what a paragraph .........

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

to treasure:

It gave me the feeling that I’d bitten into the modern world and discovered what it was really made of. That’s the way we’re going nowadays. Everything slick and streamlined, everything made out of something else. Celluloid, rubber, chromium-steel everywhere, arc-lamps blazing all night, glass roofs over your head, radios all playing the same tune, no vegetation left, everything cemented over, mock-turtles grazing under the neutral fruit-trees. But when you come down to brass tacks and get your teeth into something solid, a sausage for instance, that’s what you get. Rotten fish in a rubber skin. Bombs of filth bursting inside your mouth.

George Orwell Coming Up for Air 1939

from a rather fine essay on Lady Chatterley's Sneakers by David Trotter in the LRB

[Flosshilde]

I bet he was fun down the pub

[french frank]

George Orwell Coming Up for Air 1939

I wonder what it was like in 1939 to provoke that? I thought everything pre-war was still good and fine and healthy and real ...

[umslopogaas]

ff, quite apart from the fact that we were on the verge of WW2, I reckon 1939 was probably pretty grim, when viewed through the determinedly dystopic eyes of Orwell. After all, he'd only recently published 'The Road to Wigan Pier', which isnt a barrel of laughs.

I reckon he'd have been very interesting company for an evening in the pub, but not if you were looking for a relaxing conversation ... he was probably already collecting ideas for '1984', which is dark enough to make 'The Road to Wigan Pier' look like a Bill Bryson travelogue.

[Flosshilde]

I reckon he'd have been very interesting company for an evening in the pub,

Would he have been interesting? I think too "deteminedly dystopian" to be that, prone to see everything in the worst light, & probably holding forth to everybody, not engaging in a discussion but simply lecturing. Perhaps he & Paul Morrisey, of the miserabilist tendency, might have got on well.

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

...he may have eaten a bad frankfurter or summat ... prescient tho innit ...

[vinteuil]

... o, time for you to reread the essays!

He can be really funny - his instructions on how to make a proper cup of tea, his descriptions of the ideal English murder story, his praise of good 'bad' literature, his warm perception of Kipling...

Yes, he can be "earnest" at times. But so much more than that...

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

btw forgot to put in the first post a request for other potent paras.....

and wanted to urge boredees to check out the essay which conjoins Orwell and Lawrence admirably ....

[Lateralthinking1]

Lord knows what he would have thought about now.

I would say that in ordinary life - ie not nuclear weaponry - by far the worst of it since the 1960s has been the increase in the number of cars. If magically I could change one thing overnight, it would be to go back from the 31 million cars on today's roads to the 10 million in 1960. And that 1960 figure in itself was 5-10 times greater than at the time of his writing.

Calum, I don't have any similar potent paragraph in mind but I hope it will be a request that is followed up.

[johncorrigan]

Calum, I don't have any similar potent paragraph in mind but I hope it will be a request that is followed up.

I know it's 4 paragraphs, but Vonnegut's description of Billy Pilgrim watching a war film in reverse remains, for me, one of most potent sections in fiction.

Billy}....turned on the television. He came slightly unstuck in time, saw the late movie backwards, then forwards again. It was a movie about American bombers in the Second World War and the gallant men who flew them. Seen backwards by Billy, the story went like this:

American planes, full of holes and wounded men and corpses took off backwards from an airfield in England. Over France, a few German fighter planes flew at them backwards, sucked bullets and shell fragments from some of the planes and crewmen. They did the same for wrecked American bombers on the ground, and those planes flew up backwards to join the formation.

The formation flew backwards over a German city that was in flames. The bombers opened their bomb bay doors, exerted a miraculous magnetism which shrunk the fires, gathered them into cylindrical steel containers, and lifted the containers into the bellies of the planes. The containers were stored neatly in racks. The Germans below had miraculous devices of their own, which were long steel tubes. They used them to suck more fragments from the crewmen and planes. But there were still a few wounded Americans, though, and some of the bombers were in bad repair. Over France, though, German fighters came up again, made everything and everybody as good as new.

When the bombers got back to their base, the steel cylinders were taken from the racks and shipped back to the United States of America, where factories were operating night and day, dismantling the cylinders, separating the dangerous contents into minerals. Touchingly, it was mainly women who did this work. The minerals were then shipped to specialists in remote areas. It was their business to put them into the ground, to hide them cleverly, so they would never hurt anybody again.

[handsomefortune]

5....that's the very best war i've ever read about johncorrigan! (likewise porn films are much improved played backwards, or in fast forward too).

i'd definitely sit next to kurt, or george in a pub, or anywhere ...... if i could!

Bombs of filth bursting inside your mouth.

as a matter of fact calum da jazbo, i saw a rubber skin full of (bright orange) 'fish' in the local chippy, but being the bank holiday monday lull, either end had an encrusted yellowy 'rubber' ring.... i wondered who'd eventually eat that...perhaps someone with terrible eye sight? or someone with no idea of what a sausage should taste of? or someone numbed enough by the pub to eat virtually anything hot afterwards!

[Anna]

as a matter of fact calum da jazbo, i saw a rubber skin full of (bright orange) 'fish' in the local chippy, but being the bank holiday monday lull, either end had an encrusted yellowy 'rubber' ring.... i wondered who'd eventually eat that...perhaps someone with terrible eye sight? or someone with no idea of what a sausage should taste of? or someone numbed enough by the pub to eat virtually anything hot afterwards!

I believe that is what is called a Saveloy. No idea what it consists of but suspect a wartime recipe made from Spam and Snoek brought up to date with the addition of E numbers.
I used to love Coming up for Air and recently started to read it again. The description of a hotdog is so accurate, they really do taste of rotten, cheap, fish. Edit: Sorry for being offtopic!

[Serial_Apologist]

5....that's the very best war i've ever read about johncorrigan! (likewise porn films are much improved played backwards, or in fast forward too).

i'd definitely sit next to kurt, or george in a pub, or anywhere ...... if i could!

Bombs of filth bursting inside your mouth.

as a matter of fact calum da jazbo, i saw a rubber skin full of (bright orange) 'fish' in the local chippy, but being the bank holiday monday lull, either end had an encrusted yellowy 'rubber' ring.... i wondered who'd eventually eat that...perhaps someone with terrible eye sight? or someone with no idea of what a sausage should taste of? or someone numbed enough by the pub to eat virtually anything hot afterwards!

I hate to think what that fish had been packed into, handsome!

Which reminds me of a story I heard, many years ago.

A man goes into a shop, and asks the serving person, "Do you sell condoms?". "Yes sir", she replies, "Plain, or in assorted colours?". "Oh, I think I'll have assorted colours", the man replies. Six months down the line, he returns to the shop, and asks, "Do you sell maternity frocks?" "Yes sir; what bust?" "The yellow one", the man replies.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

5....that's the very best war i've ever read about johncorrigan!

Yes, "potent": I find it incredibly moving.

(likewise porn films are much improved played backwards, or in fast forward too).

Have you ever seen Nichetti's film The Icicle Thief (Ladre di Saponette), handy? A guy who makes porn films shares a flat with a guy who adds soundtracks to cartoons. One day, the porn guy has to leave and asks the cartoon guy to help - meaning just hold the camera whilst the girls do their job. Instead, he adds a cartoon soundtrack - one of the funniest scenes in any film I've ever seen!

[handsomefortune]

i am not sure that 'a dystopian viewpoint' is necessarily 'depressing'.

(from john corrigan's kurt vonnegut quote, upthread) imv it's a relief to see the following sentiment so creatively communicated, as the wider implications of peace should be discussed, given as much oxygen as possible .... It was their business to put them into the ground, to hide them cleverly, so they would never hurt anybody again. it's ideal if these sentiments are expressed by credible people....

incredibly moving.

agreed ferneyhoughgeliebte, kurt, (george, ray bradbury, margaret attwood, and on tv 'the twilight zone', and many others) are all moving imo. they are fascinating in that they reflect the fears, and general imaginings of which ever era!

ladre di saponette filum sounds a hoot!

this looks fun too http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oX2Xr...eature=related (jean's help required on the italian)?

(and perhaps this italian film reflects current fears domestically, in its way? but is otherwise totally off topic but i just want to post it anyway tbh) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t31wKgagKVU