EPTWhat Are You Reading 2014 - Page 25
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farvacola
United States18822 Posts
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Carnivorous Sheep
Baa?21242 Posts
On April 26 2014 04:19 farvacola wrote: BNW is miles better than 1984. Also this. | ||
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MtlGuitarist97
United States1539 Posts
On April 26 2014 04:17 Carnivorous Sheep wrote: More like the dark part... Pretty sure it's just as "dark" as 1984... Depends. Our society is kind of a mixture of both, but I guess it's scarier to me that everything I do could be monitored and that it would be impossible to have any intellectual ideas basically. The whole idea of crimestop/double think is also kind of close to home for me because I go to a very conservative Catholic school and some of the stuff I've heard to defend ridiculous practices is kind of on par with it. I'd have to agree with Farva though, I think BNW is better overall. I also love his constant stabs at George Bernard Shaw. Probably wouldn't have found it as funny if I hadn't read Pygmalion first. | ||
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NinthMango
Sweden8 Posts
I've been a long time lurker in this and the previous threads, and finally decided to take actual part myself. Here are some of the books that I read recently which I don't think I've seen here. Cat Country: It's a satire published in the 30's about a man from China who crash-lands on Mars. There he meets the cat people who inhabit the land and reflects on their crumbling society he sees around him. I thought it was a good satire but it might not be for everybody. If you're informed about the period and region in which it was written it's a enjoyable read. ![[image loading]](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41mPpHAocHL._SY344_BO1,204,203,200_.jpg) A Curtain of Ignorance: This book was first published in the 60's and is basically about the China lobby in the U.S which helped getting the Congress to donate billions to Chiang-Kai-shek's war "efforts" against the Japanese and the communists, the Yellow Peril and American hostility towards the "new" China. Remember that it's from the 60's. What Makes You Not A Buddhist: An introduction to Buddhism. The title pretty much tells it all. I enjoyed the writing. Next on my list are these two books. I'm also wondering if anybody could recommend some good books on the topics of syndicalism, the Byzantine Empire and the Ottoman Empire. Not in the same book I might add.  | ||
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bookwyrm
United States722 Posts
If you want to know about the Ottoman Empire, I recommend this book: ![[image loading]](http://assets.cambridge.org/97805216/91420/cover/9780521691420.jpg) | ||
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Boblion
France8043 Posts
On April 26 2014 04:19 farvacola wrote: BNW is miles better than 1984. Too bad Huxley couldn't predict that people would be addicted to internet forums, TV shows and video games. Soma isn't just weed lol. | ||
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Micro_Jackson
Germany2002 Posts
On April 26 2014 03:46 MtlGuitarist97 wrote: If she hasn't read Brave New World by Aldous Huxley I recommend that. It's not as dark as 1984 but it's still really amazing. The Road was also pretty good but it's about a post-apocalyptic earth that's destroyed by nuclear warfare although that's never outright stated. It's kind of hard to read because Cormack McCarthy refuses to use commas, quotation marks, or question marks, but it's still a pretty good story with some Biblical allegory in it. It doesn't really talk much about society though. Still, both of those were pretty good books and neither of them is too long. Thank you very much, unfortunately it looks like we even have an original. At least it looks 80 years old... And i think i saw the Movie to "The Road", which was bad but of course says nothing about the book. Anything that was released a little more recently? | ||
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MtlGuitarist97
United States1539 Posts
On April 26 2014 06:37 Micro_Jackson wrote: Thank you very much, unfortunately it looks like we even have an original. At least it looks 80 years old... And i think i saw the Movie to "The Road", which was bad but of course says nothing about the book. Anything that was released a little more recently? The Road was released in 2006 O_o http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Road | ||
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Shiragaku
Hong Kong4308 Posts
On April 25 2014 21:53 corumjhaelen wrote: Zizek>>>>>Chomsky. Once Zizek is dead, Marxism will hopefully be gone for good. The history of Marxism has been almost nothing but obscurantism, lies, deceit, and charlatanism in both the political and intellectual sphere as well as infecting both the proletariat and bourgeoisie. It's a damn shame that the councilists were thrown under the bus and the alternative to Stalinism became careerists doing everything they can to distance themselves from populism. The only saving grace of the far-left is anarchism and the future for them does not look too bright for them either. | ||
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farvacola
United States18822 Posts
On April 26 2014 05:47 Boblion wrote: Too bad Huxley couldn't predict that people would be addicted to internet forums, TV shows and video games. Soma isn't just weed lol. He didn't need to, and of course it isn't. Shiragaku, your post reads all huff and fluff and I know you're better than that. | ||
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bookwyrm
United States722 Posts
On April 26 2014 06:58 Shiragaku wrote: Once Zizek is dead, Marxism will hopefully be gone for good. The history of Marxism has been almost nothing but obscurantism, lies, deceit, and charlatanism in both the political and intellectual sphere as well as infecting both the proletariat and bourgeoisie. It's a damn shame that the councilists were thrown under the bus and the alternative to Stalinism became careerists doing everything they can to distance themselves from populism. The only saving grace of the far-left is anarchism and the future for them does not look too bright for them either. You're too invested in the names of tendencies. | ||
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Djzapz
Canada10681 Posts
On April 26 2014 07:17 bookwyrm wrote: You're too invested in the names of tendencies. When a man uses that many "isms" and "ists" to try to drive a point home, odds are he's just regurgitating an opinion he's read. The idea that Marxism might die with Zizek is absurd and not necessarily desirable. That said, it is indeed a damn shame that the councilists got discarded. | ||
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{CC}StealthBlue
United States41117 Posts
![[image loading]](http://img1.imagesbn.com/p/9780486478500_p0_v1_s260x420.JPG) | ||
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packrat386
United States5077 Posts
On April 26 2014 04:17 Carnivorous Sheep wrote: More like the dark part... Pretty sure it's just as "dark" as 1984... I was thinking about this recently, and I think that the focusing on the "dark" part of BNW is kind of missing the point. If we look at the way the dystopia is set up, its almost comic from the start. The lower castes of people are clown-like and the upper castes just fuck each others brains out and take tons of drugs. It also doesn't represent a "credible" threat to society in that for someone to take power with this method they would have to have already been conditioning people to do what they say for their entire lives, so unless you believe in the illuminati, you're pretty safe. I think the far more interesting part of the book is the fact that the general reaction is that the "savages" live a better life. Their life is traumatic, whereas inhabitants of the dystopia live daily in the definition of happiness, and yet we think that its the dystopia residents getting the short end of the stick. I think the gut reaction that there is more to life than straight up happiness is a far more important takeaway than the fear that someday someone will condition us all to have way too much sex. | ||
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IgnE
United States7681 Posts
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Surth
Germany456 Posts
On April 26 2014 11:41 {CC}StealthBlue wrote: More like the conquest of beard | ||
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Nisyax
Netherlands756 Posts
I sure read the title that way first. | ||
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corumjhaelen
France6884 Posts
The Memoires of the Cardinal of Retz Really great read. Retz was a brilliant mind, a crazy betrayer, a staunch opposent to absolute monarchy (and in this regard Louis XIV reign was certainly shaped by him, just not in the way he expected), someone who was willing to make his life an adventure. And while all of his schemes never lead him anywhere, it is his litterary brilliance, which he despised as much as historians, that should keep him alive. The political reflexion is top-notch, despite Retz's numerous exagerations of his self-importance, the anecdotes are funny, the writing is in this oh so charming XVIIth century French. Started : ![[image loading]](https://iseekthegrail.files.wordpress.com/2012/08/111068829.jpg) Rameau's Nephew (Diderot) ![[image loading]](http://images.betterworldbooks.com/014/The-Twelve-Caesars-Tranquillus-Gaius-9780140455168.jpg) The Twelve Caesars (Suetonius). The intro was already a great laugh, it's not easy to defend someone who seems to have written a sort of tabloid version of the lives of the powerful^^ | ||
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bookwyrm
United States722 Posts
Gonna check out this book: ![[image loading]](http://pixhost.me/avaxhome/e4/28/001d28e4_medium.jpeg) | ||
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Pursuit_
United States1330 Posts
I'm having a hard time finding any that look interesting in local bookstores though, so what would be some other reccommendations? | ||
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