I just finished reading Cold Mountain, by Charles Frazier. I hadn't read it as soon as it was handed to me, probably more than a year ago, because I wasn't in the mood to wallow in the Civil War era.
The more I think about the Civil War the more I think all uniforms and regalia should be burned as relics of an entirely shameful chapter in our history. How do you celebrate the supposed heroes without taking a side? If the heroes were heroes regardless of side, their deaths were a double waste. How is it wonderful that anyone died valiantly for a mistake? Choose for yourself which side might have been mistaken, the fact remains that one side won, one side lost and many bloody acts were committed in the process.
I saw the movie on DVD. While it wasn't one I'd see twice, it had some great bits, like when Renee Zellwegger said, "They call this war a cloud on the land, but they made the weather, and then they stand out in the rain and say 'shit! It's rainin'!'"
The book just took a lot longer to make the same points the movie did. I didn't feel as ripped off as I do after reading just about anything by Larry McMurtry, but I did feel that I could have spent my time better elsewhere. But I did want to see how book and movie compared. Now I know. And there would have been no film without the book. So it wasn't a total waste. It does not cast either side of the Civil War in a very positive light. That in itself is worth a lot.
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