Tuesday, January 16, 2018

January 16, 2003

"I was on my knees, and on the point of possessing my darling, when two bearded  brothers, the old man of the sea and his brother, came out of the sea with exclamations of ribald encouragement, and four months later she died of typhus in Corfu"--Lolita

Dreamed of seeing Leo Di Caprio in Catch Me if You Can--not of watching the film in a cinema but actually being in the movie scene, an observer rather than a character.

We went to see Nicholas Nickleby at Canada Square.  It was a handsome production and well cast--especially Christopher Plummer's villainous uncle--but talk about shameless!  Jamie Bell's deathbed scene had me thinking, "Hurry up and die!" (Smike is one of those passive characters who have to die because that's the only way they can do something dramatic.  The book was one of Dicken's first, and lacks the finesse of later works like Great Expectations. [Another character like Smike is Little Nell in Dicken's Old Curiosity Shop.]

Afterward we ate at the Mandarin restaurant nearby. It's always a challenge controlling your appetite at those buffet places.  My fortune cookie said, "Be direct--you'll accomplish more that way." [You can improve a fortune cookie line by adding the words "...in bed"!]

New Harper's had a book review about Benjamin Franklin.

Still no reply from Ardour--she hasn't visited the website yet--but I sent a message to Emma.

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