[HPFGU-OTChatter] Writers and other artists of 20 century which in your opinion will be remembered

[Shaun Hately]

On 14/02/2012 10:21 AM, Miles wrote:

> C.S.Lewis: I'm sorry to say that he is far, far from being as popular
> outside US/UK. I never heard of Narnia before I joined this list. The
> movies
> might make a difference, but that does not help the author.

As I said in a previous message, Lewis is a lot more than Narnia. He 
wrote over fifty books and while the Narnia books are his best known, 
they are not his best or most literate work.

Most of work does come from a Christian viewpoint, quite a lot of it is 
philosophical examining the impact of Christian beliefs. But even when 
he's exploring those things, it's not all he does. The Screwtape 
Letters, for example, take the form of letters from a senior Demon - 
Screwtape - in the bureaucracy of hell to his nephew Wormwood, and 
explores all sorts of aspects of the human condition. My favourite of 
them, as a teacher (and a traditionalist teacher specifically) actually 
was published after the others, and includes a stinging criticism of 
educational theory of the 1950s which is even more valid today. It's 
wonderfully written and wonderfully insightful at the same time.

> C.S. Forester: Actually I do not know him, so...

His best known works are a series of novels set during the Napoleonic 
War period about a Royal Naval officer named Horatio Hornblower as he 
rises from Midshipman to Admiral, but again this is only part of his 
overall body of work.

> Terry Pratchett: Is this more than intelligent wordplay?

Yes. Especially, and increasingly, in later works. He gets into some 
very deep philosophical areas at times. If I may, I'll just share two 
passages from his novels that I think address why I think he is, as he 
says 'guilty of literature' not just writing funny books.

One of my favourite characters in the Discworld books is Sam Vimes. He 
is the Commander of the Ankh Morpork City Watch, the police. When we 
first see him, he's a self-hating drunk presiding over a remnant force 
of only a few men, but he and his force get turned around, and in later 
books, he has risen to being one of the most powerful men in the city, 
in charge of a large, efficient, police force. Vimes is always aware 
that he has a dark side. He knows he is capable of great evil - but he 
chooses not to be. He is basically incorruptible because he insists he 
will always do the right thing. He won't let the beast he knows inside 
of him out through sheer force of will.

In this scene, he has finally captured a truly evil criminal. This man 
has killed one of Vimes' men and other people, and has threatened to 
harm Vimes' wife and newborn son, who really are the only things in 
Vimes life that he truly loves.

*****

"That's it, Mister Vimes. No more knives. I can't run. I surrender. No 
messing about this time. I give in, okay? Just arrest me? For old times' 
sake?"

The beast screamed inside Vimes. It screamed that no one would blame him 
for doing the hangman out of ten dollars and a free breakfast. Yeah, and 
you could say a swift stab now was the merciful solution, because every 
hangman knew you could go the easy way or the hard way and there wasn't 
one in the country that'd let something like Carcer go the easy way. The 
gods knew the man deserved it...

...But young Sam was watching him, across thirty years.

When we break down, it all breaks down. That's just how it works. You 
can bend it, and if you make it hot enough you can bend it in a circle, 
but you can't break it. When you break it, it all breaks down until 
there's nothing unbroken. It starts here and now.

He lowered the sword.

Carcer looked up, grinning, and said, "Never tastes right, does it, 
haha, an egg without salt..."

Vimes felt his hand begin to move of its own accord 

And stopped. Red rage froze.

There was The Beast, all around him. And that's what it was. A beast. 
Useful, but still a beast. You could hold it on a chain, and make it 
dance, and juggle balls. It didn't think. It was dumb. What you were, 
what you were, was not The Beast.

You didn't have to do what it wanted. If you did, Carcer won.

He dropped the sword.

Carcer stared at him, the gleam of Vimes's sudden smile more worrying 
than the rictus of his rage. Then metal gleamed in his hand. But Vimes 
was already on him, grabbing the hand, slamming it again and again on 
John Keel's headstone until the fourth knife dropped from bleeding 
fingers. He dragged the man upright with both hands forced up behind his 
back and rammed him hard against the stone.

"See that up in the sky, Carcer?" he said, his mouth by the man's ear. 
"That's the sunset, that is. That's the stars. And they'll shine all the 
better on my lad Sam tomorrow night 'cos they won't be shining down on 
you, Carcer, by reason of the fact that before the dew's off the leaves 
in the morning I'll drag you in front of Vetinari, and we'll have the 
witnesses there, lots of 'em, and maybe even a lawyer for you if there's 
any of 'em who could plead for you with a straight face and then, 
Carcer, we'll take you to the Tanty, one gallows, no waiting, and you 
can dance the hemp fandango. And then I'll bleedin' well go home and 
maybe I'll even have a hard-boiled egg."

"You're hurting!"

"You know, you're right there, Carcer!" Vimes managed to get both the 
man's wrists in a steel grip, and ripped the sleeve off his own shirt. 
"I'm hurting and I'm still doing it all by the book." He wrapped the 
linen around the wrists a couple of times and knotted it firmly. "I'll 
make sure there's water in your cell, Carcer. I'll make sure you get 
breakfast, anything you like. I'll make sure the hangman doesn't get 
sloppy and let you choke to death. I'll even make sure the trapdoor is 
greased." He released the pressure. Carcer stumbled, and Vimes kicked 
his legs from under him.

"The machine ain't broken, Carcer. The machine is waiting for you,' he 
said, tearing a sleeve off the man's own shirt and fashioning it into a 
crude binding for his ankles. The city will kill you dead. The proper 
wheels'll turn. It'll be fair, I'll make sure of that. Afterwards you 
won't be able to say you didn't have a fair trial. Won't be able to say 
a thing, haha. I'll see to that, too."

*****

The second one, also concerns two members of the Watch - Captain Carrot 
Ironfounderson and his girlfriend/lover Angua. Angua is a werewolf, one 
who keeps all her tendencies towards mayhem under control. She left the 
city when she worried she was no longer able to control her feelings, 
and Carrot loves Angua with all his heart, and gave up everything else 
he valued to find her. But he is an utterly good and decent man. Angua's 
brother has recently gone wild, and been killing and hunting people, and 
Commander Vimes was forced to kill him to take him down. And now Carrot 
has finally found Angua, and the two are finally together again.

*****

Let"s go now," said Carrot. "The coronation will be over soon, and I 
don"t want Mister Vimes to worry."

"Carrot! I've got to know something."

"Yes?"

"That might happen to me. Have you ever thought about that? He was my 
brother, after all. Being two things at the same time, and never quite 
being one... we're not the most stable of creatures."

"Gold and muck come out of the same shaft," said Carrot.

"That's just a dwarf saying!"

"It"s true, though. You"re not him."

"Well, if it happened... if it did... would you do what Vimes did? 
Carrot? Would it be you who picked up a weapon and came after me? I know 
you won't lie. I've got to know. Would it be you?"

A little snow slid down from the trees. The wolves watched. Carrot 
looked up for a moment at the grey sky and then nodded.

"Yes."

She sighed. "Promise?" she said.

*****

> Rudyard Kipling: Perhaps, thanks to Disney's world wide distribution

God, no. :)

Again, Kipling is *far* more than the Jungle Book. He won the 1907 Nobel 
Prize for Literature for a reason and it wasn't The Jungle Book that 
counted. Personally, I think he greatest works are his poems. 'If...' is 
my favourite and probably his best known poem, but I think there are 
better poems out there. Again, just to share one. To understand this 
one, know that "Thomas Atkins" or "Tommy Atkins" was the name given to 
the archetypal "English soldier". Soldiers were given an example on how 
to fill out their paybooks with the name "Thomas Atkins" on it, and it 
became the general name for all English soldiers (why they were known as 
'Tommies' in the First World War, for example). And Kipling wrote a poem 
called Tommy.

****

I went into a public-'ouse to get a pint o' beer,
The publican 'e up an' sez, "We serve no red-coats here."
The girls be'ind the bar they laughed an' giggled fit to die,
I outs into the street again an' to myself sez I:
O it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Tommy, go away";
But it's "Thank you, Mister Atkins", when the band begins to play,
The band begins to play, my boys, the band begins to play,
O it's "Thank you, Mister Atkins", when the band begins to play.

I went into a theatre as sober as could be,
They gave a drunk civilian room, but 'adn't none for me;
They sent me to the gallery or round the music-'alls,
But when it comes to fightin', Lord! they'll shove me in the stalls!
For it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Tommy, wait outside";
But it's "Special train for Atkins" when the trooper's on the tide,
The troopship's on the tide, my boys, the troopship's on the tide,
O it's "Special train for Atkins" when the trooper's on the tide.

Yes, makin' mock o' uniforms that guard you while you sleep
Is cheaper than them uniforms, an' they're starvation cheap;
An' hustlin' drunken soldiers when they're goin' large a bit
Is five times better business than paradin' in full kit.
Then it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Tommy, 'ow's yer soul?"
But it's "Thin red line of 'eroes" when the drums begin to roll,
The drums begin to roll, my boys, the drums begin to roll,
O it's "Thin red line of 'eroes" when the drums begin to roll.

We aren't no thin red 'eroes, nor we aren't no blackguards too,
But single men in barricks, most remarkable like you;
An' if sometimes our conduck isn't all your fancy paints,
Why, single men in barricks don't grow into plaster saints;
While it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Tommy, fall be'ind",
But it's "Please to walk in front, sir", when there's trouble in the wind,
There's trouble in the wind, my boys, there's trouble in the wind,
O it's "Please to walk in front, sir", when there's trouble in the wind.

You talk o' better food for us, an' schools, an' fires, an' all:
We'll wait for extry rations if you treat us rational.
Don't mess about the cook-room slops, but prove it to our face
The Widow's Uniform is not the soldier-man's disgrace.
For it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Chuck him out, the brute!"
But it's "Saviour of 'is country" when the guns begin to shoot;
An' it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' anything you please;
An' Tommy ain't a bloomin' fool - you bet that Tommy sees!

*****

> Arthur C. Clarke. John Buchan: Who?

Arthur C. Clarke was one of the premier Science Fictions authors of the 
twentieth century. His best known book is 2001: A Space Odyssey, which 
was, of course, made into a film.

John Buchan was a Scottish novelist (and eventually was also Governor 
General of Canada. He wrote somewhere around twenty or thirty novels 
about explorers and adventurers, really rollicking enjoyable works.

> James Joyce: Difficult reading. Maybe something for scholars in 100 years?

Not all of Joyce is difficult, but yes, a lot of it is.

> Aldous Huxley: Brave new world - anything more? (I know more and love it,
> but most people only know the title of B.N.W., not even the content)

> P.G. Wodehouse.

One of the greater humorous writers in English. Tended to write books 
set early in the twentieth century concerning upper class English 
gentlemen, rather parodying their ideas and attitudes. Juts incredibly 
funny.

> Noel Coward: Who?

A playwright and sometime songwriter. I'm not that surprised he might 
not be well known to German speakers as some of his work is decidedly 
anti-German - not surprising as it was written during the Second World 
War and they bombed his house (he was also on the list of people the 
Nazis planned to immediately round up and execute if they invaded Britain).