Stereotypes, weather, reading stuff!

I am reading (or rather re-reading but it's so long since I read it for the first time that it's almost like a first time read) Tolstoy's War and Peace. 19th century Russia was a strange place, with an upper class who often spoke to each other in French, even though some of them did so quite badly. It's especially odd as they were at war on and off with France. How odd to be able to speak to your enemy in his own language and still continue fighting. I suppose the truth was that the upper classes of all countries had more in common with each other than they did with the peasants of their own country. 

As often happens when reading a novel, I find myself wanting to shake the characters into a realisation and understanding of what a mess they are making of their lives. You can see little Natasha (I say little rather than young because she has barely got beyond playing with dolls when she is suddenly falling in love) about to make serious mistakes and mostly because silly Prince Andrei, who IS old enough to know better, went off and left her alone for a year. What a daft man! Setting himself up for heartbreak. 

At one point Tolstoy gets into a bit of national stereotyping about self-assuredness: 

"A Frenchman is self-assured because he considers himself personally, in mind as well as body, irresistible enchanting for men as well as women. An. Englishman is self-assured on the grounds that he is a citizen of the best-organised state in the world, and therefore, as an Englishman, he always knows that everything he does as an Englishman is unquestionably good. An Italian is self-assured because he is excitable and easily forgets himself and others. A Russian is self-assured because he does not know anything and does not want to know anything, because he does not believe it is possible to know anything fully. A German is self-assured worst of all, and most firmly of all, and most disgustingly of all, because he imagines he knows the truth, science, which he has invented himself, but which for him is the absolute truth." 

Priceless!!! I wonder if he would still think that England is the "best organised state in the world". 

He didn't mention Sweden in there. For most people the stereotype most representative of Sweden is, of course, IKEA, which I have just discovered has been around since 1943! Who'd have thought it. Anyway, here is a link to an odd set of pictures, artist. Ed Harrington's idea of what various monsters would look like if flat packed by IKEA. 

And, while we're talking of Russians, here's a link to some interesting photos of the Permafrost Kingdom of the Yakuts, Permafrost Kingdom is a tourist attraction set in a cave in Us-Kut, the homestead of the Atlasov family of Yakut people. Yakuts are Turkic people who mainly inhabit the Sakha Yakutia republic in Russia. 

When I first saw that last item, I read it as the Permafrost Kingdom of the Yakults. This surprised me somewhat as Yakult is a type of liquid yoghurt product that is supposed to be really good for you. I imagined a range of Yakult ice-cream. 

Not that it's ice-cream weather here. After my moans about the disappearance if the Indian summer, the sun came out again yesterday, albeit in rather a chilly fashion. Today began very dull but got brighter intermittently as the hours passed. 

Mornings are chilly. Autumn is practically here. I am determinedly donning lightweight running gear still, shorts and sleeveless vest-top, but if the mornings continue to be cold I will have to get out the cold weather gear. 

Not quite frost in the morning yet but I bet we'll have some soon.I have just heard ground-frost forecast for a few places in England tomorrow morning! Brrrr!!!!