Who am I to give a book a rating that is supposed to mean something to someone else?
What I can say is that I loved this book. Full disclosure, I knowWho am I to give a book a rating that is supposed to mean something to someone else?
What I can say is that I loved this book. Full disclosure, I know Scott, I've been hearing about this book for years, I know some of the stories from other venues. I'm a disaffected mormon who loves many mormons. I'm brotherless. Scott calls this a fraternal meditation. It unpacks issues involved with family, love, mormonism, religion in general, homosexuality, culture, and familial -- especially fraternal love. Scott's interlocutors are alive and terrifying in their critique of his narrative. His own voice is terrifyingly honest. He exposes what culture and well meaning love can do to humans who cannot live in that culture as themselves, and how insidious such attempts to shuttle us into little boxes can be. How deadly, in this case. I wish I was writer enough to convey how beautiful this book is. I am anxious to begin my first re-read....more
I read this a few days after "The Omnivore's Dilemma", and began it the day after picking up "In Defense of Food". I loved the former, thought the latI read this a few days after "The Omnivore's Dilemma", and began it the day after picking up "In Defense of Food". I loved the former, thought the latter was thin and a resaying of what he'd already said. This book was a beautiful book, though not the tome that O.D was, it's beautifully written. It also sets the stage nicely for O.D.
Here, using apples (with their amazing capacity to evolve based on seeds that don't grow true to the parent), tuplips, cannabis and potatoes Pollan sets out plainly the case that Richard Attenborough made several years before: that both humans and the foods they eat co-evolve. In the final chapter, he begins to describe the connundrum of monoculture that he deals a death-blow to in O.D (in that anyone who reads it will understand for once and for all what a death-blow to humanity monoculture is).
This wonderful little book tells the story of an educated woman of Iran who participated in the Islamic Revolution and rose her voice to criticize it This wonderful little book tells the story of an educated woman of Iran who participated in the Islamic Revolution and rose her voice to criticize it in terms of gender equality and other democratic issues, while remaining utterly faithful to her religion and to her country. She won the noble prize, as she see's it for her "one refrain: an interpretation of Islam that is in harmony with equality and democracy is an authentic expression of faith" (p. 204)....more
Pollan's writing is wonderful, he opens up this subject like sucessive leaves on a head of lettuce, peeling back leaf after leaf and exposing more andPollan's writing is wonderful, he opens up this subject like sucessive leaves on a head of lettuce, peeling back leaf after leaf and exposing more and more of what's inside. I first read his treatise in the New York Times that appears in the beginning of the book back in 2001, and didn't realize that it was the same author.
I'll be thinking about this book, its ideas and revelations, for a long, long time.
This is one of my favorite sci-fi's. About the survival of a lone australopithicus! I enjoyed it, and my daughter melissa has read it several times.This is one of my favorite sci-fi's. About the survival of a lone australopithicus! I enjoyed it, and my daughter melissa has read it several times....more
I read this as a teenager, 72 is purely a guess -- it might have been earlier, but I don't remember. What I do remember is being overwhelmed with the I read this as a teenager, 72 is purely a guess -- it might have been earlier, but I don't remember. What I do remember is being overwhelmed with the nadsat glossery in the back. My good buddy, Tom Meinskow, had read it as well and we used the language a bit.
It's so interesting to me that the methodologies used in the book to 'tame' Alex of his violence were used in the 80's to try to cure homosexuals of their inclination. I don't know if that's life imitating art or if Burgess was describing something that was already happening.
Having him bereft of both violent urges and his beloved Beethovan said something to me about the complex nature of human desires. Sure, Alex was a creep -- but he was a product of his society. And the society's violence to him was even more vile....more