Word: merchanting
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1980-1989
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...perils of materialism has ever been available to out-of-towners. For from that unpromising situation emerges a romantic comedy that is as salty and bracing as a plunge in the surf. Whenever Daryl Hannah, as the sweetly shallow creature from the deep, and Tom Hanks, as the produce merchant who loves her, start to get goopy, there is a New York City street person available to assert the reality principle: Eugene Levy, splendid as a mad scientist who seems to have wandered in from a Jaws sequel, or John Candy, fine as a man who thinks Penthouse centerfolds...
...classes," said President Seyed Ali Khamene'i, 44, last summer, "and let big landlords, big factory owners and the wealthy seethe in discontent." Opposing them are the ultrarightist clerics who insist that the Koran unequivocally condemns such socialistic practices. The Prophet Muhammad, they point out, was once a merchant, who said, "The merchant is among God's favorites." The leftists were rebuffed 16 months ago when the social reform bills they proposed were vetoed by the Guardian Council. But last summer they made up some ground by edging out of power the Ministers of Labor and Commerce...
...does not make the descent into economic obsolescence gracefully. Faced with the ignominy of pleading for jobs at a string of recession-time construction sites, he is left with no alternatives but to work as a night-watchman, or to accept a job with his brother, a small-time merchant, benevolent and argyle-sweatered, still hoping that there are fortunes to be made in "surplus" Harry cannot resign himself to either task, particularly since he, and the audience, have little doubt that he is facing his last months...
...generally depressing as things tend to move from bad to worse for all the characters. The only success story we come across is that of a crippled black man who makes it as a car thief. The minor characters--Benson's spacy yet sympathetic bride, her phrenologist-pet merchant mother, and Harry's brother--are well-portrayed, each contributing convincingly to the tapestry of Middle America fallen on hard times. Scenery of construction sites, factories and dreary Florida suburbs add to the general air of hopelessness...
...whole relationship between writing and reading in these prerevolutionary years was undergoing significant changes that reached beyond politics. Darnton endeavors to demonstrate the change from the letters that a young merchant in La Rochelle wrote to the bookseller who regularly sent him the new works of Jean-Jacques Rousseau. In Darnton's view, Rousseau's preachings first established "the author as Prometheus" and his readers as emotional disciples. Darnton also finds rich social implications in folk tales like "Little Red Riding Hood...