I opened up my Kindle to Mary L. Trump's new book, Too Much and Never Enough, about her uncle Donald. I read her epigraphic quote from Les Miserables (1862) and was reminded of the little excerpt of Victor Hugo's book we read in high school French. I thought that book has got to have some excellent ideas and I bet it is available for Kindle. Yep, downloaded it for $3.15. My Kindle tries to interest me in popular books and I saw an ad for "Two Aces and a Pair" by Blake Banner. The blurb said it featured an old, soured detective, and being old and sour myself, I was interested.
Earlier, I looked at the opening pages of Les Mis and found
True or false, that which is said of men often occupies as important a place in their lives, and above all in their destinies, as that which they do.
Hugo, Victor. Les Miserables (Kindle Locations 12-13). BookRix. Kindle Edition.
When I looked at the Banner story, the opening page of semi-nasty conversation between the local commander and the older detective seemed appropriately edgy but then, back at his desk, he starts going through the cold cases he has been assigned. He remembers this one: men around a card table, each shot dead, except for one. That one has been mutilated and the parts were laid out on the table.
So, which is better, more lasting, more valuable: pointing to unseen effects of social opinion or mutilating bodies? True, I have a body and true, I am not currently in the mood to be mutilated. Maybe later. I can't advise you to always go for what is older as a general rule, but it does offer a clue when a work has been read and re-read, made into a musical and translated into many languages.
Because I grew up in a different time, I can see that the Hugo book is too long and winding for my tastes but I am still not attracted to mutilation. Maybe these will be more fun:
http://powerfulmind.co/absurd-reasons-kids-are-crying/
