War and Peace, by Leo Tolstoy

[foraker]

i think someone needs to go climbing....

[olyclimber]

When from dark error's subjugation

My words of passionate exhortation

Had wrenched thy fainting spirit free;

And writhing prone in thine affliction

Thou didst recall with malediction

The vice that had encompassed thee:

And when thy slumbering conscience, fretting

By recollection's torturing flame,

Thou didst reveal the hideous setting

Of thy life's current ere I came:

When suddenly I saw thee sicken,

And weeping, hide thine anguished face,

Revolted, maddened, horror-stricken,

At memories of foul disgrace

[Dru]

I've mastered a margarita.

[Dru]

Concerning this a man once said: Why such reluctance? If you only followed the parables you yourselves would become parables and with that rid of all your daily cares.

–Another said: I bet that is also a parable.

–The first said: You have won.

–The second said: But unfortunately only in parable.

–The first said: No, in reality: in parable you have lost.

[Squid]

Just then another visitor entered the drawing room: Prince Andrew

Bolkonski, the little princess' husband. He was a very handsome

young man, of medium height, with firm, clearcut features.

Everything about him, from his weary, bored expression to his quiet,

measured step, offered a most striking contrast to his quiet, little

wife. It was evident that he not only knew everyone in the drawing

room, but had found them to be so tiresome that it wearied him to look

at or listen to them. And among all these faces that he found so

tedious, none seemed to bore him so much as that of his pretty wife.

He turned away from her with a grimace that distorted his handsome

face, kissed Anna Pavlovna's hand, and screwing up his eyes scanned

the whole company.

[olyclimber]

I made friends with no one and positively avoided talking, and buried myself more and more in my hole.

[googlebot]

I've already read this one several times! Its all over the net.

[olyclimber]

At work in the office I never looked at anyone, and was perfectly well aware that my companions looked upon me, not only as a queer fellow, but even looked upon me -- I always fancied this -- with a sort of loathing.

[Squid]

"You are off to the war, Prince?" said Anna Pavlovna.

[olyclimber]

I sometimes wondered why it was that nobody except me fancied that he was looked upon with aversion?

[knotzen]

I made friends with no one and positively avoided talking, and buried myself more and more in my hole.

"Final Days," by Karl Rove?

[Squid]

"General Kutuzov," said Bolkonski, speaking French and stressing the

last syllable of the general's name like a Frenchman, "has been

pleased to take me as an aide-de-camp...."

 

"And Lise, your wife?"

 

"She will go to the country."

 

"Are you not ashamed to deprive us of your charming wife?"

[olyclimber]

Of course, I hated my fellow clerks one and all, and I despised them all, yet at the same time I was, as it were, afraid of them.

[Squid]

"Andre," said his wife, addressing her husband in the same

coquettish manner in which she spoke to other men, "the vicomte has

been telling us such a tale about Mademoiselle George and Buonaparte!"

 

Prince Andrew screwed up his eyes and turned away. Pierre, who

from the moment Prince Andrew entered the room had watched him with

glad, affectionate eyes, now came up and took his arm. Before he

looked round Prince Andrew frowned again, expressing his annoyance

with whoever was touching his arm, but when he saw Pierre's beaming

face he gave him an unexpectedly kind and pleasant smile.

 

"There now!

[olyclimber]

A cultivated and decent man cannot be vain without setting a fearfully high standard for himself, and without despising and almost hating himself at certain moments.

[Squid]

... So you, too, are in the great world?" said he to

Pierre.

 

"I knew you would be here," replied Pierre. "I will come to supper

with you. May I?" he added in a low voice so as not to disturb the

vicomte who was continuing his story.

[olyclimber]

I had a sickly dread, too, of being ridiculous, and so had a slavish passion for the conventional in everything external.

[archenemy]

I had a sickly dread, too, of being ridiculous, and so had a slavish passion for the conventional in everything external.

Hard to tell.

[Dru]

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered weak and weary,

Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,

While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,

As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.

`'Tis some visitor,' I muttered, `tapping at my chamber door -

Only this, and nothing more.'

 

Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December,

And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor.

Eagerly I wished the morrow; - vainly I had sought to borrow

From my books surcease of sorrow - sorrow for the lost Lenore -

For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels named Lenore -

Nameless here for evermore.

 

And the silken sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain

Thrilled me - filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before;

So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating

`'Tis some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door -

Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door; -

This it is, and nothing more,'

 

Presently my soul grew stronger; hesitating then no longer,

`Sir,' said I, `or Madam, truly your forgiveness I implore;

But the fact is I was napping, and so gently you came rapping,

And so faintly you came tapping, tapping at my chamber door,

That I scarce was sure I heard you' - here I opened wide the door; -

Darkness there, and nothing more.

 

Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing,

Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before

But the silence was unbroken, and the darkness gave no token,

And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, `Lenore!'

This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word, `Lenore!'

Merely this and nothing more.

 

Back into the chamber turning, all my soul within me burning,

Soon again I heard a tapping somewhat louder than before.

`Surely,' said I, `surely that is something at my window lattice;

Let me see then, what thereat is, and this mystery explore -

Let my heart be still a moment and this mystery explore; -

'Tis the wind and nothing more!'

 

Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and flutter,

In there stepped a stately raven of the saintly days of yore.

Not the least obeisance made he; not a minute stopped or stayed he;

But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above my chamber door -

Perched upon a bust of Pallas just above my chamber door -

Perched, and sat, and nothing more.

 

Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling,

By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore,

`Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou,' I said, `art sure no craven.

Ghastly grim and ancient raven wandering from the nightly shore -

Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night's Plutonian shore!'

Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

 

Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to hear discourse so plainly,

Though its answer little meaning - little relevancy bore;

For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being

Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird above his chamber door -

Bird or beast above the sculptured bust above his chamber door,

With such name as `Nevermore.'

 

But the raven, sitting lonely on the placid bust, spoke only,

That one word, as if his soul in that one word he did outpour.

Nothing further then he uttered - not a feather then he fluttered -

Till I scarcely more than muttered `Other friends have flown before -

On the morrow will he leave me, as my hopes have flown before.'

Then the bird said, `Nevermore.'

 

Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken,

`Doubtless,' said I, `what it utters is its only stock and store,

Caught from some unhappy master whom unmerciful disaster

Followed fast and followed faster till his songs one burden bore -

Till the dirges of his hope that melancholy burden bore

Of "Never-nevermore."'

 

But the raven still beguiling all my sad soul into smiling,

Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of bird and bust and door;

Then, upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to linking

Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous bird of yore -

What this grim, ungainly, gaunt, and ominous bird of yore

Meant in croaking `Nevermore.'

 

This I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable expressing

To the fowl whose fiery eyes now burned into my bosom's core;

This and more I sat divining, with my head at ease reclining

On the cushion's velvet violet lining that the lamp-light gloated o'er,

But whose velvet violet lining with the lamp-light gloating o'er,

She shall press, ah, nevermore!

 

Then, methought, the air grew denser, perfumed from an unseen censer

Swung by Seraphim whose foot-falls tinkled on the tufted floor.

`Wretch,' I cried, `thy God hath lent thee - by these angels he has sent thee

Respite - respite and nepenthe from thy memories of Lenore!

Quaff, oh quaff this kind nepenthe, and forget this lost Lenore!'

Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

 

`Prophet!' said I, `thing of evil! - prophet still, if bird or devil! -

Whether tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore,

Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted -

On this home by horror haunted - tell me truly, I implore -

Is there - is there balm in Gilead? - tell me - tell me, I implore!'

Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

 

`Prophet!' said I, `thing of evil! - prophet still, if bird or devil!

By that Heaven that bends above us - by that God we both adore -

Tell this soul with sorrow laden if, within the distant Aidenn,

It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels named Lenore -

Clasp a rare and radiant maiden, whom the angels named Lenore?'

Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

 

`Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend!' I shrieked upstarting -

`Get thee back into the tempest and the Night's Plutonian shore!

Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken!

Leave my loneliness unbroken! - quit the bust above my door!

Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!'

Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

 

And the raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting

On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door;

And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming,

And the lamp-light o'er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor;

And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor

Shall be lifted - nevermore!

[Dru]

Stately, plump Buck Mulligan came from the stairhead, bearing a bowl of lather on which a mirror and a razor lay crossed. A yellow dressinggown, ungirdled, was sustained gently behind him by the mild morning air. He held the bowl aloft and intoned:

-- Introibo ad altare Dei.

 

Halted, he peered down the dark winding stairs and called up coarsely:

 

-- Come up, Kinch! Come up, you fearful jesuit!

 

Solemnly he came forward and mounted the round gunrest. He faced about and blessed gravely thrice the tower, the surrounding country and the awaking mountains. Then, catching sight of Stephen Dedalus, he bent towards him and made rapid crosses in the air, gurgling in his throat and shaking his head. Stephen Dedalus, displeased and sleepy, leaned his arms on the top of the staircase and looked coldly at the shaking gurgling face that blessed him, equine in its length, and at the light untonsured hair, grained and hued like pale oak.

 

Buck Mulligan peeped an instant under the mirror and then covered the bowl smartly.

 

-- Back to barracks! he said sternly.

 

He added in a preacher's tone:

 

-- For this, O dearly beloved, is the genuine Christine: body and soul and blood and ouns. Slow music, please. Shut your eyes, gents. One moment. A little trouble about those white corpuscles. Silence, all.

 

He peered sideways up and gave a long low whistle of call, then paused awhile in rapt attention, his even white teeth glistening here and there with gold points. Chrysostomos. Two strong shrill whistles answered through the calm.

[Norman_Clyde]

Red lips are not so red

As the stained stones kissed by the English dead.

Kindness of wooed and wooer

Seems shame to their love pure.

O Love, your eyes lose lure

When I behold eyes blinded in my stead!

 

Your slender attitude

Trembles not exquisite as limbs knife skewed,

Rolling and rolling there

Where God seems not to care;

Till the fierce love they bear

Cramps them in death's extreme decrepitude.

 

Your voice sings not so soft--

Though as wind murmuring through raftered loft--

Your dear voice is not dear,

Gentle, and evening clear

As theirs whom none now hear,

Now earth has stopped their piteous mouths that coughed.

 

Heart, you were never hot

Nor large, nor full as hearts made great with shot;

And though your hand be pale,

Paler are all which trail

Your cross through flame and hail;

Weep, you may weep, for you may touch them not.

[Dechristo]

Mustard gas

[Dru]

 

There were times when Frank and I were friendly with Chuck, Eddie and Gene. But something would always happen (usually I caused it) and then I would be out, and Frank would be partly out because he was my friend. It was good hanging out with Frank. We hitch-hiked everywhere. One of our favorite places was this movie studio. We crawled under a fence surrounded by tall weeds to get in. We saw the huge wall and steps they used in the King Kong movie. We saw the fake streets and the fake buildings. The buildings were just fronts with nothing behind them. We walked all over that movie lot many times until the guard would chase us out. We hitch-hiked down to the beach to the Fun House. We would stay in the Fun House three or four hours. We memorized that place. It really wasn't that good. People shit and pissed in there and the place was littered with empty bottles. And there were rubbers in the crapper, hardened and wrinkled. Bums slept in the Fun House after it closed. There really wasn't anything funny about the Fun House. The House of Mirrors was good at first. We stayed in there until we had memorized how to walk through the maze of mirrors and then it wasn't any good any more. Frank and I never got into fights. We were curious about things. There was a movie featuring a Caesarean operation on the pier and we went in and saw it. It was bloody. Each time they cut into the woman blood squirted out, gushers of it, and then they pulled out the baby. We went fishing off the pier and when we caught something we would sell it to the old Jewish ladies who sat on the benches. I got some beatings from my father for running off with Frank but I figured I was going to get the beatings anyhow so I might as well have the fun.

 

But I continued to have trouble with the other kids in the neighborhood. My father didn't help. For example he bought me an Indian suit and a bow and arrow when all the other kids had cowboy outfits. It was the same then as in the schoolyard—-I was ganged-up on. They'd circle me with their cowboy outfits and their guns, but when it got bad I'd just put an arrow into the bow, pull it back and wait. That always moved them off. I never wore that Indian suit unless my father made me put it on.

 

I kept falling out with Chuck, Eddie and Gene and then we'd get back together and then we'd fall out all over again.

 

One afternoon I was just standing around. I wasn't exactly in good or in bad with the gang, I was just waiting around for them to forget the last thing I had done that had made them angry. There wasn't anything else to do. Just white air and waiting. I got tired of standing around and decided to walk up the hill to Washington Boulevard, east to the movie house and then back down to West Adams Boulevard. Maybe I'd walk past the church. I started walking. Then I heard Eddie:

 

"Hey, Henry, come here!"

 

The guys were standing in a driveway between two houses. Eddie, Frank, Chuck and Gene. They were watching something. They were bent over a large bush watching something.

 

"Come here, Henry!"

 

"What is it?"

 

I walked up to where they were bending over.

 

"It's a spider getting ready to eat a fly!" said Eddie.

 

I looked. The spider had spun a web between the branches of a bush and a fly had gotten caught in there. The spider was very excited. The fly shook the whole web as it tried to pull free. It was buzzing wildly and helplessly as the spider wound the fly's wings and body in more and more spider web. The spider went around and around, webbing the fly completely as it buzzed. The spider was very big and ugly.

 

"It's going to close in now!" yelled Chuck. "It's going to sink its fangs ! "

 

I pushed in between the guys, kicked out and knocked the spider and the fly out of the web with my foot.

 

"What the hell have you done?" asked Chuck.

 

"You son-of-a-bitch!" yelled Eddie. "You've spoiled it!"

 

I backed off. Even Frank stared at me strangely.

 

"Let's get his ass!" yelled Gene.

 

They were between me and the street. I ran down the driveway into the backyard of a strange house. They were after me. I ran through the backyard and behind the garage. There was a six-foot lattice fence covered with vines. I went straight up the fence and over the top. I ran through the next backyard and up the driveway and as I ran up the driveway I looked back and saw Chuck just reaching the top of the fence. Then he slipped and fell into the yard landing on his back. "Shit!" he said. I took a right and kept running. I ran for seven or eight blocks and then sat down on somebody's lawn and rested. There was nobody around. I wondered if Frank would forgive me. I wondered if the others would forgive me. I decided to stay out of sight for a week or so . . .

 

And so they forgot. Not much happened for a while. There were many days of nothing. Then Frank's father committed suicide. Nobody knew why. Frank told me he and his mother would have to move to a smaller place in another neighborhood. He said he would write. And he did. Only we didn't write. We drew cartoons. About cannibals. His cartoons were about troubles with cannibals and then I'd continue the cartoon story where his left off, about the troubles with the cannibals. My mother found one of Frank's cartoons and showed it to my father and our letter writing was over.

 

5th grade became 6th grade and I began to think about running away from home but I decided that if most of our fathers couldn't get jobs how in the hell could a guy under five feet tall get one? John Dillinger was everybody's hero, adults and kids alike. He took the money from the banks. And there was Pretty Boy Floyd and Ma Barker and Machine Gun Kelly.

 

People began going to vacant lots where weeds grew. They had learned that some of the weeds could be cooked and eaten. There were fist fights between men in the vacant lots and on street corners. Everybody was angry. The men smoked Bull Durham and didn't take any shit from anybody. They let the little round Bull Durham tags hang out of their front shirt pockets and they could all roll a cigarette with one hand. When you saw a man with a Bull Durham tag dangling, that meant look out. People went around talking about 2nd and 3rd mortgages. My father came home one night with a broken arm and two black eyes. My mother had a low paying job somewhere. And each boy in the neighborhood had one pair of Sunday pants and one pair of daily pants. When shoes wore out there weren't any new ones. The depart-ment stores had soles and heels they sold for 15 or 20 cents along with the glue, and these were glued to the bottoms of the worn out shoes. Gene's parents had one rooster and some chickens in their backyard, and if some chicken didn't lay enough eggs they ate it.

 

As for me, it was the same—at school, and with Chuck, Gene and Eddie. Not only did the grownups get mean, the kids got mean, and even the animals got mean. It was like they took their cue from the people.

 

One day I was standing around, waiting as usual, not friendly with the gang, no longer really wanting to be, when Gene rushed up to me, "Hey, Henry, come on!"

 

"What is it?"

 

"COME ON!"

 

Gene started running and I ran after him. We ran down the driveway and into the Gibsons' backyard. The Gibsons had a large brick wall all around their backyard.

 

"LOOK! HE'S GOT THE CAT CORNERED! HE'S GOING TO KILL IT!"

 

There was a small white cat backed into a corner of the wall. It couldn't go up and it couldn't go in one direction or the other. Its back was arched and it was spitting, its claws ready. But it was very small and Chuck's bulldog, Barney, was growling and moving closer and closer. I got the feeling that the cat had been put there by the guys and then the bulldog had been brought in. I felt it strongly because of the way Chuck and Eddie and Gene were watching: they had a guilty look.

 

"You guys did this," I said.

 

"No," said Chuck, "it's the cat's fault. It came in here. Let it fight its way out."

 

"I hate you bastards," I said.

 

"Barney's going to kill that cat," said Gene.

 

"Barney will rip it to pieces," said Eddie. "He's afraid of the claws but when he moves in it will be all over."

 

Barney was a large brown bulldog with slobbering jaws. He was dumb and fat with senseless brown eyes. His growl was steady and he kept inching forward, the hairs standing up on his neck and along his back. I felt like kicking him in his stupid ass but I figured he would rip my leg off. He was entirely intent upon the kill. The white cat wasn't even fully grown. It hissed and waited, pressed against the wall, a beautiful creature, so clean.

 

The dog moved slowly forward. Why did the guys need this? This wasn't a matter of courage, it was just dirty play. Where were the grownups? Where were the authorities? They were always around accusing me. Now where were they?

 

I thought of rushing in, grabbing the cat and running, but I didn't have the nerve. I was afraid that the bulldog would attack me. The knowledge that I didn't have the courage to do what was necessary made me feel terrible. I began to feel physically sick. I was weak. I didn't want it to happen yet I couldn't think of any way to stop it.

 

"Chuck," I said, "let the cat go, please. Call your dog off."

 

Chuck didn't answer. He just kept watching.

 

Then he said, "Barney, go get him! Get that cat!"

 

Barney moved forward and suddenly the cat leaped. It was a furious blur of white and hissing, claws and teeth. Barney backed off and the cat retreated to the wall again.

 

"Go get him, Barney," Chuck said again.

 

"God damn you, shut up!" I told him.

 

"Don't talk to me that way," Chuck said.

 

Barney began to move in again.

 

"You guys set this up," I said.

 

I heard a slight sound behind us and looked around. I saw old Mr. Gibson watching from behind his bedroom window. He wanted the cat to get killed too, just like the guys. Why?

 

Old Mr. Gibson was our mailman with the false teeth. He had a wife who stayed in the house all the time. she only came out to empty the garbage. Mrs. Gibson always wore a net over her hair and she was always dressed in a nightgown, bathrobe and slippers.

 

Then as I watched, Mrs. Gibson, dressed as always came and stood next to her husband, waiting for the kill. Old Mr. Gibson was one of the few men in the neighborhood with a job but he still needed to see the cat killed. Gibson was just like Chuck, Eddie and Gene.

 

There were too many of them.

 

The bulldog moved closer. I couldn't watch the kill. I felt a great shame at leaving the cat like that. There was always the chance that the cat might try to escape, but I knew that they would prevent it. That cat wasn't only facing the bulldog, it was facing Humanity.

 

I turned and walked away, out of the yard, up the driveway and to the sidewalk. I walked along the sidewalk toward where I lived and there in the front yard of his home, my father stood waiting.

 

"Where have you been?" he asked.

 

I didn't answer.

 

"Get inside," he said, "and stop looking so unhappy or I'll give you something that will really make you unhappy!"

[Dechristo]

Like that version of War and Peace.

[Norman_Clyde]

Before our lives divide for ever,

While time is with us and hands are free,

(Time, swift to fasten and swift to sever

Hand from hand, as we stand by the sea)

I will say no word that a man might say

Whose whole life's love goes down in a day;

For this could never have been; and never,

Though the gods and the years relent, shall be.