Sherry Chandler

I’ve been intending to let you all know that my husband, the wood carver T R Williams, now has a portfolio listing on the Southern Artistry register.

Southern Artistry is “a multidisciplinary showcase of outstanding southern artists” from nine southeastern states.

I’m very proud of this achievement. Other Kentucky artists listed include Jonathan Greene, Gwen Heffner, Leatha Kendrick, Pale, Stout and Amber, Arturo Alonzo Sandoval, Rebekka Seigel, Joe Survant, and Jim Tomlinson. And these just among the ones whose work I know.

I’ve hesitated to mention this because T R’s portfolio is just sort of a placeholder at the moment. It needs some work. And also because, for some glitchy reason, he isn’t yet showing up in the search engine on the site.

But I really am very proud of him and so I’ve decided to go ahead and brag on him a little bit.

From A Farewell to Arms (Scribner’s, 1929):

“Were you there, Tenente, when they wouldn’t attack and they shot every tenth man?”

“No.”

“It is true. They lined them up afterward and took every tenth man. Carabinieri shot them.”

“Carabinieri,” said Passini and spat on the floor. “But those grenadiers, all over six feet. They wouldn’t attack.”

“If everybody would not attack the war would be over,” Manera said.

…

“One of those shot by the carabinieri is from my town,” Passini said. “He was a big smart tall boy to be in the granatieri. Always in Rome. Always with the girls. Always with the carabinieri.” He laughed. “Now they have a guard outside his house with a bayonet and nobody can come to see his mother and father and sisters and his father loses his civil rights and cannot even vote. They are all without law to protect them. Anybody can take their property.”

“If it wasn’t that that happens to their families nobody would go to the attack.”

…

“I believe we should get the war over,” I said. “It would not finish it if one side stopped fighting. It would only be worse if we stopped fighting.”

“It could not be worse,” Passini said respectfully. “There is nothing worse than war.”

“Defeat is worse.”

“I do not believe it,” Passini said still respectfully. “What is defeat? You go home.”

“They come after you. They take your home. They take your sisters.”

“I don’t believe it,” Passini said. “They can’t do that to everybody. Let everybody defend his home. Let them keep their sisters in the house.”

“They hang you. They come and make you a soldier again. Not in the auto-ambulance, in the infantry.”

“They can’t hang everyone.”

…

“I think you do not know anything about being conquered and so you think it is not bad.”

“Tenente,” Passini said. “We understand you let us talk. Listen. There is nothing as bad as war. We in the auto-ambulance cannot realize at all how bad it is. When people realize how bad it is they cannot do anything to stop it because they go crazy. There are some people who never realize. There are people who are afraid of their officers. It is with them the war is made.”

“I know it is bad but we must finish it.”

“It doesn’t finish. There is no finish to a war.”

“Yes there is.”

Passini shook his head.

“War is not won by victory. What if we take San Gabriele? What if we take the Carso and Monfalcone and Trieste? Where are we then? Did you see all the far mountains today? Do you think we could take all them too? Only if the Austrians stop fighting. One side must stop fighting. Why don’t we stop fighting? If they come down into Italy they will get tired and go away. They have their own country. But no, instead there is a war.”

“You’re an orator.”

“We think. We read. We are not peasants. We are mechanics. But even the peasants know better than to believe in a war. Everybody hates this war.”

“There is a class that controls a country that is stupid and does not realize anything and never can. That is why we have this war.”

“Also they make money out of it.”

“Most of them don’t,” said Passini. “They are too stupid. They do it for nothing. For stupidity.”