This is one of the most brutal and difficult things I've read. A horrific, contradictory post-war statement by Hoess, the commanda161st book of 2023.
This is one of the most brutal and difficult things I've read. A horrific, contradictory post-war statement by Hoess, the commandant of Auschwitz. Hoess, one minute, describes in clinical and unflinching detail, the process of leading people in the gas chambers, the process of their dying, and then the subsequent hair-cutting, teeth removals, and ovens, and the next minute, how he was 'forced' to witness these things and how he was shaken by them. How going home to his wife and children was difficult. At the end of his statement he admits he is still a National Socialist but that the Final Solution was 'wrong'.
There for the first time I saw the gassed bodies in mass. But I must admit openly that the gassings had a calming effect on me, since in the near future the mass annihilation of the Jews was to begin [...] I was always horrified by the death by firing squads, especially when I thought of the huge numbers of women and children who would have to be killed. I had had enough of hostage executions, and the mass killings by firing squad ordered by Himmler and Heydrich. Now I was at ease. We were all saved from these bloodbaths, and the victims would be spared until the last moment.
162nd book of 2023. #15 in my challenge with Alan, read a book set in Africa. This also marks my completion of the challenge, which I'll overview when162nd book of 2023. #15 in my challenge with Alan, read a book set in Africa. This also marks my completion of the challenge, which I'll overview when I get around to writing my year review.
3.5. A depressing read through and through, as expected. Lessing evokes Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) in a way that makes it incredibly uncomfortable: the redness, the heat, and as oppressive as the white South Africans at the heart of the story.
There were no clouds at all. It was a low dome of sonorous blue, with an undertone of sultry sulphate-colour, because of the smoke that dimmed the air. The pale sandy soil in front of the house dazzled up waves of light, and out it curved the gleaming stems of the poinsettia bushes, bursting into irregular slashes of crimson. She looked away over the trees, which were dingy and brownish, over the acres of shining wavy grass to the hills. They were hazy and indistinct. The veld fires had been burning for weeks, all round, and she could taste the smoke on her tongue. Sometimes a tiny fragment of charred grass fell on her skin, and left a greasy black smudge. Columns of smoke rose in the distance, heavy bluish coils hanging motionless, making a complicated architecture in the dull air.
I found it emotionally draining at times, putting the book down and feeling its causticness, its portrayal of deep-set racism and hatred, to the point of mania, under my skin. A book that is, without a doubt, good, skilled, but in no way enjoyable. In a way, I dreaded picking up and reading about Mary and her marriage with Dick and their plight against the country and the 'natives' they so dearly hate. After all, the first law of white South Africa, 'Thou shalt not let your fellow whites sink lower than a certain point; because if you do, the nigger will see he is as good as you are.'
And by the end all that racism and hatred just feels used up, for nothing, but no less powerful. ...more
Likened a lot to Maus, which is a lazy comparison, both being graphic novels. I have Alan to thank for getting me to read more lit160th book of 2023.
Likened a lot to Maus, which is a lazy comparison, both being graphic novels. I have Alan to thank for getting me to read more literary graphic novels this year. I was never opposed to them, as a boy, I never read novels, only comic books. I went to the local comic book shop every week and picked up the new releases. I've got boxes of them in the loft still. Maus is brilliant, Watchmen is brilliant. This isn't quite brilliant, but I have huge respect for it. The seemingly childlike style of artwork only makes some of the panels more harrowing. Speaking of Alan, I said to him that this felt a little dumbed down, like it was for kids. He pointed out that Satrapi is writing about being a child. Of course, there's a lot within these pages to feel fury about. And Satrapi's own fury is never too far away. You can feel it. There are little asides that burn with it. On the whole, I just wish there was more of it let out. Still, a worthwhile read....more
I wasn't going to put this on my Goodreads but I've decided to simply to record some of the ideas from it. Like any sane 20-someth158th book of 2023.
I wasn't going to put this on my Goodreads but I've decided to simply to record some of the ideas from it. Like any sane 20-something year old, on Christmas Eve, after a few drinks (at least on my end), Alan and I briefly discussed love and marriage. Not far into the conversation he told me to read this book and then get back to him. I did. I told him it seemed a bit nihilist to me. He argued it wasn't nihilist, but truthful. I'm now seeing the subheading on Goodreads 'A pessimist's guide'. I'm fairly cynical about most things anyway, but the verification of that cynicism was a little depressing. But then again, there was something stoic about it the facts too: there are things that cannot be changed.
One essay outlines the long-gone 'Marriage of Reason' criteria for marriage.
- Who are their parents? - How much land do they have? - How culturally similar are they?
In the new age, our current age, or the 'Marriage of Psychology', we should ask these questions:
- How are they mad? - How can we raise children with them? - How can we develop together? - How can we remain friends? - How can we accommodate our competing needs for extracurricular sex on the one hand and loyalty on the other?
These seem simple enough, though in my teenage years I certainly dated girls I was not friends with. Interestingly, as cliche as it sounds, I've felt my tastes and priorities change as I've grown older. Somewhat paradoxically, another essay suggests: 'No one else would be better [as a partner]. Everyone is as bad.' And as for loyalty on the one hand and sex on the other, another essay reads,
Both parties must therefore scrupulously avoid making the marriage 'about sex'. They must also, from the outset, plan for the most challenging issue that will, statistically speaking, arise for them: that one or the other will have affairs. Someone is properly ready for marriage when they are ready to behave maturely around betraying and being betrayed.
One of the most helpful essays was around loving/being loved. The writer outlined the concept that as children, most of us were 'loved', and didn't have to reciprocate in any way, really, to continue receiving that love. When a child shouts "I hate you!" at a parent, the essay says, the parent,
does not automatically go numb with shock or threaten to leave the house and never come back, because the parent knows that the child is not giving the executive summary of a deeply thought-out and patient investigation into the state of the relationship. The cause of these words might be hunger, a lost but crucial piece of Lego, the fact that they went to a cocktail party last night, that they won't let them play a computer game, or that they have an earache...
The parent, instead, understands that the child does not know how to say 'I'm lonely, in pain, or frightened'. But sadly, 'we find it exceptionally hard to make this move with our partners: to hear what they truly mean, rather than responding (furiously) to what they are saying.'
Or as some blokes once sung, In the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make.
We had guests this Christmas weekend, family from Australia, so I'd spent the day in groups and not catching anyone alone. I bumped into my mum in the hallway and said, I've just read a book of essays titled, Why You Will Marry the Wrong Person. She gave me a lopsided smile that said, "I could have told you that..." but I sensed there was a wink in there somewhere too....more
159th book of 2023. #5 in my challenge with Alan: read a book that has been banned [this, of course, was banned by the Chinese government].
Lianke publ159th book of 2023. #5 in my challenge with Alan: read a book that has been banned [this, of course, was banned by the Chinese government].
Lianke published this in 2005 and it was banned. It's easy to see why. Just over 200 pages of sex between a solider and a Commander's wife. Old school military affair. The catch is, the Commander's wife is turned on by the destruction of Chairman Mao memorabilia. A bust of his head is ground into powder as she lies naked on the bed. Her way of communicating to the solider, for when she's ready for him, is to take the sign that reads "Serve the People!" down from the wall and leave it somewhere. As well as being a soldier, he's the Commander's orderly. He'd find it on the table, in a flowerbed, and he'd bolt up the stairs to get laid.
I generally prefer my satires a bit more loopy, but this was fun. It nearly got 4-stars because I found the ending surprisingly poignant considering the rest is a farce. On GR this book doesn't seem well liked, but I'm unsure why.
157th book of 2023. #17 in my challenge with Alan: read a book with a different language in the title.
3.5. As the end of 2023 approaches, Alan and I 157th book of 2023. #17 in my challenge with Alan: read a book with a different language in the title.
3.5. As the end of 2023 approaches, Alan and I are both scrabbling to finish off the last few entries from our challenge (as well as deciding on next year's). I went in bitter that Sagan wrote this novel at 18. I got even more bitter when I realised how maturely and well-written it is. It's a book about immaturity, though, ironically, and how we meddle in other people's lives for our own gains. It's very short, but Sagan was a talent, clearly.
155th book of 2023. This hits #11 in my challenge with Alan, read a non-fiction book about writing.
Less about writing than the description suggests, 155th book of 2023. This hits #11 in my challenge with Alan, read a non-fiction book about writing.
Less about writing than the description suggests, but a breezy and gentle read. The essays in the book were adjusted from speeches Atwood has done. She claims to have not changed much, but has, she admits, removed some corny jokes. The most interesting bits were about writing being a craft and a Writer (capital W) being a discipline. I agree with this. I also had an argument with my ex-housemate the other day about intelligence being synonymous with a kind of madness, and Atwood delves into that, too. But mostly, Atwood seems to be having fun, quoting from her favourite books, chatting about the writers she likes and generally being passionate. There are also moments of autobiography: one of which Atwood recounts how one Valentine's Day, a boyfriend got her a real cow's heart with an arrow through it (in a bag - so it didn't drip).
I'm generally mistrustful of these 'till books' you find on the counter that beg for a little extra purchase on top of what you wen153rd book of 2023.
I'm generally mistrustful of these 'till books' you find on the counter that beg for a little extra purchase on top of what you went into the bookshop for, but the Time version of this series did get me reinterested in the subject and set me off on a lot of further reading. Sadly, this one was disappointing. None of the essays impressed me nor enlightened me that much, and I went in knowing nothing other than the absolute basics about the 'deep sea.' Some of the myth-busters of the book were painfully simple, like the fact we do actually know more about the deep sea than space. Shocker....more
3.5. Started reading this in Nuremberg but only finished now as I've been distracted by a number of things. Hesse is easy to read a156th book of 2023.
3.5. Started reading this in Nuremberg but only finished now as I've been distracted by a number of things. Hesse is easy to read as ever, understated and beautiful prose, like layers of an oil painting. The central theme of the book is about the life of an artist: can a true male artist also be a good father/husband. Hesse wrote this as a reaction to his own personal life, during his own failing marriage. Gradually, the narrative shifts in a fairly expected place (novels of this time always end up with someone dying), and the descriptions of death, its process, were incredibly vivid. Certain points were almost upsetting; I wonder if Hesse had seen the throes of death to write them. It does lack the philosophical depth of his later works (Siddhartha, Steppenwolf) but it's still as enjoyable as ever. I think that whenever art is involved, neglect isn't far behind it. ...more
I swapped between two translation as I read, mostly my brain was arguing about word choices and sentence structure: nothing seriou154th book of 2023.
I swapped between two translation as I read, mostly my brain was arguing about word choices and sentence structure: nothing serious; but when I reached the end, I realised one of my translations had an extra page or two than the other. Of course, we always treat Kafka as unfinished. K. is always there where we left him. If anything, the unfinished body of work left by Kafka is part of his Kafkaesque universe. Missing pieces, disjointed chapters, inconsistencies (a few here, for example, like describing both sisters as blonde but later calling one a brunette), and above all, lacking in resolution. All the depression, loneliness, stumbling, heartache in your life is because of the castle. K. is in a world that does not yield itself to him. I said this to a friend the other day and they responded, Yes, and aren't we all? I thought about that. One day I'd like to read Anthea Bell's translation as she does such a consistently good job with Zweig. I mostly ditched Muir in favour of Underwood, the latter being based on the Pasley Critical German Text, despite the fact that Muir's (with the additional translations by Kaiser and Wilkins) is sometimes considered the 'definite' edition.
I read most of this in Nuremberg and, naturally, in the castle there, thought of K. At one point we were let into a small building in the castle grounds with an incredibly deep well. The German tour guide spoke enthusiastically in German as he demonstrated its depth: he poured, from a carafe, five jets of water. He counted them aloud: "Eins, zwei, drei, vier," and perfectly in time with him pouring the fifth and saying, "Fünf...", the sound of the first jet hit the water at the bottom of the well. Everyone cooed in satisfaction and awe. Something about it felt Kafkaesque to me. ...more
On Wednesday I was sitting in courtroom 600 where the Nuremberg Trials took place. I was several feet from the place where Goering152nd book of 2023.
On Wednesday I was sitting in courtroom 600 where the Nuremberg Trials took place. I was several feet from the place where Goering and the other members of the National Socialist party sat. As I was sitting there, at promptly 12.30pm, a screen began to lower, the lights went to black as in a cinema and the curtains along the right-hand wall shut out the pale daylight. The sound of footfalls filled the room and on the screen bloomed a 3D rendering of the courtroom I was sitting in. Then, black and white footage from the trials was superimposed over the rendering, giving the chilling impression that Goering was entering. The 3D rendering panned with him, the footfalls growing louder. The judges then appeared to the right, shuffling their papers and looking stern. At the back, the interpreters sat behind glass windows. Where I was sitting, the press once sat. Later, upstairs in the exhibition and listening to the footage from the trial, I heard Jackson asking Rudolf Hess, “Did that include women and children?” They were talking about the command from Hitler to “liquidate” the Jews in concentration camps. Hess’s voice replied loudly in my ears, through the headphones, “Yes.”
Goering, of course, killed himself before he was hanged. He endured the over 200 days of the Nuremberg Trials before, on hearing that he would be hanged, bit into the cyanide tooth in his mouth. He died as Hitler had, Himmler, Goebbels, and however many National Socialist cowards had before him. Neave, writer of this intimate account, also died short of a full life [1]. The majority of this book, amazingly, is dedicated to the fascinating (though also repetitive) account of Neave handing the prisoners their indictments. Speer is as fascinating as ever, the “Good Nazi” who made a name for himself after his prison release. Neave thought his prison sentence compared to Sauckel’s hanging was a grave mistake. He insists several times that Sauckel shouldn’t have hanged. I’m surprised Hess didn’t.
In the museum at Nuremberg I also discovered a number of writers were there: John Steinbeck, Alfred Döblin, John Dos Passos and Rebecca West, to name a few big names. And it’s not surprising: the multimedia exhibition described above ended with the lasting power of the Trials to the present day. Putin must face trial for his crimes, it insisted. In Munich, I learnt more about the lasting effect of the National Socialists [2]. In England, I grew up and still live around severe Islamophobia, but have never heard much anti-Semitism first hand. Hatred never ends; it is a forever changing, multifaceted thing that we cannot escape from, but, in learning about it, the individual can stand against it.
Anyone interested in the history of justice, the Second World War, or simply wants to read about fascist state leaders sitting in courtroom docks like common criminals, this is an excellent place to start. Neave, whatever his flaws, has written a solid book here with true candour. At one point, on first arriving to the country, he recalls shaking his fist and yelling at German women on the rubble-strewn streets, “Hitler did this to you!”
”The bombing of Munich with 200 planes and the heaviest calibre bombs. The explosions could be heard as far away as Switzerland, the earth shaken for many miles around. In historical terms the foolish place has deserved this.” —Thomas Mann
”It happened, and thus it can happen again. —Primo Levi
_________________________________
[1] I could quite easily write the whole review about Neave himself. He was the first British man to escape Colditz Castle. He later became a conservative MP and was a close friend of Margaret Thatcher. I gave this brief biography [a] to S., my colleague, at work a few weeks ago and when I finished it by saying that Neave had been assassinated (blown up an IRLA car bomb [b]), he said, with his back to me: “Serves him right.” [c]
[a] My other colleague, P., who overheard Neave’s name, mentioned Colditz Castle and the fact that Airey was, so he’d read, a “git”.
[b] [image]
[c] The Witch is Dead song from The Wizard of Oz hit the charts some 70 years after its release with the death of a certain female politician in 2013.
[2] According to a 2011 report, approximately 20% of Germans are still latently anti-Semitic....more
This'll be Fitzcarraldo's first publication of 2024 from Balsam Karam, an Iranian-born Swedish writer. A short book focussing on em150th book of 2023.
This'll be Fitzcarraldo's first publication of 2024 from Balsam Karam, an Iranian-born Swedish writer. A short book focussing on emigration and immigration, I felt that The Singularity suffers from it's fragmented nature in the beginning. I didn't care so much for the characters as they felt like cut-outs designed to drive the narrative. This is, of course, natural, but I wanted a little more to hold onto. Ironically, the final part of the novel is fragmented further, made of short paragraphs per page, but I found them, stacking and more personal, to be the most affecting part.
None of your white friends have wanted to hear any of your memories from the war. It hits you one day as you've sitting with one of them, listening to him talk about how he used to pick berries with his grandmother as a child. He goes into minute detail, pulling out pictures from when he was in the bilberry patch in the woods, one where he is sticking out his tongue, pulling a face. Yes, but my friend Rozia was found in the rubble after a bombing, what do you think about that? you say and wait for him to respond.
I recently told Alan about some Israelis who have been coming into work for the last two weeks and attending story times, taking books. Two days ago they left us a card thanking us for everything, and saying they were flying back to their home in Tel Aviv. They signed off with: "If only we could be citizens of the library." This has been echoing around my head since....more
4.5. I hate rewrites and reimaginings and after Kingsolver's rubbish Demon Copperhead, I was skeptical to read Everett's James (wh149th book of 2023.
4.5. I hate rewrites and reimaginings and after Kingsolver's rubbish Demon Copperhead, I was skeptical to read Everett's James (which is due to be published in March next year), but I adore The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and couldn't resist starting immediately when this advance copy was sent to me. Safe to say, pretty early on, this was going to be a different story.
The beginning follows the plot of the original. Many events that happen are exactly as Twain invented them, but of course, everything feels different: Jim is the narrator, and Everett has crafted him into something better. For starters: the way Jim speaks in Twain's novel is merely, we learn, a 'language' that all slaves speak, and put on, for white people. As soon as any white people leave a scene, Jim drops the act. And, at times it's clear Everett wants us to laugh, however uncomfortably, as soon as a white person reappears, Jim picks it up again, Lawdy, Lawdy! He can read, he can write. He harbours nihilistic tendencies. He is not Jim, but James.
And Huck. There is no shortage of reviews damning Twain's novel as being racist. There's no shortage of people thinking it should be banned, even now. I won't lie, I was unsure about how Everett would deal with it, because there's no hiding the fact that the original novel has had a controversial and problematic history. He nails it, though. Huck feels exactly like he felt in the original. It felt like reading Twain. Huckleberry Finn is a problematic person, as history often created; he is a child born into a world of slaves and racism, with a deadbeat and abusive father. And despite the horrible ending of the original novel, Huck, I believe, even in Twain, loved Jim. And Everett blossoms that.
By perhaps the midway point, Everett begins to steer the story. The plot changes. There are some twists and inventions. There are some Django Unchained moments of revenge and retribution. The book is riddled with satire, action, pain and suffering. I've only read The Trees but this already feels like the book Everett was here to write. This is a theory from Swann, my old professor: that every writer spends their life trying to write only one book, and everything else, all their other books, are merely tests, byproducts. Vonnegut's, for example, was Slaughterhouse-Five. This, I think, with my limited knowledge, was Everett's. It just feels like it. It feels like all his power and energy collected here.
If you haven't read The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, read it. It's one of the Great American Novels. Then, in March, when this hits the bookshops, buy it.
A thousand thanks to Pan Macmillan for the advance copy. ...more
I've read all of Calvino's novels so when this new translated collection came into work, I grabbed it as a greedy completionist. I'151st book of 2023.
I've read all of Calvino's novels so when this new translated collection came into work, I grabbed it as a greedy completionist. I'm yet to read all his Cosmicomics, but this is essentially an updated version of the already published Adam, One Afternoon. So, some of those stories reappear, but some new ones are also thrown into the mix, I guess, making this a worthwhile publication. I'm tempted to say that just for this book's cover, too.
Anyway: these are early Calvino stories so not quite the postmodernist games of his later efforts. A few have a soft fanaticism to them, like The Baron in the Trees. These stories are sweet and pastoral. The back half of the collection is closer to his first novel, The Path to the Spider's Nest and deal principally with the Second World War and the spreading fascism. A lot of them are enjoyable enough but they are all a little immature in their resolutions, mostly ending in death. For example, one man picks his way through a minefield for four pages, fearing the moment he steps on a mine, and in the end he does and blows up. Another is a sort of chase that ends in a gunfight. After a series of these, you pretty much come to expect the inevitable capture and death that ends each story. I prefer the fantastical ones, and just as well, because Calvino's career leans into that for the rest of his life. ...more
Continuing my Nordic kick, Sjón is one of Iceland's big novelists and this was a slim volume to introduce me to his work. A blue fo147th book of 2023.
Continuing my Nordic kick, Sjón is one of Iceland's big novelists and this was a slim volume to introduce me to his work. A blue fox as a white whale and a girl with Down's Syndrome in 19th century Iceland are the two parallel stories that make up this novella. The beginning is closer to prose poetry with sparse paragraphs and lots of white space (emanating the feeling of snow?). I prefer big, baggy sentences to sparse prose but there's no denying the poetry. There's a bit of religion and surrealism too, but nothing major, being so short. An interesting little read but not one that will linger so much in my mind. I liked it well enough. ...more
Such a fun, messy book. Clarke could have easily ruined this: the amount of time jumps, setting moves and character introductions 146th book of 2023.
Such a fun, messy book. Clarke could have easily ruined this: the amount of time jumps, setting moves and character introductions for a 250 page novel is slightly ridiculous. We get into a character before he rushes the narrative on and they're left behind. Somehow, he makes it work. It is a mess, but the book is so enjoyable I didn't overly mind. I was right back to being a second year university student when I was just getting into the likes of PKD and Vonnegut (and 2001). A fresh take on alien invasion, even now. I was thrilled by the first portion of the book with all the unknowns, but even as he answered questions and things became clearer, Clarke keeps it alive with the idea of utopia, humankind as a whole and a few twists in the plot. Some of the descriptions at the end, like in 2001 had me in awe of Clarke's imagination. One could believe he had been to space himself. For me, now I'm older, science-fiction is so far beyond fantasy as a genre. ...more
2.5. Cute. Felt a bit immature with all the literary namedropping, but it's about young love, so maybe that's the point. A weird b143rd book of 2023.
2.5. Cute. Felt a bit immature with all the literary namedropping, but it's about young love, so maybe that's the point. A weird book that plays with being a bit meta, intertextual, whilst also feeling contemporary and 'young'. It's fun while it lasts but it's forgettable....more
4.5. I'm giving this 5-stars because so many books have come close recently, and at this point, I'm holding them back for no real r148th book of 2023.
4.5. I'm giving this 5-stars because so many books have come close recently, and at this point, I'm holding them back for no real reason. This is a brilliant novel greatly inspired by one of my favourite writers, W.G. Sebald. And where imitators fall down, Mallo leans fully into his Sebald inspirations and even has a character dissecting The Rings of Saturn in the final part.
The book is split into three seemingly (at first) unconnected parts. In the first, a narrator very much like Mallo (as Sebald's narrators are very much like Sebald), visits an island called San Simón. Then he recounts his living in New York, meeting bizarre characters, finding a manuscript, etc. Recurring images crop up. The second book (first person again), is recounted by an American, Kurt Montana, who claims to have been the fourth astronaut on the moon. Things in his story don't add up but it becomes a further reflection on the things from the first book: WW2, 9/11, Brexit, and the strangeness of life. The final part, in full Sebald fashion, follows a woman (from the first book) doing a walking tour of the D-Day beaches in Normandy. At one point she describes being the mirror image of Sebald.
I couldn't put my finger on what the novel is 'about'. This is my fourth Mallo book after his Nocilla Trilogy. In the end, I think it's about a lot of things at once, but what struck me the most is its insistence about the dead (they never leave us), time itself (not as linear as we think), the mirrors and parallels in our lives (taking into account the light having to reach our eyes, our reflection in a mirror is delayed, though imperceptible to the human eye; with the vastness between the ocean, the final narrator is the delayed reflection of Sebald), and how interconnectedness never ends.
_________________
I've now read all of Fitzcarraldo's fiction publications from 2021. With this, the other titles that shouldn't be missed are Cohen's The Netanyahus, the final part of Fosse's Septology (meaning the septology as a whole), and Tokarczuk's The Books of Jacob....more
I went off Waugh as a strong-minded university student because he was a young Tory boy who had been educated at the giant school do144th book of 2023.
I went off Waugh as a strong-minded university student because he was a young Tory boy who had been educated at the giant school down the road (figuratively) from my parents' house where, on occasions, I would be taken to their indoor swimming pool for kayaking lessons (that's how big the pool was). As I got older I realised two things about life: (1) art and the artist are separate and (2) that ignoring my hatred for their political persuasion, those with right-wing beliefs are generally funnier than those with the left. ...more
2.5. Really worth it for the short novella, And Then My Dog Will Come Back to Me, which is a feverish, running sentence like his Se141st book of 2023.
2.5. Really worth it for the short novella, And Then My Dog Will Come Back to Me, which is a feverish, running sentence like his Septology that feels in the vein of Crime and Punishment. The fragments or 'scenes' from childhood were mostly bad. For example,
BICYCLE AND GUITAR CASE Asle was riding around on the roads on his mother's old bicycle, he'd repainted it blue. He almost always had a guitar case in his hand. s he rode the bike his long hair fluttered behind him.
That's it. Or,
I ALWAYS AGREE WITH THOSE WHO DISAGREE I understand that some of what matters, most is missing from our lives. So there needs to be a revolution.
That's also it. Fosse was apparently trying to capture childhood and its essence. I guess he was going for simplicity. It didn't pay off. It's only a three-star because of the novella. ...more
Matthew Ted
>
Books:
read-2023
(162)
Loading...
