Surprise

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.

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• From How Emotions Are Made: The Secret Life of the Brain (2017)

  (This is degeneracy.) The concept is constructed in the moment, ad hoc. And among these myriad instances, one of them will be the most similar (by pattern matching) to Sophia’s current situation. That’s what we’ve been calling the “winning instance.” 7 On that particular day, Sophia leaped out of her stroller, ran across the mall, and wrapped her little arms around the man’s leg, shouting, “Uncle KEVIN!” Her delight was short-lived, however, as Uncle Kevin was at home six hundred miles away. She looked up into a total stranger’s face and shrieked. * The same general process occurs for purely mental concepts such as “Sadness.” A child hears the word “sad” spoken in three different situations. These three instances are represented in the child’s brain in bits and pieces. They are not “grouped together” in any concrete way. On a fourth occasion, the child sees a boy in her classroom crying, and a teacher uses the word “sad.” The child’s brain constructs the three prior instances as predictions, along with other predictions that are statistically similar in any way to the current situation. This collection of predictions is a concept created in the moment, by virtue of some purely mental similarity among the instances of “Sadness.” Once again, the prediction that is most similar to the current situation becomes her experience—an instance of emotion. 8 ... It’s time for me to explain something directly what so far I have only implied. Two of the phenomena I’ve been discussing are actually one and the same. I’m speaking of concepts and predictions. When your brain “constructs an instance of a concept,” such as an instance of “Happiness,” that is equivalent to saying your brain “issues a prediction” of happiness. When Sophia’s brain issued 100 predictions about Uncle Kevin, each one was an instance of the momentary concept “Uncle Kevin” that she formed before grabbing the stranger’s leg. 9 I separated the ideas of predictions and concepts earlier to simplify some explanations. I could have used the word “prediction” throughout the book and never mentioned the word “concept,” or vice versa, but information transmission is easier to understand in terms of predictions flying across the brain, whereas knowledge is more readily understood in terms of concepts. Now that we’re discussing how concepts work in the brain, we must acknowledge that concepts are predictions. Early in life, you build up concepts from detailed sensory input (as prediction error) from your body and the world. Your brain efficiently compresses the sensory input it receives, just like YouTube compresses video, extracting similarities out of differences, eventually creating an efficient, multisensory summary.

• From How Emotions Are Made: The Secret Life of the Brain (2017)

  Or if you see a picture of a smiling cartoon bee in a children’s book, reminding you of a beloved niece whom you took to a Disney movie, you could mentally construct the bee, the niece, and an instance of pleasant nostalgia. My experience in the coffee shop, where I felt attraction when I had the flu, would be called an error or misattribution in the classical view, but it’s no more a mistake than seeing a bee in a bunch of blobs. An influenza virus in my blood contributed to fever and flushing, and my brain made meaning from the sensations in the context of a lunch date, constructing a genuine feeling of attraction, in the normal way that the brain constructs any other mental state. If I’d had exactly the same bodily sensations while at home in bed with a thermometer, my brain might have constructed an instance of “Feeling Sick” using the same manufacturing process. (The classical view, in contrast, would require feelings of attraction and malaise to have different bodily fingerprints triggered by different brain circuitry.) 10 Emotions are not reactions to the world. You are not a passive receiver of sensory input but an active constructor of your emotions. From sensory input and past experience, your brain constructs meaning and prescribes action. If you didn’t have concepts that represent your past experience, all your sensory inputs would just be noise. You wouldn’t know what the sensations are, what caused them, nor how to behave to deal with them. With concepts, your brain makes meaning of sensation, and sometimes that meaning is an emotion. The theory of constructed emotion and the classical view of emotion tell vastly different stories of how we experience the world. The classical view is intuitive—events in the world trigger emotional reactions inside of us. Its story features familiar characters like thoughts and feelings that live in distinct brain areas. The theory of constructed emotion, in contrast, tells a story that doesn’t match your daily life—your brain invisibly constructs everything you experience, including emotions. Its story features unfamiliar characters like simulation and concepts and degeneracy, and it takes place throughout the whole brain at once. This unfamiliar story creates a challenge because people expect stories with familiar structures. Every superhero story is assumed to have a villain. Every romantic comedy requires an attractive couple faced with a humorous misunderstanding that turns out all right in the end. Our challenge here is that the dynamics of the brain, and how emotions are made, do not follow a linear, cause-and-effect sort of story. (This challenge is common in science; for example, in quantum mechanics, the distinction between a cause and an effect is not meaningful.) Nevertheless, every book must tell a story, even for a nonlinear subject like brain function.

• From My Year of Rest and Relaxation (2018)

  I called a taxi to take me to the train station the morning after that kiss. I didn’t wake my mother to tell her I was going back to school. I didn’t leave a note. A week went by. She didn’t call. When she “had her accident,” which is how they termed it at the hospital, Peggy was the one to find her. “Oh, sweetheart,” she said on the phone. “She’s still alive, but the doctors say you should come as soon as you can. I’m so, so sorry.” My knees didn’t buckle. I didn’t fall to the ground. I was at the sorority house. I could hear girls cooking in the kitchen, chatting about their fat-free diets and how not to “bulk up” at the gym. “Thanks for letting me know,” I told Peggy. She was whimpering and snorting. I didn’t tell anyone at the sorority house what was happening. I didn’t want to deal with the indignity of it all. It took me almost an entire day to get up there. I wrote a final paper for a class on Hogarth on the train. Part of me was hoping my mother would be dead by the time I arrived. “She knows you’re here,” Peggy said in the hospital room. I knew that wasn’t true. My mother was in a coma. She was already gone. Once in a while, her left eye would blink open—clear blue, frozen, blind, a terrifying, empty, soulless eye. I remember noticing in the hospital room that her roots were showing. She’d been vigilant about keeping her hair icy blond as long as I’d known her, but her natural color had grown in, a warmer shade— honey blonde, my color. I’d never seen her real hair before. My mother’s body stayed alive for exactly three days. Even with a tube down her throat, a machine taped to her face to keep her breathing, she was still pretty. She was still prim. “Her organs are shutting down,” the doctor explained. System failure. She felt nothing, he assured me. She was brain dead. She wasn’t thinking or dreaming or experiencing anything, not even her own death. They turned off the machine and I sat there, waiting, watching the screen blip, then stop. She wasn’t resting. She was not in a state of peace. She was in no state, not being. The peace to be had, I thought, watching them pull the sheet over her head, was mine. “Oh, sweetheart. I’m so, so sorry.” Peggy sobbed and embraced me. “You poor thing. You poor dear little orphan.” Unlike my mother, I hated being pitied.

• From How Emotions Are Made: The Secret Life of the Brain (2017)

  There is one emotion category that people seem able to perceive without the influence of emotion concepts: happiness. Regardless of the experimental method used, people in numerous cultures agree that smiling faces and laughing voices express happiness. So “Happy” might be the closest thing we have to a universal emotion category with a universal expression. Or it might not. For one thing, “Happiness” is usually the only pleasant emotion category that is tested using the basic emotion method, so it’s trivial for subjects to distinguish it from the negative categories. And consider this fun fact: the historical record implies that ancient Romans did not smile spontaneously when they were happy. The word “smile” doesn’t even exist in Latin. Smiling was an invention of the Middle Ages, and broad, toothy-mouthed smiles (with crinkling at the eyes, named the Duchenne smile by Ekman) became popular only in the eighteenth century as dentistry became more accessible and affordable. The classics scholar Mary Beard summarizes the nuances of the point: This is not to say that Romans never curled up the edges of their mouths in a formation that would look to us much like a smile; of course they did. But such curling did not mean very much in the range of significant social and cultural gestures in Rome. Conversely, other gestures, which would mean little to us, were much more heavily freighted with significance. Perhaps sometime in the last few hundred years, smiling became a universal, stereotyped gesture symbolizing happiness.* Or . . . perhaps smiling in happiness is simply not universal.18 … Emotion concepts are the secret ingredient behind the success of the basic emotion method. These concepts make certain facial configurations appear universally recognizable as emotional expressions when, in fact, they’re not. Instead, we all construct perceptions of each other’s emotions. We perceive others as happy, sad, or angry by applying our own emotion concepts to their moving faces and bodies. We likewise apply emotion concepts to voices and construct the experience of hearing emotional sounds. We simulate with such speed that emotion concepts work in stealth, and it seems to us as if emotions are broadcast from the face, voice, or any other body part, and we merely detect them. A perfectly reasonable question for you to ask at this point is: how can my colleagues and I have the audacity to claim that our handful of experiments disconfirm hundreds of others that found evidence that emotions are universally recognized in expressions? The psychologist Dacher Keltner, for example, estimates that “there are a zillion data points on a perspective that conforms to Ekman.”19

• From The Golden Ass (Metamorphoses) (2)

  Then I pressed in amongst them nigh unto the biere, and got upon a stone to see this mysterie, and behold incontinently the dead body began to receive spirit, his principall veines did moove, his life came again and he held up his head and spake in this sort: Why doe you call mee backe againe to this transitorie life, that have already tasted of the water of Lethe, and likewise been in the deadly den of Styx? Leave off, I pray, leave off, and let me lie in quiet rest. When these words were uttered by the dead corps, the Prophet drew nigh unto the Biere and sayd, I charge thee to tell before the face of all the people here the occasion of thy death: What, dost thou thinke that I cannot by my conjurations call up the dead, and by my puissance torment thy body? Then the corps moved his head again, and made reverence to the people and sayd, Verily I was poisoned by the meanes of my wicked wife, and so thereby yeelded my bed unto an adulterer. Whereat his wife taking present audacity, and reproving his sayings, with a cursed minde did deny it. The people were bent against her sundry wayes, some thought best that shee should be buried alive with her husband: but some said that there ought no credit to be given to the dead body. Which opinion was cleane taken away, by the words which the corps spoke againe and sayd, Behold I will give you some evident token, which never yet any other man knew, whereby you shall perceive that I declare the truth: and by and by he pointed towards me that stood on the stone, and sayd, When this the good Gard of my body watched me diligently in the night, and that the wicked Witches and enchantresses came into the chamber to spoyle mee of my limbes, and to bring such their purpose did transforme themselves into the shape of beasts: and when as they could in no wise deceive or beguile his vigilant eyes, they cast him into so dead and sound a sleepe, that by their witchcraft he seemed without spirit or life. After this they did call me by my name, and never did cease til as the cold members of my body began by little and little and little to revive. Then he being of more lively soule, howbeit buried in sleep, in that he and I were named by one name, and because he knew not that they called me, rose up first, and as one without sence or perseverance passed by the dore fast closed, unto a certain hole, whereas the Witches cut off first his nose, and then his ears, and so that was done to him which was appointed to be done to me.

• From How Emotions Are Made: The Secret Life of the Brain (2017)

  13 Other scientists also have demonstrated, as Camras and Oster did, that you take tremendous information from the surrounding context. They graft photographs of faces and bodies that don’t belong together, like an angry scowling face attached to a body that’s holding a dirty diaper, and their test subjects nearly always identify the emotion appropriate to the body, not the face—in this case, disgust rather than anger. Faces are constantly moving, and your brain relies on many different factors at once—body posture, voice, the overall situation, your lifetime of experience—to figure out which movements are meaningful and what they mean. 14 When it comes to emotion, a face doesn’t speak for itself. In fact, the poses of the basic emotion method were not discovered by observing faces in the real world. Scientists stipulated those facial poses, inspired by Darwin’s book, and asked actors to portray them. And now these faces are simply assumed to be the universal expressions of emotion. 15 But they aren’t universal. To further demonstrate this, my lab conducted a study using photos from a group of emotion experts—accomplished actors. The photos came from the book In Character: Actors Acting, in which actors portray emotions by posing their faces to match written scenarios. We divided our U.S. test subjects into three groups. The first group read only the scenarios, for example, “He just witnessed a shooting on his quiet, tree-shaded block in Brooklyn.” A second group saw only the facial configurations, such as Martin Landau’s pose for the shooting scenario (figure 1-6, center). A third group saw the scenarios and the faces. In each case, we handed subjects a short list of emotion words to categorize whatever emotion they saw. 16 For the shooting scenario I just mentioned, 66 percent of subjects who read the scenario alone or with Landau’s face rated the scenario as a fearful situation. But for subjects who saw Landau’s face alone, devoid of context, only 38 percent of them rated it as fear and 56 percent rated it as surprise. (Figure 1-6 compares Landau’s facial configuration to basic emotion method photos for “fear” and “surprise.” Does Landau look afraid or surprised? Or both?) Figure 1-6: Actor Martin Landau (center) flanked by basic emotion method faces for fear (left) and surprise (right) Other actors’ poses for fear were strikingly different from Landau’s. In one case, the actress Melissa Leo portrayed fear for the scenario: “She is trying to decide if she should tell her husband about a rumor going around that she is gay before he hears it from someone else.” Her mouth is closed and downturned, and her brow is slightly knitted. Nearly three-quarters of our test subjects who saw her face alone rated it as sad, but when presented with the scenario, 70 percent of subjects rated her face as displaying fear. 17 This sort of variation held true for every emotion that we studied.

• From The Golden Ass (Metamorphoses) (2)

  fore towards night (being greatly wearied by my hurrying, though it had been of none effect) I went to the baths to refresh myself, and behold, I fortuned to espy my companion Socrates. He was sitting upon the ground, covered with a torn and coarse mantle, so meagre and of so sallow and miserable a countenance that I scantly knew him: for fortune had brought him into such estate that he verily seemed as a common beggar that stands in the streets to crave the benevolence of the passers- by. Towards whom (howbeit he was my singular friend and familiar acquaintance) yet half in doubt, I drew nigh and said: ‘Alas! my Socrates, what meaneth this, how dost thou so appear? What crime hast thou committed? Verily there is great lamentation and weeping made for thee at home: thy children are in ward by decree of the provincial judge: thy wife (having ended her mourning time in lamentable wise with her face and visage blubbered with tears in such sort that she hath well nigh wept out both her eyes) is constrained by her parents to put out of remembrance the un- fortunate loss and lack of thee at home, by taking (against her will) a new husband, And dost thou live here as a ghost or beggar to our great shame and ignominy?’ Then answered he to me, and said: *O my friend Aristomenes, now perceive I well that you are ignorant of the whirling changes, the unstable forces, and slippery inconstancy of fortune’: and therewithal he covered his face (even then blushing for very shame) with his ragged mantle, so that the lower part of his body appeared all naked. But I, not willing to see him any longer in such great misery and calamity, took him by the hand to lift him up from the ground: who 3 11 LUCIUS APULEIUS 7enitor. At ille, ut erat, capite velato ‘Sine, sine’ inquit *Fruatur diutius trophaeo Fortuna quod fixit ipsa.’ *' Effeci sequatur et simul unam e duabus laciniis meis exuo eumque propere vestio dicam an contego, et illico lavacro trado; quod unctui, quod tersui, ipse praeministro; sordium enormem eluviem operose effrico; probe curatum, ad hospitium, lassus ipse fatigatum aegerrime sustinens, perduco; lectulo refoveo, cibo satio, poculo mitigo, fabulis permulceo. Iam allubentia proclivis est sermonis et ioci et scitum et cavillum; iam dicacitas tinnula,! cum ille imo de pectore cruciabilem suspiritum ducens, dextra sae- viente frontem replaudens, ‘ Me miserum ' infit ‘ Qui, dum voluptatem gladiatorii spectaculi satis famigera- bilis consector, in has aerumnas incidi. Nam ut scis optime, secundum quaestum Macedoniam profectus, dum mense decimo ibidem attentus nummatior revortor, modico priusquam Larissam accederem, per transitum spectaculum obiturus, in quadam avia et lacunosa convalli a vastissimis latronibus obsessus atque omnibus privatus tandem evado et, utpote ultime affectus, ad quandam cauponam Meroen, anum sed admodum scitulam, devorto, eique causas et peregrinationis diuturnae et domuitionis anxiae et spoliationis diuturnae et miserae refero: quae me

• From The Golden Ass (Metamorphoses) (2)

  But the poore miser fell at length into the hands of unpittifull and cruell fortune: For beeing on a day amongst a great assembly of people, to tell the simple sort their fortune, a certaine Cobler came unto him, and desired him to tel when it should be best for him to take his voyage, the which hee promised to do: the Cobler opened his purse and told a hundred pence to him for his paines. Whereupon came a certaine young gentleman and took Diophanes by the Garment. Then he turning himselfe, embraced and kissed him, and desired the Gentleman, who was one of his acquaintance, to sit downe by him: and Diophanes being astonied with this sudden change, forgot what he was doing, and sayd, O deare friend you are heartily welcome, I pray you when arrived you into these parts? Then answered he, I will tell you soone, but brother I pray you tell mee of your comming from the isle of Euboea, and how you sped by the way? Whereunto Diophanes this notable Assyrian (not yet come unto his minde, but halfe amased) soone answered and sayd, I would to god that all our enemies and evil willers might fall into the like dangerous peregrination and trouble. For the ship where we were in, after it was by the waves of the seas and by the great tempests tossed hither and thither, in great peril, and after that the mast and stern brake likewise in pieces, could in no wise be brought to shore, but sunk into the water, and so we did swim, and hardly escaped to land. And after that, whatsoever was given unto us in recompense of our losses, either by the pitty of strangers, or by the benevolence of our friends, was taken away from us by theeves, whose violence when my brother Arisuatus did assay to resist, hee was cruelly murthered by them before my face. These things when he had sadly declared, the Cobler tooke up his money againe which he had told out to pay for the telling of his fortune, and ran away. The Diophanes comming to himselfe perceived what he had done, and we all that stood by laughed greatly. But that (quoth Milo) which Diophanes did tell unto you Lucius, that you should be happy and have a prosperous journey, was only true. Thus Milo reasoned with me.

• From The Swimming-Pool Library (1988)

  There was a peculiar silence. ‘Well, I’m sure you won’t have to wait very long,’ he said encouragingly, appraising Phil’s physique with an artful glance. ‘Are you a friend of Charles’s too?’ ‘Oh, no—I’m just a friend of Will’s.’ It became clear to me that Staines did not know why he had come, but was, as I had expected, glad that he had. ‘Quite so! Well, please, make yourself absolutely at home. I’m afraid there isn’t a pool—but you may like to sunbathe outside with Bobby’—he gestured tritely towards the garden—‘or whatever!’ ‘I think Ronald and I will have things to talk about, darling,’ I said. ‘But do sit in on it if you want.’ I felt a shiver of possessiveness and cruelty, as if I were some vile businessman addressing his wife. We all went to the windows and stepped out. To the side there was a gathering of expensive garden furniture, chairs with curved wicker arms and flowered cushions, a long, unfolding sun-bed, and a glass-topped table with a jug of Pimm’s and a matching set of Deco beakers: there was something ideal about it, as if it were in a catalogue. Beyond, at the edge of the terrace, stood tubs of alpine plants—dwarf conifers, lichen-yellow, and wiry tufts of heather leading their perfectly senseless existence. ‘We can all have a drink,’ said Staines. Then round the corner from the garden Bobby appeared. Bobby was—what?—thirty-five? He had been deeply indulged, had eaten too much, drunk too much, and his face and body were the record of it. I could see at once what sort of a child he had been: the loose mouth, the cheap, unblinking, china-blue eyes, the lock of glossy blond hair that he pushed back as he ambled towards us—all were features of a school tart, as it might be Mountjoy, aged by a decade and a half (and where was Mountjoy now?). His clothes made the idea inevitable: a crumpled white shirt, plimsolls, and baggy white flannels held up round the waist with what I recognised (from James having one the same) as an Old Gregorians tie. When we were introduced he said ‘Hullo’ in a plummy, straight manner and extended a hot damp hand with plump, double-jointed fingers and long chalky nails. I thought confusedly of theories of the humours, and could not imagine intimacy with a man with such hands. ‘So you’re going to do old Charles,’ he said, and chuckled as though Charles were a delinquent like himself. ‘Well, good luck is all I can say.’ He had pitched into the subject with charmless suddenness, but I was obliged to ask him more. ‘The old boy’s not all there, you know.

• From Collected Essays (1998)

  There is often something beautiful, there is always something awful, in the spectacle of a person who has lost one of his faculties, a faculty he never questioned until it was gone, and who struggles to recover it. Yet people remain people, on crutches or indeed on deathbeds; and wherever I passed, the first summer I was here, among the native villagers or among the lame, a wind passed with me-of astonishment, curiosity, amusement, and outrage. That first summer I stayed two weeks and never intended to return. But I did return in the winter, to work; the village otTers, obviously, no distrac tions whatever and has the further advantage of being ex tremely cheap. Now it is winter again, a year later, and I am here again. Everyone in the village knows my name, though they scarcely ever usc it, knows that I come from America though, this, apparently, they will never really believe: black men come fr om Africa-and everyone knows that I am the fr iend of the son of a woman who was born here, and that I am staying in their chalet. But I remain as much a stranger today as I was the first day I arrived, and the children shout Neger! Neger! as I walk along the streets. It must be admitted that in the beginning I was far too shocked to have any real reaction. In so far as I reacted at all, I reacted by trying to be pleasant-it being a great _ part--<->fthe -----·· STRANGER IN THE VILLAGE II9 American �egro's education (long before he goes to school) that he must make people "!jke" biRl. This smile-and-the world-smiles-with-you routine worked about as well in this situation as it had in the situation for which it was designed, which is to say that it did not work at all. �o one, after all, can be liked whose human weight and complexity cannot be, or has not been, admitted. i\ly smile was simply another un heard-of phenomenon which allowed them to see my teeth they did not, really, see my smile and I began to think that, should I take to snarling, no one would notice any difference. All of the physical characteristics of the �egro which had caused me, in America, a \'cry difterent and almost torgotten pain were nothing less than miraculous-or infernal-in the eyes of the Yillage people.

• From The Golden Ass (Metamorphoses) (2)

  Then I pressed in amongst them nigh unto the biere, and got upon a stone to see this mysterie, and behold incontinently the dead body began to receive spirit, his principall veines did moove, his life came again and he held up his head and spake in this sort: Why doe you call mee backe againe to this transitorie life, that have already tasted of the water of Lethe, and likewise been in the deadly den of Styx? Leave off, I pray, leave off, and let me lie in quiet rest. When these words were uttered by the dead corps, the Prophet drew nigh unto the Biere and sayd, I charge thee to tell before the face of all the people here the occasion of thy death: What, dost thou thinke that I cannot by my conjurations call up the dead, and by my puissance torment thy body? Then the corps moved his head again, and made reverence to the people and sayd, Verily I was poisoned by the meanes of my wicked wife, and so thereby yeelded my bed unto an adulterer. Whereat his wife taking present audacity, and reproving his sayings, with a cursed minde did deny it. The people were bent against her sundry wayes, some thought best that shee should be buried alive with her husband: but some said that there ought no credit to be given to the dead body. Which opinion was cleane taken away, by the words which the corps spoke againe and sayd, Behold I will give you some evident token, which never yet any other man knew, whereby you shall perceive that I declare the truth: and by and by he pointed towards me that stood on the stone, and sayd, When this the good Gard of my body watched me diligently in the night, and that the wicked Witches and enchantresses came into the chamber to spoyle mee of my limbes, and to bring such their purpose did transforme themselves into the shape of beasts: and when as they could in no wise deceive or beguile his vigilant eyes, they cast him into so dead and sound a sleepe, that by their witchcraft he seemed without spirit or life. After this they did call me by my name, and never did cease til as the cold members of my body began by little and little and little to revive. Then he being of more lively soule, howbeit buried in sleep, in that he and I were named by one name, and because he knew not that they called me, rose up first, and as one without sence or perseverance passed by the dore fast closed, unto a certain hole, whereas the Witches cut off first his nose, and then his ears, and so that was done to him which was appointed to be done to me.

• From The Swimming-Pool Library (1988)

  It was about nine when I reached home. The tall uncurtained window at the turn of the stairs still let in just enough of the phosphorescent late dusk to make it unnecessary to turn on a light. I enjoyed a proprietorial secrecy as I walked slowly and silently up, as well as the frisson of bleakness that comes from being in a deserted place as darkness gathers. There was something nostalgic in such spring nights, recalling the dreamy abstraction of punting in the dark, and the sweet tiredness afterwards, returning to rooms with all their windows open, still warm under the eaves. The door of the flat was slightly ajar, which was unusual. I was inclined to keep it shut as I was (or had been) often the only inhabitant of the house, the businessman in the main floors below being frequently abroad. And I had occasionally witnessed Arthur pushing it to, or checking as he passed through the hall that it was closed. My heart sank as I nudged it open and heard Arthur’s voice, not addressing me—he could not possibly have known I was there—but talking quietly to somebody else. The door of the sitting-room, which was open, hid whatever was going on; the light from that room fell across the further side of the hall. My first assumption was that he was on the telephone, which would have been reasonable enough except that he had said he hated the phone. For a sickening moment I felt that I was being somehow betrayed, and that when I went out he rang people up and carried on some other existence. A plan was afoot of which I was the dupe; he had not killed anybody at all … Then I heard another voice, just odd syllables, high—it sounded like a young girl. I heard Arthur say ‘Yeah, well I expect he’ll be back here soon.’ I made a noise and went into the room. ‘Will, thank God,’ Arthur said, half rising from the sofa, but encumbered by the heavy breadth of my photograph album, which lay open across his lap and across that of a small boy sitting beside him and leaning over it as if it were a table. It was my nephew Rupert. Rupert had had longer than me to work out what to say. Even so, he was clearly unsure of the effect he would have. First of all he wanted it to be a lovely surprise: he stared up at me, mouth slightly open, in a spell of silence, while Arthur, too, looked very uncertain. Again I found myself suddenly responsible for people. ‘This is an unexpected pleasure, Roops,’ I said. ‘Have you been showing Arthur the pictures?’ I thought something might be seriously wrong. ‘Yes,’ he said, a little shamefaced. ‘I’ve decided to run away.’

• From The Golden Ass (Metamorphoses) (2)

  THE THIRTY-NINTH CHAPTER How the Priests of the goddesse Siria were taken and put in prison, and how Apuleius was sold to a Baker. After that we had tarried there a few dayes at the cost and charges of the whole Village, and had gotten much mony by our divination and prognostication of things to come: The priests of the goddesse Siria invented a new meanes to picke mens purses, for they had certaine lotts, whereon were written: Coniuncti terram proscindunt boves ut in futurum loeta germinent sata

• From Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption (2014)

  It would have been too embarrassing to turn around, so I drove slowly across the bridge and was relieved when we had made it to the other side. I continued for another mile until the forest began to give way to trailers, a few small homes, and finally, an entire community hidden away in the woods. We pulled up a hill until we reached a trailer that was glowing in the darkness, lit by a fire burning in a barrel out front. Six or seven small children were playing outside; they dashed into the trailer when they saw our car pull up. As we got out of the car, a tall man emerged from the trailer. He walked up to us and hugged Minnie and Jackie before shaking my hand. “They been waiting for you,” he told me. “I know you probably got a lot of work to do, but we appreciate you coming to meet with us. I’m Giles, Walter’s nephew.” Giles led me to the trailer and opened the door for me to step inside. The small home was packed with more than thirty people, whose chattering fell silent when I walked in. I was startled by the size of the group, which stared at me appraisingly and then, one by one, started to smile at me. Then, to my amazement, the room broke into loud applause. I was stunned by the gesture. No one had ever applauded me just for showing up. There were older women, younger women, men Walter’s age, and several men much older. Their faces were creased with a by-now familiar look of anxiety. When the applause had died down, I began to speak. “Thank you, that’s very kind,” I started. “I’m so glad to meet you all. Mr. McMillian told me he had a large family, but I didn’t expect so many of you to be here. I saw him today, and he wants me to pass along his thanks and his gratitude to all of you for sticking by him. I hope you know how much your support means. He has to wake up on death row every morning, and that’s not easy. But he knows he’s not alone. He talks about you all the time.” “Sit down, Mr. Stevenson,” someone shouted. I took a seat on an empty couch that seemed to have been reserved for me and Minnie sat down beside me. Everyone else stood, facing me. “We don’t have any money. We gave it all to the first lawyer,” called out one of the men. “I understand that, and I won’t take a penny. I work for a nonprofit law office, and we provide legal assistance at no cost to the people we represent,” I replied. “Well, how do you pay the bills?” asked one young woman. People laughed at the question. “We get donations from foundations and people who support our work.”

• From Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption (2014)

  What we were told by local law enforcement about McMillian didn’t make much sense, and the story Myers told at trial definitely made no sense. I still can’t believe a jury ever convicted him.” Cole spoke up. “You’ll be very interested to know that both Hooks and Hightower have admitted that their trial testimony was false.” “Really?” I couldn’t hide my surprise at this. “Yes. When we were asked to investigate this case, we were told that you should be investigated because Hooks had said that you had offered him money and a condo in Mexico if he changed his testimony.” Taylor was dead serious. “A condo in Mexico?” “On a beach, I think,” Cole added nonchalantly. “Wait, me? I was going to give Bill Hooks a beach condo in Mexico if he changed his testimony against Walter?” It was difficult to contain my shock. “Well, I know it must sound crazy to you, but believe me there were people down there who were raring to get you indicted. But when we talked to Hooks, it didn’t take very long before he not only acknowledged that he’d never spoken to you and that you had never bribed him, but he also admitted that his trial testimony against McMillian was completely made up.” “Well, we’ve never had any doubts that Hooks was lying.” Cole chuckled. “We started polygraphing people, and things fell apart pretty quickly.” Bernard asked the obvious question, “Well, what happens now?” Taylor looked over at his partner and then at us. “Well, we’re not completely done. We’d like to solve this crime, and we have a suspect. I’m wondering if you might be willing to help us. I know you’re not trying to get anybody on death row, but we thought you might at least consider providing some help to identify the real killer. People will be a lot more accepting of Mr. McMillian’s innocence if they know who really committed this crime.” While it was ridiculous to think that Walter’s freedom depended on the arrest of someone else, I had imagined that a successful investigation might get to this—and I couldn’t dispute that even if an ABI investigation cleared Walter, people would still think he’d gotten away with murder until the actual killer was identified. We had long ago concluded that finding the real murderer might be the most effective way to free Walter, but without the power and authority of law enforcement officers, we were limited in what we could discover. We did have a strong theory. Several witnesses had told us that around the time of the crime, a white man had been seen leaving the cleaners. We had learned that before her death, Ronda Morrison had been receiving menacing calls and that there was a man who had been avidly and inappropriately pursuing her—stopping by unannounced at the cleaners, maybe even stalking her. We had not initially been able to identify this strange man. But we did have our suspicions.

• From Saint Thomas Aquinas Collection (22 Books) (2016)

  THEOPHYLACT. Peter did not refuse to comply, as it follows, And Simon answering said unto him, Master, we have toiled all night and have taken nothing. He did not go on to say, “I will not hearken to thee, nor expose myself to additional labour,” but rather adds, Nevertheless, at thy word I will let down the net. But our Lord, since he had taught the people out of the ship, left not the master of the ship without reward, but conferred on him a double kindness, giving him first a multitude of fishes, and next making him His disciple: as it follows, And when they had done this, they inclosed a great multitude of fishes. They took so many fishes that they could not pull them out, but sought the assistance of their companions; as it follows, But their net brake, and they beckoned to their partners who were in the other ship to come, &c. Peter summons them by a sign, being unable to speak from astonishment at the draught of fishes. We next hear of their assistance, And they came and filled both the ships. AUGUSTINE. (de Con. Ev. lib. 4. c. 6.) John seems indeed to speak of a similar miracle, but this is very different from the one he mentions. That took place after our Lord’s resurrection at the lake of Tiberias, and not only the time, but the miracle itself is very different. For in the latter the nets being let down on the right side took one hundred and fifty-three fishes, and these of large size, which it was necessary for the Evangelist to mention, because though so large the nets were not broken, and this would seem to have reference to the event which Luke relates, when from the multitude of the fishes the nets were broken.

• From Saint Thomas Aquinas Collection (22 Books) (2016)

  8. And he saith unto them, Draw out now, and bear unto the governor of the feast. And they bare it. 9. When the ruler of the feast had tasted the water that was made wine, and knew not whence it was: (but the servants which drew the water knew;) the governor of the feast called the bridegroom, 10. And saith unto him, Every man at the beginning doth set forth good wine; and when men have well drunk, then that which is worse: but thou hast kept the good wine until now. 11. This beginning of miracles did Jesus in Cana of Galilee, and manifested forth his glory; and his disciples believed on him. CHRYSOSTOM. (Hom. xxii. [al. xxi.] 1.) Although He had said, Mine hour is not yet come, He afterwards did what His mother told Him, in order to shew plainly, that He was not under subjection to the hour. For if He was, how could He have done this miracle before the hour appointed for it? In the next place, He wished to shew honour to His mother, and mate it appear that He did not go counter to her eventually. He would not put her to shame in the presence of so many; especially as she had sent the servants to Him, that the petition might come from a number, and not from herself only; His mother saith unto the servants, Whatsoever He saith unto you, do it. BEDE. (in loc.) As if she said, Though He appear to refuse, He will do it nevertheless. She knew His pity and mercifulness. And there were set there six waterpots of stone, after the manner of the purifying of the Jews, containing two or three firkins apiece. Hydriæ1 are vessels to hold water: hydor being the Greek for water. ALCUIN. Vessels to hold water were there, after the manner of the purifying of Jews. Among other traditions of the Pharisees, they observed frequent washings. CHRYSOSTOM. (Hom. xxii. [al. xxi.] 2.) Palestine being a dry country, with few fountains or wells, they used to fill waterpots with water, to prevent the necessity of going to the river, if they were unclean, and to have materials for washing at hand. To prevent any unbeliever from suspecting that a very thin wine was made by the dregs having been left in the vessels, and water poured in upon them, He says expressly, According to the manner of the purifying of the Jews: which shews that those vessels were never used to hold wine. AUGUSTINE. (Tr. ix. c. 7) A firkin is a certain measure; as urn, amphora, and the like. Metron is the Greek for measure: whence metretæ1. Two or three, is not to be taken to mean some holding two, others three, but the same vessels holding two or three. Jesus saith unto them, Fill the waterpots with water. And they filled them up to the brim.

• From Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption (2014)

  Cole spoke up. “You’ll be very interested to know that both Hooks and Hightower have admitted that their trial testimony was false.” “Really?” I couldn’t hide my surprise at this. “Yes. When we were asked to investigate this case, we were told that you should be investigated because Hooks had said that you had offered him money and a condo in Mexico if he changed his testimony.” Taylor was dead serious. “A condo in Mexico?” “On a beach, I think,” Cole added nonchalantly. “Wait, me? I was going to give Bill Hooks a beach condo in Mexico if he changed his testimony against Walter?” It was difficult to contain my shock. “Well, I know it must sound crazy to you, but believe me there were people down there who were raring to get you indicted. But when we talked to Hooks, it didn’t take very long before he not only acknowledged that he’d never spoken to you and that you had never bribed him, but he also admitted that his trial testimony against McMillian was completely made up.” “Well, we’ve never had any doubts that Hooks was lying.” Cole chuckled. “We started polygraphing people, and things fell apart pretty quickly.” Bernard asked the obvious question, “Well, what happens now?” Taylor looked over at his partner and then at us. “Well, we’re not completely done. We’d like to solve this crime, and we have a suspect. I’m wondering if you might be willing to help us. I know you’re not trying to get anybody on death row, but we thought you might at least consider providing some help to identify the real killer. People will be a lot more accepting of Mr. McMillian’s innocence if they know who really committed this crime.” While it was ridiculous to think that Walter’s freedom depended on the arrest of someone else, I had imagined that a successful investigation might get to this—and I couldn’t dispute that even if an ABI investigation cleared Walter, people would still think he’d gotten away with murder until the actual killer was identified. We had long ago concluded that finding the real murderer might be the most effective way to free Walter, but without the power and authority of law enforcement officers, we were limited in what we could discover. We did have a strong theory. Several witnesses had told us that around the time of the crime, a white man had been seen leaving the cleaners. We had learned that before her death, Ronda Morrison had been receiving menacing calls and that there was a man who had been avidly and inappropriately pursuing her—stopping by unannounced at the cleaners, maybe even stalking her. We had not initially been able to identify this strange man.

• From Great Authors of the Western Literary Tradition (2004)

  239 He is the paragon of knightly qualities and virtues—more so than any other knight of the Round Table. As we will see now, our story tinkers with these conventions. Gawain and the Green Knight is both a straightforward adventure/mystery tale and a dense forest of symbols. We’ll fi rst tell the tale, then explore some of those symbols and their possible meanings. Arthur and his knights have gathered for Christmas merriment; the scene is lush and joyous. Arthur, however, insists that he will not eat until someone has told a tale of adventure. Almost on cue, a huge, terrifying green warrior comes through the door. Arthur courteously invites the stranger to join in the celebration, but the Green Knight declines, saying that he has come because he has heard of the court and wishes to challenge the men to a Christmas game. The game involves trading blow for blow—one now, one a year hence—and the Green Knight offers his own battle-axe to whomever wishes to accept the challenge. Gawain insists that he be allowed to accept the challenge. The Green Knight offers his neck, and Gawain strikes a blow and severs his head. But to everyone’s astonishment, the knight picks up his head, reminds Gawain that he should appear to receive his blow at the Green Chapel on New Year’s Day a year later, mounts his horse, and rides away. The story fast-forwards to the next All Saints’ Day (November 1), when Gawain must depart. Gawain traverses a cold and mysterious landscape, but the author provides little detail. Gawain appears before a grand castle just before Christmas, where he is welcomed hospitably and treated to every consideration. The lord of the castle proposes that someone devise a Christmas game. Gawain meanwhile says that he is honor-bound to continue on to the Green Chapel. The lord of the castle says that this will be no problem at all, then proposes that for the next three days, he and Gawain exchange whatever they “catch.” Tests reveal character, but we may ask if Gawain passed his test or if, indeed, the test revealed fl aws in his character.

• From The Swimming-Pool Library (1988)

  The citizens, some aware of the camera, some at least showing no awareness, went stiffly up and down the pavement, turning flickering smiles or frowns. Some of them were getting up from the tables outside under the awning, couples bustling off, while others, with raising of hats, went into the absolute blackness of the interior. One side of the picture was then obscured by a man’s back. He half-turned and wavered in evident response to the cameraman’s protest, and shuffled away to the left. Then he reappeared full-length further off, and took up a position against the car, full of Chaplinesque fidgets, crossing his arms, cocking an ankle on the running-board, turning his head in ladylike parody from side to side. It clearly wasn’t Charles, though even a sensible person, I knew, might act up like this when a camera was running. It was a taller but thinner man. Moreover it was a bona fide queen. He had on elegant, unEnglish light suiting, with a bow-tie and a broad-brimmed straw hat which gave him a sweetly arcadian character, at the same time as shadowing his face. Then, overcome with embarrassment, he walked rapidly towards the camera, loomed in with peculiar closeness for a couple of seconds, high cheekbones, a long curved nose, funny little mouth. James was gripping my arm. ‘It’s Ronald Firbank,’ he said. ‘I don’t think there can be any doubt, do you?’ said Staines. ‘That’s certainly him,’ pronounced Charles. ‘If it’s what I think it is,’ said James, ‘it must be at the very end of his life.’ And in the next little bit he was laughing and suddenly it was going wrong: he had started to cough and cough, doubling up, his long hand gestured the camera away. I understood then, in the next scene, why he looked so frail, had the air of a man nonetheless confronting a threat. He was tackling a steep cobbled hill at the top of which a church was outlined in the late afternoon sun. His whole walk was anyway extraordinary, not best calculated for getting from one place to another, a business of undulating hands and picked tiny steps, and yet obviously inescapable: that was how he walked. A couple of small children at the roadside watched him pass and then started to follow him. One understood their sense that anything so conspicuous must be done deliberately, as an entertainment or as the origin of a procession. A taller boy, a ten-year-old in ragged clothes, joined them, imitating the novelist’s walk. The little ones, emboldened, skipped round him, running ahead as well to see him coming on, openly curious, asking questions, it seemed, of two or three syllables. The hectic jerkiness of the film lent them all a fantastical twitching energy.