Tuesday, February 28, 2006 at 1:51 PM
Some Literary Effects of Great War
For those of you out there who can't get enough of the World War I era, there are several other books I would highly recommend.
By adriennelibrarian at 1:51 PM
- The Razor's Edge by W. Somerset Maugham. This is also a not half-bad movie starring Bill Murray. It's about a guy who fought in WWI and decides to live as an expatriot in Paris for awhile, then goes to India to meditate. A brief description which does absolutely no justice to the book. It's about the only book I've read four or five times. At this point in time, I would say it's ultimately about the choices people make and the consequences they live with.
- Johnny Got His Gun by Dalton Trumbo. This one is about a soldier who gets his arms, legs, and jaw blown off, as well as losing his sight and hearing, but doctors just wanted to see if they could keep him alive. Sounds boring, I know, but it is very disturbing and will not leave you for days. The mark of a really good book, if you ask me. This was also turned into a really good movie, Trumbo himself worked on the screenplay. Scenes from this were used in Metallica's video, "One."
By adriennelibrarian at 1:51 PM
Tuesday, February 21, 2006 at 2:52 PM
More Mill
From On Liberty , "Complete liberty of contradicting and disproving our opinion is the very condition which justifies us in assuming its truth for purposes of action; and on no other terms can a being with human faculties have any rational assurance of being right." Within the context of the essay, he is referring to supressing certain "wrong" opinions from public discourse, but it struck me as being applicable to a personal level. There are those of us out there who tend to keep things to ourselves...which is of course another way of keeping one's opinion from being contradicted. So you censor the world and yourself. It's highly effective. Yeah, it's probably one of those passive-aggressive things. Which of course, is based on fear. Oh, no, I might be wrong! After reading Mill it's easy to come to the conclusion that chances are, I probably am. But then again, most people are and always have been, so what the hell.
By adriennelibrarian at 2:52 PM
By adriennelibrarian at 2:52 PM
Tuesday, February 07, 2006 at 12:57 PM
Futility
I recently discovered that the following idiom was frequently uttered by my own flesh and blood, specifically my great-grandmother Wilson: "It's like trying to poke smoke up a cat's ass with a knitting needle." And she looks like such a nice lady in snapshots....
By adriennelibrarian at 12:57 PM
By adriennelibrarian at 12:57 PM
