lost in...

following a recent recommendation in The Times' Books section I downloaded David Bellos "Is That A Fish In Your Ear", about translation.  I found it quite fascinating.  I am not  a translator, though I worked as one (from Russian and Japanese to English) in my younger days, but I am interested in language, and anyone who is even remotely interested would find something of interest in this book.  Bellos  points out that to engage with all but a tiny fraction of people in the world, you definitely do not need to learn all of their first languages.  You need to know their vehicular languages, languages learned by non-native speakers for the purpose of communicating with  native speakers of a third tongue.  These languages are, in order of the number of speakers they have, Chinese, Hindi, Arabic, Spanish, Russian, Urdu, French, Japanese, and English.  At this point he refers to "the unfortunate but widespread idea that English is simpler than other languages".  I'll pick out some interesting snippets from this book, and paraphrase some of the rest of it, in the hope that others will read it and maybe comment and discuss.  I think these matters (especially translation and the role of English in it in the world) have not been sufficiently discussed.

The ancient Greeks thought all foreign languages sounded like "va-va-va" and so they called foreigners "varvaros", which became the word "barbarian".

"...the mother tongue that is supplanted by a learned language for higher-level activities remains only 'mother's tongue', used exclusively for interaction with the older generation".  This is precisely the situation of Alsatian, the regional language in this part of France (and across the Rhine in Germany, with variations).  When you ask someone if they speak that language they say no, but their granny does, and they sometimes speak it with her.

I have no time for Chomsky politically, but I did respect him as a linguist in former times.  His sentence "Colourless green ideas sleep furiously" was meant to show that a perfectly grammatical sentence can be meaningless - so students promptly began constructing scenarios in which that sentence had a meaning.  The author contends, further, that "no grammatical sentence, in any language, can be constructed such that it can never have a context of utterance in which it is meaningful."

"Thesaurus" means "treasure" in Greek.

The perils of online searching: in April 2010 a search for pages in English quoting "poetry is what is lost in translation" gave 15,100 results.  Almost all of them attributed the adage to Robert Frost.  But nobody has ever been able to find Frost saying anything like it in his works, letters, interviews or reported sayings.

Left dislocation (in French "moi, je veux une glace")occurs very frequently indeed in corpuses of language written originally in French, but quite rarely in translations into French of similar vintage.  This can be called a third code.  It occurs almost certainly because French grammars, and the teaching of French in francophone environments, characterise left dislocation as typical of spoken language.  So translators tend to "normalise" and write more "correctly", thus using less left dislocation than authors do.  With translation into English this work is more likely to be done by copy editors, and in both cases the author describes the task as taking the register and level of naturally written prose up a notch or two.

Recent figures, though they vary, show that in literary translation about 8 per cent of the work done in the world is into English, and that less than one per cent of all translations are into Chinese, although Chinese speakers are a quarter of the world's population.  English however is the medium as source or target of over 75 per cent of all translations, according to UNESCO.  Basically English is being translated out of and not into, and this trend is likely to expand.  Don't go into translation into English, there's no future in it.

This displays my ignorance, but I only recently discovered that Google Translate does not actually translate anything, but searches rapidly for examples of the word or phrase entered in parallel with the target language sought.  So largely it is searching existing translations.  I use Google Translate quite often at work, to check whether something already translated is fairly accurate.  But I know better than to seek a word or phrase in a language I do not know at all.  I use it to check translations into English or into one of the other languages of which I have a reasonable level of knowledge.  This book notes that English-language detective novels are quite likely to have been translated into Icelandic and other Scandinavian languages, and Harry Potter books into both Hebrew and Chinese.  It follows from this that these bodies of work have made a much greater contribution to the quality of Google and other computer translations than any of the great classics have.  The exception of course is the Bible.  The great classics are much more likely to have been translated by way of a pivot language such as English, French or German, rather than directly from say Hebrew into Farsi.

Literary translation into English is done by amateurs.  There is no money in it.  But in other countries there is.  Even in France people make money doing it, though they usually have a day job as well.  In Japan literary translators are celebrities (Motoyuki Shibata being the best known), and there are sections in bookshops devoted to their translations into Japanese.

Freud's complete works, written of course in German, have been translated only into English, Italian, Spanish and Japanese.  A number of words, such as "superego", "empathy" and "displacement" have come into English from the translation of Freud by James Strachey, which is still controversial - some say it is a betrayal of Freud's legacy - because Strachey treats Freud as a purely scientific writer.

Success in learning a foreign tongue comes at the moment when, at least in your head, you leave translation behind and begin to think in the original.  And so translation is routinely disparaged (I do this too) as no other field of endeavour is.

I thought this was interesting: "There is no form of language in the world that is ever spoken aloud without accompanying hand movements."  Interpreters gesticulate, even though nobody is supposed to be looking at them.  I remember, when I was interpreting from Japanese into English (and Japanese people are notoriously physically undemonstrative, even when drunk) how hard I worked to keep my hands from moving about while I was speaking.  As if it mattered.  Televison newsreaders don't move their hands, until they do the shuffle of papers or tap on the keyboard at the end that everyone waits for, because they are only pretending to talk to you, but are in fact reading words from a teleprompter.  A lecturer in a university who moves his hands is therefore ad-libbing, and one who is reading lecture notes aloud characteristically keeps his hands to his side or on the desk.  This also works the other way round.  Most people move their mouths when doing a complex or difficult tasks with their hands, such as threading a needle.

I was glad too to see the Great Eskimo Vocabulary Hoax exposed again.  It has been done many times, but the belief persists in too many quarters that Inuit people have 20, or 40, or 50 words for snow.  Even the great Kate Bush's new album is called "50 Words For Snow".  No, they don't.  Inuit languages are agglutinative and add suffixes and prefixes to the stem word, so it's as pointless to say an Inuit language has 20 words for snow as to say that Russian, which does its verbs in similar fashion, has 10 words for football, even though Russian has at least 10 ways of saying that someone is playing football.

A thoughtful book, and one with which I took issue a number of times, but readable.  If you translate, or if you edit, or if you ever read anything in translation, read this book.  It will help.  And if you persist in believing what you may have been told at school, that "a translation is a poor substitute for the original", then think again.  The original language and text of the Bible no longer exist, so it has to be read in translation.  Stieg Larsson has been read by millions more people than there are Swedish speakers alive on the planet.  Is this a bad thing?

a fine body of women

allegedly they are dressed in 1950s costumes.  I can just remember the late 1950s, and a lot of women dressed that way well into the 60s, and they were all better turned out than this.  Being well turned out was rather the point.

and Hartley heads for the hills

Afraid of the Greens in Park ward? I wouldn't be.

Tony's on spin cycle

Tony Jones (for it is he) informs us that erstwhile Tory group leader in Reading Cllr Andrew Cumpsty is standing down from the council next May as well as relinquishing the leadership. Tony claims to be aware of the identity of Cumpsty's successor, which he does not share with us, although he does, apropos of not very much, post positively about Cllr Tim Harris

http://jonesindep.blogspot.com/2011/11/richard-davies-one-to-watch-in.html

who is a councillor for the Tory increasingly-marginal Church ward and who is allegedly going to chicken-run north across the Thames. Well, possibly. But hang on. Why would he do that? He's not up for re-election and doesn't have to make that decision for at least a year. Tony also informs us that Tory councillor for Caversham Dave Luckett may stand down - also possibly true, but for which Tony offers no evidence - and that therefore one Richard Davies is lIkely to take Caversham for Labour. Mr Davies, whom I do not know, has not at the time of writing been selected as a candidate.

So, Tony, what is your game? Trying to run the agenda from your blog, are you? Well, I can sort of see your point. Over the past few years certain bloggers have been WAY more influential on the Reading political scene than most elected councillors have.

Tony reminds us at it is "not that long" since Caversham had Labour councillors. Depends what you call "not long". A few years, it is. And even then at least two of them were actively committed to securing Tory representation in Reading East. Bye, Ms Dysfunctional Kathryn Peak. Toodle-oo, Steve "never worked in his life" Waite.

Oh and Tony - cast your mind back those few years to when Caversham did still have a Labour councillor or two, and remember that you yourself were Mr Salter's favoured candidate for Reading East in 2005, nobly standing down in favour of Cllr Tony Page. So that went well then. (Sorry I spoiled your keynote speech opportunity by turning up at that Caversham curry house *tries to keep straight face*). Following which you were Martin Salter's favoured successor in Reading West. Until Mr S (of whom more later, bet you can't wait) thought maybe Reading West could be held after all and tried to un-stand down and get the dingbat Naz Sarkar deselected. Leaving poor Tone a'cold.

Never mind chaps, just try and keep the noise down a bit over there, won't you?

Best Blessings of Existence 24

In which Emma B treats of poor dead creatures - and those who survive.

She did not embrace her new role of deserted wife; that would have meant acceptance and she did not accept it.

The immediate task was survival.

After her initial visit to The Falcon, she closed the door and hunkered down as day became night became day; punctuated by a rattling letterbox at one end and the beam from a streetlight at the other.

Six days passed like this.

On the seventh, she showered; emptied ashtrays and opened windows before collecting the post from her doormat.

A world was outside.

She was not interested in it.

The items were various: a notice from The Department of Education and Science confirming the fact that she had passed her Probationary Year and was now a fully qualified teacher; a final demand gas bill (she put that to one side), and a postcard from Lynne. The latter was an especially garish depiction of a souk in Marrakesh with the comment: Wish you were here instead of me. S is unbearable, in Lynne’s elegant hand. Well, of course, if Lynne had been stupid enough to embark upon a package tour to Morocco with Sandra Milford, she must expect the consequences…

Stupid maybe --- but not as stupid as shacking up with someone who was virtually a stranger barely a month after meeting them; rejecting a highly prized PHD placement at York with foreign travel guaranteed – for the joys of a dead end job as a teacher; a gloomy part-furnished flat and marriage to a man with three children who treated her like something his cat had brought in when a mouse was unavailable………..

The telephone rang:

Hello – Paul here.

This was the first time he had called since decamping with a woman eighteen years her senior who favoured faux Jackie Kennedy sling-backed shoes and a French pleat up do.

If he assumed he could waltz back into her life and recline in the wheel-backed chair with a Jamieson’s, after disporting with someone who was nothing but a superannuated tart then he could think again….

He didn’t.

He wanted to arrange a time when she would be out to collect his books and records; he wouldn’t bother with the furniture – it was pretty tatty after all. Would Thursday at 2pm suit?

For a moment she wondered if she would ever, again, be capable of speech.

And then she remembered the gas bill.

It was a final demand and it was enormous. Could he please pay it?

Ah ha, he was coming to that!

Frances had made the very sensible suggestion that he should just contact all the utilities – and the telephone company -- and the landlord, of course, and transfer everything into her name. After all, he had moved out and wouldn’t be availing himself of anything. He’d thought he might pop round to see the landlord on Thursday …. Save her the bother! And now he really must dash -- sorry it hadn’t worked out; but then he had never wanted to remarry and better now than later, so to speak……….

There was nothing to do but cry.

Since Paul had left, she had been in a state of continual panic, neither eating nor sleeping and now she was ambushed by wracking sobs as she paced the lounge, leaving a trail of destruction in her wake.

The pleasure derived from mutilating the Cantos of Ezra Pound; Bartok’s String Quartet No 2; Art and Illusion by Gombrich and The Collected Works of Basil Bunting was ephemeral and did not answer the real question:

What was wrong with her?

Why had she been ditched after 13 months, when Philippa Truscott; Dorian Chase and even Betty Glenn had notched up a combined total of 36 years’ wedded bliss?

Well, perhaps not bliss exactly. Roy Truscott was a drunk; David was dull and the thought of a naked Chester Chase was frankly obscene – but at least they had stayed with their spouses. As had Donald, despite a wife whose raison d’être was not keeping up with the Joneses but annihilating them beneath the two inch heel of a sensible Clark’s court shoe ( double E fitting).

Frances Hunt was so old that her powder had settled into the fine furrows that ran from nose to mouth like the tracing on an iced cake. Was the pleasure of dining with Aiden Cleghorn really worth the pain of sexual relations with a grandmother?

The bell rang and she opened the door upon Percy bearing gifts.

He was holding white roses and swept a fedora hat from his head before walking into the room and sitting down in the wheel backed chair.

I think, he said, that I am going to take you to see the doctor.

The fact that she had existed for seven days in a foetid sty amidst torn books; smashed records; empty bottles and crumpled cigarette packets, without eating, sleeping or changing her clothes, rendered protest superfluous and she didn’t.

Two hours later, she returned with a small packet of tranquillisers; took two and slept for seven hours.

After that, things got better.

She was still hurt, angry and vengeful but at least those feelings were now directed outwards – at Paul and Frances Hunt – rather than inwards towards herself. The tranquillisers helped her to sleep – and after three nights she discovered that she could manage without them and threw away the packet.

Mistakes were made – such as the late night call to Nicola after a bottle of wine, when she pledged to continue visiting the children in Paul’s absence. Nicola was polite but bemused, and thirty years’ later, she still winced at the manner in which she had fawned over a woman whose marriage she had prized at the value of a discarded sweet wrapper.

Paul removed his books and she rearranged the lounge; stacking the makeshift shelves in the spare bedroom. Her father paid the gas bill, accompanying his largesse with an excoriating enunciation of all Paul’s faults and her own purblind stupidity. She inspected a few smaller rental properties – nothing suitable; but it was a start.

Shall I at least set my lands in order?

And she accepted a social invitation.

Following their marriage, the Kerridges had moved to a luxury apartment half way between Dorlich and Fernboughton.

This was a surprise; Lionel’s well appointed flat was ideally situated for his post at Dorlich University and everyone assumed that this would become the marital home.

However, Araminta insisted upon a new pad to go with my new man. It was the ideal opportunity for a display of fatherly munificence, and Major Bellwether obliged with the purchase of 39, Coverley Court; a ground floor apartment in a converted 18^th century mansion. It was situated at the heart of Oakshire; ten miles from the nearest village and the decorative grounds boasted an ornamental lake and well stocked orchards.

After a month’s absence, Mr and Mrs Kerridge announced themselves to be

At Home to chosen guests via white-wove board invitations with a silver bevel edge and charcoal grey ink.

She accepted Percy’s offer of a lift in the TR7.

Deciding what to wear had been tricky. It was not a black tie invitation, but such an address merited more effort than jeans. In any case, she had lost so much weight that had the wearing of jeans been de rigueur, hers would have resembled outsize oilskin waders.

After much thought, she unearthed a duck-egg blue suede skirt with a buckle belt. It was practically vintage, but a penchant for open sandwiches, lager and lime and cheesecake in her student days had rendered it off limits since her first term as an undergraduate.

Now it looked decidedly on trend when teamed with a slim-fitting black lace shirt and patent heels - proving that the desertion diet beat Scarsdale hands down – and cost absolutely nothing except grief, misery and humiliation.

Percy arrived and surpassed expectations in a grey hounds ooth double breasted suit complete with black and white spats, boater and carnation. He had packed six bottles of Bourgogne Aligote (Best Man’s present) in the boot and they set off at top speed.

Coverley Court was an impressive address by anyone’s standards and as they purred up the gravelled drive, she felt sure that even Araminta’s social ambitions could not fail to be satisfied. The lush grounds and understated elegance of Pemberley came to mind:

I expect you feel like Elizabeth Bennet, she remarked, as Araminta ushered them, via an enormous drawing room, to a terrace leading on from the splendid oak French windows. About twenty people were already in situ, enjoying appropriate refreshment. The woodland vista; cultivated shrubs, trees and an ornamental lake with a splashing water cascade, was so charming that she initially failed to register Araminta’s surly rejoinder

Who’s she? or the fact that the hostess, now tripping back into the apartment – had seemed less than sanguine. Lionel, who joined them, seemed to be rivalling her own weight loss and had developed a sort of behavioural tic; craning his head in the direction of the drawing room and addressing the tops of his guests’ heads instead of their faces.

Percy presented the wine:

Hope you’ll accept this old chap; meant to wet the bride’s head but better late than never!

Has she seen it?

said Lionel, eyes trained towards the drawing room.

Seen what?

Percy was genuinely bemused.

The wine. Because if she hasn’t, can you please take it back to the car? I’m trying to keep her off it you see.

The difficult of keeping the hostess off the wine at her own drinks party must have struck even the commentator. Lionel elaborated.

I’m trying to contain it. I thought if we had it here, there would be some measure of control but even here ( voice breaking ) - even HERE , she is AT IT; she’s brought those vile animals from Bunters and The Falcon and they’re here ALL THE TIME and I can’t read or work or BREATHE and sometimes I think Garfield Proudie had the right idea!

A cursory glance at the guests revealed a notable absence (with the exception of Romaine Hince and Lester Frogatt), of anyone remotely connected with academia.

It was an uncomfortable assemblage of all the hardened drinkers on the margins of Dorlich respectability; the type of people who would make Philippa Truscott seem like Mother Theresa.

Its all day every day, hissed Lionel. The honeymoon was bad enough. The fact that MY WIFE appreciated the hotel wine waiter more than the mosaics at the Cathedral of Santa Maria Assunta should have told me SOMETHING - but since we’ve been back it’s been like living in the Inferno! I thought that we’d have a chance to GROW as a couple – its ten miles to the nearest pub – but she’s simply brought them all here – and there’s this horrible big television and they watch something called TISWAS and sing THE BUCKET OF WATER SONG……………….

AND I WISH I WAS DEAD!

It was difficult to know what to say to this; and completely impossible to request a glass of wine in the circumstances. She looked at the ornamental lake.

It’s the STYX!!!

said Lionel, appropriating the wine.

If the coast’s clear, we can take it to the car without her noticing……….

She looked at Percy and they decided that there was nothing for it but to follow their host, via the French windows, to the drawing room and thence the entrance – hoping to appropriate a drink en route. On closer inspection, the décor of the drawing room was peculiar; Lionel’s tasteful dark wood tables, chairs and draped burgundy velvet floor length curtains were offset by an enormous television encased in a vulgar Spanish-style mock–wood cabinet with a maple grain finish. Four youngish men wearing jeans with a distinctly rakish aspect were sitting in front of it as if at a shrine, flicking through the channels with a remote control. At this point, Araminta swept into view from the adjoining open plan kitchen.

Her face was puffy; her jade satin cocktail dress and sequinned stilettos had seen better days, but her eyesight was in perfectly good order. She demanded to inspect the contents of the bag.

Aligote – oh you are such a DARLING!!! (kissing Percy full on the lips). Now run off to the kitchen LILO and get the opener! We’ve got so much to catch up on!

Araminta was clearly more than a little the worse for wear – but was still in the euphoric stage of intoxication. It would have been perfectly possible to distract her with a glass of something cheap and cheerful from the kitchen, whilst secreting the Aligote in the car boot – but maybe the public airing of a ridiculous nickname was a humiliation too far for Lionel. He snatched the remote control from the television - watching party; appropriated the carrier bag and addressed his wife.

I’m sorry, Araminta – but you are quite clearly extremely drunk; Percy’s expensive present would be wasted on you and there is Methylated Spirit in the cupboard. If you want that – then you’re quite welcome. And (pointing to the television watchers) Get these louts OUT OF HERE!

If Araminta was euphoric before, she was vituperative now and only Percy’s prompt action prevented her seizing, and in all probability, dropping, the bag with a consequent breakage of glass and spillage of wine. She rounded upon Lionel with a vengeance.

He was a loser; useless in the sack; a miserable miser who had married her for her money; was keeping her prisoner in this Godforsaken DUMP; she hated all his geriatric friends; and she wished he’d go and top himself like that OLD QUEEN PROUDIE. On second thoughts, what was her life worth? Answer, NOTHING!!!

And she ran into the kitchen; emerged brandishing a Sabatier carving knife, last seen as part of a wedding present boxed set – and locked herself in the bathroom.

There was an embarrassed silence, during which time Romaine Hince and Lester Frogatt had joined them in the drawing room and the television-watching party had left it. Lionel announced that marriage to Araminta had wrecked his health, sanity and if it continued, a career ( for which he had sacrificed the normal pleasures of a healthy male), would be as toast. He would therefore be most grateful for a lift back to Dorlich (looking at Percy).

Fortuitously, he had kept his old apartment (indeed, it still contained most of his books) and could move straight back. He would arrange for everything else to be collected later – and – no time like the present – why didn’t they just make a move now?

Percy cleared his throat.

Well, he was very sad to hear all this; very sad indeed – and such a lovely apartment too – quite delightful…….. And, of course, it was certainly possible to stump up with a lift – the TR7 was a tourer with four seats after all, but wasn’t Lionel forgetting something fairly crucial?

Araminta was in the bathroom with a carving knife.

Pause.

Lester Frogatt, a reticent PHD student, specialising in the lais of Marie de France, volunteered to investigate.

A preliminary tap on the bathroom door elicited no response; neither did another – or subsequent bangs and kicks. There was a frosted bathroom window visible from the exterior; it was a ground floor apartment and the logical thing was for Lester to take a peek from the outside – which he did.

It was hard to see anything; very fuzzy really – but he could certainly see a kind of lump in the region of the bath. Although what it was, he really couldn’t say……….

There was nothing for it but to break the door down.

On the drive back to Dorlich – minus Lionel – she discussed the Kerridge

At Home with Percy.

Firstly there had been very little of ‘home’ about it; both Lionel and Araminta from their different perspectives, seemed to detest in equal measure, one of the most delightful residences she had ever seen.

It was completely was wasted upon this ill-matched couple and Lionel for one, had determined to vacate the premises as soon as possible.

At the third heave, Percy had conquered the bathroom lock and the door had given wa, to reveal Araminta lying on her back on the linoleum.

Her legs resembled the stiff twin compasses of John Donne’s A Valediction Forbidding Mourning; she was cradling the Sabatier knife like a nursing mother and not crooning but snoring. She had not cut herself or anything else.

Having ascertained that his wife was drunk rather than dead, Lionel repeated his request for a lift back to Dorlich – to no avail. Percy was adamant:

I say, Lionel – I’ve only just officiated at your wedding! I’ve no idea what’s gone on between you and your good lady, but I am not going to arrive as your guest with your marriage intact and then spirit away the groom leaving a damsel in distress! It was my fault – I shouldn’t have tempted her with the wine – like Eve and the apple!! Early to bed – early to rise and tomorrow’s a new day!

And that, despite Lionel’s anguished pleas, had been that.

The fact that Lionel Kerridge had married Araminta Bellwether in the first instance was the stuff of a rather poor Whitehall Farce, minus Brian Rix, with or without trousers, but the news about Mr Proudie was a tragedy indeed.

This kind, elderly scholar, who had taught palaeography to her MA group, had recently committed suicide by plunging to his death from the top of Persimann’s Folly – a medieval tower house on the edge of the university complex.

He had been a courteous, witty man who had lived for many years with his aged mother until her death after a long battle with Parkinson’s disease the previous summer. Despite Araminta’s cruel jibe, she hhad ad no idea about Garfield Proudie’s sexuality and cared less.

The important fact was that he would be remembered by generations of Dorlich students for his brilliant commentary on the Gawain poet; his lively rendition of the Robin Hood ballads and most of all, his enjoyable tours of medieval Dorlich, always concluding with a lavish repast in Lucy’s Tea Room, with extra cream for the ladies.

Do you know, said Percy, as he dropped her off at Conyham Crescent after what had been, to say the least, an eventful outing: You haven’t mentioned Paul once.

It was true; she hadn’t.

There is a world elsewhere, she decided on her return to life as a woman without a man.

Perhaps she had begun to find it.

let's hear it for...

Cllr Hartley, who has been kind enough to send me the following email:

Dear Resident
 
I'm writing to remind you that the Council is hosting the Working Better with You community event at the Town Hall on the 24th November at 5.30pm. We would like as many residents to come along and hear the views the programme has gathered so far as well as helping to develop ways that the Council and its staff and members can work better with you in the future.
 
Attached is a copy of the original invite, but if you would like to attend and have yet to register please contact us using the following link On-line booking form, by calling us on 0118 937 2098 or email us at communications@reading.gov.uk.
 
Yours sincerely,

 
Jon Hartley
Lead Councillor, Service Delivery and Improvement
 

Sorry Jon, I'm having a bikini wax that day.

cholera and polio

In the past I have occasionally been asked who my heroes are. I have usually mentioned in this context Dr. John Snow. He it was, I have said, who persuaded the authorities of the time to remove the pump handle of the Broad Street well in Soho, London, thus bringing to an end the cholera epidemic of 1854 and convincing the authorities of the time that the cholera bacterium lives in water contaminated with fecal matter. Well, it wasn't quite like that. But it was because of Snow's work, though not only his, that there have only very rarely been cholera outbreaks in England since 1854. I recommend a book called "Ghost Map" by Steven Johnson, which tells this story. He tells it as an adventure, and that is what it is. Epidemics happen, and people die. But often the cause is not known. Why do some people die and not others? Why did those who worked in the sewers of London, in close contact with fecal matter every day, usually live to healthy old ages? Can one person, by their actions or their simple presence in a place and at a time, be responsible for an outbreak and for the deaths of people? If so, and if they know it, what does that do to them? A very interesting theme of this book was that "everyone" knew at the time what caused epidemics. Bad air, bad smells, bad living conditions. Well, no, actually. And I wondered while reading, what today does "everyone" know, which someone with the vision of Dr Snow will one day make us see is wrong beyond imagining, and that people have died as a result of our wrong imaginings?

I first found out about Dr Snow when my children were at the excellent E.P. Collier primary school in Reading, and they studied public health and water supply. No such important or imaginative things were on the curriculum when I was going to school. "Ghost Map" is a fast-moving read, though there were times I had to stop reading while I was eating (description of cholera symptoms, anyone?), and highly thought-provoking. We don't eat or drink things that smell bad. People used the Broad Street well because the water tasted good. Cholera bacteria don't have a taste.

Go to Soho now and you will find that Broad Street no longer exists. Where it was, approximately, is a street called Broadwick. All but one of the buildings which housed the crowded population of Soho in the mid-19th century are no more. This has a lot more to do with the Luftwaffe than with cholera. However, the pub on the corner still stands (brewery and pub workers by and large did not get cholera, because they drank beer and not water). It has a new name. The John Snow. Next time I am in London I shall go and have a drink there and raise a glass to Dr. Snow's memory.

Totally by coincidence, the next book of the collection of e-books (Kindle for iPad, vg) I had bought and downloaded to read while travelling in Australia this month was the latest Philip Roth, "Nemesis". It is about another epidemic, of polio in 1940s Newark, New Jersey, and what that epidemic does to the individuals it touches. The themes are the same. I found the Roth shocking. A story of a young man, with hopes and dreams, things are looking good for him. And then... All through the book I was waiting for the next thing to happen, the next episode in the story of Bucky (a real jock name that, not a nerdy Jewish boy's name) Cantor, and what polio does to his Jewish neighbourhood. One reviewer of this book said Roth's humour in later life (he is 77) is black bile where it has been choler. Yes. Black, dark, and utterly compelling.

I was born in 1954, the first year that universal polio vaccination was available to babies in the UK. I was vaccinated, although my mother wondered briefly whether injecting polio into a baby was a good idea. People I knew as I grew up, only a few years older than me, had often had polio, or been affected by it in some way. Part of the reason I did not learn to swim until I was 11 was a generalised fear in working-class communities of "catching polio" from public swimming pools. Ignorance. Which now manifests itself in fear of mobile-phone masts, in belief in the nonsense that the MMR vaccine causes autism, and in homeopathy. Among other things.

Because we know we are right. Don't we?