[clinton/website/site/unknownlamer.org.git] / Book List.html

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    <h1>A Not So Fancy Listing of Books</h1>
   <div class="contents">
<dl>
<dt>
<a href="#sec1">William Blake</a>
</dt>
<dd>
<dl>
<dt>
<a href="#sec2">The Four Zoas</a>
</dt>
<dt>
<a href="#sec3">Jerusalem</a>
</dt>
</dl>
</dd>
<dt>
<a href="#sec4">Kahlil Gibran</a>
</dt>
<dd>
<dl>
<dt>
<a href="#sec5">A Tear and a Smile</a>
</dt>
<dt>
<a href="#sec6">The Prophet</a>
</dt>
<dt>
<a href="#sec7">Sand and Foam</a>
</dt>
<dt>
<a href="#sec8">The Madman</a>
</dt>
</dl>
</dd>
<dt>
<a href="#sec9">John Taylor Gatto</a>
</dt>
<dd>
<dl>
<dt>
<a href="#sec10">Underground History of American Education</a>
</dt>
</dl>
</dd>
<dt>
<a href="#sec11">Luke Rhinehardt</a>
</dt>
<dd>
<dl>
<dt>
<a href="#sec12">The Dice Man</a>
</dt>
</dl>
</dd>
<dt>
<a href="#sec13">Neal Stephenson</a>
</dt>
<dd>
<dl>
<dt>
<a href="#sec14">Snow Crash</a>
</dt>
<dt>
<a href="#sec15">Cryptonomicon</a>
</dt>
</dl>
</dd>
<dt>
<a href="#sec16">Marcus Aurelius</a>
</dt>
<dd>
<dl>
<dt>
<a href="#sec17">Meditations</a>
</dt>
</dl>
</dd>
<dt>
<a href="#sec18">Søren Kierkegaard</a>
</dt>
<dd>
<dl>
<dt>
<a href="#sec19">Sickness Unto Death</a>
</dt>
<dt>
<a href="#sec20">Either/Or</a>
</dt>
</dl>
</dd>
<dt>
<a href="#sec21">Thomas More</a>
</dt>
<dd>
<dl>
<dt>
<a href="#sec22">Utopia</a>
</dt>
</dl>
</dd>
<dt>
<a href="#sec23">William James</a>
</dt>
<dd>
<dl>
<dt>
<a href="#sec24">The Varieties of Religious Experience</a>
</dt>
<dt>
<a href="#sec25">The PhD Octopus</a>
</dt>
</dl>
</dd>
<dt>
<a href="#sec26">Henry James</a>
</dt>
<dd>
<dl>
<dt>
<a href="#sec27">The Altar of the Dead</a>
</dt>
</dl>
</dd>
<dt>
<a href="#sec28">Gregor Kiczales</a>
</dt>
<dd>
<dl>
<dt>
<a href="#sec29">The Art of the Metaobject Protocol</a>
</dt>
</dl>
</dd>
<dt>
<a href="#sec30">Friedrich Nietzsche</a>
</dt>
<dd>
<dl>
<dt>
<a href="#sec31">Beyond Good and Evil</a>
</dt>
<dt>
<a href="#sec32">On the Geneaology of Morals</a>
</dt>
<dt>
<a href="#sec33">Ecce Homo</a>
</dt>
</dl>
</dd>
</dl>
</div>


<!-- Page published by Emacs Muse begins here --><h2><a name="sec1" id="sec1"></a>
William Blake</h2>

<p class="first">Blake is my <a href="William%20Blake.html">favorite</a> of the English poets. His
unique use of relief etching and watercoloring makes for very
interesting Illuminated works. There is a very high quality
<a href="http://blakearchive.org">complete archive of Blake&amp;#039;s works</a> online
with high resolution plate scans and full transcriptions among other
things.</p>

<h3><a name="sec2" id="sec2"></a>
The Four Zoas</h3>

<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">••••••••••</span></span><span class="rating-bad"> / <em>Fiction</em></p>

<p>The unfinished manuscript of Blake&amp;#039;s longest apocalypse. The
Four Zoas divide from Albion and rage through the ages of dismal woe
to bring about the end of the cycle of Ulro and restore the cycle of
Beulah.</p>


<h3><a name="sec3" id="sec3"></a>
Jerusalem</h3>

<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">••••••••••</span></span><span class="rating-bad"> / <em>Fiction</em></p>

<p>The finest of Blake&amp;#039;s Illuminated works.</p>


<h2><a name="sec4" id="sec4"></a>
Kahlil Gibran</h2>

<p class="first">Kahlil Gibran is fairly interesting; his earlier works do not
agree with my æsthetic sense (blah blah), but <em>The Madman</em> onward are
all rather nice. A few of his works are
<a href="http://leb.net/~mira/">online</a>, but I recommend scouting used book
stores for old hardcover editions. The (late 90s onward at least)
<em>hardcover</em> versions from <em>Alfred A. Knopf</em> are in fact permabound
paperbacks with a hardcasing, and are of seriously inferior quality to
the editions from the 50s and 60s (and cost quite a bit more,
naturally).</p>

<h3><a name="sec5" id="sec5"></a>
A Tear and a Smile</h3>

<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">•••</span><span class="rating-bad">•••••••</span> / <em>Fiction</em></p>

<p>One of Kahlil Gibran&amp;#039;s earlier works, I did not much like <em>A
Tear and a Smile</em> excepting the last poem (&amp;quot;A Poet&amp;#039;s Voice&amp;quot;).</p>


<h3><a name="sec6" id="sec6"></a>
The Prophet</h3>

<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">•••••••••</span><span class="rating-bad">•</span> / <em>Fiction</em></p>


<h3><a name="sec7" id="sec7"></a>
Sand and Foam</h3>

<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">•••••••</span><span class="rating-bad">•••</span> / <em>Fiction</em></p>

<p>An interesting little book of aphorisms.</p>


<h3><a name="sec8" id="sec8"></a>
The Madman</h3>

<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">••••••••</span><span class="rating-bad">••</span> / <em>Fiction</em></p>


<h2><a name="sec9" id="sec9"></a>
John Taylor Gatto</h2>

<p class="first">Former teacher and now author-activist.</p>

<h3><a name="sec10" id="sec10"></a>
Underground History of American Education</h3>

<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">•••••••••</span><span class="rating-bad">•</span> / <em>Nonfiction</em></p>

<p>An interesting <em>underground</em> history of the American education
system. Available
<a href="http://www.johntaylorgatto.com/underground/">online for free</a>.</p>


<h2><a name="sec11" id="sec11"></a>
Luke Rhinehardt</h2>


<h3><a name="sec12" id="sec12"></a>
The Dice Man</h3>

<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">•••••••</span><span class="rating-bad">•••</span> / <em>Fiction</em></p>

<p>&amp;lt;quote&amp;gt;
And it&amp;#039;s his illusions about what
constitutes the real world which are
inhibiting him...
His reality, his reason, his society
...these are what must be destroyed
&amp;lt;/quote&amp;gt;</p>

<p>A quotation from one of my <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slaughter_of_the_Soul">favorite metal songs</a> inspired me to grab
this book; at worst it would be a waste of time. Much reward was found
in this random stab in the dark. The book is framed as an
autobiography of the author as a psychoanalyst, and his progression
through life as a Dice Man after deciding to live his life through
random chance.</p>

<p>The style, plot, and content are equally neurotic; part comedy, part
attack on psychoanalysis, and part deep philosophy. It was often
difficult to put down, and was read in under a week of spare time.</p>


<h2><a name="sec13" id="sec13"></a>
Neal Stephenson</h2>


<h3><a name="sec14" id="sec14"></a>
Snow Crash</h3>

<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">•••••••••</span><span class="rating-bad">•</span> / <em>Fiction</em></p>

<p>As one must read the <em>Bible</em> to understand English literature, so one
must read <em>Snow Crash</em> today to be a nerd. In the realm of modern pop
fiction this is one of the better books I&amp;#039;ve read; it was devoured in
a mere four nights. Neal Stepheson may not be Milton, but he does come
up with enganging tales. <em>Snow Crash</em> has a nice undertone of (quite
accurate) political and social commentary that makes it worth reading
as more than mere cyberpunk fiction.</p>


<h3><a name="sec15" id="sec15"></a>
Cryptonomicon</h3>

<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">••••••••</span><span class="rating-bad">••</span> / <em>Fiction</em></p>

<p>I read <em>Cryptonomicon</em> when it was new, and at the time I thought it was
good. It could have lost a hundred or so pages without detracting from
the plot, but it was easy reading and didn&amp;#039;t take very long to
finish. The story was enganging, and the continual switching between
the 1940s and present day slowly unravelled the tale in a nice way.</p>

<p>I&amp;#039;d still have to recommend <em>Snow Crash</em> if one wished to read only one
Stephenson novel.</p>


<h2><a name="sec16" id="sec16"></a>
Marcus Aurelius</h2>


<h3><a name="sec17" id="sec17"></a>
Meditations</h3>

<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">••••••</span><span class="rating-bad">••••</span> / <em>Nonfiction</em></p>

<p>I enjoyed reading this collection of meditations on Stoic
philosophy. It is a fairly quick read; I read each of the twelve books
before sleeping over the course of two weeks. Toward the end of the
collection things get a bit topically repetetive (e.g. acting
according to the nature of man is reflected upon over and over), but
each repetition looks at the topic in a slightly different light. A
number of passages I found quite inspiring, and scratched them down in
my notebook to ponder further.</p>


<h2><a name="sec18" id="sec18"></a>
Søren Kierkegaard</h2>

<p class="first">Kierkegaard was a master of style and philosophy; his writing is
interesting even if one finds the theistic extentialism espoused
disagreeable.</p>

<h3><a name="sec19" id="sec19"></a>
Sickness Unto Death</h3>

<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">••••••••••</span></span><span class="rating-bad"> / <em>Nonfiction</em></p>

<p>I purchased this when I was looking through books at a store after
being unable to find the book I really wanted, and I must say that it
was better for me to have found this one.</p>

<p>Contained within is a beautiful analysis of despair in the context of
Christianity (really theism in general). Even if the argument offends,
the presentation cannot. The dialectical nature of despair is
reflected in every aspect of the work, and the method of presentation
forces reflection.</p>


<h3><a name="sec20" id="sec20"></a>
Either/Or</h3>

<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">••••••••••</span></span><span class="rating-bad"> / <em>Nonfiction</em></p>

<p>Composed of two portions, <em>Either/Or</em> is a rather lengthy but
rewarding read. The first book is a series of essays and a diary of a
young esthetician; the second is a pair of long letters from an older
ethicist friend to this esthetician. You are then left to resolve the
conflict between the views.</p>


<h2><a name="sec21" id="sec21"></a>
Thomas More</h2>


<h3><a name="sec22" id="sec22"></a>
Utopia</h3>

<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">•••••••</span><span class="rating-bad">•••</span> / <em>Fiction</em></p>

<p>I read most of Utopia in high school with the TI-89 ebook reader, but
the way the book was split up made it a bit difficult to grasp the
overall structure. I found a copy at a used book store one day, and so
I read it again, and found it much more comprehensible. It is a quick
read, and decent piece of literature. The interesting social system
espoused resembles resembles state communism (even if perhaps as a
negative ideal), but with an strange blend of 14th century European
social customs.</p>


<h2><a name="sec23" id="sec23"></a>
William James</h2>


<h3><a name="sec24" id="sec24"></a>
The Varieties of Religious Experience</h3>

<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">•••••••</span><span class="rating-bad">•••</span> / <em>Nonfiction</em></p>

<p><a href="William%20James%20-%20The%20Varieties%20of%20Religious%20Experience.html">A partially finished extended summary</a></p>


<h3><a name="sec25" id="sec25"></a>
The PhD Octopus</h3>

<blockquote>
<p class="quoted">/ <em>Nonfiction</em></p>
</blockquote>

<p>&amp;lt;quote&amp;gt;
America is thus as a nation rapidly drifting towards a state of things
in which no man of science or letters will be accounted respectable
unless some kind of badge or diploma is stamped upon him, and in which
bare personality will be a mark of outcast estate.  It seems to me high
time to rouse ourselves to consciousness, and to cast a critical eye
upon this decidedly grotesque tendency.  Other nations suffer terribly
from the Mandarin disease.  Are we doomed to suffer like the rest?
&amp;lt;/quote&amp;gt;</p>

<p><a href="William%20James%20-%20The%20PhD%20Octopus.html">Full Text</a></p>


<h2><a name="sec26" id="sec26"></a>
Henry James</h2>

<p class="first">The novelist brother of William James; I&amp;#039;ve not read many (read:
one) of his books, but what I did was decent.</p>

<h3><a name="sec27" id="sec27"></a>
The Altar of the Dead</h3>

<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">•••••••</span><span class="rating-bad">•••</span> / <em>Fiction</em></p>

<p>A short novella about a man who maintained an altar in a church
for all of his lost loved ones on the surface, but something a bit
more beneath.</p>


<h2><a name="sec28" id="sec28"></a>
Gregor Kiczales</h2>


<h3><a name="sec29" id="sec29"></a>
The Art of the Metaobject Protocol</h3>

<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">••••••••••</span></span><span class="rating-bad"> / <em>Nonfiction</em></p>

<p>AMOP is useful as a reference to the CLOS MOP (although less so with
the online MOP spec), but the true value of the book lies in the first
half of the book. It presents the design of the CLOS MOP through a
series of revisions that fix limitations of earlier implementations
and gradually work toward a generic and well designed MOP for
CLOS. Through that process one is made more aware of a few general
object protocol design skills, and gains insight into how to cleanly
make mapping decisions customizable.</p>


<h2><a name="sec30" id="sec30"></a>
Friedrich Nietzsche</h2>

<p class="first">A bit acerbic and esoteric, Nietzsche is for me a good <em>secular</em>
counterpart to Kierkegaard&amp;#039;s theistic philosophy. Nietzsche&amp;#039;s
polemical works raise important questions for anyone who reads works
on ethics. As such it is a shame that he has gotten a bad reputation
by being read by far too many angsty teenagers who see (and relay)
only Nietzsche the asshole rather than Nietzsche the master of the
polemic.</p>

<h3><a name="sec31" id="sec31"></a>
Beyond Good and Evil</h3>

<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">••••••••</span><span class="rating-bad">••</span> / <em>Nonfiction</em></p>

<p>A somewhat more comprehensible, if a bit less aesthetically
pleasing, presentation of much of the philosophy found in <em>Thus Spoke
Zarathustra</em> in the negative form. The final chapters are very
important (not to detract from the value of the rest of the work) if
one wishes to understand <em>On the Genealogy of Morals</em>.</p>


<h3><a name="sec32" id="sec32"></a>
On the Geneaology of Morals</h3>

<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">•••••••••</span><span class="rating-bad">•</span> / <em>Nonfiction</em></p>

<p><em>On the Geneaology of Morals</em> is a wonderful book of three
polemical essays on the origin of moral/ethic valuations, and the
blindness of modern philosphers whose very thinking is tainted by
these valuations unknowingly.</p>


<h3><a name="sec33" id="sec33"></a>
Ecce Homo</h3>

<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">•••••••</span><span class="rating-bad">•••</span> / <em>Nonfiction</em></p>

<p><em>Ecce Homo</em> is Nietzsche&amp;#039;s very strange autobiography and
explanation of his own works. At points it is clear that it could have
used a bit more editing (prevented by Nietzsche ... falling into a
catatonic state and all), but is still a very useful book to read as
Nietzsche explains the overall structure of his works.</p>


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<p class="cke-timestamp">Last Modified:
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Commit	Line	Data
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	3	"http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd">
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	5	<head>
	6	<title>A Not So Fancy Listing of Books</title>
	7	<meta name="generator" content="muse.el" />
	8	<meta http-equiv="Content-Type"
	9	content="text/html; charset=utf-8" />
54a817d4	10	<link href="http://feeds.unknownlamer.org/rss/site-updates"
	11	rel="alternate" type="application/rss+xml" title="Updates Feed" />
	12
023ad63c	13	<link rel="stylesheet" href="default.css" media="screen" />
	14	</head>
	15	<body>
	16	<h1>A Not So Fancy Listing of Books</h1>
	17	<div class="contents">
	18	<dl>
	19	<dt>
54a817d4	20	<a href="#sec1">William Blake</a>
023ad63c	21	</dt>
	22	<dd>
	23	<dl>
	24	<dt>
54a817d4	25	<a href="#sec2">The Four Zoas</a>
	26	</dt>
	27	<dt>
	28	<a href="#sec3">Jerusalem</a>
023ad63c	29	</dt>
	30	</dl>
	31	</dd>
	32	<dt>
54a817d4	33	<a href="#sec4">Kahlil Gibran</a>
023ad63c	34	</dt>
	35	<dd>
	36	<dl>
	37	<dt>
54a817d4	38	<a href="#sec5">A Tear and a Smile</a>
023ad63c	39	</dt>
023ad63c	40	<dt>
54a817d4	41	<a href="#sec6">The Prophet</a>
023ad63c	42	</dt>
023ad63c	43	<dt>
54a817d4	44	<a href="#sec7">Sand and Foam</a>
023ad63c	45	</dt>
023ad63c	46	<dt>
54a817d4	47	<a href="#sec8">The Madman</a>
023ad63c	48	</dt>
	49	</dl>
	50	</dd>
	51	<dt>
54a817d4	52	<a href="#sec9">John Taylor Gatto</a>
023ad63c	53	</dt>
	54	<dd>
	55	<dl>
	56	<dt>
54a817d4	57	<a href="#sec10">Underground History of American Education</a>
023ad63c	58	</dt>
	59	</dl>
	60	</dd>
	61	<dt>
54a817d4	62	<a href="#sec11">Luke Rhinehardt</a>
023ad63c	63	</dt>
	64	<dd>
	65	<dl>
	66	<dt>
54a817d4	67	<a href="#sec12">The Dice Man</a>
5e4e370e	68	</dt>
	69	</dl>
	70	</dd>
	71	<dt>
54a817d4	72	<a href="#sec13">Neal Stephenson</a>
5e4e370e	73	</dt>
	74	<dd>
	75	<dl>
	76	<dt>
54a817d4	77	<a href="#sec14">Snow Crash</a>
	78	</dt>
	79	<dt>
	80	<a href="#sec15">Cryptonomicon</a>
5e4e370e	81	</dt>
023ad63c	82	</dl>
	83	</dd>
	84	<dt>
54a817d4	85	<a href="#sec16">Marcus Aurelius</a>
023ad63c	86	</dt>
	87	<dd>
	88	<dl>
	89	<dt>
54a817d4	90	<a href="#sec17">Meditations</a>
023ad63c	91	</dt>
	92	</dl>
	93	</dd>
	94	<dt>
54a817d4	95	<a href="#sec18">Søren Kierkegaard</a>
023ad63c	96	</dt>
	97	<dd>
	98	<dl>
	99	<dt>
54a817d4	100	<a href="#sec19">Sickness Unto Death</a>
023ad63c	101	</dt>
023ad63c	102	<dt>
54a817d4	103	<a href="#sec20">Either/Or</a>
023ad63c	104	</dt>
	105	</dl>
	106	</dd>
	107	<dt>
54a817d4	108	<a href="#sec21">Thomas More</a>
023ad63c	109	</dt>
	110	<dd>
	111	<dl>
	112	<dt>
54a817d4	113	<a href="#sec22">Utopia</a>
023ad63c	114	</dt>
	115	</dl>
	116	</dd>
	117	<dt>
54a817d4	118	<a href="#sec23">William James</a>
023ad63c	119	</dt>
	120	<dd>
	121	<dl>
	122	<dt>
54a817d4	123	<a href="#sec24">The Varieties of Religious Experience</a>
	124	</dt>
	125	<dt>
	126	<a href="#sec25">The PhD Octopus</a>
04cda6d1	127	</dt>
54a817d4	128	</dl>
54a817d4	129	</dd>
04cda6d1	130	<dt>
54a817d4	131	<a href="#sec26">Henry James</a>
023ad63c	132	</dt>
54a817d4	133	<dd>
54a817d4	134	<dl>
b61362db	135	<dt>
54a817d4	136	<a href="#sec27">The Altar of the Dead</a>
b61362db	137	</dt>
023ad63c	138	</dl>
	139	</dd>
	140	<dt>
54a817d4	141	<a href="#sec28">Gregor Kiczales</a>
023ad63c	142	</dt>
	143	<dd>
	144	<dl>
	145	<dt>
54a817d4	146	<a href="#sec29">The Art of the Metaobject Protocol</a>
023ad63c	147	</dt>
04cda6d1	148	</dl>
04cda6d1	149	</dd>
023ad63c	150	<dt>
54a817d4	151	<a href="#sec30">Friedrich Nietzsche</a>
04cda6d1	152	</dt>
	153	<dd>
	154	<dl>
	155	<dt>
54a817d4	156	<a href="#sec31">Beyond Good and Evil</a>
	157	</dt>
	158	<dt>
	159	<a href="#sec32">On the Geneaology of Morals</a>
04cda6d1	160	</dt>
04cda6d1	161	<dt>
54a817d4	162	<a href="#sec33">Ecce Homo</a>
023ad63c	163	</dt>
	164	</dl>
	165	</dd>
	166	</dl>
	167	</div>
	168
	169
	170	<!-- Page published by Emacs Muse begins here --><h2><a name="sec1" id="sec1"></a>
023ad63c	171	William Blake</h2>
023ad63c	172
92ffc65b	173	<p class="first">Blake is my <a href="William%20Blake.html">favorite</a> of the English poets. His
	174	unique use of relief etching and watercoloring makes for very
	175	interesting Illuminated works. There is a very high quality
54a817d4	176	<a href="http://blakearchive.org">complete archive of Blake&#039;s works</a> online
023ad63c	177	with high resolution plate scans and full transcriptions among other
	178	things.</p>
	179
54a817d4	180	<h3><a name="sec2" id="sec2"></a>
023ad63c	181	The Four Zoas</h3>
023ad63c	182
54a817d4	183	<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">••••••••••</span></span><span class="rating-bad"> / <em>Fiction</em></p>
023ad63c	184
54a817d4	185	<p>The unfinished manuscript of Blake&#039;s longest apocalypse. The
023ad63c	186	Four Zoas divide from Albion and rage through the ages of dismal woe
	187	to bring about the end of the cycle of Ulro and restore the cycle of
	188	Beulah.</p>
	189
	190
023ad63c	191
54a817d4	192	<h3><a name="sec3" id="sec3"></a>
54a817d4	193	Jerusalem</h3>
023ad63c	194
54a817d4	195	<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">••••••••••</span></span><span class="rating-bad"> / <em>Fiction</em></p>
023ad63c	196
54a817d4	197	<p>The finest of Blake&#039;s Illuminated works.</p>
023ad63c	198
023ad63c	199
023ad63c	200
023ad63c	201
54a817d4	202	<h2><a name="sec4" id="sec4"></a>
023ad63c	203	Kahlil Gibran</h2>
	204
	205	<p class="first">Kahlil Gibran is fairly interesting; his earlier works do not
	206	agree with my æsthetic sense (blah blah), but <em>The Madman</em> onward are
	207	all rather nice. A few of his works are
	208	<a href="http://leb.net/~mira/">online</a>, but I recommend scouting used book
	209	stores for old hardcover editions. The (late 90s onward at least)
	210	<em>hardcover</em> versions from <em>Alfred A. Knopf</em> are in fact permabound
	211	paperbacks with a hardcasing, and are of seriously inferior quality to
	212	the editions from the 50s and 60s (and cost quite a bit more,
	213	naturally).</p>
	214
54a817d4	215	<h3><a name="sec5" id="sec5"></a>
023ad63c	216	A Tear and a Smile</h3>
023ad63c	217
54a817d4	218	<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">•••</span><span class="rating-bad">•••••••</span> / <em>Fiction</em></p>
023ad63c	219
54a817d4	220	<p>One of Kahlil Gibran&#039;s earlier works, I did not much like <em>A
54a817d4	221	Tear and a Smile</em> excepting the last poem (&quot;A Poet&#039;s Voice&quot;).</p>
023ad63c	222
023ad63c	223
54a817d4	224
54a817d4	225	<h3><a name="sec6" id="sec6"></a>
023ad63c	226	The Prophet</h3>
023ad63c	227
54a817d4	228	<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">•••••••••</span><span class="rating-bad">•</span> / <em>Fiction</em></p>
54a817d4	229
023ad63c	230
	231
	232
	233
54a817d4	234	<h3><a name="sec7" id="sec7"></a>
023ad63c	235	Sand and Foam</h3>
023ad63c	236
54a817d4	237	<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">•••••••</span><span class="rating-bad">•••</span> / <em>Fiction</em></p>
023ad63c	238
	239	<p>An interesting little book of aphorisms.</p>
	240
	241
54a817d4	242
54a817d4	243	<h3><a name="sec8" id="sec8"></a>
023ad63c	244	The Madman</h3>
023ad63c	245
54a817d4	246	<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">••••••••</span><span class="rating-bad">••</span> / <em>Fiction</em></p>
023ad63c	247
	248
	249
	250
	251
023ad63c	252
54a817d4	253	<h2><a name="sec9" id="sec9"></a>
54a817d4	254	John Taylor Gatto</h2>
023ad63c	255
54a817d4	256	<p class="first">Former teacher and now author-activist.</p>
023ad63c	257
54a817d4	258	<h3><a name="sec10" id="sec10"></a>
54a817d4	259	Underground History of American Education</h3>
023ad63c	260
54a817d4	261	<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">•••••••••</span><span class="rating-bad">•</span> / <em>Nonfiction</em></p>
023ad63c	262
54a817d4	263	<p>An interesting <em>underground</em> history of the American education
	264	system. Available
	265	<a href="http://www.johntaylorgatto.com/underground/">online for free</a>.</p>
023ad63c	266
023ad63c	267
5e4e370e	268
5e4e370e	269
54a817d4	270	<h2><a name="sec11" id="sec11"></a>
54a817d4	271	Luke Rhinehardt</h2>
5e4e370e	272
b61362db	273
5e4e370e	274
54a817d4	275	<h3><a name="sec12" id="sec12"></a>
54a817d4	276	The Dice Man</h3>
5e4e370e	277
54a817d4	278	<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">•••••••</span><span class="rating-bad">•••</span> / <em>Fiction</em></p>
5e4e370e	279
54a817d4	280	<p>&lt;quote&gt;
	281	And it&#039;s his illusions about what
	282	constitutes the real world which are
	283	inhibiting him...
	284	His reality, his reason, his society
	285	...these are what must be destroyed
	286	&lt;/quote&gt;</p>
5e4e370e	287
54a817d4	288	<p>A quotation from one of my <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slaughter_of_the_Soul">favorite metal songs</a> inspired me to grab
	289	this book; at worst it would be a waste of time. Much reward was found
	290	in this random stab in the dark. The book is framed as an
	291	autobiography of the author as a psychoanalyst, and his progression
	292	through life as a Dice Man after deciding to live his life through
	293	random chance.</p>
023ad63c	294
54a817d4	295	<p>The style, plot, and content are equally neurotic; part comedy, part
	296	attack on psychoanalysis, and part deep philosophy. It was often
	297	difficult to put down, and was read in under a week of spare time.</p>
5e4e370e	298
5e4e370e	299
5e4e370e	300
5e4e370e	301
54a817d4	302	<h2><a name="sec13" id="sec13"></a>
54a817d4	303	Neal Stephenson</h2>
5e4e370e	304
023ad63c	305
023ad63c	306
54a817d4	307	<h3><a name="sec14" id="sec14"></a>
54a817d4	308	Snow Crash</h3>
023ad63c	309
54a817d4	310	<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">•••••••••</span><span class="rating-bad">•</span> / <em>Fiction</em></p>
023ad63c	311
54a817d4	312	<p>As one must read the <em>Bible</em> to understand English literature, so one
	313	must read <em>Snow Crash</em> today to be a nerd. In the realm of modern pop
	314	fiction this is one of the better books I&#039;ve read; it was devoured in
	315	a mere four nights. Neal Stepheson may not be Milton, but he does come
	316	up with enganging tales. <em>Snow Crash</em> has a nice undertone of (quite
	317	accurate) political and social commentary that makes it worth reading
	318	as more than mere cyberpunk fiction.</p>
023ad63c	319
023ad63c	320
023ad63c	321
54a817d4	322	<h3><a name="sec15" id="sec15"></a>
	323	Cryptonomicon</h3>
	324
	325	<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">••••••••</span><span class="rating-bad">••</span> / <em>Fiction</em></p>
	326
	327	<p>I read <em>Cryptonomicon</em> when it was new, and at the time I thought it was
	328	good. It could have lost a hundred or so pages without detracting from
	329	the plot, but it was easy reading and didn&#039;t take very long to
	330	finish. The story was enganging, and the continual switching between
	331	the 1940s and present day slowly unravelled the tale in a nice way.</p>
	332
	333	<p>I&#039;d still have to recommend <em>Snow Crash</em> if one wished to read only one
	334	Stephenson novel.</p>
	335
023ad63c	336
54a817d4	337
	338
	339	<h2><a name="sec16" id="sec16"></a>
	340	Marcus Aurelius</h2>
	341
	342
	343
	344	<h3><a name="sec17" id="sec17"></a>
	345	Meditations</h3>
	346
	347	<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">••••••</span><span class="rating-bad">••••</span> / <em>Nonfiction</em></p>
	348
	349	<p>I enjoyed reading this collection of meditations on Stoic
	350	philosophy. It is a fairly quick read; I read each of the twelve books
	351	before sleeping over the course of two weeks. Toward the end of the
	352	collection things get a bit topically repetetive (e.g. acting
	353	according to the nature of man is reflected upon over and over), but
	354	each repetition looks at the topic in a slightly different light. A
	355	number of passages I found quite inspiring, and scratched them down in
	356	my notebook to ponder further.</p>
	357
	358
	359
	360
	361	<h2><a name="sec18" id="sec18"></a>
023ad63c	362	Søren Kierkegaard</h2>
	363
	364	<p class="first">Kierkegaard was a master of style and philosophy; his writing is
	365	interesting even if one finds the theistic extentialism espoused
	366	disagreeable.</p>
	367
54a817d4	368	<h3><a name="sec19" id="sec19"></a>
023ad63c	369	Sickness Unto Death</h3>
023ad63c	370
54a817d4	371	<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">••••••••••</span></span><span class="rating-bad"> / <em>Nonfiction</em></p>
023ad63c	372
	373	<p>I purchased this when I was looking through books at a store after
	374	being unable to find the book I really wanted, and I must say that it
	375	was better for me to have found this one.</p>
	376
	377	<p>Contained within is a beautiful analysis of despair in the context of
	378	Christianity (really theism in general). Even if the argument offends,
	379	the presentation cannot. The dialectical nature of despair is
	380	reflected in every aspect of the work, and the method of presentation
	381	forces reflection.</p>
	382
	383
54a817d4	384
54a817d4	385	<h3><a name="sec20" id="sec20"></a>
023ad63c	386	Either/Or</h3>
023ad63c	387
54a817d4	388	<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">••••••••••</span></span><span class="rating-bad"> / <em>Nonfiction</em></p>
023ad63c	389
	390	<p>Composed of two portions, <em>Either/Or</em> is a rather lengthy but
	391	rewarding read. The first book is a series of essays and a diary of a
	392	young esthetician; the second is a pair of long letters from an older
	393	ethicist friend to this esthetician. You are then left to resolve the
	394	conflict between the views.</p>
	395
	396
	397
54a817d4	398
54a817d4	399	<h2><a name="sec21" id="sec21"></a>
023ad63c	400	Thomas More</h2>
	401
	402
	403
54a817d4	404	<h3><a name="sec22" id="sec22"></a>
023ad63c	405	Utopia</h3>
023ad63c	406
54a817d4	407	<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">•••••••</span><span class="rating-bad">•••</span> / <em>Fiction</em></p>
023ad63c	408
	409	<p>I read most of Utopia in high school with the TI-89 ebook reader, but
	410	the way the book was split up made it a bit difficult to grasp the
	411	overall structure. I found a copy at a used book store one day, and so
	412	I read it again, and found it much more comprehensible. It is a quick
	413	read, and decent piece of literature. The interesting social system
	414	espoused resembles resembles state communism (even if perhaps as a
	415	negative ideal), but with an strange blend of 14th century European
	416	social customs.</p>
	417
	418
	419
04cda6d1	420
54a817d4	421	<h2><a name="sec23" id="sec23"></a>
54a817d4	422	William James</h2>
04cda6d1	423
04cda6d1	424
04cda6d1	425
54a817d4	426	<h3><a name="sec24" id="sec24"></a>
54a817d4	427	The Varieties of Religious Experience</h3>
04cda6d1	428
54a817d4	429	<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">•••••••</span><span class="rating-bad">•••</span> / <em>Nonfiction</em></p>
04cda6d1	430
54a817d4	431	<p><a href="William%20James%20-%20The%20Varieties%20of%20Religious%20Experience.html">A partially finished extended summary</a></p>
04cda6d1	432
04cda6d1	433
04cda6d1	434
54a817d4	435	<h3><a name="sec25" id="sec25"></a>
54a817d4	436	The PhD Octopus</h3>
04cda6d1	437
54a817d4	438	<blockquote>
	439	<p class="quoted">/ <em>Nonfiction</em></p>
	440	</blockquote>
b61362db	441
54a817d4	442	<p>&lt;quote&gt;
	443	America is thus as a nation rapidly drifting towards a state of things
	444	in which no man of science or letters will be accounted respectable
	445	unless some kind of badge or diploma is stamped upon him, and in which
	446	bare personality will be a mark of outcast estate. It seems to me high
	447	time to rouse ourselves to consciousness, and to cast a critical eye
	448	upon this decidedly grotesque tendency. Other nations suffer terribly
	449	from the Mandarin disease. Are we doomed to suffer like the rest?
	450	&lt;/quote&gt;</p>
b61362db	451
54a817d4	452	<p><a href="William%20James%20-%20The%20PhD%20Octopus.html">Full Text</a></p>
b61362db	453
b61362db	454
04cda6d1	455
023ad63c	456
54a817d4	457	<h2><a name="sec26" id="sec26"></a>
54a817d4	458	Henry James</h2>
023ad63c	459
54a817d4	460	<p class="first">The novelist brother of William James; I&#039;ve not read many (read:
54a817d4	461	one) of his books, but what I did was decent.</p>
023ad63c	462
54a817d4	463	<h3><a name="sec27" id="sec27"></a>
54a817d4	464	The Altar of the Dead</h3>
023ad63c	465
54a817d4	466	<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">•••••••</span><span class="rating-bad">•••</span> / <em>Fiction</em></p>
023ad63c	467
54a817d4	468	<p>A short novella about a man who maintained an altar in a church
	469	for all of his lost loved ones on the surface, but something a bit
	470	more beneath.</p>
023ad63c	471
023ad63c	472
023ad63c	473
023ad63c	474
54a817d4	475	<h2><a name="sec28" id="sec28"></a>
54a817d4	476	Gregor Kiczales</h2>
023ad63c	477
023ad63c	478
54a817d4	479
	480	<h3><a name="sec29" id="sec29"></a>
	481	The Art of the Metaobject Protocol</h3>
	482
	483	<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">••••••••••</span></span><span class="rating-bad"> / <em>Nonfiction</em></p>
	484
	485	<p>AMOP is useful as a reference to the CLOS MOP (although less so with
	486	the online MOP spec), but the true value of the book lies in the first
	487	half of the book. It presents the design of the CLOS MOP through a
	488	series of revisions that fix limitations of earlier implementations
	489	and gradually work toward a generic and well designed MOP for
	490	CLOS. Through that process one is made more aware of a few general
	491	object protocol design skills, and gains insight into how to cleanly
	492	make mapping decisions customizable.</p>
	493
	494
	495
	496
	497	<h2><a name="sec30" id="sec30"></a>
	498	Friedrich Nietzsche</h2>
	499
	500	<p class="first">A bit acerbic and esoteric, Nietzsche is for me a good <em>secular</em>
	501	counterpart to Kierkegaard&#039;s theistic philosophy. Nietzsche&#039;s
	502	polemical works raise important questions for anyone who reads works
	503	on ethics. As such it is a shame that he has gotten a bad reputation
	504	by being read by far too many angsty teenagers who see (and relay)
	505	only Nietzsche the asshole rather than Nietzsche the master of the
	506	polemic.</p>
	507
	508	<h3><a name="sec31" id="sec31"></a>
	509	Beyond Good and Evil</h3>
	510
	511	<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">••••••••</span><span class="rating-bad">••</span> / <em>Nonfiction</em></p>
	512
	513	<p>A somewhat more comprehensible, if a bit less aesthetically
	514	pleasing, presentation of much of the philosophy found in <em>Thus Spoke
	515	Zarathustra</em> in the negative form. The final chapters are very
	516	important (not to detract from the value of the rest of the work) if
	517	one wishes to understand <em>On the Genealogy of Morals</em>.</p>
023ad63c	518
	519
	520
b61362db	521	<h3><a name="sec32" id="sec32"></a>
54a817d4	522	On the Geneaology of Morals</h3>
023ad63c	523
54a817d4	524	<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">•••••••••</span><span class="rating-bad">•</span> / <em>Nonfiction</em></p>
023ad63c	525
54a817d4	526	<p><em>On the Geneaology of Morals</em> is a wonderful book of three
	527	polemical essays on the origin of moral/ethic valuations, and the
	528	blindness of modern philosphers whose very thinking is tainted by
	529	these valuations unknowingly.</p>
023ad63c	530
023ad63c	531
023ad63c	532
54a817d4	533	<h3><a name="sec33" id="sec33"></a>
54a817d4	534	Ecce Homo</h3>
023ad63c	535
54a817d4	536	<p><em>Rating:</em> <span class="rating-good">•••••••</span><span class="rating-bad">•••</span> / <em>Nonfiction</em></p>
023ad63c	537
54a817d4	538	<p><em>Ecce Homo</em> is Nietzsche&#039;s very strange autobiography and
	539	explanation of his own works. At points it is clear that it could have
	540	used a bit more editing (prevented by Nietzsche ... falling into a
	541	catatonic state and all), but is still a very useful book to read as
	542	Nietzsche explains the overall structure of his works.</p>
023ad63c	543
	544
	545
	546	<!-- Page published by Emacs Muse ends here -->
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	559	src="img/buttons/debian.png" alt="[ Powered by Debian ]" /></a>
	560
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	570	</p>
	571
54a817d4	572	<p class="cke-footer">Jessie: i stuck the phone antenna up the dogs nose and he ignored me
023ad63c	573	</p>
023ad63c	574	<p class="cke-timestamp">Last Modified:
54a817d4	575	September 28, 2008</p>
023ad63c	576	</body>
023ad63c	577	</html>