What book(s) are you reading at the moment?

[genovese]

Depressing af.
You need watch puppy videos after reading a few chapters to cleanse yourself.

... but highly recommended!

[Quietman]

I love to read historical fiction set in medieval times, I’m currently reading The Lady Of The Ravens by Johanna Hickson while I save up for the latest novel from S W Perry.

[genovese]

[Scurrilous Rumour]

The Darkening Age: The Christian Destruction of the Classical World.
Catherine Nixey.

In The Darkening Age, Catherine Nixey tells the little-known – and deeply shocking – story of how a militant religion deliberately tried to extinguish the teachings of the Classical world, ushering in unquestioning adherence to the 'one true faith'.

Apparently the book has ruffled a few feathers. I'm enjoying it so far. My sort of book.

[Candleholder]

Originally Posted by Scurrilous Rumour

The Darkening Age: The Christian Destruction of the Classical World.
Catherine Nixey.





Apparently the book has ruffled a few feathers. I'm enjoying it so far. My sort of book.

Looks interesting. I am reading The Last Superstition by Edward Feser which, on the face of it, appears to make the opposite argument - that Christianity is the logical continuation of Platonic and Aristotelian thought. Unfortunately Feser has some really objectionable views which he tries to shoehorn in at every opportunity, and it's just making me less sympathetic to Plato. Think I might need to read Nixey's book as an antidote.

[Moksha]

Originally Posted by Scurrilous Rumour

The Darkening Age: The Christian Destruction of the Classical World.
Catherine Nixey.





Apparently the book has ruffled a few feathers. I'm enjoying it so far. My sort of book.

I vaguely remember reading a boom called The Closing of the Western Mind, published 10 or 20 years ago, which was about the same thing – Christianity wrecking classical culture.

[Moksha]

Virginia Woolf: Orlando. I had never read a word of Woolf, but she's been on my to-read list for years. Got to say I'm pleasantly surprised.

Richard Dawkins: The Magic of Reality. It's aimed at 'young readers', which is a nice way of saying "people who are sh*t at science" (like me). Also very good.

My new year's resolution, which I've stuck to, was to always have two books on the go: one fiction, one non-fiction.

[Tonkin]

Complex PTSD: From Surviving to Thriving:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Complex-PTS...1737491&sr=8-1

The audiobook is on scribd which has a free 30 day trial: https://www.scribd.com/subscribe

A lot of the symptoms of complex ptsd look like social anxiety etc so it is a very interesting topic.

[Seagull]

Originally Posted by Nanuq

'Where the Crawdads Sing' by Delia Owens

#Best Book Ever

The writing is utterly sublime, every page dripping with stunning prose. For a debut novel it is a stellar achievement. Just a shame the incoming film adaptation looks like utter horse crap.

[Orwell20]

Douglas Murray: The War on the West. A bit extreme in places, but interesting. It's essentially a counter-attack against the woke/BLM movement.

A. C. Grayling: The Frontiers of Knowledge. A gripping summary of the boundaries of human knowledge. The book is divided into three parts: science, history and the mind/consciousness. He first explains what we know, and then goes on to explain what we don't – and where we go from here. It's the sort of book I wish I could discuss with someone.

[Scurrilous Rumour]

Originally Posted by Orwell20

It's the sort of book I wish I could discuss with someone.

Grayling is a philosopher isn't he? Is he up to date with the science, because I seem to remember Hawking saying years ago that philosophy is dead because it's lagging so far behind science. Maybe you could start a thread about some of the points the book has raised. People would probably be interested in reading about what you have to say, even if the subject doesn't get a lot of replies.

[Orwell20]

Originally Posted by Scurrilous Rumour

Grayling is a philosopher isn't he? Is he up to date with the science, because I seem to remember Hawking saying years ago that philosophy is dead because it's lagging so far behind science.

The relationship between science and philosophy is a really interesting one. Philosophy, I guess, is just a quest for understanding. We find ourselves in this bizarre universe, without any map or guide or supernatural being to explain things, and then try and make sense of it. (And as someone once said, the very fact that we can sort of make sense of it is, in itself, bizarre.)

At first we used philosophy. Today, science has replaced philosophy. You can see that in the contempt people have for philosophy students! If you were at a family party and told a relative that you were planning to study philosophy, he'd probably roll his eyes and say "what's the point of that?" If you told him you wanted to study physics, however, or biology, he'd be impressed.

I have heard it said that philosophy is now the right hand man of science – like a wise but impotent old uncle who guides and corrects a young upstart. Philosophy defends science against its critics. But it also defines the limits of science (what can we know, and what we can't), tries to work out if there really are laws of nature or whether we project them onto the cosmos, and so on. Some scientists don't want to know, however. They say that the scientists can work all this out for themselves. To them, philosophy and religion are both redundant ways of trying to understand things. Well, that's how it seems to me. But then I never studied philosophy or science, so I'm kind of making this up.

No disrespect to philosophy students btw. Personally, I think it's the most interesting subject there is.

[Moksha]

Originally Posted by Orwell20

Douglas Murray: The War on the West. A bit extreme in places, but interesting. It's essentially a counter-attack against the woke/BLM movement.

I'm not entirely against the woke movement. When it comes to MeToo, for example (which I assume is part of the woke movement) I'm all for it. Men like Prince Andrew and Harvey Weinstein have been getting away with disgusting s*it for too long. I'm also completely on the side of the LGBTQ community, which, again, I assume comes under 'woke'.

But the attacks on British history, literature, culture, identity, etc, largely driven by left-wing academics (who have an insane amount of influence), has really gone too far. It's as if anything white and western is now in the firing line. For example, a new book on Churchill has just been published by Tariq Ali. I haven't read it, but I did read a review by a leading Churchill expert. He wrote that the book was so bad it made him laugh out loud. At one point Ali even backs up his arguments by quoting from Peaky Blinders! It is nothing but a 300 page attack. That wouldn't be so bad if what he says is true. But it isn't (according to the Churchill expert). It's full of distortions, exaggerations, deliberate misquotes, quotes taken out of context, etc. If a white historian wrote something like that about Martin Luther King or Malcolm X, the book would be pulled from the shelves and the author would end up in court.

[Dougella]

^ The woke movement isn't a thing. There is the metoo movement and the BLM movement. Woke is just a way of describing people who are aware of the issues they and their community might be dealing with in terms of discrimination and power structures.

[Mr. Nobody]

On The Way to Satori - Gerta Ital.

[genovese]

[Tonkin]

All in My Head: An Epic Quest to Cure an Unrelenting, Totally Unreasonable, and Only Slightly Enlightening Headache

I haven't finished a book in ages. I get about 30 percent in then think I'l just have a look at the next one on my list and then never go back, or finish the one I switched to.

[Dougella]

^ That depends on who they are, if they're an African American anti racism activist, which is where the word originated from, then they should use it as much as they want I would think!

[Quietman]

I’m currently reading Johanna Hickson, lady of the ravens, then next I’ll read Alison Weirs new book.

[Appear]

Oryx and Crake.

I'm getting an Atwood trilogy going up in here.

[Moksha]

Still working my way through Harold Bloom’s list.

Right now, I’m reading Isherwood’s Berlin Stories. These are the sketches of pre-Hitler/1930s Berlin that the musical Cabaret was based on. It’s great - smooth prose, interesting and well-drawn characters, etc. Also just started Virginia Woolf’s Mrs Dalloway.

Gone back to audiobooks as well. God, I really think the audiobook is the greatest invention ever. I’m listening to Evelyn Waugh’s Vile Bodies atm. Some authors are perfect for reading out loud: Waugh, P G Wodehouse, Dickens, Douglas Adams, etc. It’s also the only way of rattling through the classics. Who on earth has got time to sit down and read 500 page monsters by George Eliot, Henry James, Conrad, Tolstoy...?

[Dougella]

^ I read Anna Karenina, but it took me a while!

[genovese]

Originally Posted by Moksha

Who on earth has got time to sit down and read 500 page monsters by George Eliot, Henry James, Conrad, Tolstoy...?

[Dougella]

^ Hey! (Actually, pretty accurate lol.)

[Moksha]

Originally Posted by Dougella

^ I read Anna Karenina, but it took me a while!

I take my hat off to you madam!!

Actually, I AM impressed Dougella. I’m always sincerely impressed by people who defeat the big monsters. It’s not that I don’t want to read them, more that I resent the time it takes. During the time it takes to get through, say, War and Peace or Middlemarch, I could read three or four 200 page novels. And there are just too many books out there.

A few of the monsters I’d like to try (anyone completed any of them?...no lying!!):

Herman Hesse: The Glass Bead Game
Thomas Mann: The Magic Mountain
Dostoyevsky: The Brothers Karamazov
George Eliot: Middlemarch
Henry Fielding: Tom Jones
Dickens: Bleak House
Proust: Remembrance of Things Past
Grossman: Life and Fate
Steinbeck: Grapes of Wrath
Thackeray: Vanity Fair
Heller: Catch 22
Anthony Burgess: Earthly Powers
Aldous Huxley: Point Counter Point

Scrub Proust...I tried the first volume, which I can only describe as torture. Reading Proust is like drowning in an ocean of words. If anyone on SAUK has read the whole of Remembrance of Things Past, I grovel at your feet!!

[Dougella]

^ With some of them you can cheat and watch the film or the drama series instead

[Marco]

^^ Of that list I have just read Tom Jones, Vanity Fair and The Grapes of Wrath. My advice is don't bother with the first two, Moksha - life is too short! Steinbeck's is definitely worth a read though.

[Mike.Kzov]

^^^ You should certainly read The Brothers Karamazov, I think you'd love it. It may be very, very long, but it's more worth reading than a thousand shorter books! It's a profound, beautiful exploration of the big questions.

[Tonkin]

Is that about the game Mein Craft?

[3stacks]

Heart shaped box by Joe hill

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