Sinister: Ramble - from 22 to 2

Ian Turton buffalo at xxx.uk
Wed Mar 25 18:28:35 GMT 1998


First, the (arbitrary) 2 per cent B & S content.  My favourite book.
Russell Hoban's 'Riddley Walker', the tail of a boy struggling in a
future post-apocalyptic Britain. It's written in a 'worn down
vernacular', a kind of pidgin English, where places and events that we
know today have have been handed down, mostly by word of mouth, and as
such their meanings have been transformed. It's fairly hard to get into
at first, but after a while you fall into the rhythm of the language.
Anyone who's read Trainspotting will probably know what I mean (although
I hasten to add it's many miles from that book in just about all other
respects). It's quite the most beautiful thing I've ever read, and I
can't help thinking about it when I hear the beginning of 'The Boy Done
Wrong Again', my favourite B & S song.

For the rude people on the list (and some of you seem schizophrenic in
your abuse of the medium) the next bit is not B & S related, but is
related to a post sent in recently. Anyone who still takes exception
will be a first-hand witness to a my refutation of the phrase 'violence
solves nothing'. For half an hour. Up and down the Uxbridge Road..So
cock off. Noddy.


DAVID wrote:

> I think there should be a minimum age of 25 for university entrance.
> That way
> you might actually know if you really want to go or not. If most
> people got
> jobs (or whatever) between the ages of 18 and 25, I bet they'd be a
> lot
> more sorted at the end of it. Oh dear, I have a feeling this isn't
> going to
> be a terribly popular point of view.

This is a similar view to that espoused by Rober Pirsig in 'Zen and The
Art of Motorcycle Maintenance'. He argues that people learn much more
when they actually have a desire to learn, rather than being told 'these
are the years you go to school - you gotta listen' or 'you gotta get a
degree to get on'. He goes on to champion a greater emphasis on teaching
for people who have found their 'vocation' and need training to further
themselves. Certainly in Britain 95% of the emphasis in teaching and
training seems to be (rather haphazardly) aimed at actually getting a
job, rather than (more accurately ?) at job/self furtherment.


that's it for another six weeks,

yerluvinuncleTurt

Richard Buckner,  'Bloomed' - anyone phucked ?


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