All the Literature and Reading Stuff...

[Raithe]

To get back to the literary side of things..

 

And for a mix of the snerk and humour in it... Answering questions about the zombie apocalypse and assorted writing.

 

Buzzymag - John Ringo Interview
 

JMW: Hello, this is Jean Marie Ward for BuzzyMag.com. With me today is best-selling science fiction and fantasy author, John Ringo. Welcome, John. Your list of bestsellers is long and our interview time is unfortunately short, so I’m going to focus on some of your more recent work. Your most recent series is Black Tide, which features living zombies. What made you choose this approach?

 

John Ringo: I think the zombie genre, whether you’re talking about infected biologicals or walking dead or whatever, in this case, it’s infected biologicals, 28 Days Later, that type of thing, just basically a plague which has both an airborne and a blood pathogen component which causes people to lose upper level intellect and become extremely violent and also strip. But that’s actually one of the logic things to it, which is, in some of these where you have people who are going violently insane and they’re still human, they’re not walking dead, they have normal biological processes, modern clothing holds up extremely well and they would develop rectal impaction very quickly, which will kill you.

 

So I understand why they don’t do it in movies but essentially you have to have a way for the zombies to take their clothes off before they become non-sentient, because they can’t figure it out after that. So it’s that kind of approach is – most of these things are stupid and what I’ve saying during Dragon Con talking about this is, it seems like in every zombie apocalypse, all of the competent people die five minutes before the apocalypse starts.

 

JMW: I hope that doesn’t happen.

 

John Ringo: Because you always end up with a whole bunch of people who are really incompetent. So the essential basis of the story is that a family of four who are competent, have a plan, activate the plan, which is: with this type of situation, take to sea in a sailboat. Once they get to sea, and they do have some adventures on land first, it becomes more or less Battlestar Galactica at sea in the North Atlantic, where the story is not about how to survive the apocalypse, it is about how to bring back civilization. It is about rescuing other people and forming a community and making the world better, rather than simply, “Oh God, what are we going to do?” My publisher said – two of the characters in it are sisters, Faith and Sophia – she said the one character that isn’t listed anywhere but is in every line is hope. Anyway.

 

JMW: Cool. Strands of Sorrow, the fourth and final volume in the series is scheduled for publication in early 2016. How do you feel about wrapping up the series?

 

John Ringo: The paperback is coming out in 2016, the fourth book. I finished the series a long time ago because I wrote it in about three months, I wrote four books in about three months.

 

JMW: Oh gosh.

 

John Ringo: And the problem is is that, my wife says that I cannot finish another series. I already have too many, my readers are like, “Oh God, you’ve got so many series and you’re starting another one.” But my wife says I’m no longer allowed to finish a series because I mourned it. I mourned it. I loved writing those books so much and that comes across when you read them, I mean they’re fun, everybody that reads these things goes, “Oh, these are awesome!” But I loved writing them so much, I kept wanting to write them and there was nothing else of that story to write. It was the formation of Wolf Squadron, the beginning of the re-establishment of civilization and I got up to a certain point and was done and I mourned it. I didn’t write for two years.

 

JMW: Oh no.

 

John Ringo: That’s the answer.

 

JMW: Gosh and that for you is sort of not like not eating.

 

John Ringo: Yeah, yeah, a little bit.

 

JMW: Oh dear. Is there any possibility that there will be a crossover or something that would continue it?

 

John Ringo: Yeah, right from the beginning, when I was writing it and I should have just gone ahead and done it, maybe then I would have written for more than two years, I have a completely different universe, which is referred to as the Paladin of Shadows, first book in that was Ghost. The first book in the Black Tide Rising universe is Under a Graveyard Sky. Ghost is a completely different universe, it’s techno-thriller, it’s not science fiction. It does, however, have some fantasy aspects, not just the triple-X part but pretty much everybody asked, in that environment, what would Mike Harmon and the Keldara do? In the Black Tide environment, what would Mike Harmon and the Keldara do?

 

So I finally just broke down and decided I was going – never cross the streams. I decided it was time, we’re going to cross the stream and I started posting about this on Facebook. And I do a lot of snippeting on Facebook and I said, “I’m not sure that Toni Weisskopf, my publisher, is going to publish this.” And the second response on it was Toni and it was, “Of course I’m going to publish it, we’ve all wondered.”

 

So the special circumstance universe is very hard to explain but involves a tribe in the country of Georgia who are called the People of the Axe and the Mountain Tigers and once they get to the fall of civilization part, the zombies have taken over everywhere outside of the valley because the valley has vaccine, which is made from human spines, they have it because they don’t care about the human spines. The question comes up, “How are we going to fight back? There’s not enough bullets. We’ve got a lot of bullets, we don’t have that much.” And one of the team leaders, Oleg, replies, “Keldara. They were known as the People of the Axe.” So everywhere else, they were using 50-caliber machine guns, fighting their way through it with M6s or M4s and M16s and AK47s and in the Valley of the Keldara, they’re using axes.

 

JMW: Ah and they’re going to get lots of spines, aren’t they? Yes they are, oh boy.

 

John Ringo: Yes they are. They have a vaccine production facility because the thing about the vaccine in the Black Tide universe is it’s like the original rabies vaccine, it requires that you collect the viruses and then do what’s called attenuation, which is you kill the viruses. And the only place that you can find the viruses are on infected higher-order primates. So you have a choice of green monkeys, Rhesus monkeys, chimpanzees, bonobos, orangutans, humans and you run out of all of the other ones pretty quick.

 

JMW: Yeah and it does bad things for the ecology anyway. You’re about to embark on a very exciting project with Monster Hunters International. Can you tell our viewers a little bit about that?

 

John Ringo: I was reading the MHI books because I was supposed to be doing a collaboration with Larry Correia as senior author. I’d come up with a new universe, Larry was going to write it, I was going to be the senior author. I wanted to see how he wrote and I liked the universe. I do what’s called ideation a lot, I sit in the dark smoking cigarettes and drinking coffee or smoking cigars and drinking coffee and think and concentrated daydream, if you will, and I came up with this concentrated daydream of a monster hunter in the 1980s instead of the current day period of the monster hunters.

 

There’s a reference in one of the books to “we learned from the monster hunters of the past,” and so this was the memoirs of a guy from the 1980s who was one of their top hunters named Chad Gardenier. And I just had, once it really started taking me in – when things start taking me over, I just – there’ll be long periods, like two years where I don’t write and then you cannot stop me writing. One of the reasons that I’m looking forward to going home, I love Dragon Con, one of the reasons I’m looking forward to going home is I’m in write mode and I want to go write. So I had this idea and sat down and started writing and three, four weeks later, I had two books done, I was starting on the third and I had a book and a half done and I was posting stuff on Facebook and it’s like, “Has anybody told Larry about this?” Oh yeah, hang on a second, I suppose I should – “Hey Larry, I’m writing you a universe, do you mind?”

 

And I just write stuff, I don’t, people are like, oh, you have to do a synopsis and an outline, you have to do this, you have to do that, man, when it’s time to write, I just sit down and write whatever.

 

JMW: So, what are you working on now? You’re in writing mode.

 

John Ringo: God, what am I working on now? At the moment, I’m working on an interview.

 

JMW: Okay.

 

John Ringo: When I get home, I will either pick up the third Monster Hunter book and finish it or I will just keep writing on the Keldara book. I’ll probably keep writing on the Keldara book. The problem with the Keldara book is that I had three or four really cool ideas and I’ve used them all but I’ll come up with some additional cool ideas and I’ll probably go back to writing the Keldara book. For those who are familiar with the Keldara, it’s stuff like Chief Adams walking down the road to put in a mechanical ambush, they’re expecting a whole wave of infected so they’re laying stuff out, so he’s got a Claymore in both hands, he’s got a directional line in his left hand and he’s got a six-foot sword in his right hand, so he’s got a Claymore in both hands.

 

JMW: Oh God. Oh God. We are coming up against the end of the interview and is there anything else you’d like to add, your last word?

 

John Ringo: I was just talking about snippeting and money and all that stuff. I don’t write for money. It’s nice, don’t get me wrong, it’s kind of necessary, it does pay for kids’ college and it keeps the roof over everybody’s head. But money is my way of keeping score with how many people like my stuff and how much they like it, because it’s a very, very good way to keep score and what I really like is affecting people’s brains. When I write, I cry, I laugh, I gasp, I feel terrible, I feel elated, all of the emotions that you have when you read are even stronger when you write and that’s one of the addictions to writing for me.

 

But another addiction is the knowledge or at least the hope that – the first book in the Monster Hunter is called Grunge and the ending of Grunge is the biggest rip-your-heart-out I think I’ve ever written. It’s very, very close and if I want my readers, no matter how tough they are, I don’t care if it’s the freaking commandant of the Marine Corps, should be having tears streaming down their face at one particular scene. That’s why I write. To take my tears and give them to so many other people and where I’m getting the belly laughs and give them to as many people as I can. That’s really what it’s about for me.

 

JMW: Well I don’t know where we could go from there except to say thank you John and thank you for Buzzy magazine.

 

Interviewed by Jean Marie Ward

 

[WDeranged]

Just finishing up Neuromancer, though occasionally incomprehensible I see what the fuss is about, it's way ahead of it's time and clearly the inspiration for hundreds of later works.  I've also read the first two books in the Broken Empire series, it's a bit like if GRRM had given Ramsay Bolton his own series, well worth a look if you enjoy grim fantasy with a sense of humour.

[Guard Dog]

Last week I finished a pretty good one "Neither Wolf Nor Dog" by Kent Neurburn. Prior to reading it I'd heard nothing but raves on how good it was. To tell the truth is was pretty good but not the "greatest ever " or anything like that. The gist of it is the author spends a few weeks with Dan and Grover, an pair of old Lakota men. They take a road trip through South Dakota and Dan spends it giving his take on life, philosophy, and American history from his perspective. It is a great read when the narrative is about Dan. He is a remarkable man. It fails when Neurburn injects his own angst and self loathing in it. It's being made into a movie too: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t4b1kkH7f9I

[Guard Dog]

Now reading The Mosquito Coast by Paul Theroux and Ameritopia by Mark Levin

[Meshugger]

I am trying to give "Crime & Punishment" by Dostoyevsky a shot.

[Barothmuk]

Edith Hamilton's Mythology : Timeless Tales of Gods and Heroes. For Valentine's Day my girlfriend bought me a copy The Iliad and The Odyssey so I figured I'd brush up on the cultural context before I start.

 

So far it makes for nice light reading before bed.

[Barbedbeat]

Awesome thread! So: I'm currently reading these books:

- The Name of The Rose (U. Eco)

-The Hobbit (J.R.R. Tolkien)

-The Name of The Wind (P. Rothfuss) [following AndreaColombo's kind suggestion]

on top of the many philosophical treatises

University keeps throwing at me. In a good way though.

[Vaeliorin]

I am trying to give "Crime & Punishment" by Dostoyevsky a shot.

Crime And Punishment was about the only one of the "classics" I was forced to read in school that I liked.

[Nonek]

I'm in a Thomas Hardy kind of mood lately, just finished Far from the Madding Crowd.

[Malcador]

Reading The Peripheral by Gibson. Certainly dumps you in the deep end setting wise.

[Guard Dog]

How cool is this? I love this tradition: http://www.treehugger.com/culture/icelanders-give-books-christmas-eve.html

 

And to think, all I ever do on Christmas Eve is get drunk

Edited February 26, 2016 by Guard Dog

[Raithe]

I've been having a hunt around, but apparently there are no English translations of the Crane-Iron Pentology by Wang Dulu.

 

For those who might not know it, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon was the 4th book of the series.

 

Apparently, the story runs thus:

 

 

Part I: "Crane Frightens KunLun"

(20 chapters)

 

The story begins in the late section of the Qing dynasty.

 

The leader of the Kun Lun clan, called old Master Bao by others, killed one of his disciples in a rage because this disciple broke the rule of not having affairs with married women. He also contemplated killing Jiang Xiao He, the young son of the disgraced dead disciple, to avoid being revenged later. Jiang Xiao He escaped. He met a martial artist from Mount Jiuhua who kindly kept him and later taught him martial arts.

 

Twelve years passed, Jiang Xiao He was 26 years old and became a martial art expert himself. He swore to revenge his father's death. But he and Bao Ah Luan, his childhood friend and the granddaughter of old Master Bao, are deeply in love with each other. They found themselves with a love-hate dilemma. Bao Ah Luan tried to kill herself in exchange for her grandfather's life. Jiang Xiao He was unable to save her. Seeing what he had wrought, old Master Bao was filled with regret over what he had done and also killed himself.

 

Jiang Xiao He sent Ah Luan's body back to their hometown. The memories were still fresh. Being deeply grieved, Jiang Xiao He went to Mount Jiuhua to live as a hermit. Later, he became an errant knight and sought to spend his life combating evil and helping the weak. He renamed himself Jiang Nan He (Southern Crane).

 

* The crane is a symbol of immortality in traditional Chinese culture.

** Two friends of Southern Crane - one of whom later became Li Mu Bai's father and another of whom was entrusted to be Li Mu Bai's master by Southern Crane - also figure in this novel.

 

Part II: "Precious Sword, Golden Hairpin"

(34 chapters)

 

This story starts off thirty years after Southern Crane went to Jiuhua Mountain.

 

A handsome young martial artist named Li Mu Bai fell in love with the daughter of a security firm master. Yu Shu Lien was said to have no match in her martial art skills and beauty. However, Li Mu Bai soon learned that Shu Lien was already engaged to Meng Si Zhao - a son of Master Yu's friend who lived in another town and someone who Li Mu Bai had never met - by family arrangement. Li was extremely disappointed. Shortly afterwards, he decided to leave his hometown.

 

Master Yu was threatened by some enemies. Not wanting anything to happen to their daughter, Master and Madam Yu decided to send Shu Lien to Meng's family to get married. On the road, Master Yu was chased by the enemies. At one point, he also got framed and put into jail by a local officer who was enamored on Shu Lien's beauty but was rejected as his daughter's suitor by Master Yu.

 

Li Mu Bai, who was on his way off to Peking, accidentally met up with the Yu family. Li helped Shu Lien and Madam Yu to get Master Yu free but Master Yu had got very sick while in the jail and passed away soon after getting out. Before Master Yu died, Li Mu Bai promised him that he would ensure that Shu Lien and her mother got safely sent to Meng's family.

 

When this trio arrived at Meng's home, they learned that Meng Si Zhao had injured a local tyrant and escaped from his hometown. No one knew where he was.

 

Li Mu Bai went to find Meng Si Zhao for Shu Lien. In Peking he made friends as well as enemies because of his outstanding martial art skills. One of the former, Li Mu Bai was to only belatedly learn, was Meng Si Zhao. The two men became good friends.

 

Not knowing Meng's real identity (because he was going under a fake name at the time), Li Mu Bai told Meng about his unrequited love for Shu Lien. As a fugitive, Meng Si Zhao thought Li Mu Bai could give Shu Lien a better life. So he gave his blessings for Li Mu Bai to marry Shu Lien. When some dangerous enemies of Li Mu Bai was looking for Li, Meng Si Zhao went to fight against them - alone, knowing he probably wouldn't survive. Indeed, he did end up dying from the severe injuries he sustained in that battle.

 

After her mother died of sadness and illness, Yu Shu Lien left Meng's family to go to Peking to look for Meng Si Zhao (whom she did not know had perished in the meantime). Li Mu Bai felt he could not face Shu Lien upon Meng Si Zhao's death. Sometime later, he killed a local tyrant in order to protect his friend and was put in jail. Shu Lien risked her own life and broke into the jail in order to rescue him but Li Mu Bai refused to escape. In the end, Southern Crane himself got involved in this matter and took Li Mu Bai out of the jail by force. He left Li Mu Bai's sword at Shu Lien's bedside as an engagement gift (without Li Mu Bai's knowledge).

 

* At this point in the story, Li Mu Bai was around 25 years old while Yu Shu Lien was 17.

** The book also has a significant part which is about an unusual prostitute Xie Cui Qian. She was introduced to Li Mu Bai by a friend of his when he just arrived Peking. Cui Qian' eyes reminded Li Mu Bai those of Shu Lien's. It turned out that Cui Qian came to Peking in order to escape from her savage and cruel husband, who had killed her father and forced her to marry him. This man -- Tiger Miao was his nickname -- just so happened to be the same person who killed Meng Si Zhao but later got killed by Yu Shu Lien. Although he had never before been close to a prostitute, Li Mu Bai and Cui Qian grew fond of each other. However, their story was to have a tragic end.

 

Part III: "Sword Spirit, Pearl Light"

(22 chapters)

 

Continued directly from the Part II.

 

After Li Mu Bai had been sprung out of jail, he went to Southern China under a different name as per Southern Crane's instructions and request. On the way he stole a martial arts book about paralyzing techniques from a monk named Jing Xuan. While trying to escape, he was chased and knocked into a river and disappeared.

 

Fast forward three years.

 

Yang Bao, a young martial artist, obtained 40 extremely valuable pearls. Many Jiang Hu people tried to get them from him. As a consequence of some of these attempts, Yang Bao's grandfather was killed and a sister of his was kidnapped. He himself got seriously injured and died.

 

Outraged by the injustice, and seeing that Yang Bao's sister was in grave danger, Yu Shu Lien returned to the Jiang Hu world to save the former. She showed herself to be brave as well as skillful.

 

Monk Jing Xuan and his disciples were searching for Li Mu Bai in order to get the stolen book back. One of the disgraced disciples kept harassing Yu Shu Lien after being attracted by her beauty. Shu Lien injured him in order to protect herself. Later the person died of the injury. In revenge Monk Jing Xuan attacked Shu Lien and paralyzed her twice. Due to her not know paralyzing techniques, she could not defeat him.

 

Unbeknownst to Shu Lien, Li Mu Bai - who by now had learned these paralyzing techniques - followed and helped her.

 

Convinced all the more of the pair being a perfect couple, Southern Crane ordered Li Mu Bai to marry Yu Shu Lien. But because they thought this act would dishonor Meng Si Zhao's memory, both Li and Yu refused.

 

The book ended with Shu Lien going with Li Mu Bai to Mount Jiuhua to practice paralyzing techniques.

 

* Yang Bao happens to be the biological brother of Lo Xiao Hu (Lo).

** Why didn't Li Mu Bai and Yu Shu Lien get married?

- Li Mu Bai wanted to be faithful to Meng Si Zhao, who was his good friend and eventually died for him. He did not want to take Shu Lien away from Meng, whether or not Meng was alive. As for Shu Lien, she wanted to follow the old Chinese tradition whereby a woman of moral integrity would only go with one man in her whole life, and an engagement was almost as serious as a marriage. She told Southern Crane: "Even Brother Li (Mu Bai) wanted to marry me, I wouldn't marry him. I never forget I was engaged to Meng Si Zhao. I carry the hairpin his family gave me for the engagement with me all the time."

The traditional practice that Shu Lien thought that she ought to adhere to probably will be very hard to understand for Westerners and today's young Chinese, especially when it is realized that Shu Lien decided to be a widow to Meng Si Zhao even though she had in fact never met her betrothed. Something else that ought to be known about this Shu Lien's decision is that, even in olden times, it was not something that was practiced by every woman who ended up in a similar situation as her. Rather, it was one that was idealized as being of an extremely honorable and respectable order.

 

Part IV: "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon"

(14 chapters)

 

Three years after the last events covered in the previous book.

 

Governor Yu of Xinjiang was called back to Peking to be in charge of the security of China's capital city. Yu Jiao Long, the 18 year old daughter of Governor Yu, was admired by many young women for her remarkable beauty and elitism. No one knew she was a martial art expert.

 

A skilled martial artist stole a precious sword named Green Destiny. Yu Shu Lien discovered it was Yu Jiao Long who had done so. She advised Yu Jiao Long to return the sword. This the younger woman did.

 

Yu Jiao Long was to be married off to an ugly scholar but she couldn't forget about the bandit Lo Xiao Hu whom she met three years ago in the Xinjiang desert. She stole the sword again and ran away at her wedding night. She fought with everyone who was in her way. At first, she eluded capture but her family paid dearly for her criminal actions. Her father had to resign from the position, and her mother got very sick and died. When Yu Jiao Long was captured and sent back to her home, she found herself friendless, with no one wanting to have anything to do with her.

 

Yu Jiao Long decided to jump off a cliff and by so doing, make people believe she had died. After doing so, she went and spent one more night secretly with Lo Xiao Hu, then left him forever (She could not become the wife of a bandit and thereby bring more shame to her aristocratic family). She headed back to the Xinjiang desert alone, from where she never returned.

 

* Unlike the movie of the same name, in the "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" book, Liu Tai Bo (Bo) has an important part and is the main figure who ties the story together.

** Unlike in the movie, Jade Fox in the book was not Yu Jiao Long's teacher. Instead, she was a pretended wife of Yu Jiao Long's real teacher, Gao Lang Qiu. Mr. Gao was a scholar who accidentally got a secret scroll on Wudang's martial arts. He secretly taught Yu Jiao Long some martial arts. But he did not know that Yu Jiao Long stole the scroll and learned much more from it by herself. He realized what happened before his death and regretted: "I've raised a poison dragon in the world!" Jade Fox was an infamous robber and killer. She hid herself in Yu family in order to avoid capture. In a night chase Yu Shu Lien killed Jade Fox and discovered the identity of the theft of the Green Dynasty (i.e., Yu Jiao Long).

*** The "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" book also contains lengthy portions about Lo Xiao Hu's background. E.g., details are provided re how his parents got murdered and how he got separated from his brother and sisters. Also, we learn that he knew that he sought to revenge his parents' death but didn't do so, on account of his feeling that he could only live for Yu Jiao Long after meeting her. So, instead, his youngest sister went after their family's enemies, with the help of Yu Shu Lien.

 

Part V: "Iron Knight, Silver Vase"

(19 chapters)

 

On a snowy winter night, Yu Jiao Long gave birth to a boy in an inn on the road to Xinjiang. Unexpectedly (but on purpose), her son was taken by an officer's wife, who left a baby girl and a silver vase in his place.

 

After failing to find her son, Yu Jiao Long adopted the girl and named her Chun Xue Ping (Snow Vase). They lived together in the desert.

 

19 years later, Yu Jiao Long left the desert to look once more for her son but got very ill along the way. A young man named Han Tie Fang (Iron Aroma) elected to take care of her.

 

As it so happened, Han Tie Fang was looking for his mother, an officer's wife who got kidnaped by bandits when he was a baby. Yu Jiao Long realized the young man was actually her son. Knowing herself she wouldn't live long because of the illness, she wanted to take him to the desert to be with Xue Ping. However, she was too ill to finish the journey and died on the way during a storm night (and without disclosing her relationship with him to her son).

 

Han Tie Fang went to see Chun Xue Ping but was driven away by the young woman and her friends. He later found out his mother was actually Yu Jiao Long, the 'friend' he buried in the desert. He also met Lo Xiao Hu, who believed he had a daughter and got captured for protecting her. Han Tie Fang managed to get Lo Xiao Hu free but Lo was already badly injured and died on an icy mountain soon afterwards.

 

Chun Xue Ping and Han Tie Fang had more adventures while looking for the woman who Han Tie Fang thought was his mother but turned out to be Chun Xue Ping's biological mother. Xue Ping and Tie Fang finally became a happy couple - the only happy couple of this pentalogy.

 

* Yu Jiao Long died at the age of 38. The book also mentioned that Yu Shu Lien died of illness back in her hometown five years earlier - when she was at her 38. Li Mu Bai - who did not die in the CTHD book the way he did in the film - went to pay his respect to Shu Lien at her graveside.

So, unless I learn to read Mandarin fairly competently, that's about the closest I'll get to reading the original stories.

[Drowsy Emperor]

Reading: Yeats's complete poems

Gene Wolfe's Soldier of the Mist

About to finish (I recommend it):

Walter Miller Jr.'s Canticle for Leibowitz

 

Finished:

Arthur Clarke: Rendezvous with Rama (decent)

 

Gave up on (due to being underwhelming):

Robert Heinlein: The Moon is a harsh mistress

Alfred Bester: The stars my destination

 

Next up:

Daniel Keyes: Flowers for Algernon

Edited March 1, 2016 by Drowsy Emperor

[Guard Dog]

I really enjoyed Flowers for Algernon.

[ShadySands]

Me too

 

Now all I read is sci fi and fantasy though

 

Currently churning through a lot of new Shadowrun fiction. Glad they started making these again, in English.

Edited March 2, 2016 by ShadySands

[Drowsy Emperor]

I keep on thinking to read the odd Discworld novel that I missed but Pratchett's euthanasia related activism soured his work significantly for me. Which is a shame since I loved the carefree way the first Discworld novels were written and enjoyed the more sophisticated tales he spun once the setting was established.

 

It is my opinion that his whole campaign was an extremely cowardly way to offload the responsibility for his death (which he quite able to arrange, on his own, had he the courage) from himself to others, just so that he could eke out that last "good bit" and then have someone else do the morally questionable part. Mind you, there are people who spent their whole lives ill and perhaps unable to make that decision, who have more ground to make the claim he made - but he certainly was not one of them, nor could he represent them.  

 

Its a funny thing how perception of the artist can influence the enjoyment of his work, even though the two don't have to be seen as one and the same.

Edited March 2, 2016 by Drowsy Emperor

[HoonDing]

working thru the collected works of François Villon

[Oerwinde]

The actual Witcher novels I don't find as engaging as the short story compilations. I'm on Baptism of Fire and it doesn't seem like a lot has really happened.

Edited March 5, 2016 by Oerwinde

[Drowsy Emperor]

Finished Walter Miller Jr.'s Canticle for Leibowitz. Its a decent Cold-War era, anti-nuclear weapons tale (about the human propensity to constantly repeat the same mistakes) infused with the authors Catholicism. 

[BruceVC]

Finished Walter Miller Jr.'s Canticle for Leibowitz. Its a decent Cold-War era, anti-nuclear weapons tale (about the human propensity to constantly repeat the same mistakes) infused with the authors Catholicism. 

Drowsy I would really like you to read this book...its called Civilization. The author is one of the worlds most respected Historians, he is one of those writers who has the ability to explain facts in a way that is interesting. It answers many questions about the West..I think you will appreciate it 

 

http://www.niallferguson.com/publications/civilization

[Guard Dog]

I've recently finished a deep novel and two books about politics. Now it's time for something lighter. Now reading Bottom of the 33rd: Hope and Redemption in Baseball's Longest Game. In 1981 the Rochester Red Wings and the Pawtucket Red Sox of the International League played a 33 inning game. I always knew about it but the back story is fascinating. 

[BruceVC]

I've recently finished a deep novel and two books about politics. Now it's time for something lighter. Now reading Bottom of the 33rd: Hope and Redemption in Baseball's Longest Game. In 1981 the Rochester Red Wings and the Pawtucket Red Sox of the International League played a 33 inning game. I always knew about it but the back story is fascinating. 

I never thought of you as an avid  reader ....living out in the wilderness, having no creature comforts like electricity and paying homage to primordial earth spirits 

 

Do people generalize about people like you and assume you are what I suppose is a redneck, do they assume you are not informed of current events for example? It must be fun taking them apart with your impressive knowledge of many things 

[Guard Dog]

 

I've recently finished a deep novel and two books about politics. Now it's time for something lighter. Now reading Bottom of the 33rd: Hope and Redemption in Baseball's Longest Game. In 1981 the Rochester Red Wings and the Pawtucket Red Sox of the International League played a 33 inning game. I always knew about it but the back story is fascinating. 

I never thought of you as an avid  reader ....living out in the wilderness, having no creature comforts like electricity and paying homage to primordial earth spirits 

 

Do people generalize about people like you and assume you are what I suppose is a redneck, do they assume you are not informed of current events for example? It must be fun taking them apart with your impressive knowledge of many things 

 

I am always either reading a book (or two) or looking for my next one. I have well over 1000 on my shelves here and about 150 or so on my Kindle. All kinds. From Wheel of Time to War to Peace and de Tocqueville's Democracy in America to the one I just mentioned in the Election thread. I even have a few rare collectibles in the mix. I'm an educated man Bruce. I drive a pick up truck, and I live in a house way out in the sticks. I'm adept at firearms and farming that's true but I can also speak in complete sentences most of the time. I'd hope I make the correct impression on people I meet.

[BruceVC]

 

 

I've recently finished a deep novel and two books about politics. Now it's time for something lighter. Now reading Bottom of the 33rd: Hope and Redemption in Baseball's Longest Game. In 1981 the Rochester Red Wings and the Pawtucket Red Sox of the International League played a 33 inning game. I always knew about it but the back story is fascinating. 

I never thought of you as an avid  reader ....living out in the wilderness, having no creature comforts like electricity and paying homage to primordial earth spirits 

 

Do people generalize about people like you and assume you are what I suppose is a redneck, do they assume you are not informed of current events for example? It must be fun taking them apart with your impressive knowledge of many things 

 

I am always either reading a book (or two) or looking for my next one. I have well over 1000 on my shelves here and about 150 or so on my Kindle. All kinds. From Wheel of Time to War to Peace and de Tocqueville's Democracy in America to the one I just mentioned in the Election thread. I even have a few rare collectibles in the mix. I'm an educated man Bruce. I drive a pick up truck, and I live in a house way out in the sticks. I'm adept at firearms and farming that's true but I can also speak in complete sentences most of the time. I'd hope I make the correct impression on people I meet.

 

Yes, did I not say you are very well informed. I hope I didn't offend you ?

[Leferd]

I've recently finished a deep novel and two books about politics. Now it's time for something lighter. Now reading Bottom of the 33rd: Hope and Redemption in Baseball's Longest Game. In 1981 the Rochester Red Wings and the Pawtucket Red Sox of the International League played a 33 inning game. I always knew about it but the back story is fascinating. 

 

If I recall correctly, wasn't Wade Boggs a participant?

 

 

I never thought of you as an avid  reader ....living out in the wilderness, having no creature comforts like electricity and paying homage to primordial earth spirits 

 

Do people generalize about people like you and assume you are what I suppose is a redneck, do they assume you are not informed of current events for example? It must be fun taking them apart with your impressive knowledge of many things 

 

Bruce, my impression of you is that you're really big on labels and pigeonholing people. More than anyone else on these boards anyway.