Date Finished	Title	Author	Date Published	Reading/ Interest Level	Genre	Length	Medium/ Narrator	Summary/Comments/Reactions
3/26/09	Claudius the God	Graves, Robert	1935	popular adult	fiction, historical, roman empire	19:47:00	Runger, Nelson	A follow-up to I, Claudius, taking up from the point of his accession to the throne on Caligula's death until his own pending death. A couple of follow-up passages from Seneca and a couple of Roman historians take up his death on being poisoned by Agrippanila, something that he foresees in the book. I didn't think this book was nearly as good as I, Claudius, but I couldn't pass it up after having read the first. A bit too disjointed, I think. He comes to the Emperor's throne thinking to restore the republic and turning power over to the senate, and seems to come close to it near the end, but eventually he renounces that action as impossible as the people have grown too used to tyranny. He also seems to get more hardened as the book progresses, but the turning point really comes when he must put his wife to death when he finds that she has continually slept with a number of other men and plotted to overthrow him and usurp power for herself through one of the senators. The high point of his reign seems to come with the conquest of Britain. Claudius comes off as a very likeable person, if also somewhat naive. A large portion of the book is also given over to Herod Agrippa, who helps Claudius take over the throne and begin ruling, but who also seeks to lead the Jews and the rest of the eastern roman empire on revolt. It was an enjoyable read/listen, if not up to the standards of the first book.
3/24/09	Honey Blonde Chica	Serros, Michele	2006	high school	fiction--adolescent--chicana	209 pp	print	This was another book that I had trouble finishing. I think that Serros is a very clever writer, and she has put together Gossip Girl with a Hispanic flair, but I just have trouble connecting with the issues and the feelings of the characters. I just get some impatient with them and their concerns. In any case, Evie Gomez is a flojo in Southern California and her family has made big bucks with her grandmother's bread recipe. Enough to attend a somewhat exclusive private school. But when her former best friend Dede returns to SoCal from Mexico and takes up with the "Sangrias," Evie must choose between her flojo friends or the sangrias. Confusing adolescent angst with designer labels. Clever plotting brings about a satisfying conclusion and made me feel that I had underrated the book in taking so long to finish it, but when you get down to it, the characters are still pretty much adolescent pinheads so tightly drawn into themselves and into their labels on the world that I just find them boring after a while.
3/12/09	Everyman	Roth, Philip	2006	popular adult	fiction, modern, realistic, psychological, old age	4:07:00	Guidall, George	So I'm convinced that Philip Roth must be the great American novelist of the 20th century, even though this is only the second novel that I've read by him. I certainly keep quoting his line, "Old age isn't a battle. Old age is a massacre." Or "There's no remaking reality. Just take it as it comes. Hold your ground and take it as it comes." Everyman--he's not named in the novel--certainly lives at the point of Kierkegaard's absurdity: human beings crave life but they face the inevitability of death--to which I would amend: we crave vitality and what we get is old age, suffering, and death. His was a life in full--even to the point of being a horndog--but in the end, he is shaken by disease, by age, by death, and by the utterly loneliness of looking back on his life, realizing both his joys and his mistakes without being able to do anything about it, and loses his zest for living. He was imminently successful, as were his friends and compatriots, but it all goes to shit eventually, just as it did for Swede Labov. Not much to look forward to.
3/9/09	European Thought and Culture in the Nineteenth Century	Kramer, Lloyd	2001	introductory college	history of ideas	12:00:00	Kramer, Lloyd	I wasn't very impressed with this set of lectures. I found myself often anticipating what the lecturer was going to say before he said it himself. True to the title, it begins with enlightenment thought--especially John Locke and the natural rights of man--and proceeds to show how the development of 19th century thought grows out of, or in reaction to, enlightenment thought, the French revolution, and the Industrial revolution. There just wasn't that much that was new for me. And since he cut each of the thirty minute lectures into three, there just wasn't all that much to say in the end.
3/3/09	Terms of Endearment	McMurtry, Larry	1975	popular adult	fiction--contemporary	15:00:00	Rosenblatt, Barbara	Aurora is probably the greatest of all of McMurtry's strong females--including Clara, Tess Berrybender, Karla, Patsy, Lorena, Molly, etc. etc,--and yet she irritates me to no end. I could not stand the way that she treated Vernon Dalhart and the way that se spoke to him. She seems so shallow, self-important, so self-centered in her own universe. And yet she is so obviously the center of the universe of one of the most enjoyable of McMurtry's books--I only put Lonesome Dove and perhaps Last Picture Show above it. Once again, his novels lend themselves so perfectly to oral story telling. Sara and I both cried for two days of driving to school as Emma lay dying. I had thought that the whole section devoted to her was more of an after-thought and unnecessary until those ending scenes as the world gradually passed away from her. It all just came at her from out of the blue. You have to wonder how McMurtry could get some profoundly into the consciousness of someone dying. The whole scene with Royce driving his truck through the dance hall, and of his relationship with Shirley reminded me a lot of the comedy of Carl Hiaasen. Flap, of course, is a clueless schmuck, and the General is a turd. Barbara Rosenblatt captures Aurora and Emma just right, but I found her irritating as the General and as Melanie. I look forward to her reading of That Evening Star.
3/1/09	The Long 19th Century: European History from 1789 to 1917	Weiner, Robert	2005	introductory college	history--European--19th century	18:24:00	Weiner, Robert	A lot of ground to cover 1789-1917, although Weiner covers a lot of ground previous and after these dates. The driving forces of the French Revolution and the Industrial Revolution take up the major themes until 1848. I'm still a bit hazy on the revolutions of 1832, when the Bourbons were displaced from the French throne by Louis Phillipe, and of 1848, leading to the ascension of Napoleon III. I had not realized that the Crimean War played such a pivotal role in the development of powers and alliances either, exposing weaknesses of the British and Russian armies while highlighting the comparative strength of the French empire. Then things begin to get really complicated as Piedmont begins to take over Italy under Cavour, but botches so completely that Italy still seems comparatively backward among the other states of Europe. A little later, Bismarck takes the reins in Prussia and thoroughly discredits Austria, driving nails into the coffin of the Holy Roman Empire, allowing the Hungarians to demand equal power. Bismarck picks up the pieces of Germany, goading the French into the catastrophe at Sedan and the French theme of revanche over the loss of Alsace and Lorraine and eventually World War I. Germany becomes the most powerful, most populous, most productive state in Europe. But his Byzantine alliances fall apart, especially over the colonial divisions of Africa and the ineptitude of the Austrians at keeping the different nationalities in check. The great brutalization of World War I seems inevitable regardless of the poor statesmanship. And hence World War II as well.
2/25/09	The Enlightenment: Reason, Tolerance and Humanity	Schmidt, James	2005	introductory college	history of ideas	7:48:00	Schmidt, James	I did not enjoy this set of lectures as much as I have enjoyed most of the Learning Company lectures. This was a series of 14 1/2 hour lectures that gave a very broad overview of Enlightenment thought, and so it gave a fairly shallow view of the whole, but it did have quite a few insights into different thinkers and process that I had not considered before. Schmidt begins pretty much with the premise that the Enlightenment was a child of Francis Bacon's thought and belief in the power and utility of science. It seemed to really come to the fore with the Glorious Revolution of 1688 and take off with John Locke's return to England. The Deist movement also took off about that time with Bayle, Tolland, and the book of the three imposters. Louis XIV's revocation of the edict of Nantes was a major cause of the spread of enlightenment ideas as the Huguenots moved to England and Amsterdam and carry a questioning ethic with them. The central portion of the lectures are given over to Diderot, naturally, focusing as much on the dream of D'Alembert as the Encyclopedie. Very little about Montesquieu or D'holbach. A trio chapters on the spread of enlightenment ideas in coffee houses, salons, the press, secret societies, and academies. Also reaction to enlightenment ideas as leading to the excesses of the French Revolution and Edmund Burke's critique of it's rejection of the past.
2/12/09	Far from the Madding Crowd	Hardy, Thomas	1874	popular adult, college	fiction--historical, rural England	15:44:00	Masters, Jill	Hardy is the anti-Hemingway. We know what each of his main characters think almost all the time. And it seems that most of their thinking is overwrought, reading like a 19th century soap opera, complete with sudden reversals and catastrophes and coincidences. And why are his women always such victims of their own circumstances. We can talk about the proud and headstrong Bathsheba Everdeen, but in the end, she is cowed and cajoled and dominated by the men in her life. The once central fact in her life is that she sent a valentine to Boldwood on a whim, and that completely changed his life and led to the book's final denouement. Troy is a cad who prefigures Alex Durbeyville and Wildeve, even though his feelings for Fanny Robin, after she's dead, seem touch. A bad boy is god for a girl? Why else is Bathsheba so smitten with him? Is it because he's such a bastard. Is this really a morality play with the sins of the fathers visited on the children. and then there's Gabriel Oak. He's rock stead, after all, and there's no major flaw in his character. He is the center of universe, the touch point to which all returns in the end. Part of the real charm of the book are the rural characters that make up the background: Smallwood, Jan Cogan, the old malter--and the simple rules and beliefs that govern their lives. And did I enjoy the book. I still like Hardy as well as ever. FFtMC is not one of better books, and it has a positive ending, after all. I guess I still like Gabriel best of all Hardy characters--and his dog George.
2/2/09	A Farewell to Arms	Hemingway, Ernest	1929	popular adult	fiction, World War I, love	8:36:00	Slattery, John	This was my third time through Farewell, but it's been about 35 years or so since the last time I read it, and it's amazing how much I forgot. The dominant idea for me is "no idea but in things." I think Hemingway is at his best here with his descriptive passages, the qualities of sunlight and texture and vision. That certainly seems to be the way the Frederick Henry responds to life. That and his understated emotional response to the events in his life. Things seem to catch him unaware. Is that the vaunted Hemingway masculinity? The passage where he is struck with the mortar shell and the chaos of the retreat, especially after they leave the road and make their way on foot through the country fit this. The only times where Henry shows his emotion is in trying to force Catherine to have sex, which made me really uncomfortable, and then in her ordeal in the hospital. "And this was the price you paid for sleeping together. This was the end of the trap. This was what people got for loving each other." His meditation on death just about sums it all up: "This was what you did. You died. You did not know what it was about. You never had time to learn. They threw you in and told you the rules and the first time they caught you off base they killed you. … they killed you in the end. You could count on that. Stay around and they would kill you." Although he faced death every day, his thought stays on the surface to things and he stays in control of himself until faced with the reality of Catherine's death. Coming back to Hemingway after 35-40 years has been good, and this is just a much stronger book than Sun Also Rises.
1/28/09	The Great Upheaval: America and the birth of the Modern World (1788-1800)	Winik, Jay	2007	difficult adult, college introductory	nonfiction, history, American revolution	31:15:00	Davis, Jonathan	Winik takes the tack that the American Revolution cannot be understood except in the context of world events, especially the French Revolution and Catherine the Great. He makes clear that the birth of the American nation was nothing short of a minor miracle, not only from forces without the country but from tensions within, especially in face of such rebellions as Shays, Whiskey, and the feelings that ran high over Jay's Treaty and the xyz affair that led to the Alien and Sedition Acts. At the same time, Catherine sought to expand the Russian empire with bloody and savage battles against the Turks and then again against Poland. In the meantime, the French Revolution brought about its own kind of savagery and violence. Winik portrays Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette as victims of circumstance, where a stronger personality might have prevailed, and makes us feel pity. At the same time he sees the contradictions in Catherine who began as the darling of the philosophes and then turned her back on the reforms that she had championed when the French Revolution turned so bloody. Winik's strength is making us feel for the personalities involved, but I think he may be pushing for the connections between the events. Not as well written or as analytical as The Rise of American Democracy.
1/19/09	The Great Gatsby	Fitzgerald, F. Scott	1925	popular adult	fiction, contemporary, jazz age	4:39:00	Muller, Frank	I don't get Nick's judgment on Gatsby "I think you're better than the whole lot of them." I thought Gatsby was a ditz, too. And that's strange, because I really kind of identified with Gatsby when I first read the book years and years ago. But that was in the days when I considered myself to be ambitious and embarked on some kind of self improvement scheme. Of course, I also identified with Jude Fawley about the same time, too. So while Nick comes off all righteous and somewhat cynical at the end of the book with his preachments on east and west, really he's just as naive about Gatsby as well. I guess I'm a little struck by the amount of coincidence in the book, too. The whole Dan Cody thing seems more than a bit far fetched. And to have Daisy kill Myrtle in Jay's car seems a bit overdone. Tom is just too much the fool, I guess, especially for someone who graduated from Yale. It must have been a much different time. I couldn't even get into Yale, much less graduate. Finally, I had bit of trouble with the narrator since he also narrated Moby Dick, this summer, and I kept confusing Nick with Ishmael.
1/19/09	A Thousand Splendid Suns	Hosseni, Khaled	2007	popular adult	fiction, contemporary, Afghanistan	11:43:00	Leoni, Atossa	It took Sara and I awhile to finish this book. We began it on the way back from Texas at Christmas and just didn't feel like listening to it on our morning drives to school. It was a good book, but not as good as Kite Runner. Certainly the brutality that Mariam and Laila experience both at the hands of Rasheed and of the Taliban is riveting and shocking, but somehow the story just did not seem as compelling as Kite Runner. I had some troubles with the narration of the story, and that may have contributed to my perceptions. We both agreed that the book could have ended with Mariam's execution and the story would have been stronger. I cannot look at the troubles in Afghanistan, especially the resurgence of the Taliban, without wincing now, and I wonder if another Pol Pot is about to take the stage in that part of the world. I'm not sure how we can afford to stay there, but I fear for the Lailas and the Mariams and Tariqs if we pull out. By putting a face on the victims of the Taliban and other Muslim extremist groups--or any extremist group for that matter--I find it much harder to understand how "we," whoever we are, can allow that kind of brutality to exist.
1/2/09	The Dark Side	Mayer, Jane	2008	popular adult	nonfiction, history, contemporary, politics	335 pp	print	If George Tenet, John Yoo, Alberto Gonzales, David Addington, Donald Rumsfeld, and Dick Cheney are not brought to trial for war crimes, them the rule of law is meaningless. These men flagrantly set the policies of the CIA and the US military outside the law to interrogate prisoners in the wake of 9/11. The final quote of the book sums it up: "Fear and anxiety were exploited by zealots and fools." The road down this slippery slope was set by John Yoo's memoranda to the effect that all things are permissible to the president of the United States--he is outside and above the constitution and various treaties and laws--notably the Geneva Conventions--when it comes to the defense of the United States. Dick Cheney and his evil toadie David Addington were the driving forces behind this policy as they first granted this extra-legal power to the CIA for extraordinary renditions and then to the military for Guantanamo and the detention camps in Iraq, most notably Abu Ghraib. This was all done with greatest secrecy and hidden behind the veils of national security. The value of any information obtained through torture is highly suspect and leaves Obama of what to do with the prisoners who cannot be tried. The short-term benefits of the Bush administration's extra-legal approach to fighting terrorism have had tragically destructive long-term consequences both for the rule of law and America's interests in the world.
12/24/08	Leaving Cheyenne	McMurtry, Larry	1963	popular adult	fiction, western, modern	11:06:00	Jones, John Randolph	I sometimes forget how good a story teller that McMurtry is, but that quality really shines through in audio format. This was an early book of his, and one that I read years ago, but I enjoyed it even more this time around. It is the story of three friends, Gideon Fry, Johnny McCloud, and Molly Taylor who grow up in West Texas--around McMurtry's fictional Thalia--as lovers in a very unconventional triangle. Gideon is far and away the most conventional character, driven by responsibilities laid on him by his father to ranch ownership. Molly refuses to marry him, however, even though she says he is her favorite because he never will cut loose and be free. Molly tells the middle of the book after she has had children by both Gid and Johnny. The sadness of her life is having one child reject her when he finds out that Gid is his father and of having both boys die in the war. Johnny takes over narration in the last third of the book, as an old man, when he and Gid run the ranch in their 70's Their relationship foreshadows that of Gus and Call, the same bantering of old West Texas farts who show their affection by putting each other down. I've been fussing much over mortality these past few months, and while it was poignant to watch them no longer strong enough to care for the ranch, it also gave me consolation to watch the human condition at work with Gid and Johnny and Molly.
12/22/08	A Short History of Myth	Armstrong, Karen	2005	popular nonfiction	nonfiction, history, religion, mythology	2:45:00	Burr, Sharon	Karen Armstrong is one of my favorite religion writers, but lately much of her intellectual acumen has been challenged. She pursues one of her major themes that mythos underlies much of our thinking about the world and our place in it, and we ignore it at our peril. She them proceeds to outline mythological thinking in broad outlines for the paleolithic, neolithic, and civilized cultures up through the axial age. I like her way of thinking, but she probably over generalizes about each stage. Did all or even most paleolithic cultures depend on the shaman's journey to the other world, or did most neolithic cultures truly center around the fertility of the mother goddess; did the gods of civilized cities truly become more distant and reserved from the peoples who worshipped them? But when she says, "a journey to transcend the human state was built into our condition," then she speaks to me. She maintains that the "alchemy" of ritual and music leads to transformation of man and to finding a center of peace in the midst of worldly turmoil. She brings the book up to the Axial age, where inner scrutiny and the development of compassion bring about the highest virtue. We are now in the post axial age, and the enlightenment has lead to our devaluing mythos.
12/19/08	Benjamin Franklin, An American Life	Isaacson, Walter	2003	adult popular history	history, American, founding fathers	24:42:00	Runger, Nelson	I really come to a much better appreciation of Franklin through this book. He's someone that I would enjoy running the river with, and Isaacson makes plain that Franklin was probably the greatest--certainly the most accomplished--thinker in America at the time. I would have given that to Jefferson or Adams before, but behind the self-effacement, the accolade goes to Franklin. He truly was the embodiment of the Enlightenment in America, all the more astonishing as he was truly a self-taught and a self-made man. While he has been criticized as shallow, self-serving, and compromising, he really is much more complex and thoughtful than has been given credit for. Perhaps it is the nature of much of his writing--the fables and poor Richard's almanac--that lends to his criticism, but he turns out to be one of the greatest scientists of the time and certainly the most cosmopolitan American. I even like the old lecher aspect of him, but Isaacson also presents him as human, all too human in his pursuit of love, his relationships with other men, and his treatment of his family. As much as anyone, he understood and formulated the drive for American independence and then the formation of the United States. An excellent book about an excellent character.
12/18/08	The Consolations of Philosophy	De Botton, Alain	2001	adult popular nonfiction	nonfiction, philosophy, history of thought	6:03	Vance, Simon	A look at seven philosophers who offer some consolations from the problems of the life of the mind: Socrates on being unpopular, Epicurus on not being rich, Seneca on being frustrated, Montaigne on Inadequacy, Schopenhauer on a broken heart, and Nietzsche on difficulties. It was a delightful little book, and I especially took to Seneca and Montaigne. AS much as I have begun railing against fate lately, Seneca tells me through Botton to cool it, that that's just the way things are and to get over it. And Montaigne tells me to look at myself honestly and thoroughly, warts and all. Of course, I have always appreciated Nietzsche, one of my true intellectual heroes, even if he can seen a bit overblown and pretentious. Botton cuts to the chase with these guys and tells how taking their thoughts into account will help us better to better hoist the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune. --or Fortuna as depicted by Seneca.
12/15/08	Steppenwolf	Hesse, Herman	1927	popular fiction	fiction, psychological, spiritual?	7:43	Weller, Peter	I read this years ago, but I had forgotten so much. I have pretty much identified with Harry Haller and the lone wolf image all these years, but now I have my doubts about "The Immortals." Somehow the mystic, eternal side has disappeared from all my thinking, and yet, when I finished the book I was left feeling with hope. It's certainly not hope for any kind of immortality--and death has been a lot on my mind recently--but perhaps Mozart's injunction (in the Magic Theatre) that we have to learn to laugh at ourselves in the face of death, that life is at bottom fundamentally risible. And what of Hermine? Is she real or just a projection of Harry's personality? She taught Harry the fundamentals of the physical life, as did Maria. Was Pablo then to introduce him to the spiritual side? And did he eject Harry from the Magic Theatre? And just what makes the book Gnostic?
12/8/08	Fight Club	Palahniuk, Chuck	1996	popular fiction (high demand among high school boys)	fiction, realistic, psychological	5:35	Colby, Jim	This may be the most disturbing book I have ever finished. It is brutal; it is misanthropic. I found myself yelling at it at times. This is after finishing a lot of Cormac McCarthy. I found myself questioning whether I should carry it in a high school library. Tyler Durden may be one of the all time evil geniuses of literature. I can not understand the need for wailing on one another in fight club, even if it makes them feel alive and focused. And the acts of rebellion such as the waiters pissing in soup was plain antisocial. But Project Mayhem was different business altogether, bringing down life and civilization as we know it--"I could smash the Elgin marbles and wipe my ass with the Mona Lisa." It just seemed spite and resentment writ large. So much hate and anger. And then the revelation that Tyler is a projection of the narrator, his Sybil, turns the book on its head. Suddenly it becomes good if not great literature. Still disturbing. Now I see precedent in Dostoyevski as well as MCarthy. I hear echoes of Harry Haller. More than a book, this was an experience.
12/5/08	Between the Rivers: The History of Ancient Mesopotamia	Castor, Alexis	2006	college introductory	history lecture	18:00	Castor, Alexis	This was one of the driest of the Great Courses lectures, but I was motivated to learn more about the cultures of Ancient Mesopotamia and getting a better feel for the sequence of cultures. The beginnings of agriculture in northern Mesopotamia leads to the city states of Ur and Uruk by the third millennium BC, generally devoted to one major deity. The Akkadians kick it up a notch with Sargon and Narim Sin--perhaps the first god-king. The Babylonian dynasty, known primarily for Hammurabi leads for a while, but it is really the Assyrians who consolidate empires and emphasize many of the militaristic practices of ruling we now find so appallingly familiar. Eventually the Persians establish the largest empire in history, and hold on to it for quite a while, known to us through the Greeks, until Alexander steps in. The Parthians sweep in out of the steppes and hold the Romans off. I found it a lot more fascinating that the Egyptian lectures earlier.
11/27/08	The First World War	Keegan, John	1999	college; educated adult	nonfiction, historical, World War I	427	print	I’m not sure that I have a better grip on World War I now, even after this and Tuchman’s books Guns of August and Proud Tower. You have to go back at least to the defeat at Sedan of 1871 and the unification of Germany, and then you have to come forward to today since the world we inherit is in large part made from World War I. I understood the Schlieffen plan from Tuchman, but then the War just came to a dead stop until 1919, even though millions of men sacrificed their lives at Verdun, at Ypres, at the Somme. And then fronts just collapse suddenly. Russia’s economy overheats without real wealth to sustain it, giving rise to the Russian revolution, which gets all of 10 pages. So Germany can double its manpower on the western front, putting all its hopes into one big push, but fails to break through, and with unlimited resources from the US , collapses.
11/12/08	I, Claudius	Graves, Robert	1934	college, educated adult	fiction, historical, roman empire	16:48	Runger, Nelson	Since Mediterranean civilizations have been an interest for close to 10 years now, especially Greece and Rome, I enjoyed the book a lot. It put a face on the early Roman empire from Augustus to Caligula and gave me a better understanding of that time, even in historical fiction. If Graves can be trusted, the empire really went to pieces as soon as Augustus assumed absolute power since his successors Tiberius and Caligula were corrupted absolutely. Palace intrigue with murder and assassination ruled the day, even in Augustus’s time, and Claudius survived because his family assumed he was an idiot in addition to being lame. Livia ran the show, determined that the republic could not be restored and that her sons should rule. The pax romana was bought with a heavy price.
11/8/08	Cities of the Plain	McCarthy, Cormac	1998	adult, early college	fiction, modern western	8:46:32	Adams, Alexander	The third book of Cormac McCarthy's border trilogy, Cities of the Plain brings together John Grady Cole from All the Pretty Horses and Billy Parham from The Crossing im an evocation of the dying cowboy way of life. Set in far west Texas, the Sodom and Gamorrah here is Ciudad Juarez, a town where the cowboys go to get drunk and to get laid. The books is more descriptive than narrative, overlaid with a sense of loss and of sadness. In west Texas of 1952, the cowboy way of life is almost completely dead. Those days are dead and gone, and yet the boys try to live on and make the best of it they can. But events are set in motion for tragedy when John Grady falls in love with the whore Magdalena. John Grady becomes a Christ figure who tries to redeem his little part of the world. And the epilogue stands all story telling traditions on their heads.
10/31/08	The Kite Runner	Hosseni, Khaled	2003	popular adult	fiction-modern, afghanistan	12:02	Hosseni, Khaled	I’m not sure what to think about this book. On the one hand, I found it to be a powerful work and, especially the second half, gripping. On the other hand, sometimes there were just too many coincidences. To have the most brutal scene in the book, the stoning of the adulterers in the stadium, become ultimately attributed to Assef, Amir’s old tormentor, might be satisfying as fiction but seems unrealistic in retrospect. And to have Sohrab shoot out Assef’s eye with a slingshot, as Hassan threatened to do, was another. Having Amir end up as a harelip was a good symbol, yet was it pushing the symbolism too far? And yet the book seemed so realistic that both Sara and I wondered how autobiographical it was. Afghani culture and the brutality of the Talib certainly come through strong.
10/26/08	The Genius Engine: Where Momory, Reason, Passion, Violence, and Creativity Intersect in the Human Brain	Stein, Kathleen	2007	popular adult	nonfiction science journalism	268	print	While the book is a journalist’s attempt to popularize brain science, it was still fairly complex. Stein beings with the premise that the ability of the prefrontal cortex to hold an image is the brain’s most flexible mechanism and the evolution’s most significant accomplishment. “That holding operation is the glue of our conscious experience.” Working memory comprises the PFC’s central operating system and is the distictive quality of intelligence--it gives us the ability to use the knowledge that we’ve stored long term and to modulate our responses in the moment, integrating knowledge and experience. She en goes on to investigage the various aspects and mechanisms of the PFC. One fascinating outcome for me was suggesting that the Platonism/Aristotelian, Categorical Imperative/Utilitarian dualsims may be a fuction of the different neural pathways in the PFC>
10/23/08	The Education of Henry Adams	Adams, Henry	1907	college, late college	autobiography, history of late 19th century	19:29	Colacci, David	OK. I have to admit that I just don’t get it. The top nonfiction book of the twentieth century? I guess that I don’t have the background knowledge or the culture to understand what’s going on. The book just wasn’t enjoyable. Perhaps if I come back to it later in print rather than audio. Henry grows up in a life of privilege and meets a lot of the key players in the politics of his time and confesses that he doesn’t really know what it all means. Especially when he comes face to face with early 20th century science, baffled by the lack of certainty and the drive to power. Then he tries to apply the “grammar of science” to history and it becomes all the more baffling. Didn’t Nietzsche do it all 20 years before? The last third of the book is more interesting than the rest. Some good epigrams, but that’s about it for me.
10/13/08	The Crossing	McCarthy, Cormac	1994	easy college, adult	fiction, western	13:42	Adams, Alexander	The second book of The Border Trilogy, the novel revolves around Billy Parham and three journeys into Mexico, once to free a captive wolf, then to track down his parents’ killers and their stolen horses, and finally, to find his brother Boyd. But Billy’s journeys are the opposite of the hero’s quests of Joseph Campbell, and while he encounters the various demons of the road, ultimately, he is left alone in a meaningless and alienating universe. I didn’t enjoy this as well as other McCarthy novels, perhaps because of the disjointed nature of Billy’s consciousness and his meanderings. True to McCarthy, the violence is often unexpected and sudden. Sara was put off by the various stories told by other characters in the novel, many of which seem to carry the meaning of Billy’s journey. But the descriptive narrative and the cadences of McCarthy’s sentences are more than worth the price of admission.
10/1/08	American Shaolin: Flying Kicks, Buddhist Monks, and the Legend of the Iron Crotch: An American Odyssey in the New China	Polly, Matthew	2007	high school, popular adult			print	Matthew was the quintessential kid who was always bullied on the playground in Topeka KS. But he developed a passion for Kung Fu from Bruce Lee and David Carridine, and after three years at Princeton, dropped out of school to study at Shaolin. China was a major cultural shock, even more so as he moved away from the economic engines of the coast and into the interior at Henan province, where he was often the only laowei or foreigner around. He was admitted to one of the schools, and learned to “eat bitter,” being beat up and battered in his training. And Shaolin was quite different from the days of Caine, now more like 10,000 juvenile delinquents all bent on proving themselves to be the baddest motherfuckers around. Shaolin had only recently started up in response to the Hong Kong flicks and the need for tourist money. It was dirty, filth
9/28/08	Eventide	Haruf, Kent	2004	high school, popular adult	fiction, contemporary, plains	8:20	Hearn, George	Not as good as Plainsong, but I would not have missed it once having read Plainsong. It is certainly much less hopeful with some many powerless and dysfunctional characters. And I don’t think that there is one good marriage in either book. Surely Yuma Colorado has more going for it. The close relationship between Victoria Roubideaux and the McPheron brothers drives one of the themes, but the lives of Luther and Betty Wallace, a dysfunctional, almost “special education” family that defines trailer trash, of Mary, who begins drinking heavily when her husband leaves and she almost loses her daughters, of Betty’s uncle, Hoyt Raynes, who is a violent, drunk loser of the first degree, the solitary life of D J Kephart watching out for his ailing grandfather, seem so bleak and hopeless.
9/27/08	Plainsong	Haruf, Kent	1999	high school, popular adult	fiction, con		Stechschulte, Tom	I first started it as a read years ago, gave it up when time got too short, and never returned to it. I’m disappointed that I didn’t, but it worked really well as an audio book. Tom Stechschulte is such a good narrator, and the reading reminded me a lot of Cormac McCarthy. Although Guthrie, the high school history teacher in Holt Colorado is the primary character, the McPheron brothers, Harold and Raymond are the heroes of the book for me. I could see Luther Brock in them. The story is told in episodic chapters from different characters’ points of view: Victoria Roubideaux, Maggie Jones, Ike and Bobby. The major plot revolves around the McPherons taking Vicki in, but a number of plots play throughout alternating almost lyrical tenderness with sometimes violent confrontations, as that between Guthrie and the Beckman family when he refuses to pass Russell, a jerk of the first order. A must read book for teachers and lovers of the plains.
9/16/08	Will in the World	Greenblatt, Stephen	2004	College, popular adult	literary life	15:22	Fernandez, Peter Jay	It is a highly conjectural and probably somewhat fanciful portrait of Shakespeare’s life. And yet, it is so tantalizing that it should be true even if it isn’t. It seems to fit somewhat with Bloom’s “Invention of the Human” in the Will represents something totally new in literary, something new in the reflexive self-consciousness of man as a whole. One major theme is that Will seemed to never forget anything and used everything is his memory as fodder for his writing. Much is made of his family’s Catholic connections and early need to secrecy. Also of his unhappy marriage to Anne Hathaway. Major chapters on how Falstaff, Shylock, Hamlet pulled on autobiographical episodes and yet represent something totally new. And certainly of his poetry to “young man.” Later to economic successes.
9/1/08	The Road	McCarthy, Cormac	2006	popular adult; late adolescent	fiction--post apocalyptic	6:39	Stechschulte, Tom	I don’t know, I expected to like this more, based on high expectations from other people. It was good and it was bleak, as any McCarthy novel ought to be, and certainly the descriptive passages and comparisons are nonpareil, but somehow, it fell short of what I expected from McCarthy. Perhaps there were just a couple of improbable consequences--the good guys always seem to find what they need just when they need it. I guess I kind of expected that the roving bands of death cultish cannibals would eventually get them. Of course, everything is dead, except the people. And I couldn’t tell what was up when the boy told his father that he was the one. I also thought the mother was probably right when she said that there was no point to it just before she went off to slit her own throat.
8/23/08	The Return of the Native	Hardy, Thomas	1878	adult; late high school	fiction; classic; tragic?	14:03	May, Nadia	I had trouble maintaining interest in the book until after Clym and Eustacia had begun to grow apart and Wildeve came back into Eustacia’s life. I was thinking the book was really pretty silly until Mrs Yeobright died and then I was taken aback by the scene in which Wildeve and Eustacia both die. She seems a silly, little bitch to me who can do nothing but whine, and he has control neither of his prick nor his emotions. Mrs Yeobright seems no better, though, and Clym, the purported protagonist, although having lived in the world, seems equally benighted. The only character I really cared for was Diggory, when all was said and done. The article in Wikipedia comparing RN to Greek tragedy is interesting, though, and I like the comparison of the locals to the chorus in Oedipus.
8/9/08	The Age of Napolean	Durant, Will and Ariel	1975	Popular, educated adult	European history	779	print	from the call of the states-general to the death of Napolean on St. Helena. Events move so fast in the revolution it’s hard to keep up. The death of Louis was turning point in revolution, leading to collapse of Gironde, and the Parisian mob led by Marat and Robespierre hijacked the revolution, under the threat of war, leading to the Terror. A lot of blather about the loss of religion leading to the terror. bullshit. And so Napleon restores order and stability to chaos. Is it true or had the Directory already done that. Durant marks the treaty of Tilsit in 1807 as turning point for Napolean, but he had already been declared emperor and tried to blockade England. And thence on to Moscow. Interesting chapters on Lake poets and rebel poets. Code Napolean marks beginning of modernity.
7/19/08	Rousseau and Revolution	Durant, Will and Ariel	1967	Popular, educated adult	European history	965	print	1756 - 1789, or the start of the seven years war to the start of the French Revolution. Much of this was already covered in Age of Voltaire, but more emphasis here on political events and a lot more on Rousseau than I wanted to know. Interesting now that I find him a bore whereas the “man was born free and everywhere now he is in chains” was a stellar call in my youth, trusting that the inherent goodness of man will prevail. I still dislike Dr. Johnson--still a prig. I have greater appreciation for Frederick the Great, even caught up in realpolitiik. It was his grab of Silesia that led to the Seven years war. England came out the big winner but lost America. Beaumarchis’ support of America led to the bankruptcy of France, causing Louis to call States-General in 1789. Age of Goethe, Kant
7/9/08	The Guns of August	Tuchman, Barbara	1962	adult	history, military, world war I	19:11:39	May, Nadia	Fascinating look at the beginning of W.W.I, from the plans that both reflected and spawned the war through a cursory summary of the Allied defense at the Marne that stopped the initial German advance. I still feel weak on the actual causes of World War I. Can it have only been a failure of diplomacy? And what would have happened had the Schliffen plan actually been followed through to it’s avowed purpose of capturing Paris and destroying the French army? The French were stupid, as their own plans make abundantly clear, and very very lucky. Of course, the Russians turned out to be no help at all. In any case, it’s quite clear that who we are today in terms of national status owes it significance to World War I. Great individual portraits of Joffre, Moltke, Poincarre, Wilson, Haig, and even the Czar.
7/2/08	Moby Dick	Melville, Herman	1851	adult	fiction	21:15:18	Muller, Frank	I haven’t read it in over 30 years, but I really come away this time with Ishmael’s voice, especially the comic narrator who is not above telling a good yarn. I’m not sure how well all the heavy handed themes of graduate study came across to me, although certainly Ahab is monomaniacal, as we are told again and again by Ishmael. It really is about whaling and the loving attention paid to the details about whale and about the characters that Ishmael casts out to sea with, especially Qeequeg, Starbuck, Stubbs. Ishmael also makes us weep for the whales, and in that light, Moby Dick is seen as the great white avenger and Ahab the one who has gone over to the dark side of the force.
6/16/08	The World According to Garp	Irving, John	1978	popular adult	fiction	20:24:01	Prichard, Michael	In the World according to Garp, all of us are terminal cases. a great line to end the book, but somehow the audio did not live up to my expectations. I remember it as one of my all time favorite reads in the early 80’s, and it just didn’t seem that good this time. Are my tastes changing, did the narrator turn me off, or is my memory colored too much by the movie. Hard to imagine Garp as anyone but Robin Williams, now, or Jenny Fields as anyone but Glen Close. The stories of the Pension Grilpazer and The World According to Benzenhauser play a much bigger role than I remember, and Jenny dies much earlier than I remember. Irving in the afterword says his son got it right. It’s about trying to protect his children in a world that is not safe and which cannot be made safe.
5/31/08	The Age of Voltaire	Durant, Will and Ariel	1965	Popular, educated adult	European History	798	print	This was the age that saw the shift in sensibility, where the Enllightenment took control of the modern mind. Voltaire and the philosophes stand at the middle, especially Diderot, but also D’alembert, D’Holbach, Helvetius, buliding on the thought of Hume, Montesquieu, and the scientific advance--Buffon, Linnaeus, Lyell, etc. Durant makes much of the fact that by remaining exclusively Catholic, France chose to have the whole edifice topple with the Catholic faith. Once the restrictions of Louis XIV’s old age were lifted, France also enjoyed a century of voluptuousness. At the same time, individual consciousness was developing in the modern novel of Fielding and Richardson, and education began taking on the burdens of extending civilized behavior in man.
5/17/08	Vikings	Harl, Kenneth	2005	introductory college	history, medieval europe	18:00	Harl, Kenneth	Harl makes the case that the Vikings changed the face of Europe. He outlines their history from the early trade with Romans through the age of migrations into the true Viking age and beyond to the formation of the kingdoms of Scandinavia. Vikings became the Normans in France--and hence in Italy and England, as well as the Rus in Novrogaard, and established colonies in ireland, iceland, and greenland, not to mention america. Europe is either organized by them or in response to them, and the Northmen become the most important forces in France, England, and eventually Italy.
4/27/08	Lucky You	Hiaasen, Carl	1997	adult popular	comic detective		Wilson, George	not the best Hiaasen, but not the worst. It was an enjoyable story. Joylayne wins the lottery, but so do a couple of white supremacists, Bodean Brizzer and Chub, who win the other half of the ticket. They steal her half as well, but then she tracks them down with the help of ace reporter, Tom Krome. Joylayne lives in Grange Florida, home of the weeping Madonna and road stain Jesus. In the meantime, Krome is targeted for murder by the husband of the wife he has been porking, and his boss ends up as turtle boy at the weeping Madonna stature. The plot comes to a climax on a small island in the keys where Bodean and Chub starve to death after kidnapping a waitress at the local Hooters, and JoyLayne establishes a wildlife sanctuary for her turtles.
4/16/08	American Pastoral	Roth, Philip	1997	adult	fiction	15:33	Silver, Ron	This was my first Roth novel and I was blown away. There were passages so poignant, so moving, so true, that I could only say “wow!” Although the story of Swede Luvov seems pretty straightforward, the structure is not, because it Zuckerman tells us up front that he is making the story up. Swede was his childhood hero, and a chance meeting between them leads to his misunderstanding of what the Swede was about. Swede had it all in his New Jersey enclave--the great athlete who married Miss New Jersey, grew wealthy, and moved to Old Rimrock. Then his daughter blows up a post office and his world, his American Pastoral falls apart. It’s really a story about America, though, not just Swede, and how Zuckerman feels the great American Pastoral fell apart.
4/5/08	Transcendent Summits: The Climber’s Route to Self-Discovery	Roach, Gerry	2004	popular	mountaineering autobiography	212	print	Jim gave me this to read, and I found it pretty tedious. By the time I got through Roach’s acronyms, I was pretty bored. I agree with Jim that it’s interesting to have the history of some of the early Boulder climbers, but Roach does strike me as a pompous ass at times. Too bad, for it was watching one of Gerry’s slide shows in 1974 that really started me climbing. His timing is all wrong, too, making me wonder how much is true and how much is made up. Even in Boulder, I don’t see high school kids quoting tibetan chants in the mid 50’s. I didn’t know anything at all about Shirley, and she occupies a lot of the book. Interesting to find that she later commited suicide.
3/30/08	Valis	Dick, Philip K	1981	adult	fantasy?/fiction?	8:44	Weiner, Tom	Philip K Dick, a character in the book, is going schizophrenic, and his projected personality is Horselover Fat, who is irradiated with a pink light and has an intense vision of the cosmology, cosmogony, and meaning of the universe, which he lays out in his tractates (cf Wittgenstein?), a gnostic approach fusing Christianity, Juadaism, Taoism, Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam, and science fiction. His vision ties in with other characters in the book, leading to an interview with the fifth savior of the universe, a two year old child known as Saint Sophia. She and her parents explain VALIS - vast active living intelligence system--which may or not represent a superior technology residing near the Sirius star system. She dies accidentally, however, and Horselover Fat begins his quest again.
3/25/08	Crime and Punishment	Dostoevsky, Fyodor	1866	college/serious	fiction-psychological	20:30	Heald, Anthony	I found Raskolnikov utterly suffocating in the first half of the book and wanted to put it down. He was as irritating as Ignatius O’Reilly. Not nearly as interesting as Holden in Blood Meridian. I could see Dostoevsky trying to portray the consequences of anything goes when thought is king, and in his rebirth, feeling replaces thinking. But really the novel should have ended before the epilogs kicked in. Certainly his redemption is spelled out more clearly in the epilog, but it was foretold in the original end. Porphiry could be the prototype Columbo. And what to make of Svidrigilov? Was he really so despicable? Many of the characters feel straight from a cartoon. Certainly the psychology of Raskolnikov and Svidrigilov stand out as the most telling points in the novel.
3/13/08	The Origins of Ancient Great Civilizations	Harl, Kenneth W	2005	Introductory College	history lecture	6	Harl, Kenneth	A very hurried introduction to the origins of civilization of the ancient near east, with the development of agriculture leading to the cities of the Tigris Euphrates Valley, first in lower Mesopotamia and the founding of Ur and Uruk through the Akkad kingdom of Sargon and then the Babylonia of Hammurabi. On to Egypt and the three phases of Early, Middle, and late civilizations, leading to the Egyptian empire through Ramses II. He also discussed the Hittites and Crete, but then brings in the movement and migrations of people bringing the Dark Age of about 1100 BC. Out of the ashes emerge the Hebrews, the Assyrians, and finally the Persians, who come as the natural heirs of the development of 30 centuries. Not nearly as good as his other stuff, but still gave a decent overall outline.
3/8/08	American Creation	Ellis, Joseph	2007	college/college educated adult	history of founding period	10:58	Mayer, John H	Really, a follow-up, not quite as good, to Founding Brothers. Ellis again takes seven episodes in the founding of the nation: Washington’s refusal to take the British head on and win a war of attrition, Madison and the growing force of Federalism, Madison’s standing Federalism on its head in the creation of the Republican Party, Washington’s attempt to treat American Indian tribes differently, Jefferson’s luck in the Louisiana Purchase, but also his failure to provide leadership in the slavery question. I almost get the sense that Jefferson is responsible for the Civil War. More of Ellis’s axe to grind with Jefferson. The Madison-Jefferson alliance comes much more to the front here, especially as Madison turns his back on the Federalism that Washington and others developed in response to their experiences at Valley Forge and their actual war experiences.
2/27/08	East of Eden	Steinbeck, John	1952	Adullt	fiction	25:26:00	Poe, Richard	Is it one of the great american novels? It certainly feels like it right now. Timshiel - “Thou mayest!” It is a call to freedom and ultimate responsibility. Does it fly in today’s preoccupation with brain neurology and biologic determinism? It was the force that gave Samuel Hamilton the ability to look forward to living when he knew that he was just preparing to die. It was the only blessing that Adam could give to Cal. It was the great lesson that Lee pulled from the elders. It is Lee’s book, after Samuel Hamilton dies, as far as I am concerned. There are times that Cal and Aron don’t ring true in their thinking, and I’m not sure what to make of Cathy. But right now it feels heads and shoulders above any other novel I’ve read or listened to, with only a couple of exceptions. A call to a heroic life in fiction.
2/18/08	Basket Case	Hiaasen, Carl	2002	popular	crime fiction comic	13:00	Wilson, George	Not the best Hiaasen, this one tended to go on too long. Also, I’m not sure how many first person narrators that Hiaasen has had. The journalist assigned to writing obituaries after insulting the owner who has been steadily watering the newspaper down. A lot of similarities with “Our House,” the play that we saw last month. Chasing down the murderer of the Slut Puppies. A good enjoyable story and listen.
2/9/08	The Story of India	Wood, Michael	2007	Popular Adult	History	9:37	Dastor, Sam	I find Wood to be fascinating, and that he is preoccupied with India at present is OK with me. I learning much about the general scheme of history in India, realizing that much of early India is Pakistan now. But Wood makes clear that India is a British idea, anyway. Some idea of the first civilizations of the Indus and the invasions of the Aryans--cementing what Karen Armstrong had to say about the development of Vedic religion. Did not quite realize the Siddartha was not a “heterodox” sect as claimed, but a reaction of strict Brahmanical rites. Ashoka as the first great modern empire, followed by Mauryas and then sometime later domination by Afghans in the north, leading eventually to Babar and the other Moghuls. Makes clear that India will be the world force/economy of the future.
1/30/08	The Shadow of the Wind	Zafon, Carlos Ruiz	1995	popular adult	mystery fiction	18:08	Davis, Johnathan	While I did not want to quit altogether, there were times that I wished I were listening to something else, I guess most particularly when Daniel doesn’t come to the aid of Beatrize. And then his meddling has the woman killed. The ends do get wrapped up in the end, I guess, perhaps too much so. A lot of surprising twists, especially around the character of the author. Anyway, much of seemed just plain silly. An attempt to be Davinci Code for books set in post war Barcelona complete with steamy sex and incest and some truly evil characters.
1/16/08	The Greco Roman Moralists	Johnson, Luke Timothy		College Introductory	historical philosophical lectures	12:10	Johnson, Luke Timothy	I didn’t think I would care much for these, but I got into the lectures on the philosophers of roman antiquity. Especially moving to me were the lectures on Cicero, Seneca, and Plutarch. The emphasis is on stoicism, and philosophy as a way of life, emphasizing self control. Epictetus, Rufous Musonius, Dio Chrosotom, Philo and the other Jews, and even Marcus Aurelius left me a bit mystified and cold. Johnson makes it clear that philosophy was not about abstruse ideas but about the attitude toward life to know what could be changed and what could not, and about the formation of habits and character--character is habits formed over a long period of time. Philosophy is about choice.
1/8/08	The Looming Tower	Wright, Lawrence	2007	adult	contemporary history	17:19	Sklar, Alan	Wright tries to explain the rise of bin Laden and the Moslem Brotherhood and their joining forces before the attacks of 9-11. He goes back to Qutb’s visit to America and Greeley in 1947 and the brutality that accompanied the repression and death of Qutb. He describes in detail the background and development of al Zawahiri and bin Laden but also the growing obsession of their thoughts first in Afghanistan then Sudan, leading to the bombings in Kenya, the USS Cole, and eventually the World Trade Center. He also makes clear the turning of their thoughts of excommunicating everyone who disagrees. Really scary was the failure of American intelligence and lack of cooperation between the CIA, FBI and NSA. The story of John O’Neill was especially ironic and poignant.
12/23/07	Native Tongue	Hiaasen, Carl	1991	popular adult	detective fiction	15:48	Wilson, George	Another fun listen in the Hiaasen mode. Francis Xavier Kingsbury, a mobster, opens a theme park to compete with Disney World, but his scheme begins to unravel with the theft of two blue tongued voles at the behest of an old gray haired panther who is also a radical environmentalist with a penchant for shooting men in the hand or the foot. Skink gets involved, of course. Francis X’s bodyguard, Pedro Luz, is addicted to steroids and ends up chewing his own leg off when he’s trapped. In the end he’s raped to death by Dickie Dolphin.
12/22/07	Europe Since 1815	Garrett, Mitchell and Godfrey, James	1947	college introductory	European History	40:30:00	Griffin, Charlton	I did not realize that the book was so dated, but it did a good job of catching me up on the Congress of Vienna, Nationalization, the forces leading to W.W.I, etc. A decent overview, even if many of the opinions seem a bit old fashioned, such as blaming Nietzsche as prefiguring the rise of Nazism. Particularly fascinated with the rise of Bismark, especially in leading up to the War with France in 1872, which lead directly to World War I. I had felt the need for this after reading Proud Tower. Now I feel ready to tackle Guns of August. Have we really left the antagonisms of Europe behind? Somehow we begin the with Valois not wanting to be encircled by the Hapsburgs and worked our way through the impossible alliances of the triple entente and alliance over the same issues. Will they arise again?
11/18/07	Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition	Yates, Francis	1964	post collegiate	history of renaissance thought	450	print	Did I really try to read this over 25 years ago? Where was my mind? I was a mystic and Bruno appealed to me.Yates makes clear that the split in modern science that downplays magical interpretation of the world comes from this time. There, Hermetic thought comes directly from the earliest days of the renaissance as Ficino translates the Pimander and the Ascelpius, thinking that Trismegistus predated Moses. Pico added the Cabala. They thought it gave the ability to know ultimate truths. Bruno sought a new world order based on magic and a universal brotherhood of man.“The real function of the Renaissance magus…is that he changed the will…it was this basic psychological reorientation towards a direction of the will which made all the difference.”
11/14/07	Lady Chatterley’s Lover	Lawrence, D. H.	1928	popular	fiction	12:58	Hilton, Margaret	So much it sounds silly and dated now. Connie has waves of mystical, oceanic forces swell over her body during orgasm as she gives herself over to absolute pleasure. Or am I just getting too old to enjoy it? Sir Clifford is a characiture, and Mellors really has little to recommend himself. I had forgotten how much of the book is really about the after effects of W.W.I, though, and Mellors comes off a little like Thoreau in condemning modern machinery and technology as blocking man from real life and real experiences. And the whole class consciousness bit is beyond me. Of course I was in love with Connie whilst listening to the book, but I really don’t get the connection with deeper forces while giving yourself up--the female always yielding to the male.
11/6/07	Blood Meridian	McCarthy, Cormac	1985	adult fiction	western	13:06	Poe, Richard	One of the most brutal--no, make that the most brutal--books I have ever read. Gouging out eyes, smashing babies’ heads against rocks, shooting dogs in the river, and killing a bear in the end. And what to make of the judge? Holden. Enormously talented but amoral, if not evil. And he’s left dancing at the end, claiming to live forever. Wanting to catch everything in his journal only to destroy it. Is he the devil? The kid survives everything but the judge, and at the end it’s not entirely clear whether the judge kills him, sodomizes him, or both. Some reviewers have remarked on the cleansing power of violence, but I don’t get that either. But the language is so descriptive, so powerful.
10/28/07	Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets	Rowling, J.K.				9:00	print	The book started off slowly for me, and I remember enjoying the read so much more than the beginning. But then the last two hours, as Harry and Ron begin their adventure after Hermione is petrified, picks up the action much more forcefully. I don’t know if the narrator is too “childish” for me. Certainly the themes seem a little deeper with this book, especially with its emphasis on pure blood vs mud blood. A lot less quiddich this book, and a lot more sleuthing. Still, it was very enjoyable, and I look forward to listening to the rest of the series. It’s amazing how much I have forgotten, even though I have seen bits and pieces of the movie.
10/16/07	The Proud Tower	Tuchmann, Barbara	1966	early college	historical essays	21:49	Nay, Nadia	Tuchman writes a series of essays outlining the culture and some of the major themes of the decades preceding the first world war: british aristocracy, anarchism, the hague peace conference, the spanish american civil war, the Dreyfus affair, the culture of germany, the transfer of power in 1906 england, socialism as a political force. Fascinating personalities emerge from the fray, especially, for me, the speaker of the house: Thomas B Reed. Winston Churchill is a growing player during this time. The Kaiser is a fool, but I may have gotten than more from followup reading. The chapters on the British aristocracy and the french military during the Dreyfus affair read as savage indictments, now, as does the U S role in the Philippines and in Cuba. Growing industrialism abets a growing arms race.
9/19/07	Tom Jones	Fielding, Henry	2006 (1749)			37:55:36	Griffin, Charlton
9/3/07	Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone	Rowling, J. K.					audio
8/8/07	The Age of Louis XIV: 1648-1715	Durant, Will and Ariel	1963	popular adult	history--european	721	print	From the Treaty of Westphalia signaling the end of the Thirty Years War to the Peace of Utrect, signalling the end of the war of Spanish succession. The Sun king rose to greatness and extravagance, but then revoked the edict of Nantes and drove France to bankruptcy in war. England deposed and killed the king, suffered through Cromwell, restored the Stuarts, and then overthrew them for William of Orange and eventually the Hanovers. England took mastery of the seas and Spain became a second rate empire while the Empire finally stopped the Ottomans with Polish help at Vienna. The explosive growth of 17th century philosophy, especially in Newton, Hobbes, Locke, Bayle, Spinoza, and Leibnitz, truly the beginning of the Enlightenment. Spinoza is a new hero for me.
8/6/07	The Rockies	Lavender, David	1968	popular adult	history--regional--the west	367	print	Took a long time to read 2 or 3 pages at a sitting on the shitter in Durango. From the first white contact in the pueblos and Pope’s rebellion through the gold rush and railroads to the mid-60’s and the great growth of tourism. A sordid story, really, of avarice and rapine, but then driven by individual’s needs and individual’s greeds, which is something compared to the European outlook gathered in the Durant books. The explorations, the fur trade, the way west, the discovery of gold, and suddenly, it was all boom and bustle. I was more interested in Colorado, but the same story was played out all over. Eventually the fat cats took over, and the mines were a battlefield not of individuals but of corporations and unions, all based on a boom and bust cycle of the econony.
7/18/07	The Age of Reason Begins	Durant, Will and Ariel	1961	popular adult	european history	647	print	a re-reading two years later. I am struck more now how shallow Durant seems to be, especially after reading the book on the Reformation last summer. Same material, but Mccullouch is some much more informative and scholarly. Still, overall, a good introduction to the times that led to the formation of modern states as well as the growth of scientific knowledge: Montaigne to Galileo and Bacon and Descartes. And the bloody, bloody wars: France’s civil wars, the spanish armada, the revolt of the netherlands, the thirty years war, and finally the english revolution. and again, so much great art: Rubens, El Greco, carravagio, velasquez, hals, rembrandt, not to mention bernini, and that doesn’t even take into account english poetry and drama as well as cervantes, racine, cornelle, etc.
7/2/07	The Rise of American Democracy: Jefferson to Lincoln	Wilentz, Sean	2005	College or better	nonfiction american history	796	print	Took an awful lot of time to finally finish the book, but it was worth it. While I have become shaky on the first chapters leading up to John Quincy Adams, now, especially since the book took three starts, I really do have a better feel for the decades preceding the civil war. What a bunch of intellectual pygmies between Andrew Jackson and Abraham Lincoln. Martin Van Buren may have been the only president in that time worth a damn. And with the rise of the slave power, especially as formulated by Calhoun, how much the country was really enthralled to racism and slavery. The Missouri compromise holds it in check until the Nebraska-Kansas compromise of 1850, where it all falls apart and begins the headlong rush to war.
6/25/07	The Sun Also Rises	Hemingway, Ernst	1926	popular adult	fiction	7:46	Hurt, William	I’m having trouble seeing this as a classic. While it may be a portrait of the lost generation, it didn’t do all that much for me. And I find it hard to believe that people really drank as much as portrayed in the novel. It’s all about Lady Ashley, isn’t it? Reminds me a bit of how everyone fell for Jan Long, or especially her friend, Laura. And they all seem a bit shallow. I can appreciate Robert Cohn’s need to feel alive and the need to experience life, but I do have trouble with the anti semitism of the other characters in their disgust over him. I’m not sure what to make of the style or of the seeming lack of emotion expressed by the narrator. He just wants to show the emotion through action, and it makes the prose seem pretty bleak. And he goes on and on in detail with the descriptions......
6/16/07	John Adams	McCullough, David	2001	college level adult	history--american founding father	29:56:00	Runger, Nelson	I really did enjoy this a lot more than I expected. John Adams deserves a lot more respect than I gave him. And he writes so well, that it is a pleasure when his or Abigail’s letters are excerpted at length. McCullough is not soured on Jefferson as Ellis, so he comes through stronger. I cried when Abigail died and John just wanted to lay down on the bed and die alongside her. A bad rap for his own notions of meritocracy? In any case, he did not understand the sentiments for democracy and hence lost to Jefferson. He spent a good portion of the revolutionary war in Holland and France, and thus led to the first recognition of the US by a foreign power, but that was really due to Washington’s victory at Yorktown. A true hero.
6/7/07	Strip Tease	Hiaasen, Carl	1993	popular adult	comic crime novel	15:13	Wilson, George	Although I was put off by associations with the movie--which some would have as the worst movie every made--I enjoyed the story of Erin Grant who is married to a pill freak and is caught up in the political machinations of a local congressman who is beholden to the sugar lobby for his power. She is watched over by the bouncer at her strip joint-Shad- who is constantly looking for ways to sue for negligence, and by Lt. Al Garcia who is out of his jurisdiction but wants to find the killers who spoiled his Idaho vacation. Dilbeck the congressman is handled by power broker Malcom Moldovsky, whose primary hero is John Mitchell.
5/20/07	Diamonds are Forever	Fleming, Ian	1956	popular adult	spy fiction	6:30	Vance, Simon	This time Bond goes up against American gangsters, particularly the Spangle gang, as he tries to seal off a diamond smuggling pipeline out of South Africa. Along the way, he falls for Tiffany Case as he tries to establish his identity in the Spangle gang. He investigates a horse race, in which the jockey is drowned in mud, and ends up in Vegas, where he confronts and is beaten by the American brother of the Spanele gang. Eventually he kills most of the antagonists in the story but only after he is rescued by Tiffany Case and by Felix Leiter. A bizarre play on names in the Spangle gang. Enjoyable, but there were times when I wished that Ian would just get on with telling the story.
5/18/07	Tears of the Giraffe	Smith, Alexander McCall	2002	popular adult	detective	7:51	Lecat, Lisette	Further adventures of Mma Rwamotswe and Mr. J. L. B Matakone. This time, Mma’s major case is finding out what happened to the son of a wealthy american woman, while Mr. J.L.B Matekone ends up adopting a couple of bush children without Precious’s consent. Also, his maid conspires to have Precious thrown in jail after she learns that they have engaged, but it backfires and she is thrown in jail instead. Mma Rwamotswe finds out what happened to the son by outwitting a college professor, her secretary finds out that a wife has been cheating, and Mr. JLB Matakone finds out that the girl that he has adopted will make a fine replacement for him in the shop when the time comes.
5/10/07	Buddha	Armstrong, Karen	2005	popular adult	religious autobiography	6:28	Reading, Kate	I wanted something substantial after finishing ZAMM, but I’m afraid that this wasn’t it. It was OK, but somehow it didn’t hold up as well as when I read it or when I first listened to it a couple of years ago. Karen was really pushing the Axial Age in this book and so keeps trying to putting Gotama into that category. She does a good job of showing how his yoga training is really the basis of his deeply introspective psychology and also showing how some of the first sermons came about, especially as he pushed the doctrine of dukkha beyond old age, sickness, and death into the everyday grasping of the ego and the monkey mind of consciousness, but she also makes clear that the lay members of the sangha are really pretty much second class citizens.
5/9/07	The History of Ancient Egypt	Brier, Robert		early college	historical lectures	24:37:00	Brier, Robert	This may have been the least favorite of all the Great Courses series that I have listened to. I do have a better grasp of the timeline of Egypt and some of the pharaohs, but first I didn't care for Brier all that much as a lecturer, and I kept wondering why I cared about Egypt at all. He didn’t convince me to care about Egyptian history, I guess. Monotheism may have come out of Egypt, and great monuments, but the middle eastern kingdoms seem so much more germane to who we are and how our civilization has come about.
5/1/07	Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance	Pirsig, Robert	1974	early college, popular adult	philosophical	15:36	Kramer, Michael	I was delighted that ZAMM held up so well. It’s probably my favorite read of all time, and now it’s been my favorite listen. I'm inspired to work more on my bicycle. The listen also seemed to bring out the human side of the story more, rather than the philosophical. I certainly did not want the book to listen, and I wanted to just start it all over again. The book is so seminal to my thinking that I’m not sure that I can fairly judge it. I’m also inspired to look more deeply into the Metaphysics of Quality and see where that train of thought has taken people. And I did not know that Pirsig was involved in helping to start the Minnesota Zen Center that Natalie Goldberg also frequented.
5/1/07	Whale Talk	Crutcher, Chris		adolescent	fiction		print
4/1/07	No Country for Old Men	McCarthy, Cormac	2006	Adult fiction	realistic, modern, western fiction	7:32	Tom Stechschulte	Lewellan Moss stumbles across a bloody drug deal gone bad in the deserts of far west Texas and takes the money left in the truck. Shortly thereafter he is hunted down by Anton Chigur who is a force of evil and kills everyone around him. Moss is also sought by the local sheriff, Bell, who is trying to save his life. Numerous shootouts. Chigur gets off on seeing people die and even argues with them before he blows them away. The story in the end belongs to Bell as he decides to retire rather than face forces like Chigur anymore. It really is a morality tale about the nature of evil and the power of drugs to bring that evil on. I kept saying that McCarthy had the voices of old West Texans dead on, but that really is an exaggeration.
3/16/07	Founding Brothers	Ellis, Joseph J	2000	early college	early american history	13:27	Runger, Nelson	I think that I enjoyed the listen even more than the read. Ellis sounds good. The capstone of the book is the dialog between Jefferson and Adams, which has become--to Ellis--the central dialog of American politics: freedom vs equality. When he talks about inherent contradiction, that’s essentially what he means. And he makes each of the episodes come alive: Burr vs Hamilton, Franklin’s last hurrah against slavery, Hamilton and Madison negotiating over dinner, Washington’s retirement, Madison and Jefferson and formation of the Republican (now Democratic party) as well as the reconciliation of Jefferson and Adams. I have more respect for TJ now than I did after American sphinx, and I’m ready to tackle Adams, Hamilton, and Franklin in their books.
2/20/07	A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man	Joyce, James	1916	early college	autobiographical fiction	11:18	audio	I enjoyed listening to the book a lot, especially as I had not remembered much of it from college, except for silence, exile, and cunning. The beginning consciousness with the word play, and then the early school, remind me a lot of Proust, but then as his older consciousness kicks in, especially with the arguments between the father and Dante and Stephen’s growing consciousness of being poor, take on an aging and much more self conscious voice. Later narration with his sense of guilt over the prostitutes and his failed attempt at religious conversion show a growing sense of alienation that culminates with his break with his mother and his church, his country, his family, his friends. I should take on Ulysses while I am fresh with the voice.
2/19/07	Moonraker	Fleming, Ian	1955	popular adult	spy fiction	6:50	Vance, Simon	Continuing with the series, but Bond is so different in the books than in the films. He catches a cheat at bridge, who turns out to be a deranged Nazi who has fooled most of England that he is really a benefactor for England in building an anti ballistic missile system, based on the V2 rocket. Bond uncovers part of the plot, especially after an attractive agent from Scotland Yard is compromised--Gala Brand. Eventually, they uncover Drax’s plot to land the missile on London, but Bond is able to reset the homing mechanism, which of course catches Drax in his submarine speeding away from the expected nuclear blast. Oh, and Bond loses the girl in this one.
1/29/07	Symposium	Plato	4th century BC (audio 2006)	could be high school	philosophical dialog	2:32	dramatised cast recording	This really brings out the dramatic nature of the dialogs, even if a bit overblown at times. Not much here that I hadn’t heard before, and Diotima’s speech on the nature of love and the progression from sexual attraction to the Good, really the heart of the dialog, proves to be disappointingly short. Really brings out the homoeroticism of Athenian culture at the time, especially in the first speeches praising eros, and then again in Alcibiades’ speech on Socrates later in the story. Boys night out, really, with philosophy thrown in. Aristophones and Agathon play major parts in the story as it develops. Learn more about Athenian culture than about philosophical ideas. A comedy almost. and fun
1/28/07	Tess of the D’Urbervilles	Hardy, Thomas	1891	popular adult	fiction	17:02	Porter, Davina	Pretty unremitting in its depressing narration, I had to stop listening at times because I was getting too depressed. From the time that we learn of John Durbeyfield’s nature until Tess is hung at the end of the story, Tess is constantly put upon by a variety of forces, but more especially Alec D”urbeville and then even later by Angel Claire, who, after all, was unworthy of her love. But I did not buy her assertion that she was strictly a victim of Alec, and so his murder does not ring so true to me, even if the circumstances of her mother’s homelessness kept pushing her there. But the descriptions of village life and of various pastoral scenes are worth the price of admission. Just a bit hokey that she is finally caught at Stonehenge, I think.
1/15/07	The No 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency	Smith, Alexander McCall	1999	popular adult	detective fiction	8:10	Liscat, Lisette	The first in the series as Mma Ramotswe becomes a private eye in Botswana and tells a number of episodes as she solves a number of cases, often to her own distress. A lot of love for Africa and african traditions, even as Precious is often put down by the males in the story. I found it very charming, even though the story was hard to get into after listening to Bless Me Ultima. The largest case involves rescuing a boy from a witch doctor who is befriending local politicians. Precious is a traditional African woman, even though she sees herself as modern, and her father worked long in the mines of south africa to make a better life for her.
1/12/07	Live and Let Die	Fleming, Ian	1954	popular adult	spy fiction	6:11	Vance, Simon	The second in the James Bond collection. In this one, he faces mister Big, the Harlem war lord who is finding gold doubloons and selling them in New York City to finance international terrorism. Bond falls in love with Solitaire, the fortune teller, but mainly because she lies for him. Again, Bond is a bit of a putz compared to the movie Bond, as he is captured twice by Mr. Big. He and Solitaire are only saved by luck at the end of the novel when Mr. Big tries to drag them through the coral reef to be eaten by barracudas. Pretty racist in much of its language.
1/11/07	Slaughterhouse Five	Vonnegut, Kurt			war fiction	6:02	aduio	The story of Billy Pilgrim, who can move back and forth in time, especially when directed by the Trafalmadorians. But really, the story about the firebombing of Dresden, as Vonnegut makes clear in the prologue. Pretty disjointed narration, as Billy Pilgrim jumps from episode to episode. But a powerful statement about a number of absurd propositions in our life, especially death, “and so it goes.”
1/1/07	Casino Royale	Fleming, Ian	1953	popular adult	spy fiction	4:39	Vance, Simon	The first James Bond, and a whole lot better than any of the movies. Bond isn’t nearly so invincible, so suave, and so cool. As a matter of fact, he’d be dead if not for extraordinary circumstances. He does bring down La Chiffre, but then is captured and tortured by him. He does fall in love with another agent, and the last half of the book is taken up by their affair only to have her commit suicide since she is a double agent. Bond considers quitting MIA, only to have his attitude harden once he finds her secret, and his emotions close up big time. Not particularly admirable character, but a very good listen
12/30/06	The Seven Daughters of Eve: The Science that Reveals Our Genetic Ancestry	Sykes, Bryan	2001	popular adult	nonfiction scientific	297	print	Sykes tells the story of using mitochondrial dna as a means of tracing genetic evolution, first by stories and incidents showing how mitochondrial was discovered as a means of tracing genetics and then showing how ancestry could be traced. Since mitochondrial dna is supplied only by the mother, recombination does not occur and so it transfers pure, altered only by mutation which can be shown to change slowly over time. Sykes then tells how he had to overcome resistance from the genetic establishment to establish his theory, especially Luca Cavalla-Sforsi who maintained that agricultural based population swept aside hunter gatherer-populations. Sykes traces ancestry of Europe to seven women, six of whom, representing over 80% of present population, were hunter-gatherers.
12/27/06	Bless Me, Ultima	Anaya, Rudolfo	1972	adult to late high school fiction	hispanic fiction	11:12	Ramirez, Robert	Although I read this years ago, I don’t remember it as dark and sinister as it turns out to be when taken in a short burst. I cried at the end of the novel when Tenorio shoots Ultima’s owl and she dies as well. Anotonio’s character and that of his friends seem much older than 2nd grade, but that is the only weakness. I don’t know if I came away from the first reading with the strong sense of the pull between the Lunas and the Marez in trying to influence Tony’s life, and I certainly don’t remember the scene where Tony is asked to play the priest and then is set upon by the other members of the gang when he refuses to pronounce penance on his friend. So rich in detail and so much pulling in different directions between the church, Ultima, and the golden carp. An excellent, excellent book.
12/15/06	Literacy for the 21st Century	Warwick, David					print	Warwick is a shill for educational technology. His ideas were expressed much, much earlier by George Leonard in Education and Ecstacy. He calls for expanding literacy to include what he calls the 4 E’s after buying completely into Prensky’s ides about digital natives. I guess that I’ve become too jaded about the prospect of technology transforming education to any great extent and I found myself arguting with his thesis at almost every point.
12/14/06	Galileo’s Daughter	Sobel, Dava		easy college	popular history	10:48	Guidal, George	Really, it is the history of science. Galileo’s life is portrayed, but this time in relation to the letters that his daughter wrote him. Pope Urban comes off as even more of a butt hole--has there ever been a compassionate, loving pope?--and the authority of the catholic church as a big comedy. The letters from Soeur Maria Celeste give a human face to the problems Galileo faced with the inquisition after the publication of the Dialog. And the heartbreak of having his daughter die almost as soon as he was released to house arrest outside of Florence.
12/3/06	Lord Jim	Conrad, Joseph	1900 (1997)	popular fiction--but dated	sea fiction	15:52	Steven Crossley	I hated the first half of this book and almost quit listening to it. But it was a classic that I had read years and years ago. So I kept at it. It got better, but I don’t know that I would recommend it as a read or a listen to anybody else. There is still that part of me that identifies with Jim, the romantic, but a part of me that agrees with the high school AP class that says he should have just shot himself and been done with it. Marlowe, of course, gives the story any complexity that it has. That and the descriptive narrative passages, but I was pretty uninterested until Jim went to Patusan. And he seemed a fool in the end, trusting Brown. Seems pretty dated and racist, I guess, as it talks about Jim being one of us. yes, he has demons, but was it worth the time. I don’t think so.
11/27/06	Nature Girl	Hiaasen, Carl	2006	popular fiction	mystery and comedy	11:29	Adams, Lee	Not the best Hiaasen. I took to wondering whether his recent successes with the adolescent novels and movies, not to mention Skinny Dip, has done him in. Stranded on one of the 10,000 islands with Honey Santana, and her son, and eventually her ex-husband, along with a telemarketer and his erstwhile girlfriend, complicated with a half human character, a seminole indian wanna be, a sorority girl who cannot shut up, the ghost of a dead gambler, a strange religious cult, a wife who gets off on pornographic photos of her husband taken by a jaded private investigator, somehow set around land based schemes and the usual Hiaasen scum of the earth.
11/16/06	Great Battles of the Ancient World	Fagan, Garrett		intermediate college history	history lecture	12:12	Fagan, Garrett	Fagan attempts to outline the nature of warfare and perhaps come up with some plausible explanations of why it exists and whether the “western way of war” as outlined by Hansen exists. He covers the rise of the Sumerian city states and the Egyptian kingdoms before getting into the heart of the matter with Greek hoplites, Alexander’s army, and the Roman legions before the fall of the Roman empire at Adrianople. In general, he tries to outline the major academic controversies and talk something about the way of war in face of the lack of any strong evidence, especially the early days. Warfare is ubiquitous, and so much seems to depend on chance, even though Alexander and the Roman legions have some built in advantages through superiority and flexibility of strategy and tactics.
11/1/06	The Year of Magical Thinking	Didion, Joan	2005	serious adult	memoir	5:10	Caruso, Barbara	It seems like one of the most poignant books I have read/listened to. You sit down to dinner, and life as you know it ends. She makes dinner for her husband, John Gregory Dunne, her husband and best friend of 40 years, and he dies of a massive heart attack. At the same time, her daughter, Quintana, lay in a coma in a hospital. Didion learns to cope with both, but only at her own pace, and with an honesty and a fragility that brought tears to my eyes more than once. I cried early and often while listening. She shores up the ruins of her life with wide spread reading about death and remains brutally honest about what is happening to her, at the same time blending guilt and remembrance in a mesmerizing read. How can anyone who has read this ever approach death without remembering her grief?
10/25/06	The March	Doctorow, E. L.	2005	popular adult	historical fiction	11:08	Morton, Joe	Follows Sherman on the march through Georgia and then up into the Carolinas. But the real story is the intertwining stories of a number of characters, including Sherman, Pearl, Colonel Sartorious, the surgeon, etc. etc. A lot of gore and bloodshed, and a very different take on Sherman from that painted by Victor Davis Hanson. I enjoyed the listen, but in the end felt it a little disjointed and unrealistic. Pearl probably as much a central character as anyone as she escapes plantation life and finally sets off for freedom at the end of the war, especially after failed assassination attempt on Sherman by Harley.
10/25/06	Coach: Lessons in the Game of Life	Lewis, Michael	2005	easy and short	nonfiction sports	91	print	Lewis’s old high school baseball coach is under fire at his private school in New Orleans, and Lewis wants to know why, or wants to know why present day high school athletes no longer respond to his coaching. Coach Fitz is a hard ass--the kind that I hated to play for--that intimidates kids but also gets them to respond with efforts to play beyond themselves and their abilities. Lewis recounts legends and episodes of his growing up with Fitz as a coach compared to contemporary times where parents try to protect their kids. “We listened to the man because he had something to tell us, and us alone. Not how to play baseball. . .not how to win. . .not even how to sacrifice. He was teaching us something far more important: how to cope with the two greatest enemies of a well-lived life, fear and failure.”
10/23/06	Telegraph Days	McMurtry, Larry	2006	popular adult	historical fiction	9:29	Potts, Annie	Another strong female voice for McMurtry, Larry. Nellie Courtright speaks in first person narration from the suicide hanging by her father and moving with her brother to Rita Blanca in Oklahoma’s no man’s land with her brother. The brother ends up killing the six Yazee brothers saving his sister. That attracts a lot of attention, especially Buffalo Bill who takes Nellie to manage his affairs in North Platte Nebraska. She also has flings with a number of historical characters, and she does love her fornication. Follows her back to Rita Blanca, on to Tombstone, and thence to California and the early days of the movie. Pretty unrealistic, but what a voice. And Annie Potts was the perfect narrator for the story.
10/18/06	A Confederacy of Dunces	Toole, John Kennedy	1980	classic adult or college	comedic fiction	13:32	Leslie, Don	The story of Ignatius J. Reilly, late 20’s and a fat slob, who continues to live with his mother in a run down shack in a poor New Orleans neighborhood. He cannot hold a job and holds the post enlightenment world in contempt. A medievalist who records his disagreements with the modern world on a series of Big Chief tablets scattered about his bedroom. The plot begins when his mother tears the balcony from an apartment with her car and forces Ignatius to find a job, none of which lasts more than a few days or weeks. The most memorable is the Levi pants company where he plots revolt of the workers, who eventually turn on him. He’s hard to take and I had to stop listening at times, but also pathetic, as in full of pathos, as events come to head as his plots eventually collapse on him.
10/3/06	The Great Transformation	Armstrong, Karen	2006	early college	history of religion	22:31	Armstrong, Karen	Armstrong follows up on the Axial Age idea and weaves together strands of Chinese, Indo-Aryan, Greek, and Semitic religions, showing that a major transformation in the ways that humans thought about transcendence and about ethics was changed significantly in this period between about 700-200 BC. Probably the most significant change outlined for me was that of moving from the Aryan raiding culture through the Vedic period and thence to Buddhism and the response to Buddhism. Something similar to Jewish transformation in the days of the prophets, the Greeks during the time of the tragedians through Plato, and the Chinese in the Confucian period. Maybe the least convincing of her books that I have read/listened to.
9/15/06	The Reformation	MacCullock, Diarmaid	2003	college	european history	708	print	Maybe more about Reformation than you ever wanted to know, but it really does underlie much of who we are and what we think. Well written from Medieval background to implications in today’s thought--only about 17% of Europeans now consider themselves to be Christians. Good opening section on Medieval thought, especially as different in northern and southern europe, with background movements in Moravia with Hus and with Erasmus, leading to Luther and Zwingli, and thence to eventual Counter Reformation. But major emphasis on Reformed Protestantism with Calvin et al. Then long excursion into historical circumstances with the Hapsburgs, St. Bartholomew, England, the Spanish Netherlands, the thirty years war. Almost inevitable progression to Spinoza and Enlightenment.
7/17/06	The Last Apocalypse: Europe at the Year 1000 A.D.	Reston, James	1998	popular nonfiction	history	281	print	Reston maintains that 1000 A.D. was a major turning point in history when Christianity became the religion of Europe almost overnight and gained ascendance over the three outside forces of the Vikings, the Magyars, and the Moors. Much of the first half of the book deals with the conversion of the Viks, the Norse, Iceland, Russia, and Denmark with the political ramifications. As much as I wanted to fill myself in on the history of this era, I found this book pretty boring. I guess it was just too disjointed for me.
7/3/06	Ideas: A History of Thought and Invention from Fire to Freud	Watson, Peter	2005	college	history of ideas	746	print	It’s pretty much what it says it is, a history of ideas from fire to freud. Much like the Modern Mind, that I read last summer, an awful lot of ideas are covered in a very short period of time. Probably the most fascinating for me was the development of language and of religion in early man. By the time Watson reached the Renaissance, I kind of lost interest for a bit, as I felt like he was covering common knowledge. As he reaches the 19th century, Watson reiterates what a bust Marx and Freud are for the 2th century: “is it not time to face the probablility that the essential Platonic notion of the “inner self” is misconceived? There is no inner self.” It would be interesting to use an outline of this book as the basis of a web of knowlege, putting info from other books as links in the outline.
6/23/06	Lone Star Nation	Brands, H. W.	2004	adult popular history	non fiction history	17:32	Leslie, Don	The story of the Texas liberation from Mexico from the original contracts with Stephen F. Austin through the establishment of the Republic after the battle of San Jacinto. Brands really emphasizes the role that Andrew Jackson plays in the conflict, first urging his friend Sam Houston to go to Texas and then backs him up in his retreating movement from Santa Ana. The Texicans wanted to stop and fight, but Houston kept retreating to the Louisiana border where the U S Army was waiting to join the fight. Finally, the men turned and faced Santa Ana almost on their own initiative. The politics of hold power in Mexico play a major role as Santa Ana uses Texas to hold on to power. More of a story tellers history than true analysis as Texas pretty much backs its way into independence. Also refutes the idea that Mexico really had any great hold on Texas.
3/14/06	American Sphinx: The Character of Thomas Jefferson	Ellis, Joseph	1996	college	historical biography	367	print	A whole new thinking for me of what Thomas Jefferson was about. Ellis makes the point that Barry Goldwater and Ronald Reagan probably rerpresent the Jeffersonian legacy of the hatred of federal govt. better than any other contemporary politician. It’s why the Jeffersonian “revolution of 1800” and its repudiation of federalism seems to best represent his presidency. But then the Louisiana probably the most important act of his, violates the whole spirit of his presidency. I probably identify most with his perpetual adolescence--his ability to keep his ideals neatly separated from reality--and John Adams made that point repeatedly. The comparisons with Washington are obvious, and Jefferson does not come off well. Gasp. I am extoling the adult over the adolescent.
1/28/06	A Struggle for Power	Draper, Theodore	1996	college	history	518	print	This is the book that I turned to after His Excellency, trying to figure out why the American Revolution occured. Was it just a grab for power and property by a few people who convinced the others to go along? The bottom line is, it was inevitable. The growth of population and commerce in the Americas made it so. The end of the Seven Years War and the loss of the French as a threat, combined with Parliament wishing to uphold the right to tax the colonies led to the break, and eventually neither side would back down over the issue of autonomy. IT was an inherent contradiction in the colonies with “no taxation without representation” but then impractical to be represented. It’s tied up with Locke’s idea that property = freedom and an aversion to taxes.
12/3/05	Stoner and Spaz	Koertge, Ron	2002	Adolescent	edgy fiction	169	print	Ben & Colleen. Ben is a bright high school senior, mother run away after father left, and living with grandmother, with cerebral palsy. a loner, spending his time in the movie showing oldies, Colleen is a drugger, girlfriend to the high school drug kingpin. Ben & Colleen meet by chance, then develop into a friendship/relationship, eventually a sexual relationship. Ben comes out of his shell, makes a movie about his school, as Colleen od/s and helps him work on his movie as she tries to get straight. Surprising ending as Ben shows his movie and Colleen wanders off to get high.
11/14/05	Give a Boy a Gun	Strasser, Todd	2000	adolescent	journal, interview, pastiche	188	print	In a series of interviews, chat transcripts, eyewitness descriptions, the actions of two boys planning and executing a Columbine like event at their high school. The big emphasis here is on the alienation and bullying that takes place in their school between the jocks and the goths, or whatever, preceding their rampage. Interspersed in the “narrative” are clippings of statistics and interviews with gun manufacturers showing how prevalent gun usage is becoming among youth. Eventually they lock many of the student body up in a gym and begin shooting, although not killing anyone. One boy shoots himself, and the other is beat to a pulp when one of the students gets loose. Pretty chilling, and pretty effective use of different source material.
11/13/05	Old School	Wolff, Tobias	2004	popular adult	personal narrative fiction	195	print	Seems like a followup to This Boys Life, with the narrator at an eastern prep school with a decidedly self ironic tone. Events of the plot concern three visits by authors--Robert Frost, Ayn Rand, and Ernest Hemingway--and the writing contests that precede their visits. Pretty savage portrait of Rand and the narrators rejection of her ideas after judging his family by her standards. Eventually he plagiarizes a short story, seeming unknowingly (although it is apparent to the reader), and is kicked out of school. The ending seemed a little lame as he meets with an old teacher years later who fills him in on the story of one of the teachers who quit at the same time, with a prodigal son moral. It did put me in the mind of the effect of lit on my younger days and how I came to judge people by the standards in the books that I was reading, too.
11/12/05	Keeping You a Secret	Peters, Jullie Anne	2003	adolescent	romance	250	print	I can’t believe that I found an adolescent lit novel hard to put down, but I really did enjoy this one. Holland Jaegar is a senior in the last semester of high school, senior class president, smart enough to get into Stanford, a swimmer, daughter of a single mom, having sex with her boyfriend. Then she begins to feel excited about a new girl in school--Cece--obsessed with her, finally admiting to herself that she is in love with her. The rest of the novel works out the details as people around them find out and Holland works herself out from under her mother’s expectations of her. OK, the book is a bit shallow at times and glosses over many of the difficulties, but it is easy to identify with Holland’s travails as well as her excitement over being in love with someone.
10/29/05	The World of Humanism: 1453-1517	Gilmore, Myron P.	1952	college	historical survey	270	print	I have long cherished the thought of working my way through the Rise of Modern Europe series, but this book leaves me in doubt. It covers European history from the fall of Constantinope to the Reformation, and seems so shallow in its coverage, even though it only touches on about 60 years. I enjoyed Durant so much more. Also interesting to compare to Watsons book above, for it was the time when the universality of knowledge was just beginning to break up into different compartments under the influence of humanism. The other major forces are the development of the nation states of Europe with the rise of secular power and the development of private ownership and capitalism. Erasmus’ vision of optimism and peace in 1516 is contrasted with Aeneas Sylvias despair of 1453.
10/1/05	The Modern Mind: An intellectual history of the 20th century	Watson, Peter	2001	college educated adult	intellectual history	772	print	A true tour of what seems like all the strands of thinking from 1900 to 2000. So dense and so rich that this book was hard to digest. Took damn near three months to finish, and then as soon as I finished one chapter, I pretty much forgot what was covered as I plunged into yet another chapter. One is left with a feeling of skepticism and agnosticism at the end, even, or especially, in science, where the state of knowledge changes constantly. One theme is the failure of the dominant thought of the 20th century--freud and marx--and how wrong their influence was. It has certainly represented a triumph of western thought, but at the same time presages the demise of humanism: “Humanism’s long dream of learning, of arriving at some final truth by … reading and writing, is breaking up in our time.”
7/4/05	Six Questions of Socrates	Phillips, Christopher	2004	upper high school, lower college	popular philosophy	304	print	Phillips is the propagator of Socrates Cafe, wherein he pulls together a number of people from diverse walks of life, to discuss one of “six” questions that Socrates asked: What is virtue, good, justice, moderation, piety, courage. The chapters each take up a question in three or four contextual groups--Japanese students, Muslim housewifes, innercity middle school students, New Yorkers shortly after 9-11, etc. and reflects the questions that they may have of their own values and way of lives in light of the question. I really have problems as Phillips seems to take the easy way out--Socrates always agrees with him--and when thinkers disagree with him, he shoots them down with a sentence or two. Not a book to be read for depth by an adult, but probably a good discussion starter for high school.
6/27/05	1492--The Decline of Medievalism and the Rise of the Modern Age	Litvinoff, Barnet	1991	lower college	history	250	print	The centerpiece of the book is Columbus’ voyages and the outcome of them, but they are always placed in the context of the political realities of Europe at the time. King Ferdinand of Aragon is really the central figure of the book as he intrigues to extend his families’ influence and dynastic power. The blunders of the kings of France in invading Italy numerous times, the rise of the warrior popes in Rome to consolidate the papal states, especially through Alexander and Cesare Borgia, the constant threat of the Ottoman Turks and the promises of yet another crusade, the weakness of the Holy Roman Empire but the triumph of the Hapsburgs, the expulsion of the jews from Spain and the establishment of the Spanish Inquisition, and the disillusionment of so many explorers, esp. Columbus
6/6/05	Soul Made Flesh: The Discovery of the Brain--and How It Changed the World	Zimmer, Carl	2004	popular, educated adult	scientific history	296	print	Fascinating book that I did not expect to enjoy so much. Zimmer centers the book around Thomas Willis in the late 17th century, from Cromwell’s revolution to about 1710 or so. Willis was part of the Oxford scholars that did so much to push the frontiers of the scientific revolution, especially after Descartes’ pushing of the two body theory. Aristotle and Galen were replaced by experimentation and observation in the medical and scietific schools. Following Harvey, Willis pushed the anatomy of the brain to further and further levels, which along with the discovery of blood circulation, radically defined the human body, especially given the religious context of the time. Zimmer brings the investigation up to date in the last chapter, showing the implications of many of Willis’ discoveries.
4/24/05	The Soul of Battle	Hanson, Victor Davis	1999	popular to educated adult	history of war, battle	412	print	Can't decide whether I liked the book or not. Hanson shows the similaries the march of Epaminondas through Sparta with the Theban hoplites, Sherman's march from Atlanta to Savannah with the Army of the West, and Patton’s drive into Germany. These forces were all ideologically motivated democratic armies led by eccentric and fanatic leaders that setttttry few times in history: ideologically motivated democratic armies led by eccentric and fanatic leaders that are seterman does not strike me as either in Hanson's recounting) that are seting an irresistible force and avoiding set piece battles while bring the facts of war home to the civilian populat
3/19/05	The Age of Reson Begins	Durant, Will & Ariel	1961	popular to educated adult	european history	648	print	Two months to read a book. But I’m so stuck that I just want to get on to the next one in the series. I remember being enthralled with the stories of Elizabeth and the englishmen around her, surprised at the paintings in spain and the netherlands, surprised at the intensity of the wars in france, germany and england over religion, and it’s really just stuff that i already knew. major emphasis on the role of richeleau and gustavus adolphus in saving protestantism in the thirty years war. of course, as the title says, it was the emancipation of thinking from the church via copernicus, galileo, montagne, bacon, bruno and descartes that durant points at as the greatest significance of the age. also shock at seeing the different self portraits of rembrandt as he aged.
1/15/05	The Reformation	Durant, Will	1957	popular to educated adult	history	940	print	vol 6--5 to go. took almost two months to read this guy. a lot of information to digest. the companion rather than the successor the Renaissance, covering much more of Germany, France, England, etc. Better understanding of Charles V and the Holy Roman empire. Really begins with the Avignon papacy and goes through the Council of Trent in 1563. Luther and Calvin and Henry VIII are, of course, the center of the book, but also Hus and Wyclife and even Chaucer. For me, Erasmus is really the center of the times. Also some emphasis on the Turks, especially Suleiman. A lot of people killing each other of picayune thoughts and ideas. setting the stage for who we are and what we have become. gotta get on into the enlightenment before i bring this stage to a close.
11/28/04	The Oxford History of Medieval Europe	Holmes, George, ed.	1988	graduate level survey	medieval history	329	print	Far too much to summarize for this series of six essays on the development of Europe from the fall of the roman empire to the beginning of the renaissance/reformation of europe. Good summary of the movements of germanic tribes into old roman empire and the beginning of the nations of europe with the rise of the Holy Roman Empire with its split, followed by the norse invasions that continued with conquering of britain and naples. alternating chapters on northern europe and mediterranean world, with growing predominance of the north. shifting national boundaries owing more allegiance to dynastic families through vassalage, but also growing power, and abuse, of central church through papacy as non-national player.
11/20/04	The Renaissance: a history of civilization in italy from 1304 - 1576 a.d.	Durrant, Will	1953	popular to educated adult	history	728	print	vol. 5 in the series, and i keep getting frustrated by Durant’s style and his prejudices. too many artists and lists of art without the visual support needed to understand. the politics of the times still leaves me baffled, with the different states playing off each other, especially the papal states, until finally fought over and dominated by the spanish ruled by the german hapsburgs after the sack of rome by charles v in 1527. begins with the avignon papacy from 132? to 138? with the papacy settling in rome only really after 1400, and the rebuilding of rome politically through military and economically through the levels of tithing that finally culminated in luther. the collapse of the italian renaissance not only through foreign domination but also the shift in economic power along the atlantic with new trade.
10/10/04	The Closing of the Western Mind: the rise of faith and the fall of reason	Freeman, Charles	2002	popular to educated adult	history of ideas	340	print	Freeman’s main thesis that the whole greek tradition of rationality and inquisitiveness was suppressed by the church after it was coopted by the state with Constantive and the later emporers who first defined and then enforced orthodoxy and unity of thought in an attempt to defend the unity of the empire. Coverage of greek thought, then early christianity, especially paul, but the book takes shape in doctrinal disputes of early church. The early arian controversies lead to council of nicea through augustine’s persecution of montanists and donatists and council of chalcedon. With the sack of Rome and the dis-illusion of the western empire, the church, especially popes, stepped forward as both civil and spiritual authority, suppressing different opinions and rational independent thought.
9/4/04	The Romans: From Village to Empire	Boatwright, Mary & Daniel Gargola, and Richard Talbert	2004	college, post college	history of roman empire	457	print	I was expecting to like this book a little more as it would fill me in on the history of Rome, but I feel like the lecture tapes I listened to last winter did a better job. The best part is that the third time through the history (Durant, tapes) gives me a much better feel for the events and the trends and culture that arose in this time. The book was just too much like a textbook but without the really good detail that would make it a good story. Too much too fast. Not easily summarized. I did get a pretty good grasp on the Latin and Samnite wars leading to the formation of Rome as an empire in Italy, but still not so well with the Macedonian and Punic wars that really led to the hegemony of Rome over the Mediterranean and the subsequent explosion of wealth in Rome. Better explained on the tapes.
8/17/04	The Last Temptation of Christ	Kazantzakis, Nikos	1960	mature	historical and religious fiction	496	print	I haven’t quite grasped the implications of this book. Jesus is a lonely, tortured soul that rejects family, friends, respectibility, love, and the rest of the world in order to save mankind. This is played against the backdrop of a rabid Israel who lives in constant expectation of the messiah and the freedom to loosen the bonds of the roman empire. Jesus begins by preaching love, but after confrontation with John the Baptist, he preaches the fire and repentance. Once his message is set, so is his course to Jerusalem and crucifixion. The last temptation comes at crucifixion as he is lifted off the cross and given a life of the earth--wife house kids, etc--betraying the ideals he had preached. journal
8/11/04	Doubt: A History	Hecht, Jennifer Michael	2003	easy college	philosophical history	494	print	It really is a history of philosophy, but with one theme running through: doubt. Hecht begins with Thales and runs up through 9/11, covering a vast number of thinkers, ideas and movements. Primary among her theses are that doubt pervades cosmopolitan culture and the falling away of the former identity given by tribe and religion. Most of the currents of modern doubt can be traced back to the ancients, especially with the graceful-life philosophies that developed in the hellenistic period--epicurus, cynics, skeptics, stoics. Her best chapters deal with this period, which she keeps coming back to again and again. The rest of the books seems a bit shallow in information but with some great quotes that buttress her opinions. Her conclusion: Expect Change, Accept Death, Enjoy Life. journal
7/19/04	Angle of Repose	Stegner, Wallace	1970	adult	western fiction	511	print	The story of a marriage, as the narrator calls it, and the relationship between Susan and Oliver Ward. They move from the east to New Almaden, Leadville, and Boise Idaho, chasing Oliver’s chance of scoring big. While she always accuses him of being the failure, it was she who ruined their chances for success or for happiness together in the west. Shades of Jude the Obscure in the book. I was not ready for the ending with the drowing of Agnes and Frank’s suicide and for Susan’s living for another 50 years with a total sense of guilt. It plays off of Lyman’s own failed marriage, his sense of helplessness, and his railing against the foolishness of much of the late 60’s culture of northern california. journal
7/7/04	Adam, Eve, and the Serpent	Pagels, Elaine	1988	easy adult	history of early church	154	print	Pagels tries to show how the story of creation in Genesis was used by different groups in the early christian church to bolster their views on sin, sexuality, and more importantly, human freedom. Jesus and Paul seem to condemn worldly contraints, including sex and family, as antithetical to preparing for the kingdom. early church members took these messages as affirming individual human freedom and worth in the face of oppression by the roman empire. ascetic practices became popular as an expression of this freedom, but other schools, especially gnostic, condemned the literal reading of genesis. as the church became an institution in the empire and in its own right, however, this freedom was overturned in favor of original sin and the inherrent evil in man and nature. journal.
7/1/04	The Western Way of War: Infantry Battle in Classical Greece	Hanson, Victor Davis	1987	moderate adult	classical history of warfare	228	print	Hanson covers the development of Greek hoplite battle where the different polei would gather together in phalanx formation across an open field, massed in columns at least 8 men deep, then charge each other and try to knock the other side down or off balance in a nightmarish world of confusion and carnage that left about 10% of the combatants dead. The Greeks opted for the short, ritualistic, intense battle of no more than an hour or two in length, with the outcome based on the need for a decisive outcome in a short amount of time. all citizens from 18 to 60 years of age were liable for battle and hence all knew the dread and carnage of battle. I don’t understand his emphasis on the acknowledgement of unavoidable and necessary killing from the dark heart of man. check reading journal for details.
6/27/04	The Way of the World	Fromkin, David	1998	popular adult	world history	222	print	I read this on recommendation of Calvin, and I’m not quite sure what to make of it. Fromkin distills the history of man into eight steps: Becoming Human, Inventing Civilization, Developing a Conscience, Seeking Lasting Peace, Achieveing Rationality, Uniting the Planet, Releasing Nature’s Energies, and Ruling Ourselves. He covers all of human history in about 150 pages, each sounding on these themes. There was really little that was new, but the perspective did allow some very broad generalizations to be made that allows the story to hang together. It is a very western-centric book, as anglo american ideals built around the driving force of science and technology, is the best of all possible worlds. I found the latter chapters on the future to be less convincing and less interesting.
6/21/04	A Brief History of the Mind	Calvin, William H.	2004	easy to moderate adult	evolutionary cognitive growth	190	print	Calvin takes on the stages of evolutionary growth of the mind, including brains, behaviors, and concepts, showing how and perhaps why the brain developed the way it did. He covers the obligitory evidence of protohomonids and early homonids splitting from chimpanzee behavior, then especially takes on the brains of homo erectus and then homo sapiens out of africa a million and again 100,000 years ago. Early man’s brain really began developing by about 50,000 years ago, what Calvin calls the big bang of mind, and it comes not with size but with the ability to plan and execute an overhand throw, and then using the emergent properties of the brain to develop first protolanguage and then full language with syntax, complex sentences, and finally narratives employing tropes.
5/31/04	Creation of the sacred: tracks of biology in early religions	Burkert, Walter	1996	late college, easy grad school	anthropology of religion	179	print	“humans will not easily accept that constructs of sense reaching out for the nonobvious are nothing but self-created projection, and that no other signs from the universe around are there to be perceived except for the irregularities resounding from the first big bang.” Religion rises concomitantly with language for the creation of sense in the world, especially in the wake of “biological patterns of actions, reactions and feelings activated and elaborated through ritual practice and verbalized teachings, with anxiety playing a foremost role.” Religion overrides the selfishness of individual survival of the fitttest for the better strategies that ensure survival of the group, the community, the species. Burkert follows E. O. Wilson in seeking the meaning of religion in the synthesis of biology and culture.
5/15/04	The Gnostic Gospels	Pagels, Elaine	1979	easy to moderate adult	religious history	182	print	This is Pagel’s book that first put her into prominence, and it also makes the most sense of the quote in City of God, for she really emphasizes the politics of the earliest church fathers in suppressing heresy and establishing the doctrine/practice of apostolic succession from Peter through the bishops over the gnostic emphasis on direct experience of the divine. She also makes clear, however, in the last chapter that she does not think that christianity would have made it through the crucible of history without the political emphasis of the church and discipline and unity through time. She covers the early doctrines of the bodily resurrection, apostolic succession, rejection of divine feminity, martyrdom, and self knowledge, showing how and why each argument developed out of the politics of the church.
4/25/04	Carnage and Culture	Hanson, Victor Davis	2001	adult	military history	463	print	Hanson takes nine battles and showcases them to show why Western Civilization has triumphed over the other. The rise of the citizen soldier, free, holding property, tied to industrial production and rational inquiry, disciplined to form close knit groups that can lay down a solid wall of weapons, and free to criticize and improvise as the needs arises, will always triumph--in the end--over the civilizations of the east. He was a lot more political with this book than with Ripples, and makes it clear that the United States could have and should have won the Vietnam War in his discussion of Tet, castigating the media and the counterculture along the way. And always, it is the free man versus the slave, freeing those slaves from the tyranny of satraps, zulus, aztecs, communists, kings, etc. Can’t say I buy his thesis.
3/20/04	Desire of the Everlasting Hills: the world before and after jesus	Cahill, Thomas	1999	easy adult	history	320	print	so i find him again exasperating. he writes from the point of view of a believer, like he believes--and needs to prove or justify--all the stories that we heard in sunday school. but then, he did illuminate the early history of the church, teasing out the pauline and the johanine strains and how they all came together with the other believers of “the way” to form the early church. his emphasis is on the crucified and suffering jesus, and on “the greatest moralist” angle of the gospels. i think he is strongest at the end when he emphasizes the service and the commitment to the poor and the suffering of the world that is done as a result of the commitment to jesus.
3/4/04	Sailing the Wine Dark Sea: Why the Greeks Matter	Cahill, Thomas	2003	easy adult	history	264	print	Cahill is at it once again with his hinges of history, trying to capture the essence of Greek Civilization in 250 or so pages. A lot devoted to Homer, the lyric poets, the meeting of the symposion and Plato, the sexual politics of Athens, pornographic drinking cups, Pericles funeral oration, etc. Cahill really plays up the intellectual and emotional curiousity of the Greeks, with the never ending sensibility of questioning and striving--the agon of Nietzsche--underlying many of the driving forces of today’s culture. I liked this book so much better than his book on the jews, and for that matter on how the irish saved civilization. Cahill may be trying a little too hard to make history relevant, but it does make for a good story.
2/27/04	The DaVinci Code	Brown, Dan	2003	easy adult	historical mystery		print	Weaving together historical fiction about the holy grail--taken from holy blood, holy grail--throwing in a dash of secrret brotherhoods, and wrapping it under the cloak of a page turning mystery novel. The history is, of course, fantasy, but just plausible enough, especially given the political and religious climate, to give hints of a mystery hidden from the west by the church, especially as the church took power in the Roman Empire and forced everyone’s hand with the Nicene Creed. I stayed up late a couple of nights to read more, and it really worked to jump start my reading that had bogged down in the intricacies of kant, hegel, etc.
1/24/04	Ripples of Battle	Hanson, Victor	2003	adult	history of battle	258	print	Hanson takes three battles: Okinawa, Shiloh, and Delium, and shows how they have significance beyond the immediate impact of their outcomes on the war. The chapters on Shiloh are far more developed and interesting than the other two battles, with the emergence of Grant & Sherman, the death of Albert Sidney Johnston, the rise of Nathan Forrest Bedford, and the career of Lew Wallace having ramifications far beyond the battle. According to the reviews, I should not have liked the book at all as Hanson is a firm believer in the ascendency of western culture, as well as something of a racist, and I did find his views on 9/11 perhaps to be a bit overblown, but I found the history fascinating and even his conclusions to challenge many of my own presuppositions and to be thoughtful.
1/15/04	The Spectator Bird	Stegner, Wallace	1976	adult	fiction: old guy reflection	214	print	Jimmy gave this to me last year in OK and I finally got around to reading it. It is narrated by Joe Allston, retired literary agent living in the hills above Stanford. The story bounces back and forth between his present living situation and his reading of a journal that he wrote of a trip 20 years ago to Denmark. Joe spends a lot of time reflecting on the ravages and the regrets and the limitations of old age, but in the end, it turns out to be a love story between Joe and his wife and how he deflected temptation on the trip to Denmark. The heart of the book, then, is Stegner’s portrayal of the relationship between Joe and Ruth, perhaps reflecting Stegner’s marriage--as evidenced with the interview with her in the Stanford newspaper.
1/6/04	A History of God	Armstrong, Karen	1993			399	print	I felt that I needed to reread HOG and pay closer attention, marking out significant passages. I was astounded by how much seemed new, how much I did not remember. The narrative becomes far too fast and far too abreviated when Armstrong begins with the attack on the idea of god in the enlightenment and the movements since then. For her, I think the idea of god fits somewhere between the god of the mystics and the god of the philosophers--the falasafa. but she also shows how the fundamentalist movements grow in the space left by the unsatisfactory answers given by either or the by retreat from god.
12/10/03	A World Lit Only by Fire	Manchester, William	1992	early college	popular history	296	print	The central event of the book is Magellan’s sailing around the world--and probably the most interesting narrative. Manchester spends a little time giving short shrift to the late medieval period and a lot of time sensationalizing the Renaissance. He paints a broad canvas from the ascendancy of Savanarola to the fall of Anne Boleyn. Along the way he paints a human portrait of Thomas More, relishes in the salacious details of Lucrezia Borgia, and examines the motives and the fireiness of Martin Luther. Manchester chooses Magellan’s voyage as the central event of the Renaissance that stood the Medieval world on its head. He goes to much length on Magellan’s character and his out of character blunder that leads to his death.
11/26/03	Holy War: The Crusades and Their Impact on Today’s World	Armstrong, Karen	1991	college	history of medieval ages	539	print	Another Armstrong that took a long time but proved important. The Crusades have become a much more important event for me in the history of western civilization. The Crusades essentially pulled Europe--especially the Franks--out of a role of inferiority and backwardness and propelled Europe to its dominance in world affairs. Armmstrong spends much time on the first, third and fourth crusades as well as the fiasco of Constantinople. At the same time, she shows the development of the state of Israel from an idea to the reality of the present situation of the infitada, and explains how the Crusades have influenced our present thinking. Without “triple vision” there is no hope for any kind of reconciliation and peace in the middle east.
9/15/03	The Origin of Satan	Pagels, Elaine	1995	college, technical adult	history of ideas, especially christianity	184	print	While Pagels does not claim that Christianity is solely responsible for the idea of pure evil and satanism, she makes the point quite clearly that christianity did greatly elaborate and use the idea to point out its enemies. While the old testament does contain some vague references to the concept of satan, it really did not come to occupy the position of a cosmic idea until the essenes picked up on it to characterize not just the romans but more particularly those jewish sects that did not agree with them. this then is played big time in the gospels, especially mark, that portray the jesus story as a cosmic drama, especially putting the jewish population in that light. later christians then turned the concept inward using satan as an idea to characterize heresies.
8/15/03	The Third Chimpanzee	Diamond, Jared	1992	early college, technical but popular adult	scientific explanation of human behavior	368	print	This book predates Guns, Germs, and Steel, and is not nearly as well written. Jared starts with the fact that we share 98% of our genes with chimpanzees and then tries to explain much of human behavior as evolutionary adaptation, showing how it compares with many animals. He begins with the single diaspora theory and then covers the development of sexuality, aging, language, agriculture, technology, as well as genocide, habitat destruction, and drug addiction by looking for the adaptive values of those behaviors and comparing them with various animals.
8/8/03	A Short History of Nearly Everything	Bryson, Bill	2003	early college	popular science explanation; science history	478	print	Bryson covers so much in this book that it’s hard to remember the details, but he starts with a cosmic view, moving into atomic views, moving through geology, meteorology, biology, paleontology. the full nine yards. And he takes time to tell the story of how we have come to understand some ideas and of the major players involved. And he comes to a final state of the art view of a field, and it almost invariably shows how little we understand, and how precarious our understanding is, and how precarious and almost improbable the existence of life itself, let alone human culture and history. fascinating stuff. i really want to go back through the book soon and do a good job of logging what I’ve read
7/23/03	The Gifts of the Jews	Cahill, Thomas	1998	upper high school; popular	history of religion	250	print	The subtitile says it all: how a tribe of desert nomads changed the way everyone things and feels. a history of the old testament obviously written from the standpoint of a believer. Cahill contends that our sense of individuality and our sense of history of time all come from the Jewish development of consciousness and conscience. For him, the contributions of the Jews through Abraham, Moses, David, and theBabylonian captivity mark a break with all other consciousness in the ancient work, which is cyclical and corporate. Karen Armstrong does a much better job of covering this material. I was so put off by the superlatives that Cahill used that I put the book down to read Pagels, and then downloaded a number of articles on biblical archeology, wondering what out become of his case.
7/21/03	Beyond Belief: the Secret Gospel of Thomas	Pagels, Elaine	2003	college, educated popular	religious history and commentary	185	print	Pagels covers much of the early history of christianity from the explanation of the diversity of beliefs among the early christians to the reflection of this diversity by comparing the gospel of thomas with the gospel of john, and either one with the gospel of mark. while the synoptic gospels emphasize the human nature of jesus, john and thomas emphasize the divinity of jesus. john maintains that jesus, and god, are wholly separate and other from humanity, while thomas says that jesus’ divinity is a reflection of that within each human. the gospel of john became the orthodox position of the church largely through the efforts of bishop iraneus and his attempts to stamp out valentinius and other “heresies” of his day. this lead to the formuation of the new testament canon and the nicene creed with constantine
7/15/03	Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix	Rowling, J. K.	2003	lower middle level	fantasy fiction	870	print
7/7/03	A Dog Year	Katz, Jon	2002	easy read; but adult in tone	nonfiction pet inspiration	198	print	Katz adopts a Border Collie into his household, which consists mainly of him and his two golden labs, whom he waxes rhapsodic about, and his wife. The border collie--Devon--is a schizo dog that had flunked out of obedience training, and this may his last chance to catch on. Jon tries hard to make it work, but they reach confrontational moments that outlast his patience on numerous occasions. Finally, they reach a climatic confrontation and come to an agreement. Meanwhile, one of the labs has to be put down. Jon eventually adopts another border collie, just before the other lab must also be put down. I cried a lot with this book, but it does reach a satisfying conclusion on the new york mountain cabin Jon owns and goes back to pay homage to his labs while beginning a new life with his collies.
7/5/03	Warriors of God: Richard the Lionheart and Saladin in the Third Crusade	Reston, James	2001	late high school, early college, popular	popular history	345	print	Reston fleshes out the details of Saladin and Richard and makes a good story out of the Third Crusade. Richard comes off as a dashing figure, if perhaps a little dense and partaking of the faults of his time, while Saladin comes off as noble and wise, but certainly trapped in the prejudices of Islam. Reston really tries to make the participants human and to give the thoughts, feelings, and motivations for the characters as they play them out. Richard certainly finds himself in a pickle when he realizes that no matter what he does, Saladin will win in the end. The complexities added to the situation with Richard’s brother, John, and his love affair and battles with Philip, and the plotting of Eleanor, make the story much more interesting.
6/30/03	The Battle for God	Armstrong, Karen	2000	early college	religious history	370	print	Took a while to get through this. Armstrong goes into the history of the fundamentalist movements that have arisen in the three monotheistic faiths, beginning with the expulsion of the Jews from Spain in 1492 up through the intifadah and Timothy McVeigh. Her thesis is that fundamentalism has arisen to patch over the god shaped hole in modern consciousness that has been brought about by the Enlightenment and secular, rational culture. Human beings have a need for both their logos and their mythos sides to be developed, but independently of each other. When one tries to take the other over, as has happened with scientific modern culture or with the devopment of fundamentalism, disaster is pretty sure to follow.
6/16/03	Founding Brothers	Ellis, Joseph J.	2000			248	print
5/25/03	City of God	Doctorow, E. L.	2000			272	print
3/15/03	The Girl with the Pearl Earring	Chavelier, Tracy	1999	easy popular reading	fiction	233	print	I had trouble finishing this, even though it was short. Griet, the maid, is the girl with the pearl earring, and the story is told from her point of view. The book humanizes Vermeer and paints what feels like an accurate portrait of 17th century Dutch society, especially the aesthetic that drives Vermeer, but all the same it felt like a “chick book.” I have developed a new appreciation of Vermeer, and this book contributed to that, but in the end, the story left me kind of cold
3/11/03	How the Irish Saved Civilization	Cahill, Thomas	1995	popular and personal	popular history	218	print	Cahill maintains that the Irish saved Western Civilization at the collapse of the Roman Empire. As the Celts moved west into Ireland, St. Patrick took the calling to ‘dopt and civilize the tribes of Ireland. Along the way, many anchorites, monks, and other religious orders fled to Ireland from the mediterrean and established centers of learning that flourished with the copying of the ancient texts. The Irish develped a monastic way of life, then, that found itself with the growing authority of Rome. But as the Irish began proselytizing their religion, first among the Celts, the Angles, and the Jutes of the British Isles and later on the European mainland, they brought back literacy and texts to Europe, which then thrived under Charlemagne.
12/12/02	The Ascent of Man	Bronowski, Jacob	1973	popular sciene	televison series; nonfiction popular science	438	print	I had trouble keeping the thread through this, mainly because I read it in such short bites, but also because there are so many gaps in the thought, so many jumps in ideas with little real development of substantiation--it really is a television script, after all. He really comes down to the end of it with his last chapter, that western civilization that has developed and grown with the ideas of science, is experiencing a loss of nerve in the complexity of the world. I want to rent the series as soon as I finish Civilisation in order to see if the ideas come off less disjointed when they are used with the images.
11/15/02	Civilisation	Clark, Kenneth	1969	late high school; early college	nonfiction art commentary; television series companion	347	print	Kind of a treat to read the chapters in the book and then see the episodes in the television series. Developed tastes for Michelangelo, VerMeer, Turner. Got me into a search of images on the web for many of the paintings that Clark mentions. He does seem a bit of a stuffed shirt, afterall, especially when he laments the passing of civilization as he knows it, especially as he cover the loss of nerve in the nineteenth century romanticism and revolution. Maybe it could be hypothesized that the Renaissance begins with perspective in painting in ends up in the dismemberment of reality in cubism, et. al. And then, maybe not.
9/21/02	The Age of Faith; vol 4 of The Story of Civilization	Durant, Will	1950	popular history	nonfiction history	1086	print	A longer read than even the other books in the history. I’ve been tied up in this one so long that it’s almost absurd. And yet, I feel that my understanding of the middle ages (from 325 to 1300) is so much mo betta than before I started. From Constantine to Dante. Starting with the Nicene Creed and ending with the vision of the Empyrean Rose. The breakup of the Roman empire due to its overweening pride brought it about. The Crusades with its contact with Islam and the Byzantine empire brought it down. Caesar knew a Gaul that was Celtic; by the end of the middle ages, Europe was primarily Germanic. The movements of Germans, Huns, Turks, and Slavs kills any absurd notion of “homeland.” Of such is ignorance built.
8/8/02	Civilizations	Fernandez-Armesto, Felipe	2001	academic	historical anthropology	468	print	This was a tough read. F-A tries to document numerous instances where civilization sprang up in the world, showing which eco niches they grew out of and how they in turn modified those ecosystems for their own uses. Pretty fascinating stuff, but in the end there is just too much information and not enough thread to pull the material together. I found his development of atlantic civilization and the coming of pacific civilization a little tiresome. i thought that the book may be the ideas i was looking for after jared diamond’s foray into the start of civilization, but somehow it just did not hold up that way.
7/2/02	The Buddha	Armstong, Karen	2001	popular academic--high school	nonfiction relgion and history		print	A biography of the Buddha, realizing that he overcame his individuality and personality. As with all of Armstong’s book, I came away with new insights, particularly with the end of the Buddha’s life and the emptiness that he experienced as he shucked off his entourage and the ravages of time took its toll on his body. The extinction of his personhood is an important point to remember, as is the reliance on reincarnation for the thinking of the times. It really does make me reconsider my infatuation with Buddhism as exemplified through Siddartha’s life.
6/26/02	Ceasar and Christ	Durant, Will	1944	popular academic	nonfiction history		print	Another book in the series that took a long time to finish. Almost sorry that I started it, but it did bring whole areas of Roman civilization to light for me. I was really struck by how contemporaneous the romans seemed in many aspects, and quite appalled by the level of violence that permeated Roman government from the very beginning to the end. The Roman empire also lasted much shorter than I expected. The treatment of the beginning of the Christian church seemed much less convincing to me, and yet many of the events make more sense when put in the whole context of the times.
5/14/02	Islam: A Short History	Armstrong, Karen	2001	popular, non technical nonfiction	nonfiction history and religion		print	Another of Armstrong’s books that helps me understand important areas that I had almost no comprehension of. I was especially intrigued by the explosive growth of Islam in its first century or two, but with a tolerance unmatched by historical christianity. I also spent quite a bit of time looking up information on the Mongols, the Huns, the Turks and their spread across central Asia and the Near East. I was also much taken by Armstrong’s thesis about the tension between a tribal mentality borne out of nomadism and a need for building an empire borne out of agrarian peoples, leading to the formation of the Ummah.
5/5/02	Our Oriental Heritage	Durant, Will	1934	popular academic	nonfiction history		print	Finally finished it. It took months and months. Step 2 in the whole “History of Civilization.” Seems really dated, especially in its treatment of the development of civilization in the middle east, but it did give me an appreciation of the different dynasties and reigns and kingdoms to come out of that area. Especially fascinating were the chapters on India, China, and Japan, of which I knew very, very little.
4/13/02	A History of God	Armstrong, Karen	1994	popular academic	nonfiction history and religion		print	Although the book was hard to read because it was so broken into chunks of time, it was an important read. Armstrong does a good job of showing how the conception of God grew from the local tribal god Yahweh into the different philosophical, mystical, and fundamentalist conceptions that dominate our thinking today. Convinced me of how much I did not know about Islam and the Eastern Orthodox Church, too.
11/28/01	The Metaphysical Club	Louis Menand	2001	college +	nonfiction history and philosophy		print	One of the best books that I have read this year. Explores the connection between Oliver Wendall Holmes, Jr., Charles Pearce, William James, and John Dewey with implications of the civil war and evolution on the development of pragmatism as a way of thinking. The book explains so much about the way we think today.
10/27/01	The Seekers	Daniel J. Boorstein	1998	early college	nonfiction popular history		print	I didn’t particularly enjoy this book all that much. It makes me question whether I want to tackle The Discoverers or The Creators. The chapters are much too short with too little depth of information and a lot of repetition. Boorstein does have an overall theme and offers some decent insights, but it just seemed a little too shallow in it’s treatment of the different “seekers.”
10/1/01	The Life of Greece	Durant, Will and Ariel	1933?	educated public	nonfiction popular history		print	An enjoyable read, but I do get put off by the Durants’ sermonizing. I was fascinated by the development and the playing out of Greek culture, and I really want to read the whole History of Civilization series, but again the voice put me off and wading through his/her bullshit may derail me in the process.
8/26/01	Critique of Religion and Philosophy	Kaufmann, Walter	1959	College	nonfiction philosophical critique		print	This was my 3rd or 4th time to read the book, and it did not excite me as much as it has in the past. I have always looked to Kaufmann as my guide in philosophical matters, and his arguments did not seem to hold up as well this go round.
7/30/01	Roads	McMurtry, Larry	2000	adult	nonfiction travel memoir		print
7/27/01	The Long Quiet Road	Goldberg, Natalie		adult	nonfiction memoir		print
7/15/01	Cherry	Kerr, Mary	2001	adult	nonfiction memoir		print
7/3/01	Starwars: Cloak of Deception	Luceno, James	2001	late adolescent/early adult	science fiction		print
6/25/01	Boone’s Lick	McMurtry, Larry	2001	early adult/late adolescent	historical fiction		print
6/12/01	The Gates of the Alamo	Harrigan, Stephen	2001	adult	historical fiction	592	print
6/5/01	Hatchet	Paulsen, Gary		adolescent	adventure fiction		print
5/21/01	The Wings of Merlin	Barron, Dan		adolescent	fantasy fiction		print
5/19/01	The Mirror of Merlin	Barron, Dan		adolescent	fantasy fiction		print
5/17/01	The Fires of Merlin	Barron, Dan		adolescent	fantasy fiction		print
5/14/01	The Seven Songs of Merlin	Barron, Dan		adolescent	fantasy fiction		print
5/11/01	Hope Was Here	Bauer, Joan		late adolescent	fiction		print
5/9/01	The Amber Spyglass	Pullman, Philip		adolescent	fiction fantasy		print
5/5/01	The Subtle Knife	Pullman, Philip		adolescent	fiction fantasy		print
5/2/01	Starwars: Episode 1	Brooks, Terry		late adolescent	fiction science fiction		print
4/30/01	The New New Thing	Lewis, Michael		adult	nonfiction		print
4/15/01	Backwater	Bauer, Joan		late adolescent	fiction		print
4/15/01	The Golden Compass	Pullman, Philip		adolescent	fiction fantasy		print
4/10/01	Holes	Sachar, Louis		adolescent	fiction		print
3/15/01	Weetsie Bat Books	Block, Francesca Lia		Late Adolescent	fiction		print
3/15/01	Satellite Down	Thomas, Rob		late adolescent	fiction		print
3/15/01	The Lost Years of Merlin	Barron, Dan		adolescent	fiction fantasy		print
2/10/01	Guns, Germs, & Steel	Diamond, Jared		Popular Academic	nonfiction early history/anthropology		print
2/5/01	Montana 1948	Watson, Larry		adult/late adolescent	fiction		print
1/15/01	Consilience	Wilson, Edward O.		popular academic	nonfict		print
11/15/00	The Book of J	Bloom, Harold					print
10/30/00	Tuesdays With Morrie	Alblom, Mitch		adult	nonfiction memoir		print
10/20/00	The Shakespeare Stealer	Blackwood, Gary		adolescent	historical fiction		print
10/15/00	Tribes: A Journey Into the Heart of American Adolescence	Hersh, Patricia		Adult	nonfiction sociology		print
10/5/00	Geeks	Katz, Jon		adult/late adolescent	nonfiction		print
9/15/00	The Liar’s Club	Kerr, Mary		adult	nonfiction memoir		print
9/1/00	This Boy’s Life	Wolff, Tobias		adult	nonfiction memoir		print
8/15/00	From Dawn to Decadence	Barzun, Jacques		popular academic	history		print
7/15/00	Violet & Claire	Block, Francesca Lia		Late Adolescent	fiction		print
7/10/00	The Western Canon	Bloom, Harold		adult	academic		print
5/15/00	I Was a Teenage Fairy	Block, Francesca Lia		late adolescent	fiction		print