Time trippin'

I'm now reading a curious little book, a novel called The House on the Strand, by Daphne du Maurier. You may recognize the name because her work was twice filmed by Alfred Hitchcock, with Rebecca and The Birds. Strand depicts a businessman* who goes back in time and gets involved in political intrigue in Cornwall. 

One thing worth mentioning is that the protagonist doesn't step foot inside a time machine. He takes a drug which an old school chum of his has developed. This book was written in the late sixties, and the idea of a time travel drug seems kind of native to the time. Philip K. Dick used it at least once, in Now Wait for Last Year. 

The book isn't crazy psychedelic fantasy or Phildickian paranoia, though. du Maurier incorporates the premise into her own style, which is more staid.

* In a previous edit I stated that the protagonist was a scientist. In the course of the novel it becomes apparent that he isn't, although his friend is.

Fair game

One thing you could say about Sarah Jane Baker is that her choice of post-transition name isn't doing Doctor Who fandom any favors. And that she's a psycho. There's that, too.

Then there's the response of the authorities in London, which is troubling. Even if we were going by ideal American standards of free speech, a released felon and obvious basket case openly advocating violence would be pushing it. And Britain doesn't have those standards, but at best a notion of less repression being better. 

So Baker is being protected and the terven are, for the most part, not. So who's making this call, and on whose behalf? Who benefits? Questions that are going to keep arising.

No sour grapes

Sitting here, mentally preparing for bedtime, I found myself thinking about Aesop. As one does, of course. Specifically I was wondering who he actually was. The short answer is that no one knows. He is said to have been born in Mesembria, which might mean that he was of Thracian descent, or not. Some have described him as a Black African, but this might just be a misunderstanding based on his name.

The stretch of time is funny. Aesop's lifetime at the tail end of the Iron Age was just a minute ago in geographical time. And indeed the tales, the fables, have survived, although they were probably heavily revised when Latin and Ancient Greek were still being spoken. But it was long enough ago that the doings of individual people have become quite mysterious.

I love you, you big dummy

I just watched the 1978 film Magic tonight. First time seeing it. You've likely seen it or at least heard the basic outline, so I won't go into plot synopsis. I will say that Fats is one nightmarish puppet. They didn't fall short there. Anthony Hopkins apparently wanted to get rid of the prop, but obviously they couldn't until the movie was complete. Suffering for your art and all that.

Burgess Meredith is quite good as the concerned agent. Who smokes some long-ass cigars. Meredith seems to have gotten typecast as characters with Freudian smoking habits.

Woman of at least two names

I recently read The Mystery of a Butcher's Shop, by Gladys Mitchell. It's the second book featuring her series detective, Dame Beatrice Adele Lestrange Bradley, who generally goes by the simpler name of Mrs. Bradley.

This book has been described as a parody of Agatha Christie's plots. The central crime is so gruesome and gory that someday everyone is going to think it's a parody of Tobe Hooper and/or Wes Craven. But it's presented in that Good Olde English Mystery way. The crime takes place in a village that has more than its share of cads and nitwits.

One thing that's very entertaining about Mrs. Bradley as a character is how spooky and off-putting she appears to be within the world of the story. She laughs at inappropriate places and her air of knowing much more than she lets on leaves others unsure of where she stands on the moral spectrum. She's good, but on her own stranger terms. While her psychiatric practice and mention of a grown son mean she's not a complete outcast, she is somewhat alien. The narration often compares her to a bird of prey or a saurian.

In the late 90s the BBC aired a television series starring Mrs. Bradley, played by Diana Rigg. The character would have been much better served by never having her adventures adapted into any other medium. For some reason they thought that she'd dress like a flapper and spout progressive banalities from three decades or so in the future. All it proved to me is that the Beeb is fully capable of the Hollywood practice of adapting books which no one involved has read.

Lawfare

Ideally rights shouldn't be a zero sum game. When one becomes freer, so do the rest of us. But rights can be defined, legislated, litigated so that they become a zero sum game. This falls under the heading of ways that leaders can depict their enemies as beyond the pale.

Why do I bring this up? Oh, no reason. No reason at all.

Unrelatedly I wonder who else is in on the bet Gavin Newsom and Gretchen Whitmer seem to have between them as to who can dumbass their way into the Oval Office the fastest.

Pyrotechnics eh

Fireworks have been going off this evening. I've heard them but haven't seen them, which means they're probably just in someone's backyard. Independence Day isn't for a couple of days yet. It is, however, Canada Day. So maybe a few people are just jumping the gun. Or maybe there's an underground of expatriate Canucks around hear planning to liberate the homeland. 

You know, hope springs eternal in the human breast.