Word: whir
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...sadder than the end of the Nixon era (marked by tears and the whir of an airplane), the Reagan era (no more jellybeans in the White House) or the Bush era (no more incomprehensible press conferences...
...mold all this diverse material into a single book. He renders, as tellingly as ever, the magic of individual moments. A movie begins in a small theater: "The heavy purple curtains drew back and the orange side lamps dimmed and in the air above their heads, with a racheted whir, a shuddering shaft of light surprised a few winged bugs, suddenly turned into darting, looping stars." But to fill up the long stretches between inspirations, Updike relies on recitations of headlines and on reams of relatively undigested research: how to grow and pick asparagus, how to operate a suppository-making...
While many of their friends hang out at a bar on a Saturday night, many said they are frequently stuck in some office in some town in New Hampshire planning next week's schedule, while overhearing the constant whir of the nearby fax machine...
...which look annoying awkward in the play's early 20th century setting. But the more Ward dangles and sways it, the more interesting it becomes. As the trail of the light bulb moves back and forth like a pendulum, it induces a trance which is bolstered by the constant whir of music...
...years later, the 20-year-old Jones, who goes by the name Nas, is breaking through as a rapper. His debut album, Illmatic, captures the ailing community he was raised in -- the random gunplay, the whir of police helicopters, the homeboys hanging out on the corner sipping bottles of Hennessy. Despite the harsh subject matter, most of the songs are leisurely paced, with amiable melodies. One track uses part of Michael Jackson's Human Nature as its basic tune. Nas' rapping is dispassionate -- like an anchorman relaying the day's grim news -- but his lyrics sometimes reveal submerged emotion...