Tagged: Nonfiction

The Ancient Guide to Modern Life

The Ancient Guide to Modern Life by Natalie Haynes, 3/5

Perhaps I developed too-high expectations of this book when I learned that the author is a stand-up comedian who read classics at Cambridge.  At any rate, I was not very impressed with the book.  Haynes doesn’t bother citing sources for many of her claims, which is an unconvincing way to go about dispelling myths about the ancient Greeks and Romans, as she claims to do.  The humor throughout the book is inconsistent – some parts are deadly serious and preachy, others are silly.  There were some things of interest, though, and Haynes is obviously passionate about the classics, which is somewhat contagious.  I guess I’m not disappointed that I read the book, but I’m disappointed in the book itself.

An interesting side note: Haynes thanks her friend Joss Whedon in the acknowledgments, which is pretty awesome.

The Courage to Be

The Courage to Be by Paul Tillich, 2/5

This dense and esoteric analysis of the ontological aspects of courage, specifically as it relates to existentialism didn’t really hit its stride until the last chapter.  The language barrier (Tillich’s native language was German) caused awkward sentence structure, rendering a difficult topic even more inaccessible.  Tillich made a few interesting points, cushioned in too much guesswork and psychobabble for my taste.  I especially disagreed with his viewpoint on modern art.  The introduction is noteworthy in that it is the worst I have ever encountered.  In it, its author, Peter Gomes, quoted the last sentence of Tillich’s book not once but twice!  To me, this is the pinnacle of inept disrespect.  The last sentence of a book is something you earn and fully understand through reading the entire work.  It is not meant to be excerpted in order to ennoble a pathetically written intro.  Besides this travesty, the introduction was also disgustingly slavish in its reverence for Tillich.  Gomes admits that he remembered nothing about the book but its title from reading it the first time, yet he is so inflated with self-importance at getting to write the intro that he makes a total bollocks of it.

The Hippocratic Myth

The Hippocratic Myth: Why Doctors are Under Pressure to Ration Care, Practice Politics, and Compromise Their Promise to Heal by M. Gregg Bloche, 2/5

Bloche’s writing style is so dense and awkward that I quickly lost interest.  I ended up skimming through most of the book, unwilling to put in the effort to decipher each sentence.  Some parts were thought-provoking, but I did not consider it to be the controversial, ground-breaking expose that Bloche seemed to hope it would be.

How to Read Literature Like a Professor

How to Read Literature Like a Professor by Thomas C. Foster, 2/5

Author E.B. White once said: “Humor can be dissected, as a frog can, but the thing dies in the process and the innards are discouraging to any but the pure scientific mind.”  Substitute “literature” for “humor” in that quote and you will understand the reason why I disliked this book.  I felt that Foster’s strained analytical style efficiently robbed the mystery, joy and suspension of disbelief from almost every literary example he gave.  If he was a theater or film critic, he would probably spend a lot of time analyzing the wallpaper on the fourth wall.  Knowing that “there’s only one story…every story you’ve ever read or heard or watched is part of it” (32) and then searching for traces from the “canon of literature” in every other work does not enrich my reading experience, but dampens it.  Yes, damp as if it was rained on and if you read page 75, you’ll learn that “It’s never just rain” and you’ll be able to read deeply into why I supposedly chose that particular word.  A lot of the book was spent in defining symbols and themes as “whatever you think they mean,” which is frustratingly unhelpful.  Also, from his comments, Foster seems to view Freud favorably, which I find revolting.

Update: I Stumbled on this perfect illustration of the book.

101 Quantum Questions

101 Quantum Questions: What You Need to Know About the World You Can’t See by Kenneth W. Ford, 3/5

I’m not going to lie – this book lost me a few times (most notably, at “quantum numbers”).  However, there were still a few “AHA!” moments, where staggering truths about quantum physics created little explosions in my brain.  Overall, the book was moderately accessible, but not as entertaining or beginner friendly as other books about quantum physics, such as Marcus Chown’s “The Matchbox that Ate a Forty-Ton Truck.”

Stan Lee’s How to Draw Comics

Stan Lee’s How to Draw Comics by Stan Lee, 2/5

This is a good book for looking at pictures, but is not practically helpful at all.  The prose is written in an annoying style (lots of unfunny jokes and rabbit trails) and instruction is along the lines of “look, human bodies are made of cylinders and squares…now draw some of your own.”

The Parents’ Guide to Psychological First Aid

The Parents’ Guide to Psychological First Aid, eds. Gerald P. Koocher and Annette M. La Greca, 3/5

This book does a good job of appealing to a wide spectrum of parenting/life styles without alienating anyone.  Most of its contents are commonsense, but I guess commonsense isn’t that common, to judge from my observations of modern parenting.

Moonwalking with Einstein

Moonwalking with Einstein: The Art and Science of Remembering Everything by Joshua Foer, 2/5

This book was not nearly as interesting as the title made me hope it would be.  There wasn’t much of practical use in it and it was written in a dry, unengaging, unlikable style.  It struck me as a nice magazine article that had been fleshed out with lots of predictable rabbit trails and speculation.  A little research revealed that this is exactly what it is; the author is a freelance journalist and this is his only book, for which he received $1.2 million in advance.  The book’s background really shows – it feels written for profit, not passion.

The Essential Spinoza

The Essential Spinoza: Ethics and Related Writings, edited by Michael L. Morgan, 5/5

Writing in an uncompromisingly mathematical style, Spinoza undertakes to dismantle all conceptions and preconceptions about God, life, the universe and everything, painstakingly rebuilding his philosophy from a logical progression of definitions, axioms, propositions, proofs and corollaries and resulting in the most intellectually challenging work I have ever read.  While there was much that I did not understand, there was also much that found immediate application to my own comprehension of God, religion, and existence.  I was taken right out of my head by Spinoza’s approach to everything that matters to humans – it was like seeing through a one-way mirror after a lifetime of being on the reflective side.

The Filter Bubble

The Filter Bubble: What the Internet is Hiding from You by Eli Pariser, 4/5

This book explores the ways that the increasing personalisation of the internet affects its users both in the short and long term senses.  It also explores many other related issues, including the ethics of mass media, the psychology of advertising, the centralization of internet control, and the internet’s potential both to advance and harm the development of human society.  I was very interested to learn that data about internet users is a huge and unbelievably valuable commodity for advertisers and that the gathering, buying and selling of this data is largely behind the scenes, with little accountability and opaque to public scrutiny.  This book is scary and challenging, but not sensational or fluffy, as are most books of its ilk.  I would have given it 5/5 if Pariser had been a little more scholarly with his handling of citations (there is a detailed “notes” section at the end, but the sources are sorted by chapter and not linked directly to the text, making it time-consuming to verify his claims).  I recommend that everyone read this book.  It will not be a waste of time.