This week's Long & Short Reviews question did not inspire a feel-good post. This is the week we consider books that have made us cry. Or join boycotts. Or write strongly worded letters. Or sign up for volunteer work. Or something.
The topic is daunting but that's not why the post is late. The post is late because, though I've never missed a deadline for a paid writing job, I don't think of blogging as having deadlines. Nobody's paying for blog posts so the phrase "come flood, come fire," which is applicable to paid writing contracts, is not relevant to the blog. A paid writing job would come ahead of, e.g., a friend's change of address. A friend's change of address comes ahead of blogging.
The friend in question has been called a furniture hoarder, usually by people who have not seen her daughters' store. Before the COVID panic she was buying beautiful old pieces of furniture, large and small, from 200-year-old, 18-feet-tall china cupboards to 1990s holiday lights, and selling them in Johnson City, Tennessee. Then sales slowed down and a lot of furniture just languished in a warehouse for the last few years. Now, well, a lot of that furniture has to go to Johnson City right away. Anything that can be sold before it's hauled will probably be sold, so if you like vintage furniture, this is your chance to nip in and find some fantastic bargains. It is worth driving up from Johnson City, if you happen to live there. Most of the sofas and chairs have already been moved or sold but there are still a few truckloads of china and glassware, baskets and vases and artificial flowers, Victorian Christmas decorations--this is the lady who had the Red Room and staged a different Victorian Christmas look every year--and about fifty different, attractive, lamps of all sizes.
Anyway, about the books...Additional trigger warning: I have felt moved by novels, but I've tended to feel moved even more strongly by nonfiction. They're not coming to mind in any particular order. I think I'll let them roll up on the screen alphabetically by authors...
Adams, Richard. The Plague Dogs. In which whimsy and topophilia are liberally used to temper the horror of "animal research." Some things have changed since the Carter era when this book was written but, obviously, not enough.
Brownmiller, Susan. Against Our Wills. After reading this book you should lose all tolerance for any suggestion that fighting violent crime involves women's "just staying out of dangerous situations," such as walking alone or living alone. For one thing those happen to be fundamental human rights; a society that can't guarantee women's rights to live or travel alone, unmolested, is an uncivilized society that needs to stop letting its males roam around without responsible female supervision. /For another thing the majority of hatecrimes against women have in fact been committed inside houses women shared with men. It's not that alleys, or schools, hospitals, or churches, have been "safe for women"; it's that when women have accepted the idea that they need to stay indoors to be "safe," haters have come in after them. The solution is for women to realize fully that, first of all, if men are still doing that "This is my rifle, this is my 'gun'" routine, we need to flex our fingernails and count our armored tanks.
Coats, C. David. Old MacDonald's Factory Farm. Again, not enough has changed. If you don't want to become a fanatical vegan (and you don't; their lifestyle is unsustainable and tends to promote public demonstrations of stupidity), you will want to live on a natural family farm or support someone who does when buying meat, dairy products, and leather goods.
Gore, Al. The Future. Was Al Gore's vision of the future of the Internet, which is subject to humans' control, more accurate than his vision of global warming? Reading this open confession of Gore's and his backers' evil plans for the Internet can help those of us who love the'Net plan resistance strategies and, if necessary, exit strategies.
Kopel, David, and Paul Blackman, No More Wacos. Written shortly after the "Waco Disaster" of 1993, in which misguided ATF men buried eighteen babies and their mothers under bulldozer-loads of rocks and rubble, this book documents many abuses of federal authority and gives suggestions for activists who want to prevent further abuses. It's been out for a while. As Gandhi said about European Civilization, it's not failed so much as it's never really been tried.
Malone, Robert. Lies My Government Told Me. Dr. Malone happens to be "a Washington insider" so it's appropriate that he's the one to document these abuses of the medical care system.
Packard, Vance. The Waste Makers. Actually this one didn't make me cry as often as it made me laugh, because the author's voice is dry and witty. But it did give me the mental tools to resist the social pressure of the Advertising Age.
Richter, Conrad. Light in the Woods. This is only a novel that was acclaimed in the 1970s as part of a wave of national regret for the ways European immigrants behaved toward indigenous Americans in the early years of what became the nations now recognized on this continent. Various historical books that came out during those years are more informative. This was the one that had an emotional effect on me,, and apparently on many other Americans, in the 1970s.
Woodson, Carter G. The Mis-Education of the Negro. Woodson was one of Berea College's most distinguished alumni. Although he wrote strictly and scrupulously about what he could document among Black Americans in the early twentieth century, it's instructive for other mountain people and other people who might be seen as disadvantaged groups to consider to what extent Woodson documented the same behavior patterns we see in our communities today. This exercise will induce laughter, tears, and resolution.
Yousafzai, Malala. I Am Malala. I think all readers of this web site know what to expect.
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