British superheroes

I recently finished The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (a volume comprising the first 13 short stories) and it occurred to me that Holmes is very much an early superhero. He has immense powers of deduction and disguise, often baffling even the best police detectives (whom he frequently refers to as ‘imbeciles’) and uses those powers only to further the common good and not for his own personal profit. He also shows another superhero trait, that of recognizing the value of all human beings, even wrongdoers, often finding a way to secure their escape rather than face the corrupt justice system. But Holmes makes a big deal out of his powers being no more than any person could do with the right application of brainpower. He and Watson frequently point out...

Posted by on Jun 21, 2011 in Thoughts | 0 comments

I’m not stupid, but: what’s the difference between envy and jealousy?

I thought since I’m known the world over as a pedantic git and someone who has an unrelenting desire to share crateloads of useless knowledge with everyone he meets, I’d start this series on my blog that I call I’m not stupid, but… In this series I try to explain those things that I’ve encountered that are very simple to understand but for some reason it took me some years to grasp, perhaps because no one bothered to teach me about them, in school or otherwise. I’ll start with one of my favourites, because once you know this, you’ll see the mistake everywhere and (if you’re like me) constantly have to fight the urge to correct people. I’ve noticed, also, that many novels contain passages that highlight this...

Posted by on May 10, 2011 in I'm not stupid but | 0 comments