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February 03
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David
gave
to:
Point Counter Point (Paperback)
by Aldous Huxley
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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read in August, 2007
David said:
"I love Huxley. I've inferred that he is not exactly respected as a true literary figure, and perhaps this is because he is too many things, besides literary, at the same time. I think of Huxley as having a very strong grasp on the whole spectrum of...more
I love Huxley. I've inferred that he is not exactly respected as a true literary figure, and perhaps this is because he is too many things, besides literary, at the same time. I think of Huxley as having a very strong grasp on the whole spectrum of human experience and dissecting his perceptions of humanity as if using the scientific method itself. This book, one of my favorites to date, is super heady, but also really fun to read, and enlightening. We follow a close knit circle of socially active friends and acquaintances living in 1920's London as Huxley, acting as a damn convincing chameleon, jumps from archetypal character to archetypal character laying out the inner psyches, motivations, pleasures, and torments of about a dozen very different types of people. He ultimately captures an impressively large sampling of the total and diverse human experience. This all makes for a fascinating read, though Huxley's greatest genius and greatest potential contribution, perhaps, can be seen in the current events of the time (1928) that he decides worthy of writing analytical dialog about, for these topics tend to be exactly those most poignant still today, like the dilemma of diminishing natural resources and democracy's proneness to draw out and extol a nation's own mediocrity. ...less
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David
is currently reading:
The Portrait of a Lady (Penguin Classics)
by Henry James
bookshelves:
currently-reading
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my rating:
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David
gave
to:
The True Story of Ah Q (Bilingual Series on Modern Chinese Literature)
by Lu Xun
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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read in December, 2007
David said:
"Recommended by a Chinese coworker, this is required reading for most Chinese high schoolers and is considered to be a historical classic. It's a short, old allegory that's really worth going through. The story teaches us of the ostensibly advantage...more
Recommended by a Chinese coworker, this is required reading for most Chinese high schoolers and is considered to be a historical classic. It's a short, old allegory that's really worth going through. The story teaches us of the ostensibly advantageous, but essentially flawed pattern of going easy on oneself. ...less
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David
gave
to:
Saturday (Paperback)
by Ian McEwan
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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read in November, 2007
David said:
"Having been a couple months since I read this, the most impacting content has to be the first hand depiction of the surgical theater and its workings. Other than that, this assiduous log of the commonplace mental minutiae of a highly conscious docto...more
Having been a couple months since I read this, the most impacting content has to be the first hand depiction of the surgical theater and its workings. Other than that, this assiduous log of the commonplace mental minutiae of a highly conscious doctor could stand as a historical record for what it was like to live a conscious lifestyle in 2005...that is, if you are wealthy, healthy, pragmatic, and also have managed to spawn a blues prodigy and a prodigious young poet. One's critique will depend on whether this account sounds alluring or just boring....less
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September 08
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David
gave
to:
Boomsday (Hardcover)
by Christopher Buckley
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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read in August, 2007
David said:
"This is supposed to be a satire, though I start to worry, while Buckley describes all these Washington personalities and Washington motivations and Washington spin-athons, that perhaps his outrageous depiction is closer to reality than it should be. ...more
This is supposed to be a satire, though I start to worry, while Buckley describes all these Washington personalities and Washington motivations and Washington spin-athons, that perhaps his outrageous depiction is closer to reality than it should be. It is a breezy book at heart, about an outlandish political campaign initiated by an indignant and driven under-thirty, Cass, to alleviate her own generation of the impending, gargantuan social security tax burden brought on by millions of retiring, self-indulgent, financially irresponsible baby boomers. Her platform: offer tax cuts and a sense of social conscientiousness and charity to Americans over 70 who are willing to commit suicide. There are two really good things about this book: one, It stresses the very real, very alarming national economic catastrophe looming, and two, it does so without being too depressing. In fact, it's pretty damn hilarious.
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August 13
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David
gave
to:
The Good Soldier: A Tale of Passion (Paperback)
by Ford Madox Ford
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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David said:
"An excellent display of, for the time (1915), an innovative narrative technique. A contemplative, psychological, and alluring tale is disclosed, as the downhearted narrator gradually recollects, moving backwards through time discontinuously and as i...more
An excellent display of, for the time (1915), an innovative narrative technique. A contemplative, psychological, and alluring tale is disclosed, as the downhearted narrator gradually recollects, moving backwards through time discontinuously and as if piecing the details of the scandal together for the very first time himself, the tragically unraveling lives of he, his wife, and their two closest friends. ...less
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June 20
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New comment on Alexis's review of
Kafka on the Shore
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