something clever....

OSerena · Posted: Wed Nov 29, 2006 3:40 pm Post subject: something clever....

Well funny thing...I'm not well read, well written, and certainly not well read(did I mention that?) I joined your online book world simply to become more "dedicated to the advancement of critical thinking, reason, intelligence, freedom of inquiry, philosophy and the scientific method"

I am 24yrs old and a nurse with a bachelors degree. Throughout college, I focused all my energy on nursing studies and can show for it. 1st new grad working in critical care/day shift/ M-Th/that means no Fri's or weekends. I'm sharp, witty, and good looking(i'll get to that bit later as it plays a rather important part) Two years out of college and I deeply regret not putting effort into any other sciences or liberal arts.

I'm afraid I don't know where to start. After an attempt to use a library membership the old fashioned way only to accrue fine after fine, (they don't fuck around with us slackers) I decided to start downloading ebooks. I've read vonnegut's "man w/o a country"(loved it), and am a few chapters into twains "roughing it"(meh). I'm feeling unmotivated and just plain frustrated with my lack of discipline. I think I need some accountability again, but I'm not about to waste half my salary redoing a bachelors.

So, about the being hot bit. I am unbelievably attracted to geniuses, and "they I" (why did that sound right in my head). Anywho, it's like fucking the professor syndrome, but none so far have challenged me in any way shape or form. They settle for the pretty face and pretty mouth (cynical humor mouth that is you sickos) I need support but I will slit my jugulars before joining Oprah's book club.

So this is my plea: I need suggesitons, resources, and once again accountability somehow because I'm tired of being in ADD mode with this getting cultured mission. It's like I think yah I'll listen to classical music...while reading google news...in spanish. Then I overload and say "aw fuck it the simpsons are on"

So a reply would be most appreciated even if it's to simply scorn my sense of entitlement. That's fine, maybe I can be cultured or maybe I'm just bad milk. But I don't think it's hopeless (until I'm 25, then...well then it's all renting cars for me)

Toodles.

MadArchitect · Posted: Fri Dec 01, 2006 12:09 am Post subject: Re: something clever....

Post some pictures and I'll get back to you.

I kid, I kid.

I'm afraid I don't know where to start.

The worst place to start is usually those short lists of things you should read, watch or listen to in order to be cultured. They're so ineffectual and wrong-minded that they're almost bound to make you hate everything that's supposed to be good.

I'm a big fan of the genre I call "minor works by major authors". So, for instance, if I'm going to make an effort to read Dostoevsky, I'm likely to pick something like "The Gambler" -- only a few hundred pages, and it's about a guy who trying to get rich playing roulette so he can marry a girl way out of his class -- rather than "The Brothers Karamazov". There's a couple of advantages to this. One is that the people who pick books like "The Grapes of Wrath" and "War and Peace" tend to be more impressed with the achievement than with the book itself. Ooh, look at all those pages! And some of these sentences are so oblique! The other is that the major authors often have really great, incredibly fascinating works hidden in the parts of their canon the snobs dismiss as "minor". So while I can't seem to get through "100 Years of Solitude", I just recently had my scalp peeled back by Gabriel Garcia Marquez's "Chronicle of a Death Foretold".

My other piece of advice is, with whatever cultural work you encounter, try to look for whatever clues you can find, no matter how minute, that might shed some light on how it all pertains to you. What's the relevance to your experience? What does Bach have to do with me? Nothing, unless I figure out some way to pick up the emotional complexity of one of his piano concertos and recognize the same kind of complexity in my daily life. Part of the trick, incidentally, is breaking down the myth that your life is really quite simple. Maybe you haven't bought into that myth, but it's a pretty common problem. Hence people's fixation with "drama".

And there's nothing wrong with the Simpsons. At least, nothing wrong with the first five seasons. After that, they got a little too faux clever trying to outjump everyone else's shark.

Anyway, stick around. I'm sure we can drum up some suggestions for you.

And seriously. Pictures. Think about it.

OSerena · Posted: Sat Dec 02, 2006 1:43 pm Post subject: Re: something clever....

Yeah, a friend suggested reading some works by Ayn Rand, "Atlas Shrugged" and "Fountainhead" So I went the ol' libary, located the books only to have a small infarct as I noted one being over 1200 pages, fine print, and paperback. Checked out fountainhead and read a few chapters, currently using it as a paperweight for misc crap. Definitely need to stick to the short works at first.

I believe in the KISS (keep it simple, stupid) method in emergent situations, problem solving, equations etc. Clarity + not debating = saving someones life. However, as far as human emotions and thoughts are concerned, I find it insulting when people act as though there is a simple answer to life and all it's struggles "here's your life lesson, the end" I embrace the struggles, "wow, this is what it's like to be a complex creature". Overwhelming at times, but how boring it must be to settle in ones ways. If any of that made sense.

Regarding pics, trust me I'm not some 43 yr old dude (the one from south parks WOW game episode comes to mind) getting aroused by poking around book club forums and pretending to be some naive youthful specimen of perfection if I may say so myself

Anyway, I'm "OK" but that's not the point. Rather enjoy not getting messaged by fools drooling over my saucy (and by saucy I mean completely goofy) pics every 10 min.

Thanks for the reply.
-Serena

p.s. Noted an impressive 50 kudos on your profile. I have an issue with this internet kudos thing. IF we must use this act of approval there ought to be rules: only one kudos per blog per person, no doubling up, no cumulative numbers. So kudos your kudos Mr. Maddy McKudos, and that's all you get! =)

Chris OConnor · Posted: Sun Dec 03, 2006 12:49 am Post subject: Re: something clever....

Wow, you are an entertaining one.

I love reading your posts. I'm fast at work on some web site stuff right now, so sorry for not saying too much. But I wanted to welcome you to the community and encourage you to post a picture in the picture thread. ::204

MadArchitect · Posted: Sun Dec 03, 2006 11:45 pm Post subject: Re: something clever....

Trust me, I was kidding about the photos. When I say "seriously", I usually mean "not in the least bit seriously". It's part of my whole deadpan schtick. Doesn't carry very well over the internet, though. I try to give out as little personal information as possible over the internet, so I certainly wouldn't expect you to expose yourself to the untender mercies of online predators. Like Chris. Seriously.

I didn't know I had any kudos at all. Turns out I've got "friends", too, although I didn't approve and don't recognize any of them. I only signed up for Yuku to do a little research as to whether or not BookTalk would be better served there than here on ezboard, and I haven't looked at my profile since then. Facebook it ain't.

I am not a fan of Ayn Rand, either as a novelist or a philosopher. Logical positivism was designed as a way of cutting through genuinely sticky problems by insisting that we already knew what was real and where it would take us. Great. I've taken a stab at two of her novels, but they tend to be populated with blandly representational figures rather than three-dimensional characters.

Tell ya what. I'll throw out some titles in a few categories, give you a couple of clues as to why I think they're worthwhile, and if any of them strike your fancy you can run check them out. I'll wait here until you get back.

Books - fiction
I read in your other post in the "General conversation" forum that you're not much for fiction, so I'll just say that the best reason to read fiction is that it useful in helping to draw out the texture of a full life. I'm not a fan of overtly political or philosophical fiction -- if I wanted politics or philosophy, I'd read a non-fiction book -- so just about the only thing you can count on with the following selections is that they're chosen for some other reason.

Chronicle of a Death Foretold, Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Mentioned this one earlier. It's a quick read in which a man returns to his childhood home in the Caribbean in order to piece together a vengeful murder that happened 20 years earlier. Not a conventional murder mystery. Garcia Marquez is one of the living titans of South American literature, and the smooth flow and heavy impact of this novella is proof of his reputation.

Double Indemnity, James M. Cain
From the other end of the spectrum.... Cain is one of the grandfathers of the noir novel, the impact of which has been so huge on contemporary culture that it's kind of splitting hairs to insist that he's low brow. He was literary enough to inspire Albert Camus, and while writing in a distinctly American tabloid idiom. "Double Indemnity" is about an insurance salesman who plans to get away with murder -- simple stuff for crime fiction, really, but Cain makes it... well, not so much sublime as infernal.

The Bell, Iris Murdoch
Murdoch is, for me, the alternative to Ayn Rand -- both a philosopher and a novelist, but of a different quality altogether. "The Bell" is one of her early novels, concerning the breakdown of a marriage as the couple visits a lay community associated with a British nunnery. The main character, the fickle wife, is incredibly human and endearingly flawed. My copy is constantly out on loan to friends -- the fact that they love it as much as I do is a good indication that it's not just my quirky literary tastes at work.

Books -- non-fiction
I'll try to toss out some books in different genres, although, non-fiction is so broad that it's better to get a sense of what you're interested in before making any suggestions.

The Death of Woman Wang, Jonathan D. Spence
History. Spence is probably the most prominent popular historian of China. "Woman Wang" is a short work, focussing on the death of peasant woman in rural China, a framework that Spence uses to evoke what life was like in such radically different social circumstances. (Actually, this book may be a little too similar to the Marquez novel I suggested -- I wouldn't suggest reading them back to back.)

Levels of the Game, John McPhee
Um, sports? Really, you could read just about anything by McPhee ("The Heirs of General Practice" might be relevant to your career), who has contributed scores of essays to "The New Yorker", and has recently published his 17th book, "Uncommon Carriers". He's a master of translating his fascination with a topic into prose that is, itself, fascinating. He's one of my favorite contemporary writers. This one tackles a subject that seems like it would make for dull reading -- a tennis match between Arthur Ashe and Clark Graebner -- and turns it into an enthralling portrait of the ways in which something as simple as a tennis match can embody all the struggles and differences between two people.

Science and Human Values, Jacob Bronowski
Philosophy of science. Bronowski is a practicing scientist, but in context of his written works, he's probably best understood as a humanist first and foremost. His project is to reconcile the public to science, and to reconcile science to human need. It sounds like very basic stuff, but Bronowski accomplishment rests in conveying the nuance of mediating between "the two cultures".

Classical music
Here's what I think puts most of us off about classical music -- we're not sure how to respond to it. We listen to a song in any of the various categories of popular music and, whether or not we like it, we at least know more or less how to react. But we've lost the cultural context in which most classical music was originally performed, and without that sort of basic cultural familiarization, we have to struggle to figure out where we stand in all that complexity. The best way to figure out classical music that I've found is just to try listening to it in different contexts. Sitting in a public place and observing what goes on around you -- people's interaction, traffic, the geometry of a tree -- is subtly different when you're listening to Bach on an iPod. The other catch is that the right recording can make all the difference. Here's what you do: go to a bookstore that also sells music, like Barnes and Noble or Borders. Somewhere in the music book section they'll have a big book dedicated to short reviews of classical music CDs. Use that to figure out which recordings of a piece are recommended, then try to buy those recordings. That's usually a good way to avoid some of the crappier recordings that circulate.

Piano Trios, Antonin Dvorak
Dvorak is a great Romantic composer, but most of his best known works are symphonies, which can be a little inaccessible. The piano trios are a different matter -- mostly intimate, varied but structurally accessible, sometimes evoking domestic rural life.

Piano Concertos, J.S. Bach
I recommend the Glenn Gould recordings. A lot of people were forced to practice Bach during childhood piano lessons, and can't stand him now. I think he's perfect.

The Devil's Concerto, Giuseppe Tartini
Also called "The Devil's Trill". Ornate solo violin music said to be inspired by a dream in which the composer witnessed the devil playing a similar tune. Sounds bewitching.

Enough for now. But seriously. Chris. Perv.


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