[continued from previous message]   
      
   educated at 'Oggsford College'. Aside from the pronunciation, it's   
   not Oxford College, it's the University of Oxford, which consists   
   of forty-three 'colleges' of varying sorts." [-ecl]   
      
   I think this is very deliberate in terms of showing who Wolfsheim   
   is, much in the way that the unused library helps show who Gatsby   
   is.   
      
   For an interesting sidelight, read the book and note every use of   
   the telephone. [-sd]   
      
   Evelyn replies:   
      
   That was my (apparently too subtle) point about Wolfsheim. [-ecl]   
      
   ===================================================================   
      
   TOPIC: Peter Watkins (letter of comment by Paul Dormer)   
      
   In response to Mark's comments on Peter Watkins and THE WAR GAME   
   in the 11/07/25 issue of the MT VOID, Paul Dormer writes:   
      
   Before THE WAR GAME, Watkins did what I remember being a rather   
   good film about the battle of Culloden, done in a similar style to   
   THE WAR GAME. I haven't seen it for years but I see it's available   
   on Youtube. [-pd]   
      
   Evelyn responds:   
      
   We saw that at Culloden in 1987 when we did a driving tour of   
   ancient and historical sites in Scotland. Needless to say, I don't   
   remember it all that clearly; all I remember is that Mark pointed   
   out it was the same director as THE WAR GAME. [-ecl]   
      
   ===================================================================   
      
   TOPIC: This Week's Reading (book comments by Evelyn C. Leeper)   
      
   I ran across a bunch of "Minute Mysteries" books. You know the   
   sort: they give you a one- or two-page account of a crime and the   
   investigation, and then you're supposed to say who the criminal   
   is, or how you know the witness is lying, or some such.   
      
   The problem is that many of them just don't work any more. No, the   
   hood of the car might still be cool after driving ten hours--it   
   could be an electric vehicle. No, the person who said he mailed a   
   twenty-six-pound package might be telling the truth--whatever the   
   twenty-five-pound limit was, it isn't any more. And so on.   
      
   Or it assumes some relatively arcane knowledge, such as that   
   horseshoe games have innings, or what the weight limit is for a   
   middleweight, or what some weird baseball slang means.   
      
   Then there are the predictable ones: someone describes a liquid   
   that should have been frozen given the weather, or things seen in   
   total darkness, or deaf people saying someone was whispering what   
   they lip-read.   
      
   But the really out-of-place ones are the ones that are just logic   
   puzzles: Mary and the killer both have red hair. Diane had only   
   recently arrived in town. The waitress and Suzanne use the same   
   hairdresser. And so on, until you are asked, "Who is the killer?"   
   The problem is that the police would only know this set of things   
   if they already *knew* who the killer was.   
      
   Oh, many of the mysteries show up in multiple books, even when the   
   books are by different authors. (Since at least two of the   
   authors--Austin Ripley and Donald J. Sobol--are well-known, it is   
   highly unlikely that the different names are all pen names for the   
   same author.) [-ecl]   
      
   ===================================================================   
      
                                        Evelyn C. Leeper   
                                        evelynchimelisleeper@gmail.com   
      
      
              Nothing works the way it was supposed to. They keep   
              changing things, but still nothing works right.   
                                              --THX-1138   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)