Sweet Thursday by John Steinbeck

Sweet Thursday by John Steinbeck is a sequel to Cannery Row and set in the years after the end of World War II. Steinbeck said that, "Sweet Thursday" is the day between Lousy Wednesday and Waiting Friday.

Cannery Row changes during the war. Doc is a key character based on a friend of Steinbeck and he returns to a failed Western Biological Laboratories after serving in the army during World War II to a changed Cannery Row.

The Palace Flophouse is still there as is the general store, but it has been sold. The local brothel, the Bear Flag, is still there but with a new owner, Fauna.  

Suzy works for Fauna but is not cut out for the work, so she plots to push her into the unsuspecting arms of Doc. The plan fails, and Suzy just moves out and takes a job at the local diner.

Hazel is living in the Palace Flophouse and has been told by Fauna that because of a astrological reading he is going to become President of the United States.  Hazel is concerned about his destiny but plots to help get Doc and Suzy together.  The plan eventually works.

See Literary Favorite Section for more on John Steinbeck and links to books of his reviewed on this site

Quotes

“You've seen the sun flatten and take strange shapes just before it sinks in the ocean. Do you have to tell yourself every time that it's an illusion caused by atmospheric dust and light distorted by the sea, or do you simply enjoy the beauty of it?” 

“Men do change, and change comes like a little wind that ruffles the curtains at dawn, and it comes like the stealthy perfume of wildflowers hidden in the grass.”

The Forbidden Door, A Jane Hawk Novel, by Dean Koontz

Dean Ray Koontz writes suspense thrillers where he uses the genre of horror, fantasy, science fiction, and satire.

His new book, The Forbidden Door, is another Jane Hawk novel, telling of her one-woman fight against a full-blown government mind-control conspiracy that lead to the death of her husband turning her into the #1 fugitive in the country.  

She was framed and disgraced by the FBI where she had been an agent and they are closing in on her young son, Travis, who has been hidden with friends. Jane has been untouchable by the collection of agencies that are conspiring to find her and they think finding her son will force her into the open Jane will do whatever it takes to save him.

The government forces chasing her are called Techno Arcadians and they plan to remake and control the world by injecting their enemies and with nanoconstructs, turning them into mindless robots.  Egon Gottfrey leads the group chasing her. He thinks that their group is being directed by an out of this world Unknown Playwright.  

Some exciting scenes come from some of some of Jane’s support groups also targeted by the Arcadians. In one group twelve-year-old Laurie survives the pursuit of a sadistic, brain-altered female FBI agent and the plan fails.

In the end some of the bad guys are killed and Jane moves on.

Click here to see review of “The Crooked Staircase” The prior novel in the series and the one that takes you to where this one starts.

Hondo by Louis L'Amour

Louis L'Amour said; "I think of myself in the oral tradition-as a troubadour, a village tale-teller, the man in the shadows of the campfire. That's the way I'd like to be remembered- as a storyteller. A good storyteller."

Some critical of L’Amour say they find the stories unrealistic, but those that like this author it is the very deep understanding of the land and the way of life that make his stories resonate. L’Amour is not a contemporary author bringing interest to his plot with fictional villains and methods, instead his plots are true to life for the time they take place.

Hondo Lane, on behalf of the government, is scouting the Arizona dessert looking for Apache braves. He winds up at a small ranch in the heart of the Indian territory and meets Angie and her young son Johnny. She has been abandoned by her husband, is alone, and in a very dangerous place.

​Hondo does some work helping at the ranch, buys a horse from her and then leaves to go to the fort in the area. Along the way he finds the remains of a viscous Apache on a small group of solders. He decides to go back to help Angie and the boy as soon as he gets to the fort to let them know what happened.

While Hondo is away Angie and Johnny are attacked by by Apaches and when one of the braves gets close the boy takes a gun and stands up for his mother stopping the brave.  Chief Vittoro is impressed and touched by the young boy. He makes him a blood brother and the relationship leads to some safety for Johnny and Angie for a short time.

Hondo returns to the ranch. Angie’s husband follows him. The relationship with the Apaches changes. The plot has mystery, romance and as John Wayne was quoted as saying, it was the “finest western” he had ever read.

See other Books by L’Amour Reviews and see more on this Author in Literary Favorites Section Click here

Quotes

“There was a curious affinity between man and dog. Both were untamed, both were creatures born and bred to fight, honed and tempered fine by hot winds and long desert stretches, untrusting, dangerous, yet good companions in a hard land.”

 “But a long time ago I made me a rule: I let people do what they want to do.”

“The Apache don't have a word for love," he said. 
"Know what they both say at the marriage? The squaw-taking ceremony?"
"Tell me."
"Varlebena. It means forever. That's all they say.”

The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald

Earnest Hemmingway often was critical of his friend F. Scott Fitzgerald for wasting his talent and for pompous musing.  The Roaring Twenties presented in The Great Gatsby provides a critical social history of America that seems overly grand and self-important. The story takes place in the fictional towns of West Egg and East Egg on Long Island in the summer of 1922.

Nick Carraway, a Yale graduate and veteran, narrates the story and lives in West Egg on Long Island next door to Jay Gatsby’ mansion. He is aware of the lavish parties next door but doesn’t attend.  He often eats dinner at his cousin, Daisy Fay Buchanan and her husband Tom, who lives in East Egg.  Tom has a mistress, Myrtle, and even keeps a special apartment in New York to meet her and others and have wild parties.

Nick eventually receives an invitation to one of Gatsby's parties and attends learning that they both had been in the war together. He also learns that Gatsby had by chance meet Daisy Buchanan a few years back, is in love her, and has been hoping she would show up at his lavish parties, so she could see him in his wealth and grandeur.

Gatsby uses Nick to meet again with Daisy. Gatsby and that leads to an affair over the summer.  When her adulterer husband Tom learns of her interest and involvement with Gatsby he is upset. He confronts Gatsby and tells his wife that Gatsby is a criminal having made his money bootlegging.

The story has more surprising twists and turns and whether it is an important social history story or just drama you will have to decide.

“So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.” 

“Angry, and half in love with her, and tremendously sorry, I turned away.” 

“And I like large parties. They’re so intimate. At small parties there isn’t any privacy.” “Let us learn to show our friendship for a man when he is alive and not after he is dead.” 

“You see I usually find myself among strangers because I drift here and there trying to forget the sad things that happened to me.” 

Echo Burning, A Jack Reacher Thriller, by Lee Child

Echo Burning is the fifth novel in the Jack Reacher series and begins in a Lubbock Texas saloon where Jack pushes back against a drunk bully. He breaks his nose and finger and then leaves, but the next morning he sees the bully, a local policeman, with three others, coming his way obviously planning to arrest him.

He avoids capture and escapes, walking out of town hitchhiking. Carmen Greer, a good looking Mexican lady in a fancy car, stops to give him a ride.

Carmen has her reasons for stopping: she wants Jack to kill her abusive husband, Sloop, who is going to be released from jail in a few days. Jack Reacher is a character who never hesitates to get involved in the troubles of those he meets.  He refuses to help her kill Sloop but agrees to help protect her and goes with her to their ranch in Echo County, Texas just outside of Pecos.  

Soon after Sloop is released he is found dead and Carmen is arrested. The facts make it look like she did it and she even confesses.  Jack doesn’t believe the assumed facts or that she is guilty and starts looking into both Carmen and Sloop’s past.  Carmen’s daughter Ellie is taken away for adoption, but it turns out that she was really kidnapped.  

Jack involves Alice Amanda Aaron, the pro bono attorney, in the case and they meet with Hack Walker, the Pecos County district attorney and an old friend of Sloop's who seems to want to help them.

What starts out as a what seems to be a silly old-fashioned plot takes some very surprising twists and turns and by the time Jack Reacher has saved the day and moved on you will wind up realizing you have read a very well thought out story.

Quotes

“I know I'm smarter than an armadillo” 

“Short of a shotgun, a pool cue is the best barroom weapon ever invented. Short enough to be handy, long enough to be useful, made out of fine hardwood and nicely weighted with lead.” 

“Reacher smiled. Bad luck and trouble, been my only friends.” 

What starts out as a what seems to be a silly old-fashioned plot takes some very surprising twists and turns and by the time Jack Reacher has saved the day and moved on you will wind up realizing you have read a very well thought out story.

Junis Maltby, by John Steinbeck

The first question to ask is why is it Steinbeck made this a separate short story in his book, “The Pastures of Heaven” and also in, “The Red Pony”?  If you know this up front it makes it even more surprising to find out the main character, Janius Maltby, loves to read fiction, and this fact seems to be connected to the fact that he is a lazy bounder. He especially likes to read Robert Louis Stevenson, but is that something that were told and is redemptive?

All this leads to another question: why is Steinbeck connecting reading fiction to this guys failed life?

Maltby works as an accountant in San Francisco, but his doctor tells him drier weather may help his respiratory illness. He moves South and lives with a widow on her ranch, eventually marrying her and having a son. The widow lets her hired help go but gets no help from Maltby, who just reads and enjoys his life of ease. The ranch goes to pot and the family is broke, with not enough food or even clothes. The widow and her children get sick from their poor diet and die of disease.

Maltby and his only son, Robbie, survive living with little food and ragged clothes.  His poor son goes to school barefoot and in rags while he lays around, reads and has fancy discussions with whomever will listen. Robbie is exposed to all this discussion and develops his own vivid imagination. In spite of appearance, being dressed in rags, Robbie becomes a natural leader at school with the other children and they even start dressing like he does, even tearing holes in their clothes.

The boy’s teacher seems to like Maltby romantically and doesn’t press the boy to change but the school board steps in and gives the boy some new shoes, clothes and their insight into what he should be doing. This only leads to the boy seeing himself, for the first time as someone who is poor and who should be ashamed.

Eventually from the influence of the teacher, Maltby and his son start to dress better and get cleaned up but the influence leads them to decide to go back to San Francisco.  Maltby will in the future spend his life in boring work with poor health but he will to do the best he can for Robbie.

So why did they go back to San Francisco? Maltby and Robbie are very different characters. Maltby ignored what society wanted and Robbie was a leader despite his poverty. Both lives were impacted by poverty, one innocent of what it meant and the other blind to the effects. Robbie will likely do well in the future.

The Red Pony, by John Steinbeck

John Steinbeck’s The Red Pony contains four related stories. The best-known story is “The Gift” where young Jody Tiflin is given a red pony by his rancher father which he names Gabilian. Billy Buck is a ranch hand who teaches Jody to care and train the horse. Gabilian eventually catches a cold and his head and neck fill with puss and the only way to save him is to poke a stick in the horse’s neck to open it up so the horse can bring saving him but then only to have him escapes the ranch corral  one night and be found dead.

In another story Billy Buck and Jody’s father decide he should raise a colt from birth. A mare named Nellie is chosen and Jody takes her to be bred. When the colt is born something goes wrong and it becomes necessary to kill Nellie and cut the colt out of her stomach.

This isn’t a cute little book about a boy and his horse, it is about some hard reality of life and death on a ranch.

Eventually Jody’s grandfather comes to the ranch for a visit. Jody is interested in knowing more about his grandfather’s life and how he crossed the plains and came west. Instead of the expected inspiring story he is told that his grandfather wonders whether it was all worth it.

Even with the many struggles Jody aspires to grow up and be a leader. This seems a little surprising considering that the stories this book tells are about hard slices of life.

Quotes

“Why, a trick horse is kind of like an actor—no dignity, no character of his own.” 

“No matter how good a man is, there's always some horse can pitch him.” 

“It would be a dreadful thing to tell anyone about it, for it would destroy some fragile structure of truth. It was truth that might be shattered by division

“I take a pleasure in inquiring into things. I’ve never been content to pass a stone without looking under it. And it is a black disappointment to me that I can never see the far side of the moon.”  (this quote from East of Eden)

Jack Reacher Novel, Die Trying, by Lee Child

Jack Reacher is an innocent bystander just pausing for a minute to help a very good looking lady, with a injured leg, with her dry cleaning near her Chicago office. The bad guys come up and force them both into a car at gunpoint. The lady is an FBI agent, daughter of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and more, Reacher is. of course. Lee Child’s tall, strong and talented hero in a whole series of stories.

The search begins with the security camera footage making it look like Reacher is one of the bad guys to McGrath, the FBI office leader, and the other agent.

Reacher and Holly finally are taken to the Montana home of a radical military sect wishing to secede from the US. The leader, Beau Borken , plans to use Holly as leverage to make her father agree to his demand.

Borken executes Loder, the leader of the kidnappers, for multiple failures, and Reacher is shown around the camp with the intent of sending him back with information on the militia's credibility. Before long  Borken  doesn’t trust Reacher and puts him on trial.

The FBI figures out where the militia is, but fearing political fallout from a bloodbath, they refuse to authorize an attack, McGrath and his men go rogue, setting up camp near the rogue military community.

McGrath and his men are captured but are then saved by Reacher, therefore proving his own innocence. It becomes obvious that at least one of McGrath’s agents, Brogan and Milosevic, are moles working for Borken for money.

Eventually the FBI make it to the camp after Reacher has saved Holly and McGrath. They realize that Borken had a diversion in mind using Holly and a truck filled with dynamite is on its way to be blown up in a large crowd celebrating the 4th of July in a major city.

Reacher eventually saves the day, proves to be a masterful marksman and is the hero of yet another well written interesting Lee Child action novel.

Picture of Lee Child and a picture of “Rock” Dwayne Johnson who is not Jack Reacher in the movie, but should have been……………..Anyone but Tom Cruise!

Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck

. RSS

George Milton and Lennie Small share a dream of one day settling down on their own land but they are facing the Great Depression, jobless and looking for work. George is a small dark man who is intelligent but lacks education and sees himself as Lennie’s protector. Lennie is the opposite of George, a giant of a man with a shapeless face, mentally impaired and with a habit of getting in trouble, being such a big strong individual. He loves animals, especially rabbits, and loves to pet them but in touching and petting them he always kills them. He carries a dead mouse in his pocket who he had accidently killed by stroking it.  

They find work on a farm but must deal with the owner’s son, Curley, who is a small man who dislikes Lennie because of his large size. Curley’s wife is attractive and flirts with Lennie leading to more problems.

Lennie and George become friends with Candy, an older ranch hand, who has some money saved and offers to go in with them to buy a farm of their own. Another ranch hand learns of Lennie’s fondness for petting rabbits and since his dog recently had puppies he gives one to Lennie.

George goes into town leaving Lennie on the ranch. Lennie spends time with the other ranch hands but before long Curley’s wife finds them and flirts with all of them, especially Lennie. Later she meets him again telling him how lonely she is and about her desires to be a movie star. As they talk she learns of Lennie’s desires to pet rabbits and animals and offers to let him stroke her hair. With his enormous strength pressing on her scalp she screams scaring Lennie and he breaks her neck killing her.

When George returns Lennie has run away to a secret place. George finds him and they talk of their dreams and plans, now shattered forever: after talking for a while George takes out a gun and kills Lennie.

The story is published in 1937 during the Great Depression and moving from place to place to find work and associating with a variety of ranch hands was common.

Inspired by Poem“To A Mouse by Robert Burns See Full Poem click here

“But Mouse, you are not alone, In proving foresight may be vain: The best laid schemes of mice and men Go often askew, And leave us nothing but grief and pain, For promised joy!…………………..”

https://connectedeventsmatter.com/literary-favorites/2018/10/14/john-ernst-steinbeck-jr

Quotes

“I got you to look after me, and you got me to look after you, and that's
why.” 

“As happens sometimes, a moment settled and hovered and remained for much more than a moment. And sound stopped and movement stopped for much, much more than a moment.” 

“A guy needs somebody―to be near him. A guy goes nuts if he ain't got nobody. Don't make no difference who the guy is, long's he's with you. I tell ya, I tell ya a guy gets too lonely an' he gets sick.” 

“Guy don't need no sense to be a nice fella. Seems to me sometimes it jus' works the other way around. Take a real smart guy and he ain't hardly ever a nice fella.” 

“His ear heard more than what was said to him, and his slow speech had overtones not of thought, but of understanding beyond thought.” 
“Trouble with mice is you always kill 'em. ” 

”Just like heaven. Ever’body wants a little piece of lan’. I read plenty of books out here. Nobody never gets to heaven, and nobody gets no land. It’s just in their head. They’re all the time talkin’ about it, but it’s jus’ in their head.” 

“We know what we got, and we don't care whether you know it or not.

see review of Travels with Charley click here

Journal of a Novel, by John Steinbeck

. RSS

As John Steinbeck wrote his first draft of “East of Eden” he also, each day, wrote daily letters  to his editor, Pascal Covic. Often the letters were notes he wrote on the left-hand side of his actual writings for the novel. The letters were comments on family relationships, concerns about the day’s writings, comments about his own writing skills and a variety of subjects. These notes, or letters, took place over 10 months beginning the first of February 1951.

Writers in our current day often speak about their daily writing habits sometimes called “daily pages” or “morning pages”, sometimes in longhand and sometimes just typed out and referred to as a stream of consciousness writing.   Like a good athlete, the process is a way of warming up and Steinbeck referred to it as “getting my mental arm in shape to pitch a good game.”

Steinbeck’s warm ups were part autobiography, personal detail in his life for that day, comments about his kids, feelings about his second wife Elaine, his moods, and even how he feels about his pencils.

We see the book unfolding along with the comments and we see his discipline and focus. He commented about this his daily letters process, comparing it to how he saw his own approach differently when wrote The Grapes of Wrath, explaining that approach as being “headlong” where he stayed tightly focused on a cast of characters that he carefully crafted.

Quotes

“I intended to make it sound guileless and rather sweet but you will see in it the little blades of social criticism without which no book is worth a fart in hell.” 

“The craft or art of writing is the clumsy attempt to find symbols for the wordlessness.” 

“All this is a preface to the fear and uncertainties which clamber over a man so that in his silly work he thinks he must be crazy because he is so alone.” 

“There is one thing I don’t think any one has ever set down although it is true—to a monster, everyone else is a monster.” 

“I can tell all I want about them now because they are all dead and they won’t resent the truth about themselves.” 

“But I do feel strange-almost unearthly. I'll never get used to being alive. It's a mystery. Always startled to find I've survived.” 

“I think perhaps I am one of those lucky mortals whose work and whose life are the same thing.” 

Even the Stars Look Lonesome, by Maya Angelou

. RSS

Even the Stars Look Lonesome is Maya Angelou's second book, a collection of 20 short mostly autobiographical essays. Along with her first book, “Wouldn’t Take Nothing for My Journey Now,” it is referred to as a book of homilies or “wisdom books.”

In one essay Angelou's friend Oprah Winfrey is the subject of one of the essays where she compares her to "the desperate traveler who teaches us the most profound lesson and affords us the most exquisite skills" She also defends her support of Clarence Thomas as a Supreme Court Justice. In her final essay, Angelou uses the story of the prodigal son to emphasize the value of solitude: "In the silence we listen to ourselves. Then we ask questions of ourselves. We describe ourselves to ourselves, and we may even hear the voice of God.”

She said of the book: “I have written of the black American experience, which I know intimately. I am always talking about the human condition in general and about society in particular. What it is like to be human, and American, what makes us weep, what makes us fall and stumble and somehow rise and go on.”

Angelou speaks with a strong voice about her own sensuality, marriage, and a lifetime of racism and violence. She finds resonance and meaning in the richness of Africa and its culture and art. Her own art is in sharing with us the perceptions she has gained in her life journey.

See Maya Angelou in Literary Favorite section click here

Quotes by Maya Angelou

“My mother raised me, and then freed me,” 

“Be wary when a naked person offers you his shirt.” 

“The trouble for the thief is not how to steal the chief's bugle, but where to blow it,”

 “She was born poor and powerless in a land where power is money and money is adored. Born black in a land where might is white and white is adored.
Born female in a land where decisions are masculine and masculinity controls.” 

“If it is true that a chain is only as strong as its weakest link, isn't it also true a society is only as healthy as its sickest citizen and only as wealthy as its most deprived

One-Hundred And One Famous Poems , Anthology Complied by Roy Cook

. RSS

Roy Cook, the editor, said that “the purpose of this little volume is to enrich, ennoble, encourage. And for man, who has learned to love convenience, it is hardly larger than his concealing pocket.”

The book's selection of poems is exceptional. On more than one occasion, I have sat waiting for a speaker, viewed as an intellectual, to go to the podium and then weave into their subject the value of poetry.

Talking about poetry leads to the thought that everyone should commit some poems to memory. The reason and logic for this is, at least, the idea that people have memorized and recited poetry since ancient times.

Another good reason is that if a poem’s message is to be taken to heart, it is said that a person should know it by heart.

This collection is a must-have for those who appreciate poetry. The book is full of surprises. I will offer a poem I was glad to find.

Not in Vain

By Emily Dickinson

If I can stop one heart from breaking, I shall not live in vain; If I can ease one life from aching, Cool one in pain, Or help one fainting robin Unto his nest again, I shall not live in vain.

You can see the poem “In Flanders Fields” on page 11 of the book or click to link to the poetry section.

The Builders by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Opportunity by Edward R. Sill, Out to Old Aunt Mary’s by James Whitcomb Riley, Each and All by Ralph Waldo Emerson, Charge of the Light Brigade by Alfred Tennyson, and The Night Has a Thousand Eyes by Francis William Burdillon are just a few of the 101 diverse and captivating poems in this collection.

First Ladies, An Intimate Group Portrait of White House Wives, by Margaret Truman

. RSS

Margaret Truman, daughter of Harry S. Truman and Bess Truman, was born on February 17, 1924 in Independence, Missouri and died on January 29, 2008 in Chicago.

The Presidential Daughters book, “First Ladies”, is of course opinionated and takes the view that the importance of the women themselves are secondary to the President.

Compare this impression with a quote from an article “Daughter Knows Bess that was in the Washington Post: "Mother told her secretary, 'I don't give a damn what they want to know,' and the secretary translated that to 'She hasn't made up her mind yet,' " Margaret Truman says.

For the book protecting the President is her message of importance saying.  ``While I am heartily in favor of women achieving maximum opportunities and power, I doubt that the First Lady is the ideal symbolic vehicle for this ascent.''

With this yardstick it is not surprising to see Nancy Reagan presented in the book as the type of first lady that Margaret admires. The criticism that Nancy Reagan received in Ron Reagan’s first term due to her decision to replace the White House china, which had been paid for by private donations, doesn’t seem very heavy weight by today’s standards but Margaret likely would feel ok about it being bold enough.

Another First Lady that Margaret referred to as the “almost perfect First Lady” was Lady Bird Johnson. With the praise for these two First Ladies it is really no surprise to find Margaret take a shot at Jacqueline Kennedy saying she had a ``visceral repugnance for average Americans.''

Eleanor Roosevelt even though very accomplished on a personal level was judged by Margaret against what she termed as Eleanor’s ``tragic limitations'' as a wife.

What is clear from the book is that First Ladies find themselves in a job that is impossible to define, and just as difficult to perform. Margaret Truman brings her unique perspective and tries to reveal the truth behind some of the most misunderstood and forgotten First Ladies.

The Body, by Stephen King

. RSS

Gordon Lachance is an adult telling this story in the first person, looking back to 1960 when he was 12 years old, living in the fictional town of Castle Rock, Maine.

A boy from a nearby town is missing and Gordie, Chris, Teddy and Vern decide that the boy has been missing so long that he must be dead, and they suspect he was hit by a train along the rail tracks between the towns.  They tell their parents they are camping out and begin the quest to find the corpse.

The idea of finding a dead body excites them but they start out their trip not clearly understanding death. They each come from abusive or dysfunctional families with challenges and stories that are revealed and become clear as the trip proceeds.

When they see the boy's body the reality of death hits them and become clear. "The kid was dead. The kid wasn't sick, the kid wasn't sleeping. The kid wasn't going to get up in the morning anymore or get the runs from eating too many apples or catch poison ivy or wear out the eraser on the end of his Ticonderoga No 2 during a hard math test. The kid was dead."

Gordie's, even as a boy is a writer and storyteller, and the trip gives him time to tell some of his stories and they are written out in the book in the form that it is suggested they apparently later appeared when published in magazines. Gordie’s first person comments on writing can connect with the reader with them recalling Stephen King’s own life story which might be considered a little confusing.

In the final chapters the future fate of the coming years for the boys is discussed. This short novella was made into the movie, Stand by Me, and the book is another example of how very effective Stephen King is in taking us back to this time period

See the Literary Favorite Section for more on Stephen King

Quotes From This Book

“Speech destroys the function of love, I think-that's a hell of a thing for a writer to say, I guess, but I believe it to be true. If you speak to tell a deer you mean it no harm, it glides away with a single flip of its tail. Love has teeth; they bite; the wounds never close. No word, no combination of words can close those love bites. it's the other way around, that's the joke. If those wounds dry up, the words die with them.” 

“I never had any friends later on like the ones I had when I was twelve. Jesus, did you?”

 “Gordie: Do you think I'm weird?
Chris: Definitely.
Gordie: No man, seriously. Am I weird?
Chris: Yeah, but so what? Everybody's weird” 

Paris to the Moon, by Adam Gopnik

. RSS

“Paris to the Moon'' was taken from essays originally written for the New Yorker by Adam Gopnik, who was assigned to live in Paris from 1995 to 2000. Gopnik begins his account telling us ''I've wanted to live in Paris since I was 8.''

Americans fascination with France, Paris in particular, goes back to Benjamin Franklin’s time and when this book was published in 2000, Gopnik pleads guilty to the same affection.

The essays make statements about the deeper subjects of literature by focusing on small day to day things. “Christmas lights, fax machines, children’s stories” all are items where Gopnik tries to finder larger truths about French and American life.

Gopnik wondered why his refrigerator in New York looked so different as the one he had in Paris and wrote: ''It is as if all American appliances dreamed of being cars while all French appliances dreamed of being telephones,'' He concluded that the French are obsessed by telephones because they love to communicate.

America’s “official culture”, of course, is compared to France’s “civilization”. (Benjamin Franklin likely said something like that) “The Rookie”, one of the most popular chapters in the book, seems to say that life in America brings with it the “gift of loneliness”.  Gopnik finds a way to label the culture of both countries by telling us that he wanted to “protect his child from the weather on CNN in favor of the civilization of the carousel”

At the end of Paris to the Moon, when the family decides to return to America, Gopnik’s wife Martha says, “In Paris we have a beautiful existence but not a full life, and in New York we have a full life but an un-beautiful existence.”

Has anything changed since Benjamin Franklin went to find culture?

Quotes

We breathe in our first language, and swim in our second.” 

“American long for a closed society in which everything can be bought, where laborers are either hidden away or dressed up as nonhumans, so as not to be disconcerting. This place is called Disney World” 

“The loneliness of the expatriate is of an odd and complicated kind, for it is inseparable from the feeling of being free, of having escaped.”

“After all, spinning is its own reward. There wouldn't be carousels if it weren't so.” “Writers are married to their keyboards, as to their passports.” 

“...you have taken part in the only really majestic choice we get to make in life, which is to continue it.” 

Charles Dickens…………………“I cannot tell you what an immense impression Paris made upon me. It is the most extraordinary place in the world!”

Honoré de Balzac“Whoever does not visit Paris regularly will never really be elegant.”

The only train leaving for the moon would likely be from Paris