BITS & PIECES OF A MISPLACED LIFE: THE JOY OF READING #3

“The 75th anniversary of the publication of Le
Petit Prince in France is commemorated  by a single 1.08 e stamp available in a sheet of 15. First available in the United States in 1943, it was banned by Vichy France and not published until after the liberation. The novella was written by writer and aviator Antoine de Saint-Exupery and is the story of a young prince who visits various planets and learns about ‘loneliness, friendship, friendship, love, and loss.’ “

William Silvester. “New World Issues” in The
American Philatelist (September 2021)


**

ON THE BEST SELLING NOVEL --THE DOGS OF WAR --AND  A SUCCESSFUL INVASION TO OVER THROW A REPUBLIC

‘There need only be five rules, Strike hard, strike
fast, and strike by night. Come unexpected and come
by sea. Parenthetically, the eventual book was 
imitated twice. In 1975, the French mercenary, 
Bob Denard attacked and took over the Comoro Islands, 
at the top of the Mozambique Channel.
   “He was acting with the knowledge, assistance, 
and on behalf of the French government. Amusingly, 
as the French mercenaries came up the beach in the 
predawn darkness, they all carried a paperback edition 
of Les Chiens de Guerre (The Dogs of War) so that they
could constantly find out what they were supposed to
do next. Denard succeeded because he came by sea.”

Frederick Forsyth. The Outsider: My Life in Intrigue.
(New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 2015)

**

ON DISCOVERING WHAT YOU WANT TO DO IN LIFE

“I discovered poetry as a soldier during World War II.
In 1943, my unit, having finished Basic Training in
Miami Beach, was boarding a troop train for a slow journey of several days across the country to an unknown destination, when a Red Cross worker handed us a bag of necessities for the trip, a toothbrush, comb, candy bar – and a paperback. My book was, fatefully, a Louis Untermeyer anthology of a great poems of the English Language, which I devoured on the tree. Three days later when I got off that train I knew what I wanted to be – a poet – in spite of, at the age of eighteen, never having written a line.”

Edward Field. The Man Who Would Marry Susan Sontag (Madison, Wisconsin: The University of Wisconsin, 2005)
**










SHOULD YOU BECOME A PUBLISHER?

On December 21, 1950 in a letter to Burroughs Mitchell of Scribner’s , Norman Mailer declared that
The title to James Jones’ great war novel –From Here to
Eternity –was  an “awful title.” If you agree or disagree with Mailer’s assessment give yourself 150 points. If, however, you are asking: Who is James Jones? Who is Norman Mailer? What was Scribner's? What war is being referred to? – then perhaps publishing is not the best choice for a profession for you.
**
A QUESTION TO WHICH I RARELY RECEIVE A REPLY

if John Keats


ONE OF THE STRANGEST BOOK DEDICATIONS

    Dedicated 
    to all the
    skeletons
     in your
    Closet and mine.

Walter Winchell. Winchell Exclusive: “Things That Happened to Me – and Me to Them” (Englewood Cliffs,
New Jersey: Prentice Hall Inc. , 1975)
**
ON ALTERNATE HISTORY

I purchased Wings – The Spirit of St. Louis
By Lindberg, Charles.
As I read I wonder what if
Lindberg flew not to Paris but to Arles?

*&*

If John Keats
Had sailed with Geats,
Wd he have written Beowulf?
Hey!I thought of this question all by myself!


Louis Phillips