Erik Larson

Yesterday, in between interludes of lolling on the couch, I did lots of loads of laundry. Alliteration.

Today I've watched a video recording that Jed sent me, a Wall Street Journal book club interview with author Erik Larson talking about Dashiell Hammett and The Maltese Falcon. Through Facebook, Jed had four questions about Hammett that Larson discussed.

Then last night, I happened upon an interview with Larson on CSPN Book TV, recorded March 27, 2015 in St. Paul, MN. One of his remarks that I found interesting was that Hemingway, Scott Fitzgerald and Dashiell Hammett were significant influences on his writing.

The interview was about Dead Wake, the Last Crossing of the Lusitania. It was right fascinating; he said his favorite period in history was the 1890’s to the 1920’s—partly because it was the heyday of the typewriter, which made historical research much easier to read. He also said he’s claustrophobic on an airplane and hates to fly. He said some of the passengers on the Lusitania saw the torpedo coming toward them. Wow.

Larson's books that I've read are The Devil in the White City, and Thunderstruck (at least part of it).
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This is the next tale: http://www.boop.org/jan/justso/camel.htm

Yesterday for dinner, I sliced a tomato and some yellow squash and baked them on low for about 2 hours. Some account!

I just re-read George Orwell's book of essays about his betters. Kind of cruel to Dickens and W.B. Yeats, and R. Kipling (he thought Dickens seemed to be a Fascist, Kipling might have been, and Yeats definitely was). But Orwell wrote in the late 1930s-early '40s, when the British (and lots of American) self-styled intelligentsia were hoping that communism would triumph uber alles. (I would point out that this mentality also included Ronald Reagan, but that would involve juxtaposing that name somehow with the root word intelligent.) Of course, Orwell criticized communism, too. I wonder if he likes it where he is now.

He did point out that the instances of brutality in Kipling's stories didn't necessarily mean that K. approved of violence and anti-Semitism. But why didn't K. pause after every blow and deliver a sermon against it?

All of the above is unfair to Orwell. He was a brilliant writer, and he saw deeply into motives, attitudes and politics of different times. It just annoys me to see writers pigeonholed. Especially writers in whose works I have graciously ignored the bad and admired the good.