The Lost One - brief book review

I have just finished the second of a number of books I received for Christmas. The Lost One, A Life of Peter Lorre by Stephen D. Youngkin (University Press of Kentucky). As biographies go this is fairly typical, being a chronological account of Lorre's life pretty much from birth to death. It is quite thorough and about as detailed as such works are, perhaps a bit more detailed than most. The author clearly spent a great deal of time and effort reviewing the professional career of Lorre and interviewing a great many people who knew and worked with him. As one might have surmised Peter Lorre was far more complicated than the image most of us have of him. He was not at all like the murderous stereotyped character he was forced to play by the media and the film industry. In addition to being an exceedingly accomplished if mostly unappreciated actor, he was also an intellectual, a practical joker, and a man blessed with a marvelous sense of humor. Addicted to morphine from a relatively early age he struggled with the problem all his life, and while it did not keep him from pursuing an unusually active and busy career it did at times force him into hospitals and sanitariums for "cures." Although he took eagerly to the Southern California lifestyle and Hollywood he was well aware of the shallowness and pretensioness of the industry. He worked for the money which he seemed unable to hang on to for long and, of course, died broke. I think what I came away with is the appreciation that he was a remarkably fine and talented human being who was much abused by the "business." Driven out of Germany and away from his friend and mentor, Bertolt Brecht, I'm sure he wished it had not been so. This is a fine biography and if you have any interest in such things I recommend it. Even the finest biographies regretfully can tell us only the high and low spots of someone's life, much like trying to comprehend a human body from a mere fingerprint. You must appreciate what you are given.

The small California coastal town of Arcada passed a resolution calling for the impeachment or resignations of Bush/Cheney. See, there really are some intelligent and responsible people. Too bad they seem to be so few. But things are, at last, looking up a bit. DeLay is finished as a leader and quite likely even as a Congressman. Cunningham apparently wore a "wire" which will no doubt help implicate others in this ongoing Republican scandal (don't buy into the claim that it was bipartisan, it was overwhelmingly Republican). And don't believe even for a moment that what Bush did was legal. Keep the pressure on until they all end up in jail where they rightfully belong.