The River That Flows Uphill: A Journey from the Big Bang to the Big Brain

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Enlighting

Stranger Than Fiction; The Chaotic Order In Evolution

Great science writing with a dose of ideology thrown in

The River That Flows Uphill: A Journey from the Big Bang to the Big Brain
William H. Calvin
Manufacturer: Backinprint.com
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Evolution | Science | Subjects | Books
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Downcanyon: A Naturalist Explores the Colorado River Through Grand Canyon

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ASIN: 0595167004

Book Description

Written in the form of a scientist’s diary of a two-week float trip down the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon. There we find rocks of great age, fossils, dwellings of Stone Age peoples, and experience the land much as our ancestors did during all those untold generations in the dimly remembered world from which we somehow took flight.

Customer Reviews:

Enlighting.......2007-05-14

Yet surprisingly easy read. Covers a technical topic in everyday language. Provide insight on our evolutional development.

Stranger Than Fiction; The Chaotic Order In Evolution.......1999-07-06

Fascinating! An excellent overview of what is "known", according to available evidence, about how life - particularly humans - evolved, along with some extremely intriguing theories yet unproved (although the "aquatic ape" hypothesis was being taught when I studied anthropology 20 years ago! Indeed - dig Danakil!). All set like a metaphor within the context of a 2-week rafting trip through the Grand Canyon with insight into its evolution. On the other hand, the "metaphor" can also be put the other way around. Look at man's evolution in the context of that of the Grand Canyon. It's really food for thought. Might be a bit of a hard chew in certain spots for those without a certain level of knowledge or interest in natural science, but the level required is not THAT high and Calvin explains clearly and succinctly enough to follow if you take time to read any troublesome passages twice. Popular science writing at its best. It is humbling and awesome to contemplate our existence as he explains it. The marvel of man owes so much to a certain - serendipity - that one must believe in a creative force swirling and pushing towards ever more interesting development, even if one does not believe in a "God" per se (or if one does believe in Gods, to borrow from a popular film, "they must be crazy"). The "chaotic" (stoachistic) concepts he describes are particularly intriguing. The idea that many of the traits and abilities that make us so "superior" are actually "hitchhikers"; unexpected benefits of adaptations to challenges completely unrelated to what they eventually turned out good for. Made possible because evolution - the developmental force - is by nature an innovative, irrepresible and experimental one - one that is always pushing "upstream". Now THAT is a miracle! Also really enjoyed the quotes pulled from many, many sources (from the Bible to Descartes to Newton) published in the margins which illuminated and complimented the text in a marvelous manner, such as; "Man's future is even more obscure than his beginnings. To venture to sound either depth is to enter an unknown, perhaps unknowable, realm, but it is characteristic of man that he constantly attempts these journeys" (L. Eiseley). And the book is NOT just useful for reconstructing the past and how we have come to be - it's greatest value may well be in alerting and arming (alarming?) us for the future, for our breathtaking development has been much too far, too fast and made us way too arrogant and big for our own britches. We need to recognize and acknowledge ourselves for the absolutely amazing (please don't take offence at the word) mutants that we are and realize we have no special "control" over this world. We only think we do because we have become so extremely good, in an obscenely short period of time, at exploiting and manipulating it. Population control and environmentalism have EVERYTHING to do with the topic of this book. Nature is inexorable. We are not. And we are positioning ourselves to be flattened like a pancake - no, even worse, to flatten ourselves, if we don't watch out. Of all the astonishing accomplishments of man, the most amazing is the unprecedented ability and possibilities we have created (the first life form to do so in 3,000+ million years) of making ourselves extinct. And for all our "higher" intelligence, still keep looking dead-set on doing so. I started reading this book only because I am going to be doing the exact same rafting trip in September '99. I had hoped to get some insight into what to expect on the trip. And I did, but the "trip" is, indeed, metaphorical. Where does it start? What happens on the way? Where do (or could?) you end up? It was all in there alright, but I got a lot more than I expected. Thanks Bill.

Great science writing with a dose of ideology thrown in.......1997-04-18

Calvin does science writing that is a pleasure to read. This account of floating the Grand Canyon on rubber rafts is all wrapped up in a wide sweep of natural history. My only criticism is his constant diversions to his own personal views on population control and environmentalism. He brings up these topics with all the fervor of a true religious believer, though they have little to do with the topic of the book. This is a strange diversion for a book which otherwise sticks close to a scientific outlook. Good scientists (like most of us) have a difficult time separating their own religious ideology from their science.
Read it anyway. This book is a playground of stimulating ideas

The River that Flows Uphill: A Journey From the Big Bang to the Big Brain

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The River that Flows Uphill: A Journey From the Big Bang to the Big Brain
William H. Calvin
Manufacturer: Random
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000K9UW8G

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River That Flows Uphill: A Journey from the Big Bang to the Big Brain
William H. (born 1939) Calvin
Manufacturer: NY: Macmillan Publishing Company, [1986]. 1st Printing. [xvi]+528pp. Blue cloth-backed pale blue boards with gilt spine lettering. A very good copy in pictorial dust jacket. (OP in cloth). 3 pounds 2 ounces = 1.5 kg. 9.6 x 7.7 x 1.6 inches = 24 x 19.3 x 4cm. eng.
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000SRP1Q8

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Victorian Fungi;: A key and descriptive notes to 120 different toadstools (family Agaricaceœ), with remarks on several other families of the higher Fungi,
J. H Willis
Manufacturer: The Field Naturalists' Club of Victoria
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding

General | Plants | Biological Sciences | Science | Subjects | Books
ASIN: B0007JAGYE

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Victorian toadstools and mushrooms: A key and descriptive notes to 120 different giled fungi (Family Agaricaceae) with remarks on several other families of the higher fungi
J. H Willis
Manufacturer: Field Naturalists Club of Victoria
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding
ASIN: B0007K1V24

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Victorian Toadstools and Mushrooms: a key and descriptive Notes to 120 Different Gilled Fungi (Family Agaricaceae), with Remarks on Several Other Families of the Higher Fungi
J. H. Willis
Manufacturer: The Field Naturalists Club of Victoria
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000OGL6Q2

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Victorian toadstools and mushrooms;: A key and descriptive notes to 120 different gilled fungi (family Agaricaceae), with remarks on several other families of the higher fungi
J. H Willis
Manufacturer: Field Naturalists' Club of Victoria
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding
ASIN: B0007JAAOA

Book Description

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Intelligence and Security Informatics, ISI 2005, held in Atlanta, GA, USA in May 2005.

The 28 revised full papers, 34 revised short papers, and 32 poster abstracts presented were carefully reviewed and selected for inclusion in the book. The papers are organized in topical sections on data and text mining, infrastructure protection and emergency response, information management and security education, deception detection and authorship analysis, monitoring and surveillance, and terrorism informatics.

Bethel, Atlanta companies forge strategic high-tech partnership. : An article from: Fairfield County Business Journal

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Bethel, Atlanta companies forge strategic high-tech partnership. : An article from: Fairfield County Business Journal
Bob Chuvala
Manufacturer: Thomson Gale
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Digital

General | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

Book Description

This digital document is an article from Fairfield County Business Journal, published by Thomson Gale on January 2, 2006. The length of the article is 720 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: Bethel, Atlanta companies forge strategic high-tech partnership.
Author: Bob Chuvala
Publication: Fairfield County Business Journal (Magazine/Journal)
Date: January 2, 2006
Publisher: Thomson Gale
Volume: 45 Issue: 1 Page: 6(1)

Distributed by Thomson Gale

Safe schools survey: leads to school system hardware upgrades: Atlanta Public Schools improving access control and door security.: An article from: Doors and Hardware

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Safe schools survey: leads to school system hardware upgrades: Atlanta Public Schools improving access control and door security.: An article from: Doors and Hardware
Beverly Vigue
Manufacturer: Door and Hardware Institute
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Digital
ASIN: B0008DQO9U
Release Date: 2005-07-31

Book Description

This digital document is an article from Doors and Hardware, published by Door and Hardware Institute on July 1, 2003. The length of the article is 1533 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: Safe schools survey: leads to school system hardware upgrades: Atlanta Public Schools improving access control and door security.
Author: Beverly Vigue
Publication: Doors and Hardware (Magazine/Journal)
Date: July 1, 2003
Publisher: Door and Hardware Institute
Volume: 67 Issue: 7 Page: 16(4)

Distributed by Thomson Gale

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Access Atlanta
Access Guides
Manufacturer: HarperCollins Publishers
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Access Guides | Guidebook Series | Travel | Subjects | Books

General | Travel | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 0062772333

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Access Atlanta (Access Guides)
Betsy; Braden, John Braden
Manufacturer: Collins
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000OEV3RG

Clearinghouse access and bank runs: Trust companies in New York and Chicago during the panic of 1907 (Working paper series / Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta)

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Clearinghouse access and bank runs: Trust companies in New York and Chicago during the panic of 1907 (Working paper series / Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta)
Jon Roger Moen
Manufacturer: Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding
ASIN: B0006PBTFY

Study of airport user attitudes and characteristics in relation to modal choice at the Atlanta Airport

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Study of airport user attitudes and characteristics in relation to modal choice at the Atlanta Airport
Norman Steinman
Manufacturer: Georgia Institute of Technology
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding
ASIN: B00071SFCW

Customer Reviews:

Good light read.......2006-11-27

After reading Girls Dinner Club, I was left a little informed, a little overexposed, and a little touched. It had it's overly innapropriate scenes and was written for an older teen, but I still liked it. The food sounded so good! Celia's crush on Henry was a bit predictable, but so romantic! The book made me laugh, cry, and grimace. But most of all, it made me realize how important it is to have close friends. A good read.

Courtesy of Teens Read Too.......2006-11-11

Celia, Junie, and Danielle all become friends on a whim. Celia and Junie are already friends when GIRLS DINNER CLUB starts, and one night, Danielle was at Celia's house while Junie was there. Danielle offers to make them both dinner, and because of this all the girls become friends by regularly meeting at each others houses and making and having dinner together. They celebrate with each other through the good times and the bad. Some of the things that happen to the girls include: crushes, boyfriend problems, and family issues; just the basic teenage girl problems. It's definitely not written in a depressing way, as there are so many funny things that happen in the book. During one of their dinners together they even get in a food fight! It shows a great friendship that grows between the girls. I would recommend this book to any girl who loves to read about friendships, relationships, and great food.

While I was reading GIRLS DINNER CLUB all I could think about was how good of friends the girls became. All formed such a close bond over something everyone loves--food! This is the first book that Jessie Elliot has written and there will hopefully be more to come. Even though this is Ms. Elliot's first book, it feels like she has written a million stories! GIRLS DINNER CLUB is so well-written and the characters seem so real that it feels like you could be their friend, as well.

Reviewed by: Taylor Rector

The Girl's Dinner Club leaves me wanting .......2006-10-30

I've been trying to figure out why the book left me wanting. The story lacked a certain emotional intensity. Perhaps it's because the author tried too hard. The three girls, three different ethnicities, three different lifestyles, three different schools concept left me with the feeling of seeing too much of the author's hand at work as I read through the story. It felt too contrived. The author could have mined the dinner club concept more, too, as it came off more as a plot contrivance. In the end I wanted to know more.

The novel is clearly for the older teen (grades 10 and up) and not for those who are still young emotionally. I do think the author's handling of Julie's reaction to having sex is provocative. Her sudden need to distance herself from her boyfriend is something many girls may be surprised to learn happens.

While I do have problems with the scope of this novel, I would certainly be interested in reading any future books by the author.

Wonderful.......2006-08-05

I am an adult who enjoys well written teen fiction.

The Girls Dinner Club is a wonderfully crafty novel. All of the main characters are flawed, but through it all, the author manages to keep them enjoyable.

You can feel the camaraderie of these three girls, despite the fact that they are all so different. They each, in their own ways are suffering, but still manage to be there for each other.

I thought the whole dad and eccentric girlfriend was a tad cliché, but yet the author makes it work with a bit of a twist at the end of this storyline.

The writing is wonderful and entertaining and the pacing was just right!

I hope this author is working on another novel of this quality. It would be great if she would bring back these characters. It would be interesting to see them grow together.

An Awesome Read.......2006-05-06

This book has it all: great friendship, food, heartbreak, boys, and everything in between. This is one of my favorite books. I can really relate to everything the girls are going through, because it is well written and is about things everyone goes through. It is a great story about finding friendship where you least expect it, and having good friends who are going to help you through tough times. Junie, Danielle, and Celia are so realistic and fun to read about! I recommend it!

Dinner is served ;: 4-H foods project-phase 3 (Utah Cooperative Extension Service Bulletin Series)

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Dinner is served ;: 4-H foods project-phase 3 (Utah Cooperative Extension Service Bulletin Series)
Elna Miller
Manufacturer: Utah Cooperative Extension Service
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding

General | Cooking, Food & Wine | Subjects | Books

Education | Agricultural Sciences | Science | Subjects | Books
ASIN: B0007FNM7Q

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Girls Dinner Club
Jessie ( Elliot
Manufacturer: HarperCollins
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000OF598E

Book Description

"Offers a comprehensive treatment of surface chemistry and its applications to chemical engineering, biology, and medicine. Focuses on the chmical and physical structure of oil-water interfaces and membrane surfaces. Details interfacial potentials, ion solvation, and electrostatic instabilities in double layers."

Customer Reviews:

Valuable text.......2007-09-29

This book puts together reviews and articles from experts in the field in each of these volumes. This book is quite hefty with lots of articles and has the details the informed researcher needs.

Liquid Interfaces in Chemical, Biological, and Pharmaceutical Applications.

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Liquid Interfaces in Chemical, Biological, and Pharmaceutical Applications.
Alexander G. Volkov
Manufacturer: Marcel Dekker
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000N6BMQC

Book Description

This short introduction to modernism analyses the movement from the perspective of English and American literature. It provides a critical overview of some of the central texts of literary modernism, considering both established works and those that have only recently come to critical attention. Author David Ayers shows that, however diverse modernist texts are, they are linked by concerns about social modernization and the role of art and the artist. He also demonstrates that German Marxism and French deconstruction have been crucial in realizing the full complexity of modernism. Ayers 's arguments are illustrated with reference to the works of T. S. Eliot, Virginia Woolf, D. H. Lawrence, Wallace Stevens, H. D., Nancy Cunard, Wyndham Lewis and Mina Loy, among others.

The Meaning of Life: A Very Short Introduction (Very Short Introductions)

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Vintage Eagleton
Way more than bovine contentment...
Eagleton's Witty Examination on the Most Over Asked Question in Freshman Philosophy Courses
Laugh out Loud
Witty

The Meaning of Life: A Very Short Introduction (Very Short Introductions)
Terry Eagleton
Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Philosophy | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

ASIN: 0199532176

Book Description

'Philosophers have an infuriating habit of analysing questions rather than answering them', writes Terry Eagleton, who, in these pages, asks the most important question any of us ever ask, and attempts to answer it. So what is the meaning of life? In this witty, spirited, and stimulating inquiry, Eagleton shows how centuries of thinkers - from Shakespeare and Schopenhauer to Marx, Sartre and Beckett - have tackled the question. Refusing to settle for the bland and boring, Eagleton reveals with a mixture of humour and intellectual rigour how the question has become particularly problematic in modern times. Instead of addressing it head-on, we take refuge from the feelings of 'meaninglessness' in our lives by filling them with a multitude of different things: from football and sex, to New Age religions and fundamentalism. 'Many of the readers of this book are likely to be as sceptical of the phrase "the meaning of life" as they are of Santa Claus', he writes. But Eagleton contends that in a world where we need to find common meanings, it is important that we set about answering the question of all questions; and, in conclusion, he suggests his own answer.

Customer Reviews:

Vintage Eagleton.......2007-10-09

This is vintage Eagleton! Witty, ironic, honest, and fiercely yet realistically hopeful. Happiness and love may be eminently elusive phenomena, maybe even improbable in a context of global capital, but they are possibilities that lurk in our abiding reciprocal dependence on each other. If you are looking for ideological certitudes - whether new-age idealism or postmodern pessimistic `realism' - this is not the book for you.

Way more than bovine contentment..........2007-10-01

"What's the meaning of life?" has become a sort of in-joke amongst academic philosophers. Particularly in the analytic west, supersaturated with logic and science, questions concerning "grand narratives," of which "life" could be one, have gone the way of Hegelian dialectics and causa sui. In the early twentieth century, positivists and "the linguistic turn" ground such bugbears into impotent stumps. A few brave professional philosophers, such as Thomas Nagel, have attempted to weave the question
into their work, but overall the field retains an icy silence towards the ultimate question. Regardless of this mass abandonment within universities, the question just won't go away. To survive, it has gone underground, whining like a lost puppy, and seethes beneath nearly everything we do. Ignoring it won't make it go away, so the question has found new pioneers to obsess. It found a happy medium in Terry Eagleton, whose work balances philosophy, literary and cultural theory, and history. Though a professional academic, Eagleton is not a philosopher. He thus brings a daisy fresh perspective to the question often associated with "philosophy" itself.

The query of course doesn't have an answer, but most "meaning of life" books usually have a go at it regardless. At least, that seems one of the expectations, realistic or unrealistic, behind flapping the pages of a book with such an ominous title. An honest book would comprise of one page embossed with a question mark. Amusing, but not marketable. Regardless of the challenge, Eagleton does give a sort of an answer; as much an answer as anyone can give. And, though disputable, it does makes sense.

Before giving his "answer," Eagleton, in the spirit of linguistic philosophy, rips and tears at the ligaments of the question itself and then pulls it apart to examine the bits. Chapter one, "Questions and Answers," provides a vast desultory survey of reactions to the grammar and form of the inquiry itself. For example, is "what is the meaning of life?" similar to "What is the capital of Albania" or to "what is the taste of geometry?" Does the form of the question itself deceive us (or "bewitch" us, as Wittgenstein would say) into thinking that it has a definite answer? Is the question valid? Eagleton compares it to another stultifying interrogative: "why are there beings rather than nothing?" Maybe that translates simply as "wow!" Numerous options get examined, such as "maybe we're not supposed to know the meaning of life" or "maybe we'll never know it even though there is an answer." The chapter then transitions, via similar unanswerable moral and political questions, into a survey of modernity and culture. People in the 12th century would not flick a lash at the question. They would answer "God." In a similar fashion, postmodernists would unflinchingly answer "culture." By contrast, many people in the 21st century, those not of the postmodern bend, have come to accept that human existence is contingent. So, Eagleton argues, we construct meaning for ourselves and meaning has appropriated multifarious dimensions: sport, religion, entertainment, etc. We essentially have grabbed on to anything we can get our hands on.

Chapter Two, "The Problem of Meaning," looks at the challenges to "meaning" beginning with a dizzyingly recursive discussion of the meaning of "meaning." Hint: it's a difficult word to nail down. Moving through Kantian "purposiveness without purpose" to "unintended meanings" Eagleton lands within the dank optimist-shattering brain of Arthur Schopenhauer. His conception of the selfish but pointless "Will" could wilt a field of happy flowers. To emphasize the point, the book includes a ghoulish portrait of the man himself. Sometimes appearances aren't deceptive.

"The Eclipse of Meaning," Chapter Three, talks about a time when meaning pervaded everyday life. Early moderns could remember such a time, so the gradual disintegration of it seemed like a horrific crisis. Eagleton uses Samuel Beckett and his play "Waiting for Godot" as exemplary modern with a dash of postmodernity. By chapter's end the distinction between "inherent" and "ascribed" meanings becomes clear, as well as the notion that we can't completely make ourselves since we are, fundamentally, wild animals with certain determining characteristics.

The discussion transitions to "life" in Chapter Four, "Is Life What you Make it?" So what could serve as a baseline for "meaning?" With a little help from his friends Aristotle, Nietzsche, and Freud, Eagleton arrives at a notion of meaning that includes the enabling of unselfish human flourishing. Eagleton eschews purely individualist characterizations, such as Julian Baggini's and John Cottinghams's. He instead derives a more social meaning akin to a jazz band. Here everyone has individual free expression within a totality that determines the structure of the piece. Throw in a touch of compassion (akin to agape) and Eagleton creates a life philosophy that seems meaningful, beautiful, realistic, but nonetheless Utopian. At the very least it can provide an inspiring signpost or goal. In the end, Eagleton argues that humans thrive together. We're free within physically determined bounds and we can decide what happens within those bounds.

This tiny book packs quite a discussion. Though under 200 pages it nonetheless feels exhaustive. It takes the view that life is an accidental, not a planned or intentional, phenomenon. "God" comes up, but only in historical or analytical contexts. Thus, God does not live at the center of meaning in this book. Consider it a fully modern non-theistic approach to the question. Those open to such interpretations will find much to ruminate on and possibly some solace in the face of what seems like modern meaninglessness. Along the way Eagleton makes numerous comments about capitalism, fundamentalism, current politics, and mass culture. "The Meaning of Life" is no sterile work of formalism detached and disinterested from what most of us know as "life." Though by no means definitive, it will provide much food for thought about our strange and prickly material predicament. And yes, he does mention Monty Python.

Eagleton's Witty Examination on the Most Over Asked Question in Freshman Philosophy Courses.......2007-06-19

Terry Eagleton , a long time literary critic of Marxist training (Marxist Literary Criticism, Literary Theory, Illusions of Post Moderism) and Catholic church moral rigor and one of the best explicators of the dually condensed and convoluted intersections of literature, philosophy and political action, has give us all a small, witty, tersely choice gift with his new book, more correctly an essay, called The Meaning of Life. Eagleton's intent, despite what one might assume, isn't to cast a disparaging glare at what has to be simultaneously the most over- asked and least answerable question issued forth, continually, but the swelling ranks of the Middle Brow readership. Eagleton is one of the few truly fine stylists in Leftist literary criticism, an intellectual who is able to translate the most involuted and deferring theoretical quagmires in elegant, comprehensible english, and who is likewise able, and blessedly inclined to make the murky suppositions of other academics sweat by insisting that notions of reading deal , finally, with a book's perceptable idea, and that analysis of the workings have something to do with a reader's experience of the text they've finished and seek to fruitfully ponder. He steers clear of the stalling abstractions of Frederick Jameson, and more clearly addresses the same idea advanced by the increasingly oracular Harold Bloom--the investigation into how Literature helps us think about ourselves and our deeds in the world.

The author does not sneer, deride, nor deride the question, although more than a little of his prickly wit bubbles up from under the surface of his elegantly poised writing. It's a question he takes seriously--it must be important,since queries into grander, greater (or lesser) significance in our existence have been debated for as long as humans could write and record their knowledge and history-- but he is one who is rather tired of the various sophistries that have absorbed the question and tried to force it into submission. He is short fused with the New Agers, who's dreamy capitulation of personal responsibility to whispering drives are useless to most of us who find ourselves denied celestial epiphanies in ruthless material plain, and Eagleton is equally contemptuous of post-modernist theorizers who would argue, abstrusely, thickly, blockheadly, that the Meaning of Life is a merely a social construction and that one is finely better off, by implication, attempting nothing to change one's state and purpose and instead enjoy the spectacle of observing the culture collapse upon itself. An attractive aspect of Eagleton's progressive dissections of concepts and the language that gives them form is a tangible humanity; he refuses to slide into pessimism with the false assurance that the population is too stupid or deluded to do better by themselves and their fellows, or that the quest for meaning of our deeds is delusional. There is a series of skewerings , interrogations and elucidations of the basic elements of the need to define the life worth living-- the rise of the need for metaphysical certainity as expressed in religion, philosophy and political thought, and the latter day "eclipse of meaning" as modernism and postmodernism seem to fragment phenomena into a incoherent multi-verse that could be be authoritatively unified under banner of general noble purpose. The thrust of the book, we find, is that seeking the answer to what The Meaning of Life is is less an attempt to find that patch of wise and fertile soil on which one may advance their lives with a given purpose, but that that it is a way of life. Far from being static, the genuine quest for coherence, meaning, a means by which to measure one's best intentions and making them effectively congruent with their actions, is in itself the purpose of being alive and productive, above and beyond the biological imperative. The species is quite capable of much nastiness and unmistakeable evil, but we are likewise capable of great works of art , compassion, charity. That capacity, after the psuedo systems of philosophical side streets have been blocked off, the sweetness of new age thought turns into a fouling stench, and the apocalyptic ravings of religious extremes reveal themselves as useless to the question to what one does in this life that's useful, Eagleton considers the open mind interested in the ongoing need for the good to be the thing which we must prize over all.

Laugh out Loud.......2007-06-08

Indeed as the previous reviewer said, the book is witty. And, despite all the bad news this book recognizes Life is a miracle and a comedy. One has to know a bit about philosophy to understand it, but, just as I did when I read Professor Eagleton's memoir "The Gatekeep", this was about the joy of life and the possibiity of goodness even with all the very obvious suffering, pain and injustice. A very hopeful book. Debunks a lot of heavy lifting.

Witty.......2007-05-16

I wasn't expecting Eagleton to explain the journey of man's greatest quest with such a nimble hand and cheeky delivery. This isn't so much a definition as an exploration down the philosophical paths of history.

The Modern Novel: A Short Introduction (Blackwell Introductions to Literature)

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A near perfect book.

The Modern Novel: A Short Introduction (Blackwell Introductions to Literature)
Jesse Matz
Manufacturer: Blackwell Publishing Limited
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Wales | Europe | History | Subjects | Books

General | Books & Reading | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books

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ASIN: 1405100494

Book Description

For at least 100 years now, novelists have experimented with ways to make fiction "modern ", to make it better able to reflect and resist the perils and pleasures of modernity. This book looks at how they have done so, tracing the evolution of the modern novel through the twentieth century, and providing a framework through which readers of all kinds can appreciate the significance of the genre.

Customer Reviews:

A near perfect book........2004-04-24

Beautifully written. With the breadth, depth and insight of a great professor, Matz boils down complex ideas and movements to their most fundimental components, and presents them in a conversational style that somehow preserves the fascination of the original concept while being easy-to-read.
In this book, I found myself delighted by several "eureka!!" moments...where Matz answers or asks an important question in a way that makes sense on an intuitive and intellectual level. It is exciting to read someone this gifted.
I would also recommend this author's (more specialist) text on Literary Impressionism.

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Modernist Fiction: An Introduction
Randall Stevenson
Manufacturer: University Press of Kentucky
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Contemporary | General | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books

British | Short Stories | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books

All Titles | Qualifying Textbooks - Fall 2007 | Stores | Books
ASIN: 081311814X

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