Hey Mara...

As the fin de l'annee approaches, I find myself thinking of reading goals for next year. I think I would like you to be my inspiration. So I'm thinking of hoping to read:

1. Fugitive Pieces by Anne Michaels, something I think I've heard mention as one of your favorite books?
2. The Consolations of Philosophy by Alain de Botton, an author you introduced me to.
3. something by Agatha Christie, one of your loves but someone I haven't read since seventh grade.
4. Alias Grace by Margaret Atwood, something you mentioned reading recently, though to be honest the main inspiration for this one was your Mom.
5. ???

Could you please recommend to me a fifth book? Something you love and think people, me in particular, should read?

Many thanks!
Michelle

Maud

One of my goals for 2010 was to re-read the Anne of Green Gables series by L.M. Montgomery. I succeeded at that (hooray!), and went on to read Emily of New Moon (just the first book of the trilogy; that's all I had), and a biography of Lucy Maud Montgomery. (I also have a collection of her short stories entitled Among the Shadows that I intend to read before the close of the year.) This was an interesting project for several reasons. I read the Anne series several times as a youth, and I enjoyed looking back at myself through this reading and discovering what I remembered and what I had forgotten. It was neat to immerse myself in a sense in turn-of-the-century (by which I mean the dawning of 1900, even though we've had the turn of another century since then) life on Prince Edward Island by reading ten books set there. Time passes as the Anne series progresses, though, so in the final book I got to see the Canadian women's experience of WWI and I found that really interesting. Finally, it was neat to understand how autobiographical so many elements of these stories are by reading Maud: The Life of L.M. Montgomery by Harry Bruce.

The never ending story

So the series that has been a constant companion for me in 2010 has drawn to an end, or at least that is what I expected to happen when I began to read the much anticipated seventh book in the Outlander series "An Echo in the Bone" by Diana Gabaldon. I had heard someone say that this series may never end recently, but supposed that they were just having a hard time slugging through the lengthy novels. I was reading this last book with mixed feelings of joy over having made it through the series and sadness that the characters whom I had spent so much time getting to know were no longer going to be having any new adventures.
Instead my "friends" have quite the adventure ahead of them. The book closes with numerous cliffhangers. The unfortunate part is that this author is not exactly known for writing novels quickly. This may very well be why each book is so beautifully written and complex, but that likely also means I may have a year or years to wait before I find out what happens next.

Here's what has happened so far!

Outlander:
While on her second honeymoon in the British Isles, WWII nurse Claire encounters mysterious standing stones which hurl her back in time to the forbidden Castle Leoch with the MacKenzie clan. Not understanding the forces that brought her there, she becomes ensnared in life-threatening situations with a Scots warrior named James Fraser. To protect Claire from the forces that seek to destroy her she must gain the protection of the clan which is only accessible to her through marriage. Though she is horrified to find herself married to a stranger when she is already married to her husband Frank in the future, to her surprise the marriage sparks a love and passion like she's never known.

Dragonfly in Embers:
For twenty years Claire Randall has kept her secrets. But now she is returning with her grown daughter to Scotland's majestic mist-shrouded hills. Here Claire plans to reveal a truth as stunning as the events that gave it birth: about the mystery of an ancient circle of standing stones, about a love that transcends the boundaries of time, and about James Fraser, a Scottish warrior whose gallantry once drew a young Claire from the security of her century to the dangers of his
Now a legacy of blood and desire will test her beautiful copper-haired daughter, Brianna, as Claire's spellbinding journey of self-discovery continues in the intrigue-ridden Paris court of Charles Stuart, in a race to thwart a doomed Highlands uprising, and in a desperate fight to save both the child and the man she loves.

Voyager:
Their passionate encounter happened long ago by whatever measurement Claire Randall took. Two decades before, she had traveled back in time and into the arms of a gallant eighteenth-century Scot named Jamie Fraser. Then she returned to her own century to bear his child, believing him dead in the tragic battle of Culloden. Yet his memory has never lessened its hold on her.
Then Claire discovers that Jamie survived. Torn between returning to him and staying with their daughter in her own era, Claire must choose her destiny. And as time and space come full circle, she must find the courage to face the passion and pain awaiting her.
Drums of Autumn:
Set in pre-Revolutionary War America this book continues Claire and Jamie's romantic love affair, and introduces Brianna and Roger's story.

The Fiery Cross:
In this pre-Revolutionary War period, Claire Fraser and her husband, Jamie, have crossed oceans and centuries to build a life together in the bucolic beauty of North Carolina. But tensions both ancient and recent threaten not only Claire and James, but their daughter, Brianna, her new husband, Roger, and their infant son, Jemmy, as well as members of their clan. 
 
A Breath of Snow and Ashes:
The year is 1772, and on the eve of the American Revolution, the long fuse of rebellion has already been lit. Men lie dead in the streets of Boston, and in the backwoods of North Carolina, isolated cabins burn in the forest.
With chaos brewing, the governor calls upon Jamie Fraser to unite the backcountry and safeguard the colony for King and Crown. But from his wife Jamie knows that in three years time, the result will be independence with those loyal to the King either dead or in exile. And there is also the matter of a tiny clipping from The Wilmington Gazette, dated 1776, which reports Jamie’s death, along with his kin. For once, he hopes, his time-traveling family may be wrong about the future.

An Echo in the Bone:
In this seventh installment, Claire and Jamie's story of adventure through the major turning points of the American Revolution and journey back to Scotland are skillfully entertwined with the story of Claire's daughter Brianna and her husband Roger who have returned through the stones to the 20th Century in hope of getting life saving heart surgery for their daughter Amanda. They have moved into Lallybroch, Jamies childhood home and discovered there a treasure of letters put away safely from their parents to greet them. A new danger hunts this young family and leaves Brianna to face a cruel new foe alone with her young daughter. Interwieved with this is the story of Jamie's son (which he had with a woman who died in childrbirth many years after Claire disappeared through the stones to protect their child). William has always believed himself to be the son of Lord Ellesmere, his mothers husband who also died on the day of his birth. He has been raised by his kind Uncle Lord John Grey. John has done everything in his power to protect William from the truth of his patronage, but this will become more difficult when each encounters the other on the battlegrounds between the Loyalists and the Revolutionaries.

Pilgrim in the Palace of Words

Back in Greek class, I remember Amanda Eve noting one time the different constructions that different languages have for basic concepts. For instance, in English we say, "I am tired," but the French say, "Je suis fatigue," or "I have tiredness." She wondered aloud whether phrasing such descriptions as something we are or something we have affects how we think about ourselves and our attributes. And I found that fascinating.

That's what I thought of when I saw this book. "Pilgrim in the Palace of Words is about language, about the words that splash and chatter across our tongues... Glenn Dixon... travels to the Earth's four corners to explore the way these languages create and mould societies." I put the book on my wish list, and then received it as a gift. (Thanks Justin!)

To be honest, I don't think it quite lived up to the promise of the back cover. Rather than being a language book with some travel thrown in, it was more of a travel book with some language thrown in. It was interesting, but I really wanted to read about languages! There was great potential: the author did a degree in language consciousness, "what it meant to think in one language as opposed to thinking in another." (49) But I guess he thought a book like that wouldn't sell, because at one point, after discussing a specific grammatical point that fascinated me, he basically apologized for boring the reader.

As I flip through the book after finishing it, I am finding a lot more on language than originally stood out to me. Dixon discusses the connections between languages, the history and migration of languages, and how we can linguistically trace the migration of people. He talks about how words in one language carry vast connotations that cannot be easily translated into another tongue. "When the world becomes homogenized, something is lost. Even if it's only a name, we lose a little part of the soul of that place." (13) The book also explores how many languages (other than English) have a system of social stratification (147). Like the tu and vous of French, you speak differently depending on who are addressing, and the language has a means of defining relationships between people.

There were a few times when Dixon hints at the language questions I was hoping for in this book. He asks, "What about the way a language makes you feel? What about the way it makes you think? What about the way it makes ... you?" (66) Also, he notes that: "Speaking a language is a whole way of being. You can feel it in the very sounds of the words (French, phonetically, tends to be a bit more forward in the mouth than English). And that's even before you get to the meanings, the ways languages describe the world. Languages are direct reflections of ourselves. We think in them. We dream in them. We exist in them." (34) I guess I was just looking for more of this, and I find myself considering further study on the topic.

'Becoming Human' by Jean Vanier

I enjoyed reading this book and getting to know the thought behind Jean Vaniers' L'Arche communities. I get to hear many stories of the joys and sorrows of working with and loving the disabled through a friend. Many of her stories are about the fun times and the funny quirks some of her clients have that make her day. Sometimes the stories are sad ones as those who have made progress revert to old ways, lapse into violence, or are abused by their family or the systems which have been put in place to protect them. This book isn't just about the disabled though, it's about accepting our humanity and shared need for love and acceptance. It's about the dark path of fear, anger, and intolerance that pain and hurt can lead us if we do not acknowledge it. I enjoyed Jean's warm and personal writing style and found his books' simple but profound message of love and tolerance refreshing.

First Peoples In Canada

First Peoples in Canada by Alan D. McMillan and Eldon Yellowhorn is a textbook that was assigned to me for my "Canadian Aboriginal Cultures" class.  Although I have really been enjoying the class and have been really personally challenged by it, I have to admit I feel a sense of relief upon finishing this book.  The book is essentially an introduction to the First Nation cultures throughout Canada and stretches its discussion back to "time immemorial" (which is usually during the Holocene period 10,000 or so years ago) up until the modern day.  This is a lot of history to fit in one book, especially when you consider that we are dealing with dozens of distinct societies.  The complexities of this book are further compounded when one considers that we actually have very little with which to build a history for First Nations until the dawn of globalization (European contact with the Americas). 

The first chapter of this book is devoted to explaining the different kinds of anthropology and ethnography (and a whole series of other -ologies and -ographies) that go into piecing together the missing pieces of the puzzle.  Unfortunately, due to a lack of actual story, the piecing together makes for some of the most dry and unengaging history that one could read. Subsequent chapters in the book are organized regionally according to a broad definition of cultural groups: Maritime, Eastern-Woodlands, Plains, Sub-Arctic, Plateau, North-West Coast, Arctic and Metis.  Every chapter begins with a long descriptions of what the different fossils might mean about the early cultural habits of native groups in the Holocene and Doecene periods and drawn out speculations about how those groups settled where they did in the first place.  Speculation and description culminate into a snapshot of the eating, hunting and sociological habits of these early nations.  The chapters then describe the meeting between Europeans and these Native groups - how the meeting happened and what implications it had for the native residents of that region.  Finally every chapter moves into the 20th century to describe the recent struggles and issues that aboriginal groups are dealing with today and what inroads have been made in their discussions with the Canadian government.

If the description of the book that I have written above sounds dry, it is because the book is dry.  The parts on fossils were particularly hard to get through, especially since the pages were large, the writing was small and the chapters were long.  I did appreciate the end of the chapters though, which educated me as to how all of this boring history manages to fit into the now, and this book has brought to mind some issues such as land claims that have provided food for thought.  While I can say that although this was not a fun read, it was an informative one, and I walk away from this book knowing a lot more about First Nations in Canada than I did.

The Wheel of Time

My arrays into fiction lately have been dominated by one single series: The Wheel of Time by Robert Jordan. A friend gave me a used copy of book one, The Eye of the World, that he found last spring and made me promise to read it when I had the time. I finally found time in June to start the book, and consequently I found myself embarking on a journey that would lead me through one of the most complex plots and vividly designed universes that I have ever witnessed in a fantasy setting (which is significant, since it takes a good plot and vivid imagination to design any fantasy book). I slugged through this series for months, getting book after book out of the library, spending hours going through 1000 page books and 100 page prologues (the most ridiculously large prologues that I have ever seen!). As school started and I found myself getting to the later books of the series and tired of looking at words on a page, I resorted to taking out bookCDs from the library and listening through them (a practice which I have come to love), 26 hours or so per book spread over a number of weeks. Finally, on Monday Nov. 1st, I finished book 12 of the series, The Gathering Storm, officially catching up to a series that has been in print since the early 1990’s. In fact, the series has been in print so long that the author ended up dying after book 11 and they had to find someone else who could take the author’s notes and write the end of the series, Brandon Sanderson. There are only two books left in the series scheduled for release, and the release date for book 13, Towers of Midnight, as I checked online Nov. 1st, was Nov. 2nd. I couldn’t have planned the timing better for finishing book 12 if I had planned it. Nevertheless, although the book has been released in stores, it will still take a little while for library to acquire the new release, and again it will take a little while for people on the waiting list to listen through the bookCD’s before my turn comes up, so I figured in the time that I have between books I should actually try to blog about my experience of going through the Wheel of Time Series.

This series is not for everyone. In fact, I have some very strong criticisms against it. First of all, the story is horribly complex. It revolves around the idea that time is circular and that events that happened once are reincarnated later in time as the wheel continues on its cycle. One particular important part of this cycle involves in the incarnation of a person who is known as The Dragon Reborn. In the last cycle of the wheel of time the previous Dragon, Lews Therin, was responsible for the breaking of world when he used the male half of the One Power to seal away the Dark One’s prison. Stop. Some explanation is needed. First, the magic system in this series is incredibly unique, which is definitely unusual for a fantasy series (there are about 3 systems of magic that are generally standard) and to Jordan’s credit. The One Power, as the magic is called, comes from the Creator and has two halves: saidin, the male half of the power, which can only be wielded by men, and saidar, the female half of the power, which can only be wielded by women. It should be noted that this series borrows liberally from a broad array of religion, including Hinduism (reincarnation), Daoism (balance between the male and female halves of the power) and Christianity (the conflict between the Creator and the Dark one). Resume. When Lews Therin used saidin to seal the Dark One’s prison, the male half of the power was tainted and every man who wielded it gradually grew insane, which caused chaos and war throughout the entire world, effectively “breaking it.” The series begins at the dawn of a new cycle and follows a broad array of characters as they journey into the world and become key players in preparing for an upcoming battle with the Dark One who is getting loose from his prison and causing chaos to overtake the world once again.

   

The complexity of this series becomes apparent when one realizes that there are about 9 main characters and countless main supporting characters to this story. The narrative jumps liberally (a few chapters at a time) between perspectives between all of the characters who are in different places in the world performing different actions simultaneously. There are countless points of view. Sometimes in the impossibly long prologues the author will even venture into the point of view of a character you don’t see for the rest of the story. In one book (book 6, The Lord of Chaos), one of the main characters of the series didn’t even show up for the entire book! The array of characters is so huge that the reader might begin to forget some of the names of some supporting characters who don’t show up for a while (one supporting character that showed up in book 4 didn’t reappear until book 12!)

The complexity of this series is aided by the incredibly detailed world that Jordan created. Usually when fantasy authors create a world they will focus on one or two cultures and give them lots of detail and then give skeleton descriptions of all the other cultures. Not so for Jordan; he has created a detailed culture for a dozen or more nations! As you journey to the various countries with the characters, pages upon pages are used to describe the sights and sounds of every group of people that you meet. It got to the point that I got tired of reading what nationalities were inhabiting the common floor of whatever inn the characters entered. I never would have thought that one could include too much description and detail in a story, but Jordan certainly pushes the line on this one. In some ways, however, the overwhelming detail is to his credit; not everyone could have put in the amount of effort he did into creating such a well-developed universe. It is the kind of place where you could write a hundreds or thousands of stories and never run out of material – the world is that interactive.

   

Despite the amount of detail that went into differentiating cultures from one another, I was extremely disappointed by Jordan’s character designs. For some reason in his book almost every single character feels like it has been built off the same template, and that template involves stubbornness. In fact, Jordan’s treatment of women is particularly monotonous. Most of them are stubborn, obnoxious, arrogant (while accusing the men of arrogance), domineering and manipulative. I found myself wondering if this was Jordan’s experience with women; was this how he saw them being, or is this just how he made them be in this universe? The only variation on the theme that a lot of his characters exhibited at the start was simply the degree and manner of stubbornness that they expressed. I found myself coming to dislike many of the main characters, echoing the sentiments of one of my friends: “if that woman yanks her braid one more time in this book I’m going to pull it right off her head!” Character growth for some of the characters was also dubious at times, to the point that I cheered finally after 4 books when one the characters who was particularly stubborn finally showed fear. I didn’t care if it was growth in the wrong direction – at least finally her character was showing a little change! Despite my complaints, however, about the characterization of people in this story, there have been a few characters that I have grown attached to, and one of the characters that I disliked near the most for the first half of the series is now my favourite.

Another critique I have about the writing style of the author is the repetition he uses for a number of the character’s actions and words. As in the fore-mentioned example above, there is a female character who yanks her braid whenever she is feeling particularly frustrated or stubborn – and this happens often, to the annoyance of the reader. Also, I found myself wondering how many times women can smooth or straighten their skirts in a book when they are at a loss for words. Quite frankly, I got tired of a number of the character’s actions or words wish that the author could have directed some of his incredible imagination to providing some variety with the vocabulary.

The Wheel of Time series is one of the most popular fantasy series on the library shelves today. Once when I went through the Coles checkout to purchase book 6 the young male clerk on the other side of the counter lit up and proclaimed “best series ever!” It was all I could do just to nod and smile for him, in order not to break his illusions. It is not the best series ever that I’ve read, and it is certainly not the best piece of writing that I have ever seen. It has too many faults for that. I will say however, that it is one of the most detailed universes and one of the most complex plots that I have ever seen and that for the right person this will provide many hours of enjoyable entertainment (minus a few annoyances if you’re as picky and critical as I am).

 

One final note before I give up on this post on the writing of the substitute author, Brandon Sanderson. He did a really admirable job taking over the series. In some ways I almost find him preferable to Jordan in that he doesn’t get lost in the minutia of the detail like Jordan in (probably because the world is not as vivid in his mind as it was in Jordan’s, but it makes the descriptions a little bit easier on the reader). There are places in the story where his own writing style comes blazing out, sometimes to his credit and sometimes to his disadvantage. For example in a scene one evening as I was riding home in the car he nearly had me in stitched laughing over the character’s antics, something Jordan has never been able to make me do. In some places however, a comment is made or something is done that strikes me as weird, strange, and maybe somewhat inconsistent with what Jordan would have done. One part that I found particularly unsettling was a dramatic change of character mindset at the end of book 12 to one of the main characters in the story. After dealing with Jordan’s writing where the characters change so slowly and almost imperceptibly it was rather startling to have one of the characters to go through a startling revelation that changed his outlook on life. Nonetheless, the discrepancies throughout the story have been minor and I am looking forward to the next book in the series.

Into The Wild Nerd Yonder

Into the Wild Nerd Yonder: My Life on the Dork Side, by Julie Halpern.  As a self-professed geek (a euphamism for the synonymous "nerd" and "dork") I couldn't resist but place a hold on this book when I saw its title showing up with a dress and a pink background on on the cover after I typed in 'Dungeons & Dragons" onto the library's online search function.  It did not matter that the book was found in the young adults section, the book was obviously told from a female's point of view and it involved Dungeons & Dragons and  I was intrigued.  There are not many women who play the game and even fewer stories are written about women who play it.  What would this book hold?

It has been a long time since I have read such light reading.  Even the fiction that I have been reading these days has involved going through long and complex plots.  I had forgotten how enjoyable some good fluff could be, and this little geeky book was good fluff.  It takes place in a high school setting with a young girl who is trying to figure out where she fits on the clique scene.  In fact, I really like the summary on the book jacket so let me quote it here:

"It's Jessie's sophomore year of high school. A self-professed 'mathlete,' she isn't sure where she belongs.  Her two best friends have transformed themselves into punks, and one of them is going after her longtime crush.  Her beolved older brother will soon leave for college (and in the meantime, has shaved his mohawk and started dating... the homecoming queen!).  Things are changing fast.  Jessie needs new friends.  And her quest is a hilarious tour through high school slique-dom, wit a surprising stop along the way - the Dungeons and Dragons crowd, who out-nerd everyone! Will hanging out with them make her a nerd too? And could she really be crushing on a guy with too-short pants and too-white gym shoes?  If you go into the wild nerd yonder, can you ever come back?"

This book represents an excellent balance between humour, teen issues, moral lessons and fluff.  It's not about Dungeons & Dragons, although the game is certainly featured in it.  It is about trying to find acceptance and a sense of belonging within a group while still maintaining your own pride and identity.  I really enjoyed the book.

Canterbury

I finished reading "Canterbury Tales" this week. This was another book that I was proud to finish, but glad to finish. If my memory serves me correctly, this is the first piece of literature ever written in English. It's unabridged version is in Middle English, from a time before spelling was formalized and when grammar was different. The book I read was "A Prose Version in Modern English," and the author (updater?) admitted to leaving out a couple of sections that he considered particularly dull. Usually I feel like I'm cheating when I read an abridgment, but in this case I was glad to have some help. Someone asked me when I bought this book whether I would also read the original version and I think I said "maybe," but I have no intentions of doing so any time soon now.

Here are some thoughts I had:
- I was surprised by how bawdy some of the stories were. That's not really what I expect from five hundred years ago. Also, fidelity in marriage didn't seem to be very common.
- Astrology was a significant theme in Canterbury Tales. Greek Gods also made many appearances. I found it interesting to notice the interplay of Christian and un-Christian aspects of society. The underlying setting of the tale is a pilgrimage to a Christian site at Canterbury, but few of the stories illustrate any Christian values. Several of the storytellers have Christian professions, but display terrible character. It's interesting when religion is more a function of general culture than a deeply held belief consistent with lifestyle.
- I got tired of the romanticism of some of the stories. I've heard that the whole concept of romantic love was born in the middle ages. Love is great and all, but I don't have much tolerance for the pining away, I'll die without you sort of love.

Mark Twain

Mark Twain is releasing a new book 100 years after his death! I saw the article pasted below on CTV.ca, and have decided that this is a must-have for my library. Stayed tuned for a future book blog. =D

"It was in the news todayNEW YORK — It's never too late: Mark Twain is back on the bestseller lists.

Pre-orders for the first of three planned volumes of his autobiography, released in full upon the centennial of Twain's death, have for the past few days placed the book in the top five of Barnes & Noble.com and Amazon.com. It is outpacing new works by Ken Follett, John Grisham and Jon Stewart.

"The Autobiography of Mark Twain, Volume 1" comes out Nov. 15 from the University of California Press.

Excerpts have appeared over the past several decades, but Twain's strong opinions on current affairs and other matters were left out, at his request. He had said that it was best to wait 100 year after his death for the whole book to be released."

Julie and Julia

I recently finished reading "Julie and Julia" by Julie Powell. This is the book that inspired the movie of the same title. I've seen the movie and I wasn't amazed, but I found the book at Homesense for five dollars, and figured that it would be worth a try.

I liked it! It wasn't the most amazing book ever, but it was... fuller than the movie (of course). As a result, the things that bugged me in the movie didn't stand out as much in the book. The relationships were more realistic in the book, and time didn't seem to speed by as fast.

The premise is the same in both the book and the movie: a dissatisfied secretary who likes cooking decides to improve her cooking skills and add meaning to her life by cooking her way through Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking, and writes a blog about these cooking adventures. It's a memoir of a true story (although for privacy reasons she changes most people's names, and renames her brother Heathcliff, which I thought was funny), and it includes illustrations of Julia Child's life as well. In the book these historical glimpses are largely limited to how Julia met her husband Paul. The movie includes more information from Julia's own memoir and tells the story of how her cookbook was written and published.

The movie really toned things down: the language, the sexual discussion, Julie's craziness. (She's pretty crazy, and she doesn't try to hide it.) It's a better movie because it's censored, and it's something people need to be aware of if they consider reading the book. The uncensored book was able to make Julie seem like more of a realistic person, though.

The thing that bugged me most about the movie was the purpose of her blog and what she hoped to get out of it - and how that is diametrically opposed to what I want from my own blog. By blogging, Julie wants to become famous and found - she's eager for strangers to read her thoughts and whines when she thinks she has no followers (except her Mom, who she says doesn't count). I, on the other hand, view my blog as a more quiet, private matter. I write mainly for myself, although it also turns out to be a convenient way to share my thoughts and adventures with my friends. I expect to only have a limited readership, and it makes me uncomfortable to discover that I have been found by strangers. I have a hard time understanding Julie's approach to blogging, and it kind of got on my nerves.

As this is a true story, it would be really cool to be one of the original readers of Julie's blog, considering all the fame and success that has come of it. It's nice to be able to say that you liked something before it became popular.

I think this book and movie have increased public awareness of Julia Child. I personally knew very little about her beforehand, and now I have a pretty good idea of who she was and what she did. I also think that people have been inspired to cook and explore recipes more. This was what gave me the idea of making a New Years goal of cooking 12 recipes out of the same cookbook (a much more easily attainable goal than that of Julie's - but it still isn't going all that well).

Timeline

This morning I stayed in bed until noon and finished reading "Timeline" by Michael Crichton. It is the story of several medieval scholars who are working on an archaeological site in France, who then get the chance to actually go back to the time and place they have been studying. I feel like I learned a lot about the medieval world from their travels. The story also includes physics, action, suspense, and a hint of romance.

Because it's fun to point out flaws and the questions that remained with me, here I go!
- One character, Marek, has been in love with the medieval period his entire life. He has studied it intensely, and feels like it is his home. Once he actually gets "there," he finds everything just as he expected it; the only thing that surprised him was the speed of their swords. I have a hard time believing that even the best scholarship today could be so accurate as to fully prepare someone for the real thing.
- The idea of time travel raises many logical perplexities. Crichton tried to address the issue of "time paradoxes" by having one of his characters explain how difficult it is to change any particular course of events:
"It's easiest to see if you take a contemporary example. Say you go to a baseball game. The Yankees and the Mets - the Yankees are going to win, obviously. You want to change the outcome so that the Mets win. What can you do? You're just one person in a crowd. If you try to go to the dugout, you will be stopped. If you try to go onto the field, you will be hauled away. Most ordinary actions available to you will end in failure and will not alter the outcome of the game.
"Let's say you choose a more extreme action: you'll shoot the Yankee pitcher. But the minute you pull a gun, you are likely to be overpowered by nearby fans. Even if you get off a shot, you'll almost certainly miss. And even if you succeed in hitting the pitcher, what is the result? Another pitcher will take his place. And the Yankees will win the game.
"Let's say you choose an even more extreme action. You will release a nerve gas and kill everyone in the stadium. Once again, you're unlikely to succeed, for all the reasons you're unlikely to get a shot off. But even if you do manage to kill everybody, you still have not changed the outcome of the game. You may argue that you have pushed history in another direction - and perhaps so - but you haven't enabled the Mets to win the game. In reality, there is nothing you can do to make the Mets win. You remain what you always were: a spectator.
"And this same principle applies to the great majority of historical circumstances. A single person can do little to alter events in any meaningful way. Of course, great masses of people can 'change the course of history.' But one person? No."
"Maybe so," Stern said, "but I can kill my grandfather. And if he's dead then I couldn't be born, so I would not exist, and therefore I couldn't have shot him. And that's a paradox."
"Yes, it is - assuming you actually kill your grandfather. But that may prove difficult in practice. So many things go wrong in life. You may not meet up with him at the right time. You may be hit by a bus on your way. Or you may fall in love. You may be arrested by the police. You may kill him too late, after your parent has already been conceived. Or you may come face to face with him, and find you can't pull the trigger." (172-173)
So, it's difficult to make one particular thing happen. But a greater issue in my mind is chaos theory, and how tiny little actions can have gigantic consequences. Any interference in the past, even if it doesn't change the outcome of a certain event, can still have other wide ranging effects.
I guess there's no good way to answer this, which is why it remains a question. It's unfair to expect a satisfactory explanation from a novel, and it is admirable that they at least try to address it.
- The book begins with a scientist stranded in the desert, far from where he originated. The story never does explain how or why he got exactly there, and I'm still curious.
- The entire project - both the archaeological research and the time-travel science - are funded by a company called ITC, owned by a bad-tempered, self-absorbed man named Doniger. I don't understand their interest in the particular time and place that the story is set in, nor their insistence on keeping the past pure and not bringing back any inappropriate materials (no plastics, modern weapons, etc). Don't get me wrong - I think the setting is interesting and their approach is admirable, but it doesn't seem to fit with how they are described. Although an explanation may be found in the potential tourism they see in an authentic historical experience, I still don't see their actions quite lining up with their purported priorities.

Despite the flaws I see, I found the book interesting and worth reading. The ending was really good - you don't know until the very end exactly what's going to happen, and then the epilogue keeps you from feeling like you're hanging. (It raises more questions about how altering the past affects the present, though. Sigh.)
I've heard mixed reviews about the movie, and although I'm sure it's not as good as the book, I'd be interested to see how they illustrated this book.

In Search Of Sacred Places

"In Search of Sacred Places: Looking for Wisdom on Celtic Holy Islands," by Daniel Taylor, is a book that I ordered from Amazon long ago when I was do research on the spirituality of place. After I got it, however, it became apparent to me that this book wasn't so much about place as it was about journey, or pilgrimage. Now, a couple of years later, I have pulled this book off my shelf to read it as I am finally ready to learn more about pilgrimage.
The thing I love most about this book is how earthy it is. It consists of the ramblings and meditations of the author who had taken a trip as a tourist to a number of the Celtic holy places and returned from the trip changed in small ways: ways that led him to reflect on the deeper meanings of pilgrimage, holy places, the Celtic saints and our own feeble attempts as human beings to grasp something of the holy. The author traces his journey from Iona, to Lindisfarne to Skellig Michael, reflecting along the way on the stories of the Celtic saints who inhabited those regions, and on what wisdom they have to offer. One thing I particularly enjoyed about the author is that he doesn't write as someone who is a spiritually mastered intellectual that has all the answers. Rather, Taylor writes into the questions of his journey, more often than not leaving the questions hanging for the reader to ponder.
This book makes me excited about learning more about pilgrimage as I continue my guided study. In his stories and reflections Taylor offered some very simple statements about this topic, statments that I feel are an excellent starting place to help me understand what this pecular thing called pilgrimage might be:
The tourist goes to see and collect...; the pilgrim goes to be changed." (10)
"A definition of pilgrim as one who travels hopefully." (11)
Pilgrimage is physical travel with a spiritual destination." (16)
"Walking is the maximum desirable speed for seeing things fully enough to name them. And when we name things then we begin to value them. No wonder that we all want to be named and known." (37)
"There is, then, something both individual and communal about seeking the holy through pilgrimage. Each pilgrim goes individually to find God, to find meaning, or at least, to fulfill some indefinite hope. And yet we often go together, with other pilgrims, or, even if alone, where others have gone before us. Like travelers in a dense forest, we are thankful for a worn path, for marks carved on a tree, for any hint that we are moving in the right direction." (12)

Moby Dick

Finally! I've been reading this book for a long time (over a month, I think) and I'm finally finished! I am excited to finally be able to start reading something else.

This book was long. I guess that six hundred and twenty five pages isn't as long as the works some of you are reading, but it was much longer than what I have grown accustomed to. Also, it was slow. Long and slow isn't a very good combination. The language was flowery, which at first was interesting but eventually just became tiresome. There are entire chapters of descriptions, and the lack of action for long portions of the story made reading it seem boggy.

Plot summary: Ahab (the captain of the ship and central character), before book begins, loses a leg on a whaling voyage. His leg was bit off by Moby Dick, a particularly identifiable and malicious whale. After recovering, Ahab madly goes off on another whaling expedition with the purpose of hunting down and killing Moby Dick. This is skeleton of the story that the book covers, narrated by one Ishmael.

After reading this book I know much more about whaling. I didn't realize I was lacking this knowledge, but it is interesting to have now. For instance, whaling is the origin of the term "There she blows," the cry of the lookout when a whale is spotted spouting and a term I have heard a lot throughout my life in completely unrelated situations. Whaling seems quite barbaric, but in the nineteenth century whale oil was used for everything from fueling lamps to coronation anointings and was relatively essential. One whale would require a huge amount of effort to capture and would provide a huge amount of oil. I wonder how whale populations were affected by this hunt, but I don't imagine that the majority of whales were in danger of being harvested. (Maybe I'm wrong - maybe a demise in populations are the reason we no longer hunt whales.) However, once the whalers stripped the whale of its blubber (which was then boiled down into oil), they would dispose of the rest of the carcass. This seems wasteful - like killing elephants for their tusks - and leaves me opposed to whaling.
I recently went to Head Smashed In Buffalo Jump and learned about the Native buffalo hunts. It was interesting to compare that practice with what I had been reading about whaling. In lean times the Natives used every part of the buffalo they killed and let very little go to waste, but it sounds like during times of plenty they too would only harvest the choice parts and abandon the rest. The Natives would kill entire herds of buffalo at one time - hundreds and hundreds would be led off high cliffs to their death. That seems worse than killing one whale at a time. Still, buffalo populations remained stable until the advent of Europeans brought increased demand and a feeling of sport to the hunt.

Many aspects of the book seem incohesive from beginning to end. Moby Dick is not spoken of for the third half (or so) of the book, and he does not actually appear throughout until the final three chapters, which feels like a lot of waiting for the title character. A strong friendship is developed in the beginning of the book that is then barely mentioned throughout the rest of the book, which made me wonder why they bothered creating it at all. The epilogue was really good in explaining the narrator's forgotten presence at the end of the story and how he was able to narrate it, however, and I admired that.

Despite my complaints, I'm glad to have read this book because it is considered such a classic. (Wikipedia calls it one of the greatest novels in the English language, and reading it gives me another check mark on my list of Penguin's Top 50.) One of my older coworkers who saw me reading Moby Dick on my lunch break mentioned to me how he had been required to read it in school, which seems pretty typical. That makes me think about the changes in education over the last fifty or a hundred years. I never had to read Moby Dick in high school, and I don't think my classmates and I would have done very well at it if we had been required to do so. Yet students used to be assigned Moby Dick in one class, and learn Latin in another. Nowadays I think we have changed our educational focus in two ways: we place more emphasis on sciences and math (parents look at their children's homework in these subjects with surprise and ignorance, and exclaim that they never had to learn such things), and we learn what is useful instead of what is classical (like Spanish instead of Latin).

Starbucks is named after the first mate of the ship in Moby Dick (a fact confirmed by Wikipedia)!

The Art of War

"The Art of War" is a literary classic, written in the 6th century BC by the brilliant Chinese tactician and general, Sun Tzu. Since its inception this military treatise has been used by armies throughout history to govern the art of waging war against other nations. In modern times the text has been adapted to influence business tactics and strategies. The argument of this book is written in point form over 13 little chapters and cover such topics from (#1) Laying Plans to (#7) Maneuvering to (#10) Terrain to (#13) The Use of Spies. In the introduction of this book, the editors write, "Sun Tzu was the first to recognize the importance of positioning in strategy and that position is affected both by objective conditions in the physical environment and the subjective opinions of competitive actors in the environment. He taught that strategy was not planning in the sense of working through a to-do list, but rather that it requires quick and appropriate responses to changing conditions."

Strangely enough, I found this short little book rather fascinating. As a reader of fantasy novels, I was riveted by making mental comparisons how the principles in this book have influenced authors writing about war, particularly the author I am reading right now, Robert Jordan. On a deeper level however, the observations that Sun Tzu makes are incredibly practical, earthy and wise. They involve recommendations that a leader must be connected to his troops on a emotional level, but at the same time he must not let that level of attachment interfere with the enforcement of discipline. He espouses the importance of planning and the need of secrecy to keep these important plans, and while at the same time emphasizing that plans must be flexible, and their execution quick and sure. Such is his emphasis on preplanning that he declares that one should not start a war until he is certain that battle has already been won, and that preparing for defense rests not on the liklihood that the enemy will come but that rather their position is "unassailable." Above all Sun Tzu stresses the importance of leadership, and most if not all of his arguments place the glory of victory or the blame of defeat squarely on the general's shoulders. Character, in particular, is particularly important in a general, and there are five dangerous faults that a general may show that are "ruinous to the conduct of war:" recklessness (which leads to destruction), cowardice (which leads to capture), a hasty temper (which can be provoked by insults), a delicacy of honour (which is sensitive to shame), and an over-solicitude for his men (which exposes him to worry and trouble). Sun Tzu summarizes his entire arguement in one timeless maxim that I think is still valid today in almost every action of life. "If you know the enemy and know yourself, your victory will not stand in doubt," he writes, "If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yoursef, you will succumb in every battle."

Who ever expected an anciety military leader to say that self-reflection and self-knowledge were what the most important things one needed to wage a war? These two things are so lost in today's society, but I would also say that these two traits are also paramount to living successfully to one's full capacity.

malcolm gladwell overload

over the past while, i have read

• what the dog saw and other adventures 
• tipping point: how little things make a big difference 
• outliers: the story of success 
• blink: the power of thinking without thinking

these are the four books published by new yorker columnist malcolm gladwell (in the order i read them), and they represent storytelling at its very best. what they don't represent, necessarily, is coherent and analytical argumentation. but nothing's perfect.
"tipping point" was the first of gladwell's oeuvres and therein he discusses catchy ideas, powerful regimes, and sticky trends. more importantly, he asks himself (and experts, too, thank goodness): "what makes these work, where others fail?" unsurprisingly, there's still a lot of mystery in this area, but gladwell illuminates some basic guidelines for making your idea work. one thing that stuck out to me was this: having a very clear notion of what the problem is and how the problem works is essential to crafting an appropriate solution.

in "blink," gladwell shifts his focus toward intuition and snap judgements. unfortunately, all the praise for these phenomenon comes early on, and it isn't until later in the book that the pitfalls are discussed. what he really wants to argue is that we need to educate our instincts where we can and mitigate against them where we can't. but that doesn't really come out until the afterword - which, as you may have guessed, was added to a subsequent edition of the book.

"outliers" is gladwell's most recent original work - it's not even in softcover yet, i don't think. anyway, its thesis is that people who succeed don't do so only because they're naturally gifted, but also because they have unique opportunities. in particular, because they have the luxury and ability to acquire 10,000 hours of practice at their craft. gladwell isn't fatalistic about this, but instead prescribes an increase in such opportunities for all americans. wouldn't the world be better off if every geeky kid had access to the supercomputers bill gates tested out in high school? or if there were separate peewee hockey leagues for those born before and after june? (players who are more advanced from day one on account of being older and bigger than their teammates tend to get more attention and eventually advance quicker than their peers.)

finally, "what the dog saw" brings together a wide range of interesting stories gladwell wrote for the new yorker. each of these gives the reader insight into the way someone thinks - and it's bound to be quite different from the way most of us think.

i love stories, so i thoroughly enjoyed each of gladwell's books. i read the last three over the past two months or so, and i wouldn't have done that if the material weren't engaging or if the themes weren't captivating. i highly recommend reading the books. just... think about the argument, ok? it's not always quite right. in fact, there are some bad examples, tenuous leaps, and outright contradictions along the way. (i can rant about one that especially frustrated me, if anyone's interested!) being a thoughtful reader is universally a good practice - all the more so when faced with a gifted and articulate storyteller.

The Audacity of Hope

Finally! After 2 years of slaving through, forgetting to read and coming back to the book, I have finally finished The Audacity of Hope by Barack Obama! It was such an intriguing prospect to read a book written by such a public figure, who has now become the leader of one of the most powerful nations in the world. It has given me a chance to know the person for what he has to say, not for what the media and propoganda has to say about him. In fact, one of the chapters that I enjoyed most in the book was the one where he talked about the media. It was interesting hearing about the process of newsmaking from someone at the other end, where every single action and word is scrutinized to see if it can be given a slant to portray what bias the media wants to portray.

Despite the amount of time it took for me to finish this book, I actually enjoyed it quite a bit. The book's style is unique: it isn't fiction and it isn't academic research or cold hard facts; rather it is written in the style of conversation and throughout the entire book Obama is conversing with the reader, describing what he see, discerns and envisions for his home country, which he loves. It was refreshing to be able to read something so warm, positive and optomistic, especially from someone who has now become a world leader.

In some ways, however, one of the harshest criticisms I can give about this book was that in some ways it was too optomistic - optomistic to the point of naivety. Obama had a lot of good observations, and a lot of good suggestions and criticisms, but there seems to be an assumption in his writing that if the issue he identifies is fixed in the way he suggests it be fixed, then everything would be fixed, it's just that simple. But life is rarely so simple. Below is a selection of quotes I have taken from his book regarding the taxation of the wealthy, and while I agree on many levels with him, I doubt the situation is as clear-cut as he makes it seem:

"We will have to stop pretending that all cuts in spending are equivalent, or that all tax increases are the same. Ending coporate subsidies that serve no discernible economic purpose is one thing, reducing health-care benefits to poor children is something else entirely. At a time when ordinary familieis are feeling hit from all sides, the impulse to keep their taxes as low as possible is honorable and right. What's less honorable has been the willingness of the rich and the powerful to ride this antitax sentiment for their own purpose, or the way the President, Congress, lobbyists, and conservative commentators have been able to successfully conflate in the mind of voters the very real tax burdens of the middle class and the very manageable tax burdens of the wealthy... Perhaps I possess a certain Midwestern sensibility that I inherited from my mother and her parents....that you can derive as much pleasure from a Picasso hanging in a museum as from one that's hanging in your den, that you can get an awfully good meal in a restaurant for less than twenty dollars, and that once your drapes cost more than the average American's yearly salary, then you can afford to pay a bit more in taxes."

Despite the fact that I agree with Obama in most of these statments, the fact is also that human beings will always try to exploit one another. It is also a fact that most Americans are addicted to the spending and consumerism which feeds the wealthy. Forcing the wealthy to pay more taxes makes more sense than taxing the middle class American who can barely make ends meet as it is, but it hardly solves the deeper issues. Furthermore, making such adjustments to society is not easy, as I'm sure Obama has found out since he has gotten into office. The changes he has tried to bring to the healthcare system have been mentioned in this book, and despite how good of idea they may seem on paper, implementing them has been for him a whole other ballgame.

I guess in someways this book is full of audacity. It has the audacity to claim that with a few seemingly sensible changes then everything would be better. It has the audacity to hope for change, even if, in reality, change isn't very likely or forthcoming.

"That was the audacity of the American spirit, I thought - having the audacity to believe despite all the evidence to the contrary that we could restore a sense of community to a nation torn by conflict; the gall to believe that despite personal setbacks, the loss of a job or an illness in the family or a childhood mired in poverty, we had some control - and therefore responsibility - over our own fate."

Amanda, I just noticed that you are reading "Pirate Latitudes" now too! That has inspired me to get back to reading it - I started it two months ago with Justin on a road trip, we continued it a little bit one month ago on another driving adventure, and other than that it's been kind of neglected. It's a slow process when you do it with someone else, and when you constantly forget about it. But after seeing that you're reading it too, I pulled it out of my glovebox and Justin and I read a few chapters this afternoon.

How far are you? What do you think so far?

Boundaries

I recently finished reading Boundaries in Marriage by Dr. Henry Cloud and Dr. John Townsend. I picked this book up at the one dollar book sale, not because I am planning to be married any time soon, but because I was interested in what the authors had to say about boundaries in relationships with a significant other.

I read the original Boundaries several years ago, and I think I was a bit disappointed by it. It didn't answer the questions I'd approached it with. However, as I began reading this book I was surprised by how much of what they said I already thought was important. Perhaps I internalized more from the original than I realized! For instance, even within a relationship I think we both should be free people who are ultimately responsible for ourselves. I did still find myself challenged and inspired in the areas of communication and conflict resolution, though.

Twice while reading, I was struck by something enough to make me mark the page and come back to it. First was the suggestion of asking the question: "What do you see me doing that hurts or bothers you?" (69) I would naturally be more likely to phrase the question: "Is there anything that I do..." which assumes the answer could very well be "no." Assuming the answer is "yes" relieves the responder's guilt if that is the case and makes it easier to bring up concerns and even little things, promoting communication and change, and leading to a happier relationship.

Secondly, the authors quoted a beautiful description of a good relationship by Frederick Buechner: "A marriage made in Heaven is one where a man and a woman become more richly themselves together than the chances are either of them could ever have managed to become alone." (87) I don't even know how to comment on this, other than to call it beautiful.

Quoteable

"A truly great book should be read in youth, again in maturity and once more in old age, as a fine building should be seen by morning light, at noon and by moonlight."


Robertson Davies (Canadian Journalist, playwright, professor, critic, and novelist)

Reading

Last night I finished reading The Reader by Bernhard Schlink. Has everyone seen the movie? The movie was fantastic, and this was a case where even after reading the book, the movie seems to hold its own in my mind. The book seemed like commentary. It did expand upon motivations, it explained the character's thoughts, and it presented elements with different emphases, but it didn't vastly outshine the movie to me. I wonder what I would have thought if I had read the book first. It was an easy and interesting read, and I would recommend it for that reason.

Mara, I remember when you wrote about about the movie on your blog. I'd only seen it once at that time, and to be honest, I didn't really know what scene you were referring to. Even when I re-watched it, I barely caught it. She needed kindness and warmth from him, but he was utterly unable to give it. He gave what he could, but he had his limits. I think I almost missed it because I understand. I thought he was justified in what he gave and what he withheld, because I live in a place where I have already had to give too much to others at times, and that has left me drained and feeling like I have little left to give. Thus, I don't entertain grand ideas about my own generosity of heart, or that of others.

The Book of Negroes

I'll admitt to being a little nervous when a friend lent this book to me and encouraged me to read it. Slavery is a hard topic and it seemed likely that this book would be both disturbing and possibly depressing. After finishing it during my convalescence this June, I can now say that I too would recommend it. Yes there are parts that are difficult to read and yes there are topics that are disturbing, but regardless of this the author creates a beautifully written and inspiring story. The heroine Aminata is a strong, intelligent, and compassionate woman and her story draws you in as she recounts her life up until her final days as an old woman in London. Although Aminata is not a real person, her story is universal, it's frought with pain, pleasure, hope, and bitter reality. Although Aminata never accomplishes the one thing that she has set out to do, she finds something even more precious.

"In Aminata Diallo, who evolves from stolen village child to the conscience of abolition, writer Lawrence Hill has crafted one of the most memorable female characters in Canadian fiction.... And here's how readers will come to know this — Aminata tends to linger long after the book's been finished and put aside....The Book of Negroes is thoughtful, stirring, saddening, resplendent and joyful. It's an evocative tome, and among the best in our fiction." The Hamilton Spectator

Re:

I lost the "Comment" button! At least, I didn't see it providing the option to comment on the last post! I hope that's not because you specifically didn't want any comments... So here I go!

Life of Pi had some disjointed aspects to it too, didn't it - scenes that fit a little bizarre-ly with the rest. Did you feel that way? Is that similar to what you found in this book?

I have also noticed Beatrice & Virgil at the book stores and become interested in reading it. I wanted to wait until it came out in paperback though - cheaper, and smaller to fit on the bookshelf! I'll look forward to that now. Thanks for sharing your thoughts and responses. It sounds philosophical. I wonder if it means to just raise questions instead of answer them...

beatrice & virgil

i loved life of pi, so i was all but terrified to pick up yann martel's latest novel, beatrice & virgil. what if it was disappointing?

well, the good news is that it is very, very well written. i'm just not sure how i feel about the story itself. the narrative turns on the question of how and why the holocaust should be depicted in art, and how and why it can be used as a lens of analysis for other tragedies. throw in a talking mounted donkey named beatrice and a talking mounted monkey named virgil and we've got ourselves a story!

the animals appear in a play written by one of the central characters. this man, a taxidermist by trade, writes beckett-esque dialogues in which the donkey and monkey consider the essence of a pear, the uselessness of language, and the degree to which memory is vital.

the use of animals, the description of the pear, and countless phrases of martel's are simply breathtaking. when he describes a room as being "full of adjectives," i just want to hug the book to my chest and let the beauty soak into me by osmosis.

but... like, the ending is terribly odd. the reveal is inelegant and the main character's realizations don't feel natural or follow an organic trajectory. there's an episode of outright melodrama that seems entirely unnecessary.

this book hasn't yet helped me answer its central question, which is one i've wondered about before. i don't know what to think about it.

here's what martel has to say:



i may finally read dante now.

Myself and Others

I recently read Anthem by Ayn Rand. It is set in a post-apocalyptic world (similar to By the Waters of Babylon, a fantastic short story I was introduced to in high school) that has little technology and whose inhabitants look back at our age in wonder. In Anthem, the society that has arisen is also totalitarian: it decides every aspect of a person's life. At birth, people are placed in the home of the infants, and at age five they begin ten years of study, at the end of which they are assigned a career and a home with all the others who do the same job. Each day is completely structured and monotonous. There are no marriages, and mating occurs as an awkward ritual one day a year. There are to be no friendships, for that would mean preferring one person above another. There are to be no preferences, for the state assigns what is best for each person. Learning is forbidden for everyone but the scholars because it is superfluous. The purpose of existing is to serve one's brothers. There is no individuality in this collectivist society. The word "I" has disappeared from the language, and everyone refers to themselves and others in the plural. (It was kind of creepy at first to read the protagonist constantly refer to himself as "we" - it reminded me of Gollum, and then made me question how often I do the same thing myself.)

The story is about the liberation of two characters from this society. Equality 7-2521 is banished for an innovative but wholly illegal discovery, and his forbidden love Liberty 5-3000 follows him. Together they find happiness in living a non-communal life.

The story concludes with these discoveries:

For I know what happiness is possible to me on earth. And my happiness needs no higher aim to vindicate it. My happiness is not the means to any end. It is the end. It is its own goal. It is its own purpose.
Neither am I the means to any end others may wish to accomplish. I am not a tool for their use. I am not a servant of their needs. I am not a bandage for their wounds. I am not a sacrifice for their altars.
I am a man. This miracle of me is mine to own and keep, mine to guard, and mine to use, and mine to kneel before!
I do not surrender my treasures, nor do I share them. The fortune of my spirit is not to be blown into coins of brass and flung to the winds as alms for the poor of the spirit. I guard my treasures: my thought, my will, my freedom. And the greatest of these is freedom.
I owe nothing to my brothers, nor do I gather debts from them. I ask none to live for me, no do I live for any others. I covet no man's soul, nor is my soul theirs to covet.
I am neither foe nor friend to my brothers, but such as each of them shall deserve of me. And to earn my love, my brothers must do more than have been born. I do not grant my love without reason, nor to any chance passer-by who may wish to claim it. I honor men with my love. But honor is a thing to be earned...
For the word "We" must never be spoken, save by one's choice and as a second thought. This word must never be placed first within man's soul, else it becomes a monster, the root of all the evils on earth, the root of man's torture by men, and of an unspeakable lie...
What is my joy if all hands, even the unclean, can reach into it? What is my wisdom, if even the fools can dictate to me? What is my freedom, if all creatures, even the botched and the impotent, are my masters? What is my life, if I am but to bow, to agree and to obey? (95-97)

At first I questioned the hyper-individualistic premise of the book. But then I learned that Ayn Rand grew up in Soviet Russia. She knew what she was writing about, and although collectivism can often be beautiful, she had seen its ugly sides. I found her perspective to be a very interesting one, and her background lent credibility to her argument.

This is not to say that I agree or that I am converted. I see her point; I feel like my view has gained a new dimension, but I think hyper-individuality can be similarly dangerous. I'm a big fan of the middle ground.

Around the same time that I was reading Anthem, I was also reading Becoming Human by Jean Vanier, the man who started the L'Arche communities that welcome people with disabilities. He offers a more communal view, saying that "A society can function well only if those within are concerned, not only with their own needs or the needs of those who immediately surround them, but by the needs of all, that is to say, by the common good and the family of nations," (34) and he feels that personal maturity requires involvement in a community (41). He sees individualism as a negative quality. However, he acknowledges the tension necessary between these two extremes, and he sees how living as part of a group can be unhealthy, oppressive and stifling. He acknowledges the need for personal attention.

I think the best alternative lies where we seek to develop ourselves in order to be a willing blessing to others. There was a moment of this in Anthem: Equality 7-2521 is excited to share his discovery with his brothers because it will benefit them, and although his personal search for knowledge is illegal he is sure that all will be forgiven in light of the gift he is presenting. Later, however, when things haven't turn out as he anticipated, he doubts his earlier goodwill and believes he only sought his own glory. I wish he hadn't changed his mind; I think the idea of giving to others is beautiful. I think that Equality 7-2521 went too far. But, then again, I have a relatively good sense of self, and I have never been forced to live for others. I have been able to aspire to this by choice.

Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town

I just finished reading Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town by Stephen Leacock. I borrowed this book from my Mom, who got it from a gift exchange, where it was contributed by someone who received it in a culture exchange at a Diabetes conference that brought nurses together from all over the country. My Mom has valued it much more than the original owner did, and she lent it to me with the recommendation that it is very charming.

Charming it is. Sunshine Sketches is about the inhabitants of a small town in Ontario. The stories are amusing, but one of the book's most interesting features is its narrator. He seems gullible and eternally optimistic, and much of what he relates is cause for a chuckle as we can see through what he says. He is boastful and egocentric, assuring the reader of the importance of his tiny town in the grand scheme of things, and yet he still remains charming.

Stephen Leacock is a Canadian author, and the book was written in 1912.

2 Good Quotes from "Slumdog Millionaire"

"I reflect on how good it is to have simple, uncomplicated ambitions, like shaking a film star's hand." (29)

"Meeting a long-lost friend is similar, I suppose, to eating a favourite dish after a long time. You don't know how your tastebuds will react after all this while, whether the dish will still taste as good as it used to. I met Salim after five long years with mixed emotions. Would our reunion be as warm as our friendship used to be? Would we still be as honest with each other?" (188)

C.S. Lewis: A Life

Over the past couple of weeks I have been reading a biography of C.S. from the public library written by Michael White. I was assigned the reading of a secondary source perspective on C.S. Lewis' biography by my professor, who seems to be of the opinion that I should write my undergraduate thesis on this man, whose writin I connect to so much. However, I have to admit that after reading this particular biography, I don't know if I do want to write a thesis on this man.

One thing that has always attracted me to the person of C.S. Lewis is that I connected with his writing. He writes in a way that is very relevent to how I think: linear, rational, and yet imaginative and witty. This particular book, but it also made me feel completely disillusioned with the man C.S. Lewis was, in fact, it almost makes me want to dislike him. The author represents Lewis as a bigoted snob, who didn't really have time for technology, progress, children or women, and who is deeply scarred and bitter over experiences that happened over his childhood. While I understand that all of these things were certainly a part of the human that C.S. Lewis was, I really detest how the author not only presented, but speculated on the information with his own personal bias.

The thing I dislike most, I guess, in this book, is how pitiable the author made C.S. Lewis out to be. He presented the humaness of C.S. Lewis to the point of making his seem pathetic. One particular way he did this was by painting C.S. Lewi's faith as a crutch, which although was certainly very helpful and important to C.S. Lewis, was not really worthy of any major notice. In contrast, the author spent almost a whole chapter ruminating on whether Lewis had sex with a particular women whom he lived with for a long period of time and called mother (she was the mother of one of Lewis' best friends who was killed in the war). He spend a great deal of time focusing on Lewis' fantasy literary career but tries to brush over most of his religious works with a short description.

Once again I find myself struggling with the fact on how popular literature can actually write about a person whose faith became so integral and central to their life and fail to provide any detail on how that actually worked, other than that faith being a crutch. On the positive side, I did glean some valuable information from this book - such as certain events and people who influenced C.S. Lewis' life - and I also appreciated how this author went out of his way to present C.S. Lewis as a human being and not some glorified uber-Chrisitan, but at the same time I feel like I must take even this portrayal of Lewis with a grain of salt. I understand that the author is an athiest and that every writer must have their bias, but if I were to use this book as a judge of C.S. Lewis' character, I probably would never read another one of his books again.

More

We went to a discount/used bookstore today, and I bought more books! Because the "to read" pile atop my piano isn't quite at avalanche level yet. I found...

1. The Canterbury Tales: A Prose Version in Modern English by David Wrighta
2. The Consolations of Philosophy by Alain de Botton
3. Status Anxiety by Alain de Botton a
4. Welcome Home: Travels in Smalltown Canada by Stuart McLean
5. The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz by Mordecai Richler

In addition, I have borrowed the following books from my Mom's bookshelf:
1. Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town by Stephen Leacock a
2. Slumdog Millionaire by Vikas Swarup a
3. What the Dog Saw by Malcolm Gladwella

My piano's going to get pretty full!

And I finished reading "The First Time" by Joy Fielding before I left on vacation. Joy Fielding is a really good fiction writer. Her novels are easy to read, but they draw you in and often leave you with something to think about. In this one, a woman splits up with her husband because he is cheating on her, and then discovers she has a fatal illness. It inspired thoughts on selflessness and relationships, and how sometimes the things we pretend eventually become true.

How to be a Canadian

I have also recently finished reading How to be a Canadian by Will & Ian Ferguson (one of my acquisitions from the book sale). I must say, I was a little disappointed in this one too - possibly because I got my hopes up and told someone else that this book was going to be fantastic and she would not be disappointed. It was okay, but I hoped to learn a lot, be entertained, and see reflections of myself as a Canadian in this book. I feel like the authors (1) sacrificed facts for humor, and (2) focused too much on stereotypes.

1. You can present truth in a way that's funny, or you can be funny using topics that are (at some level) true. In the latter, the truth often gets stretched to increase the humor. That's what I found in this book. In addition, the funniest things are often quite insulting if taken literally, and the authors themselves acknowledge their insensitivity because of their efforts to be funny (58).

2. It's easier to notice how stereotypes apply to other groups of people than it is to identify them with ourselves. Stereotypes tend to reduce the identity of a member of a group to just a few characteristics. But there's so much to who we are and how we see our surroundings that doesn't fit in those stereotypes that we don't see how those common conceptions define us at all. As someone else has written, "It’s easier to view people superficially but nobody likes to be viewed as one dimensional because nobody is." I didn't recognize myself in the way Will & Ian described Canadians.

This is not to say this book wasn't worth the read. It was funny, and it did have some interesting views on Canadians. This was my favorite part:

Known far and wide as master linguists, Canadians excel in particular at translating cereal boxes. Often, when the U.N. needs a cereal box translated, they call in the Canadians, who parachute out of stealth bombers clutching boxes of Capitaine Crounche and K de Special.(12)

That's me!

Philosophy Pooh

I recently finished reading "Pooh and the Philosophers" by John Tyerman Williams. It is subtitled, "...In which it is shown that all of Western Philosophy is merely a preamble to Winnie-the-Pooh," and I thought it would be whimsical, entertaining, and educational. But I was disappointed and frustrated, and I rejoiced when the book was finally over.

I wondered about whether or not to tell you guys about what I thought, or to ask you to read some of it yourself, form your own opinion, and see if it is similar to mine. (That's the thing about opinions: sometimes they have more to do with me than the subject matter.) But after I read a little bit to Justin and he validated my views by echoing them, I decided to just share what I thought of this book. If you're interested in checking it out for yourself, let me know - I have a copy I'm willing to part with.

I think the biggest problem I had was with the style. The author was arrogant. He constantly used the word "obvious," a term that I generally find quite insulting. He built his arguments on very thin evidence and made conclusive points out of shaky associations. I was telling a coworker about this book and he summarized it perfectly by saying, "It sounds like that's really a stretch." Exactly. And then the author had the audacity to write that "the last think I wish to do is to present any explanation that does not arise obviously and inevitably out of the text." (189) That is exactly what he does. He's not even fair about it - he has no trouble applying different interpretive rules to points he wishes to make and matters he wishes to dismiss. He takes his thesis (that Winnie the Pooh is a preamble to all of Western Philosophy) very seriously, and writes as if all philosophers prior to this current century were actually anticipating Milne's work, and all philosophy after its publication was merely footnotes. In addition, it seems that the author arbitrarily chose a thesis and then tried to find examples with which to defend it, instead of letting the argument arise naturally from the text. To use a cliche, it's like he put the cart before the horse.

Here's a sample:

The next important Platonic reference in this chapter occurs just after the episode of the song. Pooh finds Christopher Robin preparing for an Expedition (or Expotition) to the North Pole. Leaving aside another example of Pooh's Socratic pretense of ignorance, let us concentrate on the striking fact that in the short space of seventeen lines, we find no fewer than seven "x"s.
Now "x" is one of the rarest letters in English. We need not go into elaborate calculations to prove that an average of one "x" per 2.43 lines is quite exceptional...
A mere coincidence, does anyone suggest? An inevitable result of the fact that an expedition is the subject of their conversation? Reader, remember that we are studying the supreme work of Western philosophy. Not one word, not one letter, not one comma is there by chance. Everything in it has a meaning. Indeed that is an understatement. Everything in it has several meanings...
What does this signpost point to? What does "x" mean to us? First and foremost it is the unknown quantity. This fits well enough when the subject is an expedition into the unknown in search of the unknown. But this is only the first step. We need another to lead us directly to Plato. What is it?
Plato was a master of the general and the abstract rather than the particular and the concrete. Therefore, we can hardly be wrong if we expand the meaning of "x" from the particular "unknown quantity" to the more general "mathematical symbol."
Everything now falls into place. We remember it was Plato who inscribed over the door of his Academy the words "Let no on ignorant of Mathematics enter here." This naturally followed the well-known connection of Platonism with the teachings of the Pythagorean School. And an essential Pythagorean doctrine was that the universe had a mathematical basis - a brilliant anticipation of some theories of modern subatomic physicists.
We can now see that the Expotition to the North Pole is an allegory for the search for the ultimate structure of the universe. No longer can we be surprised that it was Winnie-the-Pooh who discovered it. (26 - 29)

So we go from 'x' to Math to Pythagoras to the structure of the universe, and somehow it's all based on Plato. It's a stretch.

Because so much of what he wrote seemed like nonsense to me, I couldn't help but wonder whether the author was trying to write a satire. But I'm not very good at satires, and I couldn't figure out what he might be intending to comment on. I did, however, find myself drawing on what I have learned about Biblical interpretation as I read. The author seemed to treat Winnie the Pooh like an allegory, where everything means something else. Honey means philosophic truth; a round balloon must be referring to the idea that the earth is a sphere. There is a belief in the inerrancy of the text and the idea that each jot and tittle is pregnant with meaning. The question of whether or not one ought to be cautious to not extract more than the original author intended in his/her work lingers. I'm not confident that this author intended to criticize a fundamentalist, allegorical approach to the Bible - he avoided discussing religion altogether, and nothing made me believe that this was his underlying message - but that is what this book reminded me of.

Although this book mentioned a lot of philosophers, I don't think I learned anything about them. I was too frustrated with the tone of the writing to accept anything it could possibly be saying. In addition, the author seemed to focus on hilighting his own wit and the intelligence of Winnie the Pooh over any explanations of philosophical thought. He twists the original characters to illustrate his thesis, making Pooh Bear a great Socratic teacher of great wisdom who seeks to enlighten his friends, a foil of the dense Christopher Robin. I must say, I prefer the original characters, the original story, the original interpretations.