Miscellaneous Links

[KxBurns]

Here is a place for you to post miscellaneous links pertaining to things you've come across in the book. Feel free to use that as a starting point for your own discussions. Fire away!

Karen

[Maria_H]

Please us this thread to post links relevant to the book. The discussion entitled "Grace's Father" will return when threads for Part 3 are posted.

Thanks!

[CanTri]

Here's a link to the Christmas Market in the City of Nuremberg. Where the Christmas Angel is from that Emmeline breaks while trying to put it on the top of the tree.

http://www.christkindlesmarkt.de/english/index.php?navi=1&rid=2

[Peppermill]

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CanTri wrote: Here's a link to the Christmas Market in the City of Nuremberg. Where the Christmas Angel is from that Emmeline breaks while trying to put it on the top of the tree.

http://www.christkindlesmarkt.de/english/index.php?navi=1&rid=2

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Delightful! Thanks, Kim. I had never heard of this. The crown the real life angel wears is great fun, as are her "wings" of pleated gold lamé. The children in many of the pictures provide a charming "visit." What I didn't find (surprisingly) was a section with ornaments for sale. And, then, too, we notice the angel's cascade of crimped golden hair -- another HAR angel?

[BookWoman718]

The Christkinklmarkts are a beloved tradition in many cities in Austria and Germany. A few years ago, I had a family member who lived with his family in Vienna, and I visited them in the summer. They mentioned that I should really come back in the winter, at the time of the markets, and the next year I did. Imagine the frosty air, carols in the background, people of all ages bundled up, laughing, buying pretzels and sausages and steaming hot mulled wine, and booth upon booth of ornaments, handcrafts, toys, food, gifts. My memories of the time spent exploring and enjoying the markets are really special, and they are rekindled each year when I unwrap the fragile glass balls, the clunky 'smokers', and the exquisitely painted tiny village figures that I bought as special souvenirs. Fortunately, my angel is carved wood, but I identified immediately with the Christmas tree trimming scene.

[Peppermill]

Here are a few links to information about WWI:

"Most military offensives ended with few gains and enormous casualties. On the first day of the Battle of the Somme in 1916, the British Army lost around 20,000 men. The offensive cost the Allies over half a million casualties but only penetrated 12km at most into German lines."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/worldwars/wwone/launch_vt_wwone_trench.shtml

This site has a virtual tour of trenches (appear to be mock-ups without actual warfare views), but it takes appropriate software to access.

The final page of this series on "origins" suggests books, provides additional links, and suggests museums to visit.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/worldwars/wwone/origins_01.shtml

"What made World War One so different was the long-term impact of the Industrial Revolution, with its accompanying political and social changes. This was the first mass global war of the industrialised age, a demonstration of the prodigious strength, resilience and killing power of modern states. The war was also fought at a high point of patriotism and belief in the existing social hierarchy; beliefs that the war itself helped destroy, and that the modern world finds very hard to understand."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/worldwars/wwone/total_war_01.shtml

You can lose yourself for awhile on these links and the further links these pages suggest. History lesson/review time??

[Peppermill]

I finally had a chance to trace down a bit more on first person narrative and unreliable narrator techniques. Some of this may be of interest to other readers here.

Part of what sustained my curiosity of these techniques was the testimony of John Dean back in the Watergate days. There was a lot of discussion at the time about what memory could reasonably recall. Much of that concerned the exact recollection of dialog.

These sites discuss some of the applicable narrative types and points of view. (The sites, however, are not fully referenced.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_person_narrative

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unreliable_narrator

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Point_of_view_%28literature%29

"The first-person point of view sacrifices omniscience and omnipresence for a greater intimacy with one character. It allows the reader to see what the focus character is thinking; it also allows that character to be further developed through his or her own style in telling the story. First-person narrations may be told like third person ones; on the other hand, the narrator may be conscious of telling the story to a given audience, perhaps at a given place and time, for a given reason. In extreme cases, the first-person narration may be told as a story within a story, with the narrator appearing as a character in the frame story."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_person_limited_omniscient

Third person limited omniscient (The dialogue?)

"While an omniscient point of view can change viewpoint characters instantly, the limited omniscient point of view narrative limits narration to what can be known, seen, thought, or judged from a single character's perspective. Thus, the narration is limited in the same way a first-person narrative might be, but the text is written from the third-person perspective."

The site includes some comments from Henry James about the artistic possibilities of this point of view.

[Peppermill]

Here are two links on lies, neither particularly authoritative, but both of which may be of interest to some as background for the discussions here. One categorizes various types of lies, including the Augustine of Hippo description of eight kinds of lies and his assignment of order of severity. This article cites several philosophers who condemned all lying. The second article takes the rather jocose view that "we lie if we believe we do not lie."

I haven't taken much time to select these two sites to call out. Personally, I would welcome studies or more carefully annotated reports that someone might call to our attention. I found interesting here the comments about the development of truth telling skills in children and the references to uses of deceit as survival skills in non-human animals.

I am also interested in the guilt that children bear when parents divorce or die, and when the child links that event to some statement, action, or omission on their part. (Does part of Grace's guilt have qualities like that of a child? If I choose to be negative and to judge Grace, I feel as if she subjugates mature guilt and hides responsibility behind childish guilt -- i.e., at the story's end, does she herself still feel more culpable for lying about her book purchase {about studying shorthand} than for withholding information at a crime scene?)


"The philosophers Saint Augustine, as well as Thomas Aquinas and Immanuel Kant, condemned all lying. However, Thomas Aquinas also had an argument for lying. According to all three, there are no circumstances in which one may lie. One must be murdered, suffer torture, or endure any other hardship, rather than lie, even if the only way to protect oneself is to lie. Each of these philosophers gave several arguments against lying, all compatible with each other. Among the more important arguments are:

1. "Lying is a perversion of the natural faculty of speech, the natural end of which is to communicate the thoughts of the speaker.
2. "When one lies, one undermines trust in society."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lie


"As long as we aren’t hurting others or breaking the law, these innocent lies can make life more pleasant. They can absorb potential friction between our varying personalities and vacillating moods as we nudge into one another on the quest through our daily routine. Most of these white lies only stretch an interpretation of what the truth actually is anyways. Given our rigid optimism to each lead a tailored ideal life, white lies simply cushion us from ourselves."

http://www.marcandangel.com/2007/10/04/
the-15-most-common-white-lies-and-why/
(Use both lines for link or use tinyurl below.)

http://tinyurl.com/2kvb3g

Message Edited by Peppermill on 01-20-2008 01:36 AM

[Choisya]

Part of what sustained my curiosity of these techniques was the testimony of John Dean back in the Watergate days. There was a lot of discussion at the time about what memory could reasonably recall. Much of that concerned the exact recollection of dialog.


Thanks Pepper - interesting links and equally interesting post!

I too feel that we must regard Grace, at the age of 90+, as an unreliable narrator and I base this on my own 75 year old memory and of others around me of similar ages. There have been many times when I have heard people of my own age recalling the past in 'rosy spectacle' terms - no crime, no sexual assaults, no paedophilia etc etc and I wonder whether my own memory of crime, sexual assaults, paedophilia etc is faulty. The other day I listened to a Polish old lady recalling pre-WWII Poland, saying that her grandmother, a factory worker in Warsaw in the 1930s, was able to buy a new dress and a new pair of shoes every week and that her husband frequently bought her gold jewellery because times were so good (pre-Hitler, pre-Communism). I recalled that Poland was one of the poorest countries in Europe pre-WWII, subject to eternal border disputes between Russia and Germany and in 1932 was severely affected by the Holodomor famine in the Ukraine, which caused thousands to flee over the border into Poland. I decided that the bitter times this lady had endured in a Poland occupied by Russians, then by Germans, then again by Russians was probably so traumatic that she needed a 'rosy' past to cling on to. I suspect that we all have a tendency to put the bad things in our memory 'out of mind' and to only remember the good - and the further away we are from those memories the easier it becomes - especially as our memories fade with age anyway. So it may have been with Grace - she needed to tell white lies to herself and to others because the truth was so painful.

I believe with Kant and others that all lies harm ourselves if not others - harm our personal, internal integrity. But 'white lies' can save the pain of others and protect us from what is painful for us to remember, so they become a lesser evil. The second of your premises, that lying 'undermines trust in society', is also very true - if we are not generally able to believe those around us to a large extent (yes, even our politicians!) then we would not be able to function and would live our lives in perpetual doubt and indecision. Hence the 'big deal' we make about politicians and other important people when they fall from grace - we need the reassurance that, at bottom, all is well.

White lies are perhaps what Burke would call being 'economical with the truth'-

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economical_with_the_truth

http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/127700.html

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Peppermill wrote:
I finally had a chance to trace down a bit more on first person narrative and unreliable narrator techniques. Some of this may be of interest to other readers here.

Part of what sustained my curiosity of these techniques was the testimony of John Dean back in the Watergate days. There was a lot of discussion at the time about what memory could reasonably recall. Much of that concerned the exact recollection of dialog.

These sites discuss some of the applicable narrative types and points of view. (The sites, however, are not fully referenced.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_person_narrative

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unreliable_narrator

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Point_of_view_%28literature%29

"The first-person point of view sacrifices omniscience and omnipresence for a greater intimacy with one character. It allows the reader to see what the focus character is thinking; it also allows that character to be further developed through his or her own style in telling the story. First-person narrations may be told like third person ones; on the other hand, the narrator may be conscious of telling the story to a given audience, perhaps at a given place and time, for a given reason. In extreme cases, the first-person narration may be told as a story within a story, with the narrator appearing as a character in the frame story."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_person_limited_omniscient

Third person limited omniscient (The dialogue?)

"While an omniscient point of view can change viewpoint characters instantly, the limited omniscient point of view narrative limits narration to what can be known, seen, thought, or judged from a single character's perspective. Thus, the narration is limited in the same way a first-person narrative might be, but the text is written from the third-person perspective."

The site includes some comments from Henry James about the artistic possibilities of this point of view.

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[deetm5282]

I thought the book excellent. I believe that Grace is a very good narrator even if she is 90+ years. It kept my interest and such an unusual ending. I never would have thought that Hannah would run away with her brothers friend. Great book!!!!!!!