I read The Kindly Ones (actually a great title referring to the Greek Fates who determined much of human life) a couple of times when it came out. The inspiration for the protagonist is the intellectual Nazi technocrat & mass murderer Otto Ohlendorf, whose capacity for rationalisation & self-acceptance (the capacities the educated & most…
I read The Kindly Ones (actually a great title referring to the Greek Fates who determined much of human life) a couple of times when it came out. The inspiration for the protagonist is the intellectual Nazi technocrat & mass murderer Otto Ohlendorf, whose capacity for rationalisation & self-acceptance (the capacities the educated & most fortunate members of humanity including you & I all share) is the overwhelming theme of The Kindly Ones. For those of us so enlightened & depraved, the book is indeed an enjoyable read, though on the third time around it's pleasant to skip around.
Good of you to try re-kindling interest in & attention to what Americans chose to adjudge at best a difficult read. That fact highlights the true insufficiency of many of the most exalted educations that have been made available to our allegedly intelligent people in process.
The relevance of The Kindly Ones to the present American crisis (also going on in Europe) is that we who have appreciated that book for 15 years had no impediments to seeing 2024 in 2015. As I warned my elite Dutch friends in my last visit there after New Years, 2016. Being a Jew with murdered relatives back in 1940s Poland was also helpful to the clarity I felt as soon as Donald rode down his golden escalator like the deus ex machina it was.
I'm very impressed you read it three times. But it does demand multiple reads. The passages that are good are SO GOOD. Reading the first chapter now made me sick to my stomach a little, now that Nazis are once again a real threat.
I read The Kindly Ones (actually a great title referring to the Greek Fates who determined much of human life) a couple of times when it came out. The inspiration for the protagonist is the intellectual Nazi technocrat & mass murderer Otto Ohlendorf, whose capacity for rationalisation & self-acceptance (the capacities the educated & most fortunate members of humanity including you & I all share) is the overwhelming theme of The Kindly Ones. For those of us so enlightened & depraved, the book is indeed an enjoyable read, though on the third time around it's pleasant to skip around.
Good of you to try re-kindling interest in & attention to what Americans chose to adjudge at best a difficult read. That fact highlights the true insufficiency of many of the most exalted educations that have been made available to our allegedly intelligent people in process.
The relevance of The Kindly Ones to the present American crisis (also going on in Europe) is that we who have appreciated that book for 15 years had no impediments to seeing 2024 in 2015. As I warned my elite Dutch friends in my last visit there after New Years, 2016. Being a Jew with murdered relatives back in 1940s Poland was also helpful to the clarity I felt as soon as Donald rode down his golden escalator like the deus ex machina it was.
I'm very impressed you read it three times. But it does demand multiple reads. The passages that are good are SO GOOD. Reading the first chapter now made me sick to my stomach a little, now that Nazis are once again a real threat.
I didn't but I've never read it after aglio e olio.