Jae Onasi Posted April 7, 2007 Author Share Posted April 7, 2007 Err...what do you consider O'Reilly then? Calling oneself fair and balanced does not make it true. He's conservative, just not nutsoid like Anne or Rush. I thought his conservatism would make an interesting counterpoint to Obama's liberal views (which I don't necessarily consider ultra-liberal, either.). I was hoping to find something somewhat less polarized than Hannity and Colmes. If we wait a couple months, hopefully Obama's book will be out in paperback so it'll be less expensive if people want to buy it. Dante's Inferno--there are any number of translations. Let me know if anyone has a particular version in mind, otherwise any version should be fine. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jae Onasi Posted April 18, 2007 Author Share Posted April 18, 2007 Is the consensus to read Paradise Lost first, then? If so, how much time do you all need to read it before we start the discussion? I can read very quickly, but most people don't read as fast as I do, and I didn't want to make a due date too short. Does 3 weeks sound like adequate time or do some people need more time? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JediMaster12 Posted April 18, 2007 Share Posted April 18, 2007 Sounds good. i have to head to the library to get it since I have no copy of my own. For some food for thought, I recently starting rereading Stephen Jay Gould's The Mismeasure of Man. It delves into some of the justifications, albeit ridiculous ones, of race such as Broca's hypothesis that smart people's brains weigh more and are more convoluted. Another is on Sam Morton's measuring of the cranium cavity with buckshot. It goes into Yerkes and the so called IQ tests. Good read and certainly a lot of laughs at least on my part. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EnderWiggin Posted April 19, 2007 Share Posted April 19, 2007 Is the consensus to read Paradise Lost first, then? If so, how much time do you all need to read it before we start the discussion? I can read very quickly, but most people don't read as fast as I do, and I didn't want to make a due date too short. Does 3 weeks sound like adequate time or do some people need more time? I think that that should be good, at least on my end. Do you think that the members who are most definitely participating in this should post and actually commit? Because I think that if we get into this and then it is two or three of us it might get boring. Maybe make a tentative master list and say that anyone who is interested may join? Dates are a little... iffy because of the time zones. Did we decide on May 9th? (EST) _EW_ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pavlos Posted September 15, 2007 Share Posted September 15, 2007 I thought we should resurrect this thread - it's a nice idea and I don't think it ever really got off to a good start. Rather than starting with Paradise Lost and The Inferno - both of which, I feel, are a little extravagant for internet debate - why don't we have our first book as being something more approachable? So we have to come to some sort of consensus as to what book we're going to pick to discuss. I recommend Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Phillip K. Dick - it's simply written but it leaves ideas and thoughts bouncing around the inside of your head (like a lot of K. Dick's stuff); I mean, what is human? Anyway, I think we should gather some preferences and then we can vote on them - listing them in preference so... an example might be: 1. Hamlet 2. Frankenstein 3. Great Expectations 4. The Life of Pi We tally up the positions each book gets and the book with the lowest count (that has been placed near the top of the list the most) goes first, then the second lowest, and so on. Sound good? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Galt Posted September 16, 2007 Share Posted September 16, 2007 Read Aldous Huxley. Brave New World and Brave New World Revisited are excellent, and Island is good as well. His books of philosophy, like The Doors of Perception and Heaven and Hell, are awesome. Even his lesser known works, like After Many A Summer, are good. I haven't even got to read Point Counter Point, which is generally considered his best, yet. I also recommend Orwell, though I haven't read his works nearly as extensively as I have Huxley's. As soon as I finish The Fountainhead and Ulyssess I'm going to read Politics and the English language, and try to hunt down a copy of Point Counter Point. Atlas Shrugged and Anthem are also good, and like I said I'm reading the Fountainhead right now, which is good but just isn't up to par with Atlas Shrugged. I need to hunt down some of Rand's philosophy, like Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal, or some Objectivist Epistomology. In terms of philosophy, The Meditations by Marcus Aurelius are good and, depending on what translation you get, maybe great. My favorite one is subtitled "the emperor's handbook." There's also an interesting essay I read last year called "On Bull****" that describes how politicians making things up is more dangerous than them purposely lying. <=obvious simplification, interesting thoughts. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jae Onasi Posted September 16, 2007 Author Share Posted September 16, 2007 Do Androids Dream would work fine for me, too as a starting point. If Paradise Lost didn't make it off the ground, Atlas Shrugged will die by page 32. How about Dracula? That and Frankenstein would work well at this time of year.... I've read Huxley and liked Brave New World. I liked Orwell's 1984 and Animal Farm, and they're pretty quick reads. I like Hamlet better than Shakespeare's other tragedies, and Much Ado about Nothing is a lot of fun. I read Great Expectations a long time ago but I wouldn't mind reading it again. Reading 'A Christmas Carol' at Christmas time would be fun. I've not read the Life of Pi so I'd be interested in seeing that. Sun Tzu's Art of War might be interesting (especially given the Iraq war), and it's not a long book at all. All the previous suggestions I made still go. If you're looking for plain old fiction, anything by Anne McCaffrey (esp. Dragonrider series) or Marion Zimmer Bradley (esp Darkover) works for me, as does Asimov or Heinlein. I love CJ Cherryh's Cuckoo's Egg too, and if you want pure entertainment, Harry Harrison's Stainless Steel Rat books are hilarious, and Douglas Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy would be fun as would Robert Asperin's Myth series. How about we pick a consensus of about 10-15 books? I can put up a poll that allows us to make multiple choices, and then we can vote--the book with the highest number of votes will be the first read, then second highest read after that, etc. We just need to make a list of our favorites. I'll look through the thread and make a list of the books already here--perhaps we can all pick from this master list then? Feel free to mention any books you might want to add--I'll wait a couple days before posting a list. In the meantime, while we're waiting for that compilation and culling and voting, how about reading Do Androids Dream....? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Weave Posted September 16, 2007 Share Posted September 16, 2007 1984 and Animal Farm by Orwell are really good books (like Jae and John said)... Hate Dracula... love Frankenstein. Art of War by Sun Tzu? I read that a year ago and thought it was pretty good... Just finished reading Ishmael, and My Ishmael by Daniel Quinn... amazing books that I highly recommend. If your into politics (and this may rock the boat a bit but whatever) I highly recommend getting Emma Goldman's collected works... along with her two books, "My Disillusionment In Russia" and "My Further Disillusionment In Russia"... two great books that she wrote while in Russia during the Russian Revolution (Which she flat out called a failure before it even ended) ... In addition, get Cherychevsky's 'What is to be done'... it's about Positive Political Nihilism and is very good in my opinion... and it's in a novel form of an adventure... similar to Ishmael. Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx and Freidrich Engelsis is good too... even if your an avid supporter of the "free-market"... you'll want to know how to critique Communism and Socialism and Marxism correctly... (PS: Lenin sux.. don't get any of his books... ) And get the Che Guevara biography by Anderson (ONLY Anderson's is good... all other's suck)... it's staggeringly researched and incredibily well-written... Tale Of Two Cities is really good as well... Olive the Other Reindeer... XP Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Empress Padme Posted September 16, 2007 Share Posted September 16, 2007 Great Expectations is a great choice , so is Hamlet. Mirror,Mirror by Gregory Maguire I've never read Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy but I have been wanting to and this would get me to read it Can Star Wars books be included??? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pavlos Posted September 16, 2007 Share Posted September 16, 2007 I've been looking for an excuse to read Dracula, actually - so that one would be ideal as a choice, for me, at least. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darth InSidious Posted September 16, 2007 Share Posted September 16, 2007 I've been intending to get my hands on a copy of Evelyn Waugh's Vile Bodies, if anyone is interested? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rogue Nine Posted September 16, 2007 Share Posted September 16, 2007 I think we should all read Goodnight Moon by Margaret Wise Brown. Oh, and Watership Down by Richard Adams too. >_> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pavlos Posted September 25, 2007 Share Posted September 25, 2007 Doesn't look like we're going to get many more book recommendations. Shall we compile the poll now or leave it for a little longer? Edit: I just don't want this to fall apart again . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jae Onasi Posted September 25, 2007 Author Share Posted September 25, 2007 Doesn't look like we're going to get many more book recommendations. Shall we compile the poll now or leave it for a little longer? Edit: I just don't want this to fall apart again . I'll try and get something posted today, probably will be a separate poll instead of on this thread so we can do more than one as the need dictates. I think this would be fun, too, so I hope it goes well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Point Man Posted September 29, 2007 Share Posted September 29, 2007 Wizard's First Rule, by Terry Goodkind. You'll thank me for recommending it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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