The Things We Never Say' by Elizabeth Strout.2026 207pg

 31/08/26

 A book right up to date of the problems of contemporary USA. Artie Dam, a fifty-something high-school history teacher in a small coastal town near Boston. 

Artie had taught history to 11th graders and had been the assistant soccer coach. In the class when Danny Marino mocked Rhoda Lazarre. Artie stood up and asked the kids " Do you ever feel superior to someone else because you are not. Artie son Rob had been driving and had an accident killing his girlfriend Heather who had not been wearing a seatbelt adn was crushed under the steering wheel. This changed both Rob and his family. Rob had a job in a high tech company that had contracts with the army. He married Francesca a concert pianist who was most of the time in Europe.

Artie had been married to Evie for 34 years, she had married someone from the working class. They had had a quiet wedding as. Where as Evie's sister  a few years later had a lavish wedding to a young man and were divorce and were divorced 10 years later. His father in law paid off arties student loans so he now felt like a free man. History tell us that in all that there has never been a time when people wee not killing each other.

Rob came home he and Francesca were through, he had met someone else. Rachel was a social worker at a hospital in Boston and helped people after they left the  hospital. Rachel wanted children but Francesca did not. A plumber came to fix the faucet and was depressed as his wife was having a affair and his son Danny Marino  knew about it. Danny had written in the first day essay " Every thing in this world is a big stinking lies and people suck.

Artie had been brought up in a basement apartment and his father was the caretaker of 3 buildings. His mother had been crazy and was institutionalized a few times. Artie's sister had not married till she was almost thirty and both their parent had died the year of their marriage. 

Evie had a hard time getting pregnant but the went on a holiday to London where a month later the discovered she was pregnant.. Reginald only married Flossie because she said she was regnant and she wasn't, she was never happy.

Artie took the dingy out to his boat, and lost grip of his sailboat and was being carried down by his heavy books. A motor boat came and saved him at hospital it took him time to war m and they checked that he had not had a heart attack. His son Rob asked him if he wanted to kill himself.  At the hospital in the days when one was still able to smoke, Artie had his tonsils out as a kid. The was an oldish woman smoking and her story was that she had cancer and they had to remove half her tongue, she lived alone and she was  scared. Arties father had spoken to her and discovered she had no money and no arrangement for when she left the hospital. She was grateful that he spoke to her while she wept. She is the only one who doesn't hold back the truth.

The saw Francesca playing her heart out on the piano at Carnegie hall. She said she was looking for god when she played ,

Rob and Francesca were going to separate because he could not see the way forward with her never home. Rachel was introduced to them, Evie said she has no since of dressing trying to look cool.

Danny Marino was a mess his mover had moved out and back 3 days later. At the soccer game someone had shouted "Jew hater" and there was a fight on the field. A year ago the hostages had been taken in Gaza. 

Ken was the Guy who saved Artie and they met for dinner often as they had a lot in common. Kens had grown up in South Boston and his father was a postman. They had a close friendship and Artie even mentioned that he knew that he hadn't fathered Rob. This friendship was solid despite Kens choice of politics and that ken was very Catholic

Artie gave assignments to kids to read letters of Union soldiers to discuss, there was a complaint that Confederate soldiers letters should also be studied.  Hoover Lakeland office had a black and white photo of Martin Luther King giving his Washington speech.  Hoover said to Artie. He is going to win "people want authority" he has a cult following. Hoover shot himself in his office. Later it was revealed that he was under investigation by the FBI for harboring illegals immigrants at this home and had received death threats , his mistress had turned him in.

Artie had gone to a catholic school but not church but the concept of evil never left him. His mother came from an Irish family in S. Boston. She and  sister that was put into an orphanage because of their poverty, after the father died and they received a widows check the girls returned home.  Artie's mother hated the Italian neighbours yet when was always talking to them on the step outside. When she was in a mental institution Mrs. Ferraro cooked for them.

Students knew little about the holocaust which they should have been taught the year before. He had lied to the students as they could not bring about world peace nobody could.

At the end of summer the boat  get pulled out of the water and wrapped for winter. 

Marie had wanted their fathers genes passed on died with her still born baby.

Elon Musks father was a awful man, and Elon probably had Asperger's.

He understood that Rob had thought about suicide, he was an engineer in a company with government contracts and could not discuss his job. He gets a letter from Reginald Mac Donald  discovers that his mom could not fall pregnant and he had obliged her. He was informed that Reg's DNA was sent for testing and he could have his tested at the same lab. His parents went to London on holiday and after that she fell pregnant and Reg is the father. They had lived a lie together.   Later Evie wanted to take Artie to London and again but he refused  to go.         

Rob has no plans to tell his mother. . Rob did not look like  Reg but had Reg's gait.

Rachel was going home to her parents for Thanksgiving so Francesca was invited home to Robs parents. Rob had been valedictorian of his class and Reg had cheered. Reg had married Flossie because she lied about being pregnant

Is there such a thing as free will Carl Jung is the one to ask? He believed in collective unconscious and coined the words extroversion and introversion.

With the election half the country was stunned and half was jubilant.

Artie realized that he had been mentally removed from his father. His father spoke of how difficult it was to be a German after WW1 and a German veteran of that war. Then came the depression. Artie felt he never learned who had his father been. He learned about sex hearing it through the ceiling.

A women unfaithfully to her husband ,her therapist Evie tried to convince her not to tell her husband- honesty comes in different forms. 

Finally Rob realizes that Rachel has issues as she is a kleptomaniac i.e. she is screwed up.  Artie at school late catches Danny writing Fuck --- on the wall. The 2 of them work to erase it and nothing was said. Mr. Dam had ushered him into the world of adults .and changed him. Danny did not want to be like his parents. Kids were worried on how they would pay for their education. Later he told Danny to get his grades as possible as he was possible to get a scholarship. But my father wants me to go into his plumbing business! Does your father love you, then he will understand?

The guy would be in prison if he wasn't bombing the Gazans his corrupt. Artie was aware how much people lied to each other. Few students saw themselves with any prospects in the world. 

He heard that a guy died Charles Schwartz who had a men's clothing store and would go to the homes of his obese customers too embarrassed to come into his store measure them and get them their size clothes delivered.  He was the guy who dealt with Artie when he had a kleptomaniac problem.  Is the Pope catholic ? means yes that is obvious.

Artie " they worst thing I did to my father was that I was not there for him" Rob says he is thinking of writing to Heathers parents. Rob was now out of work with the change of administration.. 

Evelyn Peabody tried to kill herself with Klonopin pills.

----------------Epilogue

Artie watched  as President Trump sneeringly humiliated the leader of Ukraine in the Oval office, and talked of making Gaza "the new French Riviera. He felt his country was committing suicide. Rob came with Francesca and they seemed very much a couple. Rob suggested they go out in the boat, without the cellphone. He told Artie his working for the European Union and it is serious stuff that is why they should use the burner phone. American intelligence can't be trusted any more and are working on their own AI platform. Stay off social media. Rob has a EU Passport. Suddenly a heavy fog came down and they could not see their way back and they panicked but ten minutes later the fog cleared. That was the Winter that Hoover Lakeland shot himself and the new principal was a woman who Artie had misgivings about. Don't say boys and girls as you are not sure of their gender. Students were now using ChatGPT to do their assignments. Students realized that Dam-dam went crazy and had" lost it". Artie missed Rob and Francesca tremendously, then Francesca had a miscarriage and this was hard on Artie.

His friends Carl and Anne retired. Because he loved history the state of the country weighed down on him. Talking to Anne he said "My occupation is gone just like Othello" Rob had been detained for 2 hours at immigration and said he would not risk  coming  back again. Artie died of a heart attack. Danny came to the funeral. Francesca was playing music composed by Artie. Kenneth was talking to the father of Heather Morrison's at the funeral. Evie realized that Artie was a saint and never remarried.

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Upward Bound by Woody Brown 2026  183 pg.  4/10/26

Upward bound is an asylum form of  day care centre for autistic children or adults. Jorge a gentle giant and eloper as he would suddenly run off. The narrator's parents refused to accept that he was an idiot because he was speechless., just had to untangle the channels in the brain. His mother worked with him, reading to him children classics and poetry. He also had an aid through middle and high school, he got a high school diploma. The mother became his aid at community college. He became an English Major and dreamed of supporting himself at college by writing a novel. Every morning people would sign the clients in, he could sign but slowly. His father suddenly died of a heart attack. He could not get an actual job as the door was bolted from the inside. When he sees a crime movie he has already figured out who did it 5 minutes after it started. He has many needs and little to  give in return.

At Target Jorge looked for Mr. Potato head. Copacetic vibe -relax no problem. Carlos and Jorge had a connection between them, without language and Jorge gets comfort from Carlos    OCD  patterns, compulsive disorders. Cerebral palsy makes muscles and joints stiff, freezes the face and prevents speech. Tom is in a wheelchair and sometimes is just forgotten.

Echolalia repetitive speech by a child, not voluntary.

College students part timers go home for the summer break, kids who live elsewhere need summer jobs, but feel inadequate in the role.

The school district and Regional Centre had been providing speech therapy , physical therapy, occupational therapy till the age of 18 then it falls away.  They doctor pointe doubt that patients with Spastic quadriparesis have a short life span. He needs someone to read to him a few hours a day.

Mariana had the role of Carlos's mother since she was 11, their mother was a drunk and in jail for robbery.

Ann had a lifeguard certificate so was now their life guard. So extra sessions were added to the pool so that all could get in every day. When poop was seen in the pool they had to get everyone  out. Her first day at Upward bound was a Kafka nightmare surrounded by alien creatures. People who could not walk without lurching, some were silent. This would be good for her resume. The place needed helpers badly. Had she toured the place before agreeing she would have kept walking right out. She should have kept a journal this summer to use as  part of an honours thesis. She felt infected as a person surrounded by zombies. The staff all wore a uniform T-shirt, these people were not retarded they were out of control of their bodies. Ann was thinking  of taking a speech pathology class.

 Carlos is in his mid twenties and has already spent time in jail. 

Getting all 20 into their bathing suits took virtually the whole staff. Autism comes with anxiety, the patients did not like it there and it was boring for them. Emma's mother told her she liked music and she liked it when Ann sang her Beatle songs.  Carlos had no background in disability things.  His sister got him the job after she had been working there a  long time.  The  other staffers were either too young or too stupid to teach Carlos anything. His sister Mariana was the key to survival here she was the best thing at the place. Carlos's mother had chosen drugs and booze over him. His mother had gone to prison when Carlos was 6 and Mariana was 16.  However he still said to Mariana "You are not my mother "when tried to keep him from getting into trouble.

Dave was a Luddite - It is inadvisable to play music as they get overstimulated. He had to deal with insurance and liability. Dave got to be director of Upward Bound without a special ed. or psychology background, and doesn't know about the dominant disability of each client. He depends on Carlos. Dave had come California to work at Hollywood, would love a big Hollywood night with an actress benefactor , but there's no money, he can barely pay salaries. At the show they have girls going round with donation baskets

About a third of the clients live in group homes. The others live at home. 

Walter and Emma like being together; he likes people talking to him as a one sided conversation. They have the same kind of autism and would need trained aids to help this but there are none at Upward bound. They need to point at letters to have a conversation. 

Camp Cammie which is controlled by Upward Bound is for disabled kids and adults. he had his father's bag and he took out of it a pill container a counselor saw that and in a panic grabbed it as none of them were supposed to have medication as this was given to them as needed. Oh my God did you take all of these. If Camp Cammie would not tolerate him who would.

Jorge-   the emergency contact on Jorge's file is the social worker, he is an adult and his family is not responsible for him like a child. Abandonment is part of his make up. Carlos was the only  person who cares about him, and honestly had some affection for him

 2

Avery was a cashier at Target and on a Friday a big tall Latino arrived and gave a shriek. Ten funky people on autopilot and 2 handlers came from Upward Bound like a Magic School bus. The helpers looked young and did not have their cell phones out. Slowly Avery became aware that the group was made up of individuals each different. One was in a wheelchair. This group never buys anything and for her it is the end of her week at 2pm she has a Sociology lecture. The girl aid is a pretty collage student. You earn more as a student in retail. Avery has a stepdad who doesn't like her and wants her out of the house. She sees no future in retail and got a  lot out of psychology class. She can see herself mending broken bodies but not mental problems. Looking on this group she thinks adversity is an incentive for soul building.  Every person struggles with something. Incontinence has got to be a burden.

Jorge ran across the road and a policeman pulled out his revolver and shot at him Carlos had just moved in to comfort Jorge and the bullet went into his abdomen. An ambulance arrived and Mariana went with it also . Carlos died on the way to hospital. The police took Jorge and sent him to a psychiatric hold for 72 hours. The trigger happy cop should have been in the loony bin.  Freaks like Jorge shouldn't be allowed near our homes or parks.

That ended a brief rotten chapter of my life. Carlos was the  best thing about Upward Bound. At the funeral we learn that  Carlos's dad  had left the family and the mother had worked 2 jobs. Carlos had found himself in Jorge , Drew and Emma. Dave took credit for turning Carlos around? Carlos always liked you Walter.

   Walter qualifies for Supplemental Security Income (SSI) with his mother, Lisa, acting as his provider.   Walters' mom decided that she could stop working and take care of him if they moved to a smaller house so they could get by. Walter  started writing a memorial about Carlos, then about Jorge. Walter kept on writing.

 

Books by Sabastian Barry who was born in Dublin in 1955.

 A  Long Long Way by Sabastian Barry 2005   292pg

18/09/2026  A story of the  Royal Dublin Fussileers. in the war 1914 to 1918

The book starts with the mother dying of childbirth. The father was Superintendent of Police in Dublin Castle he had been in the force for 40 years. Willie is too short so he can't become a policeman. Willie volunteered as Kitchener requested and joined the Royal Dublin Fussileers., some men joined because they had been given white feathers. They were given a cheering send off by the population as they marched to board at the docks. They were upset by the reports of the Germans mistreating the population of Flanders. Some of the RDF had been based in India and never expected to end up in war.

There were Chinese "coolies" brought to work for the war, ( errors by the author by then they did not have pigtails.) There were Jewish soldiers from Cork and Dublin and the Rabbi  gave them burial rites.   On leave in France the book describes a brothel and a woman with a rash on her leg and a soldier who also got the rash.

1916 On leave in Dublin in Sackville Street outside the Imperial Hotel the police have to deal with an uprising with a baton charge that killed 4 people Many wounded. This upset the morale of the volunteer soldiers who saw this. The rebels had hoped for German help. His friend is so upset by the Dublin riots that he refuses to take orders and is tried and executed by firing squad. The family just get a message,  died in action or died  of wounds. At the trial Willi had not been given permission to speak.

A cloud of yellow smoke was coming towards them and they thought the Germans were using it to hide their invasion, when they realized it was poisonous they began to run. Later on they were equipped with masks but had not been trained for it and there were men who pulled them off and died. The postman would arrive at far away farms with a box containing a few personal effects of a soldier , like an inheritance.  Willi had seen soldiers suffering from shell shock and just sitting and shaking, they were useless to anybody or to themselves and had to be sent home for treatment.

Someone sings the Minstrel boy by based on a poem by Thomas More 1807 became a popular Irish song about a soldier that died at war.

Willie comes home on leave and is given a cold shoulder by his father as he indicates support for Irish independence.  Then he went to visit his girlfriend Greta who had a baby and was married. She had received a message from a soldier that Willie had been friendly with a young whore girl. in France. British soldiers were no longer welcome in Dublin and kids threw stones at him. He visited the Palsey family and they  treated him well. He had admired their son Captain George Palsey. He now had to take a train to Belfast as soldiers were no longer shipping from Dublin. Back at the trenches he was welcomed by his group but the Irish had been replaced by others and he knew few of them and the Irish were considered rebels.

The French had mutanied a year before but the Irish never turned their backs to a fight. The Russian soldiers had refused to fight. He wrote a letter to his father telling him that he loved him and that he was the finest man who had brought up the 4 children without their mother. The priest that had been with him all along was killed and Willie became negligent and was killed in Oct 1918. A letter arrived from his father forgiving him but was returned unopened with his uniform and a few effects.

 Countess Markievicz and Madame Markievicz, was an Irish republican politician, suffragist, socialist and labour activist who was the first woman elected to the Parliament of the United Kingdom.  supported the Sinn Fein. Was involved in the 1916 Easter uprising.

John Redmond (born Sept. 1, 1856, Dublin, Ire.—died March 6, 1918, London, Eng.) was the leader of the Irish Parliamentary Party got a promise that after the war there would be Irish Home Rule. 1914 Home Rule Act was passed in Parliament and with that deal done he called on Irish volunteers to fighting WW1.

Of 200,000 Irish who fought 49,000 died., however some names could have been non-Irish who served in Irish regiments.

WW!  Reverend Adler and 30 Jewish chaplains worked on the Western front.

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Previous reading of A long long Way Sebastian Barry 2005 293pp 30/10/20 BC

1896 The book is about William born in Wicklow, Ireland, Named after King William of Orange 1903 Edward VII visited Ireland. 1912 His father was in the Dublin Metropolitan police. After William came Annie then Maud and was 12 his mother died of childbirth of Dolly and they moved into the Dublin Castle. Because William was not 6 foot tall and could not become a policeman he was apprenticed to a builder. James Larkin Irish Labour leader led demonstrations that were suppressed, 4 men killed. He falls in love with Greta when she was 13, her father joined the army to get a job after the riots. A soldier's wife had an allowance to live on. William joined the army because he thought it would please his father if he could not be a policeman he could be a soldier.. A wide range of Irish volunteered evern from the Irish speaking islands of Aran to public school boys. John Redmond encouraged the Irish to volunteer and then after Ireland's good service the British would give them home rule. His brother Willie died in action in the war. while Ulstermen joined to prevent home rule Ava Maria music by Shubbert. Soldiers received rum rationes as well as smoking or chewing tobacco. Tinned maconochie Spam stew) was eaten by soldiers. France had already lost half a million soldiers. Chinese were brought to dig trenches and graves for the dead. Many labourers had left the farms and there were not enough workers. Fields have to be limed because they are so acidic in Ireland. Algerian troops nearby. Germans attacked with gas the birds in front of them went silent.. When a machine gun was used a man had to pour water on to keep it cool. A rabbi also came for 2 Jewish soldiers who died. Irish soldiers were also sent to the Dardanelles. Soldiers going to a whorehouse and suffering afterwards - painful to urinate. When he came home had to be washed by his father to get the lice and nits off him, some had ringworm. 1916 They were about to board a ship in Dublin to return to Flanders and were marched back to the city to deal with the Easter uprising and instructed to build a barricade. "England's difficulty is Ireland's opportunity. Catholics were not given commissions? Gas causing hundreds of dead rats in the trenches. Men joined up to leave bad debts, escape a murder charge, for a wager, lost my way and found it in the barracks, wife in an asylum and wanted to get away. "They don't write books about us only on officers" The next time he got leave they were deloused on the way in England .Some Irish soldiers gave their guns to insurgents. Irish soldiers could not be trusted by the English and they were now unable to conscript Irish so the American arrived in time. On his visit home kids threw stones at him and he returned to England via Belfast. The surviving sergeant major became commander even without a commission as there were no officers to replace him. The US lost 116 thousand troops in WW1 half to flu.320 thousand sick and wounded of 4.7 million who served.

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The Secret Scripture by Sebastian Barry2008 301pg 1/3/21

Also the Movie made by Jim Sheridan 2016 Starring Vanessa Redgrave,Rooney Mara, Eric Bana. This story is written and ends in 2007. Rosannes was still institutionalized at age 100. Dr. William Grene, senior psychiatrist at Roscommon Regional Mental Hospital, is like a co-author, he is dealing with serious issues after the death of his wife. He has been working there 30 years and the hospital is to be closed, she was there when he arrived. Personal fates and national fates are incestuausly bound. She had a child out of wedlock whose whereabouts are unknown. Barry’s homage to the holiness of life. No one has a monopoly on truth. The image of Ireland as a forlorn old woman. Out of malice toward Protestants as well as out of a misplaced moral absolutism, Fr. Gaunt has her marriage annulled William B Yates as a child spent his summer holidays in Sligo. Dr Grene asks her the particulars of her admission as the basement archive had been attacked by mice. "I want freedom but it frightens me" What she wouldn't tell Dr. Grene she wrote in notes about herself. Roseanne's father left her Religio Medici, the Hounds of Hell and Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman. Hundreds from Sligo had fought in the great war. She discovers her father had been in the Royal Irish Constabulary under the British. Her father when rebels came to bury a member he called the priest. Soldiers arrived, got the rebels and shot them. The church was to take no part in the issue so her father lost his job as graveyard keeper and became rat catcher with a Jack Russel dog. This is work you do after dark also because he had hunted down his countrymen like rats. " a living man exiled from the dead" Surplus babies in the orphanage were allowed to die. Before he could kill a rat drenched in paraffin, it escaped, jumped down a chimney and set the orphanage alight, killing 123 girls. A Jewish Mr fine had a shop in the town. She had to leave school on her fathers death to look after her mom. Br. Gaunt says none of the Irish upheaval favour the Protestants. She married Tom and was seen chatting to John Lavelle, a rebel and her marriage was annulled. She met Tom's brother Eaun on a night walk, brought him home and cleaned him up. Belfast was the worst bombed British city after London in WW2. They spend the night together, when she is ready to give birth she goes to Mrs. McNaghty, who rejects her, she gives birth on the beach and wakes up. The baby is gone and an ambulance comes to take her. Having been pregnant "a nymphomaniac "is enough reason to put her into an asylum. She heard the baby was in Nazareth. The inmates were measured for a smock when they came in as a shroud when they left. Dr. Grene came from Southampton, his mother was Irish. His wife died and he looked for solace in Roseanne. Old Irish farm cottages the kitchen sloped to the door as they brought the animal in. There were more women than men in Ireland and wiser women went off to America to be maids instead of becoming old maids in Ireland. There was a period under de Valera 1932 where farmers slaughtered the lambs in the field as there was no market for them, because England put a duty on Irish exports. Queen Maeve is part of Irish myth. Priests felt they owned the country then. the constitution gave the Church power but never made it the established church. Albert Pierpont, an English hangman brought regularly to Ireland to hang dissidents. Tom had gone to Spain to fight for Franco till he understood what that stood for and returned in 2 weeks. Nazareth House is the orphanage in Sligo. Mc Nalty's daughter was a nun in England. John Kane is John Lavelle's son and he is the cleaner at the asylum and is the one who saved the baby. Old Mrs McNulty had been illegitimate herself. Dr. Grene in England finds the baby's birth certificate son of Roseanne Clear and Eneas Mc Nulty adopted by Mrs Grene of Padstow , in Cornwall he goes to see the grave of the nun who was his aunt. Roseane has alway lived on the edge of the known world referring to the beach where she gave birth.

Hanns and Rudolf by Thomas Harding 2013 288pgs

  18/10/19

 The narrator as a child says, you never asked survivor their story but when Hanns died, his nephew spoke at the funeral, and mentioned that Hanns had been a Nazi hunter. This is one of the best Holocaust history books I have read. Rudolf Hoss was 15 when WW1 started and enrolled was sent to fight the British in Mesopotamia, then Palestine. He returned home and joined the Freikorps a militia that went to Latvia and fought the Reds then Latvians till they were beaten and the Freikorps were banned in Germany. At a Berlin night club they set up a base and kept the militia together. So when Hitler set up a private militia it already existed and was looking for a leader. He was sent to Sachsenhausen camp when the war began 5000 communists 900 Jewish merchants and professionals and 1200 Prague student who protested against the Nazi's arrived there.

 He was now sent to Poland to a German speaking area to set up Auschwitz and right from the beginning it slowly expanded under his charge. His wife and 5 children lived in a luxury villa just outside the prison. SS Judge Konrad Morgen was sent to the camps because lots of assets taken from the Jews especially gold was being stolen by the guards and not coming into the coffers to pay for the war effort, he was shocked to discover what the extermination camps were about.  By 1945 Jan. The Red Army was moving into Poland with 2 million troops 100 000 vehicles and 6000 tanks. The inmates of Auschwitz were then marched westwards and died of cold and starvation. The Russians then found Auschwitz. Rudolf Hoss and family started moving northwards to try get to Denmark. They moved to near Rostock. When Hann's came investigating he threatened Hedwig that he would send her son off to the Russians and Siberia and she told him that he was hiding on a farm with the name Franz Lang. Her children always believed her brother gave him away. After the war people did not associate with families of war criminals and one grand daughter in law only discovered later who her husband grandfather was. Notorious Nazi Dr Hans Lolling committed suicide when he was caught. Heirich Himmler shaved his head and wore an eye patch, at a checkpoint along the road a British officers was suspicious and arrested him and he immediately bit a cyanide capsule. 

There was the ODESSA network getting Nazi's out and into South America. Rudolf was to be tried in Poland but was subpoenaed to give evidence at Nuremburg. The judge gave him paper and pencils and asked him while in jail to write his auto biography in which he admitted that he had supervised the gassing of 2 and a half million and another half a million died of starvation and illness. Nuremburg also set a precedent that "just taking orders is no value as an excuse" 1946 July Rudolf was tried in Krakow with 7 other SS officers and was hung at Auschwitz away from the press just witnesses. Hanns Alexander had a twin brother Paul there father was a leading doctor with high class clients in Berlin. Though secular Jews they had inherited the family Alexander Torah. Hanns met every important artist who came to their house while he was a kid Marlene Dietrich, Max Reinhart , Max Pallenburg, Richard Strauss, Albert Einstein, James Franck. 

While Dr Alexander was on a trip to London his wife got a message that the Gestapo was coming to get him, his wife sent him a message not to return. Hanns got a visa to England 1936 but could not get a transit via France so he had to go to his relatives in Switzerland with only the 10 marks allowed in his pocket and fly from there to Croydon. Slowly the whole family got to England. Henny the mother had to sell the property and practice for very little, pay the Reich escape tax and follow her husband. Their possessions were packed up by the housekeeper and sent to them including the Alexander Torah. 1938 Nov Kristallnacht. Paul Graetz was arrested and taken to Sachsenhausen prison and released 18 days later with a exit document issued by Rudolf. Between 1934 and 1939, 70 000 Jews fled Nazi controlled countries and entered the UK including almost 10 000 Kinder transport children. From1 Sept 1939 till the US entered the war letters came out of Germany to them via family in the States. German synagogue were set up in Belsize Park and St. Johns Wood. The Alexander Torah ended up at Belsize Square synagogue which is the used by the Alexander family till today.

 1939 Sept when war broke out Hanns enlisted and was in the Pioneer Corps (motto Labor omnia vincit). Later German aliens could avoid being interned by joining this. They worked as "jobniks" and the Corp was under Lord Reading command. Hann"s was amongst the last to get back from Dunkirk. He later did an officers course and on Victory Day landed in Europe to be a translator in the post War. In this he was working in the Nazi war crimes dept. in Operation Haystack. The Belson trial of Joseph Kramer and 44 others took place in Sept 1945 in Luneburg, Germany. These were guards both male and female as well as Kapos. 11 of this group were sentenced to death and hanged a short while later. This was a preparation for the Nuremburg Trail. He later caught Gustav Simon the Gauleiter of Luxembourg. He went to his home and asked a neighbour who told him what she knew, at this stage there were many Germans who held a grudge against the Nazi's. The Nuremberg trials took place in the American zone next to the building where Hitler's rallies had been In April 46 he was demobilized and a few days later he got his naturalization papers. 

Island of Sea Women

 The island of Sea Women by Lisa See. 2019 385pg  14/5/20   again 30/8/20 

Young-sook  narrator.   A book read in the Book Club.

The story is about 2 friends from childhood Young-Sook and Mi-ja.Yo-chan is Mi-ja son. Janet is the American granddaughter  Clara is the American great granddaughter of Mi-ja.
Sun-sil is Young-sook's mother and head of the collective. Young-sook married Jun-bu, her oldest daughter is 1)Min-Lee, then 2)Kyung-soo and 3) Joon-lee 4) son Kyung-soo born after his father's death. 
Yu-ri become an invalid almost killed by the Octopus her mother is Do-Saeng, her brother is Jun-bu
Mi-ja was an orphan daughter of a collaborator and married collaborator Sang-mun 
Kang sisters Gu-ja and Gu-sun's daughter is Wan-soon part of their diving co-op
Joon-lee  the narrators daughter marries Yo-chan i.e. Mi-ja's son
Note- I don't intend talking about the History of Korea but the following are mentioned as a background to the story. 
Timeline
Till the 13 century Korea was matrilineal thus the husband came to live with his wife's family. Then it became patrilineal.
1404 till then you had the Tamna Kingdom with Chinese  type culture on Jeju
13th Century the Mongols invaded and set up horse breeding grazing on the island.
1906 Translated into Japanese, The novel Heidi by Johanna Spyri 1881  was very well received.
1910 till 1945 Korea was colonized Japan, This was  tacitly accepted by US President Widrow Wilson
1938 April The book starts  and ends in 2008 Jeju island Korea.
*1948 to 1960 Rhee Syngman appointed first S Korean president, US educated
        Third of April incident -massacre
1949 Bukchon Massacre the city became a Village of widows.
1950 Seoul fell to the North and thousands of refugees fled.
1950 -1953 Korean War
1954 after over 7 years of insurgency the last rebels were killed with 300 villages and 4 thousand homes destroyed on Jeju.  
1961 Western doctors check women divers for shiver threshold, hypothermia, thyroid function.
*1962 President Park Chung-hee came to power by a military coup. Outlawed Shaminism and ruled till 1979 when assassinated.
1963 Escalation of Vietnam war. End of Vietnam war 1975
1976  "Aunt Suni" a book by the writer Hyun Ki- young on the massacres.
*1980 President Chung doo hwan till 1988 also ruthless dictatorship
*1988 to 1993 President Roh Tea-woo. ex army man when Darangshi cave  horror was exposed ordered it sealed again.
1991 fall of Berlin Wall and the end of the Cold War.
1995 list finally published of all who died in the massacres.
1998 50th anniversary of the 4.3 incident in Bukchon a memorial park was built
*1998 - 2003 President  Kim Dae-jung won a Nobel prize for democratizing South Korea.
2000 Speaking about the massacre's is finally decriminalized.
2008 Story ends or starts
Jeju today has a population of half a million and tourism is its main industry.
 Korea has the best example of Confucianism in its culture today. The island measures 73 km by 41km
-----The writer is of Chinese extraction has written about the Chinese of California and American and also about women their role in society.  Korea is a society where to day few women have had big roles in politics and business. This is the story of an island of South Korea that was in a very strategic position. 
We see that it is a society dominated by women and the men look after the children or are working in Japan. Matrifocal society. Women work because historically men fisherman were taxed. They make money and provide for the family and for their brothers to study.
Later on we see Young Sook married to Jan-bu a teacher and she returns to diving as this was part of her life he is enlightened and wants to educate his daughters. She points out that he got an education because his mother, his sister and his wife worked to pay for it. Where will be money to pay for the daughters education. 
1  The role of women
The book starts in April 1938  and ends in 2008 Jeju island Korea. "Every woman  who enters the sea carries a coffin on her back."
haenyeo =diver. There are 7 women diving co-ops on Hado. A quarter of the island population lived in Japan as a ferry ticket cost half the price of a bag of rice. Warm up as best you could before going into the sea. There are rules and the protect the "wet fields" months that you are forbidden to harvest a conch or abalone. They dive as deep as 60 feet. " A greedy diver is a dead diver" Shamanism outlawed by the Japanese.
When a women get married she has the best food for 3 days that must last a lifetime. 
 The story is over 80 years. The sea women supported their families over millenia. A Matrifocal society.  With the arrival of the Americans, Western and Confusion male dominated ways are imposed.
“  The author likes to write on themes of women empowerment. 
A large number of the men were killed and it became a society where women had to do everything. Shaamin Kim was a women spiritual leader. Young-sook alone supports her daughters in education to make her dead husband dream come true. However you need son's to pray for you when you are dead. But she said to her husband - Your mother, your sister, your wife all worked to send you to study. You get 3 levels of relationship that of the women working and men looking after the children, where the man works the wife is a house keeper but the narrator is allowed to hire a nanny and have a career.  Now her academic daughter Joon-lee visits and she manages to get her to come be with the divers to learn about the sociology of the divers co-op the Matrifocal system..
2 Ecology they had to protect the wet fields  The use of pigs
3 Death and survival and spiritualism. The women's religion was Shamism with a women preacher yet they needed sons to pray for them when they were in heaven. the times you couldn't dive. 
Her freind  Mi-ja where Confusionism comes back.and is a male dominated society.
1954  Jeju is a society of mostly women
4 The enemy varied.     The Japanese  The Americans  The North Koreans
The City Dwellers     The Police and the Army
The guilt by association. 
The Japanese killed Sun-sil grandparents and calls them cloven hoofed beasts" Now her father-n law is in Hiroshoma working and killed by American bomb.
5  The friendship between her and the collaborator daughter Mi -ja. These 2 were bosem friends right from The begining when Mija was 7 years old she then was in the diving co-op trained by the narrators mother, she had a shared experience in Vladivostoc togerher. All the way through as illiterates they made the charcoal rubbings that Mija kept, they knew about ice cream and bread as well as the fact that the American ship that searched for weapons only bought proper fish, not sea food. In Vietnam war period American were prepared to eat sea food (they were no longer culturally isolated. When Mi-ja left and sold her pigs. Young Sook goes to her house and like being close to her things and the book of coal rubbings.Later on the narrators daughter comes to collect this for Mi-ja.
6   The issue of Forgiveness is the most important theme. Mi-ja is forgiven for steeling baby yams at the begining of the book Young sook had to forgive herself forYu'ri becoming disabled then  her mothers death. She was married to Yu-ri's brother and saddled with looking after his sister  for the rest of her life.
Mi-ja felt blamed for her mother death in her childbirth
Mi-ja is not able to give her the support she needs
Should we blame the Americans?” as they watch the massacre and did nothing to stop it.  Most of the population suffered from wounds of post traumatic stress.
 The novel part of the book is that the narrator was at the Butchon massacre's and asked her friend to take one of her children and to protect them as her husband was a collaborator.  She refused and Youngs husband one son and sister in law were executed. This broke up the friendship. The book ends the Mi-ja was raped by Sung and forced to marry him she and her son were treated badly and she could not take on another kid under those circumstances. She had hated her husband and never wanted to have a kid by him.
Young-sook is able to make rubbing of the names on the memorial of her husband, son and sister in law.
 She was one of the few families that gave all 3 of her daugters schooling.  Bicycle is for boys not girls.
Killer and children of killers run the island. Reading the novel Heidi  her children asked what bread and milk was.  She had tasted bread and ice cream in Vladivostoc.
Hagui a villiage divided by victum and perpertrators declares forgiveness and unites. Unfair for victums to forgive those who raped turtured and killed or burned villiages. 
Wan-soon was diving with the team and dissapear completely, it appears that she was pregnant by Yo-chan (like father like son) and took her own life.  The scandle is too much for Mi-ja who leaves with her son. Young sook becomes chief diver.
Clara tells Young Sook  Yo-Chan whose wife died soon after his daughter was born. Mi-ja was brought to the US to look after her Janet and later looked after Clara and her brother, Mi-ja had become a Catholic and prayed for forgiveness. Buddist quote "To understand is to forgive" Mi-ja walks with a limp caused by her husband. Would you have sacrificed your life to save Sang -mun and Yo-chan?  
The Dead can forgive me why cant you. Mi ji had to live with her husband so that he would cancel the guilt by association to do with Joon-lee this was also part of her repentace. Why did she not save them she didn't know how to deal with her husband and he beat her up in the end as he would have saved them and she ended up in hospital. They had been good to him when he was recuperation from suffering in the North. Mi ja's husband beat her up so that she limped because she ambarrised him in front of his superiors and the ghosts of the narrators husband his wife and son would torment him.
By not forgiving she was erasing all that was beautiful. She never went to her daughters wedding. She asked if she should visit her daughter, and Shaman Kin advised  her to forgive as everyone lost people.
The relationship of the Gung sister after the death of  Wan-soon. Gung- sun says that she herself was pregnant and her husband agreed to marry her. The mother never knew if  Wan-soon was pregnant or died by accident.  The letter she got from America to say she was dying of cancer was censored later she never read the letters that arrived every month. Letters kept arriving which she put into a box without opening, pages of the coal rubbing were in every letter. Later the letter arrived with stamps and were sealed.
Mi-ja had not said anything as she was planning to die with her friends till her husband arrived with her son and she suddenly felt she could not leave him an orphan, she could not contemplating returning to her husband and he beat her up so badly that she landed in hospital and now had a limp. Sung-mun was scared of how the God's would treat him for not supporting friends. He had raped Mi-ja and that is why she was forced to marry him even though she never fell pregnant at the time.  Mija in a recording possibly after her death wants the narrators forgivenes, that she could't get while she was alive.
The book ends with Clara and Janet are interested in learning what it is like to dive and collect food from the sea bottom mor food than 30 refridgerators.
Industrialazation on the mainland lured men away and a man takes over instructing the co-op while theri daughter are in the tourist industry. The authorities want them to stop keeping pigs as a toilet and install indoor plumbing and telephones as part of tourism. The US Peace Corp comes to keep tabs out the Reds.  South Korea has more people that have cosmetic  surgary than any ohter country.
The 4.3 incident
The North West Young Mens Association  League that escaped North Korea and were violently anti -communist.
Di-saeng mentions that her husband was in Hiroshimo and died without family a victum of he atomic bomb.
The teacher husband brought her to the school at Bukchon from their villiage Hado
The island of Sea Women by Lisa See. 2019 385pg  14/5/20  Far East History
13th Century the Mongols invaded and set up horse breeding grazing on the island  Later the king put exiles here.
The South Korean Isle of Jeju an old women sit sorting sea weed washed onto the shore she are between 80 and 90 years old. (haenjeo sea women)  It is a society focused on women. This island has 3 things in abundance wind, stones and women. Her son wanted to turn her home into a restaurant for tourists and she could retire but she refused.
  She feels uncomfortable on seeing half and half children from America/
1938 April The latrine is above the pigs who eat crap. They lived in a stone house as an extended family and she had to do 3 trips to get enough water for the morning and collect dung for the fire. While the sea women worked the men met and looked after in small infants.
Korea was colonized  Japan from 1910 till 1945
Illiterate people kept rubbings on paper using a piece of coal to remember things specially when they travelled. They had small plots where they grew millet, rapeseed, rice barley soybean. . Millet for the poor, rice and barley for the rich. Sweet potato was divided into those for eating soon, those to be sold to the distillery for alcohol and the rest were sliced, dried and stored for winter. Squid was dried in the sun. Sea urchins, conch, agar and kelp were harvested. These women regarded themselves as guardian of the sea. Sea creatures have perished by change of climate, over fishing and human disregard.
 In spring they renewed the roof thatch. Insect lava of the old thatch was eaten. Ashes and seaweed used as fertilizer. Raw persimmon juice used to preserve cloth. Under the Japanese roads had been built on the island. In Hado a night school was set up for adults mostly women but they were considered insurgent by the Japanese. Japan used the island to bomb China. There were 3 Japanese air bases on the island. Sons and daughters of Japanese collaborators married each other  It was dangerous for menstruating women to be in the water as blood attracted sharks. The women worked as a shared cooperative but some articles they caught were private. Marriage was by parents matching their children.
1944 a quarter of the island population had moved to Japan especially Osaka where men worked in iron and enamel production and women in spinning and sewing. The Japanese forced the collection of seaweed to use in gunpowder and pressed boys into the Japanese Army. These Sea women were offered work off Vladivostok, where they saw modern society Russia kept out of the war with Japan. An American patrol checked they were not smuggling weapons and were interested in buying fish not seafood.  There sea women saved money or could borrow money easily to send their brothers and sons to school. So many from Jeju had studied in Japan that it had the highest education level in Korea. 
At the Moscow and Cairo conference the subject about making Korea independent was discussed. The Japanese made Jeju and armed fortress as the allies got closer to attack mainland Japan. Korea was under joint trusteeship of Russia, China north of the 38th parallel America and the UK south of that. The US replaced the Japanese flag on the island. Japanese ships and weapons were exploded  and dumped in the sea. Thousand of Japanese soldiers businessmen and soldiers returned to Japan and from Osaka and Japan returned Jeju islanders. Those who collaborated with Japan as well as people who escaped from the north and hated communism  now collaborated with the US Army. The former collaborators had been put in charge of rationing and stole provisions and sold them on the black market. Weapons left by the Japanese were discovered on Mount Halla and used in an uprising. Local teachers were replaced by North Koreans escapees.
1948 to 1960 Rhee Syngman appointed first S Korean president, US educated. Jeju now placed under marshal law. Third of April incidence?  Of those involved the ones perceived as  most dangerous were shot
1949 Bukchon Massecre the city became a Village of widows. The island was cut off from supplies. The US turned a blind eye to they way Koreans crushed Koreans as part of the Cold War.
1950 Seoul fell to the North and thousands of refugees fled the  mainland to Jeju
1954 after over 7 years of insurgency the last rebels were killed with 300 villages and 4 thousand homes destroyed on Jeju. The next generation of women went onto  becoming educated and business and  tourism took over 
1961 On Jeju since there were so few men to drink and gamble, the women could gather more wealth.
1962   President Park Chunk came to power by a military coup and ruled till assassinated in 1979
1980 Chung doo hwan till 1988 also dictatorship
.  Shamanism was outlawed, people got help from the Catholic church some turned to Buddism and Confucianism.
Scientific convention came to examine cold water stress and tolerance of hypothermia "thyroid function ? The women's body temp dropped to 32C after a half hour in the water and then returned to normal after half an hour out. Diving did cause loss of hearing. aboriginals are exposed to heat and cold without clothes.
In more recent times they used wet suites to stay in the water longer and against jellyfish stings and watersnake bites as well as weights and fins to go down quicker.
1976 Aunt Suni a book by the writer Hyun Ki- young on the massacre's. .
1998 Memorial built  under President Kim Dae -jung. Thus it took 50 years for the truth to out.
To protect the fishing the authorities limited divers to one person per household but this meant that mothers could not train daughters. During the Vietnamese war US troops had vacations on the island also US Peace Corp program. Plumbing, electricity ,telephones, paved roads and corrugated iron replace straw roofs. Many Koreans migrated to the US.
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Harvest in the Desert by Maurice Samuel 1944 220pg

18/9/18  A story that ends with  British Mandatory Palestine.

Born in Romania became a well known English and American writer. He visited mandate Palestine in 1924 and discovered and primitive desolate, diseased country that looked as if it had been cursed. Only the Jews knew the significant of the land and why they were there, not the other natives. The Zionist ideal was part of Judaism but needed the messiah.  Historically it goes back to the Exodus but could never succeed. Under Roman Emperor Julian he attempted a Zionist return in the 4C for his anti Christian purposes but died without influencing the Jews. Yavneh was allowed away from Jerusalem as a Jewish education centre and outlived the empire. The Persian Empire held the land for 14 years and there was hope of another Jewish return. Then the Ottoman Empire was only interested in taxing with corrupt system and were not interested in the provinces developing because Egypt developed and became independent. In Judaism people were Zionist in religion but were waiting for the messiah while the secular wanted to integrate into their native country. In the age of enlightenment unfortunately the leaders like Gibbons, Voltaire,Catherine Queen of Russia or Thomas Paine did not include Jews in their outlook.

 From about 1840 the discussion of waiting for the messiah was felt unnecessary and democratic ideas threated the Jewish leaders. You had the Damascus blood libel then. Adolphe Crémieux in 1860 started Allience Israelite Universalle which sent Charles Netter to set up Mikve Israel in 1871 that taught agriculture in French. In 1862 Moses Hess wrote "Rome and Jerusalem" on the Zionist concept. The BILU ("House of Jacob, come ye and let us go").arrived in 1882 and set up Gadara. They came from Kharkov, Ukraine area. In 1884 Herzl succeeded in getting the project going but he spent his time meeting world leaders and trying to negotiate a charter from the Sultan only after his death was his achievement realized. 

1903 Kishinev Pogroms sent another wave. It was now realized that setting up colonies of individuals whose purpose was to make a living as a planter. Provided work for Arabs and only setting up socialist type settlement could bring a Jewish state. AD Gordon arrived at the age of 50 and said you have to change the individual in order to create a Jewish State. Manya Shochat set up the co-op in Segera and a kitchen where they ate together and discussed management and solutions, after a year the settlement was showing a profit. 1909 Hashomer (the guards)was set up to guard Jewish farmers as hiring mercenaries (Arabs ) didn't give you freedom. The Hebrew language was by consensus the common tongue even though most spoke Yiddish yet children learned Hebrew and when the mandate started it was accepted with English  Arabic, and Hebrew  as official languages. The arrival of the British brought about he inauguration of the Hebrew University in 1918. Most of the money of the yishuv went to education. In 1919 the 3rd wave of Aliyah arrived. They were the ones who drained the Emek The 4th wave from 1924 and many left because the infrastructure was not ready to absorb that many. 

The 1929 Arab riots took place while the governor Sir John  Chancellor was out the country. The Arab ruling classes felt threated by the Jewish establishment while Arab workers benefited from the economic development and they used the religious lie that Jews were destroying the Moslem holy places. The people worst hit were the Hevron Yeshiva which was anti Zionist the settlement were more able to protect themselves. This failed as it did not lead to a popular uprising. The best years of the Yishuv were after this as the economic investment was starting to pay and waves of immigrants found work as well as waves of Arabs who crossed the border. 

The German Aliyah (immigration) many of whom were not Jewish or had converted or saw themselves becoming Palestinians of the Jewish faith. Doctors, dentist, lawyers were amongst those who started the chicken farms in Ramat Hashavim. There was a Youth Aliyah first from Germany and then from other places and middle class kids adapted to their new circumstances. From 1936 the Arabs went on strike and it lasted 6 months and this made them so poor that the strike ended. This was a period where anti- Semitic atmosphere felt world wide and the willingness of appeasement for the wishful thinking of keeping the peace also resulting in the White Paper, this gave encouragement to the Arabs countries who saw a weak Britain and the Axis taking over. During the war years immigrant ships that sunk or got to Haifa and the people were then sent away. This killed more Jews than all the Arab riots.

Maurice Samuel visited Palestine during the violent 1929 riots and documented the attacks against the Jewish population as a special correspondent for the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. What Happened in Palestine.1929 analysis of the Riots

Sir Herbert Samuel (1920–1925): The first High Commissioner and only Jewish administrator of the mandate.

Field Marshal Lord Herbert Plumer (1925–1928): A military commander who focused on maintaining regional security.

Sir John Chancellor (1928–1931): Administrator during the 1929 riots and subsequent policy reassessments.

Sir Arthur Wauchope (1931–1938): Oversaw the early stages of the 1936–1939 Arab revolt.

Sir Harold MacMichael (1938–1944): Led the administration during World War II and the implementation of the 1939 White Paper.

John Vereker, 6th Viscount Gort (1944–1945): Former governor of Malta who served a brief term before resigning due to illness.

Sir Alan Cunningham (1945–1948): The final High Commissioner who oversaw the end of the British Mandate and departure on May 14, 1948