Great Books
/greatbooks131
Primary text passages from the history of western thought.
"O then, dear saint, let lips do what hands do.
They pray: grant thou, lest faith turn to despair."
W. Shakespeare
They pray: grant thou, lest faith turn to despair."
W. Shakespeare
Steinbeck’s Grapes of Wrath is in my top-3 books, and is incredibly pertinent today with its themes of the human cost of technological upheaval, and the resiliency of the human spirit.
Interstitial chapters always hit me deep, in a way I never really understood as a kid. Here’s the true text from the joke I made below: genius.com/John-steinbe...
It’s a book that changed me, and if you haven’t read it recently I suggest you read it now.
Interstitial chapters always hit me deep, in a way I never really understood as a kid. Here’s the true text from the joke I made below: genius.com/John-steinbe...
It’s a book that changed me, and if you haven’t read it recently I suggest you read it now.
The first part of Bulgakov's "Master in Margarita" contains a retelling of the gospel from Satan's perspective, and it quite profound – turns Jesus into a purely political figure, and a very compelling one.
Shades of Arendt.
Shades of Arendt.
One can read a great book in a few days, but its hangover stays forever.
Much like the smell and crack of fallen leaves still gives me the excited feeling in my stomach that I’m walking to 5th grade basketball tryouts, the look and weight of a yellowing page of Bloom’s Republic takes my mind again to that winter in Annapolis where Plato made the whole world new.
Books can re-mind us.
Books can re-mind us.
These days, I live in a few different spaces throughout the year. And I've noticed that I am happiest in the place which contains my physical library.
Why? I think part of the reason is that every time I walk past my library, I am reminded of (1) how grateful I am that a Homer, a Plato, an Aristotle, a Shakespeare, and many others passed their thinking and teaching down to us in writing and (2) how much more time I would like to spend in the future working on how the fundamental human problems they raised can help us in our present modes of living (ie, both by seeing which problems have persisted, and which problems are new).
Invest in a library you love!
Why? I think part of the reason is that every time I walk past my library, I am reminded of (1) how grateful I am that a Homer, a Plato, an Aristotle, a Shakespeare, and many others passed their thinking and teaching down to us in writing and (2) how much more time I would like to spend in the future working on how the fundamental human problems they raised can help us in our present modes of living (ie, both by seeing which problems have persisted, and which problems are new).
Invest in a library you love!
hihi @tldr I nominate you to be a Moxie Expert and judge grant proposals in the "Education, Awareness, and Growth! " Category! Experts will also get Moxie grants for their time. Check out the Frame to learn more. Make sure to nominate yourself to accept!
cc @betashop.eth
I started reading books after having a conversation with you, I am not quite sure if you remember thank you friend
cc @betashop.eth
I started reading books after having a conversation with you, I am not quite sure if you remember thank you friend
Nietzsche on "the power of forgetting" – which is the same as the power to be "unhistorical" toward the past.
(excerpt is from "On the Advantages of Disadvantages of History for Life" – the early little essay that I consider to be perhaps the most important indicator of what Nietzsche is up to)
(excerpt is from "On the Advantages of Disadvantages of History for Life" – the early little essay that I consider to be perhaps the most important indicator of what Nietzsche is up to)
This is a great supplement to reading Shakespeare tragedies. Lots of insights.
https://youtu.be/yZndDTG0ckQ?si=4qdqWDEo7znr21Mj
https://youtu.be/yZndDTG0ckQ?si=4qdqWDEo7znr21Mj
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That’s Odyssean.
(Homer notes in the 2nd Bk of the Iliad — without explanation — that Odysseus positioned his fleet right in the middle of the long line of shored Greek ships at Troy. Ajax and Achilles were on either flank.)
(Homer notes in the 2nd Bk of the Iliad — without explanation — that Odysseus positioned his fleet right in the middle of the long line of shored Greek ships at Troy. Ajax and Achilles were on either flank.)
Love this. Socrates says it as:
“Many pray that they will receive the good things. They should instead pray that they would know how to become happy if they had the good things.”
“Many pray that they will receive the good things. They should instead pray that they would know how to become happy if they had the good things.”
Be still my heart, but... there's a movie version of The Odyssey that I'm actually excited about.
I'm bullish that they casted two unreal actors – Ray Fiennes of V*ldem*rt fame and Juliet Binoche of Chocolate fame – who happen to both be over 60 years old.
This bodes well bc few reflect on how old Odysseus was by the time he came home (he had been away for 20 years...)
I'm bullish that they casted two unreal actors – Ray Fiennes of V*ldem*rt fame and Juliet Binoche of Chocolate fame – who happen to both be over 60 years old.
This bodes well bc few reflect on how old Odysseus was by the time he came home (he had been away for 20 years...)
Odysseus is the only Homeric character who speaks to himself. He has “parts” to himself — the speaker (reasons), the heart (obeys), and the man (twists and turns).
It is a remarkable anticipation of Plato’s Republic, and helps us understand why Socrates calls Odysseus a philosopher at the end of that dialogue.
It is a remarkable anticipation of Plato’s Republic, and helps us understand why Socrates calls Odysseus a philosopher at the end of that dialogue.
ΩΚ, ΒΑΝΓΕΡ
many such pages :)
This but it’s Don Quixote
Imagine the best place you’ve ever visited. Now imagine that you lived your whole life without ever getting the chance to go.
^ This is what you are doing if you never read Homer’s Odyssey.
^ This is what you are doing if you never read Homer’s Odyssey.
Can I just say symposium of plato is one of the most head wracking book I have ever read or maybe it’s my first time exposed to a book like this
Stopped at Chapter 9, hoping to continue today a lot of personal issues came into play but that why we can always start again
This left me feeling empty and melancholic. One of those books where you wonder, what if times had been different?
“It didn’t matter. She was not happy and never had been. Why was life so inadequate, why did the things she depended on turn immediately to dust?… Yet if somewhere there existed a strong, handsome being, with a valorous nature, at once exalted and refined, with the heart of a poet in the shape of an angel, a lyre with strings of brass, sounding elegiac epithalamiums to the heavens, then why mightn’t she, by chance, find him?”
“It didn’t matter. She was not happy and never had been. Why was life so inadequate, why did the things she depended on turn immediately to dust?… Yet if somewhere there existed a strong, handsome being, with a valorous nature, at once exalted and refined, with the heart of a poet in the shape of an angel, a lyre with strings of brass, sounding elegiac epithalamiums to the heavens, then why mightn’t she, by chance, find him?”
Can’t lose my streak
Farcaster pilled my friends with the power of books
Didn’t read today
Will catch up tomorrow
Will catch up tomorrow