8/08
"Steampunk is Victorian elegance and modern technology: steam-driven robots, souped up stagecoaches, and space faring dirigibles..."
From Caligari to Hitler: A Psychological History of the German Film, by Siegfried Kracauer
8/08
The Classic Cinema: Essays in Criticism, edited by Stanley J. Solomon
8/08
Streetwise, by Mohamed Choukri 7/08
"Having taken the momentous decision to learn to read and write when in his early twenties, Choukri joins a children's class
at the local state school in Tangier. Here he leads a life of desperate poverty. In order to survive, he does a bit of everything;
when not in school he hangs out in cafes, drinking and smoking kif (it's cheaper then cigarettes!). .... Thoughout his trials and vicissitudes
two things shine through: Choukri's determination to use literacy to rise above the cruel hand fate has dealt him; and his compassion for the normally despised human beings
who share this life of 'the lowest of the low'."
The Future of the Internet: and How To Stop It, by Jonathan Zittrain 6/08
The Cathedral and the Bazaar, by Eric S. Raymond 6/08
Cryptonomicon, by Neal Stephenson 1/08
In the Beginning Was the Command Line, by Neal Stephenson 1/08
The Motorcycle Diaries, by Ernesto "Che" Guevara 1/08
Legacy of Ashes: The History of the CIA, by Tim Weiner 8/07
The English: A Portrait of a People, by Jeremy Paxman 7/07
Why the Allies Won, by Richard Overy
An analysis of factors that contributed to the defeat of the Axis powers in WWII, an outcome that was far from inevitable. 7/07
Imagined Cities: Urban Experience and the Language of the Novel, by Robert Alter
"In a series of subtle and convincing interpretations of novels by
Flaubert, Dickens, Bely, Woolf, Joyce, and Kafka, Alter reveals the
ways the city entered the literary imagination. He shows how writers of
diverse imaginative temperaments developed innovative techniques to
represent shifts in modern conciousness." 4/06
The Genius Factory: The Curious History of the Nobel Prize Sperm Bank, by David Plotz
"It
was the most radical human-breeding experiment in American history, and
no one knew how it turned out. The Repository for Germinal
Choice--nicknamed the Nobel Prize Sperm Bank--opened to notoious
fanfare in 1980, and for two decades, women flocked to it from all over
the country to choose a sperm donor from its roster of Nobel-laureate
scientists, mathematical prodigies, successful businessmen, and star
athletes. But the bank quietly closed its doors in 1999--its founder
dead, its confidential records sealed, and the fate of its children and
donors unknown..." 4/06
Age of Propaganda: The Everyday Use and Abuse of Persuasion, by Anthony R. Pratkanis and Elliot Aronson
"Americans
consume 57% of the world's advertising while representing only 6% of
its population, and half our waking hours are spent immersed in the
mass media. Persuasion has always been integral to the democratic
process, but increasingly, thoughtful discussion is being replaced with
simplistic soundbites and manipulative messages. Drawing on the history
of propaganda as well as on contemporary research on social psychology,
Age of Propaganda shows how the tactics used by political campaigners,
sales agents, advertisers, televangelists, demagogues, and others often
take advantage of our emotions by appealing to our deepest fears and
most irrational hopes, creating a distorted vision of the world we live
in." 4/06
The Great Game: The Struggle for Empire in Central Asia, by Peter Hopkirk
"The
Great Game between Victorian Britain and Tsarist Russia was foung
across desolate terrain from the Caucasus to China, over the lonely
passes of the Pamirs and Karakorams, in the blazing Kerman and Helmund
deserts, and through the caravan towns of the old Silk Road--both
powers struggling to control the riches of India and the East." 4/06
A Land As God Made It: Jamestown and the Birth of America, by James Horn
History of the first successful English settlement in America, a histroy both noble and shameful. 4/06
The Amalgamation Polka, by Stephen Wright
,
A prophetic novel, rather lyrical 4/06
A Man Without a Country, by Kurt Vonnegut
A Man in Full, by Tom Wolfe
A novel by the author of Bonfire of the Vanities 11/04
Post Office,by Charles Bukowski
"A novel based on the 11 years Bukowski spent as a Post Office clerk and letter carrier." 10/04
Postmodern Music,Postmodern Thought, by Lockead and Auner
Dancing Barefoot, by Wil Wheaton
Shakespeare, Film, Fin de Siecle, by Mark Burnett and Ramona Wray
"Over the course of the 1990's, Shakespeare films established themselves as
big business. The essays of this volume examine the major films of the
decade...and argue that cinematic interpretations of Shakespeare are
key instruments with which western culture confronts the anxieties
attendant upon the transition from one century to another. These and
other screen productions...engage with some of the most pressing
concerns of the present, apocalyptic condition--familial crisis, social
estrangements, urban blight, cultural hybridity, literary authority,
the role of reading and writing, the impact of technology and the end
of history." 10/04
Postmodern Literary Theory: An Introduction, by Niall Lucy
Advice to Young Artists in a Postmodern Era, by William V. Dunning
Charles Bukowski: Locked in the Arms of a Crazy Life, by Howard Sounes
"Charles Bukowski--onetime bum, long-term alchoholic, and author of now-classic
novels such as Post Office, Factotum and Women--rose from obscurity to
become world famous. His semiautobiographical books about lowlife
America made him a cult figure and culminated in the making of Barfly,
a Hollywood film based on Bukowski's life." 9/04
Bone Deep in Landscape: Writing,Reading,and Place, by Mary Clearman Blew
The Heart is a Little to the Left: Essays on Public Morality, by William Sloane Coffin
Credo, by William Sloan Coffin
London Fields, by Martin Amis
"The
story is of a love triangle, a bizarre tangle of love,lust,and murder.
At its apex stands one of the great antiheroines of modern fiction,
Nicola Six, a supreme femme fatale, a calculating mistress of sexual
arts, a manipulator of men without peer. All her life Nicola has been
cursed with premonitions. Now she's had the big one: She's forseen her
own death: She will be murdered by a man she meets in a pub called the
Black Cross. Into this multilayerd tale Martin Amis folds bold ideas
about what our lives are like as we hurl toward the millenium--how we
are affected emotionally and spiritually by the ever-present threat of
nuclear annihilation, the degradation of our planet by industry run
amok, the ever-growing diviaion between the filthy rich and the dirt
poor. What does all this do to our emotional and spiritual lives and to
our ideas of love, of family, of the value of creating
anything--children, or even a novel?" 8/04
Intelligent Innovation in Contemporary Web Design, by Max Bruinsma
Dark Age Ahead, by Jane Jacobs
"A
dark age is a culture's dead end. In North America, for example, we
live in a virtual graveyard of lost and destroyed aboriginal
cultures...Jane Jacobs argues convincingly that we face the coming of
our own dark age. First we must concede that things are awry. Jacobs
identifies five central pillars of our society that show serious signs
of decay: community and family; higher education; science and
technology;governmental representation;and self regulation of the
learned professions." 7/04
Gag Rule: On the Suppression of Dissent and the Stifling of Democracy, by Lewis Lapham
"In
the midst of the 'war on terror'--which makes the hunt for Communists
in the 1950's look. in its clarity of aim and purpose, like the
Normandy landings on D-Day--we face a crisis of democracy as serious as
any in our history. The Bush administration makes no secret of its
contempt for a cowed and largely silent electorate, and without
bothering to conceal its purpose the government coordinates 'not the
defense of the American citizenry against a foreign enemy but the
protection of the American plutocracy from the American democracy."
7/04
Rise of the Vulcans: The History of Bush's War Cabinet, by Jim Mann
Eugene McCarthy: The Rise and Fall of Postwar American Liberalism, by Dominic Sandbrook
Blowback: The Costs and Consequences of American Empire, by Chalmers Johnson
"In
a speech to Congress on September 20, 2001, shortly after the terrorist
attacks of September 11, President George W. Bush posed this question:
'Why do they hate us?' His answer:'They hate us for our freedoms--our
freedom of religion, our freedom of speech, our freedom to vote.' He
commented later that he was amazed 'that there's such misunderstanding
of what our country is about that people would hate us...I just can't
believe it because I know how good we are.' But how good are we really?
If we're so good, why do we inspire such hatred abroad? What have we
done to bring so much 'blowback' upon ourselves?"5/04
Dirty Truths:Reflections on Politics,Media,Ideology,Conspiracy,Ethnic Life,and Class Power, by Michael Parenti
Protectors of Privilege: Red Squads and Police Repression in Urban America, by Frank Donner
"Since
the 1890's hundreds of local governments have had investigative units
that investigate not criminal activity, but peaceful political groups
working for social change. Beginning with the communists, they later
turned their attention to any group that dissented even mildly from
those in power, including Quakers,the PTA,unions,political parties
(usually Socialist and Democratic Party),peace groups,etc. The goal: to
use illegal break-ins,deception,dirty tricks, and informers to sow
distrust and discord to break up these groups. A favorite method still
in use: undercover police or paid informers intentionally breaking
windows or throwing rocks at police to 'prove' a march or demonstration
was violent...allowing police to break some heads." 4/04
The Price of Dissent: Testimonies to Political Repression in America, by Bud and Ruth Schultz
"There
is a special irony in the existence of political repression in America.
We Americans--and others--justly consider our country to be a sanctuary
for, if not the birthplace of, modern-day political liberties. Yet our
government has often gone to great lengths to silence those who
exercise such liberties--and it has even done so in the name of
protecting democratic rights." 4/04
American Dynasty: Aristocracy,Fortune,and the Politics of Deceit in the House of Bush, by Kevin Phillips
"Phillips
demonstrates how the Bush family has perfectly exemplified many of the
growing trends in American political life -- policy favoritism to the
top 1 percent, paper entrepeneurialism, and crony capitalism a la Enron
(the Bush's dealings with Enron go back to 1986). Far more than any
previous political family, it represents an interlock between the
hitherto temporary presidency and the permanent government. As such,
the family has threaded its way through political and armaments
scandals and, since the 1980's, faint hints of acts that might in
another climate have lead to presidential impeachment." 4/04
Kick Me: Adventures in Adolescence, by Paul Feig
Rimbaud and Jim Morrison: The Rebel As Poet, by Wallace Fowlie
Towards a New Cold War: U.S. Foreign Policy From Vietnam to Reagan, by Noam Chomsky
Culture, Inc., by Herbert Schiller
"Most
Americans take for granted that they live in an open society with a
free marketplace of ideas, in which a variety of forms of expression
and opinion flourish and can be heard. But...the corporate arm has
reached into every corner of daily life, and from the big shopping mall
to the art gallery, big business influence has brought about important
changes in American cultural life." 3/04
Christopher Marlowe: The Complete Plays, by Christopher Marlowe
"Shakespeare's
rival,secret agent,freethinker,and author of: Dido, Queen of Carthage;
Tamburlaine The Great; The Jew of Malta; Doctor Faustus; Edward II; The
Massacre at Paris. 'Is this the face that launched a thousand ships...'
" 3/04
Democracy for the Few, by Michael Parenti
"For
decades, mainstream political scientists and other apologists for the
existing social order have tried to transform practically every
deficiency in our political system into a strength. They would have us
believe that the millions who are nonvoters are content with the
present social conditions, that the high-powered lobbyists are nothing
to worry about because they perform an information function vital to
representative government, and that the growing concentration of
executive power is a good thing because the president is democratically
responsive to broad national interests" 3/04
Somebody Else: Arthur Rimbaud in Africa, 1880-1891, by Charles Nicholl
"One
day in August 1880, a shabbily dressed young Frenchman disembarks at
Steamer Point, in the Arabian port of Aden. He carries a brown leather
suitcase; he has a touch of fever. At the age of twenty-five, Arthur
Rimbaud--the infamous author of A Season in Hell, the pioneer of
modernism, the lover and destroyer of Verlaine, the 'hoodlum poet'
celebrated a century later by Bob Dylan and Jim Morrison--turned his
back on poetry,France,and fame, for a life wandering in East Africa.
Following his fascinating journey, Charles Nicholl shows how Rimbaud
lived out that mysterious pronouncement of his teenage years:'Je est un
autre'-I is somebody else." 3/04
Media Control: The Spectacular Achievments of Propaganda, by Noam Chomsky
"The
issue is whether we want to live in a free society or whether we want
to live under what amounts to a form of self-imposed totalitarianism,
with the bewildered herd marginalized, directed elsewhere, terrified,
screaming patriotic slogans, fearing for their lives, and admiring with
awe the leader who saved them from destruction, while the educated
masses goose-step on command and repeat the slogans they're supposed to
repeat and the society deteriorates at home. We end up serving as a
mercenary enforcer state, hoping that others are going to pay us to
smash up the World." 3/04
Lost Christianities: The Battles for Scripture and the Faiths We Never Knew, by Bart D. Ehrman
"The
early Christian Church was a chaos of contending beliefs. Some groups
of Christians claimed there was not one God but two or twelve or
thirty. Some believed that the world had not been created by God but by
a lesser,ignorant deity. Certain sects maintained that Jesus was human
but not divine, while others said he was divine but not human. ...Bart
Ehrman offers a fascinating look at these early forms of Christianity
and shows how they came to be supressed,reformed,or forgotten. All
these groups insisted that they upheld the teachings of Jesus and his
apostles, and they all posessed writings that bore out their
claims...(it) reveals a religious diversity that says much about the
ways in which history gets written by the winners." 3/04
The Pink Triangle: The Nazi War Against Homosexuals, by Richard Plant
The Hipster Handbook, by Robert Lanham
Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media, by Edward S. Herman,Noam Chomsky
"This
book centers in what we call a 'propaganda model,' an analytical
framework that attempts to explain the performance of the U.S. media in
terms of the basic institutional structures and relationships within
which they operate. It is our view that, among their other functions,
the media serve, and propagandize on behalf of, the powerful societal
interests that control and finance them. The representatives of these
interests have important agendas and principles that they want to
advance, and they are well positioned to shape and constrain media
policy. This is normally not accomplished by crude intervention, but by
the selection of right-thinking personnel and by the editor's and
working journalists' internalization of priorities and definitions of
news-worthiness that conform to the institution's policy." 3/04
Beyond Hypocrisy: Decoding The News In An Age of Propaganda, Including the Doublespeak Dictionary, by Edward S. Herman
The Reckoning: The Murder of Christopher Marlowe, by Charles Nichol
"In
1593 the brilliant and controversial young playwright Christopher
Marlowe was stabbed to death in a Deptford lodginghouse. The
circumstances were shady,the official account--a violent quarrel over
the bill,or 'recknynge'--long regarded as dubious. The Reckoning is the
first full-length investigation of the killing,tracing Marlowe's
shadowy political dealings,his involvement in covert intelligence work,
and the charges of heresy and homosexuality against him." 3/04
Hope and Folly: The United States and UNESCO, 1945-1985, by William Preston,Edward Herman,Herbert Schiller
Necessary Illusions: Thought Control in Democratic Societies, by Noam Chomsky
"Conformity
is the easy way,and the path to privilege and prestige; dissidence
carries personal costs that may be severe, even in a society that lacks
such means of control as death squads,psychiatric prisons,or
extermination camps. The very structure of media is designed to induce
conformity to established doctrine. In a three minute stretch between
commercials, or in seven hundred words,it is impossible to present
unfamiliar thoughts or surprising conclusions with the argument and
evidence required to afford them some credibility. Regurgitation of
welcome pieties faces no such problem." 3/04
To Kill a Nation: The Attack on Yugoslavia, by Michael Parenti
"For
ten years,US and NATO forces have waged a campaign to dismember
Yugoslavia, including 78 days of round-the-clock aerial attacks in 1999
that killed or injured six thousand people in the name of
humanitarianism.To Kill a Nation reveals a decade long disinformation
campaign waged by Western leaders and NATO officials in their pursuit
of free-market reforms. The political and economic destablization of
that country continues today, Parenti shows, as does the forced
privatization and Third Worldization of the entire region." 3/04
Blackshirts and Reds: Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism, by Michael Parenti
"Parenti
shows how 'rational fascism' renders service to capitalism, how
corporate power undermines democracy, and how revolutions are a mass
empowerment against the forces of exploitative privelege. He also maps
out the external and internal forces that destroyed communism, and the
disastrous impact of the 'free market' victory on Eastern Europe and
the former Soviet Union. He affirms the relevance of taboo ideologies
like Marxism, demonstrating the importance of class analysis in
understanding political realities and dealing with the ongoing
collision between ecology and global corpratism. Written with lucid and
compelling style, this book goes beyond truncated modes of thought,
inviting us to entertain iconoclastic views, and to ask why things are
as they are." 3/04
Kabbalah: Three Thousand Years of Mystic Tradition by Kenneth Hanson
Into The Wild, by Jon Krakauer
"In
April 1992 a twenty-four year-old from the Washington DC suburbs named
Chris McCandless walked into the Alaska wilderness with a small caliber
rifle and a ten pound bag of rice. He had given $25,000 in savings to
charity, abandoned his car and most of his posessions, burned all the
cash in his wallet, and invented a new life for himself. Four months
later, his emaciated corpse was found at his campsite by a moose
hunter. How McCandless came to die is the unforgettable story..." 2/04
Middle East Illusions, by Noam Chomsky
Propaganda And The Public Mind, by Noam Chomsky and David Barsamian
"In
his latest interview collection, Noam Chomsky offers insights into the
institutions that shape the public mind in the service of power and
profit. Whether discussing U.S. military escalation in Columbia, the
attack on Social Security, or growing inequality worldwide, Chomsky
shows how ordinary citizens, if they work together, have the power to
make meaningful change." 2/04
Hellfire Nation: The Politics of Sin in American History, by James Morone
"The
American Constitution firmly seperates church and state. Yet religion
lies at the heart of American politics. How did America become a nation
with the soul of a church? ...From the colonial era to the present day,
Americans embraced a Providential mission, tangled with devils, and
aspired to save the world. Moral fervor ignited our fiercest social
conflicts--but it also moved dreamers to remake the nation in the name
of social justice. Moral crusades inspired abolition, woman suffrage,
and civil rights, even as they led Americans to hang witches, enslave
Africans, and ban liquor." 2/04
Original Youth: The Real Story Of Edmund White's Boyhood, by Keith Fleming
Shots In The Dark: The Wayward Search For An AIDS Vaccine, by Jon Cohen
Sissyphobia: Gay Men and Effeminate Behavior, by Tim Bergling
Harmful To Minors: The Perils of Protecting Children From Sex, by Judith Levin
The Assassination of Julius Caesar: A People's History of Ancient Rome, by Michael Parenti
"Most historians, both ancient and modern, have viewed the Late Republic of
Rome through the eyes of its rich nobility. They regard Roman commoners
as a parasitic mob, a rabble interested only in bread and circuses.
They cast Caesar, who took up the popular cause, as a despot and
demagogue, and treat his murder as the outcome of a personal feud or
constitutional struggle, devoid of social content. ...the
author...subjects these assertions of 'gentleman historians' to a
bracing critique, and presents us with a compelling story of popular
resistance against entrenched power and wealth. Parenti shows us that
Caesar was only the last in a line of reformers, dating back across the
better part of a century, who were murdered by opulant conservatives."
2/04
Inventing a Nation: Washington,Adams,Jefferson, by Gore Vidal
"Washington's
steady presence and regal confidence more than compensated for his poor
performance in the field against British generals, themselves every bit
as striking in their mediocrity as he." 2/04
GNU Emacs and XEmacs, by Larry Ayers
Sermons and Treatises, Volume III, by Meister Eckhart
Sermons and Treatises, Volume II, by Meister Eckhart
"Meister
Eckhart, thirteenth century Dominican theologian and the greatest of
the German mystics... Eckhart was regarded as the most learned scholar
of his time, people flocked to hear him preach and his influence on
contemporary theology was considerable. However, his declaration as a
heretic has meant that his spiritual message has been lost to us for
centuries. Today, his teachings are being re-discovered by a new
generation of spiritual seekers following his 'wayless way' which
bridges East and West." 1/04
Perpetual War for Perpetual Peace: How We Got To Be So Hated, by Gore Vidal
"Our
rulers for more than half a century have made sure that we are never to
be told the truth about anything that our government has done to other
people, not to mention our own. That our ruling junta might have
seriously provoked McVeigh and Osama was never dealt with. We consumers
don't need to be told the why of anything. Certainly those of us in the
why-business have a difficult time getting through the corporate
sponsored American media, so I thought it useful to describe here the
various provocations on our side that drove both bin Ladan and McVeigh
to such terrible acts." 1/04