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33rd out of 79 books
—
7 voters
The Message in the Bottle: How Queer Man Is, How Queer Language Is, and What One Has to Do with the Other
by
Walker Percy
In Message in the Bottle, Walker Percy offers insights on such varied yet interconnected subjects as symbolic reasoning, the origins of mankind, Helen Keller, Semioticism, and the incredible Delta Factor. Confronting difficult philosophical questions with a novelist's eye, Percy rewards us again and again with his keen insights into the way that language possesses all of u...more
Paperback, 352 pages
Published
April 1st 2000
by Picador
(first published 1975)
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despite the upchuck-inducing cover of the edition that comes up on goodreads, this is a good book, indeed a good read.
while he's more famous for his novels, i enjoy his essays more. in his novels he always strains for opportunities to wax philosophical and in his essays he finally has free reign to just go for it. "the delta factor" and "man on a train" stand out in my memory.
"the delta factor" opens with six pages of questions, mostly about the existential conundrum that we are sad when we sho...more
while he's more famous for his novels, i enjoy his essays more. in his novels he always strains for opportunities to wax philosophical and in his essays he finally has free reign to just go for it. "the delta factor" and "man on a train" stand out in my memory.
"the delta factor" opens with six pages of questions, mostly about the existential conundrum that we are sad when we sho...more
I recommend reading "Lost in the Cosmos" before this one. This is a collection of essays dealing with language and what our use of symbols and signs tells us about our essential humanity. If you are not a Christian, you should keep in mind that Percy is (although NOT a fundamentalist, young-earther; in fact, he is equally critical of fundamentalists on both sides of the God question), and it informs every argument he makes. If you know that up front, it should not stop you from enjoying and lear...more
May 20, 2011
Ilze
rated it
1 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Recommends it for:
Committed linguists
It's a miracle I made it - yes, I actually READ EVERY PAGE - all the way to the end. But then, I might've known there's trouble when I realized that the first chapter consists almost in its entirety of questions ... only to discover the origin of it all, Walker Percy had read about Helen Keller's acquisition of language and this led him to ask questions. I'm not sure how many times he repeats for us how Keller suddenly realized that "water" = "water" spelt on her hand when her tutor let the liqu...more
Robert Moynihan, reporting from Rome, "Inside the Vatican Magazine" Newsflash, Letter from Rome, #22: 'I studied the works of Walker Percy, the American Catholic novelist, when I was in college, at Harvard. I went to meet Percy in 1977. His most important book is a collection of philosophical essays entitled The Message in the Bottle.
The entire goal of his writing was to show how the historical events of Christian history constituted a "message" which brought life to people who were in the posi...more
The entire goal of his writing was to show how the historical events of Christian history constituted a "message" which brought life to people who were in the posi...more
Having read the first seven essays, I'm now debating whether or not to continue reading this now, or wait until I've had some more time to breathe in between. The remaining essays in this collection look as though they may be too theoretical for me to understand if I read them now. "The Message in the Bottle" names the volume, and is my favorite of the essays so far. I also enjoyed "The Delta Factor" which both opens, and appears to outline, the contents of the entire book. As Percy admits, the...more
Didn't end up finishing this! Many of the essays were very enjoyable and weave together linguistics, existentialism, theology, anthropology, and literary criticism. The book as a whole is something of a love letter to the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, and the author has interesting things to say about the extent to which we can say meaningful things about the world, explain scientific behavior in a world of cultural relativity, and whether "scientific" solutions to problems actually make people happy....more
Jun 26, 2007
Caitlin
marked it as to-read
The title is fabulous enough that I've got to read it.
1 like · like · see review
language theory and kind of ...antisemiotics? A bit over my head and out of date, and would have been more influential if he'd been listened to then. Now, kind of a curiosity for crystallizing at a tangent ideas that we've come to in a roundabout way (if you like to keep super close track of what Chomsky is or has been or may well be up to, this is may be more interesting to you.)
There are some true gems in this book. Honest to God though, some of the analogies he employs are absolutely beyond me. Maybe one day I will understand the title essay of the book, but at the moment the castaway scenario seems just a mess of a metaphor. And now I am running, simply racing even, back to my dear Owen Barfield to regain clarity.
Aug 28, 2007
Lowry
rated it
5 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Recommends it for:
anyone who cares about language
(See my review of The Moviegoer.) In this book you will find, in discursive form, the ideas that all of Percy's novels are about. Which is not to say that they are dry or uninviting here; it's fascinating to see how they play out in a different genre of writing. Percy was essentially a philosopher of language, a student of how it is that we are able (or not) to make a meaning jump the gap from one human mind to another. If that interests you, and it is or should be a mighty interesting subject t...more
Some of it is interesting; but the author is a little 'out there,' and the chapters are hard to follow as they are a series of independent articles that don't really mesh together in a book very well. Some of the insights are true gems, but hard to find.
I'm re-reading this for a piece I'm writing for threeguysonebook.com and can't express what a pleasure it is to hear Percy's voice again.
One of Percy's best. Just below Lost in the Cosmos.
Really fine.
Yes, this book is about semiotics and all sorts of really cool stuff that makes your brain go "WoooOOOOO!" Trouble for me was that my brain, after a while, went "FZZzzzzzt" -- obviously not well enough wired to take in all that Percy talks about here. (For a one chapter rendition of the same stuff, see the chapter on semiotics in his "Lost in the Cosmos.")
Read mostly in Sept 2011, but the final chapter - the one for which he says, in the first chapter, there probably is no audience, on 7-5-12. At that time I also reread my notes from each chapter and revised my rating from 4 to 5 stars.
I didn't feel the need to read this whole book. It is incredibly insightful, and well-written, but a bit too technical at times. The first essay is one of my all-time favorites!
Get ready for your brain to hurt - and then to feel totally enlightened about how language effects us in ways that separate us from other animals.
Jun 06, 2007
Andrew Kooy
added it
I haven't read it yet but it is on my ever dwindling to-read list.
One of my very favorite collections of essays. "The Delta Factor" can bring me to tears most any time. It's the most poignant rendering of the human condition I have ever read.
May 21, 2013
Veronica
marked it as to-read
May 17, 2013
Fatima
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May 14, 2013
Joe Walls
is currently reading it
May 10, 2013
Nana
marked it as to-read
May 08, 2013
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Walker Percy (1916–1990) was one of the most prominent American writers of the twentieth century. Born in Birmingham, Alabama, he was the oldest of three brothers in an established Southern family that contained both a Civil War hero and a US senator. Acclaimed for his poetic style and moving depictions of the alienation of modern American culture, Percy was the bestselling author of six fiction t...more
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Jun 19, 2012 11:05pm