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19. P.G. Wodehouse "The Butler Did It"
I finished "The Butler Did It" (published as Something Fishy in the UK) last this week. The book is classic Wodehouse with many chunks of lovely language, plot twists and turns, and zany characters. Solidly fun book and probably just as fun on the re-read as the first time around. Alas, it's not available public domain yet, so we have to wait. But if you do find it in some compilation at a library sale pick it up, that's what I did.
20. "Ernest Hemingway: Selected Letters 1917-1961"
I finished the selected letters of Ernest Hemingway edited by Carlos Baker this weekend while recovering from my 2nd dose of vaccine. I had been slowly working my way through this sizable tome for many months. It runs to over 900 pages. Parts were interesting, but since you're reading letters sent to different people you get a lot of repetition of some bits. His letters vary considerably depending on the audience going from dry and stilted to extremely informal and thick with in-jokes, nicknames, and the argot of his group of friends. There are lots of spats with other writers and running verbal battles with reviewers and critics. It was funny to see the editor of this volume referred to in a not exactly complementary manner in one of the letters.
Like a biography, you kind of know the ending when you start. I think I understand why he chose the exit he did. I don't think it was CTE. With what was happening with Cuba at the time, the number of people he'd lost in the past few years, the number of weeks of the prior few years he'd lost to health struggles, how depression was treated in the early '60's, and a host of other contributing factors, I think he was just overwhelmed. I'd have to do a lot more research to prove out some of my suspicions based on hints in the letters, but I think he knew his health was really headed downhill, not that it wasn't pretty far downhill already.
After reading the book on Orwell, the letters of Doyle to his mother, and the letters of Hemingway it is easy to see the patterns transcend many if not all authors. The big pattern is: if you want to make a living writing, good luck with that. Even successful writers aren't financially successful for the majority of their lives, if ever. Usually their estates and the vultures have more of a chance at wealth.
I finished "The Butler Did It" (published as Something Fishy in the UK) last this week. The book is classic Wodehouse with many chunks of lovely language, plot twists and turns, and zany characters. Solidly fun book and probably just as fun on the re-read as the first time around. Alas, it's not available public domain yet, so we have to wait. But if you do find it in some compilation at a library sale pick it up, that's what I did.
20. "Ernest Hemingway: Selected Letters 1917-1961"
I finished the selected letters of Ernest Hemingway edited by Carlos Baker this weekend while recovering from my 2nd dose of vaccine. I had been slowly working my way through this sizable tome for many months. It runs to over 900 pages. Parts were interesting, but since you're reading letters sent to different people you get a lot of repetition of some bits. His letters vary considerably depending on the audience going from dry and stilted to extremely informal and thick with in-jokes, nicknames, and the argot of his group of friends. There are lots of spats with other writers and running verbal battles with reviewers and critics. It was funny to see the editor of this volume referred to in a not exactly complementary manner in one of the letters.
Like a biography, you kind of know the ending when you start. I think I understand why he chose the exit he did. I don't think it was CTE. With what was happening with Cuba at the time, the number of people he'd lost in the past few years, the number of weeks of the prior few years he'd lost to health struggles, how depression was treated in the early '60's, and a host of other contributing factors, I think he was just overwhelmed. I'd have to do a lot more research to prove out some of my suspicions based on hints in the letters, but I think he knew his health was really headed downhill, not that it wasn't pretty far downhill already.
After reading the book on Orwell, the letters of Doyle to his mother, and the letters of Hemingway it is easy to see the patterns transcend many if not all authors. The big pattern is: if you want to make a living writing, good luck with that. Even successful writers aren't financially successful for the majority of their lives, if ever. Usually their estates and the vultures have more of a chance at wealth.
