incunabular illumination

carrying the fire

noreply@blogger.com (Philip O'Brien) — Sat, 04 Feb 2012 17:27:00 +0000

Mike Collins is not my hero.

He doesn't want to be. What Mike Collins is is smart, funny, charming and a little irreverent. Mike Collins is also a damn good writer; he insisted on no ghost writers, and its clear that he doesn't need one.

Here's a slice-o'-reading-life:

me (while reading): "Ha ha ha."
daughter: "What's funny?"
me: "Everything astronauts say is funny. Because they're the coolest guys in the world."

Collins traces he career from Air Force pilot, to test pilot, his try outs at NASA for the astronaut program, and then his two space fights aboard Gemini 10, where he did two of the first spacewalks, and then Apollo 11 which brought him, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin to the first moon landing.

Right, this is the guy who piloted the command module of Apollo 11, the Columbia, while Armstrong and Aldrin disengaged and flew away to make their dramatic moon landing aboard the lunar module, the Eagle.

The guy who orbited the moon alone, zipping around the dark side where all sight and sound of home disappear as the radio signal is lost and he, of all the billions of humans whose attention is fixed on the Eagle, is the only one who doesn't know what is happening. Was he lonely? No, he says, he was doing his job. And he was honored to do it.

The history of the Gemini and Apollo programs is laid out with a level of detail and insider insight that really bring the achievements of these projects home. Collins doesn't mince words or pull punches. He is as honest about himself, his fellow astronauts, their bosses and the multitude of engineers, scientists and subcontractors he worked with, as any autobiographer I've read. What they accomplished, with the technology available, was amazing.

A ghost writer might have edited this story down, but I'm not sure the honesty, or Collins' distinct voice would have come through, and I think that's what makes this book such a joy to read. When we're talking about something like the space program, and all we usually get to see is the bits they broadcast on television, I'm glad there are men like Michael Collins, with the guts and the patience to do the work he did, and then take the time to tell his story for the rest of us.

So Collins isn't a hero. As he says, he didn't save anyone from a burning building, or perform 'above and beyond the call of duty.' But what he did do, should make us all proud.

Read this book. And then, lets go put a man on Mars.

library material

noreply@blogger.com (Philip O'Brien) — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 22:02:00 +0000

Its not yours... its ours.

Soon, the question may not be so much about how we catalog, access, store and generally treat library materials, the question may be a much simpler one: what library materials?

It is true that information that was once contained only in books is becoming more and more digitized, resulting in the very material-ness of information slowing fading into the past. But the time when all of the physical items that we store in, and lend out of our libraries, evaporates into memory, is not here yet.

In the meantime, we have library materials. Analog, baby. But its not just books anymore, and I'm sure we all know that, but what seems to have escaped us as a public-library-using society, is that even though the materials have changed, the way we are use them has not.

But it should.

Books, frankly, can take a beating. On the surface, books seem pretty delicate. They're made of paper (generally) and other natural materials, easily ripped, folded, or marked up. They are susceptible to broken bindings, lost pages, water damage, rot, and even flames. But walk into your local library and you'll easily find volumes that are 30, 50, even 100 years old. Standing in stodgy defiance of our notions of their delicacy, they are still readable, and as fully functional as the day they were added to the collection. What differs today, is the more modern technologies used to deliver library content. These newer materials are certainly new-fangled and very techie, but seldom are they as durable as a 50-year-old book.

Books are easy: You can drop a book on the coffee table, throw it in your bag, read it at the beach, even set it on the sand. Try that with a DVD. Or a Kindle. Good luck! I'm not complaining about these new technologies, I love them! actually, I don't love ereaders. * I just wish they worked when I take them home from my library. But they don't work, because they've been damaged by careless handling.

Did you get a little of that popcorn grease on the book you took out of the library? Or did you drop in on the floor in the dark, and then kick it across the floor? While this may be a problem if everyone does it to the library books, the truth is, if it does happen now and again, we can still all read and enjoy that book. Not so with a DVD, CD and maybe even an eReader. You need to be MORE careful with these materials, because unlike our old (old!) friend, the book, info tech delivery systems are typically delicate.

You like to eat a bag of Cheetos, or a bucket of KFC while watching a movie, have at it. But wash you hands before smearing up the DVD. Grease will wash off, but it also attracts dust and dirt, which can scratch, and scratches don't wash off. And that's bad.

you may be confusing DVDs with hockey pucks.
hint: hockey pucks are black.

And don't think you can just set a disk down, just for a second, on your coffee table, which is really, really clean! Because it isn't, and you won't, and it it will get ruined, and you know it will. Can't find the box it came in? Put it back in your player, put down your Funyuns and find it. This level of responsibility is what you agreed to when you borrowed this material from the library. Its an implied contract that you've made with the library and all of its users (us!) So do your job.

Here's some advice from the Kindle Fire User's Manual:

"...glass could break if the device is dropped or receives a substantial impact. If the glass breaks, chips, or cracks, stop using your Kindle Fire and do not touch or attempt to remove the damaged glass."

Ooooo... yeah, you're done. Oh, and don't leave it where it could get hot or cold, like in your car. Because its not a book, and when you do, you could ruin it. And its not yours... its ours.

* I might love eReaders; I don't know, I've never used one.

seven samurai

noreply@blogger.com (Philip O'Brien) — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 16:11:00 +0000

I just watched Seven Samurai (Shichinin no samurai), directed by Akira Kurosawa. Classic, 1954 black and white drama of good guys vs. the bad guys... against overwhelming odds.

I didn't really stop to think about what a carefully--and patiently--constructed film this is, until the intermission reel ran about halfway through and I thought, hasn't it been over an hour? A little more actually, was the answer; this epic is 3 hours, 27 minutes. And what's so wonderful about that? I think its actually what The Lord of the Rings movies were missing: quiet time.

In contrast to the LOTR books, the movies--even though they're of similar length as the Seven Samurai--seem to be non-stop action. So much action, that there isn't time for the mind to rest and consider the tensions, the characters, and the other subtleties that make up a well constructed narrative.

Kurosawa takes his time building his story and his characters, so that when the final battle scenes come, we go into the battle with full knowledge of who these people are, how they feel and what drives them. But the final battle scene is not the only action in the film, there is a balance of drama, character building, conversation, humor and action throughout, along with some very nice camera shots along the way.

There are three scenes focused on women, for example, that not only work as contrast to the general masculinity of this picture, but are so subtle, and yet so powerful. Two of them don't even have any dialog, yet Kurosawa and his actresses bring these scenes to life and the story pours from the screen, wordlessly. Breathtaking.

I had heard that Seven Samurai was a classic, but I'm not enough of a film buff to fully understand its place in film history, which is apparently pretty high falutin'. Seven Samurai shows up on some serious ten best films of all time lists. Seven Samurai was the basis of the 1960 American film, The Magnificent Seven.

And before we close, a little praise, and some apropos ranting:

Thanks to my local public library for having such a great DVD collection! And thanks to everyone who either: didn't take this movie out because its old, or sub-titled, OR did take it out and had sense enough not to manhandle the disk.

I mean, who scratches a borrowed disk? Especially a library disk, that belongs to all of us? Y'all need a lesson in implied social contractual obligations. You know, how your rights to borrow a DVD from the library are inextricably* bound to your obligations to treat said DVD (book, map, magazine, et al) with respect, even reverence. yeah, i said it

You know what? I think the care and treatment of library materials warrants its own post.

Peace. Oh, and see this movie. Like, now.

* Unavoidably, inescapably, indissolubly, indivisibly, ineluctably... bound!

venus

noreply@blogger.com (Philip O'Brien) — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 05:02:00 +0000

I don't read a lot of books like this one, but it was good. The Birth of Venus is an historical novel set in the Florence of the Medici, during the time when Friar Savonarola came to be the spiritual leader of the city and tried to bring about the New Jerusalem. Botticelli's Birth of Venus actually turns up in the story, but only in passing, and only by reference. It's the turmoil of Florence that really acts as the backdrop for this story about a young girl who grows to womanhood amidst it. I think its fair to categorize this story as Romantic with a capital R, but it certainly isn't a bodice ripper. I've tried, I just don't like them.

The Romance in this story seems to be mainly this young woman's hopes for her future and how she'll find her way in the male-dominated society she finds herself in, especially when she dreams of a life which is simply not open to women. And the New Jerusalem thing isn't helping.

So, if the Medici/Savonarola era of Florence is the backdrop, and the plot is centered on the hopes and dreams of a young woman, then the engine that moves the story forward is art. Art is what our young heroine longs for: to experience, learn about, and (heaven forfend) to practice it herself. The scribblings of a child are a thing that Florencian society is willing to overlook, but a grown woman involved in art? Out of the question.

It appeared to me that a fair amount of research went into this book, and the feeling of what life might have been like during that time in Florence was what I enjoyed the most.

shutter island

noreply@blogger.com (Philip O'Brien) — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 14:16:00 +0000

Shutter Island by Dennis Lehane was made into a movie a few years ago with Leonardo DiCaprio. I didn't see it.

After reading, I can see why they decided to make a movie with this book, it has some great plot twists and storyline surprises that would probably lend themselves pretty well to a visual storytelling. Maybe I'll check out the movie at some point and see for myself.

I've read a few of Dennis Lehane's books recently, but this is the first that hasn't featured his private investigation duo. This story features a US Marshall and is set in the 1950s, but is still set in Massachusetts, where Lehane comes from. They say write what you know, so it makes sense. King has Maine, and Irving has New Hampshire, right? Lehane writes about Massachusetts, and that local connection is fun for me I guess, altho I don't think I've ever been to any of the Harbor Islands. George's Island is supposed to be nice, in a field-trippy kind of way.

Shutter Island takes place over the course of just a few days, but the story is tense, and filled with a kind of smoldering tension. I series of small sub-plots color the story, and the main protagonist is dealing with his own demons, which impact his decision making more than he cares to admit. Lehane rolls the story out carefully, revealing the mysteries of Shutter Island a little at a time, and in such a way that we're not quite sure what all of its secrets are until the end.

I liked this one a lot. Read this book.

I've got an idea! Did you see the movie AND read the book? If so, tell us which one you liked better.

mountains of freedom

noreply@blogger.com (Philip O'Brien) — Sat, 07 Jan 2012 04:29:00 +0000

Mountains of Freedom is a small, privately published memoir written by a South African ex-POW about his experiences in Lybia, Italy and Germany during World War II. Martin Schou was in the battle of Tobruk, Lybia when nazi Field Marshall Rommel overwhelmed the allied forces there and retook Tobruk. Schou, and thousands of other allied forces, were rounded up and shipped to Italy to concentration camps.

For over a year, Schou was imprisoned, occasionally moving from camp to camp until he found himself on a working farm in northern Italy alongside a group of young, Italian women. Schou was very fond of the ladies after being in a concentration camp, so it wasn't too long before young Martin learned to speak Italian.

When the armistice came in September of 1943, Schou was released from the northern Italian working farm, and headed for the allied troops who had landed in southern Italy.

On foot.

This adventure, told in a series of stories or remembrances, has a glow about it that I think must come from the mellowing of years. Schou spent a number of years away from his home in South Africa in the service, and some of those years as a prisoner of war, but looking back from a current age of nearly 80 (in 1998 when the story was written) has warmed and softened the story so that it contains very little horror. The horror is there, but Schou doesn't seem to dwell on it too much.

What Martin Schou does dwell on are the relationships he formed with the local people in Italy as he made his way down the Italian peninsula through the Apennines. At almost every step of the way, the poor mountain people of iItaly helped, hid, clothed, fed and directed Schou and many others on there way. And it was dangerous. The Italians had given up and surrendered to the Allies, but Hitler had filled Italy with hundreds of thousands of German troops, who took control of the concentration camps only days after the armistice, and patrolled the streets throughout Italy, and could have shot Schou if he was discovered.

Schou's adventures had their ups and downs, but he obviously made it home eventually to settle down, start a family and write his book. The stories are lovingly told, by a man who knows he's not a writer but felt obligated to tell his story and to say thank you to the simple people who helped him, just because he needed help.

His book is both a thank you note, and a love letter to Italy and the people who saved him.

This book isn't for sale in bookstores* that I've found. We bought a copy at a fundraiser to support local communities while we were in Italy. Martin Schou spent quite a bit of time in and around Sulmona, Italy and he met people there who helped him do the research for his book, and I think that's why we found it there.

* I got one hit. Mountains of Freedom is included in this list of military books from a South African bookstore. Its number 152, and its listed as sold for 195 South African Rand (about $24 US).

last surgeon

noreply@blogger.com (Philip O'Brien) — Wed, 04 Jan 2012 14:35:00 +0000

Good story. Writing... myeeehh.

Michael Palmer is just a guy with a regular job who fancies himself a writer. you know...like me But its hard to argue with him; he's written a bunch of books, and is rather popular, I understand. unlike me My biggest problem: people just don't talk like that... or act like that. Do they?

So, like any good story, we've got conflict. The good guys vs. the bad guys. The bad guys are personified by the baddest of the bad, his boss, and a few hangers on; lets call them minions. One of these minions is a career G-man who makes his way in the world by denying benefits to those who need them, and is generally an all-around hater. On a clandestine trip to the zoo for some cloak and dagger rendezvous with his boss, our minion sees a kid with his mom, who have absolutely nothing to do with the scene. Have a looksee:

"Hi Gorilla!" the boy called out. "Can you say hello?"
The boy's mother, a modestly dressed, somewhat frumpy woman in her late thirties, knelt down beside the youth to encourage his exuberance. MacCandliss cringed.
"It's not a parrot," he said to the child. "It's an ape, and apes don't talk."
[At this point the kid turns around to check out our minion and loses his hold on his balloon. Our hater is quite satisfied, and when the mother scolds him for not being 'very nice' our guy replies like so:]
"But it was nevertheless, madam, the truth," he said, handing her a ten. "Good day."

Sooo... am I right? "Good day"? Are you kidding me? Nobody does that. And for the record, this unnecessary little sidebar does not show me, the reader, what a bad dude this guy is. In two sentences he goes from evil bastard to pathetic idiot.

And while I'm ranting, what is it about lawyers (Palmer is a doctor) and writing? It seems to me that a bunch of the crime novels I've read are written by guys who worked as lawyers and now are cranking out crime novels. Is it the access to crime? Is it the money and/or good education (which may also explain Dr. Palmer)? How many bios have I read that start out: "So-and-so is a practicing lawyer, has two-and-a half kids..."

Anytho... I had piss and moan about something, right? But as I said earlier, this was generally a good book. you remember I said that right? I can wait if you want to back and look. The story WAS good, and I burned through this book in no-time. So maybe I wouldn't rush out and buy everything this guy ever wrote; but I would pick up another book-sale paperback, and throw my buck in the jar, no sweat.

little seamstress

noreply@blogger.com (Philip O'Brien) — Sat, 31 Dec 2011 17:15:00 +0000

Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress is a... fairy tale? Maybe fable is a better term. But somehow that doesn't seem right either, because when I think about what happens in this pretty little story by Dia Sijie, it seems magical--almost dreamlike--but that must be due to the telling and the subject matter. The story takes place in the rural mountains of China, where the author was sent as a young man to live for 3 or 4 years in a Maoist re-education camp. Dia Sijie was inspired by his time in the re-education camp to spin this yarn about two young men who lived in a mountain village for three years. The surrealism of life in a re-education camp in the 70s is just so foreign to western readers, that it adds to the fancifulness of the story.

According to the bio, Dia emigrated to France not long after his stint in the camp. This story is actually translated by Ina Rilke from the French.

Without knowing how the story was originally told in French, I found no problems with the translation. The story is narrated in the first person from the POV of one of the young men sent to the camp for being the son of reactionaries, with the exception of a few chapters, told in the first person by a couple of the other characters. Dia also speaks directly to the reader occasionally a la Alexandre Dumas.

What I do find odd is both the title and the cover image chosen for the soft cover English translation I read. I can imagine some mid-level conference room discussion full of overwrought, consumer targeting, clarification minded, trying-to-hard conversation that results in this title. Why the word 'Chinese?' Aren't all Chinese seamstresses Chinese? Its like ordering Chinese food in China. But after looking, I found that this imagined conversation took place one country removed. The original title is Balzac et la petite tailleuse chinoise. The cover photo just looks like an attempt to capitalize on the success and recognition of some other Asian based books that have done well recently. Who is the child these shoes are supposed to belong to? The little seamstress perhaps? spoiler! nope.

Regardless, Dia has penned a story that is touching, sensual, real and full of subtle imagery that may be rooted in his first love: directing movies.

Read this book.

drink before the war

noreply@blogger.com (Philip O'Brien) — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 16:36:00 +0000

I read another Dennis Lenhane novel a year or so ago with the same characters as this book. Lehane has used the Patrick Kenzie/Angela Gennaro private investigative team in a number of his books I understand, and after reading these two, I can see why. The characters have a lot of depth, history and both their banter and their relationship has the tang of reality to it. So good on you Dennis Lehane.

I picked this novel up, and another one like it at the local library's used book sale. My wife read both of them and enjoyed, so I'm giving them a go, but after reading this one, I'm switching to something else first--maybe a few things--before I read another one. Lehane's novels are fast paced and intense. I stayed up ay past my bedtime reading last night and had to give up and go to sleep with 4 or 5 chapters left. I need something a little more relaxing before picking up another Lehane novel.

As I mentioned in my review of Gone Baby, Gone, I'm sure that I'm reading these Kenzie/Gennaro novels out of order because of the history that keeps popping up. It could be that Lehane is just creating backstory, but I don't think that's always the case. A Drink Before the War was written in 1994, but I don't know where in the sequence of other books it sits.

The mystery that Kenzie and Gennaro need to unravel has both high connections and low connections, running from the political leaders in Boston to the gang leaders in Roxbury. The plot and sub-plots work well together and Lehane has the local dialect down, but he's either better connected to the bad business in Boston, or he's more pessimistic that I am, or... I could simple be one of the sleepy suburbanites that Lehane speaks about through his characters, and I've just been missing it.

In any case, Lehane doesn't pull any punches when it comes to violence, depravity or the dark side of the human psyche but I didn't get the feeling that any of it was gratuitous. So, yeah, I'll read the other one I picked up. And I'll be on the look out for more at the used book sale.

bombshell

noreply@blogger.com (Philip O'Brien) — Fri, 23 Dec 2011 04:02:00 +0000

I just finished Blonde Bombshell by Tom Holt, based on a recommendation from my son. I bought the book for him a year or so ago, and he actually read it! And then told me it was good. So its been sitting in the read pile for a while.

Tom Holt reminds me a little of Christopher Moore, which I'm sure both he and Moore love, but what are you going to do? They probably show up on read-alike lists but the stories I've read by Moore have been re-tellings, while this story was a new thing. I think Holt is from Australia, or New Zealand or something so his English has a British tinge to it, or I guess I should say, an Australian or New Zealand tinge, right? I could look it up but...naaahhh. Regardless, Holt is a funny man.

So what is this story? Its says right there on the back cover that its about about smart bomb set to blow up the earth. So I guess you'd call it Sci Fi, or SF, which in this case could also stand for silly fun. The story is well plotted and paced, with some interesting sub-plots weaving through, and just when you think it can't get any crazier, its does. And then after a few pages I found myself thinking, Yeah, makes sense.

I'll keep my eye out for more Tom Holt.

ghost writer

noreply@blogger.com (Philip O'Brien) — Sun, 18 Dec 2011 04:21:00 +0000

I've only just read my first Philip Roth story, and then along comes this one at the local library book sale. The Ghost Writer is from 1979--coincidentally, the same year as the last book I read; The Black Tower--and is the first in a short series of books about Nathan Zuckerman, an up and coming writer from Newark, New Jersey.

This short novel (novella?) or even long short-story, is written first person from Zuckerman's POV and is therefore rings as at least somewhat autobiographical. Whether or not this is true, any more than any work of fiction is partially autobiographical, I really don't know, but Roth's observations of people, their mannerisms, and his carefully crafted sentences shined in this little story.

I read this book TODAY! And I don't read books in a day. Ever.

"Her luminous, shameless presence in the very front row (and her white jersey dress; and her golden hair, out of some rustic paradise) led me to recall October afternoons half a lifetime ago when I sat like a seething prisoner, practicing my penmanship at my sloping school desk while the World Series was being broadcast live to dinky radios in every gas station in America."

Sentences like this are what prevented this book being put down. I'll be prowling the library book sales and stacks for more Philip Roth now.

Read this book.

black tower

noreply@blogger.com (Philip O'Brien) — Sat, 17 Dec 2011 01:32:00 +0000

I've never read P.D. James before; the old broad's got some fire in 'er belly! is it wrong to say that?

The Black Tower is carefully woven--maybe intricately woven is better--right up until the end. Unless I missed something, our man Dalgliesh forms an hypothesis based on nothing, for one small element in this mystery. I encourage you to read this, if only so that you can 'splain to me how he pulls this little rabbit out of his hat.

Now I'm not complaining (so much.) I understand that writing a complex mystery is, you know, complex. And frankly, based on how well the story is written, I'm guessing that it was in fact me that missed the clues about this niggling little bit that caught in my teeth.

James writes in a very tight language, that assumes her audience is quick and well read. Bully on that, dear lady. What, what? The text is however peppered with words that are either Englishisms or just a cut above your average vocab (and my Dictionary is in need of repair, therefore not as ready to hand.)

image: Cavell Tower, 1830. the inspiration for The Black Tower

Huge (relative term) cast of characters here, at this wind swept coastal Grange*, and a little confusing. There's four or five ladies that are 40s to 60s, described as starting to gray, graying or gray, all vaguely unhappy and with a axe to grind, and thereby not above suspicion. Two of them are patients at the Grange, two work there, and three of their names start with the letter M. This was true of some of the male characters too. And they all vaguely played the same roll, so I couldn't keep them straight, and maybe it didn't really matter. It was like the Quenta Silmarillion there for a bit. Finrod is the son of Finarfin, and Fingon is the son of Fingolfin, right?

I picked this book up used at the library, and I would certainly grab another if it shows, or borrow one of the other Commander Dalgliesh novels in the series. James has written a bunch of detective novels.

* Another Englishism: Chiefly British A farm, especially the residence and outbuildings of a gentleman farmer.

bookmark this

noreply@blogger.com (Philip O'Brien) — Thu, 15 Dec 2011 00:58:00 +0000

This one is a hoot!

This bookmark is from Highsmith, copyright 1992. So, in computer years, those beige bombers are from like... 228 years ago! If you'll step into the WABAC Machine Sherman, we'll just zip back to 1992 and see what was happening in Computerland in 1992.

According to Computer Hope, a bunch of crap happened that was cool and zippy, and then encoded in meaningless acronyms so you or I will never understand it. Some of things I could understand included: Microsoft introduced Windows 3.1, and it sold more than 1 million copies within the first two months of its release, and IBM introduced the ThinkPad with a 25 MHz 486 processor and a 120 MB hard drive! Yeah, I can feel the power.

Does ANYONE have a computer like this sitting around anymore? With a fat 386 processor, and a black and white CRT? Awesome.

Libraries Compute, indeed.

age of wonder iii

noreply@blogger.com (Philip O'Brien) — Fri, 09 Dec 2011 14:36:00 +0000

In what is maybe a corollary for the scientific time period in question, The Age of Wonder started out riveting, and ended a little sluggishly. The Age of Wonder began in youthful exuberance, mellowed to dogged determination with an eye to the future, and ends with the deaths of some of the lions of science and the squabbles of the young bucks, who without their strong leaders, bicker about the future of science, and their scientific organization: the Royal Society.

Image: Engraving by John Cochran (1821-1865) of a portrait of Michael Faraday in his late thirties, painted by Henry Pickersgill (1782-1875)

So I chose Michael Faraday as the image for this third and final entry about The Age of Wonder, but not because he is the focus of the end of the book--he showed up a number of times during the second half, but only around the periphery--I chose Faraday instead because he represents the future of science as The Age of Wonder draws to a close. Faraday is still young(ish) at the end of Richard Holmes's tour through Romantic Science in England, and represents the hope Holmes wants us to see in science. he's also not one of the squabblers

As an aside, Holmes treats Faraday with such a delicate touch, dropping just enough about him to peak the reader's interest, and then leaving us unfulfilled, that it makes a reader wonder when the Michael Faraday book will be published. Hmm...

The overall arc of this book reminds me a little of the month of March (In like a lion...) Holmes points out that this age has a beginning and an end, and this is simply the end. It doesn't just fizzle of course. Science marches on to where we are today, but the end of this era is marked with a kind of watering down of the exuberance and newness of discovery with which it opened. Is that real, or is it a function of the way Holmes has framed his story? I have no idea.

In the end, I've come away knowing a lot more about the era, and surprised at how much I enjoyed this book. and how quickly I read it... you know, for me.

Read this book. And take notes.

age of wonder ii

noreply@blogger.com (Philip O'Brien) — Sun, 04 Dec 2011 18:48:00 +0000

I could almost wait until I'm done for this one, but this book is so jam-packed with great stuff. I may have mentioned before how much the style of this book reminds me of John Adams: its a great mixture of history, biography, and in this case science, to tell a really compelling story.

Image: Joseph Banks, lately back from his South Seas travels.

I've included this image of Joseph Banks not only because he is the subject of the first chapter, but because he is leading figure in the storyline; a kind of common thread that runs through the chapters, linking together the cast of characters. What makes Banks so compelling is his undying enthusiasm for science and discovery. He is always pushing forward, striving to make science more expansive, more relevant, and better understood.

An interesting fashion of the time I really had no idea about was how interested in science some of the famous writers of the day were. Poetry and writing were obviously very big during this era, and many of the scientists Richard Holmes writes about, were amateur poets as well, and would often include poetry in their scientific writings, often to help illustrate a point or explain complex scientific ideas in more layman-like terms. But the famous poets and writers who fraternized with the scientific community and used what they learned by reading, attending lectures, and their discussions over dinners, was really surprising to me.

We've gone from botany, anthropology, astronomy, and ballooning, to chemistry and electricity, to Shelley's writing of Frankenstein, and there is still a big chunk left to go!

feedburner

noreply@blogger.com (Philip O'Brien) — Wed, 30 Nov 2011 23:41:00 +0000

I've just added RSS Feed capabilities via Feedburner. If you already pull a feed from this blog, and if it all works right, then nothing should change. If it has changed, or if you want some of this tasty content via your favorite feed reader, you can just clickety-click right here to get the new address.

You can also use the feed button in the right-hand column. It says "get yer feed on."

You may also notice that I'm trying a new template. I'm going for readability.

Let me know what you think! -Philo

age of wonder i

noreply@blogger.com (Philip O'Brien) — Sat, 26 Nov 2011 18:24:00 +0000

So I'm going to have to break this one up into chunks; its a big boy. The Age of Wonder, by Richard Holmes, that is. I put this one on my list at some point a few months ago. I think I heard Holmes on a radio talk show, but I can't be sure.

Holmes has broken the story of this scientific era down into a series of stories focused on some of the larger movers in shakers in this age of wonder, as he calls it. That era of giddy exploration, and scientific discovery that took hold of the public imagination, and often drew the public in, creating countless amateur scientists, many of which ended up making significant discoveries or contributions to this explosion of knowledge.

The age of wonder Holmes is talking about runs from the mid- to late-1700s until the early-to mid-1800s. Holmes calls his story structure a 'relay race of scientific stories' that carries the reader through the heady, 'Romantic' science of the day with compelling stories (thus far, anyway) of the people who pushed the boundaries of science outward and upward, beginning at a time when the infant United States was just standing up, Franklin was spending time in Paris before Napoleon took France, and the monarchs of England, France, and Germany vied for scientific bragging rights.

Holmes really seems to love research, and it shows in his writing. The book is thick with both end notes (boring), and footnotes (riveting*). In fact the backmatter contains (in addition to the end notes) a bibliography, list of abbrevaitions, a cast of charaters (along with short biographies), and index and an epilogue.

There are also three little groups of illustrations tucked in at the quarter points, showing the players, big and small, diagrams, notes on discoveries, and images of scientific instruments.

* A few of the footnotes are mini stories, all their own. I can imagine Holmes spinning off on a tangent to find out more about some minor character, or cross checking some calculation and spending days doing the research for his footnote.

guerilla library

noreply@blogger.com (Philip O'Brien) — Tue, 22 Nov 2011 20:04:00 +0000

Today's Boston Globe includes an article on the library that's been set up in the Occupy Boston camp at Dewey Square. Sorry about the link, but The Globe no longer supports the poor, huddled masses, yearning to breathe free. You have to pay.

Its called the Audre Lorde to Howard Zinn Library, or the A-Z Library, for short. The Occupy Boston Wiki has a page for this, their tent city library, which has some helpful info, like what to do if there is no librarian on duty, where else you can find information, and how to ask a question.

According to the Globe article (print version) there was a library in New York's Occupy Wall Street encampment, which was discarded when the protestors were evicted by the city. The ALA apparently didn't like what they called the "dissolution of a library", and came out in a statement against the police action, calling it "unacceptable".

The A-Z Library at Occupy Boston is housed in an 11-foot-square military surplus tent, strung with a few reading lamps and a twinkling of Christmas lights. There are over 1000 volumes available to read and borrow, and help is available from volunteer librarians and library science students; folks like Radical Reference and the Simmons Progressive Librarians Guild.

According to the Globe, most Occupy movements have a library (there are some 900 ongoing or intermittent protests worldwide) and they start up organically. yeah! get some! The A-Z Library in Boston was started by John Ford, who owns an alternative bookstore called The Metacomet (pronounced metə 'kämit *) in Plymouth, Massachusetts. He brought the military tent, some old shelving and a few hundred volumes. The rest of the books come from donations.

Clearly, people have a visceral and unquenchable need for a library. The Audre Lorde to Howard Zinn Library is providing what the people need; not just books, but a place to go, to talk, to learn, to escape, to play. In their statement against the destruction of the Peoples Library at Occupy Wall Street library, the ALA stated that "Libraries serves as the cornerstone of our democracy and must be safeguarded."

The library is idea-cum-reality. People living in tent cities, trying to make the world a better place, create these places from the ether and raw will, because they need to.

That's guerrilla library.

* The Metacomet is named after a the war chief, or sachem of the Wampanoag. Metacomet was also known as Metacom or King Philip. He was the second son of Massasoit. After some manhandling by the Plymouth Colony folks, war broke out: King Philip's War.

wrinkles

noreply@blogger.com (Philip O'Brien) — Wed, 16 Nov 2011 01:27:00 +0000

I just read A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle; first published in 1962. I didn't know a lot about this story, other than it seems to have some legs, and I know there have been some movies made from it (probably for television, but I'm not sure.) And this is the first in a series of books about the same characters, and probably some related problems.

The version I read is a commemorative re-print from 1997, which is 35 years after the original publish date. I assume that what they're commemorating, or the Newbery Medal, rather than the cash. In the introduction, L'Engle is pretty psyched about the new artwork developed for the Time Quintet. Yeah, the picture is pretty cool, but I'm not sure how useful those wings are buddy. I wipe bigger wings than that off my windshield.

In any case, I'm not a big fan of this little story. Its obviously written for a slightly younger reader than me, but it was a little mushy, even for that. There were so many things that were just so gushingly, indescribably beautiful that they were usually just that: indescribably indescribable. I guess that's good for the budding imagination; what do I know. In contrast, the Christian preaching was a little heavy handed. Its almost as if L'Engle took a spin through Narnia i just used the books page to find this link. sweet! and said, 'Nope. Not in-your-face Christian preachy enough for today's kids. Forget lions, lets just get Jesus in there, fighting for the team.'

Sooo... the indescribable parts are left indescribed, because kids can imagine these things for themselves, but Jesus himself needs to be trotted right out there (along with a gaggle of old white guys*) rather than eluded to, because kids can't imagine these things for themselves.

Yeah, I think I got it.

If you like to bring it on strong when you're reading to the kids, and you like a quirky, good vs. evil story, you may enjoy this. Otherwise, I wouldn't bother.

* Gandhi and Buddha made an appearance as well. Whatever. The white guy thing was funny.**
** Everyone else on the list was an old white guy. 13 of them yo.

75 books - new page

noreply@blogger.com (Philip O'Brien) — Mon, 14 Nov 2011 23:31:00 +0000

The book you see reviewed directly below this post is my 75th book since starting this blog!

I was amazed when I counted them up. It usually takes me so long to read something, that I figured it would be less. When I told my wife, however, she said, 'That's it?' she can read a book in a day, yo!

So to celebrate, I've created a new page. You can see the link to it just above; in the white band between the blog entries in the incunabular illumination title bar. There are three of them now. The new page is called 'the books' and the link sits just between the links for the 'main page' (your there right now) and 'backmatter', which is more general info, and some links to other interesting things.

So what's this new page all about? Clickity-click and you'll see! Its a list of all 75 books, which link to my reviews.

So check it out and let me know what you think. It's link-rich, so let me know if you find any of them either broken or in error.

sigurd and gudrún

noreply@blogger.com (Philip O'Brien) — Thu, 10 Nov 2011 13:29:00 +0000

The Legend of Sigurd and Gudrún, by J.R.R. Tolkien (edited by Christopher Tolkien) is Tolkien's take on some very old Norse epic poetry. If you've read any of Tolkien's other stuff, or certainly any of Christopher Tolkien's massive amount of published material about his father and his works, you may know that J.R.R. Tolkien was a professor of Anglo-Saxon at Oxford who studied and lectured about literature and linguistics, in older forms of English and related languages. Tolkien brings his scholarly views to what is essentially the reconstruction of this group of poems that may date back over 1500 years.

Parts of the poems are missing--lost to time--but large portions of them were preserved in a volume called The Prose Edda by a dude named Snorri Sturluson, in the year 1200-something. In that volume Sturlson apparently has prose versions of some of the poetry along with the poetry fragments, which helps to infill the missing bits. According to the considerable discussion about Tolkien's versions of these poems (Lays), which Christopher Tolkien takes from his father's notes, lectures, letters, and marginalia, Tolkien did not believe that some of the story elements were original to the poems, but later additions or edits, added by later poets or bards, to fill in missing information or to make them more appealing.

Tolkien has essentially pulled the stories apart and tried to reassemble them in their original form, and when that's not possible, he tries to re-create the missing bits in a form more faithful to the original poet's style and intent. He then translates them into modern English, using that same Old Norse meter and alliterative verse scheme.

But why? Why would Tolkien bother?

What becomes clear from the time and effort he put into the study of these lays, Tolkien believed that the literature of what he called the 'North' was just as compelling, dramatic, and important as the Greco-Roman Classics, among others, that we've all grown up with. His discussions on the value of Beowulf, for example, changed the way that both scholars and readers approached this poem: as a work of art by a talented poet, not just an interesting historical document.

His study of this story, and stories like it, also inspired his writing in the Silmarillion and The Lord of the Rings. And not just Tolkien, the story of lost Rhine gold is the inspiration for Wagner's Ring Cycle, and other stories as well. The story is of heroism, love and love lost, war, Valkyries, Norse gods, rivalry and tragedy.

And Sigurd and Gudrún... they may love each other, but one gets the distinct feeling that they aren't fated to be together.

Yeah...kinda like that.

This book isn't just a compelling translation of some old Norse epic poetry, its a retelling of one of the most famous stories from the north. Its also a peek into the mind of J.R.R. Tolkien, and what inspired him. A little dry in places, but I feel like I'm learning something worthwhile. I may even look up old Snorri.

Read this book. Yeah, I said it.

three musketeers ii

noreply@blogger.com (Philip O'Brien) — Tue, 01 Nov 2011 15:47:00 +0000

Why am I writing about the The Three Musketeers again, when I finished reading it like... a year ago? Its because The Three Musketeers has always been one of the bigger hits on my blog. Month after month, that entry gets hits and I never really thought about it until today. But like ONE-HUNDRED FORTY hits in the last couple of days!? Weird, right?

Maybe not.

Here's what I'm thinking; I've got two teenagers in the high school, and so I happen to know that this is the last week of the semester. Now if you were a teenager who has a report or a test coming up on the book you were supposed to read, and you know, didn't, then where would you go to cram (by which I mean: cheat)? You'd go to the the internets baby, and do a google/yahoo/bing search for The Three Musketeers. And you might get a hit on this very blog entry that you are reading right now, if only because of the number of times that The Three Musketeers is actually written in here. But my guess is, if this entry does show up, it will be a lot further down the list, and my original The Three Musketeers entry will be higher, simply because its had so many hits.

OR...

This new movie is out right? It came out 2 weeks ago. Its got Orlando Bloom, Matthew Macfadyen, Luke Evans, Ray Stevenson, Logan Lerman, and Milla Jovovich as Milady de Winter. The last time they filmed this was only in 1993, with Charlie Sheen! Keifer Sutherland, Oliver Platt, Chris O'Donnell, and Rebecca De Mornay. IMDB lists no less than 48 film versions of The Three Musketeers, and rumors of another in 2013.

So maybe its that, and maybe its not. Maybe folks are just banging away on the search engines to find out about this story for some crazy reason I can't even guess at, but I'm not sure why so many of them (you?) are coming here.

If you've come to this blog in recent days, looking for The Three Musketeers, leave a comment and let me know why!

UPDATE! sort of
So my blog entry on The Three Musketeers is a big hit generator from Google (mainly) so I went to Google and did my own search, and this blog didn't show up in the the first, like, 8 pages.

BUT

If you do an image search, the image I used for my book review is right up there, near the top. Very popular. Why? Its big and clean, and has good color. Its actually the image of the paperback I read, which I bought used, and it shows the 1993 movie cast, so its clearly a mass market job printed up to take advantage of the interest generated by the movie.

So, nothing nefarious (unfortunately) and nothing new-movie related. I'm guessing its other folks who have read the book and are writing/blogging/book reporting about it, and need a clean jpg.

Anyho, I'm glad I can provide a service to the reading community.

magicians

noreply@blogger.com (Philip O'Brien) — Mon, 31 Oct 2011 20:45:00 +0000

Lev Grossman is writing young adult literature for adults as much as the YA crowd. I'm sure the same could be said for JK Rowling--especially given the aging of the subject matter along with Harry--but Grossman also keeps his finger firmly on the irony button, whilst taking on this heady, and well-worn genre. The Magicians, from its very title onward, is a book about magic, and the magicians who use it, but Grossman has a completely different take on who these magicians are, and how they relate to our world.

In the Grossman-Magicians universe, pop culture still has its fantasy stories, and his characters know and love these stories as much as we do, but they know them more intimately for what the are... and what they aren't. They also know about, and live with, the rest of pop culture, and as much as magic can help them with their everyday lives, its also a burden they must bear as they move through a world that doesn't know, and doesn't understand, what its is to tap into the magical power that is available to all those who choose to put their mind to it.

That may be the biggest leap in The Magicians: that magic just is. And at its very core, isn't anything mystical or fantastic, its just a science. Granted, a slippery, hard-to-get-hold-of kind of science that is essentially invisible to the rest of us, in much the way scientists now speculate that some dimensions in our own universe may be: there, just tucked away, curled in upon themselves, such that they are inaccessible to us, if only for the way we might look for them.

Lev Grossman, spins this idea into a charming, engaging fable about a young man named Quentin Coldwater, who just wishes his life wasn't so 'normal'. I've been wanting to read this since reading a great review about a year ago. Grossman has a follow-up called The Magician King, which I'm looking forward to now.

Read this book.

notes and scribbles

noreply@blogger.com (Philip O'Brien) — Fri, 21 Oct 2011 01:03:00 +0000

I've added a new category on the right-hand column. Its down near the bottom, and its called 'notes and scribbles.' This little doodad (like all of the others) is basically a way for me to keep track of things. So the 'notes and scribbles' text box is just what it sounds like: a place for me to jot down little bits that don't really add up to a blog entry alone, may be related to something I've written about in the past, thinking about writing about, or just general interest.

There is also a list of books down there, along with how I feel about them. Not all of these titles appear on this blog however, as I've only written about those books I've read since I started this thing, and the list includes a smattering of other books I can recall. Maybe I'll add a search bar... not sure if anyone would use it.

So check it out, and let me know if think I should add something. Put it in a comment, and stick it anywhere around here.

american pastoral

noreply@blogger.com (Philip O'Brien) — Wed, 19 Oct 2011 14:07:00 +0000

pas·tor·al - n. (Literary & Literary Critical Terms) (of a literary work) dealing with an idealized form of rural existence in a conventional way.

Seymour "The Swede" Levov is a tall, blonde, blue-eyed Jew from a hard-working family in Newark, New Jersey. A family of immigrants who, after years of effort, have finally made it. Swede has taken over the family glove business from his now retired father--who has gone to live in Florida--and the Swede has grown the family business, married well, and moved to his dream house in the country; the setting for this American Pastoral, by Philip Roth.

This is my first Philip Roth novel, and its been on my list for a while. Reading it reminds me that I have not yet achieved the level of 'serious reader'. Oh I read it, every word, but it was slow. This novel is a thought-provoking and intensely contempletive examination of the American Dream, what it can mean, and how it can go wrong.

At its core, American Pastoral is The Monkey's Paw. You know, that creepy, fire-side tale (or bedtime story, if you grew up in my American Dream) about getting what you wish for, but not exactly in the way you imagined. It doesn't have that adrenalin-pumping, return-of-the-living-dead, something-cold-and-wet-touching-your-face-in-the-dark feeling you'd expect if this was actually just a retelling of the Monkey's Paw story. Stephen King: I'm looking at you.

The Swede succeeds and removing his family from the post-apocalyptic setting of Newark after the riots, to a lush, country manor in Old Rimrock, New Jersey. His idyllic country life can't save him and his family from the realities of modern America however. Roth examines how people who has achieved the ultimate goal of the American Dream, can fall victim to their own isolationism by failing to understand that they aren't safe from the realities of modern America, even surrounded by a hundred acres of rolling farmland and neighbors who can trace their heritage to the origins of America.

Finally, I would be remiss not to acknowledge Roth's pastoral joke.

Slow but good. Well written, but you need to be serious about examining the inner lives of normal folks, and how they live, interact, and strive in America today, and in the recent past. There is a lot to chew on in this story. I read the Lizard of Oz in the middle of this, to get a break, but it was worth the effort.