The Silver Screen Oasis

So you are old as the hills then Laffite , hope you don’t keep no rifles around. Suicide is a strange baby. When I first heard of HST’s demise I thought the wife did it. Now I don’t think that.

Swithin wrote: ↑January 29th, 2023, 8:55 pm I cannot believe you mentioned Jack Douglas and My Brother Was an Only Child, a book I read in my teen years, after seeing Douglas on TV. Nobody mentions Jack Douglas anymore!* I also read his other great work, Never Trust a Naked Bus Driver.

My Brother Was an Only Child was in the family "library" when I was a tyke. I remember the cover of the 35 cent Permabooks paperback. But, I don't think that I ever read it. I checked out reviews on the Web, and it seems that some folks who read it during their youth and subsequently read it as middle-aged or elderly adults no longer found it funny.

I can relate. I had a similar experience, but with a Whoopee cushion. I guess Thomas Wolfe was right.

EP Millstone wrote: ↑January 30th, 2023, 6:35 pm

Swithin wrote: ↑January 29th, 2023, 8:55 pm I cannot believe you mentioned Jack Douglas and My Brother Was an Only Child, a book I read in my teen years, after seeing Douglas on TV. Nobody mentions Jack Douglas anymore!* I also read his other great work, Never Trust a Naked Bus Driver.

My Brother Was an Only Child was in the family "library" when I was a tyke. I remember the cover of the 35 cent Permabooks paperback. But, I don't think that I ever read it. I checked out reviews on the Web, and it seems that some folks who read it during their youth and subsequently read it as middle-aged or elderly adults no longer found it funny.

I can relate. I had a similar experience, but with a Whoopee cushion. I guess Thomas Wolfe was right.

Thomas Wolfe was right, and it particularly applies to his own novels, as much as Jack Douglas's, though I haven't tried to read Douglas as an adult.

speedracer5 wrote: ↑January 28th, 2023, 12:07 pm I just got the boxed set of the nine 'Little House' books because I've never read them. According to Arngrim, Michael Landon took a lot of liberties with the Laura Ingalls Wilder story, so it'd be interesting to read "the truth" versus what I know from the show.

My sister and I checked on LITTLE HOUSE ON THE PRAIRIE by Laura Ingalls Wilder from the library as kids.
Based on the title we figured that it would be the "Little House" book that covered the period of the TV show. To our surprise, the Ingalls weren't even in Walnut Grove (or in Minnesota at all) in that book. And there was no Nellie Oleson! We were like, ""Where's Nellie?"

The only "Little House" book set in Walnut Grove (or Minnesota at all) is ON THE BANKS OF PLUM CREEK. This is the first book where Nellie Oleson appears.
Laura Ingalls Wilder based Nellie Oleson an three different people she knew at different points in her life. In the "Little House" books she combines them into the character of Nellie, who appears in three of the books.

HoldenIsHere wrote: ↑January 31st, 2023, 1:22 pm

speedracer5 wrote: ↑January 28th, 2023, 12:07 pm I just got the boxed set of the nine 'Little House' books because I've never read them. According to Arngrim, Michael Landon took a lot of liberties with the Laura Ingalls Wilder story, so it'd be interesting to read "the truth" versus what I know from the show.

My sister and I checked on LITTLE HOUSE ON THE PRAIRIE by Laura Ingalls Wilder from the library as kids.
Based on the title we figured that it would be the "Little House" book that covered the period of the TV show. To our surprise, the Ingalls weren't even in Walnut Grove (or in Minnesota at all) in that book. And there was no Nellie Oleson! We were like, ""Where's Nellie?"

The only "Little House" book set in Walnut Grove (or Minnesota at all) is ON THE BANKS OF PLUM CREEK. This is the first book where Nellie Oleson appears.
Laura Ingalls Wilder based Nellie Oleson an three different people she knew at different points in her life. In the "Little House" books she combines them into the character of Nellie, who appears in three of the books.

Yes. Nellie is an amalgamation of three different bullies Laura Ingalls Wilder knew. The main bully was named Nellie Owens. She actually settled in Forest Grove, OR (where I live) and is buried there! I've never seen her grave though.

In the 'Little House' pilot, the family leaves their "Little House in the Big Woods" in Wisconsin in search of somewhere to settle. Hunting is scarce in Wisconsin, so Pa decides to move his family somewhere new. They end up in Kansas and build a log cabin. They even meet Mr. Edwards. However, by the end of the pilot, the Ingallses are forced to leave because they've set up shop on Native American land. They leave their plot and head north. In the first actual episode of the show, they seemingly are moving into an already built house on the banks of Plum Creek, about a mile from Walnut Grove. They mention Plum Creek a couple times in the early episodes. In real life, the Ingallses only lived in Walnut Grove for a short time, eventually ending up in South Dakota (I think). Laura and Almanzo "Manly" Wilder (I think) moved to Missouri at some point.

After I finish reading Alison Arngrim's book, I'm going to start the 'Little House' series, which should be pretty quick reads since the demographic is something like 4th-8th grade with a 4th-5th grade reading level. I may even read this book, "Prairie Fire" which is a book geared towards adults that apparently fills in some of the "gaps" (so to speak) of Laura Ingalls Wilder's books.

skimpole wrote: ↑January 31st, 2023, 3:05 am

I recently read two George Orwell books which I prefer to his more famous works:





The Road to Wigan Pier is non-fiction and represents his time investigating living/working conditions in Wigan. The second part of the book is an explication of his political and social views, which are fascinating and, at time, quite funny.

Burmese Days is a novel based on his time working as a policeman in Burma; sort of his A Passage to India.

I read the dialogue Hipparchus and have been thinking about it the past few days. Makes me reconsider the definitions of temperance and greed and which is the vice.

Thompson wrote: ↑January 26th, 2023, 1:31 pm Did you change your name, Norfious? How did you do that? Erle Stanley Gardner of Perry Mason fame is quite the writer. Check him out sometime. Another prolific and terrific crime writer (police procedural they say) is Ed McBain, a.k.a. Evan Hunter. But when all is said and done, Charles Willeford is king with his Hoke Moseley novels, there are only four because he croaked out from his bad habits, but reading Willeford makes Bukowski seem like an amateur.

No, I did not change my name. I registered on this site ages ago before I was on the TCM forums and before I started going by "Broadway." I would love to change my name, but I've heard it's quite a hassle, so I'll stay "Norfious" for now.

Thank you so much for all the recommendations! I will be looking for these next time I am at the secondhand book store!