What are you currently reading?

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

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Kullervo




Steve


Kullervo

I'm reading a collection of Gogol's short stories. Very funny and odd.

Maciek

Quote from: Harry on June 11, 2007, 03:00:13 AM
I am currently re-reading "'Oscar Wilde" by Richard Ellmann.
A fascinating book, about a fascinating man.

Love that one too. Must re-read it one day...

Justin Ignaz Franz Bieber

i'm about to finish the hobbit & tomorrow i'll start gravity's rainbow by thomas pynchon. & from what i've read about gravity's rainbow, i'll have to re-read it a couple more times before i can follow what goes on lol  :P
"I am, therefore I think." -- Nietzsche

Joan

I'm a page late for this, but I also love Poe's stories. They're beautifully complemented by Harry Clarke's illustrations, if you can get hold of an illustrated edition. The Assignation is an amazing little piece of breathless heightened prose.

I just finished Ian Buruma's Murder in Amsterdam: the murder of Theo van Gogh and the limits of tolerance. I picked this up in lieu of Aayan Hirsi Ali's book Infidel; she recently toured the US promoting her book, so there was a bit of a waiting list at the library for infidel.
Buruma's book seems to be balanced and objective, so it's probably good to read it before Hirsi Ali's book.

Anne

#308
Plague, a Story of Science, Rivalry and The Scourge that Won't Go Away.
by Edward Marriott
The one thing (among zillions of others) I learned was this:  If the rats start dying, run away!  When the rats are dead, the ravenous disease-carrying fleas are famished and looking for a new host, i.e., YOU!!! 

The Western 1/2 of the US has had cases of Bubonic plague throughout the 20th century.  What concerns scientists is the fact that worldwide the disease can go into hiding for years, then come roaring to life decimating a population.

I love to read nonfiction and am now reading a second book on the same subject:
Plague, the Mysterious Past and Terrifying Future of the World's Most Dangerous
Disease by Wendy Orent.
This book so far is concentrating on Russia and its use of Bubonic plague as one of the biological weapons buildup in the cold war.

Thanks to Sonic Man for both of these selections.

karlhenning

If only he'd write poems, we could have Carmina Buruma . . . .

Joan

Quote from: karlhenning on June 20, 2007, 09:50:19 AM
If only he'd write poems, we could have Carmina Buruma . . . .

O, Fortuyn!   (Pim, that is.)

Kullervo

Quote from: Joan on June 20, 2007, 08:18:50 PM
O, Fortuyn!   (Pim, that is.)

Someone should write an opera based on Fortuyn.

Harry

Charles Dickens.

The Pickwick Papers.


That's what I call a book, and a good book, and a unsurpassed writer. :)

Florestan

Quote from: Harry on June 21, 2007, 02:38:21 AM
Charles Dickens.

The Pickwick Papers.


That's what I call a book, and a good book, and a unsurpassed writer. :)

Seconded wholeheartedly.
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

Harry

Quote from: Florestan on June 21, 2007, 02:56:07 AM
Seconded wholeheartedly.

May 12, 1827. Joseph Smiggers, Esq., P.V.P.M.P.C., presiding. The following resolutions unanimously agreed to:-
That this Association has heard read with feelings of unmingled satisfaction, and unqualified approval, the paper communicated by Samuel Pickwick, Esq., G.C.M.P.C. entitled "Speculations on the Source of the Hampstead Ponds, with some Observations on the Theory of Tittlebats".

Isn't that marvelous writing! :)

SonicMan46

Quote from: Anne on June 20, 2007, 06:53:16 AM
Plague, a Story of Science, Rivalry and The Scourge that Won't Go Away...............

Thanks to Sonic Man for both of these selections.

Anne - glad that you're enjoying the books!  Please report back on any NEW discoveries in this area - thanks!  :D

karlhenning

Quote from: Harry on June 21, 2007, 03:37:18 AM
May 12, 1827. Joseph Smiggers, Esq., P.V.P.M.P.C., presiding. The following resolutions unanimously agreed to:-
That this Association has heard read with feelings of unmingled satisfaction, and unqualified approval, the paper communicated by Samuel Pickwick, Esq., G.C.M.P.C. entitled "Speculations on the Source of the Hampstead Ponds, with some Observations on the Theory of Tittlebats".

Isn't that marvelous writing! :)

The Apotheosis of the Pushkinisti  8)

Danny

Quote from: Kullervo on June 18, 2007, 10:11:03 PM
I love Poe. I even love his early short stories, despite their occasionally flatulent prose and arcane references.

Opium does that to you; read Coleridge for further proof (though I love S.T.C.).

Anne

Quote from: SonicMan on June 21, 2007, 04:32:17 AM
Anne - glad that you're enjoying the books!  Please report back on any NEW discoveries in this area - thanks!  :D

There is presently no vaccine against plague in the US as the previous one has been discarded but there is a new vaccine in the animal trial phase currently being tested.

The following was big news to me: one of my daughters lives in a suburb of Lansing, MI which is home to MSU.
Robert Brubaker, is a Michigan State University professor known as the 'Plague guru" in the US!  a quote from Orent's book p. 37

"Brubaker was one of the first scientists in the West to discover that plague had plasmids - those extra rings of DNA outside the plague chromosome that contain some of the germ's most deadly devices." 

Steve

Quote from: Danny on June 21, 2007, 02:15:07 PM
Opium does that to you; read Coleridge for further proof (though I love S.T.C.).

Or Keats...  :)