Books: Ripley`s Game By Patricia Highsmith

 

(Drivebycuriosity) - Recently I watched "The Talented Mister Ripley" on the screen - both versions, the 1999 movie by Anthony Minghella and this year´s sinister Netflix show "Ripley". Both visualizations waked my appetite for the real thing. So I rereads Highsmith´s "Ripley`s Game", the third book in her Ripley series ( amazon).

This Ripley is older, he lives now in France, and he is well-off, totally straight and married with a beautiful woman. Ripley became a more cunning and seasoned criminal. He starts a psychological game, a revenge for a petty insult, that creates great dangers for him and others (this is a spoiler free blog). 

The novel is a drama, diving deep into the psychology of twisted persons - typical for Highsmith - , but the book is slowly gaining speed and turns into a thriller with nail-biting action. She wrote very clearly and I had the feeling that I was part of it and cared a lot about the characters. "Ripley´s Game" belongs to the best she wrote.  

There is also a movie version with John Malkovich as Ripley (imdb ). Book and film are highly recommended.

Books: China. A History By John Keay

 

(Drivebycuriosity) - Action, homicide, revolution, treason, intrigues, heroes & villains, blood and thunder. You will find all that and much more in just one book: "China. A History", by John Keay (amazon ). It`s not just another history book, it`s a thriller, but not solely based on fiction. The author describes the ups and downs of a gigantic nation.

Keay explains why China´s rise, the awakening "of the dragon", is just a comeback, a reawakening. In the 16th century China was already the largest and wealthiest nation on Earth. 

And the Asian giant had many "golden ages" before then. The Han Empire (202 BC till AD 220) was as large as the coeval Roman empire, and China`s brightness lasted until the end of the millennium, not just half way through it. But for China, after each "golden age" came a deep fall.

The history of China is as colorful as a Chinese New Year Parade. It´s also a tale about fights, and a permanent struggle about power. Keay describes the many battles between the "Kingdom of the Middle" and her neighbors, the clashes between emperors and their usurpers or families about dominance. Very often the rulers struggled with the bureaucrats, who were very powerful eunuchs. Most of the time the administration was the true ruler of the vast empire.

The giant struggles China had to suffer in over 2,500 years brought the world many gifts. China invented paper, book printing (long before Gutenberg printed his Bible), the compass, banknotes (paper money), kites (ancestors of airplanes), rockets, noodles (spaghetti) and much more.

"China. A History" is highly recommend, not just for historians or students of economics and politics, it helps everybody to understand why the globe is changing again now.  And - it is an exciting read.

Books: The Healer By Antti Tuomainen

 

(Drivebycuriosity) - Antti Tuomainen belongs to my favorite writers. I like his dark humor & his surreal descriptions of weird characters and situations and I enjoyed his droll novels "Little Siberia", "Palm Beach Finland" & "The Man who died" (my reviews Siberia  Palm   The Man Who).

The novel "The Healer", first published 2010, is Tuomainen`s first book and very different from the later publications ( amazon). Contrary to the above mentioned novels this book is not funny. Apparently the author tried to follow the popular Nordic Noir Trend (Jo Nesbø, Henning Mankell, Stieg Larsson) and created a very sinister, dirty & rough plot set in a hyper-dystopian world. Everything is falling apart. Unfortunately he overdid it and the reader drowns in violence & disintegration.

"The Healer" is - like the later novels - written in first person. The wife of the protagonist is missing. She is a journalist who investigates the case of a serial killer & eco terrorist, known as name giving "The Healer". Tuomainen showed already some writing skill and tried to create interesting atmospheres, but the plot does make no sense. There are too many unanswered questions, the narrator is too naive and the other characters are unbelievable and unpleasant.

Fortunately the author changed his concept.

Contemporary Art: Imagined Landscapes @ Gallery Long Story Short New York

 (Drivebycuriosity) - Manhattan`s Chinatown is rapidly gentrifying. New art galleries are sprouting like mushrooms in autumn. One of them is Gallery Long Story Short on Henry Street. Recently I spotted a show called "A Tree falls, does is make a sound?" by Chinese artist Linane Chu ( lss.gallery). The title is based on the English bishop & philosopher George Berkeley (1710).

I like the paintings - which I see as imagined landscapes - very much, but let the images speak for themselves.

 

 

To be continued 

Science Fiction: Revelation Space By Alastair Reynolds

 (Drivebycuriosity) - Alastair Reynolds belongs to my favorite science fiction authors. His novels and short stories show what contemporary scifi is capable of. Reynolds`work display the influence of his scientific development. He has a PhD in physics and started his career as research astronomer for the European Space Research and Technology Centre (part of the European Space Agency) until 2004 when he left to pursue writing full-time ( wikipedia). But he also has a lot of fantasy and commands over excellent writing skills.

 Reynolds shows his hand in the space opera "Revelation Space", published in 2000, while he still worked at the Space Agency (amazon). Over more than 400 pages he celebrates cosmology, particle physics, Einstein`s relativity, quantum mechanics, information theory and other sciences and mixes them together into a futuristic opera. The book could be seen as an explanation for the Fermi Paradox (why we did not find another civilization even though the sky is full with stars).

The novel starts with 3 different plot threads: There is an archaeologist, who wants to find out what caused the extinction of an ancient civilization. There is a woman who travels on a huge space ship, which can reach almost the speed of light, but the ship is infected by a nano tech virus. And there are is a female contract assassin on a new mission. 

Soon the threads - and their lives - get intermingled (this is a spoiler free blog. You can find a synopsis here wikipedia). There are a lot violent conflicts between the protagonists and with other humans, but the real story  is the influence of some still powerful ancient civilizations and their outstanding technologies.

It seems that Reynolds`fantasy has no limits, but he stays strict inside the rules of physics and logic. Even though he imagines wildly bizarre scenarios and grotesque events, a kind of futurist baroque, the outcome is defined by relativity, gravity and other physical forces.

I had a lot fun reading this space opera while refreshing my knowledge about physics and other sciences. Highly recommended!

Economics: Why Inflation Is Cooling

  (Drivebycuriosity) - Today we learned that the US inflation rate sank to 2.5% continuing the slow retreat of the recent months (cnbc ). That was not a surprise.

 

                         Helicopter Money

The high inflation of the recent years was caused by a deluge of money in the years 2020 & 2021, when the Biden government flooded the economy with stimulus cheques in the value of trillions of dollars to fight the Covid19 recession (American Rescue Plan). The Federal Reserve financed the government cheques by massive bond purchases by the Federal Reserve (Quantitative Easing known as QE1, QE2 & QE3).  

The government money landed directly on the bank accounts of the Americans, blowing up the money supply M2 (bank notes & coins & deposits at banks). Milton Friedman described this as helicopter money (cato ).

 

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As a result in 2020 & 2021 the US money supply M2, the engine of the inflation, jumped 40%. The money deluge met a constrained supply of goods & services partly - because of Covid19. "Inflation is caused by too much money chasing too few goods and services", taught Milton Friedman.

                        Causal connection

The causal connection between money and inflation is known since the 16th century at least! Nicolaus Copernicus described already in the year 1522 how "too much money" causes inflation. Copernicus` "quantity theory of money" is based on observations: 

Early in the 16th century Spain conquered today`s Latin America and looted the silver stocks. The Spaniards send the precious metal to Europe where is was printed into coins and used as money.

As a result the European money supply jumped, meeting a restrained supply of goods (agriculture, hand works) &  services. The flood of money raised suddenly the demand for scarce goods & services and caused a jump of the price level.

Elaborated studies by Milton Friedman, Karl Brunner, Allan Meltzer and many other economists (known as Monetarists) described already in the 1960s how and why the inflation rate follows the growth rate of money with a time lag (causal connection).

 

                      The Pull Of The Money

 

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Fortunately the money flood ended in 2022 and the money supply shrank for a while. Since October 2023 the money volume is growing again, but only moderately. 

Since inflation follows the growth of money, the inflation rate (growth rate of prices) will follow the pull of the slow growing money supply and the inflation rate will continue to cool.

 

 

 

 

Contemporary Art: Between The Lines @ Lyles & King New York

 

(Drivebycuriosity) -  Gallery Lyles & King in Manhattan´s Chinatown belongs to my favorite art places ( lylesandking). I have spotted so many amazing exhibitions there. Now you could see there "Between the Lines" by Kathy Ruttenberg & Stephanie Temma-Hier ( between-the-lines).

 

As usual at this place the exhibited art works are funny & sexy. The amusing lobster composition on top of this post is called "See through people" (2024,
Oil on linen with glazed stoneware sculpture) by Stephanie Temma Hier, followed by another painting by Temma Hier.

 

Above 3 paintings by Kathy Ruttenberg.

 

To be continued

Economics: E-commerce - Why Is The US So Far Behind?

 

 (Drivebycuriosity) - There is a lot ado about e-commerce. Many complain that online shopping is growing too fast. They claim that e-commerce is eating the cake of the brick and mortar retailers and they accuse Amazon to be a monopolist.

Here are the facts: In the US e-commerce is just 16% of the retail (bilello.blog ). I think this number is disappointing after almost 30 years growth.

 

 ( source)

It is interesting that e-commerce does better in the UK. Online sales are there about 27% of retail.

Now I am wondering, why does e-commerce so much better in the UK than in the US? I guess the difference is caused by different density. 

A high percentage of the British lives in London or near the capital. There are short ways from the fulfillment centers to the customers, meaning relative low costs and short delivery times.

The US - in the opposite - is widely spread. States like Wyoming, Arizona, Nevada & Utah are almost empty. That means high costs and slow deliveries. It is not surprising that fewer American buy online. 

In the recent 10 years e-commerce gained on average annually just 1 percentage point, from about 6% to 16% of the whole retail. If this trend continues, e-commerce would need about 40% years to be more than half of retail. Maybe in the year 2100 the fast growing Chinese Amazon challenger Temu will become a monopolist.

 

Books: Tudors - The History Of England Volume II

 

(Drivebycuriosity) - Even that I am German, I really like England. I grew up with the music by Rolling Stones, Kinks, Beatles & Co. and I read a lot English authors from Enid Blyton to Agatha Christie, Evelyn Waugh, Ian McEwan and myriads others. And I love London, which I visited 5 times in several decades.

Naturally I am interested in English history, which shaped Kinks, Waugh & Co. So I began reading Peter Ackroyd´s series: "The History of England ". This post is about "The Tudors" (amazon ). 

The House of Tudors ruled England for 118 years and shaped the country`s history, almost as much as William the Conqueror and his Norman relatives did 5 centuries earlier. The book focuses on four of the five Tudor monarchs, ignoring Henry VII, who lived from 1457 through 1507; and begins in the year 1507 when Henry VIII reached the throne.

Henry VIII is well known for being a monster and for his erratic adolescent behavior. The brutality, willfulness and the fate of his unfortunate six wives are well documented in so many books, plays and movies. But it is hard to feel sorry for Anna Boleyn, who was an intriguer and did what everything she could do to outmaneuver her predecessor Catherine of Aragon. And why did these women chose to become the wife of a feared monster? "The wives of kings were generally considered to be little more than brood mares".

Monster or not, Henry changed England forever. He released the country from the yoke of the Catholic Church and the rule of the Popes. The monarch did not intend to become a religious reformer, the reform was just a means to an end. 

Akroyd wrote: The king "was not in the least evangelical. He only wished to augment his revenues, with the treasure of the old Church, and to increase his power". He also aimed to get rid of the command of the Pope, who - and his church - did not allow Henry´s divorce from Catherine of Aragon.

 

     The Law of Unintended Consequences

Henry´s reformation is a example for the law of unintended consequences. But the result stays till today and defines the culture in England and the former English colonies, the USA, Canada, Australia & New Zealand. Thanks to the Tudors the country not only avoided the bloody inquisition, which tormented the populations of Italy & Spain (and the Spanish colonies). England did not participate in the messy wars which devastated the German speaking regions in the 17th century. Even today we can see the huge cultural - and economic - divide between former English colonies (US, Canada, New Zealand) and the Hispanic countries

There already existed a parliament. But it was just summoned "as a way of informing the nation of the king´s will"! The members of the Commons, in large part lawyers and country gentlemen, were quite at ease with the royal prerogative; their role was to register the king´s decrees and to shield him from blame for unpopular measures. The Speaker was a royal official whose salary was paid by the king and the most part of the Commons were the king´s servants. 

Henry´s son Edward tried to continue his fathers reform, but did not live long enough to make any impression. The death of his allmighty father - and his youth & frail health - seemed to invite rebellions and unrest all over the country. Henry´s daughter Mary, a radical and fundamentalist Catholic, tried to turn history back and bring England again under the Catholic yoke and hoped to import the Spanish inquisition. No wonder, she was known as "Bloody Mary". Fortunately for the English Mary`s terror regime ended with her early death.

                           Rise & Fall

Akroyd gave Elizabeth half of the book, more than he dedicated to Henry. Rightly so. The queen continued basically her father´s religious reform and made the separation from Catholic fundamentalism and the regime of the Popes definitive. 

Obviously she was very smart, otherwise she would have not survived in this turbulent & vicious era. Too many domestic & foreign powers wanted her death, even her devout sister Mary was a danger. Elizabeth was often accused to be too indecisive. "Elizabeth vacillated. She never made a decision when one could be avoided. Procrastination was her policy in all the affairs of state." 

But thanks to her caution England avoided ruinous and messy wars. Her cautious regiment started England´s conversion into a democracy and laid the foundation of England becoming a sea power. She benefited of course from many others, like Sir Walter Raleigh and Sir Francis Drake, who strengthen England´s Navy. The actions of these men and other leuds of the Queen disturbed & weakened the numerical superior Spanish navy, known as the Armada. They were important in the war against Spain and also supported the English to set foot in North America.

During Elizabeth´s regency the industry of England advanced as strongly as its commerce. The investment in looms, furnaces and forges increased; while parliamentary Acts were passed to promote the trade in leather. A lot more coal was needed for the manufacture of glass and for soap boiling. The production of pig iron rose threefold in the space of thirty years.

The Tudor epoch saw the rise & fall of men like Thomas Wolsey, Thomas Cromwell, the Duke of Norfolk and many others, who where sometimes in the favor of the king or the queen and sometimes not.  

There was a lot violence and an atmosphere of fear and threat. Many lost their lives in rebellions and skirmishes. People were afraid of the afterlife. And people often behaved strange and irrational, from the sovereign to the poorest farm hands. 

They were obsessed with the Bible and ancient Greek texts and believed in them blindly. Too many got denounced as heretics and got burned alive. Owning the wrong book could cost one`s life. The dispute whether one can eat a piece of God by swallowing a little piece of bread (the Catholic communion) could decide about life and death. Even an improvident comment, that seemed to conflict with the common believe, could bring one on the pyre or the scaffold. I am surprised how often men and women confessed and stubbornly persisted on statements which will bring them death.

Akroyd delivered a fascinating portrait of a dangerous but also exciting era.