Last Tango in Aberystwyth by Malcolm Pryce

A sequel to Aberystwyth Mon Amour.

Louie Knight, the only private detective in Aberyswyth is called on to find a missing man. He has to deal with allies that betray him and enemies that aid him, but in the end the truth is revealed to the people who need to know and the evil beaten back.

A twisting detective story to the average reader. A surrealist experience to anybody that knows mid-Wales.

"... And I don't believe you don't know. So we're going to play a little game of mine. It's called Welsh roulette." He took out his trunceon and put it down on the desk. "You can think of it as a variation on blackjack." He walked over to a filing-cabinet, took out some keys, and opened a drawer. He brought out two things and put them down in front of Harri Harries. There was truncheon that had been painted red. And a kid's roulette wheel. "The rules are simple so you won't have any trouble picking them up. We spin the wheel. If the ball lands on black seven, I hit you seven times with the blackjack. If it land on red two, I hit you two times with the redjack. The game is over when you tell us where Calamity is." He spun the wheel and dropped the ball. Red three. Llunos turned to me. "You see! I told you he was lucky." Then he hit him three times with the red truncheon. The next one was a black four. He hit him four times. He spun the wheel, dropped the ball. Red thirty-six. "Bingo!" shouted Llunos and picked up the cosh. I turned away in dread. And Harri Harries confessed

Recommended to anybody who has ever been in Aberystwyth.

The warrior's honor by Michael Ignatief

The warrior's honor: ethnic war and the modern conscience

Five essays on ethnic war. Another title for the book could be "the intelligent TV-watcher's guide to understanding ethnic conflict". Tensely written, with descriptions of personal experiences of causes and treatment of ethnic conflict.

Is Nothing Sacred? The Ethics of Television

A look at how the cruelty of conflict is brought to our living rooms, and how this activates the conscience of the people. If then, television is capable of treating power as sacred, it becomes plausible for us to ask it to treat suffering with equal respect. If television can jettison its schedules and transform its discourse for the sake of a wedding or funeral, then we can ask it to do the same for a famine or genocide.

The Narcissism of Minor Difference

On how minor differences between people are magnified into hatred. He introduces the concept of nascisstic self-pity, when people see their neighbours only as the cause of their undeserved misery. To ignore differences for purposes of political deliberation, moral behaviour, and the rule of law is not to lie. But it does require us to see beneath the skin, a process that commits us to a daily exercise of the moral imagination. And this exercise of the imagination - this choice th focus on identity rather than difference - is what sustains liberal institutions.

The Seductiveness of Moral Disgust

On how easy it is to condemn participants in ethnic conflict as barbarians, using the Rwana genocide as an introduction. Most of persist to believe that while fires far away are terrible things, we can keep them from our doors, and that while they consume the roofs of our neighbours, the sparks will never leap to our own.

The Warrior's Honor

Essentially on the work of the International committee of the Red Cross, and how they enforce the Geneva Convention. While war is inevitable, the only way to reduce the horror of it is to ensure that the warriors abide by their own code of honour. To me it was an interesting reminder/introduction to the function of the Red Cross. Human rights, of course, is a recent concept. The laws of war predate it by many millennia: the idea that warriors should show compassion to their victims may be a lot older than the one that all human beings have rights and should be treated as equals.

The Nightmare from Which We Are Trying to Awake

On how history should be interpreted to avoid recurring ethnic conflict, essentially the integration of truth, reconciliation and justice. Reconciliation has no chance against vengeance unless it respects the emotions that sustain vengeance, unless it can replace the respect entailed in vengeance with rituals in which communities once at war learn to mourn their dead together.

The Rough Guide to Greece

I'll be attending a conference on the Greek island of Spetses soon, so I obtained the Rough Guide to Greece. I've not read the whole book (over 1000 pages!) but only the parts on Athens and Spetses that I'll need. The Rough Guide, more than any other guidebook, seems to evoke the feelings of visiting the country, although the prejudices are British. The history sections are concise, and aimed at explaining the Greece one will encounter.

Napoleon and Wellington by Andrew Roberts

Three hills and the sea define the limits of the town of Aberystwyth in mid-Wales. Each of the three hills contribute to the unique charm of the town. Constitution Hill has the Cliff Railway, Penglais has the University, and on the top of Pen Dinas is the Wellington Monument. I don't know much about the monument, except that it was built in 1858, represents an upturned cannon, and was intended to carry an equestrian statue of Wellington. By reading this book, I've learned some more about Wellington and his opponent, Napoleon. The book is neither a biography of Napoleon, nor of Wellington, nor a history of Napoleonic campaigns, but a look at what Napoleon and Wellington thought about each other. Inevitably, I came to learn a lot about the history, as the book shows how Napoleon slowly came to know about the existence of Wellington through his actions in the Peninsular Campaigns in Portugal and Spain, and at last acknowledged him as a good general, and how they finally met in the field at Waterloo, Napoleon's bitterness at Wellington for being exiled to St Helena (though Wellington saved his life and had nothing to do with the St Helena decision), and how Wellington's private opinion of Napoleon crumbled when he learned that Napoleon had bequeathed a sum of money to the man who had tried to assassinate him. I now understand a bit better why there is no outright condemnation of Napoleon in the English-speaking world; during his reign Napoleon had the support of the British Whigs (the Liberals of the period) who were pro-reform, therefore anti-royal, and therefore pro-Napoleon. The author says that some of the Whigs that visited Napoleon on Elba might "have blood on their hands", for encouraging his escape and return to power. My favourite quote from the book (by Wellington, on events much later):

It isn't important whether it's Napoleon's government, or the Directors', or Robespierre, or a prince from the house of Bourbon [or an Republican or Democrat President]; whilst this government uses war as a resource, be it political or financial, and that in the country war isn't considered a disgrace, the world Powers without exception have to be on guard. Bonaparte's wars weren't revolutionary. They were wars of conquest; for the object of finance, or generally for reputation. Like they are going to do in Algiers. There is no lack of men in France, like Bonaparte, who could put everything into confusion.

I recommend this book to those seeking an additional view on the period, or for readers interested in the personalities. Do not read it to learn about the politics, the campaigns or the battles. A useful book, I think, and not just another on the pile.