“With the collapse of totalitarian empires, we believed that living together, peace, pluralism, and human rights would gain the ascendancy and the world would leave behind holocausts, genocides, invasions, and wars of extermination. None of that has occurred. New forms … Continue reading →
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Scripturient: Blog & Commentary: Hell 2.1, a small update
I left you in my exploration of the Encyclopedia of Hell pondering which version of the Faustus story was better: with or without his final redemption. Personally, I prefer without, because it offers greater dramatic opportunities. I also don’t like the notion of redemption: it seems like a “get out
Continue readingScripturient: Blog & Commentary: What in Hell…?
Hades, you know, isn’t a place. It’s a guy. The Greek god of the underworld. His territory consists of a bunch of domains, including the rather unpleasant Tartarus, where souls – called shades – suffer eternal punishment. Hades wasn’t a fun god. If you weren’t getting your skin ripped off
Continue readingChadwick's Blog & Commentary: Reading, Writing and Memory
“Memory,” he read the headline as he settled into the armchair, resting his elbows on the wide arms to expand the National Post paper to its fullest, “declines much slower in people who read, write throughout life.” Ah. Interesting. He … Continue reading →
Continue readingChadwick's Blog & Commentary: The Game of the Book of Thrones
No, it’s not about that heavyweight book series by George Martin, or the TV series based on it (or even about how you really need to read the books to understand anything that is happening in the TV series). It’s … Continue reading →
Continue readingmark a rayner | scribblings, squibs & sundry monkey joys: If on a Summer’s Day, a Fridgularity
You are reading a blog posting about Mark A. Rayner’s most recent book, The Fridgularity. You had been hoping to find a funny picture, and maybe a microfiction that played off that image, but instead, you find yourself reading another … Continue reading →
Continue readingChadwick's Blog & Commentary: More’s Speech to the Mob
The scene is a riot, on the first day of May, 1517. It would later be known as Evil May Day,or Ill May Day. An angry mob, mostly comprised of apprentices, marched through the streets of London, their passion inflamed … Continue reading →
Continue readingWalking Turcot Yards: Marilyn Monroe Reading Ulysses
A great picture. And she appears to be reading the last page which is, quite awesome!
Continue readingChadwick's Blog & Commentary: Mastery: Self Help or Just Opinion?
Robert Greene’s new book has me somewhat flummoxed. It’s not at all like his previous books. The other books of his I have were all ‘meta’ books – books about what others thought on various subjects: power, leadership, war, seduction, … Continue reading →
Continue readingChadwick's Blog & Commentary: Tom Swift and His Rocket Ship
I was 8, maybe 9 years old, when my parents gave me a hardcover copy of Tom Swift and His Rocket Ship by Victor Appleton II. Probably a birthday or Xmas present. I can’t recall which. I just recall how … Continue reading →
Continue readingChadwick's Blog & Commentary: April, the cruellest month
April, wrote T.S. Eliot in his remarkable poem, The Waste Land, is the “cruellest month.”* And not merely because of the inclement and unsettling weather that seems to mix winter with spring in unpredictable doses. Nor for the necessity of … Continue reading →
Continue readingTrashy's World: Kim Jong-un…
… reading things… Probably written in English. (17) Trashy, Ottawa, Ontario
Continue readingChadwick's Blog & Commentary: The Consolation of Literature
For Boethius, it was the Consolation of Philosophy*. For me, it’s literature. Not to write about it so much as to read it. Consolation from the act of reading. And read about literature. Sometimes literature is made more meaningful, brought … Continue reading →
Continue readingChadwick's Blog & Commentary: The Art of Worldly Wisdom
Published in 1637, The Art of Worldly Wisdom is a collection of 300 aphorisms about life, behaviour, politics, morality, faith, philosophy and society. One comment, on Amazon.ca called it, somewhat unfairly to Machiavelli, “Machiavelli with a soul.” I have been … Continue reading →
Continue readingChadwick's Blog & Commentary: Happy New Year!
Happy New Year. 2012 is almost over. 2013 looms a few hours away. I wish you all the best of times in the upcoming year. What a year it’s been. For council, we flailed around in the tar-baby issues of the … Continue reading →
Continue readingChadwick's Blog & Commentary: The Bedside Library
When the books stacked beside the bed get tall enough to hold not only a cup of tea at easy reach, but a plate of toast with no threat of falling, then perhaps it’s time to cull the pile and put aside those … Continue reading →
Continue readingPolitics and its Discontents: Word On The Street
Word on the street suggests that reading books in becoming obsolete. This Word on the Street, which we are heading off to attend, suggests otherwise. Recommend this Post
Continue readingknitnut.net: Ask Me Anything #7: Are you a reader?
I’m answering Leeann’s question out of sequence, because I need more time to think about Auntiemichal’s question. Leeann asks: “You often post about writing, but I don’t recall ever seeing a post about reading? Are you an avid reader? If so, what types of books do you typically read? What
Continue readingmark a rayner | scribblings, squibs & sundry monkey joys: Ask General Kang: Apparently, only one in four people read a book last year — how can we improve that figure?
I’d start by disabling the publishing industry in some way — perhaps an elite cadre of pulp-loving squirrels armed with plasma-shredders and capable of firing book worms out of their mouths? Or perhaps you could change the tax laws so … Continue reading →
Continue readingThings Are Good: Reading for Faster Freedom in Brazil
Prisoners in Brazil may be able to shorten their stay in jail by reading and writing. It’s only 48 days but it can make a difference, the prisoners need to read from a collection of philosophy, science, literature, or the classics then reflect on them in a submitted paper. Educational
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