[lit-ideas] Re: Sunday Twofer
- From: "Lawrence Helm" <lawrencehelm@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sun, 5 Dec 2010 12:41:59 -0800
Lest it seem as though I could hardly wait until you finished yours until I
interjected mine, I appreciate both of yours. Loved "He's absolutely
convinced the French speak French only as an affectation"
Lawrence
From: lit-ideas-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:lit-ideas-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx]
On Behalf Of David Ritchie
Sent: Sunday, December 05, 2010 12:21 PM
To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [lit-ideas] Sunday Twofer
From the bottom of my heart and teacup, on a break from writing bureaucratic
things and thinking a bit in French, these are my current P.G. Tips. What
fun there is at the opening of "Frozen Assets": people proposing to people
out of the blue, as Wodehouse's folk often do, and here's a French
bureaucrat, "constructed of some form of suet," expertly making the simple
difficult. Here also, of course, is someone inheriting millions (as one
does in such vols.) and finding himself wondering where the catch or caveat
is cached. He's concerned in re. the friend who wants to marry his
sister--follow carefully here--whether said friend would be better than the
"pill of the first water" to whom she's already engaged. He's absolutely
convinced the French speak French only as an affectation which, like the
form -stamping actions of the caged bureaucrat, impart to les gars a sense
of time being properly occupied. Novels, the hero thinks, are fine things
"until the writing part," which is "very testing to the stamina." "It's all
right when you're lolling back in your chair with a pipe and a little
something in a glass thinking the thing out, but then comes the writing.
That's the snag." Read it and weep.
Today I am like the weather in la Jolla, morning clouds and fog giving way
to afternoon sunshine. I imagine an alternative historian, one who returns
to the old lifeguard routine: swimming before breakfast, in an outdoor pool,
in Wales, in winter and in spring. Thus tough as old leather and maybe a
little buffer, with a tad less codger showing. What I remember of that
routine is if it didn't make you live longer, it at least produced in
classroom minutes following, hints of eternity.
David Ritchie,
Portland,
Oregon------------------------------------------------------------------
To change your Lit-Ideas settings (subscribe/unsub, vacation on/off,
digest on/off), visit www.andreas.com/faq-lit-ideas.html
_____
No virus found in this message.
Checked by AVG - www.avg.com
Version: 10.0.1170 / Virus Database: 426/3298 - Release Date: 12/05/10
Other related posts:
