ketchup ~

[lookingland]

i've doing a lot of reading, but not reporting on it as of recent. i'm currently sort of muddling through thomas nelson page's Red Rock, which is interesting, but a long narrative with too many characters (i'm having a hard time keeping track of them all). i've also been reading fits and futz from various nonfiction books, but nothing substantial worth reporting (mostly retread). nevertheless, i have these two books to offer for the 50bookchallenge:

no. 6 ~ First Blood by david morrell. i've always been curious about what the original source material for the film was like. now i need be curious no more. i have to say i was mostly disappointed. somehow the movie improved on an interesting story that ends sorta eh. the book is oddly superficial. the motivations are scant, the violence is over the top. in the book, john rambo kills everybody (including teasle). in the film he kills nobody (though his actions do lead to a single death). in the book, trautman knows who he is, but they never worked together. in the film, they're like father and son. in the book, rambo gets it in the end (by trautman's hand, no less!). in the movie, rambo is redeemed. the book is a really bleak, nihilist take on the pointlessness of human existance and the desperate failure of people to connect.

i like the movie. now i have always liked the movie. i respect it now even more.

no. 7. ~ The Douglas Diary by Henry Kyd Douglas. this is Douglas's school diary (from Franklin and Marshall College, 1856-1858). i came across it by accident while looking for his war memoir and i am glad i did. it's a nice little book (beautifully printed!) with a good detail of life in a pennsylvania college town before the war (Lancaster). he mostly writes about "idling" a lot, oversleeping, not doing his homework, and stealing test questions by elaborate means (is there no honor?). Douglas and i would not have got along if he'd been in my high school. he seems a snooty, self-important little dork (a reputation that followed him as Jackson's youngest staff officer).

of historical note: it's speculated that Douglas was the idiot who lost Lee's order (for the invasion of Maryland) and possibly cost the Confederacy that campaign. there's no hard proof, but he was shortly thereafter sacked by Jackson and sent packing (the two evidently had a rather serious falling out, though Douglas would deny it later). most of his contemporaries called him a confabulator at best, a rank liar at worst. it's hard to know what to believe.

Douglas and J. F. Hartranft became friends during the war despite being from opposite sides of the Mason-Dixon (Douglas was an ingratiating, charismatic little rebel booger, for certain ~ and Hartranft seemed to be easily taken by charmers and toadies). the circumstances under which they met was certainly ineresting ~ Hartranft captured him. let it be testament to Hartrant's marshamallowy sentiment that even as captor, he couldn't help striking up a friendship with the boy-officer who had attended his own alma mater in Lancaster. anyway, the friendship turned out to be life-long (with Douglas reaping the benefits of Hartrant's influence). Douglas delivered an address at Hartranft's memorial unveiling in 1899 (which makes me all kinds of sad, though i can't exactly explain why).

Douglas was in prison for breaking parole at the time of the conspiracy trial ~ he was arrested for wearing a uniform hat (edit: i mean coat ~ in itself a hilarious story). he was brought in to corroborate the testimony presented by one of a number of government "plants" (probably in exchange for his release), but once on the stand denied ever seeing the man and contradicted everything the man had said. this infuriated the commission, he went back to prison, and his testimony was for all intents and purposes stricken from the record. it's impossible to know what in the world he was playing at in all of this. my sense of it was that he enjoyed the power he wielded and wanted to make fools of the commission (which he did). he was that sort of person (i.e. a punk). in this way i find him an interesting study, but i still don't like him, though kudos (where duly due) for him for thumbing his nose at the military trial. and i am still endeared to him for admiring Hartranft as he did, even under the worst circumstances.
h. k. douglas about the time of his writing of the diary.
okay, he was just a kid, but i still think
he was a conceited little miscreant.