I’m reading Eastern Standard Tribe by Cory Doctorow. It’s this satisfyingly weird book about economic warfare waged among time zone tribes. It talks a lot about sleep deprivation, social networking and chat rooms, so it’s a great read for someone from my generation. 
Here’s a quotation that resonated with me:
I was too smart for my own good. I could always argue myself into doing the sexy, futuristic thing instead of being a nice, mundane, nonaffiliated
individual. Too smart to settle down, take a job and watch TV after work, spend two weeks a year at the cottage and go online to find movie listings. Too smart is too restless and no happiness, ever, without that it’s chased by obsessive maundering moping about what comes next.
I can understand that restlessness, that rebellion against the mundane. For instance, watching TV every evening seems a waste of time to me, especially when the Internets are begging for my attention. 
save
Reading Wind in the Willows this time, I was struck by Mole ’s character growth. At the beginning of the book, Mole is timid and naive, learning about the world for the first time. By the end of the book, after a few adventures, Mole is a clever creature and a steadfast fighter! He has even earned Badger’s respect!
When I mentioned this to my sister, she said that it was similar to Bilbo Baggins’ character arc in The Hobbit! I wish I had noticed that myself.
In Chapter Five of Wind in the Willows, Rat says to Mole:
‘Why, only just now I saw a sardine-opener on the kitchen dresser, quite distinctly; and everybody knows that means there are sardines about somewhere in the neighbourhood.’
That’s my kind of logic. Or illogic. Whatever.
Rat really shines in this chapter, both as a good friend to Mole, and as someone who can improvise and make the most of things. Although they can only find sardines, crackers, beer and one sausage in Mole’s long-abandoned home, Rat considers those items a veritable feast:
‘There’s a banquet for you!’ observed the Rat, as he arranged the table. ‘I know some animals who would give their ears to be sitting down to supper with us tonight!’
Maybe the real reason I am impressed with Rat is that he uses exclamation marks often in this chapter.
In Chapter Four of Wind in the Willows, Mole admires Badger’s underground home:
. . . he took the opportunity to tell Badger how comfortable and home-like it all felt to him. ‘Once well underground,’ he said, ‘you know exactly where you are. Nothing can happen to you, and nothing can get at you. You’re entirely your own master, and you don’t have to consult anybody or mind what they say. Things go on all the same overhead, and you let ‘em, and don’t bother about ‘em. When you want to, up you go, and there the things are, waiting for you.’
This passage can work pretty well as a description of escapism. 
Escaping into a novel or movie is just like spending time comfortably underground.
In other news, I’m pretty convinced that the main theme of this book is the idea of home. I’m not even done Chapter Five yet, and so far, several homes have been mentioned or discussed:
- Mole’s home, which is named Mole End. I love that name.
- Rat’s home in the riverbank. Sometimes it floods, and Rat has to move out for a while.
- Toad Hall.
- Toad’s canary-yellow gypsy caravan.
- Badger’s impressive underground home.
Another quotation from Wind in the Willows, this one from Chapter Four. This is after Mole got lost in the dreaded Wild Wood, and was found by Rat. Now Mole and Rat are safe at Badger’s underground home, eating and talking:
. . . it was that regrettable sort of conversation that results from talking with your mouth full. The Badger did not mind that sort of thing at all, nor did he take any notice of elbows on the table, or everybody speaking at once. As he did not go into Society himself, he had got an idea that these things belonged to the things that didn’t really matter. (We know of couse that he was wrong, and took too narrow a view; because they do matter very much, though it would take too long to explain why.)
In Chapter Two of Wind in the Willows, Ratty makes up a silly song about some ducks he is watching. I like how the ducks respond:
Why can’t fellows be allowed to do what they like when they like and as they like, instead of other fellows sitting on banks and watching them all the time and making remarks and poetry and things about them? What nonsense it all is!
I just opened up a cheap paperback copy of The Wind in the Willows to find an introduction written by A. A. Milne, the guy who wrote the Winnie the Pooh books! The introduction’s first paragraph was so cool/funny that I just had to post it here:
To the moderately well-read person Kenneth Grahame is known as the author of two books written in the 1890s: The Golden Age and Dream Days. In his spare time he was Secretary of the Bank of England. Reading these delicately lovely visions of childhood, you might have wondered that he could be mixed up with anything so unlovely as a bank; and it may be presumed that at the bank an equal surprise was felt that such a responsible official could be mixed up with beauty.
Haha. I like the idea of being mixed up with beauty.
Quotations, Reading | ShanShen, 28 Oct 08 | 
Comments (0) 