BABYLON

"Walking carefully, downhill, Anselmo in the lead, Agustin next, Robert Jordan placing his feet carefully so that he would not slip, feeling the dead pine needles under his rope-soled shoes, bumping a tree root with one foot and putting a hand forward and feeling the cold metal jut of the automatic rifle barrel and the shoes sliding and grooving the forest floor, putting his left hand out again and touching the rough bark of a tree trunk, then as he braced himself his hand feeling a smooth place, the bases of the palm of his hand coming away sticky from the resinous sap where a blaze had been cut, they dropped down the steep wooded hillside to the point above the bridge where Robert Jordan and Anselmo had watched the first day"--For Whom the Bell Tolls

Last Tuesday I saw Babylon with John P.  It's like being on a runaway train:  unsettling in places, but you may as well enjoy it.  Brad Pitt has a subtle way of winking at the audience.

Finished For Whom the Bell Tolls yesterday.  It's a masterpiece of grim realism, though not so romantic.  I was thinking of doing Robert Louis Stevenson's Kidnapped and David Balfour for my now-defunct book club, and maybe I'll reread them anyway. (I'm interested in Scottish history these days.)

My History Meetup's next subject will be India's ancient Maurya Dynasty, so I'm now going to read Charles Allen's Ashoka:  The Search for India's Lost Emperor. (Walter Isaacson's Benjamin Franklin biography was excellent!) I may do the Spanish Civil War in April since Hemingway got me interested in that.

The week before last my historical movie watch party showed David Mamet's superb adaptation of Terence Rattigan's play The Winslow Boy.  I didn't return it right away because Moira wanted to see it too, and then I forgot about it and only returned it a day late.  But they didn't charge a late fee!

Moira's gone to Kingston for a while so I'm living on my own.  I went to the supermarket and bought nine frozen dinners! (I can cook, but it seems pointless to go to the trouble of cooking no more than one person will eat...)

It's pomelo season again!