Tuesday, March 05, 2013

Great Regulars: For the moment, therefore, what we have

here is a very shabby, very sleepy little village at one end of the beach, and the surprisingly ­intact remains of an imperial economic powerhouse at the other end. The clash is too good to miss.

The Spanish sit on beaches better than anybody else. It’s all peace and quiet and paddling. At the imperial end, you can spend hours in the lovely museum and on the walkways in the ruins.

from Bryan Appleyard: Bolonia: Tuna and the Empire

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The further point is that Mormons themselves are mainstream, in America at least. They make a fetish of respectability as well as of being the true native faith, yet they aim at universality as if American respectability was the proper condition of all mankind. This is funny in itself and it  clears up a point about what is being satirised here. Neither Mormonism nor religion is the prime target, parochialism is the heart of the matter.

from Bryan Appleyard: The Mormons and Liberty Valance

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