Metal Reviews

Nabokov's Lolita. He writes really good. And Paul Boghossian's Fear of Knowledge, which is a book arguing against Rorty.

<3<3<3 that book.

I've probably told this story before but I was in a Brit Lit night class. We took a break, I whipped out my copy of Lolita, the professor who I adored began chatting me up about it, everyone comes back after 15 minutes, everyone is confused what we're talking about but trying to catch up, then someone asks what it's about and I describe how the book we are both adoringly discussing is a book about a man who takes a young girl who he has sexual relations with on a cross-country road trip. Weird looks was the response.

The tension between Nabokov writing Humbert's POV so evocatively but not wanting to identify with him is really great.

Anyone read "The Stars My Destination" by Alfred Bester? Thinking about picking it up...

Slough Feg song "Tiger! Tiger!" was apparently inspired by it.

Arthur C. Clarke - 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Makes a lot more sense than the movie, probably not as good in the end though.

nein, sorry.

finished Tom Wolfe's The Bonfire of the Vanities, got better toward the second half or so, and started José Saramago's Baltasar and Blimunda ("Memorial do Convento"), in Portuguese of course.

top of my to-read list:
ismail kadare's palace of dreams
a dance with dragons (HAVE TO READ IT FFS)
josé saramago's year of the death of ricardo reis (o ano da morte de ricardo reis)

also considering borrowing the kiterunner and a thousand splendid suns from my sister.

Done my school readings for the semester so opening up Les Miserables again. Want to cuddle with Victor Hugo's brain. Also anybody who thinks French is a more graceful language than English has "évanouir" to explain.

Azrael: Dance with Dragons apparently sucks. I'm waiting for the price to drop.

Noodz: what do you mean? What's the problem with 'évanouir'?

The sound it makes does not suit its definition at all >:[

As a fan of the Dragonlance series I have no idea why it took me this long to pick this up... But the pages are flying by, that's for sure. Need to buy more Dragonlance books me thinks.

fuck yeah raistlin

Over the weekend, I read Hunger Games. Yesterday, I read Catching Fire, the second book in the series. Today, the third. Overall, great children's series on the caliber of The Golden Compass series, if not better. Ultimately, the third book wrapped it up weakly but it worked.

Also reading Zizek's Parallax View, Kristeva's Power of Horror: A Theory of Abjection and Freud's Totem and Taboo.

Reading "The Stars My Destination" by Bester now. Oh man it's good, and funny recognizing stuff from lyrics on "Hardworlder".

Also got "Cien Años de Soledad" by Garcia Marquez to read.

Finished first book of Les Mis, but school is back so I'm starting 1984, phonetics textbook, and some Epicurus.

Read Julia Kristeva's Power of Horror: An Essay on Abjection, Susan Bordo's The Male Body and Mike Davis' Ecology of Fear over the last few days.

Currently reading some of Simone de Beauvoir's Second Sex and hoping to start Charles Mills' Racial Contract before Monday. At that point it will be all Freud and Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations.

Susan Bordo's book The Male Body contained an excellent essay on Hubert and how he is presented in both the book and the two films. Really awesome essay which ends up eviscerating the movies' credibility.

Just finished Alfred Bester's The Stars My Destination.

Holy shit

Any fan of sci fi needs to read this. Mike Scalzi called it the best book he had ever read. Soooo good, action packed with interesting characters and good writing...still reeling.

Sounds really cool, and now I wish I hadn't used my bookstore giftcard yesterday. I'll check it out.

Re-reading Lord of the Rings now- onto The Two Towers. So awesome.

Dan Simmons- Children of the Night

Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations
Freud's Interpretation of Dreams
John Bellamy Foster's Ecology against Capitalism
a section of Simone de Beauvoir's The Second Sex

Oh and if I didn't mention it after I did, Susan Bordo's The Male Body is a fucking awesome non-academic read about masculinity and pop culture.