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A couple days ago I mentioned that I was starting to read The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath. I read Chapter One that first night before falling asleep. I have to admit I was somewhat skeptical. Too much of the frilly, feminine fluff I had come to expect from the disappointing writings of most female writers.
Well, I have now read through Chapter 7 and admit that I was wrong, quite wrong. And now I am thoroughly hooked.
One thing though . . .
I admit that I have always been a nitpicker and prone to finding fault with little things a writer does or does not do, whether or not the nit I pick is meaningful or not. In The Bell Jar, Ms Plath describes a character as being overly fat and she compares his size with that of Sydney Greenstreet. While I am old enough to appreciate the comparison, I am sure that very few young people reading it today would not be able to identify Sydney Greenstreet as the portly gentleman attempting to acquire a priceless relic from private detective Sam Spade (played by Humphrey Bogart) in the 1941 film, The Maltese Falcon.
Note: The Maltese Falcon has been named as one of the greatest films of all time by Roger Ebert and Entertainment.Weekly, and was cited by Panorama du Film Noir Américain as the first major film noir.
Of course all that is trivial and insignificant.
So sue me. I said I was a nitpicker.
More later . . .
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Did You Know . . .?
Only one person in two billion will live to be 116 or older.
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HISTORICAL EVENT
The Leonids meteor shower is an annual event that is greatly enhanced every 33 years or so by the appearance of the comet Tempel-Tuttle. When the comet returns, the Leonids can produce rates of up to several thousand meteors per hour that can light up the sky on a clear night. Douglass witnessed one such manifestation of the Leonids shower, and the subsequent return of the comet Tempel-Tuttle in 1833 is credited as inspiring the first organized study of meteor astronomy.
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WORD FOR TODAY
temporal
adjective
1. Of, relating to, or limited by time: a temporal dimension; temporal and spatial boundaries.
2. Of or relating to the material world; worldly: the temporal possessions of the Church.
3. Lasting only for a time; not eternal; passing: our temporal existence.
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CELEBRITY BIRTHDAYS
(born November 12, 1934)
Charles Manson is an American criminal and musician who led what became known as the Manson Family, a quasi-commune that arose in California in the late 1960s. He was found guilty of conspiracy to commit the murders of Sharon Tate and Leno and Rosemary LaBianca carried out by members of the group at his instruction. He was convicted of the murders through the joint-responsibility rule, which makes each member of a conspiracy guilty of crimes his fellow conspirators commit in furtherance of the conspiracy's objective.
At the time the Family began to form, Manson was an unemployed former convict, who had spent half of his life in correctional institutions for a variety of offenses. Manson's death sentence was automatically commuted to life imprisonment when a 1972 decision by the Supreme Court of California temporarily eliminated the state's death penalty. California's eventual reinstatement of capital punishment did not affect Manson, who is currently incarcerated at Corcoran State Prison.
(born November 12, 1954)
Rhonda Shear is an American television personality, comedian, and actress. She is best known for her role as a host of the USA Network's 1980s and '90s weekend B-movie show, USA Up All Night. From 1991 to 1998 she hosted segments that aired on Friday (and later moved to Saturday) nights, replacing comedian Caroline Schlitt. Shear also briefly hosted a comedy program called Spotlight Cafe.
In June 1991, Shear posed in Playboy magazine's Funny Girls pictorial. In October 1993, she appeared in her own Playboy pictorial titled "Rhonda Up All Night". Rhonda also co-starred in numerous sitcoms from playing the Fonz's girlfriend on Happy Days to the sexy neighbor on Married with Children. She then made her way into stand-up comedy,
(born November 12, 1982)
Anne Hathaway is an American actress. After several stage roles, she appeared in the 1999 television series Get Real, coming to prominence after playing Mia Thermopolis in the Disney film The Princess Diaries (2001) and in its 2004 sequel. Since then, Hathaway has starred in dramatic films such as Havoc and Brokeback Mountain, in 2005. She has also starred in The Devil Wears Prada (2006) with Meryl Streep and in Becoming Jane (2007) as Jane Austen.
(Nov 12, 1922 - Sep 11, 2002)
Kim Hunter was an American film, theatre, and television actress. She won both an Academy Award and a Golden Globe Award, each as Best Supporting Actress, for her performance as Stella Kowalski in the 1951 film A Streetcar Named Desire. Decades later she was nominated for a Daytime Emmy Award for her work on the long-running soap The Edge of Night.
Although not recognizable because of the costume and make-up, Hunter's most frequently played movie role was that of Dr. Zira in the film Planet of the Apes and its two sequels.
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Time passes, and little by little everything that we have spoken in falsehood becomes true.
--Marcel Proust
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