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A Writer's Wit: Winston Churchill

11/30/2021

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A lady sitting at dinner next to Winston Churchill said to him, “Mr. Churchill, you are drunk.” He replied, “And you, madam, are ugly; but in the morning I will be sober.”
​Winston Churchill
Born November 30, 1874
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W. Churchill
FRIDAY: My Book World | Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall
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Close to 'Road of Unfreedom'

11/26/2021

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A WRITER'S WIT:
"People don’t talk much now about the Spanish influenza, but that was a terrible thing, and it struck just at the time of the Great War, just when we were getting involved in it. People came to church wearing masks, if they came at all. They’d sit as far from each other as they could" (41).
From Robinson’s novel Gilead
Marilynne Robinson
Born November 26, 1943 
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M. Robinson

My Book World

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Snyder, Timothy. The Road to Unfreedom: Russia, Europe, America. New York: Duggan, 2018.

A scholarly and erudite book, The Road to Unfreedom is a plea for Western peoples to wake up and smell the borscht burning on the stove. Snyder begins with two phrases: politics of inevitability, “a sense that the future is just more of the present,” and that nothing can be done (7); the other phrase, politics of eternity “places one nation at the center of a cyclical story of victimhood” (8). As Snyder develops his thesis that both Europe and American could be on the way to unfreedom, he repeatedly weaves into the fabric of his text these two terms. Russia has already traveled down this road, accepted its role as victim, that the world is always out to get Russia. If Europe and America do not pay attention to the signs of fascism or authoritarianism present in their own countries, they, too, could wind up like Russia. For the general reader, this book can be tough reading, but I invite anyone wanting to know what might be wrong with our country to take a look at it.

​NEXT FRIDAY: My Book World | Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall: A Novel. Book One of the Thomas Cromwell Trilogy

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A Writer's Wit: Frances Hodgson Burnett

11/24/2021

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Two things cannot be in one place. Where you tend a rose, my lad, a thistle cannot grow.
​Frances Hodgson Burnett
Author of The Secret Garden
Born November 24, 1849
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F. H. Burnett
FRIDAY: My Book World | Timothy Snyder's The Road to Unfreedom
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A Writer's Wit: Guy Davenport

11/23/2021

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SOLDAT'S REMARK TO GENERAL APPLAUSE:
Fuck all starters of wars up the arse with a handspike dipped in tetanus.
Guy Davenport
Author of 
Apples and Pears
Born November 23, 1927
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G. Davenport
FRIDAY: My Book World | Timothy Snyder's The Road to Unfreedom
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Jobs for Women on 'Maiden Voyages'

11/19/2021

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A WRITER'S WIT
Sloppy language leads to sloppy thought, and sloppy thought to sloppy legislation. 
​Dick Cavett
Author of 
Brief Encounters: Conversations, Magic Moments, and Assorted Hijinks
Born November 19, 1936
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D. Cavett

My Book World

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Evans, Siân. Maiden Voyages: Magnificent Ocean Liners and the women Who Traveled and Worked Aboard Them. New York: St. Martin’s, 2020.

This is an interesting book in which Welsh author Evans focuses on thirteen women (some famous, some not) in the early twentieth century who make careers on the seas. Mostly by way of working on lines such as the White Star and Cunard, these women toil as conductresses, stewardesses, and nurses, sometimes rising to supervisory positions. During an era when women are not encouraged or even allowed to work outside a domestic situation, these women serve as pioneers who earn good salaries and are able to support families back home in the UK, where the man of the household, say, has been lost to war. Of course, their success is hard won, and it is only a beginning, but indeed there must be a thread that connects them to airline hostesses and to female astronauts such as Sally Ride. A quick but meaningful read. 

NEXT FRIDAY: My Book World | Timothy Snyder's  The Road to Unfreedom: Russia, Europe, America

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A Writer's Wit: Donald D. Quinn

11/18/2021

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If a doctor, lawyer, or dentist had forty people in his office at one time, all of whom had different needs, and some of whom didn’t want to be there and were causing trouble, and the doctor, lawyer, or dentist, without assistance, had to treat them all with professional excellence for nine months, then he might have some conception of the classroom teacher’s job.
Donald D. Quinn
Author of For Goodness Sakes: 
Fibber McGee and Molly
Born November 18, 1900
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D. D. Quinn
TOMORROW: My Book World | Siân Evans's Maiden Voyages
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A Writer's Wit: Eva Gabrielsson

11/17/2021

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I'm not violent, I don't believe in killing people, but standing up for yourself, speaking out against injustice, is another form of vengeance. 
​Eva Gabrielsson
Author of There Are Things I Want You to Know about Stieg Larsson and Me

Born November 17, 1953
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E. Gabrielsson
FRIDAY: My Book World |  Siân Evans's Maiden Voyages
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A Writer's Wit: Kate Thompson

11/16/2021

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What I do find enormously gratifying is the reviews my books get from the American press. They are so on the ball compared to anywhere else. It's so satisfying to get a review that conveys the reader understood precisely what I was trying to get at.
​Kate Thompson
Author of Secrets Between Sisters
Born November 16, 1959
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K. Thompson
FRIDAY: My Book World | Siân Evans's Maiden Voyages
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'On the Beach' Ultimate of Global Warming

11/12/2021

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A WRITER'S WIT
I have a color-coded computer spreadsheet that divides things down to chapter fragments. Each character's point-of-view is a different color. The text of the manuscript is color-coded the same way. The last thing I do before submitting the manuscript is turn all those colors back to black.
​Neal Shusterman
Author of Thunderhead
​Born November 12, 1962
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N. Shusterman

My Book World

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Shute, Nevil. On the Beach. New York: Morrow, 1957. 

​​This novel, which could have worked as a cautionary tale in its publication year, 1957, can still bring shivers to one’s spine. In this narrative, the worst has already happened, a vague war begun, on accident, between Russia and China, in which nuclear warfare destroys most of the northern hemisphere. Only the Australians and other South Pacific cultures survive . . . for a while. As we know, such high amounts of radiation kill immediately and keep on killing over weeks and months as its fine particles continue to float to earth. The main characters realize intellectually what will happen but continue to live as if death won’t come, racing in a local grand prix, planting a garden one won’t benefit from, collecting presents for one’s children when one “returns” to his family in America. Shute is deft in creating what looks like denial and yet is a way for characters to cope, until the very end. At that time, little red pills of barbiturates have been distributed like penny candy, and we see each one take his or her dosage and end their lives peacefully. We are made to consider, however, what will happen to the earth itself. After a number of years, so Shute believes, the radiation will clear, the earth will be ready for inhabitation again. It shall repopulate itself with some kind of creatures. The novel has one final lesson for those living today. Nuclear war is the ultimate global warming, the ultimate in climate change. Forever. The thought should still give us pause. 

NEXT FRIDAY: My Book World | TBD

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A Writer's Wit: Mary Gaitskill

11/11/2021

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What is faithfulness, anyway? Can you be unfaithful to your own feelings and faithful to someone else? Is it faithful to lie in bed night after night with someone you love but no longer desire while ardently dreaming of someone else?
​Mary Gaitskill
Author of Lost Cat
Born November 11, ​1954
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M. Gaitskill
TOMORROW: My Book World | Nevil Shute's On the Beach
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A Writer's Wit: Holly Black

11/10/2021

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Inspiration comes from everywhere. From life, observing people, etc. From movies and books you love. From research.
​Holly Black
Author of The Wicked King​
Born November 10, 1971
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H. Black
FRIDAY: My Book World | Nevil Shute's On the Beach
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A Writer's Wit: ​Imre Kertész

11/9/2021

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In a democracy, you have to find a market niche, make sure a novel is “interesting” and “spectacular.” That may be the toughest censorship of all.
​Imre Kertés
Author of Kaddish for an Unborn Child
Born November 9, 1929
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I. Kertész
FRIDAY: My Book World | Nevil Shute's On the Beach
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    AUTHOR
    Richard Jespers is a writer living in Lubbock, Texas, USA.

    See my profile at Author Central:
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