At 05:46 AM 05/05/2005 -0700, you wrote:
>The essence of Hemingway escapes you. The
dominant
>theme that runs through all of Hemingway's work
is
>grace under pressure, a theme that is every bit
as
>relevant and universal as anything Conrad
did.
Grace under pressure? What a pleasant homily for the
powerful. I think you may just have confirmed Etienne's
point.
But I mostly wanted to develop Dennis' observation:
Being a Canadian doesn't entirely let you off the hook, any
more than being a Brit does. While Canada has mumbled against
the course the US and Tony Blair have taken, and so have
Britons, neither has stood up and genuinely disowned the 300
million pound gorilla south of your border. The only way to
defeat a bully is to stand up to him, say it like it is, and
declare that THIS emperor, too, has no clothes.
This is very true, but you have to remember that Canada is an
economic colony of the U.S., every bit as firmly as it was
once a colony of Great Britain. As such, we are culturally
repressed. Just yesterday a Toronto printer I work with
complained that business has been bad since 9/11, and that
things had been made worse when a Member of Parliament
bad-mouthed George Bush (and much of that in
self-deprecation.) I don't know if the loss of work was
direct, or through a well-recognized decline in local
tourism, but clearly the printer felt that mouthing off to
the Yanks was not a wise thing to do.
I assure you that there are many discussions in Canada, a
number of which have been published, that address the current
state of haberdashery in Washington, with opinions aired from
both sides, but there's little to be gained, and much to be
lost by loudly declaiming the neighbour's taste in fashion.
Instead, one takes one's friends, even the most insincere
friends, aside and quietly suggests that they zip it up. If
they refuse, one withdraws and hopes for a more suitable
occasion on which to express neighbourly support.
That, I think, is grace under pressure.
Best, Kerry
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