I dream of hippos

My health is improved but does not, shall we say, sparkle. Tonight a winter storm is forecast. I’m hoping that tomorrow my high school workplace will be closed, or at least that its classes will be delayed for two hours; and that Bethel will not be closed. It’ll be the last day of regular classes there. I want to finish watching The Two Escobars with my students. It was gratifying, yesterday, to listen to them gasp at René Higuita (his famous escorpión play) and at Carlos Valderrama (his mere physical appearance).

Reflecting on Colombia, I am pleased to think of its wild hippos, whose ancestors escaped the finca of Pablo Escobar. Sadly, this article reports that the authorities have set out to castrate those hippos. Happily, this article suggests that it will not be easy to subject them to the knife.

Karin put up our Christmas tree last night, and while we slept the kitties knocked it down, which surprised us zilcho. Now we’re home from work. The tree is still upright. The kitties seem to have accepted the tree. I have two or three chapters of John Charles Chasteen to read this evening, and ten study questions per chapter to write, or else my students will get off easy when they take their final exams. As I said, the semester is nearly ended. I’m making a mental list of holiday readings for myself. I hope that over Christmas I’ll enjoy a respite from illness so that I can lie on the couch and read and watch TV.

Rosaura; born in blood and fire; monsters’ offspring; Leibniz; I know what you did last summer; down a dark hall

I haven’t had much time for blogging, but during the last few weeks I’ve managed to read good-sized portions of several books. They haven’t been difficult books (not even Leibniz’s Political Writings have been very difficult; for one thing, Leibniz digresses at key moments to promote the use and development of microscopes). Nor have they been lengthy books. But they’ve all been “top quality.”

Some more titles:

(1) Born in Blood and Fire: A Concise History of Latin America, by John Charles Chasteen. My Spanish “beginning” students will be tasked, after Thanksgiving, with reading this. It’s the liveliest general history of Latin America that I know of.

(2) Rosaura a las diez, by Marco Denevi, with notes and cuestionarios by Donald A. Yates. This is an Argentinian mystery novel, in the fashion of Wilkie Collins. (Yates’s introduction goes so far as to say that Denevi’s only literary influence was Wilkie Collins.) Rosaura was recommended to me by my Uncle Tim, who read it in high school. Right now I’m forcing my Spanish “intermediate” students to read it. How they struggle.

(3) I Know What You Did Last Summer, by Lois Duncan. Until recently, I only knew this as the lousy slasher movie that came out when I was a youth – the movie with the hook-handed killer known as the “Fisherman.” Lo and behold, the tale began as an early-’70s novel. The novel has no “Fisherman.” It does have narcissistic teenagers in a hell of their own making, a hell of regret, of jealousy, and of fear. This is not a merciless book, but it is a deeply unsettling one.

Duncan was quite prolific, quite expert at writing this sort of thing. I’ve started reading another of her grim offerings, Down a Dark Hall.

(4) Children of Monsters: An Inquiry into the Sons and Daughters of Dictators, by Jay Nordlinger. Each chapter treats a different dictator and his offspring. Hitler – did he have children? Mussolini. Stalin. Mao. The Ceausescus. Castro. Gaddafi. Saddam Hussein. Mobutu. Bokassa. Amin. Pol Pot. It reads a little like Kings and Chronicles, especially when it covers the dynastic dictatorships (the Kims, the Duvaliers, the Assads). Though it’s wryly written, it’s still a bit of a chore to get through. The chapters are nevertheless worth reading in the given order, because they set the stage for one of the most compelling characters: Idi Amin’s son, Jaffar, who manages to be both a peace advocate and a “chip off the old block” (many dictators’ children have tended to be one or the other, but not both). With Jaffar it’s as if the psychological pieces almost fit together, and it’s poignant. (If only the dictators had been more like Jaffar, instead of, you know, murderers.)

Nordlinger has written a book which is “on the other side of the looking-glass” to this one. It’s about the recipients of the Nobel Peace Prize. I intend to read it soon.