Loved Fahrenheit
451, although some of the ideas went over my head a bit. But the whole idea of
a future world where books are dangerous and subversive, and how this affects
society was brilliantly imagined. Sadly, like so many dystopian visions, it
seems apposite at the moment, in our era of celebrating ignorance and 'having
had enough of experts'. Maxwell's book has been on my wishlist for over 12
years, since we went to the wonderful city of Marrakech. I'd love to go back,
but our budget is now so tight it's just impossible. With 3 kids, we struggle
to afford a caravan for a week in august - £1200! £1200!. I read 'Jerusalem' in
one sitting, having given up on the chance of ever seeing Mark Rylance play
Rooster
Tuesday, 25 September 2018
Gavin Fridell, Coffee, Douglas Adams, The Restaurant At The End Of The Universe.
'Coffee'
was about coffee statecraft, and was a very dry economic study that critiqued
the 'free market' approach to coffee production and trade. TRATUE made me smile
a lot, but all very familiar. A bit of a comfort read
L.G. Mitchell, Charles James Fox, Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Saul Bellow, The Adventures of Augie March
Here we go again,
another Great American Novel that I struggled to wade through. It was just a
slog. Augie, the 'born recruit' went from one job to another, never seemed to
come alive to me as a character, and I just didn't care what happened to him.
I'm obviously a philistine.
Fox surprised me - I
know very little about him beyond the high regard he has among some politicians
and historians. Reading his life, and his apparent dislike of active politics,
I couldn't understand what it was that inspired such reverence. Was it just
that in an era of conformity, he dared to be different by supporting the
American and then the French Revolution? Neither seems to have cost him much as
he relaxed in Chertsey, and nothing he did gave active support to either
revolution from what I could glean.
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