What are you currently reading?

[Opus106]

Wilma, a fiction?!

I'm so sorry, Karl, to be the bearer of bad news, but I'm afraid that that's the Truth.

[karlhenning]

No worries; I knew Bam-Bam was . . . a myth . . . .

[Coco]

I'm reading it becouse i'm fascinated about the history of this planet and us
The Geological data actually fits better of Biblical account of things than evolutional does---it's more how do you interpret the data. And there is no point interpreting  Genesis in a "symbolical way" ; it's a symbol of what??
Fascinating stuff; dinosaurs living the same time as men; records from different parts of the world  of a big universal flood that destroyed all humanity except for few people etc... Thruth is more interesting sometimes than fiction!!!

I did not know former Governor Palin was a poster here.

[Fëanor]

I'm reading it becouse i'm fascinated about the history of this planet and us
The Geological data actually fits better of Biblical account of things than evolutional does---it's more how do you interpret the data. And there is no point interpreting  Genesis in a "symbolical way" ; it's a symbol of what??
Fascinating stuff; dinosaurs living the same time as men; records from different parts of the world  of a big universal flood that destroyed all humanity except for few people etc... Thruth is more interesting sometimes than fiction!!!

I agree with you last sentence.

[Scarpia]

I agree with you last sentence.

But I sense we don't all agree what is the truth and what is the fiction.   

[Daverz]

I'm reading it becouse i'm fascinated about the history of this planet and us
The Geological data actually fits better of Biblical account of things than evolutional does---it's more how do you interpret the data.

Only if by "interpret" you mean "completely disregard".

[Bogey]

Thanks for you response, Bogey.

I was raised by a devout Christian mother who alway propounded that evolution was a fact but was guided by God.  Devout as she was all her life, (she passes away last year at 91), she never took seriously that the world was created in ~4000 BC.  She never felt that Genesis had to be take literally, but rather as a metaphor.
 
Any good scientist will tell you that science isn't a body of knowledge but rather a process.  Science, the process, insists that there is no absolute, unchallengable knowledge -- this makes it different from religion.

Thank you much, Bill!

[Antoine Marchand]

Is there anything new to be said in this respect after Nietzsche? 

A clever question, indeed. But probably Onfray can be useful as a sort of Nietzsche-substitute because I can't stand people like Nietzsche who writes like-screaming. Too many exclamation marks for me!!! 

[Antoine Marchand]

Our time can be sometimes a wonderful time. This morning I was reading some chapters of Marshall McLuhan's book The Gutenberg Galaxy: The Making of Typographic Man (Spanish translation), when I found some interesting quotes from a 1932 book titled Books and Readers in Ancient Greece and Rome by Frederic G. Canyon (presented as "Late Director and Principal Librarian of the British Museum").

[asin]0802060412[/asin]



Well, now, here in the farthest province of the Empire, I have read the first chapter of this excellent book that anyone of us can read online or download here:

http://www.archive.org/details/booksandreadersi013546mbp

It's wonderful, isn't it?

[Florestan]

A clever question, indeed. But probably Onfray can be useful as a sort of Nietzsche-substitute because I can't stand people like Nietzsche who writes like-screaming. Too many exclamation marks for me!!!  

Hah! So true. 

[ibanezmonster]

AT LEAST NIETZSCHE DIDN'T ALSO WRITE IN ALL CAPS ALL THE TIME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Henk]

A clever question, indeed. But probably Onfray can be useful as a sort of Nietzsche-substitute because I can't stand people like Nietzsche who writes like-screaming. Too many exclamation marks for me!!! 

No need to make excuses, Antoine. Nobody says you should read Nietzsche. If you don't feel attracted, it's fine as well. But you are the one who screams now.

[ibanezmonster]

NIeTzSCHE SHoULD HAVE WRItTEN iN THIS STyLE, DONTChA tHInK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Scarpia]

I read a lot of Nitzsche in my misspent youth.  What I get from it is that he was very clever on the small scale (lots of insightful aphorisms, some idiotic ones) but the grand scheme be built up from it was nonsense. 

[Sid]

Just read these in the past week, I was sick in bed so had a lot of time on my hands -

"Stop-time" by Frank Conroy - an autobiographical work written in the 1960's about the author's childhood during the '40's in '50's. It was pretty good, I enjoyed it. He had a tendency to lapse into poetic descriptions of the most mundane things, I don't know whether this aspect appealed to me, it came across as a bit verbose. But apart from that, Conroy described things that happened to him - some of them ordinary, others not - in a very dry way, without a hint of sentimentality.

"The White Tiger" by Aravind Adiga - This was a present from my sis ages ago, so I decided to finally read it (she's been nagging me to do that ever since!). This is an Indian rags to riches story with a twist. Some of the oppression and corruption outlined in the book makes me think that the author is kind of exaggerating things. Is it true that things are as bad as this in India? By the way he tells it, the country is still stuck in a Feudal mentality. Anyhow, it was quite a good read...

"Running with Scissors" by Augusten Burroughs - I laughed out loud a lot while reading this book. The book was not so much funny, though, it was more cringeworthy. This is also an autobiography of the author's childhood and teenage years. It details his parents divorce, his mother's mental breakdowns (many of them, it was an annual event that came around Autumn) & his eventual "adoption" by the family of his mother's psychiatrist, Dr Field. The family is cooky to say the least. The doctor's house is a home for not only his family but also mental patients. By the age of 14, Augusten has been in a mental ward after a "staged" suicide to get him out of school so he can stay permanently with the doctor, he's having sex with a guy in his thirties who drifts in & out of the house, he's smoking (both tobacco & pot) & drinking, staying up late. This must have been one of the wierdest childhoods on record, & Burroughs tells the story with a lot of humour, as if that was the only thing that helped him get through all of this wierdness. I'm now going to borrow some of his other books from the library, I like his style a lot...

[Opus106]

Re: The White Tiger

Some of the oppression and corruption outlined in the book makes me think that the author is kind of exaggerating things.

Do you have anything particular in mind? While I found the writing terribly crass (as in Balram's reflections), I don't think I would be surprised to find similarly affected people roaming the streets, or maybe even running a successful firm.

[Sid]

Re: The White Tiger

Do you have anything particular in mind? While I found the writing terribly crass (as in Balram's reflections), I don't think I would be surprised to find similarly affected people roaming the streets, or maybe even running a successful firm.

The way Balram's father died of TB in a hospital without any supplies and no staff is the best example I can think of. Balram says that the staff is at the hospital (& payed for it) as far as the paperwork is concerned, but the reality is different. Then there's Balram's primary school teacher, who recieved school uniforms for his class from the education department, but sold them off on the black market. I mean, do these things actually happen in India today? I have a friend who (tried) to do business in India but got nowhere, not only because of the massive amounts of government red tape/bureaucracy, but also because of the corruption (he was saying that in order to do anything, he would've had to pay everyone off, and his budget worked out here in Australia didn't allow for that - not to speak of the ethical implications). Are how things run on government and business levels as bad as that in India?...

[Opus106]

The way Balram's father died of TB in a hospital without any supplies and no staff is the best example I can think of. Balram says that the staff is at the hospital (& payed for it) as far as the paperwork is concerned, but the reality is different. Then there's Balram's primary school teacher, who recieved school uniforms for his class from the education department, but sold them off on the black market. I mean, do these things actually happen in India today?

Regrettably, they do. It's not rampant, but neither is it rare. In most cases, it's just hushed up or more commonly, no one cares to (and even if they do, they wouldn't dare) raise their voice against such happenings. Locally it's called the "chalta hai" attitude -- Hindi for "so it goes", just go with the flow, don't bother about rules.

I have a friend who (tried) to do business in India but got nowhere, not only because of the massive amounts of government red tape/bureaucracy, but also because of the corruption (he was saying that in order to do anything, he would've had to pay everyone off, and his budget worked out here in Australia didn't allow for that - not to speak of the ethical implications). Are how things run on government and business levels as bad as that in India?...

[Sid]

Regrettably, they do. It's not rampant, but neither is it rare. In most cases, it's just hushed up or more commonly, no one cares to (and even if they do, they wouldn't dare) raise their voice against such happenings. Locally it's called the "chalta hai" attitude -- Hindi for "so it goes", just go with the flow, don't bother about rules.

Well then maybe Adiga's novel has some truth in it regarding the culture of corruption in India. I feel a lot of anger in that book, anger at the injustices in Indian society. Sometimes I thought that the writer should lighten up a bit. There is humour in there, but it's very dark humour, very sarcastic. I can understand where he's coming from, but I'm not going to rush out to read another one of his novels. I don't feel that there's much hope there. Maybe it's justified, but I like a bit of a boost when reading these kinds of narratives. If they're as emotional as this, I like a boost at the end. Otherwise, if it's detached, then that's ok, I don't need a boost.

I've just finished reading two other books -

"Dry - A memoir" by Augusten Burroughs - This is kind of like the sequel to Running With Scissors, which I read last week. That memoir details Burroughs' experiences growing up in a mad house, amongst the cooky family of his mother's psychiatrist. This book, in a way, continues the story. After leaving Massachusetts, Burroughs went to New York city and began working in advertising. Without realising it, he became an alcoholic. His boss basically sends him to rehab to get off the sauce. This is successful, he doesn't touch a bottle for about one year after leaving rehab. But when tragedy strikes (a close friend who has the AIDS virus dies), Burroughs can't cope with it emotionally and gets back on the booze. This time his addiction is worse, he has blackouts, hallucinates, can't get out of bed for days, lying there in his own urine. It's pretty harrowing reading - he was literally on the brink of death. After hitting rock bottom, he goes cold turkey again and starts to attend AA meeting again. His drinking buddy Jim also joins him in quitting. So the memoir is all wrapped up pretty neatly, but it's far from cliched. I think that (this time) the sequel is better than the original. The story especially resonated with me, not because I've had any problems with alcohol, but I've known people who have and I myself am an ex-smoker, so I know a bit about addictions which can kill you. This was an excellent read, and I look forward to getting more stuff from Burroughs soon.

"My music, my life" by Marjorie Rieu - Andre Rieu's autobiography was written by his wife because he says he hates writing. He details his life growing up under the wing of his father, a renowned conductor in the Netherlands. He talks about meeting many famous musicians during his childhood years, and being particularly inspired by the likes of Menuhin, Kogan, Oistrakh and Grumiaux. Although he had been in the industry for decades - both as a violinist in the Limburgh Symphony Orchestra and as leader of his own quintet the "Maastricht Salon Orchestra" - Rieu's big break came when he was about forty in the early 1990's. He put all his savings and effort into establishing his "Johann Strauss Orchestra" and the risks he took - such as giving up his day job in the Limburgh SO - gradually payed off. It's interesting reading how he found it difficult to get his first professional recording made, let alone a recording contract. After reading this book, I admire Rieu the man more than I admire his music - not only in terms of resurrecting repertoire that had been dead since the age of 48 & 78 rpm records, but also for his dedication to various charitable causes. This is by no means a deep book, but it gives and interesting glimpse of one of the musical phenomenons of our age...

[Henk]

I read a lot of Nitzsche in my misspent youth.  What I get from it is that he was very clever on the small scale (lots of insightful aphorisms, some idiotic ones) but the grand scheme be built up from it was nonsense.

Similar reaction as Antoine's.

Nietzsche doesn't deliver a grand scheme, you shouldn't expect that, his philosophy is mainly insight and communication. Maybe in his Genealogy of Moral he gives a "grand scheme".

If you want a "grand scheme" read Arnold Cornelis. Logic of the Feeling (theory of stability layers in culture for nestling of the emotions), The Retarded Time, Restpoints of the Spirit. Not available in English language yet.