(1559) The slow move towards evening after an easy afternoon.

 

16. An inaccessible novel for its time

What often happens with me late afternoons/early evenings is that I find myself, Steve’s last NOWP posted and with no plans by me to post any more that day, able to lie down, phone switched off, and rest after a day’s blogging … then either snooze or explore for upcoming posts.

Trouble is … sometimes I find something … but how to post? This “till close of play” format does not lend itself to long posts … they’re better standalone, the long ones, and I’m too weary anyway to go through all that again with dusk falling.

With that left unresolved, let’s plunge in regardless.

I was looking at Agatha Christie Best to Worst mystery novel lists and one billed as her 80th, to coincide with her age, with many strikes against it before it even started, was Passenger to Frankfurt. To fend off criticism, she just said it was a fantasy … and let it go at that. The intro was commented on this way:

“There is also an author’s introduction on the writing of the story, which concludes, “This story is in essence a fantasy. It pretends to be nothing more. But most of the things that happen in it are happening, or giving promise of happening in the world of today. It is not an impossible story – it is only a fantastic one.”” (Wiki)

Trouble is, again … it’s no fantasy in 2025, but it was bound not to find a ready audience/readership/reception in 1970. Under the Wiki heading “Literary significance and reception”, the typical critics used to her clever mysteries and bemoaning her loss of writing ability closer to the end … loss of vocabulary, repetition and so on … were generally quick to dismiss. Some saw it as a refreshing departure, unusual … it was certainly unusual for her, though it returned to one of her themes … the state of the world and of youth.

It’s no fantasy in the sense of Steve’s latest four links, IYE’s (hope he’s feeling better) deep dives, Redacted’s, Mark Matis’s, mine … many others who are uncovering all sorts, esp. what this deep state actually is. I have a feeling Christie stumbled on some of this at high level dinners, functions but how on earth to print it, let alone put it in a novel as a theme or plot?

Then we get to the stage today, where there are vastly more people more receptive to these crazy ideas of ours than, say, in 1970 when it was published.

No one reading it, except for a select few, would have had any idea what she was banging on about … that select few knew exactly whom she was accusing … and thus she had to disguise it as “semi-fiction” … weaving in some of her cloak and dagger, as in a novel, whilst inventing scenarios which were not directly referencing real events, but were redolent of them. How could she put in the Welfs for example?

So the story, along with her typical devices and hobbyhorses, plus no real tale of reality to dare use, remained in a sort of limbo, easily dismissed. Don’t forget her age in this.

15. Steve and war room

• Make Georgia Great Again: Rep. MTG Calls Out Woke Infiltration In Economic Hub Of South
• “We Want A Government That Will Put Its People First.” Malachy Steenson Live From Ireland
• “This Has CIA Written All Over It.” Tej Gill On [The] Ukraine Intel Becoming A Proxy
• JIm Fannell: In The Past 30 Years China Has More Than Doubled The Size Of Its Navy

14. How to prevent Prevent?

13. We may have had it already

… let’s have it again:

12. The criminals in charge