The Mysterious Flame of Queen Loana X -- chapter 9: FLIP-FLOPPING ITALY

1. This might be entirely out of context or beyond the scope of the book, but the disregard (contextually justified) of his sister's box of elementary- and middle-school things makes me think about the degree of selfishness this trip represents in Yambo.  He has had one afternoon with his daughters and grandchildren that, perhaps, pulled him at least slightly and temporarily away from himself.  Of course we have no indication that their visit did any more to help him than all his much less selfless hours, but yet I wonder: might he not be better off simply living his life as best he can, and if the memories come, great, and if not, then, oh well?  This taps into the issue, of course, that we've touched on already: would a character realistically want to rediscover (and likely thereby have to relive) his past, having to balance and negotiate the potential discovery of unsavory memories, acts, thoughts, etcetera.  None of Yambo's friends or family have acknowledged (beyond his infidelity, which, apparently, is no big secret anyway) that there's anything Yambo should be scared or hesitant to discover, but still, is there a potential advantage (I don't know of any advantage specifically, so I'm throwing the question "out there" for suggestions) to altruism rather than selfish seclusion?
2. What do you make of Yambo's dubiously effecting act of turning on the radio panel light and then playing a record? The last chapter indicated the necessity of the records rather than radio, but why does he bother with the entirely connotative radio light?
3. Gee Whiz 1: The B and V phonemes are very similar, and in some alphabets even interchangeable, and commonly misused by children learning to speak, among others.  I'm not going to get into the details, but if you don't believe it, try out each letter and consider what your mouth is doing to produce each sound.
4. Connect the lie of fog to the fascist propaganda; then disconnect it (or whatever you think best) by the "truth" of fog.
5. Gee Whiz 2:  Italian pronouns for address, and their levels of formality: tu (singular) = you, informal; lei (singular) = you, formal; voi (also 2nd person plural) = you (singular), more formal; loro (also 3rd person, plural) = you (singular or plural), super formal, as in for royalty or, more likely today, sarcastic formality.
6. "That song must be why, years later, I took note of this passage from Corazzini’s poem 'The Streetlamp': Murky and scant in the lonely thoroughfare, / in front of the bordello doors, it dims, / and the good smoke that from the censer swims / might be this fog that whitens out the air.  [¶]  "'Lili Marleen' came out not too long after the giddy 'Comrade Richard.' Either we were generally more optimistic than the Germans, or in the interim something had happened, our poor comrade had grown sad and, tired of walking through muck, longed to go back to his streetlamp. But I was coming to realize that the same series of propagandistic songs could explain how we had gone from a dream of victory to one of the welcoming bosom of a whore as hopeless as her clients."
7. What is the potential for the Italians' experience in WWII to be a parallel of some sort to Yambo's current predicament?
8. What is the value of one's past childish ambitions and dreams to an adult?
9. Unbreakable.
10. "I was still missing some link, perhaps many links. At some point I had changed, but I did not know why."
11. Finally, what do you make of the chapter title?

Wednesday's for Kids XIII -- FORGOTTEN SEUSS

I think it may actually be impossible to claim yourself a book-lover and yet not like, or at least appreciate (that ever snobby word for those stuffy and shallow enough to attempt to save face amidst the true bibliophiles) Dr. Seuss (his books, I mean; I don't know much about the actual man behind them).  In fact, I would be interested to know if you or someone you know may be one who actually does dislike him--err, his books, I mean (and "dislike" being the mildest, though I'm sure there's someone out there--likely a non-book lover, but perhaps not--who just flat out despises him).  But I have a problem.  My problem is indeed with his books and is two-fold: 1, there are so many of them (which, of course, is also a strength, but without which this next wouldn't happen); and 2, so many of the very best are forgotten because of what pop-culture and bookstores (the latter parcel to the first, of course) does to only a handful.

I have three favorite titles by Seuss.  None of them have I ever seen at a Barnes and Noble.  None have been made into a movie--or at least some massive wide-release travesty (thank Heaven! (though, done right, maybe they wouldn't be so bad)).  Nowhere have I found a student even who's ever heard of more than one.

I am not going to dwell on the stories, metaphors, and characters of each, but simply show their covers, list their titles, and little else.

What do I recommend?  Get the books.  Buy them.  Put them on your shelves, but not in the children's section, but right between, say, Salinger and Tennyson, where they belong.

NUMBER 1: Horton Hatches the Egg, surely forgotten in large part because of the book's big, though nonetheless great (just hackneyed by the evil Pop!), brother, Horton Hears a Who.

NUMBER 2: Scrambled Eggs Super, a long-time favorite of mine, and even before my Dad's renown for his ability to recite the entire thing word-for-word, as well as a now-favorite of my kids.

NUMBER 3: The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins, which is a rare example of a story without rhyme, as well as one of, if not, the longest stories Seuss wrote.

(I don't know what happened to the "500"...)

Each of these books is as rife with character, fun, and real-world application as any of his classics with more mega-media face-time; I argue, however, that these are, perhaps, lucky to be at least partially forgotten, as certainly characters like Horton and the Cat in the Hat have only suffered at the attention of Hollywood's heavy, oh-so-un-holy hand.

Gee Whiz: In searching pictures of the books, I stumbled upon this of the Hebrew translation for Scrambled Eggs Super; how spectacular that they thought to reverse the cover art!

Jane Eyre XIII -- chapter 13: FAIRIES and THE MEN IN GREEN (not black)

Reading Questions

1. Interesting the rhetoric that goes into the building of a hero.  What does Bronte do to paint Mr. Rochester as a desirable, admirable man?  (Consider the difference between the author's unique slants in usage, and those that might be written off as Jane's own impressions and prejudices.)
2. "I should be obliged to take time, sir, before I could give you an answer worthy of your acceptance: a present has many faces to it, has it not? and one should consider all before pronouncing an opinion as to its nature."  What faces?
3. Why is Mr. Rochester such a grump--or, at least, "humph"-ing?
4. The dashes, by the way, in lieu of place and person names, and typical of literature from the period, are only to indicate nonfiction; most names and places, with periodic exceptions, are fictional.
5. "Eight years! you must be tenacious of life. I thought half the time in such a place would have done up any constitution! No wonder you have rather the look of another world. I marveled where you had got that sort of face. When you came on me in Hay Lane last night, I thought unaccountably of fairy tales, and had half a mind to demand whether you had bewitched my horse: I am not sure yet. Who are your parents?"  Of what kind of face does Mr. Rochester speak?  Fill in the blanks: describe, perhaps more visually, what he sees there.
6. How does this previous quotation and assumption (particularly augmented by the spoken sarcasm, though with at least a hint of sincerity, "Nor ever had," referring to Jane's lack of parents?) indicate our continued look at the fantastic and/or haunted?  (Or should I just shut up about the whole horror aspect of the book?)
7. Supposedly (and according to various sites where I've look for variance of interpretation for "men in green" (leprechauns or hobgoblins, by the way)) the exchange at the fire over tea is supposed to be "playful" and "light;" does it feel like that to you?  I see Mr. Rochester as mostly annoyed--or embarrassed--by his fall on the ice, and that mood, in my mind, plays throughout the dialog here.  Most optimistically I see him early on his guard with Jane and later relaxing as the discussion evolves.  Thoughts?  If playfulness is involved, at what point does it gain traction?
8. There must be some significance to the paintings, else why make such a big deal over them?  I get a clear impression of the source and meaning of the first, the next two are more nebulous.
9. Mrs. Fairfax believes--or so she says--that Mr. Rochester is not a complicated man.  Jane see more than that.  What might justify the difference?

Gee Whiz:

I've found the word "deuce" used over and over again in British lit, mostly from this time period, as well as in movies whose subjects take place then and there as well.  Mr. Rochester uses it as the object of the mild oath: "What the deuce," which is supposedly in reference to one of the many nicknames for the devil.  However, "deuce" is also a degenerate form of the French for two (deux), and shows up all over military slang to refer to something that would otherwise reference 2.  Better yet, just like the grade-school euphamism, it is also slang for the latter of two primary activities in which one engages in the bathroom ("bathroom" itself being also euphamistic) --yes, deuce can also mean "#2."