The Library

[mabel1015j]

The Library Our library cafe is open 24/7, the welcome mat is always out. Do come in from daily chores and spend some time with us. We look forward to hearing from you, about you and the books you are enjoying (or not). Let the book talk begin here!

*Suggestion Box for Future Discussions
*SeniorLearn's Archives  
 

Holy smokes!!! While checking out some locales of the books I've read I looked up Linda Fairstein who I knew as a crime writer about Manhattan prosecutor Alexandra Cooper. I found her on wiki with some very interesting facts about her!!!! She is/was, not sure which, a prosecutor in NYC and prosecuted the "preppy murder case" and the "Central Park jogger case". That one was overturned for 5 convicted teenagers charged of rape - check out the story and the aftermath! WoW! I guess because we're not in NYC we didn't hear of this. Scary, scary stuff!


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_Fairstein

[MaryPage]

I live in Chesapeake Country and I can tell you Michener made a LOT of factual errors about this area in that book.  Good writer, but he did not get all of his research right.
Also, like so many, though goodness knows not all, authors, he got weaker and weaker on the ground as he continued to write.  I thought his masterpieces were Caravan and Tales of The South Pacific.

[Steph]

 grew up in Delaware and Chesapeake had a lot of factual errors, although he did do a good job on the quakers in the area..
Could not get on Seniorlearn this morning about 8:30am.. simply insisted there was no such beast.Sigh.

[CallieOK]

I enjoyed "Chesapeake" - as I did almost all of the Michener books....even "Texas" and "Centennial", both of which I read with a critical geography eye because he did take liberties with that sort of thing in both of them.

MaryPage, I see you felt the same way about "Chesapeake".  Apparently, M. had a habit of "rearranging the countryside" to suit his purposes!     

I loved Michener's "The Novel", set in Pennsylvania Dutch country.

[BarbStAubrey]

What a great list - have not read or even heard of South Wind or the Tall Grass need to put them on my list - oh and I see you included Fannie Flag - just love to take a break and read her stories - they put a smile on my face. I love how you describe Michener - "he starts at the beginning of humankind in the area" - only read two - Centennial and Hawaii looks like you have a few more states to share with us - I am as anxious to learn what New Mexico book you read as I am your selection for Texas. 

[Steph]

New Mexico.. wouldnt that be Tony Hillerman? New Mexico is so beautiful in so many different ways. Surely there was a good Indian book for that area.. Gallop seems to be in the heart of railroad country, so I vaguely remember reading a book on "The Harvey Girls" back in m 20's about the women who abandoned farm life to work for Fred Harvey and meet the world at the railroad stations and restaurants.

[ginny]

Dana and PatH:  It appears truly to be a conflict in perception. The Cambridge people insist there is "plenty of grammar." As the old Latin teachers die out (tho hopefully the universities and colleges of our country will keep the old standards as appears to be the case), and more and more Latin classes are taught by people who really don't know Latin  at all (that's also become the "new Latin," unfortunately),  I can see less and less emphasis on grammar because despite what Dana and PatH here have said, the new folks simply don't know it and don't understand  the joy and benefit of it.

And there IS something to be said for the Cambridge approach. I came home determined to master this approach, too.   To see if I even can.  If we can ask the poor student to begin (as I regrettably did in my face to face Latin 200 class last year,  memorizing the conjugations to catch up, one this week, one more the next....happily they ignored me or they would have all quit) ...hahahaa then I can begin to look at Vergil as if he were a Cambridge text. The "no fear" mentality.  I'm going to try, very hard,  in the next month to try to stop parsing first, and to stop looking at it and seeing the fabulous grammar, and structure,  and read it like a dime novel.  If I can ask them to do something so foreign to them, I can put my money where my mouth is and try the same.

I remember when we met in NYC with Carol  Goodman, who is a former Latin teacher,  for a brunch at the Ritz, it was a lovely time. She is a wonderful  person and author  who writes mysteries with classical themes, and has been lauded for her contribution to the classical world. I asked her as we were talking alone beforehand, so as not to be questioning in  public,  about a scene in her book in which the scholar/ hero/ expert  unearths a previously unknown scroll, (which look like lumps of coal at the Villa of the Papyri, which seemed to be the setting)  and quickly thru (or was it without)  the technology they now use to read these things, ultraviolet or infrared or x ray  or whatever it is, (she had researched that very well),  the scholar  read it quickly, and the entire mystery hung on it, so the mystery  was solved instantly.

But at any rate that struck me as strange,  I couldn't have done it, particularly those old things with their faded inks and their missing parts, and which it had been stated earlier  in the book were particularly difficult to decode, and  I was curious and asked her if she, in fact, could have done that, read the fragment that rapidly and she immediately  said no, she could not have,  but she thought perhaps somebody at that level, who did that for a living, might have been able to. Good answer. Later on she as she talked in the public about some errors she had made or things she would do differently,  she  cited that one, actually, to the group, which I thought was amazing. (And which I wished I  had brought up AFTER the talk).

Certainly I have not written any best selling books and she did have them vetted  first, so perhaps somebody who read it actually  could have done that.  Or didn't want to seem NOT to be able to do it. Obviously a Cambridge Series  graduate. hahahaa

I'm telling this story to show that the vaunted ease in translating is not shared by those who came up in the grammar tradition but after seeing a transcript of an actual recorded session of young people translating the Cambridge series, I have to doubt it even more.... and it may be only that the old guard is passing, and is sorry about it.    I do have to say , tho, that after seeing 5 days of presentations, the Old Guard of Grammar seems very much alive.

[ginny]

Love the poll results. Those of you who put "Other" will you mention what those "Other" are? We had hoped to get up a dialog on the famous books we never read.

 What have we left out of the list? I know there's one, it's just on the tip of my tongue, it's nagging me but I can't think of it. It may be a children's book.

[Dana]

 I don't understand how you could translate by sight and intuition and, let's say, know the proper subject of the sentence, or whether what is expressed is a wish or a command.....just a couple of tiny poor examples......or a simple or contrary condition.....if you don't figure out these things how can you possibly know if you have the right meaning?  Who exactly can be translated by sight?  Cicero? Horace?  They've got to be kidding.....

I guess no-one has suggested learning Greek by sight yet!!!!!!

[ginny]

It's a very interesting discussion you're having here on books about every state. It would make a great poll.

How important to you is the setting of a book?

Very important: influences my desire to read the book.
Important: I like learning about new places
Somewhat important: I'm vaguely influenced
Neutral: I don't care where the book is set
Not Important:  Has no bearing on my interest in reading a book.

[ginny]

There are two new books coming out which I am really excited about, one is a new  Amy Tan. I loved her first one The Joy Luck Club and got it again to reread. It was wonderful, did we ever read it here?

The second is this one, coming in October:

A mesmerizing first novel about trust, dependence, and fear, from a major new writer


Ruth is widowed, her sons are grown, and she lives in an isolated beach house outside of town. Her routines are few and small. One day a stranger arrives at her door, looking as if she has been blown in from the sea. This woman—Frida—claims to be a care worker sent by the government. Ruth lets her in.

     Now that Frida is in her house, is Ruth right to fear the tiger she hears on the prowl at night, far from its jungle habitat? Why do memories of childhood in Fiji press upon her with increasing urgency? How far can she trust this mysterious woman, Frida, who seems to carry with her own troubled past? And how far can Ruth trust herself?

     The Night Guest, Fiona McFarlane’s hypnotic first novel, is no simple tale of a crime committed and a mystery solved. This is a tale that soars above its own suspense to tell us, with exceptional grace and beauty, about ageing, love, trust, dependence, and fear; about processes of colonization; and about things (and people) in places they shouldn’t be. Here is a new writer who comes to us fully formed, working wonders with language, renewing our faith in the power of fiction to describe the mysterious workings of our minds.

That's in kindle and hardback, I think. That looks really good, to me.

[Dana]

ah kindle....I got one recently but I sent it back without really trying.  I will have to get another one sometime, but I am recently spending  my free time   with an electric piano (I mean keyboard) and piano lessons, so no time for learning to use a kindle!!

[rosemarykaye]

Ginny - to answer your question re setting, it's VERY important to me, I think I often get more out of it than out of the plot itself.  I can't stand books with no interesting setting - one of the many reasons that I couldn't get on with Rachel Tusk's books was that I felt there was no setting at all, it was some kind of amorphous London landscape that I felt I was seeing through a fog. I'm afraid I have to admit I felt like that about Iris Murdoch too...

Writers who are good at settings: Donna Leon, Dana Stabenow, Alexander McCall Smith (Edinburgh only, not good at London), PD James, Barbara Pym, E Nesbit, Veronica Henry, Maeve Binchy - these are just a few I thought of off the top of my head, there are of course hundreds more.

Rosemary

[Dana]

How about books set in foreign settings--this  summer I've been reading Pearl S Buck and Henning Mankell, (both again-shall have to get more creative and read someone new sometime)....  but Buck evokes China so powerfully, whether accurately of-couse I don't know, and Mankell--the Wallander books taken together with the Swedish (not British) TV series, do the same for Sweden and Swedes.   And yes, I do enjoy that feeling of being sucked into another place and time.  I think the best historical biographies do that too,  not so much the place, more the ambiance of the age, I suppose.  I'm thinking of, for example. the biography of Catherine the Great by Raymond Massie, which I recently enjoyed.

 

[ginny]

And....we  have a new Poll!! Thank you Rosemary and Dana for those very interesting posts!

Here is the result of the old poll:

Q: What is the most famous book you have not yet read?

 The Great Gatsby    - 6 (14.6%)
Pride and Prejudice    - 3 (7.3%)
Gone With the Wind    - 5 (12.2%)
To Kill a Mockingbird    - 4 (9.8%)
The Chronicles of Narnia    - 7 (17.1%)
Ulysses    - 12 (29.3%)
Other    - 4 (9.8%)


Try our new Poll today, on the setting of a book!

[mabel1015j]

The setting of a book does not matter to me, except often the locale becomes part of the character of the story - i.e. MA Monroe, DF Frank in South Carolina, Eugenia Price's Savannah books and I think, Margaret Maron's NC books, altho I think that is more just "rural", it wouldn't have to be NC. Isn't it interesting that they are all southern locales and the others that I thought of are too - Ya-Ya Sisterhood, Haywood Smith's Red Hat and Mimosa books, etc. Anything set in Louisiana, especially New Orleans has the locale as a "character" and Texas also often becomes an important part of the story. Altho, I guess books set in NYC often use the city as an important part of the story.

Jean

[maryz]

The geography is always a major character in Hillerman's books.

[mabel1015j]

To continue with my 50 states list of books:

Missouri – Huckleberry Finn, Truman, Joy School – Elizabeth Berg, Immortal Wife Irving Stone's book about Jessie Fremont - loved it!
Montana – Janet Dailey’s Calder series, The Horse Whisperer, Debbie Macomber Montana series
Neb – My Antonia, maybe Don Coldmith’s “Kansas Territory” series, Wagons West: Nebraska – Dana Fuller Ross' good historical fiction series
Nevada – a Nancy Drew mystery, don't remember the name
New Hamp – Our Town, Peyton Place
NJ – Portnoy’s Complaint, Evanovich mysteries, Jane Isenberg Mys, Burr, Thomas Fleming’s Stapleton family historical fiction, Freydont mysteries, Dorothy Gilman’s Mrs Polifax series,
NY – J.D. Robb mysteries, The Great Gatsby, Catcher in the Rye, Mornings on Horseback (D. McCullough on TR’s youth) The Great Bridge (D McC’s story of Brooklyn Bridge), Thomas Fleming’s Irish-American historical fiction series, Fallen Founder (Burr by Nancy Isenberg)
NC- M. Maron (Judge series), J Medlicott (Covington series), Ross’s Miss Julie series,
ND
Ohio
Oklahoma – Grapes of Wrath, The Old Buzzard Had It Coming and Hornswoggled – Donis Casey, Where the Heart Is - B Letts
Oregon – Wagons West: Oregon and Oregon Legacy – D.F. Ross,
Pennsylvania – John O’Hara, Linda Scottoline, Nancy Martin’s Blackbird Sister’s mysteries, Ben Franklin’s autobio
Rhode Island – The Vineyard, Witches of Eastwich
SC – Secret Lives of Bees, D.B Frank’s books, Pat Conroy, Caroline Hart mysteries
Tenn – The Firm, Black Dahlia, The President’s Wife (Irving Stone – Rachael and Andrew Jackson)
Texas – True Women, Susan Albert’s China Bayles series, Giant – Edna Ferber ( I probably read Ice Palace which would give me an Alaska book, but I'm not sure if I did, or just saw the movie
Utah
Vermont
Virginia – Confessions of Nat Turner, Roots, The Kitchen House, Makes Me Want to Holler ( interesting, they are all about Blacks or slavery???) Citizen Washington, The American Sphinx (Jefferson by Joe Ellis)
Washington – Snow Falling on Cedars, Bold Spirit true story of woman and dgt who walked across the U.S. in the 19th century to earn money to save their farm, Macomber’s Blossom St and Cedar Cove series
Washington D.C. – Mrs. Lincoln’s Dressmaker, Makes Me Want to Holler, Personal History (Kathryn Graham)
Several “First Ladies” books, LBJ, Truman, Kennedy, TR
West Va
Wisconsin – Jill Churchill’s mysteries

I know that there are many that I read in my teens/twenties/thirties that I have forgotten. I didn't start keeping a list of books read until the 80s or 90s,  darn!

So don't some of you want to make your list?

[mabel1015j]

Some how I missed the Guardian's listings.................but it didn't matter much, I have only read 7 on each list - that I can remember. Again, like with the states lists, I have to think "did I read that one, or just know about it?" I know about a lot of them, but not sure I ever actually read the whole book.

Not many women represented on those list, altho the second one did surprise me with the several feminist must-reads, those were 3 of my 7.

Jean

[Steph]

I am very influenced by the place and time of books. I love historical mysteries, especially the ones on San Francisco(Dianne Day) and New York..( the midwife, Caleb Carr, etc). Chicago , present day,,All the state parks that Nevada Barr did before she got too gory for me.. Boston, Robert Parker made you able to drive around Boston and Cambridge just by reading him.. Ah, yes the place..

[MaryPage]

I love a good mystery that also teaches me something about a place or a type of study or something in the way of a business enterprise that I would not have known about otherwise.  There have been lots of delightful authors who do this.  Margaret Maron really turned me on with her description of pottery making in North Carolina.  Just read details about the aquarium in Sydney, Australia in Nesbo's The Bat that I would not have known a thing about otherwise.  I mean to say, they have actually penned in part of the harbour and the marine life is in its natural habitat!  And you go underneath in a tunnel between the glass and the world under the sea is on both sides AND ABOVE you!  I don't think my claustrophobia would allow me to do that, but reading such vivid a description and imagining it is wonderful.  And I do truly love descriptions of places.  The Mrs. Pollifax stories of long ago were great at that, as well.

[JeanneP]

I have had a wish to go to china ever since reading Pearl Buck books years ago.  Think would find it much changed now.
Glad to hear that Amy Tan written another book. Will look for it
I am reading another Alice Monroe book.  The butterfly's Daughter. I did read her "Time is a river" I don't know if I am that fond of her.

[JeanneP]

Two books I have to find and read.  "Fairyland" which is a Memoir by Alysia Abbott.
and the other one is "Red Kimono." by Jan Morrill.  Japanese Internments during the war.  Well researched. Fiction.This is her first book but she is writing a followup on the 3 people I believe..
Another Historical Fiction is "Finding My Place.". Women or girls in Vicksburg.

[mabel1015j]

Jeanne, i don't know what part of the country you live in, but if you ever get to Bucks Co, Pa - northeast of philly - you would probably enjoy touring Pearl Buck's home. It became, and remains, the headqtrs for her international adoption agency. Her personal story is much more interesting then what i had known before i went on a tour. Her story is more racy than one would expect of the dgt if missionaries.    The house is one of those great 18th century Pa limestone farmhouses, so just the house itself is interesting.

Jean

[BarbStAubrey]

there are still so many places I would like to see in the US - I am getting to the point where it is either travel or taking care of this house - hmmm

Been working on my list - first I had to list all 50 states and did fine for 48 - could not figure out what I was missing and had to break down and look it up - of all places New Jersey - I group them by north and south and all the New something but forgot Jersey and the other I missed was West Virginia.

Trying to remember the books I read some of which for the life of me I can recall the entire story but not the title or the name of the author - grrrr - this is not easy so I am in awe of the job you did - so far only have 14 states completed  - well not really complete since there are many more authors that I read in some of these states but enough is enough. If I read more than 2 books by the author I am listing the author's name rather than the title of the books. And yes, you are so right doing it on pad with pencil makes it at least possible.

[JeanneP]

Mabel.
I wish I had known that about the Pearl Buck house.  Traveled all around the East last Oct. Would have tried to have seen it.  I love the East. Ohio, Pa. Mass. New York, Conn. (GD lives there).  Just have to do it again.
So true it being very close to what my Area I grew up in in the UK.. I think I need to see. Maine also. They say like our North both West Coast and East coast..

[MaryPage]

I have passed the point of making a choice between travel and taking care of a house.  Sold the house in 1996 and did my last traveling in 2006.  I am just too old for either!  It takes all of my energy just to get up each day and take care of my old lady self!

[Steph]

I still love travel so very much, but dont do nearly enough. Just cant quite get the heart of it with him gone.But I did solve most of my housing problems with the winter house and the summer house..Best of both worlds from my point of view.
Pearl Bucks house is neat, but yes she lived quitea different life than I had imagined.

[Dana]

Re Pearl S Buck.  I have her biography by Hillary Spurling, but haven't got around to it yet.  However I remember the reviews did indicate that her life was pretty dramatic.
  Was she a missionary, or just her parents?   Guess I'll find out when I read the book--but from her books she seems to be too liberal a thinker with too many positive things to say about some of the old Chinese beliefs, and some negative views of Christian missionaries, to have been dedicated to instilling Christianity into so called heathen heads.  

[Steph]

Parents were missionaries..  An interesting woman. I have read at least two biographies over the years. My husband and I applied to her adoption agency in the late 50's, but after filling out hundreds of forms and an in person interview, I got pregnant out of the clear blue..Oh well

[ginny]

I have the Spurling, apparently stopped, if the bookmarks is correct,  half way thru. My memory is not that good on Pearl Buck but I believe she's required reading now in China...I mean they destroyed so much of their history.

We lived 8 years in Bucks County when I was growing up and I never saw or went to her home. I was a child and really didn't know much about her till later on.  Isn't that always the way? We sure did the Revolutionary  War sites tho and of course Gettysburg which is not in Bucks County.

She was definitely not a missionary and some of her sentiments  on that subject, I seem to recall particularly one remark about hymns,  are not pro missionary. Apparently her farther (Sydenstricker or something like that was his last name? Too lazy to look it up)   was something else. She was saved by her Chinese nurse during the Boxer Rebellion, the nurse hid her under something.  What a fascinating time she lived through. The Boxer Rebellion!!

The Good Earth has two sequels and they are both good, about the sons. Neither approaches The Good Earth but they  show what happens when a father has worked to accumulate worldly goods (land in this case) and pass it down.  She was very wise. The Good Earth is  certainly a wonderful book, I reread it myself last year. Nobody should miss it. It's funny how you think of it in the strangest times.  

[ginny]

I'm reading another new non fiction book, My Lunches With Orson, conversations with his friend Henry Jaglom, a director.

I never really had an appreciation for Orson Welles, nor an understanding of his great "genius," and I thought perhaps this book might enlighten me. The famous names alone stopping by the table are astounding .Richard Burton asks to bring over Elizabeth Taylor to meet him. No. Jack Lemmon stops by, praising Welles, he gets to sit down.

It's  like This Town, which I'm still reading, but unlike This Town (which is about what really happens among the movers and shakers of our government, what they really say and how they really act). Yesterday the author made the startling statement that there was a great deal of "homoeroticism" in the back slapping, glad handing congressional members: the boys club. hahahaa I'm sure that will not go over well.

At any rate, I regret that the names thrown about here are becoming more and more obscure to me, most of them I have never heard of and therefore am increasingly not caring about. The overall picture, however, is not very inspiring.

The Orson Welles book is the same thing. He's outré,  there is no other word for him. He says outrageous things. Apparently he has been an intimate of FDR, Winston Churchill, Charlie Chaplin, Laurence Olivier, Rita Hayworth, Spencer Tracy (whom he despised) and many many MANY others. He hates Woody Allen's "arrogance" hidden under the schtick that Allen uses of self deprecation. A lot of what he says about the "stars" is shocking. But is it the truth?

What he says has the ring of truth, yet, in moments when he's talking about bigotry and racism, Jaglom says Orson, why are you saying this, you're not racist or bigoted, and then he says  he is SO bigoted, everybody should be bigoted, meaning something perhaps different from what others do, and at the end the reader is left no wiser about what he really thinks.

 As one critic says "Welles's conversations with Henry Jaglom glitter with memory, intelligence, and malice, and above all offer a magnificent act of self- impersonation: Orson Welles playing Orson Welles."

Welles said that FDR used to say,  "You and I are the two best actors in America."

It's an interesting book. Lots of tidbits like Swifty Lazar would order lots and lots of towels when staying in a hotel: he would  only walk on towels if barefoot in hotels, as he did not want to get ringworm (or roundworm, can't recall).  The foibles and real conversations of the rich and famous.

I still don't know who Welles was. But maybe I can decide by the end of the book. Why is there such a fuss about him?

[MaryPage]

No one does Paris, France better than Cara Black.
She has written, or plans to write, a book for each of the 20 arrondissements.

[pedln]

Agreed, MaryPage.  I've only read the first one -- loved it and want to read more.  It's just a matter of fitting it in.

I've really been enjoying setting and the State setting discussion very much. The main Wisconsin book for me will always be children's book CAddie Woodlawn by Carol Ryrie Brink, and the main movie,  Our Vines Have Tender Grapes -- w/ Margaret O'Brien and Edward G Robinson.  Both rural settings and I was sure they were tucked away somewhere in Waupaca County.

As for Missouri, four (adult) in my own neck of the woods in SE MO. 
Winter's Bone by Daniel Woodrell
Killerwatt by Sharon Hopkins
Enemy Women by Paulette Jiles
The River Wife by Jonis Agee


All you Washingtonians -- were you shocked at yesterdays news  about the Post?  Wow, owned by the same family for over 80 years.  Eugene Robinson had some very nice things to say about Don Graham this morning on Morning Joe.

[JoanP]

Shocked - and dismayed, Pedln!  Bought outright from the Grahams by Jeff Bezos, 49 - who is also the dominant shareholder and CEO of Amazon.  It is said that this young man prefers to read the news digitally....

[JoanP]

oops...forgot that I came in to let you know the POLL has opened in the Suggestion box as we attempt to narrow the list of nominations for our group read in September.  You might be interested in the fact that Pearl Buck's The Good Earth is on that list.  Lots of interest in the woman these days since it was announced that a never published book of hers will be released in mid October.

Please drop in to the Suggestion Box and look over the nominations and Vote your top three preferences.  The titles in the header are all links to descriptions or reviews of the stories.  

[ANNIE]

I've been reading summer reads.  Just because they are offered.  Just finished, Zero Day by Baldacci and Tricksters Point by Krueger.  Both mysteries.  I have always enjoyed Baldacci but Krueger is news.  Set in northern Minnesota, the authors\ writes about the Indians who live up there--Lakota, Dakota and the Ojibwe.  And we are told a great deal about West Virginia in Baldacci's "Zero Day".

I read Louise Erdrich and she is Indian herself and published many books about the Indian tribes in maybe? Minnesota.  Not sure, but I do like her books.  And, of course, Tony Hillerman's books are a delight to read.  I just picked up another Laurie King--Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes.  Laurie King is quite talented in placing her characters in places of which she knows the history.  Did you know that Jerusalem has an underground city? And of course I love the books about the husband and wife(Peabody) archeologists in Egypt during the late 1800's. Author?? Can't remember.  They are very comedic through the murder and mayhem.  

I am always interested in location of stories.  As to Michener, truly liked "Chesapeake", "Alaska", "Centennial", "Hawaii" (grew after his successful short story, "Fo Dollah"), "Texas"(I haven't ever finished it) and "Caravan".  Did not read the one about Spain yet, "Iberia".

Guess I will go vote if I really want to read one on the list.



 

[Tomereader1]

Annie, read Wm. Kent Kruger's new book, a stand-alone, not a mystery, which is beautiful.
"Ordinary Grace". 

[PatH]

The Graham dynasty bought the Washington Post the year I was born, and made it the quality newspaper I've read all my life.  Signs of trouble have abounded in recent years: downsizing, staff buyouts, a larger and larger fraction of the paper only appearing online, etc.  Sometimes I feel like I'm only getting half what I paid for in my print edition.

But it's shocking to think of it being sold, and losing the family dedication to, and love of, the newspaper.

What will happen now?  Bezos bought the paper with his own money, and the price is small compared to his worth.  He is not obligated to anyone to show a profit, and he is a person with a lot of patience, willing to run something for long-term goals, not worrying about this month's profits.  So he can make what he chooses of the paper, and I can only hope that his goals overlap what I want in a newspaper.  I especially hope he doesn't skimp the investigative journalism.  This is getting cut everywhere, and it's an important safeguard for our freedom--the knowledge that someone will probably uncover your dirty tricks if you try any.  I hope he keeps up the quality of the paper, doesn't use it too much to support his own views, whatever they are, and doesn't transfer too much of it online.

I wait with trepidation.

[mabel1015j]

One of my Washington D.C. books is Kathryn Graham's Personal History. It's one of the best autobios i've read and very interesting. Her husband was manic-depressive. She was totally the "mistress of the manor" all her life. The most astonishing statement for me was that when she went to college was the first time she realized that one had to wash one's dirty clothes! Her clothes always just showed up in her drawers and closets, washed and ironed, she had no clue how they were maintained! She was good about laughing at herself and seemed very forthcoming.

You probably know that when her husband died and she was to take over as publisher, she had no clue either, but called on her friend Warren Buffet. Not a bad first decision! They were very close friends from there on.

Jean