What Are You Reading

[Tiki Tom]

The Scarlet Pimpernel was banned at my school. Well not exactly banned, more cold shouldered. Having just read through most of Wiki about The Pimpernel and the author, I cannot, for the life of me, figure out why.

I think I know why. In the story, towards the end, there is a chapter titled “the jew”. In this chapter, the bad guy —a French representative of the revolution— throws just about every antisemitic stereotype at the Jew in question. It is pretty bad. However (spoiler alert!), it turns out that the much abused Jew is, in fact, the Scarlet Pimpernel in disguise. So, does all this make the book antisemitic? Or can it be argued that, because the hero of the story takes the abuse, it is actually a statement against antisemitism? I have heard arguments in both directions. I will say that, before getting to the conclusion, that particular chapter had me feeling pretty uncomfortable. Of course, the book was published In 1905, which makes one suspect that no lofty statements were being made; that is just how the world was in those days.

 

[Fading Fast]

I think I know why. In the story, towards the end, there is a chapter titled “the jew”. In this chapter, the bad guy —a French representative of the revolution— throws just about every antisemitic stereotype at the Jew in question. It is pretty bad. However (spoiler alert!), it turns out that the much abused Jew is, in fact, the Scarlet Pimpernel in disguise. So, does all this make the book antisemitic? Or can it be argued that, because the hero of the story takes the abuse, it is actually a statement against antisemitism? I have heard arguments in both directions. I will say that, before getting to the conclusion, that particular chapter had me feeling pretty uncomfortable. Of course, the book was published In 1905, which makes one suspect that no lofty statements were being made; that is just how the world was in those days.

I haven't read "The Scarlet Pimpernel" (I have seen and enjoyed the Leslie Howard movie version), but what you just said echoed in my head with another book published in 1905, "The House of Mirth."

In it, there is a pretty major character who is a Jew and he encounters some anti-semitism along the way. He also is one of the nicer characters in the book - but he is not perfect.

Reading it through a modern lens, one can rightfully get incensed at the antisemitism, but one can also be encouraged by the Jewish character's overall positive presentation. However, as you note, all of that is probably just our modern head going to work on it as the 1905 author (Edith Wharton) was, most likely, just writing her story and characters to reflect the way the world was then.

 

[GHT]

I think I know why. In the story, towards the end, there is a chapter titled “the jew”. In this chapter, the bad guy —a French representative of the revolution— throws just about every antisemitic stereotype at the Jew in question

I haven't read "The Scarlet Pimpernel" (I have seen and enjoyed the Leslie Howard movie version), but what you just said echoed in my head with another book published in 1905, "The House of Mirth."

In it, there is a pretty major character who is a Jew and he encounters some anti-semitism along the way. He also is one of the nicer characters in the book - but he is not perfect.

Tom, your speculation makes a lot of sense, and FF I have come across that anti-antisemitism remark previously. Have you ever read Laura Hobson's: "Gentleman's greement?" It's the story of a gentile journalist who poses as a Jew in order to gain a firsthand experience of anti-Semitism in life.

 

[Fading Fast]

Tom, your speculation makes a lot of sense, and FF I have come across that anti-antisemitism remark previously. Have you ever read Laura Hobson's: "Gentleman's greement?" It's the story of a gentile journalist who poses as a Jew in order to gain a firsthand experience of anti-Semitism in life.

GHT, yes, I have read the book and have seen the movie and am impressed with both. I do not quite understand your comment, though.

 

[GHT]

GHT, yes, I have read the book and have seen the movie and am impressed with both. I do not quite understand your comment, though.

The way that perceive it one is an analogy for the other. What I was commenting on was the unusual phrase: anti-antisemitism, that's all.

 

[FOXTROT LAMONT]

A rain soaked muddy Churchill Downs track this London evening; or Kentucky afternoon rather, prompted a split superfecta gamble with intuitive second look at win-place choices
for bankroll insurance cover. I went outside my probables for Thorpedo Anna to score the win and boxed bet #11; 13. Having bet my arse off on a heavy High Fiver fan spread-eagle I most
sincerely regret placing, rescued my roll for tomorrow but busted flat the Oaks.

Churchill Downs doesn't look good with cumulus clouds gathered for another track soaking.
Having watched yesterday's Oaks replay, the horses with initial speed gained ground and were ahead beyond catch much less pass, so today needs a speed-focused second look.
Fierceness #17; despite mood swings merits lead pick to win based on his explosive celerity.
And #2 Sierra Leone poorly posted at tight deuce is fast. A far too fast horse some pros might have earlier discounted for post squeeze but today is a sealed track rain race.
Posts #3, 4, 6, 7, 8 look bettable second-third tier trifecta crap shoot or bet out dice throws
along superfecta four and high fiver. I recommend only light and tight for amateur frolic today.
Rain really tests a hardbitten rail track crow like meself with all these Noah's Ark doves crashing Churchill Downs.

 

[FOXTROT LAMONT]

A busted flush Kentucky Derby. Ironically, however, it's my own fault but overall I'm satisfied
with my play in the run for the roses. With the rain abated and track sealed, I eschewed easy
peasey two bit bets to set sight on just High Five wagers. Speed favoured stalk and closure with #11 wild card Fierceness considered-rightly so-the most dangerous. Mercurial thoroughbreds are a handicapper's wood splinter, so doubtful meself took another glance
at tightly squeezed #2 Sierra Leone who came in behind Mystick Dan, highly favoured mudder; yet sealed track absent rain gave nod hunch Resilience. Resilience came in sixth.
I put Sierra Leone second followed by Forever Young, Catching Freedom, I had then to cap the five spot. I hit ALL, netting T.O. Password. Four out of five horses picked/hit. Fierceness came in at fifthteenth.

The Kentucky Derby High Five paid $316,920.10 per dollar staked.

 

[Tiki Tom]

“A Month in the Country” by J.L. Carr. 135 pages.
A perfect book to read in one’s old age by a cosy fire.
The book claims itself to have been written 50+ years after the events in question…
It is the bejeweled summer of 1920. A young man in his mid-twenties shows up in a small village in the countryside to perform a job: he has been hired to live in the bell tower of an ancient church and spend the summer painstakingly revealing a medieval mural that has recently been discovered hidden beneath whitewash. The young man arrives with a ferocious face twitch and an instinct to bury himself in his work. He is a veteran of the hell of Passchendaele. His sometimes wife has flaked out on him yet again. But these stories are only revealed in passing, in short asides. The narrator talks of that glorious, beautiful summer. The mural turns out to be a quiet masterpiece depicting the last judgement. He makes friends in the village. There is a sad but sweet near-miss with love.
As the last few pages reveal, all this was written after a half century later. After that summer, he never once returned to that village. Yet the memory of fleeting time, of the healing qualities of work and quiet and art, and of friendship remain.
It’s a short book filled with pathos and sweetness. A quiet book with a main character that everyone can relate to. Ahh, the passage of time.

 

[Fading Fast]

“A Month in the Country” by J.L. Carr. 135 pages.
A perfect book to read in one’s old age by a cosy fire.
The book claims itself to have been written 50+ years after the events in question…
It is the bejeweled summer of 1920. A young man in his mid-twenties shows up in a small village in the countryside to perform a job: he has been hired to live in the bell tower of an ancient church and spend the summer painstakingly revealing a medieval mural that has recently been discovered hidden beneath whitewash. The young man arrives with a ferocious face twitch and an instinct to bury himself in his work. He is a veteran of the hell of Passchendaele. His sometimes wife has flaked out on him yet again. But these stories are only revealed in passing, in short asides. The narrator talks of that glorious, beautiful summer. The mural turns out to be a quiet masterpiece depicting the last judgement. He makes friends in the village. There is a sad but sweet near-miss with love.
As the last few pages reveal, all this was written after a half century later. After that summer, he never once returned to that village. Yet the memory of fleeting time, of the healing qualities of work and quiet and art, and of friendship remain.
It’s a short book filled with pathos and sweetness. A quiet book with a main character that everyone can relate to. Ahh, the passage of time.

I read it so many years ago, I needed you to bring the plot/story back to me, but as you did - you distill these books down very well - I remember it and how much I enjoyed It. Thank you.

 

[Fading Fast]

A Bear Called Paddington by Michael Bond, original published in 1958


"Please look after this bear. Thank you."


The best children's books can be enjoyed by adults. The best children's books also don't slam you over the head with lessons or, worse, politics, an obnoxious obsession of modern authors of children's books.

If you want, you can read lessons and politics, even modern politics, into A Bear Called Paddington, but that's on you, as the book is best enjoyed for the joie de vivre of a small bear and the loving family who takes him in.

When a little bear, from "the Darkest Peru," arrived at Paddington Station with just the simple note "Please look after this bear. Thank you" written on his lapel, Mrs. Brown knew what she had to do: she and her family had to look after this bear.

Paddington, immediately named for the station at which he was found - and quite proud of his impressive sounding new name - is a handful, a joy and a singular personality. One can only be amazed at the inspiration that led author Michael Bond to create Paddington.

Paddington was sent to England by his Aunt Lucy when she got too old and had to go into "a home for retired bears." Paddington loves marmalade (smart bear) and loves trying new things, but often understands them as only a bear can.

He's kind hearted, but gets incensed at cheaters and mean people. His stare, when he thinks somebody is behaving badly, leaves no doubt as to his displeasure. He's got a rigid, but mainly, well-calibrated sense of justice.

His politeness is indefatigable and a source of much of the book's humor. Even when he's created chaos, eating in public usually leads to unexpected messes, his sincere apologies reveal his genuine surprise that things have gone awry. You just can't get mad at him.

His enthusiasm for life and adventures is contagious, which uplifts the entire kind Brown family. The Browns themselves are part of the wonder of author Bond's world.

All the Browns, Mr. and Mrs. Brown, their two children Judy and Jonathan and their housekeeper Mrs. Bird, take Paddington in stride. Flooded bathrooms, toppled window displays and food everywhere are just part of the experience of living with Paddington.

The Browns all intuit that having Paddington in their lives is such a positive and such an act of kindness - what else could they do, after all, send him out into the world alone? - that all his bear contretemps are taken in stride.

Bond's anthropomorphized bear combines a child-like approach to life - he likes to have his hat and suitcase with him at all times and he is always open to new friendships - with a sensitivity for others that makes him adorable, but neither selfish nor treacly.

There are lessons here about friendship, charity, decency, kindness and family, but they come out of the entertaining and, often, funny tales as opposed to being forced on you.

Bond wrote a total of twenty eight books in the Paddington series and there have been, so far, two enjoyable movies with, surprisingly, the second one being the better of the two. Clearly, Bond created something special in his little bear from "the darkest Peru."

You want to start with A Bear called Paddington as it's always good to get the origin story straight, but it's comforting to know there are so many more adventures to read because, as Paddington says, "Things are always happening to me. I'm that sort of bear."

 

[FOXTROT LAMONT]

Our beloved late Queen Elizabeth II filmed a Paddington Bear commercial spot for her
platinum jubilee. Bowled the whole entire isle over.

She also filmed a 007 snip with Daniel Craig that was spot on Bond.

 

[Tiki Tom]

 

[FOXTROT LAMONT]

Crunching numbers for Saturday's Preakness now, 04.00 London but wide awake with
Tony Bennet/Norah Jones and coffee.
Baffert scratched Muth who spiked a temperature, crashing the board back down square one. However, adversity sweetens the stakes. Kentucky Derby winner Mystik Dan is the horse
to beat yet three horses-Catching Freedom; Tuscan Gold; and Baffert's Imagination can
beat Danno. Imagination is capable though lacks a killer instinct. Tuscan Gold is still a wet
behind the ears rookie albeit a Chad Brown rookie.
Catching Freedom ran the KD course at 53.53 ft per second to Danno's 53.59, but did a wider
race off railbird Dan, covering fourteen additional feet at cost. 1/600th of a second which when removed matches Daniel the Mystik.

 

[Fading Fast]

Until They Sail by James A Michener from the anthology Return to Paradise originally published in 1951


Until They Sail is a long short story from James A. Michener's Return to Paradise, an anthology of essays and related short stories on the South Pacific. The essays are informative but dry, and the short stories are uneven.

Until They Sail and its essay, though, are engaging and evocative, which is probably why the fictional story part of the pair was turned into the very well-done 1957 movie Until They Sail. Hollywood has a talent for knowing what stories will translate to the screen. (Comment on the movie can be found here: #31,467 )

In the essay, Michener gives a brief history of New Zealand, including a not politically correct recounting that reveals it wasn't just Westerners who moved in and pushed out indigenous people; here, the early settlers, the Moriori, were pushed out by later settlers, the Maoris.

Michener also explores the tangled history New Zealand has with the United Kingdom, which resulted in the white New Zealanders, like whites in other colonies, often being more "English" and attached to the Crown than many who lived in England at that time.

The real fun in this pairing, though, is the long short story Until They Sail. Four sisters, ranging in age from fifteen to thirty, live in a small but pleasant bungalow with their nearly comatose mother.

Their mother never recovered from the shock of her Naval Captain husband's death at sea early in WWII, so the sisters are, effectively, on their own. Properly raised for their day, their world changes when New Zealand's young men go off to fight in WWII.

For a time, the island is devoid of young men, but this drought turns into a surfeit when American servicemen arrive to defend New Zealand and to use it as a base from which to take back the islands to the north that the Japanese recently conquered.

Until They Sail is a homefront story, though, as it explores what happens when a young female population, wanting for men, runs smack into a wave of young, virile and flush-with-funds Americans, far from home and wondering how much longer they'd be alive.

Each sister responds in her own way. The fifteen-year-old innocently dates a braggart young soldier just to experience dating and kissing, even though she knows he's "a drip." But the second youngest, Delia, goes, well, wild.

Despite being married to a New Zealand boy now being held in a Japanese prisoner of war camp, Delia makes up for lost time by sleeping with a succession of Americans until she finds one that wants to marry her and take her back to America after the war.

The oldest sister, Anne, who is thought "cold" (a euphemism for frigid) and on a path to spinsterhood, surprises everyone by having a love affair with an American officer. He, though, will soon be leaving to fight in the hell that would be Tarawa.

The second oldest, Barbara, the most practical one who takes on the role of mother, tries to manage all these American males swirling around her sisters even as she, herself, begins a gentle flirtation with an American officer.

The story takes several surprising turns including infidelity, an out-of-wedlock pregnancy (when that mattered) and even a murder trial, as Michener packs plenty of drama into this fast-paced tale. One assumes he conflated a lot of real experiences into this one fictional family.

It works because you care about the sisters and because Michener has wonderful raw material to work with -- an atypical moment in homefront history.

Being no more blunt than Michener is, he captured what happened when young, sex-starved women were smashed up against young, sex-starved men, in a time when the normal rules of decorum seemed "suspended."

This is the rare occasion when the movie might just nudge out the book, though, as the 1957 picture is so wonderfully acted and directed that you have a stronger connection with the characters in the film than on the printed page.

The book, however, as almost always, gives you additional background information on the characters and events that help to round out the story. This is one, though, where you might want to see the movie first to experience the picture completely fresh.

Return to Paradise, the full book, is a clunky and somewhat dated effort that awkwardly tries to combine essays and short stories. But being a talented author, Michener did drop one jewel in the center of it with the wonderful homefront tale Until They Sail.

 

[FOXTROT LAMONT]

I've read some of Mitchner. Tales of the South Pacific long long time past back in Spitalfields.
His essays were all to the better best for study larn read type take hold to shake this Eastie
lad awake when needed most. I'll find this for its sagacious salacious scripture set and tone. Flick also afterwards.

Done with handicapping the race. A Preakness upended for riders as much ridden and rain yet. Looked over race film. I dinna hold that Baffert's has the distance. Film proves it sure, so
I guess Bob wanted this one to hold back the pack for his scratch.

 

[GHT]

My current bedside reading. In his joyful new book, Billy explores this philosophy and how it has shaped him, and he shares hilarious new stories from his lifetime on the road. From riding his trike down America's famous Route 66, building an igloo on an iceberg in the Arctic, playing elephant polo (badly) in Nepal and crashing his motorbike (more than once), to eating witjuti grubs in Australia, being serenaded by a penguin in New Zealand, and swapping secrets in a traditional Sweat Lodge ritual in Canada, Rambling Man is a truly global adventure with the greatest possible travel companion.

Rambling Man is very much like Billy's television monologues, it's a collection of stories, easy to dip in and out of.