Word: ancient
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...flags don't fly very often these days. Except for St. Patrick's Day, when the Ancient Order of Hibernians rolls a couple of veterans of the Rebellion out of mothballs and everyone cheers at the tattered signs that read "England Get Out of Ireland," the glamor and the electricity have long since gone out of being Irish. Oh, there are still a pack of third-generation, boring middle-class accountant-types who think the best tribute to ethnic purity is to sneak money overseas so the IRA can continue its "glorious struggle." But blowing up orphanages and hospitals somehow...
...sweet scent of flowers reaching their boats inspired ancient Romans and Greeks to call them "the Fortunate Islands." The refreshingly mild and breezy climate was praised by more modern travelers as "perpetual spring." But early natives of the Canary Islands,*70 miles off the northwest coast of Africa, knew better. They chose the name Pico de Teide (Peak of Hell) for the 12,200-ft. volcanic mountain that looms broodingly over Tenerife, largest of the seven major islands: the natives thought the devil lurked inside it. Last week Tenerife was about as hellish as any place on earth...
...ancient Platonic tradition of the philosopher-king, a would-be American ruler read his poetic works yesterday to a small crowd of Harvard students in the Leverett Junior Common Room...
...Drury still made a great effort to hammer out a respectable book. A God Against the Gods is the product of years of meticulous research, as the impressive bibliography at the end of the volume attests. From an intellectual standpoint, the book offers fascinating insight into the details of ancient Egyptian customs and the intricacies of dynastic politics, which the author has adapted deftly to his main theme. And Drury has clearly not lost his old gift for sustained narrative that salvaged some of his previous works. An accomplished literary craftsman if nothing else, he has skillfully worked this great...
...unbelievable--it is merely difficult to understand why Drury would ever have bothered to resurrect this hedonistic, simple-minded Pharaoh and his sycophantic friends. The dialogue, moreover, could only have been overheard coming from inside a dusty sarcophagus. Like the stiff-jointed and forbidding statuary that is ancient Egypt's gift to the world's wealthier art collectors, Drury's characters never bend or smile--they simply stare straight ahead at the endless desert of a plot the author has created for them...