Writer’s Mail
Tuesdays With Story
July 2, 2013
Writer’s quotation . . .
Below is simply a good piece of writing in honor of this week’s 150th Battle of Gettysburg and especially Pickett’s Charge. The Confederate General Pickett led some 12,500 men on an advance over a mile of open ground in the face of cannon fire and small arms at the center of the Union’s forces on Cemetery Ridge, losing nearly half of his force. It was a turning point in the war for the blue. . .
William Faulkner wrote perhaps the most famous account of Pickett’s charge in the American and, especially, the Southern mind in Intruder in the Dust:
“It’s all now you see. Yesterday won’t be over until tomorrow and tomorrow began ten thousand years ago. For every Southern boy fourteen years old, not once but whenever he wants it, there is the instant when it’s still not yet two o’clock on that July afternoon in 1863, the brigades are in position behind the rail fence, the guns are laid and ready in the woods and the furled flags are already loosened to break out and Pickett himself with his long oiled ringlets and his hat in one hand probably and his sword in the other looking up the hill waiting for Longstreet to give the word and it’s all in the balance, it hasn’t happened yet, it hasn’t even begun yet, it not only hasn’t begun yet but there is still time for it not to begin against that position and those circumstances which made more men than Garnett and Kemper and Armistead and Wilcox look grave yet it’s going to begin, we all know that, we have come too far with too much at stake and that moment doesn’t need even a fourteen-year-old boy to think This time. Maybe this time with all this much to lose and all this much to gain: Pennsylvania, Maryland, the world, the golden dome of Washington itself to crown with desperate and unbelievable victory the desperate gamble, the cast made two years ago; or to anyone who ever sailed a skiff under a quilt sail, the moment in 1492 when somebody thought This is it: the absolute edge of no return, to turn back now and make home or sail irrevocably on and either find land or plunge over the world’s roaring rim.”
History buffs: on Wednesday 7/3/13, Breitbart News is broadcasting the reenactment of Gettysburg live online. Pickett’s Charge coverage begins at noon EST.
Tuesday at Barnes & Noble . . .
(Thank you to Andy for the notes)
Amber Boudreau started with chapter 16 of Noble. The cliffhanger was well-received and many people were anxious to find out what would happen next. Pat began to ask questions. Why would people try to kill Moira? Who are they? Why would magic backfire? What is Moira’s goal becoming? Why? Why isn’t Moira asking these questions? Andy wanted to know in what way Moira was incapable of using a sword, since it wasn’t shown, and that Moira only almost died by exhausting herself. There were also many opinions about the sword itself as well as the timeframe in which she used it. Millie was curious about Moira’s grades, which will be clarified next time. Lisa began to feel sorry for Bertram in that he suddenly appeared to be lonely, but still didn’t know if she could be trusted. (more…)
Tuesdays with Story 