"All other swindlers upon earth are nothing to the self-swindlers, and with such pretences did I cheat myself. Surely a curious thing. That I should innocently take a bad half-crown of somebody else's manufacture, is reasonable enough; but that I should knowingly reckon the spurious coin of my own make, as good money!"
Such a great paragraph. The remembrance of an older man, bitter at his younger self for the stupidity of his actions. I've been reading "Great Expectations" and it's a stunning piece of work. I mean, you know the story: the burning, the prisoner, the churchyard, Pip. But there's such a depth of humanity in the writing. Even characters who only appear for a couple of lines seem to have life and spirit about them. not only that but it reads as an intense thriller - he really knew how to do make readers want to turn the next page.
This morning, I was reading the part where Magwitch died, and Joe appears like an angel of mercy to care for his old charge, Pip, while he's sick. I cried on the train!
Anyway. I'll talk about comics again next week.
Other news: at present, taking the continually offensive "How dare you question my authoritay" line, Blair is refusing outright to countenance the idea of an inquiry in to the weapons of mass destruction evidence. It is a desperately sad thing to see someone who at one point was an idealistic and seemingly decent human being allow himself to descend to this level of lies and hypocrisy. I don't think they realise just how much damage has been done in the last 6 weeks or so. And 90% of the damage is down directly to the way Blair has reacted to criticism or questioning of his actions.
The whole thing is just sad in so many ways. I'm glad we've begun to think that maybe we might want to leave this country in the next few years. It's inexorable decline, bound in decrepit post-imperialist ego is depressing to be in the middle of. Rather to go to somewhere with barely any history to speak of.
Posted by cait at June 3, 2003 02:46 PM