Word: ritualized
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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Early in to Siberia, a new novel by Per Petterson (Graywolf Press; 245 pages), the narrator and her older brother cut their hands and mix their blood. It's a familiar childhood ritual, sweetened by naive redundancy: How much closer than siblings can you be? The bond between this sister and brother turns out to be a love story--pure, but as painful as the touch of steel to skin...
It’s Friday night and you forgo the usual ritual of tequila shots, awkward dancing to the latest T.I. song, and waking up the next morning (aka 3 p.m.) with painful aches and even more painful recollections for a mellow night of takeout from the Kong and numerous episodes of Gossip Girl. After getting your feet toasty warm by the fireplace (aka the stack of Moo Shu chicken on the floor) and cheering for Team Serena, you hear a drunken rendition of “Living on a Prayer” that would make even William Hung cringe...
...Despite my trepidation, it turns out that the only ritual required in requesting an audience with the hermit is a knock on the door. Father Dario emerges from his quarters wearing a black cowl and a warm smile. He explains that although he has many visitors - some of whom wake him in the middle of the night, or use his pencils to graffiti their names on the walls of his cell - all are welcome. It is the duty of Christian hermits, he explained, to serve both God and humanity through prayer and penitence, and that apparently includes suffering fools gladly...
...steps of Pusey Library, devotees attempt the impossible task of coaxing tape into adhering to damp stone. Magicians are called in with new tapes and new methods. Sometimes their efforts work; the dominant clans earn prominent viewing space. Other times the ritual is a complete failure, and magnificent banners of taped-together posters billow out into the wind before skittering, tumbleweed-like, across the pavement...
...audience members who happen to share the Klansmen's views. Some examples of those views: Obama's election "could be the destruction of America," says Greene, who states categorically that he would not vote for a black candidate. Says the Emperor of the Mississippi White Knights (the group's ritual leader), who asked not to be identified: "Locally, every place that has come under black rule has declined, and has declined sharply." He cited Jackson, Miss., and Washington, D.C., as examples. "Not all black people are particularly bad people," the emperor adds. But leadership, he asserts, "is just...