1/2 term reading

   

   

(stephen batchelor is the tiny-fonted author of buddhism without beliefs) all rather wonderful in their own ridiculously diverse way (even the campiness of the agatha christie). the only thing that left a slightly sour taste in my mouth - and it's not easy to say this given the terrible manner of tony judt's death and the extraordinary mental strength it took to write the memoir (composed in his mind at night while he lay sleepless and paralysed by lou gehrig's disease, then dictated to an assistant in the morning) - was the strain of old world misogyny running through the book, not just in his discussion of student / tutor sexual relations, but in his dismissive references to his unnamed wives (e.g. taking advantge of the lengthy - and increasingly welcome - absence of wife no. 2). i guess it's hard to be a towering public intellectual - or indeed a towering public anything - without some deficits elsewhere.