Churchill's political philosophy .. in fiction

In addition to being a decent painter and statesman, Mr. Churchill (at the age of 25) wrote one work of fiction, Savrola. The state of Laurania faces a revolt after a bungled show of force by the authoritarian president. Savrola is the leader of the opposition and in love with the president's wife, Lucille.

The story is messy but not without its merits. There is passage where Savrola explains his views of development of societies to Lucille. The theme is interestingly modern and has been recently discussed by for example Rosling and Harari: Since human political actions often appear random and selfish, why does it look like human societies have generally gotten better? Churchill's idea goes like this: as societies grow from tribes to nations, alliances were favoured. Societies that had alliances based on honesty and justice were most likely to survive, since they promoted collaboration.

Living Through Literature

Earthly Powers has a famous opening. It has many other notable aspects, too. The narrator (unreliable of course) has his first sexual experience during Bloomsday (16th June 1904), begins his career as a writer during the First World War, hangs out with expats in Paris in the 1920's, saves Himmler's life, hangs out in Hollywood, sees his grand-niece getting involved with a religious doomsday cult in the 1960's etc. The book is almost like a fictional counterpart to an intellectual history of the 20th century (but there is no psychoanalysis).

But about the opening: it was mentioned in Terry Eagleton's How to Read Literature, alongside with several others. Oddly, the opening of One Hundred Years of Solitude was not mentioned.

Rowing through literature

The story in Juha Hurme's book Nyljetyt ajatukset (Skinned Ideas) is simple: two guys row a boat up the Gulf of Bothnia shore line, and talk about art. The topics cover well-known and obscure authors, playwrights, musicians and journalists. I'd be surprised if there are readers who have heard of everyone discussed there. For instance Kaarlo Uskela, an anarchist revolutionary poet from Tampere; wrote well, died young. Another surprising person was Tapio Rautavaara who apparently succeeded in many things he tried. He won the gold metal in javelin in London olympics 1948, later the world championship in archery, was a film star, singer, composer and guitar player.

Here are some extracts from Hurme's book. Here the rowers have adopted the identities of Bertolt Brecht (B) and his disciple Erwin Strittmatter (S) and talk about epic theatre.

S: In Aristotelian plays (dramatic theatre) the story or fate takes the hero to situations where his inner self is revealed. This is not the case in epic theatre.
B: Indeed it isn't. In epic theatre we scrutinize that "fate" and reveal that it is human action. Modern men do not know the powers that dictate their lives, be these powers internal or external to them. In this scrutiny our tool is called "gestus".

..
S: A spectator in a dramatic theatre would say:
B: "Yes, that's how I feel. too", "that's who I am", "that's natural", "that's how it is and always will be", "the fate of that person is moving because he cannot avoid it", "it's great art, it's self-evident", "I cried with those who cried; I laughed with those who laughed".
S: Whereas a spectator in an epic theatre would say:
B: "I never though of that", "One should not do that", "That's exceptional, can it be true?", "The fate of that person is moving because he would have the means to avoid it", "it's great art, nothing is self-evident", "I cried at those who laughed; I laughed at those who cried".

The suburbian battlefield

Some time ago I confessed finding "Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned" a memorable book.
So is Christos Tsiolkas' The Slap, though it runs a bit out of steam after page 400. Anyway, I do not remember that many other books where suburban life (and its conflicts) has been depicted so well.. expect maybe White Teeth.
White Teeth has, too, a good description of the school yard as enemy territory. Scarlett Thomas' PopCo is more blunt when Thomas writes about peer pressures at school.
Despite revealing a lot of tension and unhappiness, The Slap ends with a positive note .. that includes drugs and casual sex, of course.

Notes before holidays

I came across Hogg's exceptional book The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner through a recommendation from a friend. The Testament of Gideon Mack that I mentioned in an earlier post, is a kind of homage to Private Memoirs, though the devil character in these two books is rather different. Someone might want to write a Ph.D. thesis about this.. and other devil characters, like the memorable one in Karamazov Brothers.

In Scarlett Thomas' latest book, Our Tragic Universe: Checkhov found Tolstoy's idealism about peasants unfounded. Need to check out Checkhov's short story Peasants.

Donna Leon's skilled computer users

I read Donna Leon's 2004 Doctored Evidence due to a recommendation from my mother. Leon is a good writer, the character descriptions are not shallow and the story proceeds well.

Interestingly, 2004 was seemingly still a time when not absolutely everyone used a computer every day. Doctored Evidence features signora Elettra who is a .. genius hacker working for the Venetian police force. Her male colleagues, on the other hand will get caught if they try to imitate her.

Likewise, a lawyer is able to make account transfers using a computer, but a baker would be too slow and dim to do so. Hmh, nowadays I would think that anyone can make an account transfer but it would take at least some intelligence to bake a loaf.

Doubles

Orhan Pamuk: The White Castle, first published 1985.

Jose Saramago: The Double, first published 2003.

Both discuss a situation where two persons look identical, and are wrongly believed to be the other person.

And both the authors won the Nobel price. Coincidences..