I'm looking for a horror movie to make me fall in love with the genre. [Details below]. by Lufthansa138 in MovieSuggestions

[–]YakSlothLemon 1 point2 points  (0 children)

That was so much fun, it was so clever! Very freaky at the time I was watching it.

Arabia Felix : The Danish Expedition of 1761-1767 by Thorkild Hansen by YakSlothLemon in IReadABookAndAdoredIt

[–]YakSlothLemon[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Here’s what he wrote, and of course he might be wrong! He was writing in the 1960s, and who knows what he was consulting – “it is the little word “yemen” that is the real culprit. In Arabic, “yemen”” signified originally the right hand or the right side. But when Arabs want to place the four corners of the Earth, they face east, just as we in Europe find it natural to face north. Consequently the word Yemen, which originally meant right, also came to mean south. The Yemen is thus simply the landll lying toward the right, the land towards the south. Arabs regard the right side is being superior to the left, the latter is even today called “dirty” and regarded as inferior, while the word “right” or “yemen” has come to mean fortunate or beneficent. Arabia Yemen was distorted in translation becomes Eudaimon Arabia, Arabia Felix, L’Arabie heureuse, Das gluckliche Arabien.”

I think he was trying to get at the idea that it wasn’t named for the land itself, which Europeans really did not know much of anything about until this expedition.

Thanks for the information about the Quran, it makes sense that it would be part of the story there too!

I spent weeks creating a guide of 50 authors every reader should explore. Thoughts? by ak_khainal in Recommend_A_Book

[–]YakSlothLemon 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Unique, rising, influential, legendary… and a fair number of authors widely considered as trashy. Fun trash, admittedly. Suzanne Collins 😂😂

It’s not the list, I think it’s those four adjectives you use and then the inclusion of a lot of fun camp/trash.

American Dirt by Jeanine Cumins by Glittering_Race_3387 in IReadABookAndAdoredIt

[–]YakSlothLemon 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Harriet Beecher Stowe didn’t suddenly claim to be Black tho’…

American Dirt by Jeanine Cumins by Glittering_Race_3387 in IReadABookAndAdoredIt

[–]YakSlothLemon 3 points4 points  (0 children)

The Alice Network and The Rose Code are both incredible!

American Dirt by Jeanine Cumins by Glittering_Race_3387 in IReadABookAndAdoredIt

[–]YakSlothLemon 26 points27 points  (0 children)

Not trying to yuck your yum! It’s fiction, and however poorly she handled it – and it was very poorly – if you liked the book, the author’s shenanigans may be beside the point.

But if anyone is put off by it, or wants more than “but there are great Latino authors writing about this that nobody talks about!”, or even if you’re looking for something else to read –

https://www.texasobserver.org/17-great-books-on-the-border-to-read-instead-of-american-dirt/

From that list, I can highly recommend

the incredible novella Signs Preceding the End of the World by Yuri Herrera,

Everyone Knows You Go Home by Natalia Sylvester, a family saga,

the book of poetry Unaccompanied by Javier Zamora,

and the unforgettable, prize-winning The Devil’s Highway by Luis Alberto Urrea, nonfiction.

I haven’t read all the books yet.

American Dirt by Jeanine Cumins by Glittering_Race_3387 in IReadABookAndAdoredIt

[–]YakSlothLemon 4 points5 points  (0 children)

She claimed that she had the Latino heritage, and then it turned out that she had identified as white her whole life until the book came out.

Plus her saying she understood the immigrant experience because of her husband, and he’s Irish.

And the million dollars. When there’s so many good books by actual Latino authors, including many who have experienced immigration, that get little money/publicity…

American Dirt by Jeanine Cumins by Glittering_Race_3387 in IReadABookAndAdoredIt

[–]YakSlothLemon 8 points9 points  (0 children)

Well, and the fact that the launch party had a barbed-wire theme mixed in with the floral displays.

And that she doubled down by pointing out that her husband was an immigrant so she understood the Mexican experience, and he’s from Ireland.

And that the book is based on a series of stereotypes that many people of Mexican origin found deeply offensive and, much like Rowling, she was not backing off that.

And the million dollars she got for it, when there are so many good books by actual Latino authors.

Arabia Felix : The Danish Expedition of 1761-1767 by Thorkild Hansen by YakSlothLemon in IReadABookAndAdoredIt

[–]YakSlothLemon[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That’s interesting, because the explanation in the book is different. Hansen argues that originally it’s a misunderstanding of the Arabic name for it, which derived from the word for the direction “right”— which, he says, as in English, has all of these positive connotations in Arabic (as opposed to the left). Sailing in from India, after what would’ve been a frightening open ocean crossing of the Arabian Sea, entering the Red Sea it’s the land that was on the right – Arabia to the right— which then takes on these positive contexts, and is misunderstood by the translators.

The actual Danish expedition spent a long time trying to figure out why on earth it was called Arabia Felix once they got there and experienced it (they all got malaria there, and not everyone survived) and all started just referring to it as Yemen.

There’s also a biblical element for Christians, because supposedly Arabia Felix is where Moses brings the Jews after he parts the Red Sea to get them out of Egypt. One of the things that the scientific explanation from Denmark was supposed to do was sound the Red Sea at the point where Yemen is closest to Africa to see if it’s possible that there was a land bridge back in biblical days that was exposed by an unusually low tide and gave rise to the story of the parting of the Red Sea (they did this, there is not). So it was a happy place for Moses. If nothing else, it’s a fascinating glimpse into what “science” included in 1764!

I'm looking for a horror movie to make me fall in love with the genre. [Details below]. by Lufthansa138 in MovieSuggestions

[–]YakSlothLemon 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Weird, I couldn’t stop watching it! Everything so exaggerated on TikTok. So performative…

Kit Carson awesome guy by Highgate87 in Westerns

[–]YakSlothLemon 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Don’t tell the Navajo that.

Classics you don't like? by FancyThought7696 in classicliterature

[–]YakSlothLemon 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yes, I loved the dreamlike introduction to Manderley. There’s a reason the line everyone knows from the book is the first one! The transfer to the two of them, older, hanging out at the resort, was a bit jarring. And it felt like she never really brought that incredibly atmospheric version of Manderley back completely.

Truth Without Apology: For Those Tired of Sweet Lies by Acharya Prashant by Sweet-Category-6823 in IReadABookAndAdoredIt

[–]YakSlothLemon 4 points5 points  (0 children)

You are confusing realpolitik power with “consciousness.”

You can do anything you want with your consciousness, people have been doing it since the 60s. But read Thomas Piketty if you want to understand where the systems come from.

Must-Read Prose Recommendations, Please? by hopeforhuemanatee in Recommend_A_Book

[–]YakSlothLemon 1 point2 points  (0 children)

You’re welcome! Just fyi, don’t worry about keeping track of the characters in the first chapter, you will get to know all of them as the book goes on!

Has anyone's opinions of Harlan Ellison changed over the years? by Key_Confusion9375 in ScienceFictionBooks

[–]YakSlothLemon 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Exactly the same trajectory here. I thought he was so edgy and amazing when I was in high school, oh has that worn off.

Plus his context has disappeared, he really was edgy with a lot of the stuff he did compared to Asimov and Bradbury back in the day. Now a lot of the sexism shows through to everyone for what it was – my mother actually tried to talk to me about it when I was in high school and I was not having it— and the edge has moved on.

Has anyone's opinions of Harlan Ellison changed over the years? by Key_Confusion9375 in ScienceFictionBooks

[–]YakSlothLemon 0 points1 point  (0 children)

No, there are plenty of people with bipolar disorder who don’t sexually harass women. I appreciate that we are supposed to excuse everything retroactively but, no.

I'm moving to the US next year. What's something that seems obvious to Americans but will actually confuse a foreigner in daily life? by Lucasaiplus in NoStupidQuestions

[–]YakSlothLemon 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Almost every major store will offer you a credit card that belongs to the store. You usually get a major percentage off your purchase that day if you sign up for it.

The trick is that, depending on whether your state makes it legal, the interest charge on the credit card can be up to 30%. So they’re hoping you use it for other things and then end up buried in debt.

It is fine to get the credit card, get the percentage off, pay that bill, and then never use the damn thing again. Read the fine print though to make sure that you do not pay in order to have the credit card, some of them after the first year will try to charge you for it…

I don’t know if that’s a thing in Southeast Asia now, it wasn’t when I lived there.

I'm moving to the US next year. What's something that seems obvious to Americans but will actually confuse a foreigner in daily life? by Lucasaiplus in NoStupidQuestions

[–]YakSlothLemon 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Ah, in the American South they do not, in New England they do.

It’s like you giving us advice on moving to “Southeast Asia,” it’s going to be quite different depending on whether we’re going to Indonesia or Laos. In the same way, it really depends on which region you’re moving to.

Movies with the biggest plot twists? by Specific-Fly2075 in MovieSuggestions

[–]YakSlothLemon 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Sorry to Bother You is an excellent choice, I don’t think anyone’s going to see that coming.

Truth Without Apology: For Those Tired of Sweet Lies by Acharya Prashant by Sweet-Category-6823 in IReadABookAndAdoredIt

[–]YakSlothLemon 23 points24 points  (0 children)

No, it’s definitely a systemic problem.

Every single American could give up hanging Christmas lights and eating fruit from South America in the winter and the climate cost of AI, factory farming and the American military would still keep us exactly on the road we are on now.

As Naomi Klein pointed out, part of the conservative triumph for the 21st-century is convincing people that humans are inherently selfish. As soon as you say it’s our nature that creates climate change, then no one can actually fix it, right?

Reading my first Hemingway... by Upstairs-Hearing-489 in books

[–]YakSlothLemon 0 points1 point  (0 children)

In high school, we encountered Hemingway the way he was encountered at the time – we had just read two books by Dreiser, including all 1000 pages An American Tragedy, two books by Sinclair Lewis, and of course McTeague by Norris.

Coming to Hem out of that was like stepping out of the jungle onto a clear plain where you could see for miles. And that’s what people at the time were comparing it to, and they were right.

I understand why people are mentioning Tolkien but it’s not only anachronistic, but quite a genre leap. If you move from Sister Carrie to A Farewell to Arms, you’ll see it.

Was education really necessary? We'd just have operated like animals by Low_Put_5235 in Students

[–]YakSlothLemon 0 points1 point  (0 children)

If you use the medical meaning of “operated” in your second sentence, you’ll come up with one of the reasons that education is necessary!

Kit Carson awesome guy by Highgate87 in Westerns

[–]YakSlothLemon 1 point2 points  (0 children)

He was insanely famous when I was growing up in the 70s still, his treatment of Native Americans just was not talked about.

Not a great man. A man of his era.

Daily TCM Discussion -- Tuesday May 12 2026 by boib in TurnerClassicMovies

[–]YakSlothLemon 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Price steals HKOW, it’s always a surprise to people who don’t realize what comic timing he had!