Word: flesh
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Earth and air are the two unvarying components in any basketball game -- which is to say, flesh and spirit. No-look passes and jump shots are the feathers of the game; offensive rebounds and blocking out are the hard muscle underneath...
...championship series is, of course, more than just a clash of titans. Barkley, for example, is attended by his equally spherical protege, Oliver Miller, an eager rookie who might have been deemed too fat for the league before Barkley redefined the limits of flesh; Jordan's constant partner is the silken Scottie Pippen, who might have been regarded as one of the kings of the game were he not in the company of royalty. The Suns' coach, Paul Westphal, is a serious, articulate Christian, a poster boy for Sun Belt conservatism; his opposite number on the Bulls, Phil Jackson...
There is a rich vein of misogyny, or at the very least, a virulent strain of anti-feminism running through this novel. Margaret, at age 28, agonizes about her husband's purported infidelity moaning that "he has forsaken my aging flesh for-for what? To lose him to some exquisite little girl with long hair flicking like a horse's mane, a student drawn to him and he to her, intoxicated with the wine dark words of Walt Whitman, yes, okay, that's as it should be." Since when does turning 30 signal the onset of senescence? Admittedly, there...
...another woman, and her two children in a mysterious house fire. She then flees into the Outback, where she attempts to erase her identity and, with it, her memories of humiliation and tragedy. As Thomas Keneally paints it, the landscape is almost biblical: an antipodean Sinai, where the flesh is challenged and the spirit purified...
...just confirmed his power in the eyes of his flock. And for anyone who thought it odd that a holy man lived out a teenage boy's sexual fantasy, Koresh had a mangled theological rationale. He was Jesus Christ in sinful form, who because he indulged the flesh could judge mankind with insights that the first, more virtuous Messiah had lacked. Or as he put it in one of his harangues to the faithful: "Now what better sinner can know a sinner than a godly sinner...