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HIBBS, THE CUB WITH NO CLUE!
HIBBS, THE CUB WITH NO CLUE!
Denise Covey has her WEP prompt this month as TAKING CHANCES.
My entry is from my WIP
Set in 1895 Egypt,
starring my undead hero, Samuel McCord
The snippet is entitled ...
PARIS ALONG THE NILE
- Wallace Stevens
Both Susy and Clara Clemens became little girls again as they gasped and
pointed at the ornate buildings we soon passed on our way to the State
Ball. I wonder what their perspectives,
their take on the world allowed them to see.
I saw … many things.
Cairo was a battleground. First
fought over by the French, now ruled pompously by the British. It was even a retreat for former officers of
the American Confederacy.
The
Cairo Susy and Clara wondered at was the city that Khedive Ismail built, with
the help of his master builder and Minister of Public Works, Ali Mubarak … with
the European money that would eventually steal the common Egyptian's freedom
and give it to the great banking empires of the west.
The city’s buildings were
built during this time when ruthless European powers vied for Egypt and won her from her people, but
in the course of things, a grand city was laid out.
So
while Susy and Clara saw a city of magic, I saw a city of foreign occupation,
heartbreak, and harsh living for most of its peoples. Stuffshirts like Lord Cromer thought he knew
the Egyptian people.
He only knew his prejudices. He imposed them on the people here when he should have been deriving facts from them. Life was induction not living out your prejudices on people too weak to fight back.
He only knew his prejudices. He imposed them on the people here when he should have been deriving facts from them. Life was induction not living out your prejudices on people too weak to fight back.
The
people: merchant, farmer, beggar, child – they all lived in fear and
anxiety. If they offended the wrong
tourist, failed to get out of the way in time, not have the increased taxes, birthed
a beautiful daughter that those in power coveted, they were in danger of losing
what little they had, including their lives.
A lifetime of that kind of worry gnawed at their hearts, their sense of who they were.
A lifetime of that kind of worry gnawed at their hearts, their sense of who they were.
It
bred a seething anger – an anger they could not vent on the British who fueled
it. And the only thing they could do
with all that anger was to vent it out on one another … usually over trivial
things … because something had to
matter in their lives.
If
their lives were so impoverished that there were no things which were
important, then things had to be assigned importance arbitrarily and defended
at great risk. Because the risk validated the importance.
Something, someone had to be important in their thread-bare lives – even if they had to blindly latch onto that something, that someone blindly and hopelessly.
Beside me, Meilori sighed, “Did ever any kingdom or state regain its liberty, when once it was invaded, without bloodshed? I cannot think of it without horror.”
Something, someone had to be important in their thread-bare lives – even if they had to blindly latch onto that something, that someone blindly and hopelessly.
Beside me, Meilori sighed, “Did ever any kingdom or state regain its liberty, when once it was invaded, without bloodshed? I cannot think of it without horror.”
