Thanks for your reply, Mary Lupin,

As you say, it is hard to narrow it down when I look at all the influential books over the course of my life, especially if I don't limit in terms of genre.

A book I enjoyed recently with some of the cross-disciplinary interest that you seem to favor was The Archimedes Codex about the discovery and preservation of a unique manuscript text by Archimedes (not in his handwriting -- in a later scribe's, of course). It also discusses the possible impact on the history of mathematics; the authors believe the manuscript shows Archimedes understood some principles of calculus and how to calculate the number of ways a puzzle with a high number of solutions may be solved. They go into the difference between the way the ancient Greeks approached geometry and the way we do, as well as providing quite a set of interesting slices of more general history.

I will now betray what kind of a reader I am by saying that in spite of all these fascinating and absorbing ideas, the element that gave me the most pleasure in the entire book was the "character" of Abigail Quandt, whose responsibility was to restore and preserve the manuscript, not necessarily in that order. While experts from all over practically jumped up and down, tugging at her sleeves to get at the text, Abigail calmly took her time and did what was necessary to preserve the text as cultural artifact for posterity. She made them wait years. In one place one of the authors says, "Abigail and I were not speaking...." Understand that this entire strand of narrative is just a few sentences here and there throughout the whole book and Abigail doesn't get to say anything, but I really liked her anyway.

Silly GentleReader9. I was reading (and largely understanding) the kind of texts like the ones you mention, probably a few years after you did both in terms of our ages and in terms of the year in history, but it was all wasted because I always cared more about the people, the temporary, individual, not so perfect or geometrically rational humans. That's why some of my all time favorite books are still children's books to this day.

About dreams. I was in my first dream interpretation group at sixteen (I'm forty-seven). The rest of the participants were adults and the leader was a Jungian analyst. But a few years before that I had decided to become a vegetarian based on a dream (still am one) and I always paid attention to my dreams and talked about them. Now I do the Jeremy Taylor style dreamgroups. He has a lot of books. One is Where People Fly and Water Runs Uphill. That outlines how a group is structured and what his ideas are.

So if you were to answer your own question, what book or books are giving you the most joy recently?

Just started The Child in Time by Ian McEwan today. I generally read everything for a reason which I can recall, I am struggling to remember my reason for having had this one listed in my book notepad. Ah well I can tell already that it is going to be worth it.

http://www.anobii.com/grim/books

GentleReader9 wrote:...the element that gave me the most pleasure in the entire book was the "character" of Abigail Quandt...

Have you read Galileo's Daughter by Dava Sobel or C.P. Snow's book The Physicists? They are both about what it means to live science (obviously) but both come at it from the perspective of character. I really like both even though they are very different.

GentleReader9 wrote:but it was all wasted because I always cared more about the people, the temporary, individual, not so perfect or geometrically rational humans. That's why some of my all time favorite books are still children's books to this day.

Have to say I don't think your reading was wasted. There are no perfect rational humans. We all make decisions via our emotions. Learning is (I think) fundamentally about coming to know who you are so that you can see the world as clearly as possible. That is both an emotional and a rational undertaking. Cannot see clearly with out both.

GentleReader9 wrote:About dreams...Now I do the Jeremy Taylor style dreamgroups.

Taylor, isn't he the "if this were my dream" dude? Funny, I have been setting up dream groups, teaching the group how to do it and then moving on for decades now. I don't use any particular method. I go with what the group intends. What a group of secularists, a group of wiccans or a group of Indians wants to do with dreams are usually very different.

GentleReader9 wrote:what book or books are giving you the most joy recently?

I have thought about how to answer this last question. I am going away for a few days and so I decided to list what I am taking to the cabin.

Wallace Stevens' collected poetry
Hardscratch Row by Anne Cameron
Meaning and Action: A Critical History of Pragmatism by H. Standish Thayer
The Enormous Room by e e cummings
The Fold by Deleuze

Homo Ludens by Johan Huizinga

Philosphical Essays by O.K. Bouwsma

The True Eye of the Tiger by Sakis Totlis

63 The Fox
▅▅▅▅  ▅▅▅▅ ears
▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅
▅▅▅▅  ▅▅▅▅ eyes
▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅
▅▅▅▅  ▅▅▅▅ teeth
▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅

I've just finished reading Hero by Perry Moore. It's absoluetly brilliant. For those who say, "Homosexuals can't be heroes." think again.

This book not only tackles a teenager's struggle with his sexuality, but with the prejudice aimed at homosexuals and the negation of their presence in our society.

I can't get over it! It's fantastic!

Oh, and I'm about to read Max the Mighty now, sequel to Freak the Mighty, such a nice story. :in_love:

Currently reading Carry Me Down by M J Hyland, it is told from the perspective of a 12year old boy living in Ireland in the 70's, I'm already gripped, in fact, can't wait to get back to it!!!!

I,too, am usually reading more than one book at a time and I am also currently reading Duma Key - Stephen King, Ship of Destiny by Robin Hobb and The Pact by Jodi Picoult.

Thomas Hood wrote:Homo Ludens by Johan Huizinga

I've heard really good things about this book and about the notion of play as central to human development. Once you're done would you mind posting a bit about the book? I would like to hear your reactions.

MaryLupin wrote:

Thomas Hood wrote:Homo Ludens by Johan Huizinga

I've heard really good things about this book and about the notion of play as central to human development. Once you're done would you mind posting a bit about the book? I would like to hear your reactions.

My reaction is one of frustration. Huizinga mostly limits his discussion of play to the competitive game, which to my mind isn't play because typically in competition the participants strive to win -- that is, achieve a goal that is outside the playing. True play -- as I conceive it -- is enactment, participation, empathy. A child playing airplane moves and sounds like an airplane. The child becomes airplane, and this, I think, is the real basis of freedom and creativity in play.

Huizinga's book is important though. It suggests ideas and sources, and I suspect has been the basis of many other books. There is a picture of Huizinga on p.228 of Runes' Pictorial History of Philosophy, and also a helpful characterization of his thought. Huizinga lived in unplayful times and died in a German concentration camp. His ideas about play were perhaps limited by the forces of his era.

Tom

Currently reading The Apology, Phaedo and Crito by Plato and On Liberty by John Stuart Mill.

I'm just starting the second chapter of On Liberty. Mill talks about how we are obliged to give up some liberty to government. The liberties we should give up are activities which would cause harm to others. He realizes judgment is man's gift and man should be allowed to exercise it despite mistakes which he might make. Mill knows that a man is his own person and should be allowed to do with himself whatever he pleases no matter how detrimental it may be to his person as long as it does not bring harm to others.

This is a very tricky argument. He believes that in his day the state of affairs in 'free' countries were at a point that people could be allowed to make their own mistakes without it causing such harm as to become a threat to the state as a whole. For instance, I infer that a person may be allowed to cause such harm to their person as to become fully incapable of contributing to society and it be totally allowable. What freedom. We would never allow that kind of freedom.

But, we have a system in place where a person can refuse to contribute to society and harm the majority of Americans. It's backward. Mill doesn't talk about this but it's impossible not to think of it.

Thinking about each instance of each action and legislation of government, who it hurts and who it helps, leads to me think that Mill's simple statements should be the guiding light of the state.

Mill recognizes the power of small groups that coerce the majority. Mill also sheds light on the tyranny of the majority and the danger of government agreeing and advertising its opinions as its own.

Mill goes further and attacks the Church and attacks popular opinion as being so strong an influence as to stifle the thought, reason, and opinion of men.

So far, it's very good.

The Apology, Phaedo and Crito by Plato isn't doing it for me. I can appreciate the way Socrates argues his way to proving himself right but he's arguing his way to proving something one way when it is in fact another and shows to all who listen that it is truly and undeniably proven as it isn't. He convinces himself and those around him that something is when it is not. How brilliant this gift is to trick others and make ignorant the people who now hold their false truths to be proven righteous by a man dialectically gifted. Our latter day master of spin.

Ever lasting soul? Kiss my ass.
Earth in the center of the Universe? Kiss my ass.
We know everything before we're born and are just recollecting things as we go? Kiss my ass.

I'm sporadically reading a few inspirational books:

Think and Grow Rich - Napoleon Hill
The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People - Stephen Covey
A New Earth - Eckhart Tolle

Surprisingly, they are all quite similar.


I've just started:

Life: A User's Manual - Georges Perec


After posting in another thread I think I'll grab:

Selected Letters - Jack Kerouac