To Readers It May Concern
To Readers It May Concern
My name is Ruben. This is where I share my love of books (and help you discover books to love for yourself).
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Keep up the good work! You are doing great!
Thanks!
Keep up the good work, man!
Thanks so much!
Interesting comments on the relationship between music and poetry. I've sung Whitman and Tennyson - those two stand out, but I've done others. I think many folks are turned off by pietry because of the way it's taught, with a focus on form rather then meaning. What matters to me most? That the poem speaks to me. Eliot, Browning, Whitman, Dickinson, Shakespeare. The Southern Decadents, but not Wallace Stevens. Philip Larkin. Byron but not Shelley or Keats (and lord help me, Not Wordsworth). Poetry has to be relatable, primarily. Greetings from Split, Croatia, btw!
The hints of your life sound so full and adventurous-singing Whitman and Tennyson, wonderful! And now you bask in Croatia? You've been on a journey, my friend. I agree with much of your list of poets, though I'm surprised by Keats. I'm guessing he's too adherent to the Romantic trends of his day, too much mimicry and falsity in imagery? He certainly gets lost in pattern and detail and tropes in his mythological pieces, but I do find his lyricism magic in moments. Maybe I find myself wooed by his sorrow seeping through so much of what he writes and that desperate yearning to be great despite the limits of his condition and place (though his autobiography is perhaps what seeps through more in my reading of him).
Many years ago I decided I could either wait for other people to join in my travels or I could simply go by myself. Croatia iis a family history stop - I visited the church where my maternal grandparents wed and one aunt was baptized, but no family remain in the area other than distant cousins. As for Keats, I appreciate his lyricism but his themes do nothing me (as I sidenote, I've seen his deathbed in Rome). Whitman is like fullbodied coffee and is best declaimed in full voice - preferably to an audience. Keep up the good work - I'll send send some potential video topics when I'm back in Houston this weekend. And call me Tony - aadamtx sounds a bit formal 😁
Thank you for this.There is so much I would like to say, but won't; simply because this is a comment & not a conversation. Unfortunately, or perhaps not (who is to know) my Mind's Eye is and always has been completely blind. Apparently, this is why so much of my past is shrouded in fog, unable to see my past, now I struggle to see where I am headed. Also, I happened to notice those two books on your shelves--books that sat for so long upon my shelves. The Man Without Qualities. One of my favorite books (in 2 volumes). A pity Musil died before completing it.
The Man Without Qualities is also one of my favorites, which I read decades ago. Try some Heinrich Mann and Berlin Alexanderplatz!
@@aadamtx I've got the latter on one of my wish lists & added the former. Anytime you would like to address the wide variety of styles that make up European Modernism, I am all in. Have you read Broch's The Death of Virgil? simply wonderful. Keep up the great work.
The Death of Virgil has long been on my tbr list, but I've read Broch's The Sleepwalkers. Too many books, too little time!
I didn't think watching this video was a struggle at all. I enjoy your "rambling". Your videos are thought provoking and sincere and I find that refreshing. I admit I struggle with poetry, though, however the poetry you read from your friend's book was stunning. I look forward to reading it myself. Thank you for the time and effort you put into your videos. And thank you for sharing stories about your childhood and your father. It's real and honest and much appreciated.
Thank you, Bridget. Your kindness is much appreciated as well.
Ah that was great. Very heartfelt. Thanks for sharing all that.
Thank you for seeing the value in it. 🙏
I have never been able to get into poetry, but I hope it will "click" someday. I will never give up! ;) I loved your story about your first experience with it as a child. What you said reminded me about writing lyrics. When I write those, I also feel like I turn something private into a public thing. :)
I think a feeling of inner turmoil about anything you create is quite normal Ruben. As your unconscious desires surface and crystalize into something tangibly conscious often the shape or form can come as a shock to the system. A phantom whose reflection looks like you but is not. For me your videos are deeply impactful. It isn't what you say but the way you make me feel. There is a beauty in your passion, a sensitivity in your heart and a love for the written word that always inspires me to dive a little deeper into the depths of my own internal landscape. I always come away with the desire to read more, to write more and most importantly to share my love of these things more openly with the world. An introvert does not willingly raise anchor and sail to new climes but your videos helped me have the courage to risk running aground. Silly is not an adjective that belongs in your dictionary and certainly not one I would use to describe your Art. Thankyou, keep going, you are having an impact.
"A phantom whose reflection looks like you but is not"-that speaks. That resounds. There seems an unavoidable splitting: I cannot be all of me, only the filmable one. That is, I know, necessary and okay, but it is certainly also strange. The fact that I can still connect, if only in temporary portions of myself, with those like you is a genuine relief. So thank you for that.
Thanks for this video. All I want from poetry is to have something communicated in a way that can't be done as effectively through fiction or essay form. A little beauty in turn of phrase would also be welcome.
I am sorry for the legacy of your dad's struggles with poor mental health. I, unfortunately, empathise with your experience.
Poetry is my way to understand/be in the world. I don't know 'why' poetry, but I lost my heart to it when a teenager, & the infatuation has only deepened as I've grown into an old man. I especially love the confessional poetic, the imperative to jolt in the 'truth' of a confessional 'I': Plath, Sexton, Levertov, Berryman, Lowell, Snodgrass... (Ted Hughes' 'Birthday Letters'!) Poetry is a quirky way of being in the world. Thanks for this spotlight on what is important.
There are moments available in poetry unmatched anywhere else. Those moments are similar to a late, late night with a friend, one in which you both finally speak something true. Perhaps that's why confessional poetry can hold such a special place, a place of intimacy. Thank you for the author recommendations. I will keep them all in mind.
@@ToReadersItMayConcern: travel well, & look after yourself.
Beautiful video ❤
Thank you for giving it a chance. I consider you among the best on BookTube, so your compliment means a lot.
Best intro books to philosophy?
I'll have to make a video on this topic someday. There is not a straightforward answer for everyone. Here is a comment I left to someone else that gives related advice (but, again, there's a lot more to say, and I'll have to work on that for a video): I started with Bertrand Russell's history of philosophy and then jumped to A.C. Grayling's broad overview (delivers a better and more specific view of contemporary issues) and Roger Scruton's Modern Philosophy book. After that point I think it's necessary to seek the specific authors and concepts you find most interesting and begin reading summations of those views (The Oxford A Very Short Introduction series is great for this) and then the original sources (alongside lectures online). Frankly, there are going to be tedious elements of this process. But, if you're like me, there will be rewards along the way that make it worthwhile. Another book that helped me greatly is Kwame Anthony Appiah's Thinking It Through (more of a textbook, and requires more attention than the others)-that one made contemporary issues feel significant (and helped clear up why philosophers would choose to struggle with such issues for so long). Expect a long process: you will have to grow substantially as a reader, especially by the time you read the original sources. If you stick with it, reading philosophy does become easier. Eventually you'll be able to read almost any philosopher's work and follow it (except some extreme cases of wobbly writing). It is an expertise. Think of it like learning mathematics from the bottom. You can't expect to become an expert in just a few years, and you should learn from video and lectures online to help you avoid pitfalls and to make the concepts feel natural to you.
@@ToReadersItMayConcern thank you!! Keep it going great vids
*addenda
Certainly matters to me. When I get my channel going, I will begin with poetry. If one can learn to read it well, one can read anything. And yes, the trick is to dissect without butchering. Wordsworth is always warning us: “We murder to dissect.” But poems are like Osiris or Lemminkainen. They can be torn apart and resurrected. But the resurrecting reader needs the skills to see the thing whole. So we learn the tools that let us see things whole, and our cadavers come back to life. Lovely reading from Whitman, Ruben. But it’s to sing of myself AND the whole, right? Myself and “en-masse.” The body whole, and the body politic whole through it. The body elecrric in both. God, what a poem Song of Myself is! As for rambling: so much of what is best in us as humans emerges in such moments. There is great virtue in formal strictures, compression, economy-all virtues of great poetry. But poetry itself often codifies and redescribes with arresting vividness what we are reaching for when we ramble, looking for just the words, the ideas, that lie beyond and beneath whatever it is we realize we are saying. When we ramble we often try to connect diffuse things into a whole too diffuse to communicate easily. The poet’s miracle is to distill something like this. I loved the Donne allusion in that poem you read (the one about “systemic”). “Airy thinness”: “Like gold to airy thinness beat,” from The first poem I will talk about once I get going: “A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning” (“like gold to airy thinness beat”). As for pretentious: we are such an anti-intellectual society. Shame on anyone who says such a thing of or to you. You are the least pretentious BookTuber I know. You try so hard to make the difficult accessible, and you do it without any airs. You’re not trying to be smart, either-you are smart. Really goddamned smart. Wallace, when he was a teacher, advised a student trying too hard to be artsy to write a story about a child whose pet bunny had died. You caught that point wonderfully too.
I start with feeling here-the poet feeling their way through text and the reader feeling their way through connection to said text-but there are tools I could (should) cover, too, because each allows us more to work with, and, really, more to notice. I end up caring about these tools because of the feeling, so maybe that is why I start there (with feeling). Your channel will be a balance to my emotive fixation: a structure for one to lift upward by. I can't wait to have you here on BookTube. I consider you already a valuable partner in asserting a deep, close attendance to text. Yes, in Whitman, we sing from self to whole. We discern from the self, through the self, and communicate outward to others who themselves discern. In that moment of returning discernment, I see a return to self, then, and what each sees. I see that the whole is always 'known' from out the window of self, and Whitman, too, discerned and sang of the Civil War glory and despair, and of the workers, and of the self in parallel with all, but the self was always the discerner, and I think about that when I hear of wholes (and I think free-associatively of Wittgenstein arguing with Russell that there is no "world"). We could emphasize the 'en-masse,' but an accumulation of singulars remains, and I like to return to that center of individual selves perceiving. That's only a matter of emphasis, though. Of course, perception is molded by the whole, collapsed into being by it. I think I have a disposition wary of that collapse, for personal reasons.-At the end of all this writing I realize I am rushing through a complex position; I'll have to cover more carefully sometime later when I can, perhaps in a video.-And here I notice a return to rambling, and then think of a fitting poem: "To The Sea" by Anis Mojgani, which employs deviation and repetition to mimic the rambling being adored. Someone loves our rambling, and that is comfort.
I've never really been into poetry. I respect the skill, but it's never something that appealed to me. That being said there was always once piece that stuck with me throughout the years. It's a poem called Annabel Lee by Edgar Allen Poe. I think I read it in middle school many, many years ago. I always thought it was so sad and tragic, but beautifully written. It's funny how something will stick with you like that even if you're not a fan of the medium itself.
The musicality of Poe is nearly unmatched. Go back to that piece when you get a chance. You'll probably hear it as much as read it. It's powerful in that ongoing resonance. I think that's a nice way to start with poetry, just to hear it, then sometimes the meaning will surprise you amidst the sound.
I used to enjoy reading poetry posted online and writing it many years ago. Haven’t been able to find poetry books lately that I enjoy reading. That’s interesting that you say you mimicked your dad’s way of speaking because you do speak like a poet. Never noticed it before.
What a wonderful video! (And that comes from a person who reads very little poetry although incidentally I did read some Pessoa poems today). Hope the video does get a lot of views (and nice comments!) :)
The video is currently not reaching far, but I'm proud of it, and I'm proudest when hearing from those like you who leave such kind remarks. Thank you.
Thank you for this video and your thoughts on poetry. I am a newbie in poetry but totally for art in all their forms. I love to be still, get confused, dive in, forget, learn, change perspectives and be blown away by it all. 💟
If one allows confusion without panic, a wavering loss-of-place but movement forward nonetheless, that is often where sublimity lies. Thank you for being here, for allowing yourself to travel with art a while. That is to be cherished.
Thank you for another great video! Will definitely be looking into some poetry to sit down and read, if anyone has suggestions please leave a reply!
It takes time to get back to that space: it is a slow-moving current, poetry. My friend shared some of his favorites with me recently, and I found them helpful, if only a start, to allow myself back into that soundless singing. Here is the list he shared. I hope it helps you too: "America" by Tony Hoagland "Those Winter Sundays" by Robert Hayden “My Dead Friends” by Marie Howe "Landscape of a Vomiting Multitude" by Federico Garcia Lorca "[The Dark Collects]" by Ben Lerner "Dear Reader" by James Tate "Ars Poetica" by Aracelis Girmay "The Colossus" by Sylvia Plath "Harlem" by Langston Hughes "Romanesque Arches" by Tomas Tranströmer, translated by Robert Bly
“Make of them your heart’s bed” beauty emerging from a dark but brave and honest poem.
I wish your friend all the best with his book launch!
Thank you. It can be tough catching attention for one's poetry, as I'm sure you know. Even this video about poetry is having a tough time getting attention, but that's to be expected. Hard sell, poetry.
Thank you, David! We had a lot of fun making it. Checking out your channel now!
@@brenboothjones I’ve just subscribed to yours, and looking forward to it.
How lucky we are to have your thoughts on poetry and literature in general. And thank you for sharing my own work with your audience! I can’t thank you enough. Love that you dive into Whitman and your dad’s poetry in this video. “Strange music” is so apt!
Oh by the way, regarding the Bonus Books with distended time following Marguerite Young… Include William Golding’s second, “Pincher Martin” - the time frame is the getting out of boots of a drowning man…
Sounds fascinating. Thank you!
Ruben! You are such a discovery! The first thing I noticed was that you own Peter Nadas’ “Parallel Stories”, a recommendation by my Hungarian refugee father that happened to make Nadas my favourite author in a most private way - not a writer I’d recommend to anyone but silently congratulate everyone who makes it through to have found because it totally succeeds in surprising you in how it ends after a long, long journey (you only find out that the main story is actually over, devastated, some hundred pages after it ended: so impeccably structured to get a reader’s response!) Try “A Book of Memories” as well: similarly mind-boggling structure. And then you recommend Lucy Ellman’s “Ducks, Newburyport” (you’ve got her father’s Joyce Biography on your shelf as well…) - that was, in physical hard-cover, and fully unexpectedly the most immersive read of my entire life - I planned to read it in Covid confinement returning to Hong Kong and never did because the quarantine requirement was scrapped the day I returned from some trip, but then it took me 8 months and left me with an excel file of 246 leitmotivs and … a new friend: this women, her entire view on things and her little life is so endearing and positive (the story is actually the passing of a mountain lion that escaped from a private zoo whilst they worry about it and never find that it actually was at their house before moving on). Your tone of recommendation is exactly what I’d wish to be able to do: be humble, be lucid, and recommend the authors I am passionate about: Nadas, Ellman - without seeming to be presumptuous. I rather feel the need to shield readers from the experience in order to keep their friendship. And I owe you “Miss Macintosh”. But one might summarise: whatever Dalkey Archive Press re-issues is the Criterion Edition of lifetime reading experiences. Thanks, Man!
Man, thank you for this wonderful comment, and I especially feel that near-last remark: "I rather feel the need to shield readers from the experience in order to keep their friendship." It can feel sometimes that we've grown wary of our passions as others have grown weary of caring; and then we all deaden ourselves for this cutting away of difference. It is lonely. Thank you for your wonderful thoughts, here. I find them invaluable (and I recently ordered A Book of Memories and feel all-the-more confident in my purchase).
The biggest mistake people make in approaching poetry is to assume it can be read like any other free hand, prose writing (in referring to verse) when in fact that's not the case. As a rules-based form of writing, the general public often misses the sophistication behind the elaborate construction of a poem, like the importance of rhythm, the varying sound patterns (high, low, or vice versa); line length as an indication of carefully measured wording. There's a reason poetry is for the most part curated by MFAs and PhDs these days, although an unfortunate one as well, making it less accessible
Agreed. There is much delicate choice-making in the succinct frame of a poem. This video focuses on the poet; a later video will likely focus on the poem itself, and thus the skeleton that holds it firm.
@@ToReadersItMayConcern Bring it on! Sounds exciting
What matters to you most about poetry? Let me know! Keep in mind, I'm discussing one small facet of poetry in this video. I will likely create more videos covering other key elements later on. You can see me discuss poetry in more detail with my friend Bren Booth-Jones for the book launch of his latest collection, Blue Remembered Star, here: kzread.info/dash/bejne/n6h62a2uk7DKmc4.htmlsi=AdgCLscb0S7B2xZW
Hi Ruben! Thank you for making this kind of video content. I have never heard of these books, and your articulate descriptions have made me want to drop an inordinate amount of money at my local bookstore.
Thanks for stopping by! I'm glad to inspire spending for a good cause (never enough books).
Frick, one book in and it is a definite must aquire and read. Well, here goes nothing. It is not like I already spend roughly 90% of my income on books or anything. More shelves needed, more books, and eventually I gotta slow down on work so I can have some time to really read. But that can wait another while.
I'm glad to be here enabling your addiction. Books are better than work. Enjoy!
Many thanks! No, your videos are not too long because they are so informative and well spoken. :) Many thanks for tagging others - I just discovered TheActiveMind! ps. I will reply properly to you on the other video over the next few days. Many thanks for your patience.
thank you. so much to learn in one video!
You're very welcome! Glad you received some worth from it.
Nicely reviewed. I'm about to start this, having just finished Natasha's Dance (excellent book!). I'm looking forward to A People's Tragedy even mor enow after having watched your video.
That's excellent! Seems you and I have been on a Russian kick for a little while (I recently read Montefiore's two Stalin biographies and his book on the Romanovs). Orlando Figes also has a book called The Whisperers that focuses on personal accounts of living in Soviet Russia. I'm really looking forward to that one, and you may be interested too. Thanks for stopping by!
@@ToReadersItMayConcern I have The Whisperers on my shelf too and hope to get to it soon. As well as the two Stalin biographies and, of course, The Romanovs. Check out the Russian episodes on Empire podcast with Figes, Applebaum, Sebag and Rappaport. I binged it this month and it's excellent!
@@CamsCampbellReads Thanks for the great podcast suggestion!
@27:15 Watching your video and right now having a revelation with a game called Elden Ring.
Oh, yeah, questioning one's completionist tendencies is essential for gleaming worth out of video games as much as anything else.
Gertrude Stein’s writings are unreadable garbage. She was trying to write like how Picasso and other experimental artists painted. But her work ends up just being thousands of pages of nonsense. But boy she sure thought a lot of herself. She once said American literature is “Poe, Whitman, James, and myself.” Jealous as anything, when Sylvia Beach publish Ulysses, Stein canceled her subscription to Sylvia’s lending library. Ezra Pound called Stein “a mere parasite on the body of literature” and an “old tub of guts.” She was also a fascist who thought Hitler should get the Nobel prize.
Um, I know what you mean (reading for 'love alone') but reading within a critical culture where there is engagement & considered response can also be generous & connective. I've worked full-time as a book critic for the past decade, & it does sometimes grind joy (that is true) but when you get the 'right' response to a new book, it can be a joyous marriage. Really enjoy thinking about your provocations.
Excellent point. I'd say there's space in one's reading for critical attention and a space for pure passion. This video is partly a reminder to myself to remember the latter (though the former still occurs).
@@ToReadersItMayConcern: couldn't agree more
Thank you so much for this amazing video!! I'm starting my Barth's journey after reading his collection of short stories "Lost in the Funhouse" for my short story class which was an absolute terrific experince! It was like a whole new door to language and narrative opened for me. Very excited to deep dive into his works!!
Wonderful! There is plenty to appreciate in his careful attendance to language and meta-structural trickery. I'm glad my video was of help to you!
Thank you for being the only person on the internet who understands "a lot" is TWO words.
26:28 there is no skipping happen here 😁 Many thanks for introducing the Oxford books!
You're a very-much-appreciated, dedicated viewer. Thank you. 🙏
For a work that could be a purely speculative science, bordering on mad science fiction, I recommend you read: The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind by Julian Jaynes. It's as mind altering read. Before reading Gould's epitome, read Dawkins vs Gould, it's far shorter and easier read, and highlights the approach and philosophy of two great biologists of the 20th century. You can read it in a day. I noticed the lack of mathematics in your list. So, I would recommend Principia Mathematica by Whitehead and Russell. I studied mathematics, but I would never go near it. But, you seem to love the long, dense, and abstruse. :) So have a go at it. But here's some math books with more philosophical tone: 1. Mathematics and Plausible Reasoning (Two volumes) by Polya. 2. The Value of Science by Poincare. 3. Science and Method by Poincare. 4. Mathematician's Apology by Harding 5. Symmetry by Weyl. These are actually easy to read compared to some of the books on your wishlist. And, yes, I've read all the books (except Mathematica). As far as metaphysics/physics is concerned, you must read: 1. Travels in the 4th Dimension (short and "easy" to read) It's a book on the philosophy of space and time.
Phenomenal recommendations! You've just given me half of a year of deep study (been many years since I've thought carefully about mathematics). Thank you!
@@ToReadersItMayConcern Two others books I forgot to mention, but were on the tip of my tongue: Mathematician's Apology by Harding Science and Method by Poincare. (updating original post)
I have a video you may be interested in: Why Bother with Philosophy of Science?! It covers a textbook on that subject you may appreciate. Thank you again for the excellent recommendations!
Always good to hear what others have to say about books. Thanks for the insights. I'm currently reading through the Bible and almost finished. I do think one needs to read the most read book of all time, cover to cover. There are so many books I'd love to read, and with over a thousand unread ones in my bookshelf, I need to focus on the ones I already own. Tsundoku is perhaps the apt word.
That is an excellent idea. The BookTube channel @readreadofficial released a video about nine months ago wherein he did exactly what you described: read the Bible cover to cover. What version are you reading? Do you find the translation flows smoothly for you? There's a set of books you may be interested in as a literary follow-up-God: A Biography; Christ: A Crisis in the Life of God; and God in the Qur'an, all by the author Jack Miles. In those books he reads through the Bible and analyzes God as a character across all of the books, treating it like a literary analysis wherein one makes inferences about the psychology of the character and of the arc of the story generally. It's obviously not the only way to interpret the text, but it could be a fun frame to look through for a while since you're now so familiar with the source material. Our book collections are ourselves in many ways. You can learn a lot about a person via their shelves.
@@ToReadersItMayConcern Thanks for the feedback. I'm reading the KJV as I enjoy the King James english. I'll make a note of the books you mentioned. Reminds me of Northrop Frye's The Great Code. Yes agreed, if you want to see a man's soul, look at the books in his bookshelves. What's that saying I once heard 'we are the people we meet and the books we read.'
Thanks for this, just discovered Steve's booktube channel myself, & yes, I love it. I am really enjoying this whole booktube thing. It's amazing reading within community, isn't it? I've been so lucky with my reading/writing career. I don't think I'll ever be as bold as Steve, but I guess we all have our own tone. I love how thoughtful & considered your videos are, you always seem to engage from a position of centred calm & I appreciate that. And thanks for the prod to keep learning from Steve. His book recommendations are often fresh, unexpected & surprising - an ambush of joy.
Absolutely deserve, and I have no the doubt the first of many partnerships coming your way.
I noticed most avid reader read multiple genres at a time. It's a great little tip, it helps with setting a time to read everyday and it keeps you used to different types of writing styles. I always keep a reread too--I consider them my treats so if I am not enjoying any of the new books (which is rare but it does happen) I always have my beloved books to fall back to.
100%. Having a range of genres to pick from makes every moment of reading precisely what you want: an escape, a lesson, a dream, a reflection, whatever beckons in those quiet pages. I'm glad you discovered that for yourself, too. We're not assigned these books; they are our pleasure.
If you're interested in a book that functions on multiple levels, from prose to poetry, philosophy and mathematics to fiction and satire, and historical reference to futuristic exploration... Give "Vitruvia 144" a chance.
I would love to hear the montefiore stalin review since im about to have a course about it and the more visions on the book the better. oh and what are these 4 books with ladies in the second bookcase second shelter on the second bookcase, they are gorgeous
Yes, I'll try to organize my thoughts on those books and release something, probably in a couple weeks (have other videos to get out first). Those four books are part of the A Dance to the Music of Time series by Anthony Powell. I discuss that series briefly in my BookTube Greats: Ten Books I Only Know about from Steve Donoghue video.
Great content!
Love running into your videos every time they pop into my feed periodically🙏 I can’t help but wonder what your words per minute is to cover so many books while maintaining such a high level of understanding and comprehension. I’m personally not a very good reader due to my falling into the swirls or social media and doomscrolling in high school and now college haha But aspiring and working my way back to getting my lost skill🫡
I actually consider myself a slow reader. What benefits me is how consistent I am. Over time that day-to-day habit adds up.
Greetings from London! I just spent a long weekend in Oxford, stopping in especially Blackwells to drop a few pounds. The OUP brick & mortar shop closed down a few years ago, so unless you order direct from the Press it's difficult to find those tomes on bookstore shelves. A video on the Short series would be good; I've read a couple volumes. I'm curious about your students, who seem well above the average for high schoolers (and college freshmen, for that matter). Are these AP students? Just curious.... My brain is on vacation at the moment, so not reading anything heavy - couple of Andrey Kurkov's, deWitt's THE LIBRARIANIST, Renata Adler's SPEEDBOAT. Didn't see DUCKS or some of the other big books from your last video, even at Hatchards - and they have four floors of quality books!
That sounds like a fantastic trip! Good to hear you're taking your time and soaking it all in-perfection! I do creative writing and essay writing classes and one-on-one sessions over summer. Many of these students have been taking AP courses, but not exclusively. Most have been excited by my offer to 'debate' with them on whatever topic they choose in order to hone their arguments. I did a kind of crash-course in philosophy beforehand, and then presented the contest as an optional opportunity to practice philosophizing themselves (and I allow them to take any stance so long as they can defend it rigorously). Not all of my students took up the offer; the ones who have seem most excited by my attempts to 'not go easy on them' with their argumentation. I told them I would treat them like serious philosophers.
I have those two Stalin biographies by Montefiore (havent read) , would be interested to hear your thoughts. Havent seen much talk about them as the Stephen Kotkin biographies seem to be more popular. Dont know if i should start with young stalin or red tsar.
I'll probably discuss this when I do a review, but I found Young Stalin disappointing in comparison to Court of the Red Tsar. Young Stalin focuses on the gangsterism and adventure of Stalin's early life, which becomes a repeat of offenses and arrests that becomes predictable, written with copious dialogue, almost too much like a story. Court of the Red Tsar has a narrative focused on politics and interpersonal pressures, as well as contradictions in Stalin's character and in those around him-a less flat view than Young Stalin. I struggled to enjoy Young Stalin; I enjoyed Court of the Red Tsar very much. It might be a good idea to start with Court of the Red Tsar, and if you end up particularly interested in expansions of youthful Stalin's adventures, Young Stalin can serve that purpose, but expect it to feel like a repetitive 'adventure.'
@@ToReadersItMayConcern thanks for your reply, thats what I was thinking. Definitely more interested in the more influental historical/political aspects of Stalin to expand my knowledge of USSR and WW2.