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1 | (((|Alan| |Moore|) |
2 | nil |
3 | ("Watchmen" :fiction 8) |
4 | ("V for Vendetta" :fiction 10)) |
5 | ((|Neil| |Gaiman|) |
6 | nil |
7 | ("The Sandman (series)" |
8 | :fiction 10 |
9 | "Perhaps the best comic book series of all time; I would say *The |
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10 | Sandman* as a whole ranks higher than anything even Alan Moore has |
11 | written.")) |
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12 | ((|William| |Blake|) |
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13 | "Blake is my [[William Blake][favorite]] of the English poets. His |
14 | unique use of relief etching and watercoloring makes for very |
15 | interesting Illuminated works. There is a very high quality |
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16 | [[http://blakearchive.org][complete archive of Blake's works]] online |
17 | with high resolution plate scans and full transcriptions among other |
18 | things." |
19 | ("The Four Zoas" |
20 | :fiction 10 |
21 | "The unfinished manuscript of Blake's longest apocalypse. The |
22 | Four Zoas divide from Albion and rage through the ages of dismal woe |
23 | to bring about the end of the cycle of Ulro and restore the cycle of |
24 | Beulah.") |
25 | ("Jerusalem" :fiction 10 "The finest of Blake's Illuminated works.")) |
26 | ((|Kahlil| |Gibran|) |
27 | "Kahlil Gibran is fairly interesting; his earlier works do not |
28 | agree with my æsthetic sense (blah blah), but *The Madman* onward are |
29 | all rather nice. A few of his works are |
30 | [[http://leb.net/~mira/][online]], but I recommend scouting used book |
31 | stores for old hardcover editions. The (late 90s onward at least) |
32 | *hardcover* versions from *Alfred A. Knopf* are in fact permabound |
33 | paperbacks with a hardcasing, and are of seriously inferior quality to |
34 | the editions from the 50s and 60s (and cost quite a bit more, |
35 | naturally)." |
36 | ("A Tear and a Smile" |
37 | :fiction 3 |
38 | "One of Kahlil Gibran's earlier works, I did not much like *A |
39 | Tear and a Smile* excepting the last poem (\"A Poet's Voice\").") |
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40 | ("The Prophet" :fiction 9) |
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41 | ("Sand and Foam" :fiction 7 "An interesting little book of aphorisms.") |
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42 | ("The Madman" :fiction 8)) |
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43 | ((|John| |Taylor| |Gatto|) |
44 | "Former teacher and now author-activist." |
45 | ("Underground History of American Education" |
46 | :nonfiction 9 |
47 | "An interesting *underground* history of the American education |
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48 | system. Available |
49 | [[http://www.johntaylorgatto.com/underground/][online for free]].")) |
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50 | ((|Luke| |Rhinehardt|) |
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51 | nil |
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52 | ("The Dice Man" |
53 | :fiction 7 |
54 | "<quote> |
55 | And it's his illusions about what |
56 | constitutes the real world which are |
57 | inhibiting him... |
58 | His reality, his reason, his society |
59 | ...these are what must be destroyed |
60 | </quote> |
61 | |
62 | A quotation from one of my [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slaughter_of_the_Soul][favorite metal songs]] inspired me to grab |
63 | this book; at worst it would be a waste of time. Much reward was found |
64 | in this random stab in the dark. The book is framed as an |
65 | autobiography of the author as a psychoanalyst, and his progression |
66 | through life as a Dice Man after deciding to live his life through |
67 | random chance. |
68 | |
69 | The style, plot, and content are equally neurotic; part comedy, part |
70 | attack on psychoanalysis, and part deep philosophy. It was often |
71 | difficult to put down, and was read in under a week of spare time.")) |
72 | ((|Neal| |Stephenson|) |
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73 | nil |
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74 | ("Snow Crash" |
75 | :fiction 9 |
76 | "As one must read the *Bible* to understand English literature, so one |
77 | must read *Snow Crash* today to be a nerd. In the realm of modern pop |
78 | fiction this is one of the better books I've read; it was devoured in |
79 | a mere four nights. Neal Stepheson may not be Milton, but he does come |
80 | up with enganging tales. *Snow Crash* has a nice undertone of (quite |
81 | accurate) political and social commentary that makes it worth reading |
82 | as more than mere cyberpunk fiction.") |
83 | ("Cryptonomicon" |
84 | :fiction 8 |
85 | "I read *Cryptonomicon* when it was new, and at the time I thought it was |
86 | good. It could have lost a hundred or so pages without detracting from |
87 | the plot, but it was easy reading and didn't take very long to |
88 | finish. The story was enganging, and the continual switching between |
89 | the 1940s and present day slowly unravelled the tale in a nice way. |
90 | |
91 | I'd still have to recommend *Snow Crash* if one wished to read only one |
92 | Stephenson novel.")) |
93 | ((|Marcus| |Aurelius|) |
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94 | nil |
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95 | ("Meditations" |
96 | :nonfiction 6 |
97 | "I enjoyed reading this collection of meditations on Stoic |
98 | philosophy. It is a fairly quick read; I read each of the twelve books |
99 | before sleeping over the course of two weeks. Toward the end of the |
100 | collection things get a bit topically repetetive (e.g. acting |
101 | according to the nature of man is reflected upon over and over), but |
102 | each repetition looks at the topic in a slightly different light. A |
103 | number of passages I found quite inspiring, and scratched them down in |
104 | my notebook to ponder further.")) |
105 | ((|Søren| |Kierkegaard|) |
106 | "Kierkegaard was a master of style and philosophy; his writing is |
107 | interesting even if one finds the theistic extentialism espoused |
108 | disagreeable." |
109 | ("Sickness Unto Death" |
110 | :nonfiction 10 |
111 | "I purchased this when I was looking through books at a store after |
112 | being unable to find the book I really wanted, and I must say that it |
113 | was better for me to have found this one. |
114 | |
115 | Contained within is a beautiful analysis of despair in the context of |
116 | Christianity (really theism in general). Even if the argument offends, |
117 | the presentation cannot. The dialectical nature of despair is |
118 | reflected in every aspect of the work, and the method of presentation |
119 | forces reflection.") |
120 | ("Either/Or" |
121 | :nonfiction 10 |
122 | "Composed of two portions, *Either/Or* is a rather lengthy but |
123 | rewarding read. The first book is a series of essays and a diary of a |
124 | young esthetician; the second is a pair of long letters from an older |
125 | ethicist friend to this esthetician. You are then left to resolve the |
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126 | conflict between the views.") |
127 | ("Fear and Trembling" |
128 | :nonfiction nil |
129 | "An interesting dialectical lyric contrasting Despair and Faith.")) |
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130 | ((|Thomas| |More|) |
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131 | nil |
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132 | ("Utopia" |
133 | :fiction 7 |
134 | "I read most of Utopia in high school with the TI-89 ebook reader, but |
135 | the way the book was split up made it a bit difficult to grasp the |
136 | overall structure. I found a copy at a used book store one day, and so |
137 | I read it again, and found it much more comprehensible. It is a quick |
138 | read, and decent piece of literature. The interesting social system |
139 | espoused resembles resembles state communism (even if perhaps as a |
140 | negative ideal), but with an strange blend of 14th century European |
141 | social customs.")) |
142 | ((|William| |James|) |
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143 | nil |
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144 | ("The Varieties of Religious Experience" |
145 | :nonfiction 7 |
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146 | "[[William James - The Varieties of Religious Experience][A partially finished extended summary]]") |
147 | ("The PhD Octopus" |
148 | :nonfiction nil |
149 | "<quote> |
150 | America is thus as a nation rapidly drifting towards a state of things |
151 | in which no man of science or letters will be accounted respectable |
152 | unless some kind of badge or diploma is stamped upon him, and in which |
153 | bare personality will be a mark of outcast estate. It seems to me high |
154 | time to rouse ourselves to consciousness, and to cast a critical eye |
155 | upon this decidedly grotesque tendency. Other nations suffer terribly |
156 | from the Mandarin disease. Are we doomed to suffer like the rest? |
157 | </quote> |
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158 | |
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159 | [[William James - The PhD Octopus][Full Text]]")) |
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160 | ((|Henry| |James|) |
161 | "The novelist brother of William James; I've not read many (read: |
162 | one) of his books, but what I did was decent." |
163 | ("The Altar of the Dead" |
164 | :fiction 7 |
165 | "A short novella about a man who maintained an altar in a church |
166 | for all of his lost loved ones on the surface, but something a bit |
167 | more beneath.")) |
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168 | ((|Gregor| |Kiczales|) |
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169 | nil |
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170 | ("The Art of the Metaobject Protocol" |
171 | :nonfiction 10 |
172 | "AMOP is useful as a reference to the CLOS MOP (although less so with |
173 | the online MOP spec), but the true value of the book lies in the first |
174 | half of the book. It presents the design of the CLOS MOP through a |
175 | series of revisions that fix limitations of earlier implementations |
176 | and gradually work toward a generic and well designed MOP for |
177 | CLOS. Through that process one is made more aware of a few general |
178 | object protocol design skills, and gains insight into how to cleanly |
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179 | make mapping decisions customizable.")) |
180 | ((|Friedrich| |Nietzsche|) |
181 | "A bit acerbic and esoteric, Nietzsche is for me a good *secular* |
182 | counterpart to Kierkegaard's theistic philosophy. Nietzsche's |
183 | polemical works raise important questions for anyone who reads works |
184 | on ethics. As such it is a shame that he has gotten a bad reputation |
185 | by being read by far too many angsty teenagers who see (and relay) |
186 | only Nietzsche the asshole rather than Nietzsche the master of the |
187 | polemic." |
188 | ("Beyond Good and Evil" |
189 | :nonfiction 8 |
190 | "A somewhat more comprehensible, if a bit less aesthetically |
191 | pleasing, presentation of much of the philosophy found in *Thus Spoke |
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192 | Zarathustra* in the negative form. The final chapters are very |
193 | important (not to detract from the value of the rest of the work) if |
194 | one wishes to understand *On the Genealogy of Morals*.") |
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195 | ("On the Geneaology of Morals" |
196 | :nonfiction 9 |
197 | "*On the Geneaology of Morals* is a wonderful book of three |
198 | polemical essays on the origin of moral/ethic valuations, and the |
199 | blindness of modern philosphers whose very thinking is tainted by |
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200 | these valuations unknowingly.") |
201 | ("Ecce Homo" |
202 | :nonfiction 7 |
203 | "*Ecce Homo* is Nietzsche's very strange autobiography and |
204 | explanation of his own works. At points it is clear that it could have |
205 | used a bit more editing (prevented by Nietzsche ... falling into a |
206 | catatonic state and all), but is still a very useful book to read as |
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207 | Nietzsche explains the overall structure of his works.")) |
208 | ((|Aristotle|) |
209 | nil |
210 | ("Ethics" |
211 | :nonfiction nil) |
212 | ("Categories" |
213 | :nonfiction nil) |
214 | ("Poetics" |
215 | :nonfiction nil) |
216 | ;;; ("Prior Analytics" |
217 | ;;; :nonfiction nil |
218 | ;;; "*Prior Analytics* is essential reading if one wishes to understand |
219 | ;;; [[Term Logic][traditional logic]]. Given that traditional logic is |
220 | ;;; used by most philosophers prior to the mid-1800s it is a *bit* |
221 | ;;; important. Luckily *Prior Analytics* is |
222 | ;;; [[http://etext.library.adelaide.edu.au/a/aristotle/a8pra/index.html][available online for free]] and is fairly short.") |
223 | ("Rhetoric" |
224 | :nonfiction nil)) |
225 | ((|Aristophanes|) |
226 | nil |
227 | ("The Frogs" :fiction nil) |
228 | ("The Clouds" :fiction nil) |
229 | ("Ecclesiazusae" :fiction nil)) |
230 | ((|Plato|) |
231 | nil |
232 | ("Symposium" :fiction nil) |
233 | ("Euthyphro" :fiction nil) |
234 | ("Apology" :nonfiction nil) |
235 | ("Crito" :fiction nil) |
236 | ("Protagoras" :fiction nil)) |
237 | ((|Aeschylus|) |
238 | nil |
239 | ("Oresteia":fiction 10) |
240 | ("Prometheus Bound" :fiction 9) |
241 | ("The Persians" :fiction 8)) |
242 | ((|Homer|) |
243 | nil |
244 | ("The Odyssey" :fiction 10)) |
245 | ((|George| |Orwell|) |
246 | nil |
247 | ("1984" :fiction 10) |
248 | ("Animal Farm" :fiction nil)) |
249 | ((|Aldous| |Huxley|) |
250 | "Perhaps the most overrated modern writer. Other people have written |
251 | everything he has to write better and many years before he got around |
252 | to it." |
253 | ("The Doors of Perception" |
254 | :nonfiction 0 |
255 | "Huxley stains the name of Blake by naming this horrible |
256 | pseudo-scientific and pseudo-poetic essay after a line from *The |
257 | Marriage of Heaven and Hell*. Subjectivity and objectivity are |
258 | incommensurable; his attempt and being subjectively objective is |
259 | utterly worthless.") |
260 | ("Heaven and Hell" |
261 | :nonfiction 0 |
262 | "Blah blah LSD blah blah Mushrooms blah blah Peytoe blah blah I'm |
263 | Aldous Huxley I'm a pretentious jerk. Don't bother.")) |
264 | ((|Douglas| |Adams|) |
265 | nil |
266 | ("Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy (collected)" :fiction 8) |
267 | ("The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul" :fiction 6)) |
268 | ((|H.G.| |Wells|) |
269 | nil |
270 | ("The Island of Dr Moreau" :fiction 7))) |