Avidya’s last login was 4 days ago.
Hello friend. :) I want to apologize for tumbling completely off the face of the Shelfari Earth for so long. Life suddenly hit me full in the face and I (mostly and inadvertantly) gave up internet as a result. How are you?P.S. Thanks so much for your contribution to my Kant scoffing!
I do read non-fiction, though admittedly not as much as fiction. As to what kinds I like...well, maybe I should start with what I don't like: you won't catch me reading books like "How to Become a Billionnaire While Doing Absolutely Nothing" or "How to Lose 300 Pounds in Less than One Day". So yeah, self-help is out (does it even count as non-fiction?). I'm not necessarily sure how to classify the non-fiction I tend to read; let's call it non-fiction of place, for lack of a better term. I like the author to take me somewhere specific, or even a collection of places linked by a common thread, and, as they would say in Harvey's Berlin, "Expatiate!" Favorite authors are John McPhee, Ian Frazier, Bill Bryson, Peter Matthiessen, and, of course, Edward Abbey. I also like an author to be able to choose the most arbitary subject and somehow weave an entire, fascinating book out of it (e.g. McPhee's "Oranges" or Martin Booth's "Opium: a History"). Historical non-fiction (Anne Applebaum's "Gulag: a History), naturalist non-fiction (anything by Muir -- especially since he's writing about my mountains!), and adventure non-fiction (Clarence King's "Mountaineering in the Sierra Nevada"), are also favorites...though they could conceivable be grouped under my initial broad category of place. But anyway! That was a long answer to your short question. I'll throw it back in your direction: what kind of non-fiction do you like?Also, our favorite cryptographer has added "'Gerontion' or 'Remembrance of Things Past'" to his crossed-out code. Perhaps he suffers from a deep-seated hatred of Eliot and Proust?
Maybe she just wants to give you more chances to catch the sunrise than you'd ever give yourself.Something very odd is happening in "Harlot's Ghost". A reader before me, for some reason, decided very meticulously to cross out (not underline) words and phrases in this copy of the book. So far I've found a line through every occurence of Dashiell Hammett's name, the words "sophomoric nihilism", and the phrase "It is evil to recognize the good, and continue to work against it." As this is a book about the CIA, it must be a code, right? :) By the way, I'm feeling quite indebted to you for your inadvertant recommendation. Mailer's writing is phenomenally good, and I find myself reading when my intention is to do something else. I accidentally glimpsed the final page with the words TO BE CONTINUED... Is this true?
Sounds good. Our club will have to have a catchy name to make up for the fact that it only has two members. :)Any luck with "Bullet Park"?
Forgive me. I completely ignored your advice, and I'm now about 100 pages into "Harlot's Ghost". It's incredible.
I've had a lot of experience working in archives with the National Park Service, so I'm applying mainly to libraries and museums. I've found a few openings that look really interesting. I pretty much like jobs in which I can dig through and organize the small-scale history of a place or era. For some reason, random boxes with disorganized and unknown contents fascinate me.Right now I'm in the middle of Bob Dylan's "Chronicles: Volume One". I grabbed it because I'd finally gotten my library card, I was in a hurry, and the book had an attractive cover. I find it interesting but also really frustrating: it's very disjointed -- not at all an autobiography like I was expecting. I keep wondering why he wrote the book... He'll talk for pages about the chord progressions in a song from an album society seems to have forgotten, but then he'll skip fifteen years of his life without saying a word. I'm perplexed. I'm also in the middle of Pico Iyer's "Abandon", which I started at the beginning of the summer but never finished. I got distracted by my complete lack of knowledge concerning Rumi's poetry and Sufism in general, upon which the story focuses. I was wondering, of your top ten, which would you immediately recommend? I'm intrigued by the Calvino. I've had him on my book shelf for years, yet I've somehow passed him by...
Oops. I somehow entirely missed that whole "why are you in Chicago" message. I don't know if it's my wireless connection or my Shelfari page, but nothing seems to be working right. Which is why you keep ending up with multiple copies of the same message on your page (feel free to delete them) and I keep missing new messages.But anyway, I'm not in Chicago for a job -- I'm sending out applications like crazy right now -- but simply for... well, I don't really have a good reason to be in Chicago, actually. For the adventure? That sounds about right. I had a realization a while back that I haven't seen much of the world at all. So Chicago sounded like as good a place as any to begin -- I wanted to move somewhere I'd never been before --, and I knew I'd have a roommate if I moved here. I also considered moving to Juneau, Alaska, Oxford, Mississippi, Kauaii, or some small town in Montana.St. John's College in Santa Fe learned me real good. I could go on and on about their education (Great Books curriculum) but instead, if you have a minute, you should check out their website: www.sjcsf.edu. What about you? Have you been in NY your whole life? Who learned you so good?And I agree completely about the thunderstorm/hiking combo. I spent one harrowing evening on the top of Mt. Whitney in the middle of a thunderstorm. All I could think was 'right now I'm on the highest point in the continental US...in a lightning storm'. We ran almost the entire way down.
good collection, i have to read some of these...
To tell you the truth, of the ancient historians Thucydides is definitely my favorite. I pretty much fell completely in love with Alcibiades my freshman year of college, and so far my opinion hasn't changed. Do you remember his oratory battle with Nicias over sailing to war in Sicily? I think that's some of the most powerful stuff ever written. But I wrote my senior thesis on Livy so I figure he deserves a spot in my top ten. I'm still not sure why I didn't choose Thucydides...except that I loved watching the birth of a nation, even through its most tedious details. And I loved stumbling upon characters (Brutus and Lucretia, Coriolanus, --later, Virginius and his daughter) whose stories could so easily be expanded into whole novels or epic poems. You have to give Livy credit for coaxing such a convinging history from a time so far in the past. He didn't have Thucydides' advantage of living (and being exiled) during the Peloponnesian War. As to some others off my top ten, Hamann is the best writer I've ever read. The next time you're in Borders, just read the first chapter (it's very short) and you'll see what I mean. Your Top Ten is full of a bunch of good books that I've never read, with the exception of a handful of poems and the first twenty pages of "Blood Meridian". Why are there no surpises? Perhaps you should toss in some chick lit and "Tagalog for Dummies" just to confuse us all. :)
I appreciate your empathy. And you're right -- yesterday morning I ran down to Powell's and picked up a used replacement for my doomed book, Barbara Kingsolver's "Prodigal Summer". Right before I left for Chicago,a friend gave me "The Poisonwood Bible" and urged me to read it. I can honestly say that it was one of the best books I've ever read. "Prodigal Summer", though not at the same level as its predecessor, was beautifully written and full to the brim with imagery and characters that made me miss home a bit. I guess talk of coyotes, mountains, and rednecks is all it takes. :)It's good to find another thunderstorm connoiseur. Do you go camping much? That's one thing I need to find a city-style substitute for...I'd probable get arrested if I set up camp down on Hyde Park beach.I was looking at your shelf and wondering why you don't have a Top Ten list. No Favorites? Or too many?
I just sprinted like crazy to catch my bus after jumping off the El, and my book fell out of my bag somewhere in the middle of some intersection, no doubt, to be run-over by some taxi driver speeding through the downtown's empty, late-night streets. I was twenty pages from the end! So yeah, acclimating myself to life in Chicago is an exciting and very new process -- I only moved here two weeks ago. It's not the transition from California to Chicago that's been tough (though I'm sure I'll be eating my words, come winter), but the whole new process of living in the city. I grew up in a very rural town in California with a population of 500 and a high school graduating class of 10. Then I moved to Santa Fe, New Mexico, which was urban to me but small town to everyone else. I loved it there -- I already miss the wild thunderstorms that would roll in each afternoon, giving way to the most flawless and striking sunsets I've ever seen. If you've never been to New Mexico, it comes more highly recommended than any book on my shelf.By the way, I walked past a bar downtown called Oenology, and (thanks to you!) I knew it specialized in wine.Is there any particular reason you chose a screen name that means ignorance?
Wow...I am laughing so hard right now! I've been using this screen name for years and I never knew that's what it means! I chose "Oenothera" because it's the name of my favorite flower -- a weed, actually -- which grows in California, where I'm from originally. There's nothing particularly striking about it -- a small, four-petaled yellow blossom-- except that it blooms at night instead of during the day. I always liked that. Why Greek? Hmmm.... Well, I've always been intrigued by dead languages. There's something mysterious and special about keeping something alive for the aesthetics rather than for the utility. When I was in 8th grade I decided I was going to learn Latin. And the college I chose required Ancient Greek and French. Ancient Greek was my favorite because I love learning non-Roman alphabets. I like that you have to learn a entirely new way of writing -- not just reading -- before moving into the language itself. Plus, written Greek is really beautiful, I think, even just to look at. Not to mention that it leads to the ability to translate Homer, Sophocles, Thucydides, Euripides...many of my favorites; the list goes on. As to buying a trashy gripping novel to learn Spanish, that sounds like a great idea. Or maybe a cookbook in Spanish...? That way you could benefit from making tasty food (Mexican is my favorite) and learning the language at the smae time.What kind of company are you starting?
The edition I have is dual language, so maybe you could find a similar one. You're teaching youself Spanish? Why is that your language of choice? I took it in High School and the only thing I really remember anymore is "Puedo ir al bano?" I just moved to Chicago a few days ago, so I'm thinking I'd like learn a new language in this new city...or maybe catch up on Ancient Greek, which I took in college and loved. If you have any pointers on self-teaching, send them my way.
I mean this in the best way possible, but why in the world have you read Kant's "Foundations of the Metaphysics of Morals"? You may be the first other person I've met with Kant on their shelf...though Kant and I tend to disagree strongly. You have a fantasic shelf full of many books that I can't wait to read, and a few I've had my hands on already. I also have a bit of a poetry problem, which resulted in the executive decision to put only my absolute favorites up on Shelfari. One of these is Borges' "In Praise of Darkness", which I didn't notice on your shelf ,so I wanted to send that recommendation your way. If you get a chance to read it, let me know what you think. As far as I can tell, I'm the only one on Shelfari right now with it up on my shelf, and it would be good to make that two.
I don't think I could choose a favorite book of poetry, but I love Roethke, W.C. Williams, and Cummings.
The Rattle Bag? What a great title! I need to get it just for that, and of course, because of your glowing recommendation : )
Thanks to you I've added A Book of Luminous Things to my "must read" list for the fall. This girl's going to be spending an awful lot of time with books and park benches!