Steven > Recent Status Updates

This just came out as an audiobook included in Spotify premium, so I will likely finish it that way. Will I miss out on footnotes? Maybe. Will I be less overwhelmed by information and therefore more easily able to finish the book without remaining attached to non-essential details? Yes, definitely. Graeber is brilliant in his specificity but his attention to detail is somewhat stifling in text form

Everything said in the "Theory of Practice" section might as well be ripped straight out of Buddhist philosophy. The entire universe is a totality consisting of various causes and effects and the agents that produce those causes and effects. Anarchism is predominantly concerned with social structures and how they reproduce, meaning that its analysis must necessarily include a holistic interpretation of human action

Really excited to dig into this one. I'm a fan of Dr. Baker's YouTube channel and even the small portion of this book that I've read so far has been excellent

Really trying to slog through some of the historical evidence here. Again, it's interesting, but the information in this book is very dense. I'm also further into the book than the percentage on GR would suggest because of the 170-ish pages of footnotes.

I'm shelving this book because there are too many other books that I want to read at the moment. The premise is somewhat interesting but nothing super substantial happens in the first three chapters. Will come back to it at another time

Skipped the intro because I didn't feel that it was super important. Don't tell me how to feel about literature please.

This book has everything--Racism towards Italians, lack of generational wealth, xenophobia, bankers, canned goods, Catholicism, and shady backroom deals! And that's just the first chapter... Like damn, now I know why people like Steinbeck so much

I've heard excellent things about Steinbeck's writing but I've just never gotten around to reading him before. This novel seems particularly interesting, and the introduction is noting that it's representative of Steinbeck's jaded attitude towards the Cold War. As someone who sees this period in American history as the most important for understanding the modern day, hopefully it will be entertaining.

The second half of this book is really saving the story as a whole. The war gives Achilles and Patroclus purpose--I still think there are some missed opportunities in terms of the narrative, but I'm starting to see the novel overall in a more positive light.

Still not sure how to feel about this book. It's strange--I want to like it because it's holding space for queer media, but I'm having trouble finding the characters themselves interesting in a lot of respects. The storyline is good but it's because it's a retelling of the Iliad

I should note that the reasons that I'm progressing through this book so slowly are twofold:
1. It's very dense with information, though not in a way that makes it unpleasant to read, and
2. The footnotes take up about 170 pages of the back of the book, and I'm reading them as I go along.

So really, I would say I'm more like 40% of the way through the text itself.

110 pages in and we finally have a hand job!! The problem is that I feel that these characters are rather one-dimensional. Still though, I think this type of literature is important for queer kids that feel insecure about themselves.

I can't quite decide if I like what I'm reading so far or not. I like this author's prose, but at the same time, Achilles and Patroclus seem like they have flat personalities. Granted, they're young when this novel starts, but it just feels like there isn't much attention paid to their complexities. I'm still willing to give this novel a chance though so I won't stop reading quite yet

At the risk of reading too many things at one time, I'm reading this commentary in preparation of the ley rung that I am planning on doing this upcoming year. Zasep Tulku Rinpoche is a wonderful teacher, despite his connections to "that deity." And frankly, I often think that issues concerning "that deity" are mostly political in nature and don't have much to do with the actual practice of Tibetan Buddhism.