Bright Remarks and Throwing Shade: What Are You Reading, Summer 2022?

by, not be. Sorry for the typos. I need a copy editor.

Nevada, by Imogen Binnie. A third-person narrative, although it feels like first person, about a transgender woman living in New York, trying to understand what it means for her to be trans and struggling to stay engaged with life. I had some trepidation based on the Goodreads reviews, but so far it's well-written and engaging.

I recently finished The Outward Urge by John Wyndham. Originally published in 1959, later editions (including the one I read) add a last chapter which was originally published as a separate story. The novel imagines the gradual expansion of human exploration into space with chapters set at 50 year intervals, starting in a space station orbiting Earth and ending with mining trips to the asteroid belts. All feature descendants of the hero of the initial story (set in 1994). The central conceit of the novel, perhaps a bit old-fashioned, is that there is something like a natural aristocracy of space explorers, whose intelligence and high-minded idealism runs in their blood. This is good old hard sci-fi, interested in teasing out the logical implications of the physical challenges posed by space and the outlines of possible future technologies. There is some unresolved tension between the largely unquestioned patriotism and sense of duty depicted among the ranks of cosmic adventurers, and the grim account given of the effects of nationalism and the "space race" on the planet.

I recently finished Farley Mowat's The Boat Who Wouldn't Float, which tries very hard and mostly succeeds in being a comic light entertainment, in spite of several incidents where Mowat was obviously in extreme peril of dying. After the success of his more lighthearted books, such as The Dog Who Wouldn't Be, it's obvious he and his publisher felt the need to follow up with what his audience wanted and expected and carefully guarded against letting the serious side of the material show through. Mowat delivers. He was an excellent storyteller.

Now I'm nearly done with Camus' The Outsider, as translated by Stuart Gilbert and published by Penguin. My copy is old enough that the price on the cover is in shillings and pence. I found the pivotal scene of the murder rather unconvincing, in spite of Camus selling his description of that event as hard as he possibly could. However, in the end, my skepticism about the realism of that description hasn't detracted from the book's overall impact, so it's kind of moot.

Is it bizarre that, before just now, I have never seen or even heard the title of <<L’étranger>> translated as “The Outsider”?

According to the all-knowing web the Gilbert version was the first to appear in English, in 1946. It was published concurrently in London (as "The Outsider") and New York (as "The Stranger").

Nevada, by Imogen Binnie. A third-person narrative, although it feels like first person, about a transgender woman living in New York, trying to understand what it means for her to be trans and struggling to stay engaged with life. I had some trepidation based on the Goodreads reviews, but so far it's well-written and engaging.

― immodesty blaise (jimbeaux), Saturday, September 17, 2022 11:11 AM (two days ago) bookmarkflaglink

fantastic book

A Brief History Of Neoliberalism David Harevy
as the title says, 2005 book on a negative political trend that still seems to be wrecking things . I wanted to have a better understanding of the term after knowing the term for a while and meeting a few people who seemed to be leaning that direction. Would be nice if the resultant mess from the trend could be cleaned up but may just have lasting destructive effect,

Astral Weeks A Secret History of 1968 Ryan H Walsh
Several stories from the alternative side of Boston in the late 60s with Van Morrison threading through a lot of them.
Quite interesting book, I knew some of this stuff now know more of it. Would like to see some of the David Silver stuff, hear the acoustic live stuff Peter Wolf recorded of Van and find the previous electric band had some recordings miraculously appear.
GLad I've finally got to read this after it came out about 4 years ago.

Augusto Boal Games For Actors and Non-Actors
The methodology for his theatre practise which is based in Stanislavski and I think Brecht and a few other influences.
HIs theatre work was based in an application of Paulo Freire's thought on education.
I attended a workshop on this last week then bumped into a friend who had read a lot more of his work as it applied to the non theatrical world and saw how it applied to politics etc. Seems to be a far cry from the watered down version I had as a partial introduction to him that I had from a local supposedly pro human rights group that really just seemed to be pretty hypocritically white saviour/white privileged bunkum more grounded in management training than Boal's radicalism.
I'm hoping to read a lot more of his work.

Trust by Hernan Diaz was interesting, an historical novel about a NY finance magnate in the 20s told from four different narrators' perspectives, with increasingly divergent and ultimately ethereal points of view.

I discovered the late Javier Marias.

Coolidge’s ‘Far Out West’ was a fun paratactic poetic romp through old western films. Fun book and a little foreboding, too .

Reading Prynne’s ‘Brass’ for reading group and also thinking of reading a James Purdy or non-fiction book as a palate cleanser— been reading a ton of poems for work and pleasure, the relative ease of a strange novel seems like a good idea.

I'd thought that THE COLLEGIANS would prove stodgy but actually it rollicks along well enough. Protagonist Hardress Cregan becoming increasingly manic as his actions work out badly. I suppose that this novel is close to an 18th-century world of the hard-riding Irish gentry, roguish squires, whiskey-swilling peasants and the like.

Occasionally the novel falls into first-person-plural oratory about humanity - 'We always find it easiest to love that which is far, and neglect that dear treasure that is close at hand', etc - which reminds me that Proust and George Eliot constantly do this and massively annoy me.

whiskey-swilling peasants

aiui, Irish peasants back then were far too poor to swill much whiskey, even poteen, so that it was considered a personal triumph if one ever managed to become drunk.

table, I've been reading Prynne's The White Stones with pleasure

Nice, we just finished that a few weeks ago. Amazing book, we sort of sussed out that Prynne considers love a sort of elemental force at odds with a world that ignores "long time" in favor of a crass immediacy and fealty to, well, the commodity form. That's a simple take, but it was really helpful reading it with others. I also highly encourage reading them out loud, they have a real aural force that is lost on the page.

Good call, all of you who recommended Teenager by Bud Smith.

I also finished Teenager. At first I thought it seemed too heavily influenced by Denis Johnson and it was kinda bugging me, but after a while it started to seem more Coen Bros. Or maybe a Coen Brothers adaptation of Denis Johnson. Anyway, it ends strongly.

Anyone read Thackeray's Henry Esmond recently?

Stuart Hall (ed) Representation
Looks like this was done as a text book for an Open University course but is a good introduction to the subject of Representation on several levels. How language works, citing de Saussure. How things are mediated through various media.
I should have this read now but have a stack of books going on at the same time. THink I'm geting pretty heavily underway anyway. Just read teh section on Documentaries this morning. Hoping to get it read while I still have time to do so. Think I have a full time course starting soon which is going to make the amountof reading I can do dip heavily.

God is Red Vine Deloria
INdigenous American writer writes about teh subject of belief among the peoples of the Americas . Attempts to correct some misinformation passed on by pseudo native writers and various other popular misconceptions. There is some overlap with the writing in Thoams King's the Inconvenient Indian but they are different enough writers that this remains fascinating.
I just heard in a webinar Roxanne Dunbar ortiz held last week that he had been the individual who got her interested in Indian affairs , got her in for a court case he was working on .
Another great book that I'm not giving enough attention to. Think I will try to read more by him after this

Insurgent Empire Priyamvada Gopal.
great book on native radical attempts to get rid of the British Empire over the 19th & 20th centuries.
very interesting and again should be spending more time dedicated to it. I think I'm about half way through it and should have got through it a few months ago. Focused on other things instead and now yet another one I want to get finished before something else starts or possibly never will.
I think it is well written and if I was reading a book at a time instead of double figures i would be very into it. Recommended if you are into the subject.

Just finishing Augusto Boal the end note added material to his Games For Actors and NOn-Actors which explores problems he encountered while practising his craft. Have now been listening through several podcasts on Theatre of the Oppressed which gives me a lot of background on him.

Equinox today. About time for a new 'What are you reading?' thread, as per long standing ILB tradition.

Floored by vaccines, I turn to the one thing I feel able to read: Ross Macdonald. THE BARBAROUS COAST in 24 hours and straight on to THE GOODBYE LOOK.

New WAYR thread:

He Can't Just Come Right Out And Say He Likes It Because It's About Four Guys That Starved To Death In An Igloo Or Something: What Are You Reading, Fall '23?