Been having ideas of sorts again
Jun. 15th, 2005 08:15 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
inulroNot a particularly well thought out or articulated thought, but one worth scribbling down before I forget.
I came across this book today and I'm not sure whether I should read it or not. It sounds interesting, but in my experience people who leave the plains & come back are more sanctimonious than the ones who never left, so I might end up throwing it through a window. Also, because I grew up at one remove from the farm, I don't know how much of it I will relate to.
Not too long ago I read Jane Smiley's A Thousand Acres and many of the characters' attitudes made me think that the author had been spying at a get-together of my mother's extended family. Which was decidedly - odd. It's not something people normally write about, or that I read about.
As far as the media (mainstream and otherwise, as far as I can tell) are concerned, I'm an anomaly. I think you're either meant to fail in the outside world & go back and be a born-again hick, or else reinvent your urban sophisticated self and pretend that's who you always were. I refuse to be ashamed of where I come from - I got some good values from it, like working hard, fearlessness, and not being a delicate and sensitive flower. Equally, there's no way I'd ever go back. I think Bristol is a backwater and Toronto is a nice medium-sized city, and I'm quite happy with that. Then again, from a mass culture perspective, being from the only city in an agricultural area is a bit of an anomaly too, so I'm from somewhere in between to begin with.
This was all brought to you by something I read on AlterNet today, which I only mention, because although it's good writing & interesting, it's extremely US-centric. Has anyone come across a comparable site based in the UK or Canada?
I came across this book today and I'm not sure whether I should read it or not. It sounds interesting, but in my experience people who leave the plains & come back are more sanctimonious than the ones who never left, so I might end up throwing it through a window. Also, because I grew up at one remove from the farm, I don't know how much of it I will relate to.
Not too long ago I read Jane Smiley's A Thousand Acres and many of the characters' attitudes made me think that the author had been spying at a get-together of my mother's extended family. Which was decidedly - odd. It's not something people normally write about, or that I read about.
As far as the media (mainstream and otherwise, as far as I can tell) are concerned, I'm an anomaly. I think you're either meant to fail in the outside world & go back and be a born-again hick, or else reinvent your urban sophisticated self and pretend that's who you always were. I refuse to be ashamed of where I come from - I got some good values from it, like working hard, fearlessness, and not being a delicate and sensitive flower. Equally, there's no way I'd ever go back. I think Bristol is a backwater and Toronto is a nice medium-sized city, and I'm quite happy with that. Then again, from a mass culture perspective, being from the only city in an agricultural area is a bit of an anomaly too, so I'm from somewhere in between to begin with.
This was all brought to you by something I read on AlterNet today, which I only mention, because although it's good writing & interesting, it's extremely US-centric. Has anyone come across a comparable site based in the UK or Canada?
