books more than once and have always done so. As well as reading plenty of new things!
Gpfr wrote: "giveusaclue wrote: "Just because someone doesn't agree with the ultra woke brigade doesn't automatically make them far right or even right wing...."I'm sorry I started this now.
I know AB76 isn't..."
No problem
As its response to Pacific Northwest weather, the Seattle Times held a haiku contest. A couple of samples:Each day, seconds gained
Plants, pets, people crane towards light
Soon flowers will bud.
--Julian Bentley-Edelman
Orion rises
Keeping watch in the darkness
Till the sun returns
--Emily Stonehouse
How many lattes
Will I drink before I next
Glimpse the sun again?
-Paul Kwiatkowski
Tatiana by Martin Cruz SmithBook 8 in the Arkady Renko series, Cruz Smith is back on form - a single story which deals with post-Soviet Russia, after Putin takes over. Gangsters of various stripes are gradually transitioning into 'respectable' businessmen, but killings still occur. One such member of the kleptocracy is murdered, followed soon after by the defenestration of an investigative journalist - Tatiana. In addition, a talented translator is found dead on a beach near Kaliningrad (Köningsberg)... the translator was a cycling nut and his custom-made bike provides a valuable clue. Naturally, only the doggedly curious investigator Renko links these events, or is in the least bit inclined to look into them.
Between the portrayal of the corruption in the Russian system, the themes of language and translation, the cycling references and last but not least the wonderful depictions of how beaches are constantly changing shape and appearance (something I know only too well from daily dog walks), this was a treat for me. Top-notch Renko.
The Wycherley Woman by Ross Macdonald Book 9 in the excellent Lew Archer series... it's the 1960s, and Archer is hired to track down a disappeared young woman/girl of 21. Is she dead, or alive? As usual, the author gives us some wonderful descriptions of a fast-changing California. Many of the settings are real (San Francisco, Stanford, Palo Alto, San Mateo etc., and some are fictional ('Boulder Beach' etc.) - no doubt still retaining characteristics of towns in the state.
The greatest pleasure in reading this series lies in enjoying how well written the books are - and savouring the many witty one-liners and observations. The plot here is perhaps less complex than usual, and anyway I would not read Macdonald for plotting - this one contains a hard to believe element which becomes very important towards the end. Read Macdonald if you like stylish, amusing writing; don't, if plotting is your main driver.
(At the time, I was unable to source a reasonably priced edition of this out-of-print book, so my thanks go to the great resource the 'Internet Archive', where by borrowing the book for 1h at a time I was able to read it for free: https://archive.org/ )
AB76 wrote: "MK wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Gpfr wrote: "AB76 wrote: "i just dont think its progressive to close discussions down, to no platform people and to make some perfectly reasonable opinions almost illegal. ...."Google clip - For the most recent fiscal year, which ended on June 30, 2023, the return on the Harvard endowment was 2.9% and the value stood at $50.7 billion.
Consider the $50B an insulator from the real world.
Robert wrote: "As its response to Pacific Northwest weather, the Seattle Times held a haiku contest. A couple of samples:Each day, seconds gained
Plants, pets, people crane towards light
Soon flowers will bud. ..."
I vote for #3!
MK wrote: "Consider the $50B an insulator from the real world."There can be no doubt that having an inordinate amount of money can insulate people from what life is like for the majority - Sunak and many other Tory politicians have no idea. He could not even use a credit card or fill a petrol tank! And yet they moan about how tax cuts are needed, people on benefits are 'scroungers' etc. As for properly funding public services - forget it.
Institutions such as Harvard, Oxbridge etc. are also to blame for maintaining this status quo. It is far easier to enter these universities if either a member of your family has been before, OR if you make a large donation. It becomes a closed circle, with only a few super-talented commoners allowed entry... a magic circle of unreality. (This is not to denigrate the excellent work done by forementioned 'talented commoners', though one wonders if concentrating all these people in one place is actually more beneficial than spreading them around different institutions would be.)
scarletnoir wrote: "MK wrote: "Consider the $50B an insulator from the real world."There can be no doubt that having an inordinate amount of money can insulate people from what life is like for the majority - Sunak ..."
Thanks to that book on JFK (which I have now finished), I want to write about this issue and post it here - when I am not in a time crunch.
@Clue - didn't you say you are already making outing plans for later? Here's one the FB algorithm gave me - https://derbytheatre.co.uk/event/derb...
Mod
I vote for #3!..."
That was my choice too ☕😉
for anyone interested, the latest LRB has an article on the "campaign against claudine gay".i havent read it yet but am looking foward to it
This topic has been frozen by the moderator. No new comments can be posted.
Ersatz TLS
Books mentioned in this topic
The Bangalore Detectives Club (other topics)Greeks Bearing Gifts (other topics)
Breaking Through: My Life in Science (other topics)
Busman's Honeymoon (other topics)
Busman's Honeymoon (other topics)
More...
Authors mentioned in this topic
Sarah Abrevaya Stein (other topics)Sarah Abrevaya Stein (other topics)
Arthur W. Upfield (other topics)
Tony Hillerman (other topics)
Amitav Ghosh (other topics)
More...
My resident manager told me about verizon/US gubment partnering in providing wifi for low income people. The wifi gizmos are going fast but I was in time. Plus the new tablet which is 50% set up.
So even tho I dont have a phone yet, I can stream. Thinking of old Eddie Murphy comedy where he is pretending to be blind and when busted for pretense, he shouts I can see! I can see! Well, I can stream, I can stream!
But I dont like it. My computer screen is barely 13 inches. And there are ads. Found Middle of the Night (1959 Frederic March and Kim Novak) buried in the movie rubble and was excited b/c this is a movie I never thought I'd see again. So it stops after 15 minutes for an ad.
I'm sure I am missing out but when I get help reinstating my phone maybe I'll just go back to my low-tech ways which has been fine.