What are you currently reading?

Started by facehugger, April 07, 2007, 12:36:10 AM

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SonicMan46

Neanderthal Man: In Search of Lost Genomes (2014) by Svante Pääbo - kind of the 'godfather' of ancient DNA evolution - short bio below (much more at the link) - I've been reading about human evolution since my teenage years, so just an ongoing interest with this new book about sorting out the genetics of the Neanderthals - bought the tee shirt on the end a few years ago, of course the meaning is that modern humans (esp. of European descent) have about 3% Neanderthal genes in their DNA - kind of cool to me at least.   :laugh:  Dave

QuoteSvante Pääbo (1955-Present) is a Swedish geneticist specializing in the field of evolutionary genetics. As one of the founders of paleogenetics, he has worked extensively on the neanderthal genome. Since 1997, he has been director of the Department of Genetics at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany.

   

vers la flamme

Started this anthology of plays by August Strindberg today:



So far I've read The Father, which was certainly a weird one. Not sure what to make of his writing so far, but it's dark and brutal. I'm intrigued and excited to read on.

JBS


Ms. Picard's most recent, published in 2017, when she was 90.
It seems she worked for the government as a lawyer (she is a graduate of Gray's Inn) until her retirement at age 60, when she began the research for her first book, Restoration London, published when she 70.  Never say you're too old...

The book is structured around Chaucer's pilgrims to depict English society c 1390.
It does seem slightly more superficial in content and more chatty than her previous books.

Hollywood Beach Broadwalk

Dry Brett Kavanaugh

Quote from: Dry Brett Kavanaugh on November 30, 2021, 07:37:53 PM
Churchill: A Life. Martin Gilbert. Re-reading the book about one of my heroes.
I haven't bought the other biography by Andrew Roberts yet.

Still reading the biography of Churchill. It is very one-sided. Everything WC did was clever and prescient, and whatever his critics did and said were wrong and unreasonable. I may quit the book and switch to Andrew Roberts' book. It is disconcerting that this kind of book is well-liked and respected in the populace.

Mandryka

#11704


This is pure Mulholland Drive style in literary form. Is it a dream? Is it real? There's even a bit which is like No Hay Banda - the cabaret is called Le Néant! Very good, and like Mulholland Drive, disturbing. This Modiano voice, half Kafka half Lynch, that you find in some of his books post 2000, is special for me.
Wovon man nicht sprechen kann, darüber muss man schweigen

Artem

Finished recently. Belladonna is a really devastating book dealing with WWII atrocities. I strongly urge everyone to check out Drndic. She's a brilliant writer from Croatia. I've already read three of her novels and Belladonna may be my favourite.

Handke and Kluge also deal with WWII. Less enjoyable.

The big heavy book on Joan Mitchell paintings has beautiful reproduction of her work, but the writing and articles are all over the place. I just didn't find it enjoyable. Maybe they were in a rush to publish it for an exhibition.


vers la flamme

Quote from: vers la flamme on December 03, 2021, 05:19:53 PM
Started this anthology of plays by August Strindberg today:



So far I've read The Father, which was certainly a weird one. Not sure what to make of his writing so far, but it's dark and brutal. I'm intrigued and excited to read on.

A Dream Play was a trip. Reminded me of Bob Dylan's "Desolation Row". The Ghost Sonata I couldn't make heads or tails of... at all...

vers la flamme

Started this anthology of plays by Henrik Ibsen



Currently Ghosts. So far, so good...

aligreto

Hardy: The Woodlanders





This is the story of the occupants and their inter-relations of a rural hamlet. The story focuses primarily on one young woman and the extent to which her father does all in his power to elevate her social status. That ever present sense of foreboding that exists in Hardy's novels permeates this work also.

ritter

Taking another break from André Salmon's memoirs Souvenirs sans fin (which are very interesting and great fun, but do seem to be sans fin in their length) with a first approach to the work of Victor Segalen.



Starting his posthumously published novel René Leys, about China and the Forbidden City  in 1911. It's the record of conversations (real? fictitious?) with the title character (based on a real person) who had direct access and intimate knowledge of the Chinese imperial court in this turbulent times. When the book was finally published in Spanish translation not too long ago, it was hailed as some sort of masterpiece. Let's see.

Florestan

#11710
Maiden reading.



More than halfway through and not half bad, especially given the current international context. Playing God is never a good idea.
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

SimonNZ

Youre just itching to start a political argument in a non political thread.

You know damn well that every advancement in medicine and surgery you would now eagerly approve of for yourself was at some point accused of as playing God. And you could only call state actions in protecting people from covid playing God if you were drunk.

Frankenstein is about personal responsibility and obligations before and after ones actions.

Dry Brett Kavanaugh

Quote from: aligreto on December 07, 2021, 06:33:36 AM
Hardy: The Woodlanders

This is the story of the occupants and their inter-relations of a rural hamlet. The story focuses primarily on one young woman and the extent to which her father does all in his power to elevate her social status. That ever present sense of foreboding that exists in Hardy's novels permeates this work also.

I checked the book on the Amazon site and it looks very interesting. I will get a copy!

Iota




Sometimes Dickens' prose gives me pleasure like no other, ineffably warm and witty, it just dances off the page. A somewhat Victorian fairy tale ending, but nobody's perfect.

JBS

Quote from: Iota on December 09, 2021, 12:36:44 PM



Sometimes Dickens' prose gives me pleasure like no other, ineffably warm and witty, it just dances off the page. A somewhat Victorian fairy tale ending, but nobody's perfect.

It's probably the most famous of the Christmas stories Dickens wrote as follow-ups to A Christmas Carol.

Hollywood Beach Broadwalk

Karl Henning

Quote from: Iota on December 09, 2021, 12:36:44 PM



Sometimes Dickens' prose gives me pleasure like no other, ineffably warm and witty, it just dances off the page. A somewhat Victorian fairy tale ending, but nobody's perfect.

Time I read that 'un!
Karl Henning, Ph.D.
Composer & Clarinetist
Boston MA
http://www.karlhenning.com/
[Matisse] was interested neither in fending off opposition,
nor in competing for the favor of wayward friends.
His only competition was with himself. — Françoise Gilot

aligreto

Quote from: Dry Brett Kavanaugh on December 09, 2021, 09:06:31 AM
I checked the book on the Amazon site and it looks very interesting. I will get a copy!

Yes it is definitely a good read. It was refreshing to get back to the Hardy that I know after recently abandoning "The Woodlanders".

SimonNZ

Started:



from the back cover:

"The task of living in modern New Zealand – and especially in modern Auckland – is not just to understand how to live with different peoples, but how to adapt to the future that has already happened.

New Zealand is a nation that exists on Pacific Islands, but does not, will not, perhaps cannot, see itself as a Pacific Island nation. Yet turning to the Pacific, argues Damon Salesa, enables us to grasp a fuller understanding of what life is really like on these shores.

After all, Salesa argues, in many ways New Zealand's Pacific future has already happened. Setting a course through the 'islands' of Pacific life in New Zealand – Ōtara, Tokoroa, Porirua, Ōamaru and beyond – he charts a country becoming 'even more Pacific by the hour'. What would it mean, this far-sighted book asks, for New Zealand to recognise its Pacific talent and finally act like a Pacific nation?"

Ganondorf

Yesterday, finished reading Maupassant's best known short story:


aligreto

Quote from: Ganondorf on December 12, 2021, 11:35:31 AM
Yesterday, finished reading Maupassant's best known short story:



That one is a very cutting story that shines a light on human nature; something that Maupassant was very good at.