http://www.goodreads.com/review/list_rss/33765 en-US Wed, 11 Jun 2008 21:55:24 -0700 60 http://www.goodreads.com/ 200 41 http://www.goodreads.com/images/layout/gr_logo.gif 22860523 Wed, 11 Jun 2008 21:55:24 -0700
On the front of this book, there is a blurb by the Boston Globe that reads, "A joy to read...as they reveal the man for good and ill." I was about halfway through when I realized that there is much more of the "for good" than the for "ill," unless "ill" literally refers to illness. In fact, there wasn't really anything about Eliot as a person I didn't like.

In these letters, everyone of them from boyhood to 1922, when The Wasteland was published, Eliot comes off as an eminently sympathetic, eminently likable guy. He is a concerned, caring, sensitive person who is constantly worried about the comfort level and quality of life of everyone surrounding him. I mean, he's not a selfless martyr. He does a fair amount of complaining about his own hardships, and strained emotional states, but none of it is done with even a hint of bitterness. Bitterness for whom, you may ask?

Reading these letters, it's hard to say exactly where the circle of symbiotic neurosis starts and stops vis a vis Eliot and the woman he married after only a few months of courtship, Vivien (but that's the way they did it back then, right?) Whether it was her incessant worrying and "neuralgia" that fed his nervous energy or vice versa is something of a Gordian knot. They both seem to susceptible to excessive strain from the travails of life, though, I do have to say she rubbed me the wrong way more than once during the course of reading these letters. For one, she doesn't have a job but instead stays all day laid up in bed with some version of a head ache, while he worked full-time at a bank during the day and dedicated his nights to writing (both poetry but mostly criticism because it was, seemingly, easier for Eliot to write). She also seems to really relish the gossipy side of the literary quarrels that Eliot found himself in which he didn't have the fortitude to enjoy. Incidentially, one wonders what their love life was like and how this contributed to their respective neuroses.

For me, Eliot's correspondence letters with Ezra Pound are probably the most fascinating of the letters in the book. The contrast in their respective personalties is stark. Where Pound is didactic and aggressive, Eliot is measured. Where Pound never tires of polemics and ranting in American colloquialisms (no doubt ironically, though I'm sure he also felt comfortable in that style), Eliot's thoughts are lucid and his prose elegant. One wonders what their face-to-face conversations were like. While they were both American, born and bred, it's not hard to understand why Pound ended up settling in Italy and Eliot staying in England. Their respective temperaments fit those climes exactly.

If there is anything critical one can say about Eliot, it's that he is perhaps a little too refined, too effete for anything but the most well-educated and well-mannered in society. The sometimes sycophantic devotion he expresses to his mother often crosses the line past being "healthy". The epithet "mama's boy" comes to mind. Taken together, however, I see this more as the downside of being an incredibly intelligent, well-educated and sensitive man, which is something I see no reason to deride.]]>
author: T.S. Eliot
name: Justin
average rating: 3.80
book published: 1990
rating: 5
read at: 06/08
date added: 06/11/08
shelves:
review:
Reading the letters of T.S. Eliot, or anyone's letters provided they are not an utterly boring person, famous or not, is fascinating. It's rather like being a Peeping Tom. Or should I say a "Peeping T." Sorry. Terrible joke. On to the review.

On the front of this book, there is a blurb by the Boston Globe that reads, "A joy to read...as they reveal the man for good and ill." I was about halfway through when I realized that there is much more of the "for good" than the for "ill," unless "ill" literally refers to illness. In fact, there wasn't really anything about Eliot as a person I didn't like.

In these letters, everyone of them from boyhood to 1922, when The Wasteland was published, Eliot comes off as an eminently sympathetic, eminently likable guy. He is a concerned, caring, sensitive person who is constantly worried about the comfort level and quality of life of everyone surrounding him. I mean, he's not a selfless martyr. He does a fair amount of complaining about his own hardships, and strained emotional states, but none of it is done with even a hint of bitterness. Bitterness for whom, you may ask?

Reading these letters, it's hard to say exactly where the circle of symbiotic neurosis starts and stops vis a vis Eliot and the woman he married after only a few months of courtship, Vivien (but that's the way they did it back then, right?) Whether it was her incessant worrying and "neuralgia" that fed his nervous energy or vice versa is something of a Gordian knot. They both seem to susceptible to excessive strain from the travails of life, though, I do have to say she rubbed me the wrong way more than once during the course of reading these letters. For one, she doesn't have a job but instead stays all day laid up in bed with some version of a head ache, while he worked full-time at a bank during the day and dedicated his nights to writing (both poetry but mostly criticism because it was, seemingly, easier for Eliot to write). She also seems to really relish the gossipy side of the literary quarrels that Eliot found himself in which he didn't have the fortitude to enjoy. Incidentially, one wonders what their love life was like and how this contributed to their respective neuroses.

For me, Eliot's correspondence letters with Ezra Pound are probably the most fascinating of the letters in the book. The contrast in their respective personalties is stark. Where Pound is didactic and aggressive, Eliot is measured. Where Pound never tires of polemics and ranting in American colloquialisms (no doubt ironically, though I'm sure he also felt comfortable in that style), Eliot's thoughts are lucid and his prose elegant. One wonders what their face-to-face conversations were like. While they were both American, born and bred, it's not hard to understand why Pound ended up settling in Italy and Eliot staying in England. Their respective temperaments fit those climes exactly.

If there is anything critical one can say about Eliot, it's that he is perhaps a little too refined, too effete for anything but the most well-educated and well-mannered in society. The sometimes sycophantic devotion he expresses to his mother often crosses the line past being "healthy". The epithet "mama's boy" comes to mind. Taken together, however, I see this more as the downside of being an incredibly intelligent, well-educated and sensitive man, which is something I see no reason to deride.
]]> 22860481 Sat, 24 May 2008 03:32:32 -0700
Anyway, it's not really a hopeful philosophy and it might not save your life or answer your questions (even the same ones Heidegger asks himself), but it's a lot less pessimistic than Nietzsche. Anyway, Heidegger is the launch pad for postmodernism, so if you want to get into the latter, you have to read the former. I'm not sure if I want to get into the latter. I'm sure I will at some point. For now, I'm content to read Heidegger at the pace at which he was meant to be read. Slowly.

As for the essays, if you know a little something about what Heidegger's on about, I'd start with the last, eminently readable, essay first ("The End of Philosophy and the Task of Thinking") and then go back to the beginning (Intro to Being and Time for which you might need an online Heidegger Dictionary).]]>
author: Martin Heidegger
name: Justin
average rating: 4.12
book published: 1993
rating: 5
read at: 04/08
date added: 05/24/08
shelves:
review:
The thing about reading Heidegger is, well, one, he's obtuse. If you can get past that, it's special. I mean, I know I've had profounder thoughts on Heidegger, but it's really amazing to read the thoughts of a man who was consumed with the question, "What does it mean to "be"?" I really can't think of any cooler.

Anyway, it's not really a hopeful philosophy and it might not save your life or answer your questions (even the same ones Heidegger asks himself), but it's a lot less pessimistic than Nietzsche. Anyway, Heidegger is the launch pad for postmodernism, so if you want to get into the latter, you have to read the former. I'm not sure if I want to get into the latter. I'm sure I will at some point. For now, I'm content to read Heidegger at the pace at which he was meant to be read. Slowly.

As for the essays, if you know a little something about what Heidegger's on about, I'd start with the last, eminently readable, essay first ("The End of Philosophy and the Task of Thinking") and then go back to the beginning (Intro to Being and Time for which you might need an online Heidegger Dictionary).
]]> 8419612 Mon, 29 Oct 2007 21:26:30 -0700 about Heidegger. Anyway, you'll probably see a lot more practical reading out of me for the next several months but who's keeping track?

Read this book and enjoy. The subtitle to the former is "How to Philosophize with a Hammer." Fucking, really. I mean, who can beat that? What intellectual has enough balls to title books like that and still be taken seriously? Anyway, it's like this: I recall this quote from the latter book and it sums up the story pretty well. Something like, "There was only one Christian in the history of the world and he died on the cross." You sort of get to the kernel of the story without delving too much into details which is, I think, what you and I want right now. ]]>
author: Friedrich Nietzsche
name: Justin
average rating: 4.17
book published: 1990
rating: 4
read at: 11/07
date added: 10/29/07
shelves:
review:
I recently lost this book at a party that--don't ask why I brought it but--I got drunk at and since I read like 85% of it I'm considering it "read". Truth be told, these days I've been boozy a little more than I'd like to admit which is not the best state to be reading philosophy. However, I read (present tense) Nietzsche more to peer into the mind of a tragic figure and someone whom I have some affection for, intellectually, of course. He's indisputably more radical than most of what passes for radical thinking today and I really appreciate that. I really appreciate someone who can take something as good and wholesome as Equal Rights and just disparage the shit out of it, not because I hate equal rights but just because I appreciate people who truly think outside of the box. Man, I have to get into Heidegger soon but that's gonna be such a headache. I seriously need to be in another place in my life both physically and figuratively to start reading Heidegger. Maybe I'll start reading about Heidegger. Anyway, you'll probably see a lot more practical reading out of me for the next several months but who's keeping track?

Read this book and enjoy. The subtitle to the former is "How to Philosophize with a Hammer." Fucking, really. I mean, who can beat that? What intellectual has enough balls to title books like that and still be taken seriously? Anyway, it's like this: I recall this quote from the latter book and it sums up the story pretty well. Something like, "There was only one Christian in the history of the world and he died on the cross." You sort of get to the kernel of the story without delving too much into details which is, I think, what you and I want right now.
]]> 3202545 Sun, 23 Sep 2007 21:08:45 -0700 Vice Magazine and this book is a collection of his columns, which are ostensibly reviews of porno movies but they rarely are. More often, either Nieratko riffs on the title of the movie-to-be-reviewed and it reminds of him of some depraved situation he himself was once a part of, or he just completely disregards the fact that he's supposedly writing a porn movie review and will write about something completely unrelated. I'll just say that if so-called gonzo journalism has something to do with getting fucked up and making the focal point of the piece you are writing you, then this is gonzo journalism. Actually, I'm not so sure Hunter Thompson would like this, but what do I know?

Anyway, you should read this if you like hilarious sex stories that involve drinking, drugs, being an asshole, tattoos, etc. (I know that description sounds like "been there/done that" but Nieratko is both creative and hilarious.). Actually, the book is much more than sex stories and what not. Fairly often, he retreats into flights of fancy that are, as the rest of the book is, often hilarious. He has a flair for the right phrase, even if the prose itself (and the subject matter) never rises above low brow. I'd like to give you a snippet but I don't have the book with me.

You get the feeling that Nieratko may be fudging anywhere from 2%-98% of the stuff written about in the book, but it really doesn't matter because a)it's not billed as a memoir and; b)it's, again, hilarious.

So, yap: depraved, debauched, degenerate, degraded, licentious, low, twisted, unhealthy (just peruzing the old thesaurus here), and wonderful. I think you can buy this at American Apparel. Or you can get it off the internet (or at Barnes & Noble, I suppose). ]]>
author: Chris Nieratko
name: Justin
average rating: 3.66
book published: 2007
rating: 5
read at: 09/07
date added: 09/23/07
shelves:
review:
This book is a whole lot of awesome! It's very funny and very fucked up, and I mean that in the nicest way possible. Chris Nieratko is an Asshole At Large for Vice Magazine and this book is a collection of his columns, which are ostensibly reviews of porno movies but they rarely are. More often, either Nieratko riffs on the title of the movie-to-be-reviewed and it reminds of him of some depraved situation he himself was once a part of, or he just completely disregards the fact that he's supposedly writing a porn movie review and will write about something completely unrelated. I'll just say that if so-called gonzo journalism has something to do with getting fucked up and making the focal point of the piece you are writing you, then this is gonzo journalism. Actually, I'm not so sure Hunter Thompson would like this, but what do I know?

Anyway, you should read this if you like hilarious sex stories that involve drinking, drugs, being an asshole, tattoos, etc. (I know that description sounds like "been there/done that" but Nieratko is both creative and hilarious.). Actually, the book is much more than sex stories and what not. Fairly often, he retreats into flights of fancy that are, as the rest of the book is, often hilarious. He has a flair for the right phrase, even if the prose itself (and the subject matter) never rises above low brow. I'd like to give you a snippet but I don't have the book with me.

You get the feeling that Nieratko may be fudging anywhere from 2%-98% of the stuff written about in the book, but it really doesn't matter because a)it's not billed as a memoir and; b)it's, again, hilarious.

So, yap: depraved, debauched, degenerate, degraded, licentious, low, twisted, unhealthy (just peruzing the old thesaurus here), and wonderful. I think you can buy this at American Apparel. Or you can get it off the internet (or at Barnes & Noble, I suppose).
]]> 5598187 Mon, 03 Sep 2007 15:20:06 -0700
Anyway, what Nietzshe's on about is sort of demystifying humans as humans have been/are now perceived thanks to what we've been told about us. If that's not vague enough, Nietzsche himself sometimes gets a bit mystical, so, yeah, at points, it is hard to grasp what he's getting at. At the risk of over-simplifying the shit out of his general train of thought, Nietzsche rejects God and the soul, he doesn't even necessarily believe that there might be an "I" or "you" to speak of. The latter, matter--taken up later in much more detail by such luminary philosohers as Heidegger, Foucault, Derrida (esp. Heidegger)--is where it gets pretty confusing, but if you can hang on through it, it's worth it. Nietzsche's scope is none other than the entire intellectual history of Western society since Plato and really Socrates and considering this book is only like 175+ pages, his style is very terse and profound. Again, he doesn't really bother to elaborate a whole lot. You either understand or you don't.

Regardless, Nietzsche is just about the most radical thinker you're going to read. Not only does he dissavow of Christianity and any sort of morality which measures an action based on any sort of scale that measures good or evil (including utilitarianism), he also doesn't like democracy, humanism, equal rights, freedom to not find yourself under the tyrrany of someone and pretty much all of what rational people consider "progress." I think a lot of readers are originally attracted to the Nietzster because he despises Christianity whereas for the reader, it's "organized religion" that he/she is disaffected with. And then they realize Nietzsche doesn't like Christianity itself, and, moreover, pretty much hates everything and I mean Everything about modern society (because Christianity has shaped so much of modern society). And then the reader gets turned off and goes back to reading Locke or whatever. It is what it is. Still, pretty radical for 1886 or whenever this was written. I have more to say but I don't know if the word limit's going to let me. Anyway, read it (or don't).]]>
author: Friedrich Nietzsche
name: Justin
average rating: 4.06
book published: 1886
rating: 5
read at: 09/07
date added: 09/03/07
shelves:
review:
Reading Nietzsche is fucking fascinating even if you can only grasp 85% of what he's getting at. He's pithy as all get out which makes him difficult to understand at points. He writes assuming the reader already has a certain background in history/philosophy/the history of philosophy and, frankly, it makes perfect sense that he's loathe to dumb it down because he despises the hoi polloi as it is.

Anyway, what Nietzshe's on about is sort of demystifying humans as humans have been/are now perceived thanks to what we've been told about us. If that's not vague enough, Nietzsche himself sometimes gets a bit mystical, so, yeah, at points, it is hard to grasp what he's getting at. At the risk of over-simplifying the shit out of his general train of thought, Nietzsche rejects God and the soul, he doesn't even necessarily believe that there might be an "I" or "you" to speak of. The latter, matter--taken up later in much more detail by such luminary philosohers as Heidegger, Foucault, Derrida (esp. Heidegger)--is where it gets pretty confusing, but if you can hang on through it, it's worth it. Nietzsche's scope is none other than the entire intellectual history of Western society since Plato and really Socrates and considering this book is only like 175+ pages, his style is very terse and profound. Again, he doesn't really bother to elaborate a whole lot. You either understand or you don't.

Regardless, Nietzsche is just about the most radical thinker you're going to read. Not only does he dissavow of Christianity and any sort of morality which measures an action based on any sort of scale that measures good or evil (including utilitarianism), he also doesn't like democracy, humanism, equal rights, freedom to not find yourself under the tyrrany of someone and pretty much all of what rational people consider "progress." I think a lot of readers are originally attracted to the Nietzster because he despises Christianity whereas for the reader, it's "organized religion" that he/she is disaffected with. And then they realize Nietzsche doesn't like Christianity itself, and, moreover, pretty much hates everything and I mean Everything about modern society (because Christianity has shaped so much of modern society). And then the reader gets turned off and goes back to reading Locke or whatever. It is what it is. Still, pretty radical for 1886 or whenever this was written. I have more to say but I don't know if the word limit's going to let me. Anyway, read it (or don't).
]]> 4964734 Wed, 22 Aug 2007 17:19:52 -0700 Being and Time." But saying you're going to sit down and read Being and Time is like saying you're going to sit down and read Finnegan's Wake or some such other notoriously opaque tome. You might get through the book but there's going to be a fair amount of forehead-slapping and head-pounding, and when you're done you feel like you understood maybe 60% of it, if not like 20% of it. Let you know how it goes . . .

. . . .

The previous paragraph I wrote about 3 months ago. Since then I've broken up with my girlfriend (you'd think this would've given me more time but it's actually given me less), and my boss has suggested, nee commanded that I use 85% of my free time for work-related activities. But, to put the onus completely on the fact that I have been really busy would be misleading. This book requires 100% of your concentration, and more importantly, if you aren't fairly steeped in the jargon of ontology (more specifically, phenomenology), you're pretty much fucked. I'll probably go back to this book in probably another six months when things calm down at work, but for now I'm taking it off the currently-reading shelf and calling it read. I read about 150+ pages which is a little worse than as far as I treaded in Ulysses. Anyway, I'm going back to Herr Nietzsche.]]>
author: Martin Heidegger
name: Justin
average rating: 4.13
book published: 1996
rating: 4
read at: 10/07
date added: 08/22/07
shelves:
review:
There comes a time in some men's lives when they say to themselves, "I think I'm ready to read Being and Time." But saying you're going to sit down and read Being and Time is like saying you're going to sit down and read Finnegan's Wake or some such other notoriously opaque tome. You might get through the book but there's going to be a fair amount of forehead-slapping and head-pounding, and when you're done you feel like you understood maybe 60% of it, if not like 20% of it. Let you know how it goes . . .

. . . .

The previous paragraph I wrote about 3 months ago. Since then I've broken up with my girlfriend (you'd think this would've given me more time but it's actually given me less), and my boss has suggested, nee commanded that I use 85% of my free time for work-related activities. But, to put the onus completely on the fact that I have been really busy would be misleading. This book requires 100% of your concentration, and more importantly, if you aren't fairly steeped in the jargon of ontology (more specifically, phenomenology), you're pretty much fucked. I'll probably go back to this book in probably another six months when things calm down at work, but for now I'm taking it off the currently-reading shelf and calling it read. I read about 150+ pages which is a little worse than as far as I treaded in Ulysses. Anyway, I'm going back to Herr Nietzsche.
]]> 4191192 Tue, 07 Aug 2007 01:55:08 -0700
Anyway, I didn't read this book because I'm "totally interested in knowing what really happened in the weeks in months building up to 9/11," but more because I like political memoires or books by guys who really were at the center of the proverbial storm (check Woodward and Bernstein's book The Final Days for a starting point). Anyway, this book was in many ways, a Real Page Turner for me. I didn't want to put it down. I think the CIA is fascinating. I think that Tenet's book is probably the closest you're going to get to the "real story" behind what went down behind the curtain during Bush. You get a real read on some personalities, etc. Moreover, according to Tenet, a lot of the contretemps and "mistakes" have more to do with the inevitable complications of navigating and maneuvering within huge bureacracies rather than some concerted effort to mislead, which is, for me, totally believable (eg., the whole Niger Delta/Iraq/yellowcake/State of the Union Address gaffe). I'd like to go into to detail but there's really too much to say (though I will say that nothing in here really surprised me.). It is what it is. Check it out for yourself. Until Colin Powell writes his book or (gasp!) maybe Condoleeza Rice or someone else closer to Bush (maybe even Bushy himself!) decides to write their political memoires (or maybe even after), this book is about the best thing you're going to get as far as an insider's account. Morever, as I wrote earlier, I'm more inclined to believe Tenet than I would be Rice, or Rummy or pretty much anyone besides George Tenet. So, this book just might be the best thing you'll get if you want know what went on in the Executive Branch, 2001-2005.]]>
author: George Tenet
name: Justin
average rating: 3.53
book published: 2007
rating: 5
read at: 08/07
date added: 08/07/07
shelves:
review:
I like George Tenet. He has a tough-guy New York accent and there's a picture of him in the book with a leather jacket on looking like he's really giving it to Andrew Card. Personally, I have no special strong feelings for George Bush, either way. But, when it comes down to finger-pointing (which, yes it has for a while now), Tenet wasn't a Bush Man---Clinton appointed him--and I think, in a lot of ways, that gives him a lot of credibility as far as believing what he has to say in this book. He wasn't totally wet behind the ears when 9/11 rolled around like most of the Bushies, and so in a lot of ways (yeah, again), his CYA (Cover Your Ass, which it's sort of undeniable this book is) has a lot more resonance for me. The fact of the matter is that unless Iraq miraculously turns itself around, there's going to be a lot of CYA coming out of the Bush administration as they, like Tenet, move from policy-making to history-writing. In addition to the fact that Tenet wasn't a Bush Man to begin with, his being the head of the CIA lends him more credibility, as the CIA is more of a technocratic, fact-finding organization than a policy-making organization (though that is debatable). The DOD should be a technocratic fact-finding org. too, but the fact is that during Bush Jr., it was staffed with the finest the American Enterprise Institute had to offer (read: the much maligned 'neo-cons'). And if half of what people, including Tenet, have to say about guys like Doug Feith, Richard Perle, and Paul Wolfowitz, along with Cheney and Rummy and their coteries, basically railroading the rest of Bush admin. into the Iraq War, then Tenet's CYA, again, has a lot more traction than whatever will come out of, for example, Rumsfeld's or Wolfowitz's corners (which, to tell you the truth, if they write memoires any time in the next decade, I'll be surprised.).

Anyway, I didn't read this book because I'm "totally interested in knowing what really happened in the weeks in months building up to 9/11," but more because I like political memoires or books by guys who really were at the center of the proverbial storm (check Woodward and Bernstein's book The Final Days for a starting point). Anyway, this book was in many ways, a Real Page Turner for me. I didn't want to put it down. I think the CIA is fascinating. I think that Tenet's book is probably the closest you're going to get to the "real story" behind what went down behind the curtain during Bush. You get a real read on some personalities, etc. Moreover, according to Tenet, a lot of the contretemps and "mistakes" have more to do with the inevitable complications of navigating and maneuvering within huge bureacracies rather than some concerted effort to mislead, which is, for me, totally believable (eg., the whole Niger Delta/Iraq/yellowcake/State of the Union Address gaffe). I'd like to go into to detail but there's really too much to say (though I will say that nothing in here really surprised me.). It is what it is. Check it out for yourself. Until Colin Powell writes his book or (gasp!) maybe Condoleeza Rice or someone else closer to Bush (maybe even Bushy himself!) decides to write their political memoires (or maybe even after), this book is about the best thing you're going to get as far as an insider's account. Morever, as I wrote earlier, I'm more inclined to believe Tenet than I would be Rice, or Rummy or pretty much anyone besides George Tenet. So, this book just might be the best thing you'll get if you want know what went on in the Executive Branch, 2001-2005.
]]> 352727 Wed, 18 Jul 2007 01:46:13 -0700
This book is often marketed as some kind of self help book but it's much more than that. I don't know if the "48 Laws" are the only laws and, moreoever, I'm not sure they couldn't be condensed into fewer, more elegant, laws. BUT, what Greene has to say has caught on in a lot of circles (I read a story about Robert Greene in the New Yorker where he was hanging out with both 50 Cent and the dude who started American Apparel, Dov Charney. I wouldn't consider either of those guys my literary heroes or anything, but it is interesting that they have this fellow and his book(s) in common), and I think it's definitely worth reading.]]>
author: Robert Greene
name: Justin
average rating: 4.02
book published:
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 07/18/07
shelves:
review:
This is Machiavelli updated for the everyman (and woman). Robert Greene is educated as all get out and he puts it out there for everyone to see. Really, the only way you can make arguments for the positions he takes is by citing historical example, (i.e. the laws of power are immutable and unchanging and here's all my examples throughout history to explicate that). Machiavelli really only relied on his own times (Renaissance Italy which of course was populated with characters like Cesare Borge who were ripe for Machiavelli to canonize) and antiquity. Greene, on the other hand, talks about everyone from ancient Chinese warlords to Talleyrand to Thomas Edison.

This book is often marketed as some kind of self help book but it's much more than that. I don't know if the "48 Laws" are the only laws and, moreoever, I'm not sure they couldn't be condensed into fewer, more elegant, laws. BUT, what Greene has to say has caught on in a lot of circles (I read a story about Robert Greene in the New Yorker where he was hanging out with both 50 Cent and the dude who started American Apparel, Dov Charney. I wouldn't consider either of those guys my literary heroes or anything, but it is interesting that they have this fellow and his book(s) in common), and I think it's definitely worth reading.
]]> 2854564 Tue, 17 Jul 2007 22:32:05 -0700
Anyway, as for the book itself, I thought it was really great. I really like what Levitt is doing as far as using the tools of Microeconomics in other fields. One of my intellectual heroes (I only have a few) is Kenneth Waltz who did the exact same thing in the field of International Relations in the '70's and wrote the seminal book The Theory of International Politics, which pretty much the single-handedly invented defensive (neo) realism. More generally, I think Economics is probably the most formalized of the social sciences and the one to which others should esteem. A lot of the Political Science field concerned with both voter behavior and how legislatures work is now pretty formalized as well, and, I, for one, think this is a good thing. I don't see how anyone could think it's not (good) unless they a)think the scientific method cannot be used to analyze human behavior; or b)have a visceral aversion to mathematical languages. Actually, I am one of the latter, but I, at least, see the value in having a formalized language to work with.

As for the book itself, there's some maybe-controversial things in there like Levitt did some work that showed that the legalization of abortion in the U.S. (Roe v. Wade) was one of the main reasons that crime in the U.S. dropped in the '90's and continues at the same rates today. He stands behind it pretty hardily though and it doesn't seem like he has a moral agenda at all. Some might argue that the best writers are those who are best able to disguise their moral agenda, but considering he writes about all kinds of not-very-serious things like how sumo wrestling in Japan is probably corrupt as far as matches g,o and there's stuff in there about how real estate agents sell their houses for more than they sell their customers' houses (which, may or may not be surprising), I really don't think he has a hidden pro-life agenda.

Anyway, there's a bunch of stuff in there (the book), hence the 'freak' in Freakonomics. It's well-written. It's not dry. It's written for a lay audience. I recommend it. Read it and feel the power of social science! ;-)]]>
author: Steven D. Levitt
name: Justin
average rating: 3.82
book published: 2006
rating: 4
read at: 07/07
date added: 07/17/07
shelves:
review:
I guess some people don't like this book because it's not centered around one theme. Instead, it's more about the seemingly diffuse academic work of one of the authors Steven D. Levitt (the other author is a journalist, Stephen J. Dubner). Levitt is something of an economist but more like a social scientist using the tools of Microeconomics applied to other fields that happen to catch his interest (often having something to do with cheating, corruption, crime, etc.). In the back of the book he mentions how he considers himself a student of Thomas Schelling who is kind of like the father of Game Theory (strategy theory?), except much more of a 'man of ideas' than what one might think of when one thinks about game theory today, which is much more mathematical.

Anyway, as for the book itself, I thought it was really great. I really like what Levitt is doing as far as using the tools of Microeconomics in other fields. One of my intellectual heroes (I only have a few) is Kenneth Waltz who did the exact same thing in the field of International Relations in the '70's and wrote the seminal book The Theory of International Politics, which pretty much the single-handedly invented defensive (neo) realism. More generally, I think Economics is probably the most formalized of the social sciences and the one to which others should esteem. A lot of the Political Science field concerned with both voter behavior and how legislatures work is now pretty formalized as well, and, I, for one, think this is a good thing. I don't see how anyone could think it's not (good) unless they a)think the scientific method cannot be used to analyze human behavior; or b)have a visceral aversion to mathematical languages. Actually, I am one of the latter, but I, at least, see the value in having a formalized language to work with.

As for the book itself, there's some maybe-controversial things in there like Levitt did some work that showed that the legalization of abortion in the U.S. (Roe v. Wade) was one of the main reasons that crime in the U.S. dropped in the '90's and continues at the same rates today. He stands behind it pretty hardily though and it doesn't seem like he has a moral agenda at all. Some might argue that the best writers are those who are best able to disguise their moral agenda, but considering he writes about all kinds of not-very-serious things like how sumo wrestling in Japan is probably corrupt as far as matches g,o and there's stuff in there about how real estate agents sell their houses for more than they sell their customers' houses (which, may or may not be surprising), I really don't think he has a hidden pro-life agenda.

Anyway, there's a bunch of stuff in there (the book), hence the 'freak' in Freakonomics. It's well-written. It's not dry. It's written for a lay audience. I recommend it. Read it and feel the power of social science! ;-)
]]> 418359 Wed, 20 Jun 2007 16:46:46 -0700 as the story of North Korea. In reading, not only do you get the straight up history of the Kims (and by extension, North Korea) but tipping in at a little under 900 pages this books is full of really interesting, sometimes hilarious and often tragic anecdotes (I still can't decide if the stuff about the sexual proclivities of the Kims is more funny than tragic or more tragic than funny). There is also a couple chapters dedicated to testimony of North Korea's many defectors, the validity of which is debatable but Martin himself often comments on the subject.

The only thing I didn't like about this book were a few parts where Martin sort of wanders into fantasy. One is a verbatim account of what the author, Bradley Martin, would adivse Kim Jong Il to do as far as the management of the state apparatus. I mean, does anyone really care or is this just unnecessarily self-indulgent filler? Taking that into account, you wonder if this book couldn't have been trimmed down to a more palatable size (under 500 pages?). Still, if you are at all interested in what goes in the hermit kingdom, read this book. ]]>
author: Bradley K. Martin
name: Justin
average rating: 4.18
book published: 2006
rating: 4
read at: 01/07
date added: 06/20/07
shelves:
review:
This book was probably straight up the most interesting book I've read on North Korea to date. It's also not at all academic, and maybe that's why. Bradley Martin compiles a couple decades of covering North Korea for various publications into a huge compendium of everything you'd want to know about the Kims and more. Because cult-of-personality Kim (both Il Sung and Jong Il) worship is pretty much the state-sanctioned religion of North Korea, Martin writes the story of the Kims as the story of North Korea. In reading, not only do you get the straight up history of the Kims (and by extension, North Korea) but tipping in at a little under 900 pages this books is full of really interesting, sometimes hilarious and often tragic anecdotes (I still can't decide if the stuff about the sexual proclivities of the Kims is more funny than tragic or more tragic than funny). There is also a couple chapters dedicated to testimony of North Korea's many defectors, the validity of which is debatable but Martin himself often comments on the subject.

The only thing I didn't like about this book were a few parts where Martin sort of wanders into fantasy. One is a verbatim account of what the author, Bradley Martin, would adivse Kim Jong Il to do as far as the management of the state apparatus. I mean, does anyone really care or is this just unnecessarily self-indulgent filler? Taking that into account, you wonder if this book couldn't have been trimmed down to a more palatable size (under 500 pages?). Still, if you are at all interested in what goes in the hermit kingdom, read this book.
]]> 1774667 Sun, 10 Jun 2007 05:32:55 -0700
The other thing I wasn't expecting in this book was the overwrought prose. I guess it shouldn't have surprised me, considering when the book was written, but, to some extent, it did. Not that it was always a bad thing. When I had time to really sit down with this book, I rather enjoyed a lot of the more poetic passages. Here's an example of Ishmael describing Moby Dick (the whale) for the first time:

On each soft side--coincident with the parted swell, that but once leaving him, then flowed so wide away--on each bright side, the whale shed off enticings. No wonder there had been some among the hunters who namelessly transported and allured by all this serenity, had ventured to assail it; but had fatally found that quietude but the vesture of tornadoes. Yet calm, enticing calm, oh, whale! thou glidest on, to all for who the first time eye thee, no matter how many in that same way thou may'st have bejuggled and destroyed before.

This paragraph perfectly captures the peacefullness and destructive force that Moby Dick, and the sea itself at large, represent. Hemingway wrote a story about an old man and a fish, but he could (nor would) never do justice to all the poetic majesty of the sea and seafaring life.

However, what Hemingway could do was sublimely represent the masculine and stoic grace of the sort of characters who did lead seafaring lives. And I guess that's where the contrast lies (and where I'm also sort of torn about who writes a better seafaring story in the Melville-vs.-Hemingway title fight I just made up): more than once I thought about how, due to the prose, Ishmael comes off sounding more like a prancing, lisping, effete, Little Lord Fauntleroy describing (and ascribing) the most fanciful things to what were probably very stoic and burly men in the most flowery prose. On the one hand, if you can get over that, then, yes, the prose often is quite beautiful and, again, much much better at touching the rightful majesty of the sea. But, yeah, on the other hand, reading Moby Dick, you get the feeling that most of the sailors on any given ship-of-fools at that time probably didn't talk in the way Melville ascribes to them (unless it was an especially well-read ship-of-fools) and, at the very least, that the old, grumpy Ahab didn't speak in parables more fitting to Homer than a whaling ship.

But Melville probably has more in common with Homer than Hemingway as far as what each was trying to accomplish with their respective stories. Both Melville and Homer want to inject a large amount of poetry and eminence into what are essentially professions that require neither poetry nor eminence (whaling and warring, respectively). Hemingway uses understatement to, as I said earlier, do justice to the terse, stoic nature of the men who populate his books.

Also, Melville is funny. Seriously. But not seriously funny. Just funny.
]]>
author: Herman Melville
name: Justin
average rating: 3.62
book published: 1992
rating: 4
read at: 06/07
date added: 06/10/07
shelves:
review:
I really didn't know what to expect from this book other than what comes down the pike (i.e. crazy man with one leg captains a whaling ship and wants to seek revenge on the whale that bit his leg off). For one, I'll just say that this book is much more a celebration of whales--or, more specifically, the sperm whale--than it is a book about killing whales. I mean, don't get me wrong: If the whole idea of catching and slicing up whales make you squeamish, you will probably be horrified by more than a few passages in the book, not to mention the fact that the sole purpose of the voyage being undertaken in the book is to do exactly that (kill whales). But if you put yourself back in the time when the book was written and try to not judge too harshly by today's killing-whales-is-really-really-bad (which I agree with) standards, then, yeah, you'll see Melville really set out to put whaling and, by extension, the sperm whale, on the map. Pages and pages are dedicated to an exhaustible understanding of the whale itself.

The other thing I wasn't expecting in this book was the overwrought prose. I guess it shouldn't have surprised me, considering when the book was written, but, to some extent, it did. Not that it was always a bad thing. When I had time to really sit down with this book, I rather enjoyed a lot of the more poetic passages. Here's an example of Ishmael describing Moby Dick (the whale) for the first time:

On each soft side--coincident with the parted swell, that but once leaving him, then flowed so wide away--on each bright side, the whale shed off enticings. No wonder there had been some among the hunters who namelessly transported and allured by all this serenity, had ventured to assail it; but had fatally found that quietude but the vesture of tornadoes. Yet calm, enticing calm, oh, whale! thou glidest on, to all for who the first time eye thee, no matter how many in that same way thou may'st have bejuggled and destroyed before.

This paragraph perfectly captures the peacefullness and destructive force that Moby Dick, and the sea itself at large, represent. Hemingway wrote a story about an old man and a fish, but he could (nor would) never do justice to all the poetic majesty of the sea and seafaring life.

However, what Hemingway could do was sublimely represent the masculine and stoic grace of the sort of characters who did lead seafaring lives. And I guess that's where the contrast lies (and where I'm also sort of torn about who writes a better seafaring story in the Melville-vs.-Hemingway title fight I just made up): more than once I thought about how, due to the prose, Ishmael comes off sounding more like a prancing, lisping, effete, Little Lord Fauntleroy describing (and ascribing) the most fanciful things to what were probably very stoic and burly men in the most flowery prose. On the one hand, if you can get over that, then, yes, the prose often is quite beautiful and, again, much much better at touching the rightful majesty of the sea. But, yeah, on the other hand, reading Moby Dick, you get the feeling that most of the sailors on any given ship-of-fools at that time probably didn't talk in the way Melville ascribes to them (unless it was an especially well-read ship-of-fools) and, at the very least, that the old, grumpy Ahab didn't speak in parables more fitting to Homer than a whaling ship.

But Melville probably has more in common with Homer than Hemingway as far as what each was trying to accomplish with their respective stories. Both Melville and Homer want to inject a large amount of poetry and eminence into what are essentially professions that require neither poetry nor eminence (whaling and warring, respectively). Hemingway uses understatement to, as I said earlier, do justice to the terse, stoic nature of the men who populate his books.

Also, Melville is funny. Seriously. But not seriously funny. Just funny.

]]> 890601 Sun, 10 Jun 2007 05:31:25 -0700
In particular, Huntington sets his sites on America for no other reason than that he's an American and he perceives a profound crisis looming in America's future. Namely, the enormous influx of Mexican and other Latin American immigrants who either refuse to or are unable to adapt to the U.S.'s mainstream culture pose an existential problem.

The crisis is that the fact a large percentage of the population is culturally, linguistically, and perhaps politically un(der)assimilated and concentrated primarily in one geographic location has the potential to sunder the country politically, in which case the problems are obvious (Civil War II) or culturally, in which case the problems are, I believe, less obvious. Regardless, I agree with Huntington that more needs to be done to assimilate the Mexican population with America's mainstream culture. Of course, there is a lot of debate about whether this is even a problem at all, and what you think about this issue will determine your opinion of this book.

Hungtington is not a right wing nut and this book is not partisan polemics. That doesn't mean this book won't piss you off if you consider yourself far left or right on the political spectrum (to put it simply). But if you are open-minded, this is a good book about the subject of immigration and its potential effects on the country. Hungtington is first and foremost a scholar and his aim is to present his argument with precision and clarity with as much appeal to logic and as little appeal to emotion as possible.

However, this book is not without its faults. His emphasis on ethnicities and cultural distinctions propels him to single out militant Islam as the major foreign policy threat for the foreseeable future. Whereas, I, as a dyed-in-the-wool realist, cannot but believe the whole Islamic terror thing is just a blip on the radar as the next great power conflict approaches (U.S.-China?, Japan-China?, China-India?). In fact, Hungtington compares the Communist threat after WWII to the Islamic threat now when he should've contrasted the two. However, I do side with him in that culture and ethnicity are much more powerful forces in the domestic political arena and need to be heeded.]]>
author: Samuel P. Huntington
name: Justin
average rating: 2.74
book published: 2005
rating: 4
read at: 05/07
date added: 06/10/07
shelves:
review:
Is patriotism passe? Not so says academic extraordinaire Samuel Huntington. In fact, he thinks that it's essential to the very extistence of the nation state itself.

In particular, Huntington sets his sites on America for no other reason than that he's an American and he perceives a profound crisis looming in America's future. Namely, the enormous influx of Mexican and other Latin American immigrants who either refuse to or are unable to adapt to the U.S.'s mainstream culture pose an existential problem.

The crisis is that the fact a large percentage of the population is culturally, linguistically, and perhaps politically un(der)assimilated and concentrated primarily in one geographic location has the potential to sunder the country politically, in which case the problems are obvious (Civil War II) or culturally, in which case the problems are, I believe, less obvious. Regardless, I agree with Huntington that more needs to be done to assimilate the Mexican population with America's mainstream culture. Of course, there is a lot of debate about whether this is even a problem at all, and what you think about this issue will determine your opinion of this book.

Hungtington is not a right wing nut and this book is not partisan polemics. That doesn't mean this book won't piss you off if you consider yourself far left or right on the political spectrum (to put it simply). But if you are open-minded, this is a good book about the subject of immigration and its potential effects on the country. Hungtington is first and foremost a scholar and his aim is to present his argument with precision and clarity with as much appeal to logic and as little appeal to emotion as possible.

However, this book is not without its faults. His emphasis on ethnicities and cultural distinctions propels him to single out militant Islam as the major foreign policy threat for the foreseeable future. Whereas, I, as a dyed-in-the-wool realist, cannot but believe the whole Islamic terror thing is just a blip on the radar as the next great power conflict approaches (U.S.-China?, Japan-China?, China-India?). In fact, Hungtington compares the Communist threat after WWII to the Islamic threat now when he should've contrasted the two. However, I do side with him in that culture and ethnicity are much more powerful forces in the domestic political arena and need to be heeded.
]]> 1307036 Sat, 19 May 2007 02:48:09 -0700
I won't explain the book. If you're interested in reading it, you may already have know what it's about. I like this book because a)I have delusions of starting an internet company and making a retarded amount of money; and b)the author believes that the internet will get rid of the blockbuster-hit-making-machine culture forced on us by the music industry, Hollywood, Oprah, etc. and subsequently change popular culture.

Regarding the latter issue, the author, Christopher Anderson who is also the Chief Editor of Wired, basically says that the internet's potential to supply an economy of "infinite" supply will be met by infinite demand (think itunes, amazon, ebay) and people will no longer see all the same movies, listen to the same music and read the same books, but instead everyone will be into his or her niche. The countervailing force is the so-called water-cooler effect, whereby people consume the same entertainment in order to share and be part of a shared community. Anderson writes, "These days our watercoolers are increasingly virtual; there are many different ones and the people who gather around them are self-selected. Rather than being loosely connected with people thanks to superficial mass-cultural overlaps, we have the ability to be more strongly tied to just as many people if not more people with a shared affinity for niche culture." (191)

It's interesting. I'm skeptical, but I'd like to believe it. I think the water-cooler effect (not to mention the positive feedback loop (a semi-related phenom.)) is pretty strong.

The other thing this book made me realize (more like confirmed) is that if you're going to do a business, you're pretty much stupid unless you go online with it at some point. Speaking of which, what's up with H & M? Why don't they have an online store?]]>
author: Chris Anderson
name: Justin
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2006
rating: 5
read at: 05/07
date added: 05/19/07
shelves:
review:
I hate to be one of those everyone-should-read-this-book guys but, yeah, everyone should read this book, at least for no other reason than you're on the intnernet, and, "Hey, the internet is changing the world!" And that's what this book is about.

I won't explain the book. If you're interested in reading it, you may already have know what it's about. I like this book because a)I have delusions of starting an internet company and making a retarded amount of money; and b)the author believes that the internet will get rid of the blockbuster-hit-making-machine culture forced on us by the music industry, Hollywood, Oprah, etc. and subsequently change popular culture.

Regarding the latter issue, the author, Christopher Anderson who is also the Chief Editor of Wired, basically says that the internet's potential to supply an economy of "infinite" supply will be met by infinite demand (think itunes, amazon, ebay) and people will no longer see all the same movies, listen to the same music and read the same books, but instead everyone will be into his or her niche. The countervailing force is the so-called water-cooler effect, whereby people consume the same entertainment in order to share and be part of a shared community. Anderson writes, "These days our watercoolers are increasingly virtual; there are many different ones and the people who gather around them are self-selected. Rather than being loosely connected with people thanks to superficial mass-cultural overlaps, we have the ability to be more strongly tied to just as many people if not more people with a shared affinity for niche culture." (191)

It's interesting. I'm skeptical, but I'd like to believe it. I think the water-cooler effect (not to mention the positive feedback loop (a semi-related phenom.)) is pretty strong.

The other thing this book made me realize (more like confirmed) is that if you're going to do a business, you're pretty much stupid unless you go online with it at some point. Speaking of which, what's up with H & M? Why don't they have an online store?
]]> 1017787 Thu, 03 May 2007 17:22:03 -0700
Kang takes a more traditionally realist/deterrence approach in that he believes that because the DPRK has no real chance of winning a war against the ROK, it would never launch one. Engagement should be based on the belief that North Korea would like to terminate its rogue status. On balance, Kang's view and engagement proposal toward North Korea is more optimistic than Cha's. Cha stresses the punitive measures that should be taken against North Korea, should engagement fail to curb its nuclear appetite. Kang, on the other hand, believes that the DPRK is truly trying to reform itself, would like to be a part of the community of nations, and does not touch on issues regarding North Korean belligerence.

Kang and Cha do, however, agree on many issues, and they collaborate to write the last two chapters of the book. The most interesting contribution is their view on the future regional stability should the Korean peninsula reunify. They stress that better U.S-Japan-Korean trilateral relations are crucial to regional stability. They reject the notion that a threat must be present for alliances to exist. This strikes me as overly optimistic, and naive. They countenance such criticism by pointing to the alliances that exists between the U.S. and the U.K., and the U.S. and Australia. Perhaps also taking a page from the continued existence of NATO after the fall of the USSR, they state that such alliances can become permanent unions after the threat disappears because the alliances have identities based on common liberal-democratic values, norms, and institutions(180, 185). Aside from the many problems with such thinking, Cha himself wrote a book on the U.S.-Japan-Korean alliance and showed that Korea and Japan became closer only when the U.S. backed away from its commitment to Asian stability. They answer such criticism by stating that "the American position in Asia should therefore be recessed enough in this new arrangement to impart responsibilities on the allies to consolidate their relationship, but not so recessed that Japan and South Korea choose self-help solutions outside the alliance framework . . . "(176)

Such an assertion seems based more on hope than solid theory. The dynamic that Cha analyzes in the aforementioned book whereby Korean and Japanese relations improved when American commitment was on the wain existed during the Cold War when a bipolar system was in effect. In today's multipolar, or perhaps unipolar, world the same dynamic may not, and probably does not, exist. More thinking on alliance behavior in a multipolar environment needs to be done before we can begin to speculate on the best American options in a post-unified Korean Asia.]]>
author: Victor D. Cha
name: Justin
average rating: 3.50
book published: 2005
rating: 4
read at: 05/05
date added: 05/03/07
shelves:
review:
In this book Victor Cha and David Kang promise to apply social science to the debate of how to engage with North Korea, and step back from the histrionics [to] offer a reasoned, rational, and logical debate on the nature of the North Korean regime and the policy that should be followed by the United States, Japan, and South Korea?(4). Cha calls his position hawk engagement,?and it is that as North Korea becomes poorer, more castigated and generally more a vestige of a bygone era, it becomes more likely to lash out with force. Through prospect theory,Cha shows that North Korea is particularly susceptible to double-or-nothing logic, and that preemptive lashing out on its part would not be surprising. He believes, therefore, that North Korea should be engaged to mitigate potential risky behavior by North Korea. Kang, on the other hand, believes that because containment has worked so far, there is no reason to fundamentally change it.

Kang takes a more traditionally realist/deterrence approach in that he believes that because the DPRK has no real chance of winning a war against the ROK, it would never launch one. Engagement should be based on the belief that North Korea would like to terminate its rogue status. On balance, Kang's view and engagement proposal toward North Korea is more optimistic than Cha's. Cha stresses the punitive measures that should be taken against North Korea, should engagement fail to curb its nuclear appetite. Kang, on the other hand, believes that the DPRK is truly trying to reform itself, would like to be a part of the community of nations, and does not touch on issues regarding North Korean belligerence.

Kang and Cha do, however, agree on many issues, and they collaborate to write the last two chapters of the book. The most interesting contribution is their view on the future regional stability should the Korean peninsula reunify. They stress that better U.S-Japan-Korean trilateral relations are crucial to regional stability. They reject the notion that a threat must be present for alliances to exist. This strikes me as overly optimistic, and naive. They countenance such criticism by pointing to the alliances that exists between the U.S. and the U.K., and the U.S. and Australia. Perhaps also taking a page from the continued existence of NATO after the fall of the USSR, they state that such alliances can become permanent unions after the threat disappears because the alliances have identities based on common liberal-democratic values, norms, and institutions(180, 185). Aside from the many problems with such thinking, Cha himself wrote a book on the U.S.-Japan-Korean alliance and showed that Korea and Japan became closer only when the U.S. backed away from its commitment to Asian stability. They answer such criticism by stating that "the American position in Asia should therefore be recessed enough in this new arrangement to impart responsibilities on the allies to consolidate their relationship, but not so recessed that Japan and South Korea choose self-help solutions outside the alliance framework . . . "(176)

Such an assertion seems based more on hope than solid theory. The dynamic that Cha analyzes in the aforementioned book whereby Korean and Japanese relations improved when American commitment was on the wain existed during the Cold War when a bipolar system was in effect. In today's multipolar, or perhaps unipolar, world the same dynamic may not, and probably does not, exist. More thinking on alliance behavior in a multipolar environment needs to be done before we can begin to speculate on the best American options in a post-unified Korean Asia.
]]> 890751 Thu, 26 Apr 2007 04:14:04 -0700
author: Betty Friedan
name: Justin
average rating: 3.76
book published: 2001
rating: 5
read at: 10/06
date added: 04/26/07
shelves:
review:
I loved this book. My girlfriend hated it. She's sort of a feminist. I'm sort of not. Needless to say the whole debate is pretty complicated. I do know that the "problem that has no name" is still alive and kicking some 50 or 60 years after this book was written so . . . Yeah. Read this book. Decide for yourself.
]]> 489705 Sun, 15 Apr 2007 17:53:34 -0700
This is one in a number of books written or due out under the Great Discoveries series that Norton is putting out under their Atlas imprint. Wallace's is, I believe, the first. Regardless, this isn't typical pop science/math literature. I read this book because I really like Wallace and I had a general interest in the subject. True to form, though, this book is written in classic Wallace style. The sentences are not as long as what you may be used to with Wallace, but he has not abandoned his love for profuse footnotes, the acronym (there is an acronym glossary in the beginning of the book in case you lose track), occassionally turning common nouns into proper nouns, and generally using a very conversant prose style interpolated with really impressive words you have to look up in the dictionary that remind you just how smart Wallace is (if the suject matter itself isn't doing the trick). All of this, I believe, stems from Wallace's (perhaps excessive) concern with his audience, which, also, I believe, is what led him in part to do postmodern fiction in the first place.

My main problem was that even though this was supposedly written for the layman, I had trouble with A LOT of the heavier, abstract math, which is, well, a large part of the book. I basically just bit the bullet and trudged through it because I'm a dedicated enough Wallace fan to do that. Depending on how much you like Wallace, and how much math you had (and can remember) in high school and college, the reading may be more or less enjoyable for you.

Overall, good stuff. I'm looking forward to reading Consider the Lobster.]]>
author: David Foster Wallace
name: Justin
average rating: 3.34
book published: 2005
rating: 4
read at: 04/07
date added: 04/15/07
shelves:
review:
The reason this book works so well is that Wallace writes about the history of grappling with possibly the most slippery and forbidding concept (infinity) in a very conversant tone. While at times, I did feel like he went overboard a bit so that it went from "conversant" to "patronizing," I generally like DF Wallace a lot and appreciated what he was trying to do with this book (i.e. write a book that "anyone can read" about a "very complicated subject").

This is one in a number of books written or due out under the Great Discoveries series that Norton is putting out under their Atlas imprint. Wallace's is, I believe, the first. Regardless, this isn't typical pop science/math literature. I read this book because I really like Wallace and I had a general interest in the subject. True to form, though, this book is written in classic Wallace style. The sentences are not as long as what you may be used to with Wallace, but he has not abandoned his love for profuse footnotes, the acronym (there is an acronym glossary in the beginning of the book in case you lose track), occassionally turning common nouns into proper nouns, and generally using a very conversant prose style interpolated with really impressive words you have to look up in the dictionary that remind you just how smart Wallace is (if the suject matter itself isn't doing the trick). All of this, I believe, stems from Wallace's (perhaps excessive) concern with his audience, which, also, I believe, is what led him in part to do postmodern fiction in the first place.

My main problem was that even though this was supposedly written for the layman, I had trouble with A LOT of the heavier, abstract math, which is, well, a large part of the book. I basically just bit the bullet and trudged through it because I'm a dedicated enough Wallace fan to do that. Depending on how much you like Wallace, and how much math you had (and can remember) in high school and college, the reading may be more or less enjoyable for you.

Overall, good stuff. I'm looking forward to reading Consider the Lobster.
]]>