Fear

Passages

Every passage tagged with this emotion in the Vela corpus. Search the body text, narrow by source or register, click through to a book’s profile to see how the passage sits with the rest of the work.

Page 149 of 529 · 20 per page

• From In the Unlikely Event (2015)

  Some alien thing is trying to take over Earth. ANGELO VENETTI: UFOs—they’ve been sighted in New Mexico. The Martians want to turn us into zombies so they can control our planet. DERISH GRAY: They want to take dead children to the past, or the future, to show what life was like in the mid-twentieth century on a planet called Earth. Miri tried not to listen, tried to believe what Henry had told her—that both crashes were accidents. But she wasn’t convinced. That wouldn’t explain why three schools were almost hit, first Hamilton, and now Battin and St. Mary’s. And she remembered Leah telling them how close the first plane had come to the Elks Club on the day one hundred little kids were at a holiday party. But why would Martians come to Elizabeth, New Jersey? What was so special about them that made these creatures from outer space come here? Or was it a mistake? Did they mean to land in New York? Were they after only dead children to carry back in their spaceships or did they want living children, too? Is that what they were going to do with Penny, who liked to dress up in her pink ballet slippers and leotard, showing Miri and Suzanne what she’d learned in dance class that week—were they going to turn her into a zombie? She wasn’t even sure what a zombie was. Something undead. Something that feasted on human brains. They’d probably all be dead by June, Miri thought. Forget prom and graduation. She just hoped it would be a quick death so they wouldn’t suffer, so they wouldn’t wind up horribly burned or blinded, or left without arms and legs. It was coming. She didn’t know what it was but it was just a matter of time. She was beginning to believe they were jinxed. DONNY KELLEN: McCarthy’s doing the right thing, going after all the pinko Jew bastards like the Rosenbergs. They’re the ones behind it. They should all be fried. SUZANNE: Leave the Jews out of this. This has nothing to do with Jews. Plenty of Jews were killed on those planes. DONNY KELLEN: You’re such a Jew lover. That was just a cover to make it look like they’re not responsible. CHARLEY KAMINSKY ( to Donny ): You’re an asshole, you know that? Stick your finger up your butt and take a whiff. That’s you. A piece of shit! Donny came after Charley but Charley socked him first, giving him a bloody nose. The other boys held Donny and Charley apart. ELEANOR ( shouting ): It’s sabotage, you idiots! We’re under siege. Get it through your heads. Korea is nothing compared to what’s happening here. Korea is a distraction. You don’t hear Eisenhower saying nominate me for president, and I’ll stop these crashes tomorrow. No, because he can’t. Sure, he can stop the war in Korea. But he can’t stop this one. Because our side doesn’t know who we’re fighting.

• From The Golden Ass (Metamorphoses) (2)

  ‘Phen one of them that came last answered : “ Why, are you only ignorant, that the greater the house is, the sooner it may be robbed and spoiled? For though the family of servants be great and dispersed in divers lodgings, yet every man had rather defend his life than save at his own hazard the riches of his master; but when the people be few and poor and live alone, then will they hide and protect very fiercely, even at the danger of their lives, their sub- stance, how little or great soever it be. And to the intent you will believe me, I will show you our story as an example. We were scarce come nigh unto seven-gated Thebes, and began at once to enquire of the fortunes of the greatest men thereof, which is the fountain of our art and science, and we learned at length where a rich chuff called Chryseros did dwell, who, for fear of offices and burdens in the publie weal, with great pains dissimulated his estate and lived sole and solitary in a small cot (howbeit well fortified) and huddled daily in ragged and torn apparel over his bags of gold Wherefore we devised 157 LUCIUS APULEIUS placuit ad hune primum ferremus aditum, ut con- tempta pugna manus unicae nullo negotio cunctis 10 opibus otiose potiremur. Nec mora, cum noctis ll initio foribus eius praestolamur, quas neque sublevare neque dimovere ac ne perfringere quidem nobis vide- batur, ne vulvarum sonus cunctam viciniam. nostro suscitaret exitio. Tunc itaque sublimis ille vexil- larius noster Lamachus spectatae virtutis suae fiducia, qua clavi immittendae foramen patebat sensim im- missa manu, claustrum evellere gestiebat: sed dudum scilicet. omnium bipedum nequissimus Chryseros vigilans et singula rerum sentiens, lenem gradum et obnixum silentium tolerans paulatim arrepit, gran- dique clavo manum ducis nostri repente nisu fortis- simo ad ostii tabulam offigit et exitiabili nexu patibulatum ! relinquens gurgustioli sui tectum ascendit atque inde contentissima voce clamitans rogansque vicinos et unumquemque proprio nomine ciens et salutis communis admonens, diffamat in- cendio repentino: domum suam possideri: sic unus- quisque proximi periculi confinio territus suppetiatum decurruntanxii. Tunc nos in aucipiti periculo consti- tuti vel opprimendi nostri vel deserendi socii reme- dium e re nata validum eo volente comminiscimus : antesignani nostri partem, qua manus humerum subit, ictu per articulum medium temperato prorsus abscidimus atque ibi brachio relicto, multis laciniis offulto vulnere, ne stillae sanguinis vestigium pro- derent, ceterum Lamachum raptim reportamus ; ac, 1 MSS patibulum. The emendation is variously ascribed to Sealiger or Vulcanius. : 3 158 THE GOLDEN ASS, BOOK IV

• From In the Unlikely Event (2015)

  She hadn’t missed a day of work in fourteen years and she wasn’t about to start now, just because a plane crashed into the Elizabeth River. Never mind that she’d hardly slept, that Miri had spent most of the night in her bed, both of them tossing and turning, dozing off, then waking with a start. When Miri asked if she believed in God, what was she supposed to say? “Of course I believe in God,” she’d told her. “But how could God let such a terrible thing happen?” “It’s not God’s job to decide what happens,” she’d said. “It’s his job to help you get through it.” If only she really believed that. On the train her hands shook and her teeth chattered. The man seated next to her assumed she was cold and offered his coat. “Maybe you’re coming down with something.” “No, it’s not that…” She thanked him but refused his coat. Maybe she should have stayed home, but then Miri would have wanted to stay home, too, and it was important for her to set an example, to show Miri that no matter what, you take your responsibilities seriously. She’d landed the Employee of the Year award more than once, and not just because of her exemplary attendance record. If Irene hadn’t stepped up to the plate when Miri was born, Rusty wouldn’t be executive secretary to Charles Whitten, senior partner at Whitten, Granger and White, one of the most respected law firms in the city. Rusty was lucky to have such a good job, such an important job, given that she’d never gone to college. She’d planned to go, had been accepted to Douglass, the women’s school of Rutgers University, but things happen, things that can change your life overnight. Not that she was going to dwell on that. She’d learned a long time ago to look ahead, not back. What’s done is done. Make the best of it and move on. And she had, hadn’t she? None of the girls at the office asked her about the crash. They knew she commuted from New Jersey, but they were chatting about their weekends—about how their boyfriends couldn’t believe Joe DiMaggio had announced his retirement. Only Mrs. Yates, head of the secretarial pool, said, “You live in Elizabeth, don’t you, Rusty?” “I do.” “I heard about the crash. Tragic.” “Yes, it was.” “Glad you were able to make it to work today.” “Me, too.” And that was it except for her friend Naomi. Rusty’s family called her the “Other Naomi.” They met for grilled cheese sandwiches at the coffee shop around the corner from their offices. Naomi wanted to talk about the crash but Rusty kept changing the subject. Turned out she didn’t want to talk about it, after all, or even think about it. Instead, she bummed a Chesterfield off Naomi and asked for a refill on her coffee.

• From A Boy's Own Story (1982)

  Using the same ill-fated parchment on which I’d written Helen, I indicted a love poem to Mr. Pouchet. I didn’t sign it and I was careful to disguise my handwriting, to imitate laboriously the long, lean eccentricities of an italic script I traced out of a copybook. His compliance in going to church with me every Sunday and his reluctance to talk to me about his private life (if he had one) had enabled me to fancy he was quite prepared to love me—his compliance and reticence were the soft wax I impressed with the intaglio of my daydreams. In the afternoon, when I knew he’d be with the track team, I flew by his room and pushed the poem under his locked door. Now it was done. Would he read it and search me out after supper, invite me to drive with him into town where we’d sit in a dirty hamburger joint and feed nickels into the miniature jukebox at our table? Would he frown and pretend to be studying the song titles on the movable cards revolving under the smudged glass while he muttered his love for me, almost as though he were angry at me or embarrassed? Or would he really be angry? Would he grab my arm as I came out of the dining hall and sadistically dig his nails into my biceps as he steered me down brick walkways glittery with ice and gritty with cast sand until we reached the deserted gymnasium, where he would unlock door after door, pushing me ahead of him onto a varnished, echoing, suddenly floodlit basketball court and would order me to do hundreds of pushups and jumping jacks in expiation, hours and hours of exercise as punishment and cure? But he never lifted his long-lashed eyes at dinner except to wisecrack with one of his kids and to hand out the pudding. I kept looking at him from my table. He was illegible. Had he, come to think of it, been able to read my fancy writing? Was he so dim he didn’t recognize, in spite of my flimsy precautions, that I was the author of this great love poem? Did he—oh, many questions, one fear: he would hate me. I never found out. He didn’t mention the poem to me. He didn’t invite me to go churching with him the next Sunday, nor did I seek him out. We both attended our fatuous chaplain’s service. “Dearly beloved,” the chaplain said, his eyebrows bouncing roguishly, “let us pray,” and then, since he had no style for seriousness, he became horribly boring. He bowed his head and spoke in a monotone so dull it repelled attention. A rich person’s smell of wet wool and perfume pressed down on us. The dismal leaking of the hushed organ trickled out around us. Sunlight came and went behind a rose window coarsely stenciled in lead, harshly colored with aniline shades, an industrial rose.

• From The Golden Ass (Metamorphoses) (2)

  Then spake Panthia unto Meroe and said, Sister let us by and by teare him in pieces or tye him by the members, and so cut them off. Then Meroe (being so named because she was a Taverner, and loved wel good wines) answered, Nay rather let him live, and bury the corpse of this poore wretch in some hole of the earth; and therewithall shee turned the head of Socrates on the other side and thrust her sword up to the hilts into the left part of his necke, and received the bloud that gushed out, into a pot, that no drop thereof fell beside: which things I saw with mine own eyes, and as I thinke to the intent that she might alter nothing that pertained to sacrifice, which she accustomed to make, she thrust her hand down into the intrals of his body, and searching about, at length brought forth the heart of my miserable companion Socrates, who having his throat cut in such sort, yeelded out a dolefull cry, and gave up the ghost. Then Panthia stopped up the wide wound of his throat with the Sponge and said, O sponge sprung and made of the sea, beware that thou not passe by running river. This being said, one of them moved and turned up my bed, and then they strid over mee, and clapped their buttocks upon my face, and all bepissed mee until I was wringing wet. When this was over they went their wayes, and the doores closed fast, the posts stood in their old places, and the lockes and bolts were shut againe. But I that lay upon the ground like one without soule, naked and cold, and wringing wet with pisse, like to one that were more than half dead, yet reviving my selfe, and appointed as I thought for the Gallowes, began to say Alasse what shall become of me to morrow, when my companion shall be found murthered here in the chamber? To whom shall I seeme to tell any similitude of truth, when as I shall tell the trueth in deed? They will say, If thou wert unable to resist the violence of the women, yet shouldest thou have cried for help; Wouldst thou suffer the man to be slaine before thy face and say nothing? Or why did they not slay thee likewise? Why did they spare thee that stood by and saw them commit that horrible fact? Wherefore although thou hast escaped their hands, yet thou shalt not escape ours. While I pondered these things with my selfe the night passed on, and so I resolved to take my horse before day, and goe forward on my journey.

• From Christianity and the Social Crisis (1907)

  But if he occupies a house for years in which roof and drainage are defective, and if his children are perpetually sick in consequence, it is criminal for him to let things run on because some day it may happen that he will move. Hostility to the Empire and its civilization In the preceding chapter we discussed the attitude of primitive Christianity to the Empire and the civilization organized in it. We saw that the hope of the Lord’s coming necessarily involved the hope that the Empire and its social life would come to an end. The feelings inherited from Judaism and its apocalyptic literature, and the feelings generated by the persecution of the Christians, united in creating a clouded atmosphere of fear and distrust through which imperial Rome loomed threatening and detestable. This feeling received a strong moral reenforcement by the awakened Christian conscience which felt keenly the immorality of heathen society, the lasciviousness of its pleasures, the unnaturalness of its ornaments and luxuries, the greed of its traffic, the factiousness and hatred prevalent in private and public life. How could the ideals of life which they carried in their hearts be realized in a world so incompatible with them? How could a social life so fundamentally wrong be reconstructed? Men usually undertake a hopeful reformatory activity only if betterment is somewhere within sight. In some of our cities in which local politics seemed bad beyond remedy, citizens were long in a state of pessimistic lethargy. Socialists are so profoundly convinced of the hopeless and fundamental injustice of the capitalistic system that they will coöperate in no reform which is simply to ameliorate or prolong a system that ought to cease. Similarly the political and moral outlook of Christians on the world about them was so dark and hopeless that the idea of a moral campaign could hardly have occurred to them, even if it had been permitted, and even if their hope of God’s intervention had not made their efforts seem useless. This moral outlook received a sinister reënforcement by the religious belief prevailing in early Christianity that the heathen world was under the control of demon powers. This was the common belief of the heathen world itself. Only the word “demon” did not have the exclusively evil significance which it has with us. Their demons were good, bad, or indifferent. The common man believed himself surrounded by them just as the mediæval Christian felt himself protected by ministering angels and saints, or tempted by devils. For their favor the Roman merchant offered gifts and prayers. Against their anger or spite the Greek sailor wore his amulets. From their defilements men sought cleansing in the ritual of the heathen “mysteries” and the prevalent Oriental cults. For the educated man, with whom the conception of one God had shouldered aside the belief in the ancient gods, it was convenient to think that the traditional gods were real spiritual powers, though of an inferior rank.

• From Christianity and the Social Crisis (1907)

  By their contact with the possessing classes they could help to persuade them of the inherent justice of the labor movement and so create a leaning toward concessions. No other influence could do so much to prevent a revolutionary explosion of pent-up forces. It is to the interest of all sides that the readjustment of the social classes should come as a steady evolutionary process rather than as a social catastrophe. If the laboring class should attempt to seize political power suddenly, the attempt might be beaten back with terrible loss in efficiency to the movement. If the attempt should be successful, a raw governing class would be compelled to handle a situation so vast and complicated that no past revolution presents a parallel. There would be widespread disorder and acute distress, and a reactionary relapse to old conditions would, by all historical precedents, be almost certain to occur. It is devoutly to be desired that the shifting of power should come through a continuous series of practicable demands on one side and concessions on the other. Such an historical process will be immensely facilitated if there are a large number of men in the professional and business class with whom religious and ethical motives overcome their selfish interests so that they will throw their influence on the side of the class which is now claiming its full rights in the family circle of humanity. On the other hand, the Christian idealists must not make the mistake of trying to hold the working class down to the use of moral suasion only, or be repelled when they hear the brute note of selfishness and anger. The class struggle is bound to be transferred to the field of politics in our country in some form. It would be folly if the working class failed to use the leverage which their political power gives them. The business class has certainly never failed to use political means to further its interests. This is a war of conflicting interests which is not likely to be fought out in love and tenderness. The possessing class will make concessions not in brotherly love but in fear, because it has to. The working class will force its demands, not merely because they are just, but because it feels it cannot do without them, and because it is strong enough to coerce. Even Bismarck acknowledged that the former indifference of the business class in Germany to the sufferings of the lower classes had not been overcome by philanthropy, but by fear of the growing discontent of the people and the spread of social democracy.

• From Christianity and the Social Crisis (1907)

  This effort will be prompted partly by the desire to put its organized power at the service of the poor; partly by the fear of non-Christian or anti-Christian influences which may dominate social radicalism; and partly by the instinct of self-assertion, self-protection, and self-aggrandizement which resides in every social organization. Just as the desire to save individuals is now frequently vitiated by the anxiety to increase church membership, so the desire to save social life may be vitiated by the anxiety to keep the Church to the front. Those ecclesiastical bodies which have the strongest church-consciousness are most likely to insist that this work shall be done through them or not at all. The history of the social movement in Europe has furnished most interesting and significant demonstrations of this tendency. But it is full of peril not only to the Church, but to the social movement itself. It beclouds the social issues by ecclesiastical interests and jealousies. It subtly and unconsciously changes the aim from the salvation of the people to the salvation of the Church. The social movement could have no more powerful ally than religious enthusiasm; it could have no more dangerous ally than ecclesiasticism. If the Church truly desires to save the social life of the people, it must be content with inspiring the social movement with religious faith and daring, and it must not attempt to control and monopolize it for its own organization. If a man wants to give honest help, he must fill himself with the spirit of Jesus and divest himself of the ecclesiastical point of view. Social repentance and faith In personal religion the first requirement is to repent and believe in the gospel. As long as a man is self-righteous and complacently satisfied with his moral attainments, there is no hope that he will enter into the higher development, and unless he has faith that a higher level of spiritual life is attainable, he will be lethargic and stationary. Social religion, too, demands repentance and faith: repentance for our social sins; faith in the possibility of a new social order. As long as a man sees in our present society only a few inevitable abuses and recognizes no sin and evil deep-seated in the very constitution of the present order, he is still in a state of moral blindness and without conviction of sin. Those who believe in a better social order are often told that they do not know the sinfulness of the human heart. They could justly retort the charge on the men of the evangelical school. When the latter deal with public wrongs, they often exhibit a curious unfamiliarity with the forms which sin assumes there, and sometimes reverently bow before one of the devil’s spider-webs, praising it as one of the mighty works of God. Regeneration includes that a man must pass under the domination of the spirit of Christ, so that he will judge of life as Christ would judge of it.

• From The Pillar of Salt (1953)

  Suddenly, from behind the hills, two British fighter planes came flying low over the fields to attack a farm which, to us, looked like a doll’s house. A German antiaircraft gun, hidden in the hills, reacted violently and dryly like a piece of cloth being ripped. Swift and elegant, the steel-gray pursuit plane rose and then, as if unaware of the antiaircraft barrage, swooped down on the road. We threw ourselves into the ditches just as a terrifying din burst out. I lay with my face to the ground, beneath the weight of my haversack, and was only aware of the mauve thistle that was scratching my face. I supposed that, seen from above, the red, green, and blue Bedouin blankets in which our kits were rolled on our backs must form a colorful ribbon. Automatically, I slipped my blanket beneath me. In the general noise, a hurrah came from the men. I looked to the side: a little cart, madly drawn by a galloping donkey, tore down the road. I joined in the shouting too when, with my shortsighted eyes, I made out Picchonero, oblivious to the bombing, gesticulating on the seat by the driver. “I’ll send you help from Tunis! I’ll send...” So he disappeared. Across the road, from the depths of their ditches on either side, the men lay flat on the ground and made joyous signs to each other. If Picchonero was not killed on the way, we could hope for a truck in a few hours. Silence followed the uproar. We were all alive, not quite knowing whether we had been aimed at, but our new hope reviving all our last and most selfish energies. We took to the road again in small and scattered groups, linked only loosely by our ebbing strength. The first group disappeared far ahead, and the last straggled to the rear. Each one wanted to exploit to the full his last chance, and the redhead no longer tried to regroup us. Nor did I have any more suggestions to make. Maybe he was right, and it was better to save a few than lose the lot. I hid my precious papers, some sugar, and a piece of bread in my pockets, and threw away my haversack. The road grew narrower, constrained between tall wall-like hedges of cactus. At the entrance to an Arab farm, we saw two charred and disemboweled mules. We had had nothing to drink since the distant and vague time of our work at the quarries. We ran to the well of the deserted farm, and took turns drinking from a bucket an opaque and salty liquid, the mere sight of which made us drool. Some men lay down in the shade of the narrow shapeless buildings and refused to move any more, so we went on without them. Discussion implies at least a minimum of contact and it had long since died between us.

• From The Pillar of Salt (1953)

  As soon as all the anarchic fantasies that suggested themselves to our minds had been acted out, we felt that we needed one another and discovered that we were a crowd. How were we going to organize ourselves? The older boys were more experienced and more daring, strong enough, too, to impose their points of view. They soon agreed to return to ancestral traditions and decided to play, like adults, at circumcision. The crowd at large began to express some uneasiness, then a mitigated enthusiasm as we screamed and clapped hands. We all felt attracted toward this mystery in which each of us had taken part, against his will and in the unconsciousness of his first days of life; it was indeed the act that bound us within the great and sacred chain which, throughout the centuries, went all the way back to God. The extraordinary promise of consecration contained within this mystery appealed to us and disturbed us because the covenant with God was of a sexual nature; at the same time, it terrified us because it imposed itself on us like a fatal necessity in which we saw, each day, our younger brothers and neighbors, soon after their birth, also involved. Our enthusiasm was soon followed by a silence full of mystical terror when it came to the problem of choosing the victim, the baby to be circumcised. But were we still at play? The older boys began to examine the younger, who included me, with the sadistic calm of executioners. I was absolutely terrified of being chosen. Besides, I was quite unusually shy, and could already feel myself turn pale with shame at the mere idea of having my pants torn off me in front of everybody. For some time now, I had been concealing myself from my mother whenever I had to change my shorts, and for anybody to touch me would make me feel that I had been violently raped. So I retreated against the distempered wall and felt the blisters in the distemper break as I pressed against them. Even the big boys seemed to be impressed by the general silence and began to whisper among themselves, like men who are about to perform a sacrifice that involves terrifying responsibilities. When they at last approached our group, where the smallest boys were gathered together, I closed my eyes and my lips and prayed to God to save me.

• From The Divine Comedy (1950)

  but how from an animal it becomes a human being5 thou seest not yet; this is that point which made one wiser than thou to err; so that by his teaching he made the intellectual faculty separate from the soul, because he saw no organ occupied by it.6 Open thy breast to the truth which is coming, and know that so soon as the organization of the brain is perfect in the embyro, the First Mover turns him to it, rejoicing over such handiwork of nature, and breathes into it a new spirit with virtue filled, which draws into its substance that which it finds active there, and becomes one single soul, that lives, and feels, and turns round upon itself.7 And that thou mayst marvel less at my words, look at the sun’s heat, that is made wine when combined with the juice which flows from the vine. And when Lachesis has no more thread,8 it frees itself from the flesh, and bears away in potency both the human and the divine; the other powers, the whole of them mute; memory, intelligence and will,9 keener far in action than they were before. Staying not, it falls of itself in wondrous wise to one of the shores; there it first learns its ways.10 Soon as it is circumscribed11 in place there, the formative virtue radiates around, in form and quantity as in the living members; and as the air, when it is full saturate, becomes decked with divers colours through another’s rays which are reflected in it, so the neighbouring air sets itself into that form which the soul that is there fixed impresses upon it by means of its virtue; and then, like the flame which follows the fire wheresoever it moves, the spirit is followed by its new form. Inasmuch as therefrom it afterwards has it semblance, it is called a shade; and therefrom it forms the organs of every sense even to sight. By this we speak, and by this we laugh, by this we make the tears and the sighs which thou mayst have heard about the mount. The shade takes its form according as the desires and the other affections prick us, and this is the cause of that whereof thou marvellest.” And now had we come to the last turning, and had wheeled round to the right hand, and were intent on other care. There the bank flashes forth flames, and the cornice breathes a blast upward, which bends them back, and keeps them away from it; wherefore it behoved us to go on the side which was free one by one; and on this side I feared the fire, and on that I feared to fall downward. My Leader said: “Along this place the rein must be kept tight on the eyes, because lightly a false step might be taken.” “Summæ Deus clementiæ“12 I then heard sung in the heart of the great burning, which made me no less eager to turn aside;

• From The Genius of Judy: How Judy Blume Rewrote Childhood for All of Us (2023)

  My point, which was taken out of context, is that I can empathize with a writer—or person—who has been harassed online.” Then there were the sanitized versions of Roald Dahl’s books that struck up a frenzy in the winter of 2023. That February, UK conservative broadsheet the Telegraph reported that “Augustus Gloop is no longer fat, Mrs. Twit is no longer fearfully ugly, and the Oompa Loompas have gone gender-neutral in new editions of Roald Dahl’s beloved stories.” Dahl’s publisher, with the blessing of the Dahl estate, had scrubbed potentially offensive descriptions and passages from his famous books, presumably to appease today’s more sensitive readers, with Gloop going from “enormously fat” to just “enormous,” and the Cloud-Men in James and the Giant Peach becoming Cloud-People, for instance. But the response was mixed at best; PEN America criticized the move, and oft-censored author Salman Rushdie tweeted that Puffin Books and Dahl’s descendants “should be ashamed.” Puffin later announced that it would continue to publish “classic” versions of Dahl’s novels, giving contemporary readers a choice between the two. Waxman said that she keeps her collection up to date, which at times means retiring titles that no longer fit in with cultural norms. She said any children’s books that depict guns—which used to be unremarkable—are now “taboo, completely taboo” in the age of mass shootings. Same goes for illustrations that show adults smoking cigarettes. Waxman also mentioned Lois Lenski, an author and illustrator who published award-winning children’s books in the 1930s and 1940s. Waxman would “never” recommend them for young readers today, she said, because of their outmoded depictions of gender roles within families. “The mother is always home, never works, always wearing a dress, always home cleaning the house,” Waxman said. “I’m very aware of those books now, not that anybody is going to tell me to ban them, but they’re just not in good taste.” (People have compared this process, called “weeding” in the library biz, to banning books but it’s a false equivalency. Weeding is about unshelving titles that have been rendered irrelevant by the culture. Banning is about cutting off access to books that are contributing to current cultural conversations in the hopes that these conversations will stop.) “It’s really scary being a librarian right now,” LaVerde confessed, given high levels of polarization and the aggression with which citizens express and defend their personal views. “It’s really scary being an educator,” she went on, “which is weird, because it’s something I would never in my entire career of thirty-plus years think I would say.” LaVerde conceded that “honestly, in New York, we’re luckier. But I think about my colleagues in Florida, in Texas, who are being threatened, not only to lose their certification, their license, their pensions, their careers, but they’re being threatened with bodily harm.” Politics, religion, and the concurrent racial justice and transgender rights movements have all crashed together in a shockingly painful collision over… books, of all things.

• From The Golden Ass (Metamorphoses) (2)

  * O most reverend and just judges, the thing which I purpose to declare unto you is no small matter, but toucheth the estate and tranquillity of this whole city, and the punishment thereof may be aright good example to others. Wherefore I pray you, most venerable fathers, to whom and to every of whom it doth appertain to provide for the dignity and safety of the common weal, that you would in no wise suffer this wicked homicide embrued with the blood of so many murders to escape unpunished. And think you not that I am moved by private envy or hatred, but by reason of mine office, in that I am captain of the night watch, and I think that until this day no man alive can accuse me to be remiss in the same. Now I will declare all the whole matter, orderly, as it was done this last night. For when at about the third watch of this night past I diligently searched every part of the city, spying everything close from one door to another, behold I fortuned to espy this cruel young man, sword drawn out for murder, and already three by his fierce onslaught dead at his feet, their bodies still breathing, in a welter of blood. Now this when he had done (moved in his conscience at so great a crime) he ran away and aided by reason of darkness slipped into a house and there lay hidden all night; but, by the pro- vidence of the gods, which suffereth no heinous offences to remain unpunished, he was taken up this morning before he escaped any further by secret ways, and so I have brought him hither to your honourable presence to receive his desert accordingly. So have you here a culpable homicide, one caught in : 105 LUCIUS APULEIUS itaque reum tot caedibus impiatum, reum coram deprensum, reum peregrinum : constanter itaque in hominem alienum ferte sententias de eo crimine, quodetiam in vestrum civem severiter vindicaretis.” . 4 . Sic profatus accusator acerrimus immanem vocem repressit, ac me statim praeco, si quid ad ea respondere vellem, iubebat incipere. At ego nihil tunc temporis amplius quam flere poteram, non tam Hercule truculentam accusationem intuens quam meam mi- seram conscientiam ; sed tamen oborta divinitus audacia sic ad illa :

• From Fear of Flying (1973)

  It really made you believe in the universality of art to see all these pastoral types loving Lucille Ball and Raymond Burr. I was looking forward to the day when America extends its glorious civilization to other solar systems. There they’ll be—all those inter-galactic types—watching Lucille Ball and Raymond Burr in rapt attention. The relatives stayed and stayed. They drank coffee and wine and Arak until Aunt Françoise was wringing her pudgy hands. We were all exhausted and wanted to go to sleep, so instead of actually throwing them out, Pierre’s Uncle Gavin quietly left the room, climbed up on the roof, and began monkeying with the TV antenna until the picture turned into a mass of zigzags. Within a few minutes, the visitors departed. I was given to understand that Uncle Gavin climbs up on the roof quite frequently. Sleeping arrangements were difficult. Randy and Pierre and the kids were to be put up at Pierre’s father’s house down the hill. Lalah and Chloe were to share a double bed in another aunt’s house next door. And I drew a single in a tiny annex of Aunt Françoise’s house. I’d really have preferred to be with Lalah and Chloe than to be alone in that creepy room, sleeping under a crucifix and grubby pictures of the illustrious queen. But there was no space for three in bed, so I sacked out alone, amusing myself before sleep with thoughts of scorpions scampering up the wall, and fatal spider bites, and visions of breaking my neck during the night when I needed to find the outdoor toilet without a flashlight. Oh there was plenty to keep the most phobic mind thoroughly occupied for many busy hours of insomnia. I had been lying there in full phobic flower for about an hour and a half when the door creaked open. “Who is it?” I said, my heart thudding. “Shhhh.” A dark shadow moved toward me. The man under the bed. “For God’s sake!” I was terrified. “Shhh—it’s only me—Pierre,” Pierre said. And then he came over and sat down on the bed. “Jesus—I thought it was some rapist or something.” He laughed. “Jesus wasn’t a rapist.” “I guess not…. What’s up?” It was a poor choice of words under the circumstances. “You seem so depressed,” he said, full of counterfeit tenderness. “I guess I am. All that craziness with Brian last summer and now Charlie…” “I hate to see my little sister depressed,” he said, stroking my hair. And for some reason that “little sister” sent chills through me. “You know I always think of you as my little sister, don’t you?”

• From The Annotated Lolita (1991)

  In order to break some pattern of fate in which I obscurely felt myself being enmeshed, I had decided—despite Lo’s visible annoyance—to spend another night at Chestnut Court; definitely waking up at four in the morning, I ascertained that Lo was still sound asleep (mouth open, in a kind of dull amazement at the curiously inane life we all had rigged up for her) and satisfied myself that the precious contents of the “luizetta” were safe. There, snugly wrapped in a white woollen scarf, lay a pocket automatic: caliber .32, capacity of magazine 8 cartridges, length a little under one ninth of Lolita’s length, stock checked walnut, finish full blued. I had inherited it from the late Harold Haze, with a 1938 catalog which cheerily said in part: “Particularly well adapted for use in the home and car as well as on the person.” There it lay, ready for instant service on the person or persons, loaded and fully cocked with the slide lock in safety position, thus precluding any accidental discharge. We must remember that a pistol is the Freudian symbol of the Ur-father’s central forelimb. I was now glad I had it with me—and even more glad that I had learned to use it two years before, in the pine forest around my and Charlotte’s glass lake. Farlow, with whom I had roamed those remote woods, was an admirable marksman, and with his .38 actually managed to hit a hummingbird, though I must say not much of it could be retrieved for proof—only a little iridescent fluff. A burley ex-policeman called Krestovski, who in the twenties had shot and killed two escaped convicts, joined us and bagged a tiny woodpecker—completely out of season, incidentally. Between those two sportsmen I of course was a novice and kept missing everything, though I did wound a squirrel on a later occasion when I went out alone. “You lie here,” I whispered to my light-weight compact little chum, and then toasted it with a dram of gin. 18The reader must now forget Chestnuts and Colts, and accompany us further west. The following days were marked by a number of great thunderstorms—or perhaps, there was but one single storm which progressed across country in ponderous frogleaps and which we could not shake off just as we could not shake off detective Trapp: for it was during those days that the problem of the Aztec Red Convertible presented itself to me, and quite overshadowed the theme of Lo’s lovers.

• From The Divine Comedy (1950)

  I know not what it said, though I already was on the ridge of the arch which crosses there; but he who spake seemed moved to anger. I had turned myself downwards; but my living eyes could not reach the bottom for the darkness; wherefore I: “Master, see that thou get to the other belt, and let us dismount the wall: for as I hear from hence and do not understand, so I see down and distinguish nothing.” “Other answer I give thee not,” he said, “than the deed: for a fit request should be followed with the work in silence.” We went down the bridge, at the head where it joins with the eighth bank; and then the chasm was manifest to me: and I saw within it a fearful throng of serpents, and of so strange a look, that even now the recollection scares my blood. Let Libya boast no longer with its sand; for, though it engenders chelydri, jaculi and pareæ, and cenchres with amphisbæna, plagues so numerous or so dire it never showed, with all Ethiopia, nor with the land that lies by the Red Sea.3 Amid this cruel and most dismal swarm were people running, naked and terrified, without hope of lurking hole or heliotrope.4 They had their hands tied behind with serpents; these through their loins fixed the tail and the head, and were coiled in knots before. And lo! at one, who was near our shore, sprang up a serpent, which transfixed him there where the neck is bound upon the shoulders. Neither “O” nor “I” was ever written so quickly as he took fire, and burnt, and dropt down all changed to ashes; and after he was thus dissolved upon the ground, the powder reunited of itself and at once resumed the former shape: thus by great sages ’tis confest the Phœnix5 dies, and then is born again, when it approaches the five-hundredth year; in its life it eats no herb or grain, but only tears of incense and amomum; and nard and myrrh are its last swathings. And as one who falls, and knows not how, through force of Demon which drags him to the ground, or of other obstruction that fetters men; who, when he rises, looks fixedly round him, all bewildered by the great anguish he has undergone, and looking sighs:6 such was the sinner when he rose. Power of God! O how severe, that showers such blows in vengeance! The Guide then asked him who he was; whereupon he answered: “I rained from Tuscany, short while ago, into this fierce gullet. Bestial life, not human, pleased me, mule that I was; I am Vanni Fucci,7 savage beast; and Pistoia was a fitting den for me. And I to the Guide: “Tell him not to budge; and ask what crime thrust him down here, for I saw him once a man of blood and rage.”

• From The Divine Comedy (1950)

  [image file=image_rsrcA5N.jpg] I HAVE ere now seen horsemen moving camp, and commencing the assault, and holding their muster, and at times retiring to escape; coursers have I seen upon your land, O Aretines! and seen the march of foragers, the shock of tournaments and race of jousts, now with trumpets, and now with bells,1 with drums and castle-signals, and with native things and foreign: but never yet to so uncouth a cornet saw I cavaliers nor footmen move, nor ship by mark of land or star. We went with the ten Demons: ah, hideous company! but, “In church with saints, and with guzzlers in the tavern.” Yet my intent was on the pitch, to see each habit of the chasm and of the people that were burning in it. As dolphins, when with the arch of the back they make sign to mariners that they may prepare to save their ship:2 so now and then, to ease the punishment, some sinner showed his back and hid in less time than it lightens. And as at the edge of the water of a ditch, the frogs stand only with their muzzles out, so that they hide their feet and other bulk: thus stood on every hand the sinners; but as Barbariccia approached, they instantly retired beneath the seething. I saw, and my heart still shudders thereat, one3 linger so, as it will happen that one frog remains while the other spouts away; And Graffiacane, who was nearest to him, hooked his pitchy locks and hauled him up, so that to me he seemed an otter. I already knew the name of everyone, so well I noted them as they were chosen, and when they called each other, listened how. “O Rubicante, see thou plant thy clutches on him, and flay him!” shouted together all the accursed crew. And I: “Master, learn if thou canst, who is that piteous wight, fallen into the hand of his adversaries.” My Guide drew close to his side and asked him whence he came; and he replied: “I was born in the kingdom of Navarre. My mother placed me as a servant of a lord; for she had borne me to a ribald waster of himself and of his substance. Then I was domestic with the good king Thibault; here I set myself to doing barratry, of which I render reckoning in this heat.” And Ciriatto, from whose mouth on either side came forth a tusk as from a hog, made him feel how one of them did rip. Amongst evil cats the mouse had come; but Barbariccia locked him in his arms, and said: “Stand off whilst I enfork him!” And turning his face to my Master: “Ask on,” he said, “if thou wouldst learn more from him, before some other undo him.” The Guide therefore: “Now say, of the other sinners knowest thou any that is a Latian, beneath the pitch?” And he: “I parted

• From In the Unlikely Event (2015)

  He clutched her necklace, a golden strawberry on a thin chain, while his mother retched. The chain broke. So what? For seven horrible minutes, seven minutes that felt like hours, years, a whole lifetime, everything seemed to be in slow motion. Ruby heard only the thump of her own heart, not the screaming, not the wailing, not the two-hundred-pound wrestler seated behind her reciting the Lord’s Prayer. This is it? This is how it’s going to end? No, it has to be a mistake. Please, God, make it be a mistake. She held the baby close, feeling the warmth of his little body, kissing his soft cheek. He looked right into her eyes. Outside the window the wing broke away from the plane. Then they were falling…falling diagonally out of the sky. HenryAs Henry and Todd came out of the Elks Club and started down the long flight of stairs to the street, they heard a roaring sound. “Jesus, is that what I think it is?” Todd asked, looking skyward. He opened his camera, framed the image, then clicked. Henry hoped he’d captured the plane trailing smoke, flames billowing back nearly to the tail, maybe one hundred feet above them and banking steeply to the left. “Your car or mine?” Todd shouted. “Mine. Let’s go!” Henry already knew this would be his first front-page story. He drove with his hand on the horn, following the path of the plane. “Get everything you can,” he told Todd, who had no experience but was the nephew of the managing editor. “Every detail. Don’t stop to think—just do it or you’ll miss your chance.” He was talking as much to himself as to Todd. MiriOutside the theater, the weather had grown even worse. Miri and Rusty locked arms and walked quickly with their heads down. Miri had never felt so cold, so weak from hunger. The candy bar at the movies was the only thing she’d had to eat today. A few more blocks and they’d be home. She could almost smell the leg of lamb rubbed with garlic and rosemary that would be waiting, with pan-roasted potatoes, mint jelly, and green beans, plus a wedge of iceberg lettuce with Russian dressing. Irene would have already frosted the birthday cake she’d baked for Rusty. Miri’s mouth was watering just thinking about it. At the corner of Westfield Avenue and Lowden Street a small child, one of the Bell kids, probably, was sledding in front of her house. There was a Bell in every grade. Miri knew at least four of them. Suddenly the child screamed and pointed to the sky. Miri and Rusty looked up to see a ball of fire rushing toward them. Miri could feel the heat from above as Rusty grabbed her, pulling her across the street. They ran as fast as they could but the fireball kept coming. They heard a deafening roar. Then a splintering crash, followed by two explosions only a second apart.

• From In the Unlikely Event (2015)

  [image file=Image00041.jpg] [image "Elizabeth Daily Post" file=Image00042.jpg] [image "Elizabeth Daily Post" file=Image00042.jpg] COMMERCIAL JET FLIGHTS BEGINBy Henry AmmermanMAY 3 — While Elizabeth awaits the CAB verdict on the reopening of Newark Airport, a new era of airplane travel began today with the flight of a British De Havilland Comet jet airliner from London to Johannesburg, South Africa. The British Overseas Airways Corporation plane carried a full payload of 36 passengers on this first-ever commercial jet trip. The journey was expected to take 24 hours, with intermediate stops in Rome, Beirut, Khartoum, Uganda and Northern Rhodesia. With a top cruising speed of 480 miles per hour, the Comet is 50% faster than propeller aircraft such as the DC-6, and its proponents say it provides smoother and quieter travel. 32 [image "image" file=Image00005.jpg] [image file=Image00005.jpg] MiriOn May 8 news spread that another plane had crashed in Elizabeth, smashing into Levy Brothers department store. Miri was eating lunch at her usual table in the cafeteria when she heard. She felt sick to her stomach and had to swallow again and again to keep down the egg salad sandwich she’d just finished. She thought of the lady who worked in the teen department at Levy Brothers, the one who was having her nails done the morning Mr. Roman gave Miri her Elizabeth Taylor haircut. Had she been at work today? Was she dead now? The teacher who was lunch monitor that week shouted, “Everyone under the tables. Now!” She was one of the new, young teachers. She wore small pearl earrings that gave her face a glow. But now she wasn’t glowing. She shouted, “Quiet, please! Another plane may be on the way. Cover your heads with your hands.” Kids were screaming. Someone vomited on the floor. The smell of sweat mixed with the vomit and the uneaten lunches. They had grown complacent, Miri thought, more interested in ninth-grade graduation and going off to high school than about planes crashing. They’d been moving on with their lives, which is what their parents urged them to do. They were trying to be regular kids, happy kids, to please their families. But this proved you never knew when something terrible would happen. Miri wished she could be with Mason. If she was going to die she wanted to die in his arms. Oh, god—please let him be all right. She and Suzanne held on to each other under the table. Some girls were whimpering. For once, the boys shut up. Miri could smell her own sweat, the sweat of fear, the sweat that deodorant didn’t prevent. Robo was probably so glad she’d moved away from Elizabeth. But not everyone could afford to buy a house in Millburn or South Orange or some other fancy town where planes didn’t crash. Suzanne’s eyes were tightly shut. Her lips moved silently. Probably she was praying. But praying wouldn’t save them, would it? It didn’t save the people on the planes.

• From In the Unlikely Event (2015)

  Las Vegas Sun MCCARTHY LOSES FACE IN VERBAL FIRE JUNE 30 — What was perhaps the most drama-packed and best-attended political meeting ever held in Nevada broke up in a scene of bedlam last night at War Memorial hall after the audience had listened to Sen. Joseph McCarthy of Wisconsin, who had purportedly come here to speak on behalf of Sen. George W. Malone, now seeking re-election. McCarthy in his typical wild swinging fashion, with no regard for facts but with a hold on his audience that is frightening, called Sun publisher Hank Greenspun “an ex-convict” and “an admitted Communist, publisher of the Las Vegas ‘Daily Worker.’ ” Women shuddered and strong men controlled their emotions with difficulty as the attacks continued. They had never heard such disgraceful language in Nevada. Cheers rang out when Greenspun responded and challenged the Wisconsin Senator to debate these “vicious lies.” But McCarthy turned and ran like a scared rabbit. — TOO BAD Miri couldn’t share that story with Eleanor. They could taunt Donny Kellen about his hero, McCarthy, except they’d heard Donny had been shipped off to military school. And who knew the next time she’d see Eleanor? Still, she liked knowing this was the newspaper Dr. O would probably bring home every day, or maybe it would be delivered to their house. It made life in Las Vegas seem real. They had a newspaper and the publisher’s name was Hank, short for Henry. A good omen. When Fern squealed, “Here come the bumps! Daddy—it’s the bumps!” Dr. O turned in his seat to look back at Fern, to smile at her, to pat her leg. The smooth air had turned choppy on the final descent into Las Vegas. Miri didn’t like it. It wasn’t like riding a bucking bronco. Not that she’d ever been on a bucking bronco but she’d seen them in cowboy movies. These bumps were unpredictable. The stewardess told them to keep their seat belts fastened until they’d landed. Rusty turned to Miri. “How’re you doing, honey?” “I’m fine.” A lie. She was so terrified she dug her fingernails into the fabric of her seat cushion. “How about you?” “Good.” But Rusty didn’t look good. She was pale, with beads of sweat on her forehead and upper lip.