Reading

I read 'The Intimate Lives of the Ancient Greeks' recently. Besides being a generally fascinating topic, the author suffused it with playful humor, making it a great deal of fun from beginning to end.

"And in the hopes that I do not offend, either by subject matter or my treatment of it, let me offer the following advice: If you will be easily offended by pictures of people masturbating, just close this book right now. (For pictures of people masturbating, go to Chapter 2.)"

I'm not into comic books at all, but a while back in college someone heartily and vigorously recommended 'The Watchmen' as a good place to start. The artwork was hard to stomach at first, as it was very much stereotypical comic book style, and it seems like even in the 80s it would have looked dated. The pacing/arrangement of the artwork was excellent though, very cinematic and well done -- I was really impressed by that. I loved the story, I only wish it were a novel. Pictures just cannot convey the amount of detail I'd like, it can't put you inside the heads of the character or even flesh out the story as words can. If it were novelized as-is it probably wouldn't even fill up 100 pages (maybe too optimistic of an estimate).

Today I've been scanning through 'A Treatise of the Police of the Metropolis, 'containng a detail of the various crimes and misdemeanors by which the public and private property and security are, at present, injured and endangered: and suggesting remedies for their prevention.' It's a reprint of the 1806 edition. I ran across it on accident and thought it looked fun. Turns out it's all very bland and dry. There is a chapter titled 'On River Plunder', which just has a zesty ring to it and tickles much. It has reintroduced the word 'plunder' into my vocabulary. I don't use that word enough.

"The Gambling and Lottery transaction of one individual in the great Metropolis, are said to be productive of from ten to fifteen suicides annually."

/r/SanctionedSuicide Thread