The most touching book you have read till date.

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Re: The most touching book you have read till date.

Post by Deej »

Moonraker wrote: Offensive? But is it? We tell people that Enid's writings should be read in the context of the time in which they were written.The term idiot, as Anita suggests, was a bone fide medical term back then. I can't see anything offensive in the term (used in the time it was written) at all. In fact, it gives a very strong flavour of the times of those eras. We dress everything up today, seemingly thinking that to use certain terms cause offence. Parkinson's Disease has now lost the word disease. The same with Alzheimer's. They are diseases, what is wrong in calling them so? It is good that we no longer to refer to cripples, spastics etc. Mental health has changed even more. Of course, so much for the better in many ways. It would be unthinkable to talk seriously of lunatics, asylums, madhouses and so on. However, calling patients clients and even hospitals aren't called hospitals in some areas. Our local psychiatric hospital (I probably shouldn't even call it that today) used to be called Old Manor Hospital. Today it is just called Fountain Way. We are told, and I agree, that mental health issues should be treated similarly to physical health problems. Why then, are these name changes being made? Or am I mad to even ask?
I would class Alzheimer's as more of a mental health condition than a disease but I take your point that in the context during the time, certain words such as 'idiot' were not offensive.We have gone a little OTT with the use of certain words in modern society to the point that people are scared to say anything as they're running the risk of being 'offensive'. But then the advantages of the PC society we live in are the condemning of words which are clearly unacceptable to use.
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Re: The most touching book you have read till date.

Post by Katharine »

I always get confused by the word 'disease', I can't shake off the idea that diseases are something you catch. Obviously that's not the case with things like Parkinsons. Maybe it's because of the Tony Hancock phrase 'coughs and sneezes spread diseases'.

As for whether the word idiot, or indeed any other word is offensive, I suppose it's a case of not whether the word is offensive as such, but more the context in which it's used. So I could call myself an idiot for forgetting to switch the oven on to cook the dinner, but it would be unacceptable to call someone an idiot because they had dyslexia.
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Re: The most touching book you have read till date.

Post by Courtenay »

Katharine wrote: As for whether the word idiot, or indeed any other word is offensive, I suppose it's a case of not whether the word is offensive as such, but more the context in which it's used. So I could call myself an idiot for forgetting to switch the oven on to cook the dinner, but it would be unacceptable to call someone an idiot because they had dyslexia.
I think that about nails it for me too. I know terms like "idiot" and "moron" were formerly accepted medical and legal terms for specific forms of mental disability, but they also come from a time when society was far less accepting and supportive of those with such conditions - which is probably how those words became equivalent to "stupid" or "brainless".

While I think in some cases the modern tendency to put labels on people can go too far (the worst I've ever heard of was shyness being classified as "social anxiety disorder" :roll: ), I'm grateful that we've progressed a long way in avoiding denigrating or insulting those who do have a genuine disability or difficulty.
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Re: The most touching book you have read till date.

Post by Deej »

Katharine wrote:I always get confused by the word 'disease', I can't shake off the idea that diseases are something you catch. Obviously that's not the case with things like Parkinsons.

As for whether the word idiot, or indeed any other word is offensive, I suppose it's a case of not whether the word is offensive as such, but more the context in which it's used. So I could call myself an idiot for forgetting to switch the oven on to cook the dinner, but it would be unacceptable to call someone an idiot because they had dyslexia.
Agree with all this.
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Re: The most touching book you have read till date.

Post by Fiona1986 »

Altzheimers is a disease, that's not really debatable. It involves physical degeneration of brain cells.

"A disease is a particular abnormal, pathological condition that affects part or all of an organism. It is often construed as a medical condition associated with specific symptoms and signs.[1] It may be caused by factors originally from an external source, such as infectious disease, or it may be caused by internal dysfunctions, such as autoimmune diseases....
The term disease broadly refers to any condition that impairs normal function, and is therefore associated with dysfunction of normal homeostasis.[5] Commonly, the term disease is used to refer specifically to infectious diseases, which are clinically evident diseases that result from the presence of pathogenic microbial agents, including viruses, bacteria, fungi, protozoa, multicellular organisms, and aberrant proteins known as prions. An infection that does not and will not produce clinically evident impairment of normal functioning, such as the presence of the normal bacteria and yeasts in the gut, or of a passenger virus, is not considered a disease. By contrast, an infection that is asymptomatic during its incubation period, but expected to produce symptoms later, is usually considered a disease. Non-infectious diseases are all other diseases, including most forms of cancer, heart disease, and genetic disease..."

This is different from a mental health condition, most of which are caused by imbalances in hormones etc. Some diseases can cause mental health issues of course if they interfere with hormone production.

"In medicine, a disorder is a functional abnormality or disturbance. Medical disorders can be categorized into mental disorders, physical disorders, genetic disorders, emotional and behavioral disorders, and functional disorders. The term disorder is often considered more value-neutral and less stigmatizing than the terms disease or illness, and therefore is a preferred terminology in some circumstances. In mental health, the term mental disorder is used as a way of acknowledging the complex interaction of biological, social, and psychological factors in psychiatric conditions."
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Re: The most touching book you have read till date.

Post by Deej »

Thanks for posting the definition, Fiona.

I appreciate that Alzheimer's is a disease but I know that it's bracketed in with mental health. My has worked as a nurse looking after people with it and I have known of people with it. It definitely effects the mental health, although I can see it's different from someone with depression, people who my mum works with now as a mental health nurse.
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The brain is the hub of our bodies, so it could be argued that there are many cases when a mental condition can contribute to a physical condition, or vice versa. The brain/mind isn't separate to everything below the neck in the body, it is inexorably linked, with brain tissue running down the spinal cord. Of course, the term "brainless" isn't a medical term, as without a brain we wouldn't be alive.
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Re: The most touching book you have read till date.

Post by Rob Houghton »

Interesting thread! Not sure whether we're discussing the most touching books, or family research or mental health names...but I think I can combine all three! ;-)

Some of the books I've found most touching - the ending of The Railway Children by E Nesbit, the ending of Rubadub Mystery by Enid Blyton, most of 'The Clover Club and the House of Mystery' by A.D Langholm, Rebecca by Daphne DuMaurier, A Tree Grows In Brooklyn by Betty Smith and The Shell House by Linda Newbery.

In doing my family research, I came across my grand mother's uncle, born in 1869. He was a victim of infantile paralysis - died aged 32 - but in an earlier census he was also listed as 'idiot' and in another census as 'imbecile'. I'm not sure if these were actual medical terms. In those days the census enumerators could pretty much write what they liked, as a good percentage of people in the census couldn't read it anyway.
Last edited by Rob Houghton on 16 Aug 2015, 22:43, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: The most touching book you have read till date.

Post by Fiona1986 »

Daddy! My Daddy! :cry: gets me every time.
"It's the ash! It's falling!" yelled Julian, almost startling Dick out of his wits...
"Listen to its terrible groans and creaks!" yelled Julian, almost beside himself with impatience.


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Re: The most touching book you have read till date.

Post by Rob Houghton »

Moonraker wrote:
Courtenay wrote:This is getting even further off topic, but I must say I'm very reluctant to read reviews in the Cave for any of Enid's books I haven't already read... while invariably well written, they're often so long and detailed that they give away heaps of plot spoilers. :P
I never give away plotlines, and am really annoyed when people do. Thanks, Katharine, for your kind words. I agree with you, it is always best to read the book first as the outline of the story is bound to be revealed.
I have to admit, as I've said before in other threads, I don't really understand the difference between giving away 'plotlines' and revealing 'spoilers'. I know many of my story reviews could be accused of revealing plotlines - and after all, I wrote them for The Journal, where we have to presume that people have already read the story that's being discussed. I agree it's best not to read any of these reviews if you've never read the book in question. Being picky, I've never read a review that didn't include plotlines or spoilers - even Nigel's excellent review of Hollow Tree House contains numerous plotlines. I would say it's impossible to write a review of a book without revealing way too much of the plot. I know I couldn't manage to write one, because even mentioning characters and settings can spoil the enjoyment of a plot to some readers.
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Re: The most touching book you have read till date.

Post by MJE »

     I could name a couple of books I read which really affected me back in the 1970s (I don't think I've re-read them since), which I believe have never been mentioned on this forum. Anyone who knows the books will probably realize how emotionally unsophisticated I probably was then (and very likely still am) to have chosen these.

     One is the semi-school story "Those Summer Holidays" by Dora Joan Potter, set in South Australia at the height of World War II - partly at a boarding school in or near Adelaide, and partly in Port Lincoln (across a couple of long gulfs - St. Vincent's Gulf and Spencer Gulf - which separate the two locations).
     It is a bit of a "House at the Corner" type of story, with family members having their own issues, and a mother who has been vegetative for years after a car accident, and the schoolmistress who is also the children's aunt who holds the family together in times of crisis. There is a seemingly wild, very nervous, yet kind and gentle man hiding in a cave nearby whom the two twins befriend, who, it turns out, is a fugitive from the Military Police (who are in town due to the World War II setting). This is because of his German background, but in fact he has no sympathy for the Nazis, and is indeed a fugitive from them, too, owing to deserting the German Army a year or two earlier - but he is also a neurosurgeon who may be able to help the mother - and also longs to do useful work again, instead of hiding terrified in a cave.
     There are many, many other subplots skillfully woven together, and it all ends in a very heart-warming, very Blytonian way. I believe this book is part of a quite long series, which I would be very interested to read; but I have never seen any of the other books, and feel I probably never will.

     My other nomination is a far better-known book - or was at one point, at least - it has been filmed at least twice, once as "The Parent Trap". It is "Lottie and Lisa" by the German author Erich Kästner, perhaps better known for "Emil and the Detectives" and its sequel "Emil and the Three Twins".
     Two young girls meet at a summer holiday camp - and are astonished to see that they look identical, despite never having met before. They are both the daughter of a single parent, and, after comparing notes, they work out that they are twin sisters who were separated soon after birth when their parents divorced - after which neither parent ever mentioned to their daughter her sister or other parent. One girl, Lottie, is the daughter of a woman editor for a magazine in Munich, and Lisa is the daughter of a famous conductor and composer in Vienna.
     Both girls are consumed with curiosity about their other parent, and at the end of their holiday they decide to swap places and go back to the other parent, pretending to be each other - with very surprising results. And they learn that it is not nearly so easy as they thought to pretend to be their sister - even when that sister is an identical twin.
     Again, there is a heart-warming close to the story.

Regards, Michael.
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Re: The most touching book you have read till date.

Post by MJE »

Robert Houghton wrote:I have to admit, as I've said before in other threads, I don't really understand the difference between giving away 'plotlines' and revealing 'spoilers'. I know many of my story reviews could be accused of revealing plotlines - and after all, I wrote them for The Journal, where we have to presume that people have already read the story that's being discussed.
[...]
I would say it's impossible to write a review of a book without revealing way too much of the plot. I know I couldn't manage to write one, because even mentioning characters and settings can spoil the enjoyment of a plot to some readers.
     I would say that the way one writes a book review would be determined by what you think the purpose of a review is, what you are trying to accomplish in writing it. And, while there may be various approaches to writing a review, I can think of two, off the top of my head.
     One kind might be a review targeted towards those who have not read the book, and designed to help them decide whether they are sufficiently interested to spend the time reading the book. Given how many of us have limited reading time, and there are so many books to choose from, I think this could serve a useful purpose. Of course such a review would have to give some information about the plot, since this would help readers decide if their interest is sufficient to buy and read the book; but it would also have to avoid disclosing sensitive information which might spoil the book. This could be a difficult balancing act, since opinions may vary considerably about what, and how much, information could spoil the story.
     The other kind of review would be targeted only towards those who have read a book, and would be intended to discuss aspects of the story in depth. It may discuss the characters and plot and setting in depth, and include comparisons with other books by the same or a different author, and relate the story to the society it is set in, or how it may differ from today's society (in the case of a story set some time ago). This kind of review could include spoilers, although I would consider it thoughtful to post a prominent spoiler warning at the top.
     I have a few reviews on my own web site and on Amazon, and I think they combine elements of both the approaches I mentioned above. I probably wanted to write uncounted dozens of them early on, especially when doing so was still a novelty, but it just never happened. I seem to find it very hard to write a review, even when I know a book well, if I don't have interesting things to say about it, and I can't seem to summon up these at will; but if interesting points to say occur to me, then it can be almost effortless. I have never tried to force reviews for the sake of it, so I have written them only when inspiration struck me in this way - and that doesn't seem to happen often.
     On my own web site, I adopted a two-layered approach to spoilers that I have never seen anyone else adopt: I have a main review page which does not include spoilers, although, as pointed out earlier, it does discuss aspects of the plot, and really cannot avoid doing so. If I want to discuss further points relating to the crux of the plot which would require spoiling it, I put those additional comments on a separate page, and put a link to that page at the bottom of the primary review page, along with a spoiler warning. If you follow the link, there is a further spoiler warning in fire-engine red - so you really cannot read the spoiling paragraphs without being aware of it and deliberately going ahead after being informed of what you are doing. With that, I do not hold back in discussing whatever aspects of the spoiling information I wish to.
     I don't seem to write reviews any more - I think I've come to the conclusion that, when inspiration strikes, I can write a reasonably interesting discussion of a book - but not anything really penetrating or insightful or out of the ordinary. And maybe I'm now a little less interested in spending time trying to do things that I don't think I'm *very* good at doing - just somewhat good doesn't seem to be enough any more.

Regards, Michael.
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Re: The most touching book you have read till date.

Post by MJE »

     I could also nominate a few science-fiction stories in this category:

Charles Logan: Shipwreck
     This book is unusual in that it has only one character - unless you count the spaceship's computer he has a legal battle with to gain control of the ship's resources, or the probably intelligent seal-like aliens who communicate by dilating their eye pupils, whom the human character feels a mystical connection with, but cannot otherwise communicate with.
     Isidore Tansis is the sole survivor of a generation starship explosion, and manages to escape in a small landing craft and land on one of the planets of the star Capella. There is no hope of rescue, since he is aware no other ships are within many light-years, and this story is set in a sub-light-speed universe (i.e., the novel observes the Einsteinian limit on the maximum speed one can travel, this beng less than the velocity of light).
     The novel begins with Tansis burying some of his shipmates who have just died lingering deaths from radiation sickness, and now has to organize his own survival: food, water, shelter, energy, and so on. The planet is barely hospitable to human life, and so he can survive only with great effort and ingenuity.
     It is a very emotional novel, quite deep psychologically as well as coping with the hard-science aspects, and it is such a shame that this is the only work ever written by Charles Logan.
     My review of this can be found here: http://www.foxall.com.au/users/mje/Shipwrek.htm

Edmund Cooper: A Far Sunset
     Again, a single man, Paul Marlow, is marooned on an alien planet, but there is native intelligent life here, humanoid but very different culturally from Homo sapiens. There is hope of rescue in this case, but Paul expects that to take years, if at all.
     Meanwhile, he has to survive, and get on with the local natives. He manages to gain acceptance by them, and ends up making a great sacrifice to exert influence which will be of long-term benefit to them. I don't quite remember the details now, but it is very emotionally affecting, and it is clear from having read several of Cooper's novels that his stories tend to have a tough exterior, but can be very emotionally sensitive underneath.

Edmund Cooper: Transit
     This time a man, Richard Avery, is abducted from Earth mysteriously and placed on an island on another planet, for no detectable reasons. The island is quite comfortable and compatible with human life - but of course he is worried about what might happen, why this has befallen him, and terribly homesick for Earth.
     In due course, he meets two other men and three women on the island, who have similarly been marooned there after being abducted from Earth. There are complex relationships between these six, but they end up pairing into three couples, and more or less get on together - with a few hiccups. None of them have any idea why this has happened - but meanwhile, they have to survive, and cooperate, despite huge differences in background and personality between them. There are also other alien but humanoid beings on the island, of a primitive nature, whom the humans have conflict with at times.
     This turns out to be an experiment conducted by very advanced aliens who represent a Galactic Federation, and they are doing this to find out if humans are a suitable species to take on an important role for the Federation. The other species were also there, being tested in a similar way. And the humans win that contest, largely due to their kindness and compassion in dealing even with their enemies. And, having adjusted to life on the island, they elect to stay after being offered the choice of going back to Earth, and commit themselves to their new life.
     That idea of being tested by more advanced aliens is a somewhat stereotyped science-fiction plot idea, and used many, many times in various ways, although it can be interesting if portrayed convincingly (I didn't see it in advance before it was revealed near the end).
     But what is emotionally touching about the book is the way the humans resolve their own differences, and learn to tolerate each other and accept each other's differences - and the kind and merciful way they treat their adversaries on the island, harming them no more than necessary to protect themselves.

     I'm sure I could at other times nominate further science-fiction books - but those three are the ones that occur to me right now.

Regards, Michael.
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Re: The most touching book you have read till date.

Post by Daisy »

MJE wrote: I seem to find it very hard to write a review, even when I know a book well, if I don't have interesting things to say about it, and I can't seem to summon up these at will; but if interesting points to say occur to me, then it can be almost effortless. I have never tried to force reviews for the sake of it, so I have written them only when inspiration struck me in this way - and that doesn't seem to happen often.
I don't seem to write reviews any more - I think I've come to the conclusion that, when inspiration strikes, I can write a reasonably interesting discussion of a book - but not anything really penetrating or insightful or out of the ordinary. And maybe I'm now a little less interested in spending time trying to do things that I don't think I'm *very* good at doing - just somewhat good doesn't seem to be enough any more.

Regards, Michael.
Well having said you find it hard to write a review you have just done some very good ones here and certainly whetted my appetite to try to find some of the books you have mentioned!
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Re: The most touching book you have read till date.

Post by Fiona1986 »

MJE wrote:          My other nomination is a far better-known book - or was at one point, at least - it has been filmed at least twice, once as "The Parent Trap". It is "Lottie and Lisa" by the German author Erich Kästner.
I'll have to look out for that. I like both versions of The Parent Trap though the best is obviously the original with Hayley Mills.
"It's the ash! It's falling!" yelled Julian, almost startling Dick out of his wits...
"Listen to its terrible groans and creaks!" yelled Julian, almost beside himself with impatience.


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