A History of Western Philosophy, by Bertrand Russell. Russell is my favorite philosopher – he made few original contributions to philosophy, but is without peer as a popular explainer. I have a better understanding of Kant now than I ever could have gleaned from Kant’s own impenetrable prose.
I had an excellent philosophy professor at my undergrad uni who was big on Kant and a good explainer himself. I know exactly what you mean.
Just finished Comrades: 1917 – Russia in Revolution, by Bryan Moynahan. There were two revolutions that year – the February Revolution, which overthrew the tsar and set up a provisional government led (eventually) by Alexander Kerensky; and the October Revolution, which brought the Bolsheviks to power. (Actually in March and November by the Gregorian calendar, but Russia was still using the Julian calendar.) The February Revolution was a real popular uprising, which happened mainly because the people were sick of the tsar’s mismanagement of the war with Germany. The October Revolution was more of a coup d’etat, but looks kind of like a revolution if you squint – the Bolsheviks did not represent a majority, but they did have a lot of support on the ground. (For more on that, read John Reed’s Ten Days that Shook the World.) At some point, there were enough Bolshevik sympathizers to arrest the provisional government and seize control of key government buildings in Petrograd.
Why did Lenin win, against what seemed overwhelming odds? I think it was because:
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Lenin was heartless. He mentally divided the world into friends and foes, and, unlike Kerensky, he had no compunction at all about killing his foes.
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Lenin was certain. He was a True Believer in his unorthodox version of Marxism (allowing for proletarian revolution in an underdeveloped agrarian country); he was untroubled by doubts that he represented the real wave of history.
The excellent 1983 miniseries Reilly, Ace of Spies includes several episodes on the Russian Revolution as seen by a British operative who may or may not have been a double agent. Good stuff.
I don’t know. I’ve got mixed feelings about Bond, even though I’ve read each of the Fleming novels multiple times(and every pastiche at least once). I think his later ones are better overall. So On Her Majesty’s Secret Service is good (and is one of the few cases where the movie actually follows the book, and is arguably better. It also is the only book to slyly refer to the movies – Bond sees Ursula Andress skiing and remarks on her tan. This was written right after she co-starred in Dr. No). Also, despite its rough edges (Fleming died before he could edit the manuscript) and its absurdities, I liked The Man with the Golden Gun. (which is definitely better than the film of the same name, which adopted very little from the book.)
I finished treasure, and am now reading Dennis Piszkiewicz’s The Nazi Rocketeers, which contains lots of information I hadn’t previously encountered.
On audio, I just finished 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, and started Earth by the folks at The Daily Show.
Thanks, Cal! Didn’t know that.
I finished the 007 novel Moonraker which, despite its preposterous ending (including a coverup of an underwater nuclear detonation in the North Sea), I mostly liked.
Just started Thomas Harris’s 1981 serial-killer novel Red Dragon, which I hadn’t read in quite awhile. Still a very effective thriller.
I’m also enjoying Nicholas Meyer’s 1974 Sherlock Holmes pastiche The Seven-Per-Cent Solution, in which a young Dr. Sigmund Freud helps Holmes kick his cocaine habit.
I loved Seven per cent Solution, even though it’s not even vaguely in Doyle’s style*. The first sequel to it by Meyer, The West End Horror, is a bit of a stretch, but still pretty good. I wasn’t fond of the second sequel, * The Canary Trainer* (in which Holmes meets The Phantom of the Opera), but that one’s kind of hard to find, anyway.
*For my money the best pastiche in Doyle’s own style is The Exploits of Sherlock Holmes by Adrian Conan Doyle (Arthur’s son) and John Dickson Carr. Carr wrote several of the stories in the collection, and I suspect he wrote most of the ones that are credited to the two of them. Good mysteries, and a good copy of the style.
I finished Killing With Confetti, the latest in the Inspector Diamond series by Peter Lovesey. The story, about Diamond’s thankless assignment to provide security for the marriage between a well-know gangster’s daughter and a Deputy Chief Constable’s son, is certainly different, but overall the whole thing falls short of Lovesey’s usual standard. Also, points subtracted for far too much of Assistant Chief Constable Georgina, Diamond’s insufferable boss.
(As an aside, one of the few things I dislike about British crime novels is the complicated police rankings. I don’t think I’ll ever really understand the difference between a DS, a DCI, a CS, and a DAC.)
Finished Unearthly Neighbors by Chad Oliver. A first contact SF novel, 144 pages (published in 1960), and not bad, although it would’ve been better as a short story.
Includes the following, which I don’t believe is used ironically:
“Despite his empty belly, he would have been completely content with his pipe. He had always loved the land, any land which had not been spoiled by the stinks of civilization.”
Still reading Dickens’ Bleak House.
I disagree; I think Meyer comes pretty close to the mark. The best Holmes pastiches I’ve ever read, though (other than my own!), are by the British author June Thomson. If someone had never read Conan Doyle, I think they’d be hard-pressed to tell her stories from his.
I’m 51 pages into Stephen King’s new release, The Institute, happy as a pig in …clover.
King’s invented another new word, “cheesedog” used as an adjective. Appears to mean “seedy”.
Finished Red Dragon, an abridged audiobook which didn’t take too long. A great, creepy serial-killer novel. I remembered from the last time I read it some scenes that were shortened or omitted entirely, so I’ll be going back to the hardcover to take another look at those.
And now for something completely different: I’m listening to an audiobook of Robert Heinlein’s The Star Beast (1954), a lighthearted juvenile that still has some serious things to say about sentience, slavery and empire.
I am reading Because Internet by Gretchen McCulloch. It’s an interesting linguist’s take on the Internet and Language.
And I disagree with your disagreement.
we’ll probably have to leave it at that.
Hadn’t heard of June Thomson. I’ll have to check her out. I’ve read a LOT of bad Holmes pastiches. Surprisingly, some of the least Doyle-like are by accomplished authors. Philip Jose Farmer, whose other stuff I like, is arguably one of the worst. Stephen King also failed to capture Doyle’s style. Maybe they just can’t submerge their own style sufficiently.
Start with this one, CM: Amazon.com. If you don’t like it (but I bet you will!), no need to go on.
The Moon: A History for the Future by Oliver Morton
A comprehensive look at how humans have understood the moon, from ancient times, to Leonardo and Galileo, and Apollo and SpaceX.
Mr. Morton seems quite certain that humans will return to the moon in the near future (i.e. the 2020s) I hope he’s right.
Although the writing style was a bit flowery for my taste, I found the book enjoyable and informative.
Finished Bleak House, by Charles Dickens, which was excellent.
Now I’m reading Chesapeake Legends and Lore from the War of 1812, by Ralph E. Eshelman and Scott S. Sheads.
Finished The Nazi Rocketeers. Picked up a collection over the weekend, including The Old Leather Man by Dan DeLuca, about an anonymous wandering hermit who dressed entirely on leather, a suit of his own manufacture. He was pretty famous in the circuit he walked between Conecticut and New York, but no one ever learned his name, or where he was from.
https://www.amazon.com/Old-Leather-Man-Historical-Connecticut-ebook/dp/B00K8M3KI4/ref=sr_1_1?hvadid=1695551404&hvbmt=be&hvdev=c&hvqmt=e&keywords=the+old+leatherman&qid=1568635109&s=books&sr=1-1
I picked up a copy of Girlie Collectibles: Politically Incorrect Objets d’art by Leland and Crystal Payton. Fascinating photos of once-acceptable sexist pictures, statues, and the like. It’d be better without their continuous and annoying comments on political correctness.
I found another book examining the attractiveness of the James Bond mythos, but don’t recall the title or author. Looks interesting.
The one I’m reading now is a Colored Man in Exeter by Michael Cameron Ward. It’s the self-published book about the author’s father, who moved from Brooklyn, NY to the very white town of Lee, New Hampshire. They were the first black family in the area. I got it at an author event several months ago from the author, who autographed it for me.
On audio, to my surprise, I’m reading Elizabeth Gilbert’s Eat, Pray, Love. It was cheap, so I picked it up, thinking it sounded sort of self-indulgent. It’s actually much better than I thought it would be (although a more accurate title would have been Learn Italian, Pray, Love, but that wouldn’t have been as good. And she DID eat a lot in Italy.) I’m 2/3 of the way through now.