Metal Reviews

Irene Nemirovsky - Suite Francaise

John Julius Norwich- Byzantium: The Early Centuries

Started up The Two Towers.

Digging through Zizek's Violence once again. This time focusing on captialism and homeland security for a paper I have to write. Listening to some Slovenian Laibach to get me in the mood.

I'm reading the Positivist Dispute in German Sociology; basically the compilation of a long row between Adorno and Popper with input from various others. I'm reading it for uni, not for fun. Because it sure as hell isn't fun.

My supervisor said Popper completely pwns Adorno but I'm not quite so sure at the moment. Adorno comes across as quite a cool guy, which you wouldn't expect. I'd always thought of him as a miserablist nerd.

Oh gosh I always saw Popper as the snobby nerd.

Yeah, snobby nerd for sure about Popper. But Adorno always seemed to me to just be down on everything. Music? Worthless tool of capitalism. Films? Worthless tool of capitalism. Everything else in the entire world? Worthless tool of capitalism.

That was before; now I've been reading I think I was mistaken. He says cool stuff like "we should judge research on how interesting and original its conclusions are, not how much it stands up to criticism", except he takes about 9 unreadable paragraphs to say it. Cool nonetheless.

I'm so proud of him for saying things that sound absolutely loopy when out of context.

Zizek takes a definite two reads and a lot of mulling over to catch it all but it is worth it.

Just finished Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. In the end really enjoyed it, although you can tell it was written by a teenager. Before that read Orwell's 1984.

Mmmmm that's some good psychological terror.

I actually think the appendix is the most horrifying part of the book.

not a book but book-related:
just came back from the opera adaptation of Gonçalo M. Tavares's "Jerusalém". hated it. so opera is basically like a musical but with worse music and a more confusing story?

admittedly i didn't like the book that much, either, but seriously if you didn't read it there was no way in hell you'd understand anything in the opera.

Finished Snow Falling on Cedars. It was good. The dialogue kinda sucked but the descriptions and the plot were great.

Now reading Catcher in the Rye because my friend keeps bugging me to.

Dude, seeing operas these days is not about following a plot, especially since most of them are in Italian or German. Not that I'm a big fan of the opera genre, just because the great musical ideas in each opera seem to be spread across three hours or more with maybe one hour alltogether of great and non-repetitive music, but ya- unless you have the libretto or a summary, you're never going to have more than a general idea about what's going on in the plot.

Mao's China and After: A History of the People's Republic

Rather good; very carefully researched.

and then it was really really dark, so i could't read the libretto. as for the music, it had tension and all but it never really 'unfolded', and it was extremely repetitive throughout the... 90 minutes.

The Butcher's Tale : Helmut Walser Smith

I remember reading Catcher in the Rye in highschool. Everybody hated it 'cept me, they all said I was crazy. So crazy that I read it twice.

Paycheck and Other Stories - Philip K Dick. This is my first non-film exposure to the guy and...it's okay. I was expecting more, I guess. Granted, I'm not that far and holy crap this guy wrote a lot, so I'm trying not to be too hasty in judging him. Also, I think the book is mostly comprised of earlier stories, so perhaps he hasn't hit his stride yet. I'm not sure. There are some cool concepts, certainly, but they oftentimes feel clunky in the execution, particularly in regards to some of the dialogue. After this and maybe some other books I intend to check out some of his longer books. Any recommendations?

Earlier I read Anansi Boys, Good Omens, some Kafka and quite a few comic books.

Philip K. recommendations:

A Scanner Darkly
VALIS
The Game-Players of Titan
Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said
The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch
The Man in the High Castle
Deus Irae
Galactic Pot-Healer

Those are my favorites of his. No particular order, but I think A Scanner Darkly, High Castle, and Flow My Tears are some of his most accomplished work.

Don't worry. It's amazing and you won't regret reading it.