Ingredients
Methods of consumption
Greatest Hits…
...Although none of these were ever Number 1s in Azerbaijan, Japan or on college radio.
* On visiting countries that have been the subject of airstrikes by allies of your home country
* Why it's important for The Beatles to make their songs available digitally
* A visit to Peleliu, home of some fascinating WW2 relics and origin of the phrase 'thousand yard stare'
* Five ways to beat writer's block and get words going
* On Holbein and Shakespeare
* The 2011 BHAG, how I cycled 2,011 miles in 12 monthsFrom which department?
This is the past
Category Archives: Books and reading
A Terrible Beauty
Published in 2000, A Terrible Beauty is defiantly a pre-internet book(1). In under 850 pages (under 775 if you discount the index), it gives the reader a history of the twentieth century’s defining ideas, from Marxism to Nazism, from Feminism to … Continue reading
Posted in Books and reading, On Journalism and Media, Tech
Tagged clay shirky, history, ideas, ipad, nick carr, progress
1 Comment
Added to the wishlist: Lights Out For The Territory
[Book] The tiniest remarks can spark in me the biggest desire to read something. In this case, it was reading through William Gibson’s blog (he’s back at it now his new novel, Zero History, is done*). He’s taking questions: “From … Continue reading
Added to the wishlist: The Future History of the Arctic
Speaking of the Geiger counter, here’s Tyler Cowen recommending and quoting from The Future History of the Arctic: “Svalbard is an integral part of the kingdom of Norway — there are reminders that the archipelago is both something more and … Continue reading
David Mitchell on ideas and characters in his new book
Just been to see David Mitchell read from his new novel, The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet at Shoreditch House. Readings are always a little weird, bits of text disenfranchised from their home-novel, and the author never seems to … Continue reading
Posted in Books and reading, Creativity
Tagged character, david mitchell, ideas, plot, readings, writing
4 Comments
Added to the wishlist: The Age of Absurdity
Reviewed in The Guardian: “Foley is not one for the “fatuous breeziness” of bullet-pointed self-help manuals or the nostrums of the new science of wellbeing… Here are Christ and Buddha, Marx and Freud, Spinoza and Nietzsche, Joyce and Proust, mixing … Continue reading
Added to the wishlist: The Lost Books of the Odyssey
Previewed in the New York Times: “The Lost Books of the Odyssey purports to be a compilation of 44 alternate versions of Homer’s epic… In some of the alternate histories Odysseus returns to Ithaca only to find the island abandoned, … Continue reading
On Grief, and the Year of Her Magical Thinking
And so, the second book of the year becomes a DNF. When I closed The Year of Magical Thinking – perhaps the 21st century’s most highly praised book on death – this evening, around page 120, I knew I wasn’t … Continue reading
Books I’ve Read, 2010
Previously: 2005 and 2006 2007 2008 2009 Starting the reading for 2010 a little late; it took me a while to finish Richard Holmes’ Age of Wonder, which is both excellent and substantial. As per usual, this post will be … Continue reading
My Year in Books, 2009
Previously: 2006 – 25 books, 28% non-fiction, and my book of the year was Jonathan Safran Foer’s Everything is Illuminated. 2007 – 24 books, 33% non-fiction, far fewer contemporary novels, and my pick of the year was Crime and Punishment. … Continue reading
Posted in Books and reading, Tech
Tagged cormac mccarthy, dan chaon, ebooks, haruki murakami
2 Comments
Added to the wishlist: The Thousand Autumns of Jacob De Zoet
[Book] How could it not be? The Thousand Autumns of Jacob De Zoet is the new one from David Mitchell, my favourite living author. It sees Mitchell’s fiction returning to Japan – site of the many of the stories in … Continue reading
