Vox Meditantis

Holt

Published by

Bob Lynn

on

| Reading time:

1–2 minutes
Holt

What’s the most annoying trope in books or movies?

“Five dollars. One loop. One dead friend from Winnipeg.”

Georgia, September 1925. A bearded, foul-mouthed barnstorming pilot stands beside his patched Curtiss Jenny at a county fair, hawking five-dollar rides to strangers and picking fights with every moving picture he has ever endured. But when a question about the most insufferable trope in storytelling takes hold, the sales pitch becomes something else entirely – a quarrel with the dead, with the living, and with every tale that insists a man can walk through fire unchanged.

Funny, furious, and quietly devastating. The sky, it turns out, has no plot. Neither does grief.

Read the original post.

Bob Lynn | © 2026 Vox Meditantis. All rights reserved.

Tags: ,

One response to “Holt”

  1. Steven S. Wallace avatar
    Steven S. Wallace

    I think this is about a barn stormer who, a trope himself, has little patience for thrill seeking behaviors himself. He is parading around to carnivals and fairs taking those who will give him five dollars on thrill rides. But he has been a pilot in the War and has observed friends of his be shot down. He has seen the planes crash unlike the viewers of movies who are spared the images of the crash.

    I rather like films about the silent soldier or gunman who perseveres with a stiff upper lip. In the end the good avenge the losses of their colleagues and go onto to their next moment with nary a scratch.

    This is contrary to the realities of trauma and heroes rare as they are seldom not affected. This pilot has experienced the most significant years of his life in the war and is now twiddling his thumbs flying stunts for carnivals. He is producing as a commodity for mass consumption a sanitized version of his life in the war. What a hard thing it is to enlist, be trained and then face death. It almost makes a post-war life rather silly.

    👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻

    SSW

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

Leave a comment

Feign the virtue thou dost seek, till it becometh thine own

Recent Posts

Categories