I think I've mentioned this before, but a recent NY Times article reminded me:

In the pre-Potter days, would an American publisher have brought out "The Water Mirror"? Hard to say, but Kai Meyer's very European fantasy, translated gracefully from German by Elizabeth D. Crawford, brings a refreshing, and occasionally jarring, perspective to New World readers.

No American children's book would take such a derogatory view of fat people, for example. In "The Water Mirror," fat characters are baddies and thinness is usually a sign of virtue.

This always throws me in the Harry Potter and Roald Dahl's books. Wish Fay would drop by to comment or get a little Brit-perspective on it.

I recall being rather nonplussed by the book Fattypuffs and Thinifers [link] (which is not particularly flattering to either, really) when I read it as a kid. But I guess it was by a Frenchman, now that I look at it. Andre Maurois, who knew?

Andre Maurois, who knew?

They're sneaky, those French.

Who are fat villains in Dahl? I can think of Aunt Sponge; all the rest (brewer in Danny..., Veruca Salt's parents) seem to be overweight by virtue of epitomizing the wealthy and overfed upper-classes, in contrast to poverty-stricken heroes. But I'm not a Dahl completist.

Augustus Gloop, but then, the whole point of him was overindulgence. If AUgustus Gloop had been skinny, he would have been a very strange object lesson.

I remember Fattypuffs and Thinifers, or, just enough to remember that the skinny people ate their meals standing up, and I thought that was stupid.

seem to be overweight by virtue of epitomizing the wealthy and overfed upper-classes, in contrast to poverty-stricken heroes.

This may be possible, but it's the particular way he writes about fatness that has a very judgemental tone.

Whaddya talk? Everything Dahl wrote had a judgemental tone. Dude was Judge Dredd, William Rehnquist, and Satan all rolled into one slightly-rumpled body. I say that with love, but not a lot of illusions. Check out his feelings about mothers, and people who don't read, and anyone who would dare to harm a hair on wittle Matilda's head.

In other news, I am finishing up The Natural, and it is not all that and a bag of tricks. I guess I just don't get it, or I am not wowed by its post-war OMG Manliness! I hardly knew ye! stance. It's not bad, but -- it feels like a book whose time came and went.

Next up: either I Capture the Castle or an annotated edition of Ring Lardner Jr. stories. (Now there is a book whose time came and went!)

Has anyone here read Stephen Unwin's The Probability of God? I've just finished it, and I've love to discuss it.

I've read it, Am-Chou, but it was a while ago.

Has anyone here tried audible.com? I'm not listening to as much music, what with the headaches, so spoken word is becoming more appealing.

I have some stuff that I ripped off my own CDs, and some MP3 recordings of radio broadcasts, and an wondering about branching out.

I can get pretty cheap books on DVD from a used bookstore near me, but the selection is erratic, and I still have to, you know, do work.