Ataraxia

  From the author of the acclaimed chef d’oeuvre Schindler’s Ark, Thomas Keneally...another splendid work – A Commonwealth of Thieves 10 out of 10     The world has been horrified by what it has seen in The Schindler’s List, as adapted from the original master work by Thomas Keneally, though there is of course the towering figure of Oskar Schindler, the one who had saved so many Jews, the Holocaust is at the center of the story with its unbelievable mirror that it puts in front of humanity…the film has popularized the novel and that in turn made the author of the acclaimed opus a famous figure, who has given the world another great book, A Commonwealth of Thieves…   The under signed has been mesmerized by Australians – incidentally, they cause furor with their athletic prowess, now on display at the Olympics, where they may very well be the most successful nation, if we look at it in terms of medals versus population…no, I have to edit that, in terms of Bermuda and m...

  Schindler’s Ark by Thomas Keneally Horrifying subject in a great novel that in the midst of all that terror brings in  luminary, the epitome of the hero, on a par with Ulysses, Superman and all the rest…The Ultimate Übermensch…more on this and other novels at -            https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLEVa4_CsRStSBBDo4uJWT8BSWtTTn0N1E                         Even if the novel is wondrous, the subject is terrifying and I had to read it in two stages, having abandoned half way through. The plot and the end is well known so there is no need for a spoiler alert, preventing anyone that characters die at the end. -            Many Millions die This is so depressing that I avoided the book, knowing in advance who the characters are and everything else does not a...

  La Rempailleuse by Guy de Maupassant On Love   The moral of this short story seems to be that Love is the most noble of all feelings and even if you are a Rempailleuse, it will transform you like it did to Cinderella, from a mere commoner to a lady of emotions. In the view of the expert Barbara Fredrickson, Positivity is obtained from gratitude, joy, awe, interest, amusement, inspiration, pride, hope, serenity and most of all love! In other words, science has come to confirm what writers like Maupassant had underlined- love is the key to happiness and ultimately heaven. The gloomier perspective is that you only find it in…books. I was astonished to read a short story by Thomas Mann, some thirty years ago in which this view was expressed by a character: -            Real people are incapable of love, for that is ever lasting -            It is appalling to hear so often- words ...

  Love Story by Erich Segal 6 out of 10 now, though this reader gave it 10 out of 10 as an adolescent Love Story has enjoyed an immense success decades ago, though the credit goes  mostly to the film, which counterintuitively seems to have been first in concept and then the idea of a book inspired the novel listed among The Guardian’s 1,000 Novels Everyone Must Read -  https://www.theguardian.com/books/2009/jan/23/bestbooks-fiction  - in the Love section (where else) Even in our parts people were enthralled by it – I remember reading it and being so affected that it is perhaps hard to understand why going through it now it appears almost worthless, prompting indeed the question ‘what is wrong with me?’ for this reader has actually been rather annoyed instead of being shaken, mortified by what is announced from the opening lines – ‘what can you say about a twenty five year old who died…that she was beautiful and brilliant…she loved Mozart and The Beatles…’ From t...

  A Country Love Story by Jean Stafford 10 out of 10 Notes and thoughts on other books are available at: -               https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLEVa4_CsRStSBBDo4uJWT8BSWtTTn0N1E  and    http://realini.blogspot.ro/ A Country Love Story is included in the series The Bostonians, and Other Manifestations of the American Scene. And they are included in the Pulitzer winning chef d’oeuvre: The Collected Stories of Jean Stafford. This narrative has reminded me of a short story by Thomas Mann. In it, the protagonist is upset, if not horrified by what he hears people say around him, on important themes. They keep saying: -            I love you and my feeling cannot be described in words…it is beyond wonderful… -            Our friendship…there is no way to talk about it…it will pass any t...

  Love Story by Erich Segal Good, I remember I cried- 8 out of 10   I have just realized that I have read this book. It was many years ago, maybe thirty, maybe thirty five. Robert Evans, former head of Paramount and responsible for the movie version that became a huge success talks about it. He is the author of an exciting book that I read now, called  The Kid Stays in the Picture  that has a passage on Love Story. There are two things that I need to mention here- -            First, amends are to be made for the really long  time that has passed, which means much of the plot is gone from the mind -            Second, the notes would refer more to the movie story since these are the details which Evans has refreshed with his book. After the alert connected to the time travel, it is all right to say that the plot of the movie is well known and déjà vu. As a ma...

  Slouching Towards Kalamazoo by Peter de Vries is worthy of the 1,000 Novels Everyone Must Read list and is indeed one of the best comedy books you can find  https://www.theguardian.com/books/2009/jan/23/bestbooks-fiction 10 out of 10     When we reach Singularity, Artificial Intelligence will have taken over many tasks, if not most, that humans perform – there are glimmers of hope for archeologists, because as one of the most prominent luminaries of the age, Yuval Harari, explains in his stupendous Homo Deus  http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/02/homo-deus-brief-history-of-tomorrow-by.html  this is a profession where investment in replacing earthlings would not bring savings, nobody is interested in the relics uncovered by these people to the point where they would automate the activities involved… hence we could say the paleontologists are safe too – and maybe we would be reading Perfect Flexible Personalized Novels that would exhilarate us (individually, ...

  The Tunnel of Love by Peter De Vries, author of Slouching Towards Kalamazoo  http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/03/slouching-towards-kalamazoo-by-peter-de.html 10 out of 10     The Tunnel of Love is mentioned in the phenomenal Memoirs of Magister Ludi Kingsley Amis, who says that this is about the funniest novel he has read – or words to that effect – and coming with such a recommendation, entering The Tunnel of Love becomes a necessity, notwithstanding the fact that Peter De Vries is the author of Slouching Towards Kalamazoo, which is included on the list of 1,000 Novels Everyone Must Read   The Tunnel of Love shares with Slouching the irony, satire, incredible humor and the serious look at important themes, looked upon by an erudite, sophisticated, playful luminary, who has had the father of the narrator and his rival for mother’s affection dispute over the existence of God in Slouching, with one convinced by the other, father losing his faith and then the com...