tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6959297.post265535769187035483..comments2024-03-21T07:37:30.475-04:00Comments on Light reading: "Gosh, I could do with a bathe"Jenny Davidsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02295436498255927522noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6959297.post-44231621513443118302009-07-31T23:15:58.017-04:002009-07-31T23:15:58.017-04:00Iris Murdoch has a couple of great swimming scenes...Iris Murdoch has a couple of great swimming scenes--an extremely dramatic one in <i>The Nice and the Good</i>, when a character has to rescue a boy who's been trapped in a sea cave by rising water, and another in . . . <i>Nuns and Soldiers</i>, maybe, when a young man falls into a rushing river in France that ducks under a rock formation and carries him underground unexpectedly for a while. <br /><br />Not a surprise, I suppose, since Murdoch loved to swim.Levi Stahlhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11094919454842047688noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6959297.post-13294267429377260152009-07-31T22:58:42.713-04:002009-07-31T22:58:42.713-04:00"I sat in the sun and watched the bathers on ..."I sat in the sun and watched the bathers on the beach. They looked very small. After a while I stood up, gripped with my toes on the edge of the raft as it tipped with my weight, and dove cleanly and deeply, to come up through the lightening water, blew the salt water out of my head, and swam slowly and steadily to the shore." <br /><br />-The Sun Also Rises, p. 242. <br /><br />1) I think the raft tipping with his weight makes the passage. <br />2) Blew water out of his head? Huh? Like a whale?<br />3) There is actually a better swimming passage on the previous page, but it's too long to type!Paul Devlinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05931755750549699626noreply@blogger.com