Rough Reading - How The Mighty Have Fallen

Jack Higgins has always been one of my favorite authors. The Eagle Has Landed. Storm Warning. Classics.

But what the hell happened with Rough Justice. Ridiculous plot. Even more ridiculous dialogue. Stilted much?

I read the entire 417 pages while traveling on a long overseas flight. If it wasn't for my obsession with always seeing things like reading and movies through to the end, I would have given up after the first 50 pages. So I knocked it out.

Aarrgggh. It sucked.

The Not Enough Time Reading List - "Aaronsohn's Maps"

"Aaronsohn's Maps: The Untold Story of the Man Who Might Have Created Peace in the Middle East" by Patricia Goldstone.

This might take a while. And a few entries.

OK - I'll cut to the chase. Aaron Aaronsohn died in a plane crash from Britain en route to the to the post-WWI Paris talks in 1919. Goldstone does a lot more than hint - in fact, she pretty much slaps you in the face - with the outrageous theory that Zionist leader Chaim Weizmann and the British Government conspired to assassinate Aaronsohn by having a airborne British military assassination team kill Aaronsohn and his British military pilot (a known hero for having recently beat the London-Paris speed record with T.E Lawrence in tow). By somehow shooting the pilot mid-flight, from another 1918-era biplane, without a machine gun (which might have attracted attention, since the whole drama played out directly over a an English coastal sea town).

Goldstone's theory apparently, is that Chaim Weizmann convinced the British government to assassinate Aaronsohn (her proof - Felix Frankfurter's comment years later that there was "blood" on Aaronsohn's death somehow). So they arranged to have Aaronsohn go up in a plane. With a well known British military hero as his pilot. And convinced other British military pilots to kill him. By shooting him not with a machine gun. No, but by somehow shooting him with a pistol or rifle shot from a second 1918s-era biplane flying at 75 MPH over the coast of England. Puuuhhhllease! Why not just kill Aaronsohn in a car crash? Or even yet, don't let him fly to Paris by saying the weather is bad or there are no pilots available. And don't even get me started on Goldstone's "cover-up" of the pilot's death. I could go on and on. And on. And on. And on.

Before I go for today. Early on, a great resource for the early history of Zionism and the nascent Israeli state. Fairly good factually, though many Jews and Israelis have pointed out that Goldstone is pretty flippant with her history and understanding of historical Judaism.

Oh, by the way. Everything in the Middle East between Israel and the Arabs could have been cured by Aaronsohn's ideas on shared water rights and river usage. That Arabs hate Jews, and Jews in the Middle East haven't historically make politics any easier for themselves - not a factor. Yeah.

OK. To be continued later. I'm all verklumppt. Talk amongst yourselves.

Reading List - "Feeding A Yen"

I'll keep this short. Sister Katie sent me Calvin Trillin's "Feeding a Yen" I was pumped. I was even more pumped reading about about Trillin's youth in Kansas City, trekking down to the New York City and Deli at it's original downtown KC location.

Time passes. The Kansas City New York City and Deli changed location, and moved over near Hwy 71 at the Watkins/63rd Street exit near the hospital. Tragically across from the cemetery.After a long battle with old equipment, dramatically changing demographics, and KC health inspectors, the last, and oldest, authentic Jewish deli in Kansas City closed in 2009.

The nearest decent corned beef on rye? Des Moines. Really.

The Not Enough Time Book List - Playing The Enemy

I ordered this book from Amazon the day after I saw the movie Invictus with Matthew. Rare enough that nowadays I'll pay full price for a book off Amazon (I couldn't find it on Ebay). But glad I did. Great book. Really, really great book.

By John Carlin, this is one of the best - and most readable - histories of South Africa and the end of apartheid. And a great intro to the novice (like me) into the world and personality of Nelson Mandela. And the story of the Springboks and the rugby World Cup - it's so inspiring, so moving, and well, if it didn't really happen, you'd swear it was a Hollywood movie script. That's probably why Invictus was such a great movie. Heck, who needed to write a script. History wrote it, better than any fiction writer could have.

Reading List - "Diamond, Gold and War"

I picked up this incredible book, Diamonds, Gold and War: The British, the Boers, and the Making of South Africa, by Martin Meredith for $2.00 at a Big Lots in Kansas City. Amazing to find it there. Long story short - an incredibly detailed, yet incredibly readable, history of South Africa from the time of the arrival of Cecil Rhodes through the establishment of the Union of South Africa following the Second Boer War.

Meredith could have easily subtitled the book "How Could These Guys Sleep at Night?". The main character throughout this history is Cecil Rhodes, and what's a recurring theme throughout, and stunning to the modern reader, is not just how cravenly dishonest, feckless, and brazen he and other British politicians and businessmen were in the conduct of their business and politics. Perhaps the only character less honorable than Rhodes was Sir Alfred Milner, the British High Commissioner and Governor of the Cape Colony, who almost singlehandedly started the Second Boer War, which killed tens of thousands (over 22,000 British troops) and resulted in a scorched earth policy by the British toward the Boers that drove thousands of women and children to suffer and die in miserable concentration camps, and paved the way for the unique cruelty of the apartheid regime in South Africa.

I could go on and on. Great book. Excellent history. Great read. Jolly good stuff.

Book List Entry - The Americans

At yet another estate sale lately, I was rummaging through a shelf loaded with cookbooks (bad ones, unfortunately) when I spied a copy of The Americans: 50 Talks on Our Life and Times by Alistair Cooke. Quite an interesting read. Published in 1979, this was one of Cooke’s many books detailing his career spent observing life in the United States. What is interesting is that his observations were intended for a British audience (the 50 essays are transcripts of his weekly BBC radio show Letter from America). Running from 1969 through 1979, Cooke gives an interesting multi-part running commentary on the Watergate scandal, which, interestingly, he initially poo-poo’d as a tempest in a teapot ginned up by the Democrats (oh, how hindsight works!). Clearly a man of an earlier era, he takes a dim view of the youth culture of the 1960s, the decline of traditional institutions such as marriage, and the U.S. opening of relations with China (which he clearly saw as a Chinese con-job).

After reading this book, I concluded that Cooke was the Craig Ferguson of an earlier generation. He became a U.S. citizen in 1941, but unlike many naturalized citizens, never felt the need to bash neither his native Britain nor his adopted country, the US. Interestingly, he uses the term “us” in referring to people in the US, denoting that he is firmly one of them, when addressing his British audience. He was a keen observer able to see past the chaff on most issues. One thing I found surprising about the book was his willingness, in picking 50 talks out of over 500 in a ten-year period, he chose some that showed that he himself did occasionally get it wrong. Initially, he clearly liked Richard Nixon, and it wasn’t until after five years and the Watergate scandal that he clearly considered him pretty much an immoral scumbag. Among his many interesting observations on life in America, I enjoyed this one in particular:

“…American football is an open-air chess match disguised as warfare.”

Reading this book, I kept drawing mental comparisons to Craig Ferguson and his observations on life in the US and on becoming a citizen. On the whole, I think Cooke would have approved of Ferguson’s comment “If you don’t vote, you’re a moron.” In reverse, I think Ferguson would thoroughly enjoy this book. Perhaps I’ll send it to him.

Oh, final note. At the estate sale. Old book, obviously in good condition and unread. Open cover. Look at flyleaf. There it is. “Alistair Cooke”. Signed by the author. Cool.

Added bonus - Craig Ferguson's rip on Americans who don't vote. Classic. View at:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pdRVQ4xwwmQ

A Good Read - The Mystery and Meaning of the Dead Sea Scrolls

Not your usual estate sale. An entire Episcopal church closing in Kansas City. Church, parsonage, school, rectory, everything. It was kinda sad.

But there is always a bright side. Among the many many books at the sale, I ran across a copy of The Mystery and Meaning of the Dead Sea Scrolls by Hershel Shanks, which is one of the best histories and layman's explanation of the Dead Sea Scrolls (it is certainly the most readable). In a whole bunch of different ways, a completely fascinating book. First, the history of the discovery of the scrolls, and how they were obtained against the backdrop of the birth of the State of Israel. Shanks is remarkably even in his hind-sight look at history, even when discussing in incidents and individuals he clearly found objectionable. For example, while he clearly took issue with the composition of the original scroll team (primarily Catholic priests, and no Jews), he does clarify that the team was technically employed by the Jordanian Government, which would never have countenanced Jewish involvement.

Alternately, Shanks tends to defer a bitt too much to the professional reputations of the original scroll scholars, even though he was a lifelong critic of their slowness and secretiveness regarding their findings. What does come through, however, between the lines was that many of the scholars and their financial sponsors acted very badly, at times almost childishly, regarding their research and their place in history.

In one part of the book I found a bit head scratching, Shanks at length describes his puzzlement at a prohibition in the scrolls against spitting. Frankly, I didn't think it strange at all. Most of the Jewish dietary and ritualistic prohibitions, such as not eating pork, have their ancient origin in health and disease prevention roots. A prohibition against spitting, which spreads diseases like tuberculosis, is entirely logical (as it is in China today). Just because this particular restriction died out in the Jewish traditions over time, I couldn't see why Shanks found it so unusual, or improbable.

Finally, Shanks does an excellent job in tying together biblical history with that of the the scrolls and making is accessible for the layman. Shanks is clearly more comfortable, and much more scholarly in his knowledge of the relevance of the Old Testament to the scrolls. Frankly, I found his references between the scrolls and books of the New Testament to be somewhat unsupportable, if not a little far fetched.

For anyone wanting a basic introduction and history to the Dead sea Scrolls, this is the first book to read.

Another Late Reading List Item - Absolute Friends

Yet another book I actually finished a couple of weeks ago, but hadn't gotten around to posting to the list. I picked this book up for free in the "share box" at the Jefferson City office. I figured, how can you go wrong with John LeCarre? Well, you can't apparently. An excellent read, on par with any of LeCarre's earlier books, with the same elaborate plot development, counterintuitive twists, and great characters. Absolute Friends takes the LeCarre spy genre, and updates it to factor in the post 9/11 paranoia of the GWOT era.

Book List #3 - Nothing But Blue Skies

OK, I actually finished reading Thomas McGuane's Nothing But Blue Skies before the Penn Central book a couple of months ago. The initial interest was a novel about a guy living in the far west mountain country of Montana, a part of the country I really like. In that regard, Thomas McGuane did a great job in capturing the quirks, pace, and humor of life in a small rural mountain town in the far West. Similarly, I thoroughly enjoyed his main character Frank, a man left totally rudderless by his divorce, but comfortable and wealthy enough not to be desperate - and thus having a whole lot of time and aimlessness on his hands to make a whole series of slow-motion train wreck decisions. I that regard, the imagery was perfect - you could see the deliberate absence of reasoned thinking, as well as the oncoming cliff. What put it all together was Frank's basic 'niceness', and your hoping for him to find his way despite his basic knuckleheadedness. I came, I read, I enjoyed. A good read.

Book List Entry - "In Search of the World's Worst Writers"

I now can't recall where exactly I picked up a copy of Nick Page's In Search of the World's Worst Writers (London: Harper Collins,2000). But, oh, am I glad I did. Subtitled "A Celebration of Truimphantly Bad Literature", the book is a collection of short essays describing authors considered by Page to be among the worst ever to been published, culminating with the inimitable Amanda McKittrick Ros (pictured), considered by many as the worst published author ever (or, at the least, the worst abuser of alliteration). How good was this book? Tom's tip - don't read it in public. I laughed out loud reading parts of it, which is kinda frowned upon on Amtrak. Apparently, they have a low threshhold for loony behavior (unlike Greyhound, which is still a rolling freak show).

I would like to add a few quotes from Page's book here, but I don't know how he feels about such things. I've emailed him for permission.

One key element of a great book (like In Search of the World's Worst Writers) is when it inspires you to find out more. After laughing out loud reading Page's essay on Amanda McKittrick Ros, I found out a couple of pretty hilarious factoids:

First, she was considered so bad a writer that "she became the fad of the moment for the London literary crew, who threw Amanda McKittrick Ros parties at which they would take it in turns to recite favourite passages", and

Second, "The Oxford literary group the Inklings, which included such luminaries as C. S. Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien, held competitions to see who could read Ros' work for the longest length of time while keeping a straight face". Whoever laughed first, lost.

My one quibble with Page's list: he only gave Timothy Dexter two stars (on a one-to-five scale) for literary awfulness. I would have given him a couple more, for one very simple reason. "Lord" Timothy Dexter was so bad, he made other writers suck. I've read all of John P. Marquand's books, and Lord Timothy Dexter, which, ironically, was Marquand's first "biggie" that put him on the road to fame, is the only one that I found, in my humble opinion, practically unreadable. So Little Time it's not. Perhaps it just didn't age well.

As for Amanda, rare copies of her works are still around. Alibris.com is currently selling A.A. Milne's first addition of Delina Delaney for $651, and Abebooks has a first edition of Irene Iddlesleigh with a signed letter from McKittick Ros (ZOINKS!) for $251. Ah, for a bit of spare cash to splurge.

As for my copy of In Search of the World's Worst Writers, it's too good to keep to myself. I'll probably send mine on to Katie. For anyone else, it's worth finding, buying, and reading. Your darting orbs will become lachrymal lakes of laughter.