Ataraxia

  This is an interesting love story, which used to be weird, even forbidden one hundred years ago. Come to think of it, even today, this kind of thing and many others are unthinkable in Saudi Arabia, the Islamic State (a new horrible apparition), Brunei and many other places, where the Sharia dictates that infidelity is punished by stoning. In the past few days, many people have lost their heads, literally- in the Middle East and everybody talks with disgust and loathing of the Islamic State. However, an ally of the West gets away with murder. Saudi Arabia has beheaded 12 people recently for: hashish trafficking and…witchcraft. One was killed even if he had been declared mentally ill. Coming back from the desert to Paris, we have a love triangle, which turns into a square at times.  The heroine, Paula Tessier is 39 years old and loves a man close to her age- Roger Demarest. Alas, he is more than interested in young women, with whom we may say that he cheats on his partner. Phi...

  Seven written by Andrew Kevin Walker, directed by David Fincher, and starring Morgan Feeman, Brad Pitt, Gwyneth Paltrow, Kevin Spacey is the Top-Rated Movie Number 20 – you find reviews from this, The New York Times’ Best 1,000 Movies Ever Made and other lists on my blog https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2026/08/do-you-have-any-suggestions-how-to-make.html and YouTube channel   8 out of 10   Brad Pitt https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2026/07/a-river-runs-through-it-by-norman.html is one of my favorite thespians, he has a leading role (or maybe he is the main character here) in Se7en, which by the way, may be Seven or Se7en, I am not sure, I have seen it both ways, he is detective Mills, who wants to be in this narrative   That is, he asked for this job, though the results are quite awful for him – spoiler alert, though I am not yet sure how much I will divulge, and more importantly, who gives a damn – the monster at the center of this mystery fea...

  Billy Bathgate by E.L. Doctorow was the finalist for The 1990 Pulitzer Prize for Literature, notwithstanding the fact that it is only 8988 th on The Greatest Books of All Time site – you have thousands of reviews of magnum opera from the aforementioned and other lists on my blog https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2026/08/do-you-have-any-suggestions-how-to-make.html and YouTube channel   8 out of 10   E.L. Doctorow https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2025/09/ragtime-based-on-novel-by-el-doctorow.html was a celebrated writer, albeit he was failed to overwhelm this reader, moreover, all the three oeuvres that I have read have all the same 8 out of 10 rating in my ledger, with a plus for Billy Bathgate, read for the first time years back   Billy Bathgate is a likeable enough character- nay, leading I was going to say, except he is not yet sixteen when we meet him, even if he has an adult in the background, the one telling us the crime story – but the is...

  Dune written by Denis Villeneuve, Jon Spaihts and Eric Roth, based on the novel by Frank Herbert, which is ranked 101 st on The Greatest Books of All Time site, it is included on The 1,000 Novels Everyone Must Read list, although it is not a story I get; you have thousands of reviews of magnum opera from The GOAT, 1,000 Novels and other pages on my blog https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2026/08/do-you-have-any-suggestions-how-to-make.html   7 out of 10   I have tried https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2024/09/dune-by-frank-herbert-my-other-note-on.html the celebrated Dune before, in book format, that is audiobook, and I did not find the oomph, stamina, determination to get on with it, I was thinking that perhaps the movie adaptation will catch my attention, appreciated as it is   Alas, it did not happen, granted, we seldom have a motion picture that is better than the original, it happened to me in the case of Doctor Zhivago, where the film is phen...

  Poems by Paul Verlaine – we find the Selected Poems at 7100 on The Greatest Books of All Time site and The One Hundred and One Poems by Paul Verlaine even lower on that page, nonetheless, they are among my favorites…you have thousands of reviews on magnum opera from the GOAT and other lists on my blog https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2026/08/do-you-have-any-suggestions-how-to-make.html and YouTube channel   10 out of 10   ‘Words create worlds’ https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2025/02/happier-by-tal-ben-shahar.html I don’t know the source of the original quote, but I have heard this in the YouTube videos of the most popular courses at Harvard, which you could, maybe should access for free, Positive Psychology from the wondrous Tal Ben Shahar   Paul Verlaine is nec plus ultra for yours truly, who has learned three of these masterpieces by heart, decades ago, and then enjoyed them ever since, even during…swimming, I used to take laps for about half...

  Evelina by Frances Burney is one of The 1,000 Novels Everyone Must Read, it is ranked 818 th on The Greatest Books of All Time, nevertheless, it failed the capture my attention, and this is mea culpa…you have thousands of reviews of magnum opera from The GOAT, 1,000 Novels and other lists on my blog https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2026/08/do-you-have-any-suggestions-how-to-make.html and YouTube channel   7 out of 10   Alice Adams https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2025/07/alice-adams-by-booth-tarkington.html came to mind when reading about Evelina, I thought reading the latter would be as elating as the former, alas, it did not happen, and this is because of the under signed, I did not find it engaging enough, granted, there may be some reasons:   LibriVox is the site where generous volunteers donate their time, they read great works (probably some lesser ones too) that are in the public domain, one such is Evelina, and despite the kudos for the...