Worst Hard Time by Timothy Egan

Jun3


The Worst Hard Time: The Untold Story of Those Who Survived the Great American Dust Bowl by Timothy Egan

“We dream of the faint gurgling sound of dry soil sucking in the grateful moisture, but we wake to another day of wind and dust and hopes deferred.” —Caroline Henderson, 1934.

“We are getting deeper and deeper in dust.” The Boise City News, 1934.

“Our country has been beaten, swept, scarred, and torn by the most adverse weather conditions since June, 1932. It is bare, desolate and damaged. Our people have been buffeted about by every possible kind of misfortune. It has appeared that the hate of all nature has been poured out against us.” —John McCarty, editor of the Dalhart, Texas newspaper, The Texan, 1935.

“Three little words, achingly familiar on a Western farmer’s tongue, rule life in the dust bowl of the continent —‘if it rains.'” —Bob Geiger, AP reporter.

“If God can’t make rain in Kansas, how can the New Deal hope to succeed?” —A U.S. congressman on ambitious government plans to renew the soil and bring rain to the Dust Bowl.

An amazing true story. My grandparents and my husband’s parents lived in West Texas during these times and must have experienced some of the drought, dust storms, and hard times chronicled in Egan’s book. But I never heard them talk about anything like the stories in the book: dust so thick that people got lost and ran their cars off the road, respiratory diseases caused by the dust, dusters, clouds of dust so tall they blotted out the sun. I remember dust storms when I was growing up in San Angelo in West Texas, but nothing like the cataclysmic storms of the 1930’s.

McCain Reads Jewish Writers

Jun3

From this interview in The Atlantic with Jeffrey Goldberg:

JG: A final question: Senator Obama talked about how his life was influenced by Jewish writers, Philip Roth, Leon Uris. How about you?

JM: There’s Elie Wiesel, and Victor Frankl. I think about Frankl all the time. “Man’s Search for Meaning” is one of the most profound things I’ve ever read in my life. And maybe on a little lighter note, “War and Remembrance” and “Winds of War” are my two absolute favorite books. I can tell you that one of my life’s ambitions is to meet Herman Wouk. “War and Remembrance” for me, it’s the whole thing.
Then there’s Joe Lieberman, who lives a life of his religion, and who does it in the most humble way.
JG: Not a big Philip Roth fan?
JM: No, I’m not. Leon Uris I enjoyed. Victor Frankl, that’s important. I read it before my captivity. It made me feel a lot less sorry for myself, my friend. A fundamental difference between my experience and the Holocaust was that the Vietnamese didn’t want us to die. They viewed us as a very valuable asset at the bargaining table. It was the opposite in the Holocaust, because they wanted to exterminate you. Sometimes when I felt sorry for myself, which was very frequently, I thought, “This is nothing compared to what Victor Frankl experienced.”

I didn’t know that Hermann Wouk was Jewish.

Celebrate the Day: June 3

Jun3

Birthday of Confederate President Jefferson Davis (which may not inspire celebration, but may prompt a teachable moment.)

Also born on this date:

Author/illustrator Anita Lobel. Author of the picture books Sven’s Bridge, Potatoes, Potatoes and The Rose in My Garden, among many others.

William Douglas Home (pronounced Hume). He was a playwright. The Literary Encyclopedia says of him:

However, the Second World War was to change the course of his so far peaceful existence. As a British officer in 1944, he had to take part in the landing in France. But he refused on moral grounds to bomb Le Havre because the civilians had not been evacuated —and indeed 5000 of them were to be killed in the operation. For his refusal to perform what he considered to be a war crime, Home was stripped of his rank, degraded and condemned to a year’s hard labor.

It sounds like a story that would make a good play, novel, or other literary exploration.

Preacher and writer Sydney Smith (b.1771).
“In composing, as a general rule, run your pen through every other word you have written; you have no idea what vigor it will give your style.”
“The object of preaching is, constantly to remind mankind of what mankind are constantly forgetting; not to supply the defects of human intelligence, but to fortify the feebleness of human resolutions.”
“In the four quarters of the globe, who reads an American book? Or goes to an American play? or looks at an American picture or statue? What does the world yet owe to American physicians or surgeons? What new substances have their chemists discovered? Or what old ones have they advanced? What new constellations have been discovered by the telescopes of Americans? Who drinks out of American glasses? Or eats from American plates? Or wears American coats or gowns? or sleeps in American blankets? Finally, under which of the old tyrannical governments of Europe is every sixth man a slave, whom his fellow-creatures may buy and sell and torture?” (1820)

Not too impressed with what we Americans had accomplished in our first fifty or so years as a country, was he?

More June Celebrations, Links, and Birthdays.

Books Read in May 2008

Jun2

Word Freak by Stefan Fatsis.

The Bookshop by Penelope Fitzgerald.

Sunshine by Robin McKinley.

The Worst Hard Time by Timothy Egan.

The Secret of the Rose by Sarah L. Thomson.

Mother Tongue: English and How It Got That Way by Bill Bryson.

The White Darkness by Geraldine McCaughrean.

Do Hard Things: A Teenage Rebellion Against Low Expectations by Alex and Brett Harris.

America Alone: The End of the World As We Know It by Mark Steyn.

Stolen Lives: Twenty Years in a Desert Jail by Malika Oufkir and Michele Fitoussi. Semicolon review here.

When Men Become Gods: Mormon Polygamist Warren Jeffs, His Cult of Fear, and The Women Who Fought Back by Stephen Singular. Semicolon review here.

The Giver by Lois Lowry.

The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro.

Celebrate the Day: June 2, 2008

Jun2

Author birthdays:

Thomas Hardy (b.1840)
Gautami Tripathy reviews Tess of the d’Ubervilles.
Dani Torres reviews Tess.
And here’s Bonnie’s (Dwell in Possibility)take on the same book.
My favorite Thomas Hardy novel is Far From the Madding Crowd; he and George Eliot remind of me one another. In fact, if I don’t think carefully I get their novels confused: both feature nineteenth century English country towns and farms, bad things happening to good and bad people, fallen women, and love entanglements.

Barbara Pym (b.1913).
Mary at Glass of Blessings reviews Quartet in Autumn by Barbara Pym.
Semicolon review of Pym’s Excellent Women.

Paul Galdone (b.1914).
I included several folk tale/fairy tale books written and illustrated by Paul Galdone in my preschool curriculum, Picture Book Preschool, because I like his bold colorful illustrations. In my experience, preschoolers find Mr. Galdone’s work both accessible and inviting.

Norton Juster (b.1929). I love Juster’s book The Phantom Tollbooth. I wish I had time to go back and re-read it today.

More June Celebrations, Links, and Birthdays.

Word Freak by Stefan Fatsis

Jun1

Stefan Fatsis set out to write a book about Scrabble, particularly competitive Scrabble, and he ended up becoming a part of the competitive, obsessive, game-playing culture that he intended to chronicle as an outsider, a journalist. Fatsis got sucked into a fascinating game, and he says he loved it, still loves it as far as I know.

I’m always interested in worlds, hobbies, and passionate interests that consume other whole groups of people and that I never even knew existed. I knew that some people played competitive Scrabble, but I didn’t know that serious players travel all over the U.S. and even the world to play in tournaments in which the prize money for the winner is usually barely enough to pay travel expenses. And they memorize word lists: all of the permissible two-letter words, then the threes, the words that have a “q” without a “u” following, the combinations that yield a “bingo” (a seven letter word using all the letters in your rack which gets you an extra 50 points in Scrabble). It’s amazing to me that anyone can become so consumed with playing Scrabble that they build their entire life around the game. They play incessantly: on the internet, pick up games in the park, at Scrabble clubs where players pay a cover fee to get in, at home, at tournaments. It’s almost a religion. In fact, one of the players profiled in the book says that Scrabble is the only thing that gives his life meaning.

The book includes a fairly full history of Scrabble, its invention and its growing popularity. But the most fascinating part of the book is the stories about the people who play the game and who compete for the glory, not much money, that is to be gained by winning the National or World Scrabble Championship.

I must admit that I’ve been playing Scrabble online at scrabulous.com. It’s fun, but I’m terrible. My rating is below 1000, way lower than Mr. Fatsis started out as a novice. And the urchins have been playing a weekly Sunday night Scrabble game. Computer Guru Son and I are tied at two games apiece in the series.

“This is my favorite anagram of all,” Eric says, and he makes me write this down in my notebook: 11+2=12+1.

Then he instructs me to spell it out: ELEVEN + TWO = TWELVE + ONE

“God put that there,” Eric ays. “There is no other explanation.”

I like that story. Maybe I’m a bit of a word freak myself.

Celebrate the Day: May 31

May30

Anniversary of the Johnstown Flood.

Birthday of poet Walt Whitman:

THERE was a child went forth every day;
And the first object he look’d upon, that object he became;
And that object became part of him for the day, or a certain part of the day, or for many years, or stretching cycles of years.

The early lilacs became part of this child,
And grass, and white and red morning-glories, and white and red clover, and the song of the phoebe-bird,
And the Third-month lambs, and the sow’s pink-faint litter, and the mare’s foal, and the cow’s calf,
And the noisy brood of the barn-yard, or by the mire of the pond-side,
And the fish suspending themselves so curiously below there and the beautiful curious liquid,
And the water-plants with their graceful flat heads–all became part of him.

The field-sprouts of Fourth-month and Fifth-month became part of him;
Winter-grain sprouts, and those of the light-yellow corn, and the esculent roots of the garden,
And the apple-trees cover’d with blossoms, and the fruit afterward, and wood-berries, and the commonest weeds by the road;
And the old drunkard staggering home from the out-house of the tavern, whence he had lately risen,
And the school-mistress that pass’d on her way to the school,
And the friendly boys that pass’d and the quarrelsome boys,
And the tidy and fresh-cheek’d girls–and the barefoot negro boy and girl,
And all the changes of city and country, wherever he went.

His own parents,
He that had father’d him, and she that had conceiv’d him in her womb, and birth’d him,
They gave this child more of themselves than that;
They gave him afterward every day–they became part of him.

Read the rest of the poem.

Celebrate The Day: May 30th

May30

The Semifinals of the Scripps National Spelling Bee air live on ESPN from 11:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. ET. The Championship Finals air live on ABC May 30 between 8:00 and 10:00 p.m. ET.

Today is the Feast Day of St. Joan of Arc.

It’s also the birthdate of authors Cornelia Otis Skinner (b.1901) and Julian Symonds (b.1912.).

LOST: Live Updates

May29

SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS

I wrote a birthday post about Jeremy Bentham and his utilitarianism here. Little did I know that he would show up in a coffin on LOST.

It’s nice to see Walt again. My, that boy’s grown.

So Jeremy Bentham is really . . . who? And Hurley’s playing chess with Eko. Cool!

Sun’s going to work with Widmore? Not cool.

“Whoever moves the island can never come back.”

I think Ben is Jeremy Bentham.

And Sawyer and Juliette are going to console one another?

Sayid wants to take Hurley someplace “safe.” I’m not buying if I’m Hurley. Even though I still like Sayid.

So what’s going to happen to Frank Lapidus and to Desmond and Penny. I’m theorizing that Penny and Desmond are in hiding. Where’s Frank?

“All of you have to go back.”

So Ben isn’t in the coffin. Then who? Oh . . .

Added on Friday after a bad night’s sleep and further reflection:

Everybody’s wondering about Claire. If Charlie had to die so that Claire could get on the helicopter, why wasn’t Claire on the helicopter? And why is she so adamant that Kate NOT take Aaron back to the island?

I looked up a little more about Jeremy Bentham:

Bentham dismissed all notions of “natural rights” or “social contracts” as enshrined in Blackstone’s Commentaries and political documents such as the 1776 American Declaration of Independence and the 1789 French Declaration of the Rights of Man. He also dismissed all “ipsedixitisms”, i.e. moral judgments based on criteria such as “sympathy” or “intentions”. For Bentham, only consequences mattered. Actions are to be judged strictly on the basis of how their outcomes affect general utility.

And philosopher John Locke:

Locke exercised a profound influence on philosophy and politics, in particular on liberalism. Most modern libertarians claim him as an influence. He was a strong influence on Voltaire, while his arguments concerning liberty and the social contract later influenced the written works of Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, Thomas Jefferson, and other Founding Fathers of the United States. In addition, Locke’s views influenced the American and French Revolutions.

So is Locke/Bentham dealing with some kind of split personality? Was he a freedom-loving, natural law believing, liberal when he got to the island? And now has he become, or disguised himself as, a utilitarian whose only concern is the “greatest good for the greatest number”? These two namesake philosophers were diametrically opposed to one another in their ideas, as far as I can tell. What that says about John Jeremy, I’m not sure. But I hope he stays dead. Have you noticed that everyone was sad when Charlie the selfish drug addict child endangerer died last season? And I read of people crying their eyes out when Jin the Korean mafia hit man died on the boat. But the death of Locke, who in pre-island life was a fairly good guy, mostly a victim, provokes no grief in anyone on the show or in the audience. Why not? I think it’s because he was always a self-righteous pain who, even when he made mistakes, thought his failures were better than everyone else’s best decisions, especially Jack’s.

Which reminds me. Locke tells Jack he will have to lie when he leaves the island. Jack comes to believe that he and the others of the Oceanic Six must lie to protect the people left on the island. But what was that dig about Jack lying to himself so well? About what? About miracles? O.K., so Jack’s not willing to admit that the island works miracles, but he surely knows about the healing that has taken place. So, how is lying to himself about the existence of miracles supposed to help Jack lie to the world about where they’ve been?

Where is Sayid taking Hurley? To Ben? Is Ben still working his plan, the Man Behind the Curtain, in all of this?

There’s no place like home. Where is home for the LOST survivors? For the Oceanic Six? Except for Kate who’s found one and Aaron who’s with her, all four of the others seem to have lost their homes. Sayid’s a wandering assassin. Jack’s living in a trashed apartment, strung out on drugs, and trying to crash again. Sun’s looking for revenge or justice or something instead of mothering her child. Do they all need to go “home” to the island? And Richard’s words to Locke when he came to the Others Group were, “Welcome home.” Is Locke’s home on the island, leading the Others? If so, then, why does he leave to become Jeremy Bentham?

What’s up with Charlotte S. Lewis? And my new favorite, Mr. Daniel Faraday? And Miles? Could Charlotte have been born on the island? Is Miles a creep, or just sort of creepy because he hears dead people? Of course, half the people have seen or heard from dead people, so Miles is in good company. Did the little boat get taken away with the island? I sure hope so. Faraday and Charlotte are obviously a couple, or at least could be.

I don’t think it’s a good idea to make us wait for more developments until next January. People have short attention spans.

Celebrate the Day: May 29th

May29

This is the day the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.

Today is the birthday of G.K. Chesterton (b.1874), U.S. president John F. Kennedy (b.1917), Virginia patriot Patrick Henry (b.1736), and authors Andrew Clements (b.1949), Brock Cole (b. 1938), T.H. White (b.1906), Max Brand (b.1892).

Andrew Clements is a prolific author of middle grade fiction and a former school teacher. You can read fifth grader Karate Kid’s review of No Talking by Andrew Clements here. Karate Kid and Betsy-Bee are both reading Frindle by the same author this summer.
Andrew Clements’s website.

Brock Cole is a writer of young adult novels and an illustrator and author of children’s fiction and picture books. Several of the picture books are derived from classic folk tales, such as The King at the Door (out of print, unfortunately), in which a ragged old beggar at the village inn says that he is really the king, but no one believes him except for a servant. My pastor used this story as a sermon illustration one time, and it worked quite well. Picture books should be used in sermons more often, imho.

Terence Hanbury White is most famous for his Arthurian novel, The Once and Future King. The first part of this novel, called The Sword in the Stone, was Disney-fied into an animated movie, and the latter parts were the basis for the Broadway and the movie musicalCamelot. Camelot, the movie, is on my list of 107 Best Movies Ever. But I still refuse to link Camelot with the Kennedys, even if Mr. White and JFK were born on the same day of the year.

More May Celebrations, Links, and Birthdays