Word: muldoonism
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...Muldoon, the narrator, is a grad student at Harvard, worried by the prospect of an affair with a woman he labels "Norma the Nice"--she (surprise, surprise) turns out to be not quite so nice after all. He confesses...
Norma, his fantasy object, affects the accent of the Viennese doctor in Lugosi's Dracula as she discusses the "inner cheese of life." Just as self-consciousness leads Norma to make a joke out of the "energies of life," this whole book concerns Muldoon's discovery that the voice often masks the subject; action similarly disguises reality. Muldoon is aware that "unseen and mysterious forces" propel him. He recognizes that the Light--wisdom or maybe just balance--drawing him beyond the everyday world is as inevitable as the lure of the apple to Adam...
Despite the author's attempts to define degrees of normality, there is no fixed moral code to which Muldoon can adhere. That, of course, is the quintessential dilemma of the thoughtful. What saves this book from the pseudo-philosophical platitudes such a theme might have spawned, however, is Alonzo's sense of the humorous and the bizarre, even in the midst of deadly sincerity. There may be moments when he speculates with great profundity and great tedium about every slimydeep secret in Muldoon's self-absorbed soul. Yet there is something appealing about a man who defines his condition thus...
...atmosphere of caution and even retrenchment among the delegates from the industrial countries was understandable. The conference, lamented New Zealand's Prime Minister Robert Muldoon (who also serves as Finance Minister), was plainly "overshadowed by events." They included the political uncertainties in the U.S., Japan and West Germany, Britain's request for a $3.9 billion IMF loan to prop up its suffering pound sterling, and the growing probability of another price increase by the oil-exporting countries this winter...
...power, Muldoon's National Party will probably try to dampen inflation and reduce the $970 million balance of payments deficit by imposing import restrictions and reducing or eliminating subsidies aimed at protecting consumers from rising transport, postal and electricity costs. Promising "a year of belt tightening," Muldoon could be in for rough times with organized labor...