Page 177 "...one more episode would have pushed him over the Reichenbach Falls"

Clockwise from top left: Sherlock Holmes and Moriarty battle at the top of the Falls;
The Reichenbach Falls, Switzerland; Sherlock Holmes climbing the Falls;
another view of the Falls.

From page 177 of the book: "...But because Owen had gone a little over the bend, the stories of his life which had been told in cold blood, had reached a point where if he didn't get sick from the telling, one more episode would have pushed him over the “Reichenbach Falls.” One more thing was going to drive him completely insane. Like Sherlock Holmes, it was going to be the final problem. And like Holmes, whose instinct was to survive and whose death over the Reichenbach Falls was a mere fiction, our instinct nevertheless was to survive. Owen's elemental impulse was to survive."

Page 176 "...reading Cobban's History of Modern France..."

Mid-19th century engraving of the storming of the Bastille

 Alfred Cobban (1901–1968)
Professor of French History, University College, London

From page 176 of the book: "...I was alone in the back yard, sitting between two kerosine lamps, reading Cobban's History of Modern France and fantasizing about the strange, romantic attachment I had to my mother's country."

Page 176 "...Aeneas' visit to hell in order to speak with his father"

Various images of the Aeneid

Aeneas visits the underworld

From page 176 of the book: "...As if to put a final topping on the discussion, relative to its meaning for fathers and sons, Ebert quoted from Virgil's Aeneid, a passage which spoke of Aeneas' visit to hell in order to speak with his father, Anchises. In translation, it said that the road to hell is easy, that the gate stands open night and day, but "to trace one's steps and return to the upper air, that is the toil, that the difficulty."

Page 174 "...our dinner table had an evolution that was nothing slight of spectacular"

A few images of Provence and its food.

From page 171 of the book:  "...In exchange for her volunteerism, Mme. Cendre was teaching her the French language and Provencal cooking.  The result of which was our dinner table had an evolution that was nothing slight of spectacular."


Some interesting links regarding Provencal cooking:

Life in Provence http://lifeinprovence.com/
Herbs and Spices of Provence www.beyond.fr/food/herbs.html

http://www.foodreference.com/html/art-provence.html

http://www.epiculinary.com/fra_valmouriane.html

Page 173 "...Camus once described the New York rain as a rain of exile"

From page 173 of the book:  "...Camus once described the New York rain as a rain of exile; and walking along Eighth Avenue, I'd felt not the encumbrance of the solitary patriot but indeed sensed the labyrinthine mess of our present course in life."


[an excerpt from Camus' essay]:
"New york rain is a rain of exile.  Abundant, viscous and dense, it pours down tirelessly between the high cubes of cement into avenues plunged suddenly into the darkness of a well: ...you suddenly feel caught in a trap....  And the very smell of New York rain tracks you down in the heart of the most harmonious and familiar towns, to remind you there is at least one place of deliverance in the world, where you, together with a whole people and for as long as you want, can finally lose yourself forever."

Page 173 "a book called Mr. Weston's Good Wine"

Clockwise from top left: Theodore Powys (early); Theodore Powys (later);
various covers for "Mr. Weston's GoodWine"

From page 173 of the book:  "...Owen nonetheless had pulled out of his intantry coat a pocket-size, cloth edition of a book called Mr. Weston's Good Wine, in which Death, disguised as a well-dressed, English wine purveyor, visits a small town and brings with him a special kind of wine.  What a title to be reading in the freezing dark of this train, I thought, slouched on the seat next to him."



[Mr. Weston's Good Wine (by T.F. Powys, a younger brother of John Cowper Powys) is the unusual tale of the struggle between the forces of good and evil in a small Dorset village. Its action is limited to one winter's evening when Time stands still and the bitter-sweet gift of awareness falls upon a dozen memorable characters. During the book a child knocked down by his car is miraculously brought back to life; the sign Mr Weston's Good Wine lights up the sky; and the villagers soon discover that the wine he sells is no ordinary wine. (Text copyright by The Powys Society)]


[an excerpt from Mr. Weston's Good Wine]

"If you let Tamar run about these hills in the way she does," Miss Pettifer told Mr Grobe, "who can say what might not happen! I wouldn't be in the least surprised to hear that the girl had fallen in love with a hay-trusser--or a badger. Or she might set up housekeeping with an old raven in a tree top. If a girl is not taught to play hockey, she might be found in a wood talking to a serpent."

Page 242 "...the Germans refer to his condition as Zerrissenheit..."

Zerrissenheit. Clockwise from top left: "Study of a Head,"
1952, painting by Franics Bacon; still from the movie "Of Men and Gods";
sculpture depicting "Lost Faith"; photo of Richard Burton as Hamlet, 1953.

The New Cassell's German Dictionary defines Zerrissenheit as raggedness, want of union, inner strife. It comes from the verb zerreissen, to tear up, lacerate, dismember.



From page 242 of the book:  "...The Germans refer to his condition as Zerrissenheit, a state of being torn apart. It was thus that Owen hadn't been able to satisfy the demands of his own individual world with those dire necessities of the real, objective world. Zerrissenheit ran through his veins."