From Goodreads
Jonathan Livingston Seagull
Richard Bach
What in the holy hell of hodgepodge gumblygook did I just read? Bach crammed a bit of eastern mysticism, a dash of de-deified Jesus as a dude, pseudoscience mumbojumbo, Socrates and a hobbyist's enthusiasm for aviation into a tumbler and shook it up to see what he could pour out. What poured out was a bunch of black and white seagull pictures that a sophomore in high school took on the family vacation that he deemed art surrounded by a boring, pointless fable. This is a prime example of spiritualism without a grounding in any truth. On a side note it did make me think about a story where the earth is falling apart because the number of souls remains constant and because of modern medicine the number of bodily beings is exhausting the stock of souls. Imagine, all the wicked souls who ought to be languishing in hell for eternity are being released early. That's where all the extra evil is coming from. Too much body, not enough soul. If I flesh it out for a hundred and fifty pages and find a high schooler with an old film SLR I could turn the idea into a movie. This book got made into a freaking movie!!! I'm probably not going to search it out, but I might try to track down the soundtrack by Neil Diamond.
Thursday, August 29, 2019
Mucha
From Goodreads
Mucha - An Illustrated Life
Roman Neugebauer
I picked this book in the Prague airport on the way home as an afterthought. I'm glad we had a few extra minutes because it was worth the impulse buy. Often those purchases don't pan out as well as this one did, like the house organ. But at about $5, the book not the organ, the stakes weren't that high. It's a quick read and a good miniature biography. There's a lot of interesting stuff in Mucha's life and it is written in an easy style to read. Mucha's aesthetic theories are intriguing too and how they are intertwined in a nationalism and ethnic struggle speak to the condition of late 19th century and early 20th century Europe. He was born and flourished at the dawn of a new age only to die as that dawn was blotted out by the clouds of Nazi Germany. His work's renaissance seems to be being born again at another tempestuous epoch's beginning.
Mucha - An Illustrated Life
Roman Neugebauer
I picked this book in the Prague airport on the way home as an afterthought. I'm glad we had a few extra minutes because it was worth the impulse buy. Often those purchases don't pan out as well as this one did, like the house organ. But at about $5, the book not the organ, the stakes weren't that high. It's a quick read and a good miniature biography. There's a lot of interesting stuff in Mucha's life and it is written in an easy style to read. Mucha's aesthetic theories are intriguing too and how they are intertwined in a nationalism and ethnic struggle speak to the condition of late 19th century and early 20th century Europe. He was born and flourished at the dawn of a new age only to die as that dawn was blotted out by the clouds of Nazi Germany. His work's renaissance seems to be being born again at another tempestuous epoch's beginning.
Notes on Confessions Book III
Confessions
St. Augustine
Book III
Ch. 1
In loving for the sake of loving, some pleasure is to be found because love was created by God. But love, not rooted in God, is unsatisfying.
Love, when abstracted for its own sake, opens man to the scourging of jealousy, fear, anger and strife.
Augustine polluted the spring of friendship with lust. (The notion here of polluting at the spring of friendship is interesting. It denotes that all the water coming forth from the spring is polluted. Later in the chapter he uses another water analogy, the rivers are flowing but he questions where they wind up).
Ch. 2
What kind of compassion is it that arises from viewing fictitious and unreal sufferings? Without considering God in this compassion we pervert it, turn it into pity and seek to achieve some sort of feeling from the sorrows of others. It is not compassion at all, but selfish.
Augustine sought out the sorrowful plays because the sorrow captured his imagination. Apart from God, being in his own sorrowful place because of it, it was obvious why Augustine sought it out. In seeking out the imagined sorrows of the stage, he didn't have to dig deeper into his own sorrow, which stemmed from his ignoring of God.
Ch. 3
Even in this state God's mercy hovered over Augustine from afar.
The wreckers (a group of intellectuals who mocked others with their eloquence) became wreckers because they were wrecked themselves. It's a "hurt people hurt people" kind of thing.
Ch. 4
Augustine was struck by Cicero's Hortensius. It was through this lost book that a sudden realization came over Augustine. He was struck by the substance and not the style of Cicero. Now, Augustine would seek wisdom for its own sake and not for the glory that studying would bring him.
Ch. 5
After Cicero, Augustine read the Scriptures and was nonplussed. He regarded them as beneath him and stylistically inferior to the Roman writers.
Ch. 6
He tried the Manicheans but the dishes they served him did not satisfy his hunger.
The spirit is before the material: "For thy spiritual works came before these material creations, celestial and shining though they are".
God had mercy on Augustine before he confessed his sins.
Ch. 7
Evil is nothing but a privation of good. Evil has no being.
To judge the patriarchs for their "sins" or "follies" is to judge men whom God called righteous as unrighteous. They apply a human standard to something that is divine. That they judge this way is not surprising because they do not know God; they do not know the divine. "It is as if a man in an armory, not knowing what piece goes on what part of the body, should put a greave on his head and a helmet on his shin and then complain because they did not fit."
Augustine then makes some interesting points on men being upset with the Scriptures because men whom God had called righteous were allowed to do something that they are now no longer permitted to do. "Or as if, on some holiday when afternoon business was forbidden, one were to grumble at not being allowed to go on selling as it had been lawful for him to do in the forenoon." Some of Augustine's arguments could be used to favor a very stratified society and likely has been some of the foundation stones for aristocratic thinking. But, his point in showing it is that God is just in all his actions towards man. He also takes on the idea that this makes justice a relative concept. He answers this by saying that, no, justice is not variable but the times over which she presides are.
Ch. 8
"The fellowship that should be between God and us is violated whenever that nature is polluted by perverted lust".
God is the greatest authority of all and to be obeyed over all.
When men sin against God they also sin against their own souls.
This is arrogance or a false sense of freedom: to love our own good more than God, the common good of all.
Ch. 9
There are also sins committed by men who are making progress towards God. These men are to be censored for their sins but not condemned, because, "they show the hope of bearing fruit, like the green shoot of the growing corn"
Ch. 10
Augustine condemns Manichean teaching as it focuses on the created things rather than who the things were created for and for whom the things were created by.
Ch. 11
Augustine's mother saw by the light of faith that Augustine was dead.
Ch. 12
Augustine admits that deep in his Manichean thought he was unteachable and taken in by the novelty of heresy. She even implored a bishop to talk with him but the bishop refused. When Monica persisted and wept the bishop exclaimed that, a man who is surrounded by so many tears can not perish. Monica took these exclamations as a word from God
St. Augustine
Book III
Ch. 1
In loving for the sake of loving, some pleasure is to be found because love was created by God. But love, not rooted in God, is unsatisfying.
Love, when abstracted for its own sake, opens man to the scourging of jealousy, fear, anger and strife.
Augustine polluted the spring of friendship with lust. (The notion here of polluting at the spring of friendship is interesting. It denotes that all the water coming forth from the spring is polluted. Later in the chapter he uses another water analogy, the rivers are flowing but he questions where they wind up).
Ch. 2
What kind of compassion is it that arises from viewing fictitious and unreal sufferings? Without considering God in this compassion we pervert it, turn it into pity and seek to achieve some sort of feeling from the sorrows of others. It is not compassion at all, but selfish.
Augustine sought out the sorrowful plays because the sorrow captured his imagination. Apart from God, being in his own sorrowful place because of it, it was obvious why Augustine sought it out. In seeking out the imagined sorrows of the stage, he didn't have to dig deeper into his own sorrow, which stemmed from his ignoring of God.
Ch. 3
Even in this state God's mercy hovered over Augustine from afar.
The wreckers (a group of intellectuals who mocked others with their eloquence) became wreckers because they were wrecked themselves. It's a "hurt people hurt people" kind of thing.
Ch. 4
Augustine was struck by Cicero's Hortensius. It was through this lost book that a sudden realization came over Augustine. He was struck by the substance and not the style of Cicero. Now, Augustine would seek wisdom for its own sake and not for the glory that studying would bring him.
Ch. 5
After Cicero, Augustine read the Scriptures and was nonplussed. He regarded them as beneath him and stylistically inferior to the Roman writers.
Ch. 6
He tried the Manicheans but the dishes they served him did not satisfy his hunger.
The spirit is before the material: "For thy spiritual works came before these material creations, celestial and shining though they are".
God had mercy on Augustine before he confessed his sins.
Ch. 7
Evil is nothing but a privation of good. Evil has no being.
To judge the patriarchs for their "sins" or "follies" is to judge men whom God called righteous as unrighteous. They apply a human standard to something that is divine. That they judge this way is not surprising because they do not know God; they do not know the divine. "It is as if a man in an armory, not knowing what piece goes on what part of the body, should put a greave on his head and a helmet on his shin and then complain because they did not fit."
Augustine then makes some interesting points on men being upset with the Scriptures because men whom God had called righteous were allowed to do something that they are now no longer permitted to do. "Or as if, on some holiday when afternoon business was forbidden, one were to grumble at not being allowed to go on selling as it had been lawful for him to do in the forenoon." Some of Augustine's arguments could be used to favor a very stratified society and likely has been some of the foundation stones for aristocratic thinking. But, his point in showing it is that God is just in all his actions towards man. He also takes on the idea that this makes justice a relative concept. He answers this by saying that, no, justice is not variable but the times over which she presides are.
Ch. 8
"The fellowship that should be between God and us is violated whenever that nature is polluted by perverted lust".
God is the greatest authority of all and to be obeyed over all.
When men sin against God they also sin against their own souls.
This is arrogance or a false sense of freedom: to love our own good more than God, the common good of all.
Ch. 9
There are also sins committed by men who are making progress towards God. These men are to be censored for their sins but not condemned, because, "they show the hope of bearing fruit, like the green shoot of the growing corn"
Ch. 10
Augustine condemns Manichean teaching as it focuses on the created things rather than who the things were created for and for whom the things were created by.
Ch. 11
Augustine's mother saw by the light of faith that Augustine was dead.
Ch. 12
Augustine admits that deep in his Manichean thought he was unteachable and taken in by the novelty of heresy. She even implored a bishop to talk with him but the bishop refused. When Monica persisted and wept the bishop exclaimed that, a man who is surrounded by so many tears can not perish. Monica took these exclamations as a word from God
Notes on Confessions Book II
Confessions
St. Augustine
Book II
Ch. 1
Dig into the past to face your corruptions, not for the love of those corruptions, but for the love of God.
Corruption can seem good in one's eyes, but it is not seen so by God.
Ch. 2
Both the good (pure affection) and the bad (unholy desire) boiled up in Augustine making it impossible to distinguish the good from the bad.
"For thy omnipotence is not far from us even when we are far from thee"
I should've sought pleasures free from God's discontent. Where to find such pleasures? Only in God.
Ch. 3
Augustine admits he took as much pleasure in being praised for his sin than in committing the sin itself.
Ch. 4
Augustine stole for the sake of stealing, sinned for sin's sake.
"It was foul, and I loved it. I loved my own undoing. I loved my error - not that for which I erred but the error itself".
Ch. 5
But sin for sin's sake still requires some motive.
Ch. 6
The pears he stole weren't even that tasty. He enjoyed the sweetness of the theft more than the sweetness of the fruit. What made the theft so sweet?
All the vices of man are searching for ends outside of God. Lust replaces love as men seek satisfaction from love from something that cannot satisfy in the way God can. Vices are corrupt forms of going after a need in something other than God. Rightly done the need would have been satisfied in God.
"Thus the soul commits fornication when she is turned from thee and seeks apart from thee what she cannot find pure and untainted until she returns to thee"
Even in sin the sinner is imitating God - setting themselves up as the ultimate law unto themselves.
Augustine wrestles with why he stole the pears. Was he trying to set up a counterfeit liberty? Trying to become omnipotent himself?
Ch. 7
God melts sin away like it's ice. All the sins Augustine confesses are forgiven.
Ch. 8
Augustine loves the sin of theft because of the companionship he got in the act.
Ch. 9
The friendship that brings about sin is a corrupt version of friendship.
Ch. 10
"I fell away from thee, O my God, and in my youth I wandered too far from thee, my true support. And I became to myself a wasteland".
St. Augustine
Book II
Ch. 1
Dig into the past to face your corruptions, not for the love of those corruptions, but for the love of God.
Corruption can seem good in one's eyes, but it is not seen so by God.
Ch. 2
Both the good (pure affection) and the bad (unholy desire) boiled up in Augustine making it impossible to distinguish the good from the bad.
"For thy omnipotence is not far from us even when we are far from thee"
I should've sought pleasures free from God's discontent. Where to find such pleasures? Only in God.
Ch. 3
Augustine admits he took as much pleasure in being praised for his sin than in committing the sin itself.
Ch. 4
Augustine stole for the sake of stealing, sinned for sin's sake.
"It was foul, and I loved it. I loved my own undoing. I loved my error - not that for which I erred but the error itself".
Ch. 5
But sin for sin's sake still requires some motive.
Ch. 6
The pears he stole weren't even that tasty. He enjoyed the sweetness of the theft more than the sweetness of the fruit. What made the theft so sweet?
All the vices of man are searching for ends outside of God. Lust replaces love as men seek satisfaction from love from something that cannot satisfy in the way God can. Vices are corrupt forms of going after a need in something other than God. Rightly done the need would have been satisfied in God.
"Thus the soul commits fornication when she is turned from thee and seeks apart from thee what she cannot find pure and untainted until she returns to thee"
Even in sin the sinner is imitating God - setting themselves up as the ultimate law unto themselves.
Augustine wrestles with why he stole the pears. Was he trying to set up a counterfeit liberty? Trying to become omnipotent himself?
Ch. 7
God melts sin away like it's ice. All the sins Augustine confesses are forgiven.
Ch. 8
Augustine loves the sin of theft because of the companionship he got in the act.
Ch. 9
The friendship that brings about sin is a corrupt version of friendship.
Ch. 10
"I fell away from thee, O my God, and in my youth I wandered too far from thee, my true support. And I became to myself a wasteland".
Wednesday, August 28, 2019
The Last of the Mohicans
From Goodreads
The Last of the Mohicans
James Fenimore Cooper
I really loved Cooper when I was a kid. The Last of the Mohicans is full of stuff young boys are supposed to like. It has adventure, danger, nature, a love story that is there without any kissing and a lot of adjectives. As a grownup with a few more books under my belt I can say that I am glad I read it again and I'm glad I'm finished. The romanticism of nature that is such a part of this book no longer grabs my attention like it did when I was younger. But that's a personal flaw and has nothing to do with the book. The adventure and story are fantastic. The romance in the book is definitely a product of its age, and while I'm not rushing out to grab romance novels with Fabio on the cover, I'm not as against kissing books as I was when I was a kid. The Princess Bride showed Fred and I both that stories can be cool even if there's some girly kissing stuff. Lastly, I could've done with a little less adjective play. I'm an adult now and don't have as much leisure time as I did and The Last of the Mohicans could have been as good and as enjoyable with a few less descriptions. But, it's still worth the time to read if you haven't yet.
The Last of the Mohicans
James Fenimore Cooper
I really loved Cooper when I was a kid. The Last of the Mohicans is full of stuff young boys are supposed to like. It has adventure, danger, nature, a love story that is there without any kissing and a lot of adjectives. As a grownup with a few more books under my belt I can say that I am glad I read it again and I'm glad I'm finished. The romanticism of nature that is such a part of this book no longer grabs my attention like it did when I was younger. But that's a personal flaw and has nothing to do with the book. The adventure and story are fantastic. The romance in the book is definitely a product of its age, and while I'm not rushing out to grab romance novels with Fabio on the cover, I'm not as against kissing books as I was when I was a kid. The Princess Bride showed Fred and I both that stories can be cool even if there's some girly kissing stuff. Lastly, I could've done with a little less adjective play. I'm an adult now and don't have as much leisure time as I did and The Last of the Mohicans could have been as good and as enjoyable with a few less descriptions. But, it's still worth the time to read if you haven't yet.
Friday, August 16, 2019
The Virgin Suicides
From Goodreads
I thought this was a very well crafted story with great characters and a clever scaffolding in which the story was built. It left me wanting a little bit more and I think that is somewhat of the allure and what makes the book a good one. At times there was a bit too much polish and had the feel of a bit overwrought shabby chic to it, like cutting perfect holes in expensive jeans and trying to pass it off as gritty originality. Wile the jacket of the book lauding Eugenides as the next great American novelist making his voice known might have been a bit too over pronounced, it is a strong tragedy that is told well. I wouldn't recommend this as a light read, but it isn't so overwhelming to make the sadness mundane. I enjoyed it enough to want to read more of his work.
I thought this was a very well crafted story with great characters and a clever scaffolding in which the story was built. It left me wanting a little bit more and I think that is somewhat of the allure and what makes the book a good one. At times there was a bit too much polish and had the feel of a bit overwrought shabby chic to it, like cutting perfect holes in expensive jeans and trying to pass it off as gritty originality. Wile the jacket of the book lauding Eugenides as the next great American novelist making his voice known might have been a bit too over pronounced, it is a strong tragedy that is told well. I wouldn't recommend this as a light read, but it isn't so overwhelming to make the sadness mundane. I enjoyed it enough to want to read more of his work.
Monday, August 5, 2019
Even Tree Nymphs Get the Blues
From Goodreads
Even Tree Nymphs Get the Blues
Molly Harper
I thoroughly enjoyed this book. I'm not usually down to grab a romance novel but this one was worth the time. The story was great. The characters were enjoyable and not having much experience with a woman's perspective on a romantic read, let alone one housed in a magical realism setting, my mind was stretched and expanded by this book. The dialogue was what thoroughly stood out for me. While the scene between the three men characters felt a little bit off, like it was what women think men could talk like in men's only conversations, it was amazing to read the dialogue in women only conversations. It was an entirely different viewpoint and the story was much more enhanced in my estimation. I think I might have to take on this series and see what becomes of the Mystic Bayou!
Even Tree Nymphs Get the Blues
Molly Harper
I thoroughly enjoyed this book. I'm not usually down to grab a romance novel but this one was worth the time. The story was great. The characters were enjoyable and not having much experience with a woman's perspective on a romantic read, let alone one housed in a magical realism setting, my mind was stretched and expanded by this book. The dialogue was what thoroughly stood out for me. While the scene between the three men characters felt a little bit off, like it was what women think men could talk like in men's only conversations, it was amazing to read the dialogue in women only conversations. It was an entirely different viewpoint and the story was much more enhanced in my estimation. I think I might have to take on this series and see what becomes of the Mystic Bayou!
The Adventures of Tom Stranger, Interdimensional Insurance Agent
From Goodreads
The Adventures of Tom Stranger, Interdimensional Insurance Agent
Larry Correia
Firstly, this was an exceptionally silly, almost stupid book. Secondly, I loved it. The premise was bizarre to begin with - an interdimensional insurance agent's day. Add to it the almost high schoolish level of cramming in of superlatives and insane amount of pop internet culture and it can come off as absolutely stupid. While it reads like a fanzine knockoof of science fiction it does so to sarcastically lampoon the genre, the fans of the genre and even the author himself. This was a highly enjoyable experience and a necessary one after such a heavy read in Uwem Akpan.
The Adventures of Tom Stranger, Interdimensional Insurance Agent
Larry Correia
Firstly, this was an exceptionally silly, almost stupid book. Secondly, I loved it. The premise was bizarre to begin with - an interdimensional insurance agent's day. Add to it the almost high schoolish level of cramming in of superlatives and insane amount of pop internet culture and it can come off as absolutely stupid. While it reads like a fanzine knockoof of science fiction it does so to sarcastically lampoon the genre, the fans of the genre and even the author himself. This was a highly enjoyable experience and a necessary one after such a heavy read in Uwem Akpan.
Say You're One of Them
From Goodreads
Say You're One of Them
Uwem Akpan
Man! I was not expecting to get hit so hard when I picked up this book. I'm not sure what I was expecting; but, whatever it was it wasn't this. I only read this book because it was on my bookshelf. It was actually my wife's book and I just put it on my reading list because we owned it. Some of the stories in this collection of stories were very, very difficult to read. Akpan wrote poignant and brutal depictions of Africa. I would recommend this highly as it is excellent writing. However it is not a light subject matter nor is it hiding behind some metaphoric apparatus. It depicts brutal events as they are.
Say You're One of Them
Uwem Akpan
Man! I was not expecting to get hit so hard when I picked up this book. I'm not sure what I was expecting; but, whatever it was it wasn't this. I only read this book because it was on my bookshelf. It was actually my wife's book and I just put it on my reading list because we owned it. Some of the stories in this collection of stories were very, very difficult to read. Akpan wrote poignant and brutal depictions of Africa. I would recommend this highly as it is excellent writing. However it is not a light subject matter nor is it hiding behind some metaphoric apparatus. It depicts brutal events as they are.
Sunday, August 4, 2019
Great Expectations
From Goodreads
Great Expectations
Charles Dickens
Great Expectations is wordy enough without me bloviating about it. The story is well written, tragic and worth reading. But, sometimes reading Dickens is like admiring a massive painting, one square centimeter at a time.
I had never read the "original" ending before this one. I think that it fit better with the overall flow of the novel as a whole rather than what Dickens saw as a happy ending. The problem is Estella. She remains cold, proud and unbreakable. But then, in the happy ending her suffering breaks her. In the original she is bent, not broken. It just makes more sense that way.
Great Expectations
Charles Dickens
Great Expectations is wordy enough without me bloviating about it. The story is well written, tragic and worth reading. But, sometimes reading Dickens is like admiring a massive painting, one square centimeter at a time.
I had never read the "original" ending before this one. I think that it fit better with the overall flow of the novel as a whole rather than what Dickens saw as a happy ending. The problem is Estella. She remains cold, proud and unbreakable. But then, in the happy ending her suffering breaks her. In the original she is bent, not broken. It just makes more sense that way.
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