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Thumper

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Everything posted by Thumper

  1. Hello All, I'm going to start doing my own thang on MLK Day. I'm going to read a non fiction book every January. One, I'm going to read something, anything, because so many white folks in the past did their level best to make sure that one of the things we, as black folks, were lacking was an education. With the laws on the books about us not being taught to read and write, then when slavery ended, our education system was still lacking in many parts of the country, for decades after slavery; it's the one thing I know I can do because so many did not want me to be able to read. I'm going with non fiction because, you all know I lean towards fiction, so I'm -- watch for it now -- broadening my horizon. *LOL*
  2. Hello All, Smiley Face: I have those two Mosley novels, but I haven't read them. I don't believe that he is jumping on any bandwagon, per se. I would imagine that he's stretching his artistic muscle. I also wonder if sales might have anything to do with it.
  3. Hello All, Carey: I don't know if you can have your credentials back yet or not. I'm still thinking about it. You may have to sit out this Oscar season because of it. Anyway, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, the movie, is based on a short story, same title, that was written by one of my favorite authors of all times, F. Scott Fitzgerald. I done went and pulled down my big volume of Fitzgerald's short stories. I remember when I moved out from my mother's house, got an apartment after being on my job for over a year, I got my hands on this huge volume of Fitzgerald's short stories, and I would read from the book every night before I went to sleep. I hadn't read the Button stories in years. I'm going to read it in a few and get back with you. I think short stories fit into this issue because be it novels or short stories, the origin of the movie comes from another literary source. In my opinion movies based on short stories are not judge as harshly as those based on novels because the novels are longer; thereby, taking the time to develop the story line, characters, settings, etc, that short stories don't have that benefit. There were 2 movie versions of The Postman Rings Twice; the first with Lana Turner and John Garfield, the second with Jack Nicholson and Jessica Lange. The second version, the Jack Nicholson version, SUCKED! I heard that there were other versions of Double Indemnity, but I have only seen the one with Barbara Stanwyck and Fred McMurray. As far as this year's Oscar goes. It's going to go down like this: Best Picture: The Hurt Locker Best Actor: Jeff Bridges - Crazy Heart Best Actress: Meryl Streep or Gabby Sidbie Best Supporting Actor: Christoph Waltz - Inglorious Basterds Best Supporting Actress: Mo'Nique - Precious BEst Director: Kathryn Bigelow - The Hurt Locker Now, this is how things are looking so far. But, I'm not going to make the final selections until a few more awards are presented and I'll get back with you. Here's a side note for you though that has gone unnoticed--Lee Daniels became the FIRST AA to be nominated as Best Director for the DGA award.
  4. Hello All, I was watching my girl Rachel Maddow the other night. This night happened to be after that fool Pat Robertson said that the Haitian people asked for that earthquake because their ancestors had made a deal with the devil in order to get the France's foot off their necks to become free from slavery. He's ignorant as all hell. The Haitian Ambassador was a guest of Rachel Maddow and he dropped some knowledge that I did not know: that if it was not for the Haitian people freeing themselves from the French, the French would not have sold the US the Louisiana Purchase. Many of you know that the Louisiana Purchase basically doubled, more than doubled, the United States. My interest was peeked and I got to looking for books--novels cause you all know I do fiction a lot better than I do non-fiction--that deals with the Haitian slave revolt. The novels that surfaced was the trilogy by Madison Smartt Bell: All Souls' Rising, Master of the Crossroads and The Stone the Builder Refused. Believe it or not, I had my copy of All Souls' Rising for years and never read it. After the conversation, I had to pull it down and put it on the pile. I see when it comes to our history, we still have to go out there and get it!
  5. Hello All, Since there don’t seem to be a lot of books coming across my desk, no less books that I want to read. So, this past summer I have been all over the map with my reading. I had started a new trend of reading books that are the basis of many of our classic movies. Naturally, I thought of my Ol’ Grayhead because I know he loves movies as much as I do. I began this kick after reading Nina Revyor’s marvelous novel, The Age of Dreaming. The Age of Dreaming is a novel that tells the life story of a Japanese actor who eventually became a Hollywood movie idol during Hollywood’s silent screen era. The book is Revyor’s masterpiece. I had reviewed Revyor’s previous two novels, The Necessary Hunger and Southland. I loved both of the novels. I was going to submit a review of The Age of Dreaming but couldn’t honestly do it because there were no African American characters in it. After reading the novel, I got to thinking, how many of the movies I love are different from the book. It is a standard belief that the books their motion picture counterparts are based on are better than their movies. I am one that holds this belief, so I do my utmost to read the current books that are made into movies before I see the movie. Oddly enough, I have not read the books that the classic movies are spawned. I set out to change that oversight. I started with All The Kings Men by Robert Penn Warren. The movie version featured Broderick Crawford, who won the Best Actor Oscar for his performance as the corrupt governor Willie Stark. The movie was awfully close to the book. I thought, OK, this is going good. So, I moved on to Goodbye, Columbus by Phillip Roth. I got turned on to this book because I had seen a Steve McQueen documentary on the Biography channel and Ali McGraw was discussed, which lead me to thinking about McGraw’s first picture that brought her to prominence; Goodbye, Columbus, costarring Richard Benjamin. I am not a fan of the movie, but I LOVE the book! Now that Phillip Roth is in my sights, do not be surprised if I begin a Phillip Roth kick. One night, I was flipping channels and ended up on the Fox Movie Channel and watched the last half of The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie. I wondered if before it became a movie, The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie was a book. I hopped on the internet, hit Amazon.com and discovered that there was a book which the movie was based, The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie by Muriel Sparks. I loved the book, which is better than the movie! Sparks is a remarkable writer, which kinda surprised me. Sparks is a British author. I find many British authors’ writing style stiff and suffocating. Sparks writing is simple, elegant and to the point. Fortunately for me, I bought the Everyman’s Library edition of the book which is hardcover and includes a few more novels by Sparks since Sparks believes in writing short novels. Now, I’m cooking with gas and now James M. Cain and Patricia Highsmith are up. James M. Cain wrote The Postman Rings Twice, Double Indemnity and Mildred Pierce. Patricia Highsmith wrote The Talented Mr. Ripley. She also wrote the Hitchcock classic Strangers on a Train. I’m going to have to get Strangers on a Train. Now, I’m at the beginning of The Postman Rings Twice. Except for John Garfield, the rest of the cast is NOTHING like the characters in the book. I love it. The storyline of The Postman Rings Twice in the movie stayed pretty close to the movie. But Double Indemnity was a total flip. The first quarter of the movie was real close to the book, but then everything flipped. The ending to Double Indemnity in the book pimp-slapped the hell out of me. There has not been that many times where an ending of a book rendered me speechless, and Double Indemnity is the latest addition to the short list. I am not going to tell it because you have to read it for yourself, but I have no doubt that it’ll get you too. Cain is one helluva writer! I haven’t had the chance to get to Patricia Highsmith yet. There are some awfully interesting AA books coming down the pike, so Ripley is going to have to go on the back burner for a minute, probably until the summer when I usually go on my Winter Wonderland reading vacation.
  6. Hello All, If you have read my review of Sleep Don't Come Easy, you'll notice that I wondered where all of the AA detectives have gone. I started looking around and really, where are they? I would have thought with all of the shoot 'em books that the publishers swear we, the AA reading audience, can't seem to do without; I would have thought that there would have been a couple of detective supermen to go along with that. Are mysteries to hard to write, to hard to read, what is going on?
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