This novel begins as the diary of a gentleman’s adventure on a 19th-century pacific island. It’s all quite eventful until it stops, right in the middle of
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Losing Ourselves – Jay Garfield
This is an exploration of the Buddhist concept of no-self: we don’t exist as a distinct self with an unchanging identity. Instead, we are just the sum of the various thoughts, feelings, emotions and so on that are associated with our body. In other words, there are thoughts, but there is nothing separate that thinks the thoughts.
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The Summer Book – Tove Jansson
This wise and wistful book narrates many episodes in the life of an old woman living with her young granddaughter Sophia on a remote Finnish island. The relationship between the two is sweet, yet unsentimental. Sophia’s father lives with them too, but he is often away and the two are left to themselves in the isolated and harsh environment.
Continue readingHow To Live. What To Do. — Josh Cohen
A diverting combination of self-help book, literary discussion and psychoanalysis primer. The premise is a bit twee: throughout the books are case notes of famous fictional characters, as if they had gone in for psychoanalysis. These case notes cover a diverse bunch: Young Werther, Alice (the Wonderland one), Jay Gatsby, Mrs Dalloway, Jane Eyre and many more. There are also some characters from more modern novels, such as Sally Rooney’s Conversations with Friends and Marilynne Robinson’s Gilead. Cohen talks about their backgrounds, motivations and choices, relating them to the lives of real people like you, and indeed me.
Continue readingDefinitely Maybe – Arkady & Boris Strugatsky
Malianov, an astrophysicist, keeps getting distracted as he is working towards a breakthrough in his current project. He receives mysterious visitors, and his scientist friends are behaving very strangely. Slowly, disturbing signs emerge that there is some sort of conspiracy afoot. Malianov tries to figure out what’s really going on while all around him is confusion and paranoia.
Continue readingHow To Make Mistakes On Purpose – Laurie Rosenwald
This title pretty much says it all: sometimes making mistakes can be just what you need. This book is fun to read, with a somewhat chaotic layout and style. The overall message is of course that you shouldn’t just always do what you know will work. Try the unexpected sometimes, throw a spanner in your works, and see what happens. Move out of your comfort zone. Try something new. Etc. It’s kind of a hackneyed idea but still a good idea, and good to be reminded of it.
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Noise – Kahneman, Sibony & Sunstein
Human judgement is not infallible – no matter how unbiased we are, our judgement will be affected by unrelated thoughts, whether we are tired or hungry, and a hundred other things. This is “noise”. This book catalogues the different kinds of noise and shows how we can at least be aware of it, and hopefully mitigate it.
Continue readingAre Universes Thicker Than Blackberries? — Martin Gardner
Martin Gardner is absolutely brilliant on puzzles and mathematical topics, but when he moves to other topics as he does in this collection, he writes as just a smart, opinionated and slightly old-fashioned commentator. The title essay is about the multiple-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics. He thinks it’s tosh, which I tend to agree with. But somehow these pieces do not read like balanced and insightful discussions; rather, they sound like slightly irascible kvetching.
Continue readingPhilosophy & Terry Pratchett
If you like Terry Pratchett then you will probably get a lot out of this book. If you also like philosophy then it’s an absolute shoo-in.
I have read a few of Terry Pratchett’ novels and enjoyed them all immensely. The humour, the characters, the gentle yet insightful parody. He deals with some fairly weighty subjects, but since they’re transferred to a fantasy setting the topics become less fraught and easier to discuss. Philosophy & Terry Pratchett brings these topics out and shows the philosophical underpinnings of the stories and plots.
Continue readingPostcards from the Edge – Carrie Fisher
I read this book about 30 years ago and loved it. It may be a pretty easy read, but Suzanne the protagonist is very witty and likeable and the dialogue is packed – packed! – with one-liners and profundities in equal measure.
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