In Medias Res: Ghost Hunters

So I was reading Ghost Hunters, which I'm enjoying so far, when I stumbled upon this passage concerning a trip the psychologist William James took to see his brother Henry, the novelist, in England:

William relaxed into the visit. He spent afternoons in conversation at his brother's clubs, surrounded by an aromatic fog of tobacco smoke. He made occasional calls on scientists. He walked the sooty streets, enjoying Henry's company. Then he found himself suddenly alone. Back in America, Henry James Sr. was dying. Their mother had died of bronchitis earlier that year, and their sister, faced with this second impending death, felt overwhelmed. She asked Henry Jr. to come home.

William--the more high-maintenance brother--was to stay in England. "All insist William shall not come," his sister telegraphed. William debated returning home anyway, despite his nervous state, but had to admit he probably wouldn't be an ideal deathbed companion.

Interesting family dynamic they had going there.

In Medias Res: Keats

So, I've finished My Booky Wook, but I'm not focused enough right now to gather my thoughts. Instead, I thought I'd offer this passage from Andrew Motion's biography of Keats, which I've just started.

It was a world fraught with violence. In the factories and the fields, where the conditions of everyday life were routinely shaped by appalling levels of suffering, the danger of rioting was a constant threat. There was a distinctly 'Sturm und Drang quality' about political life too. 'Think of the Earl of Chatham,' one recent historian has urged, 'collapsing in the House of Lords as he made his last manic and incoherent speech against war with America in 1778, or of Edmund Burke flinging a dagger into the floor of the House of Commons in December 1792 as a symbol of his departure from the Foxite Whigs, and of Charles James Fox bursting into tears as a result.' Think too of the Prime Minister Perceval, assassinated in the House of Commons in 1811, or of the startling statistic that nineteen Members of Parliament committed suicide between 1790 and 1820, and that a further twenty lapsed into insanity, as did their king.

Some people think history is dull. I can't imagine they've read the preceding paragraph.

In Medias Res: The Lost City of Z

Explorer John Hanning Speke

I don't normally post about books until I've finished them, but I decided to make an exception for The Lost City of Z by David Grann. I'm enjoying it so much, and so many passages are standing out to me, that I know I won't be able to get to all of them when I write it up. So, I decided to share one now.

Perhaps the most vicious feud was over the source of the Nile. After [John Hanning] Speke claimed in 1858 that he had discovered the river's origin, at a lake he christened Victoria, many of the [Royal Geographic] Society's members, led by his former traveling companion [Richard] Burton, refused to believe him. Speke said of Burton, "B is one of those men who can never be wrong, and will never acknowledge an error." In September of 1864, the two men, who had once nursed each other back from death on an expedition, were supposed to square off in a public meeting. The London Times called it a "gladiatorial exhibition." But, as the meeting was about to begin, the gatherers were informed that Speke would not be coming: he had gone hunting the previous day, and was found dead of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. "By God, he's killed himself!" Burton reportedly exclaimed, staggering on the stage; later, Burton was seen in tears, reciting his onetime companion's name over and over. Although it was never known for certain if the shooting was intentional, many suspected, like Burton, that the protracted feud had caused the man who had conquered the desert to take his own life. A decade later, Speke's claim to having discovered the Nile's source would be proved correct.


I was going to ask if anyone else wanted a Burton & Speke movie, but it turns out there already is one. And a novel! Brilliant. That story just blows my mind.

PS - This book is totally making me want to become an explorer. Just an FYI.