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Recently read books
Kannon
NAMU AMIDA BUTSUAch-To Veteran
I searched for a thread similar to this but didn't find one. If there already is a thread and I didn't look well enough, my bad!
I read a lot. I know many of us here do. What books have you read recently?
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I just finished Catch 22. It's been called the only war story that makes sense. Of course it's actually filled with paradoxes, loopholes, and disregard to humanity. It's a very funny, chilling, emotional look at war. The kind of novel where you'll either love it or hate it. I loved it.
Catch 22 is class. I've read some of Joseph Heller's other stuff (over a decade ago now) and I think he's a brilliant, but much under-rated writer.
I'm currently reading a book about photography, but I devour Audio books and pay a small fortune to Audible. I reckon I listen to a book a week from Audible; I do mostly solitary manual work, and it's like I get paid to listen to talking books.
I'm currently listening to The Other Side of History: Daily Life in the Ancient World. It's about how the ordinary people lived, from Neanderthal times onwards.
Prior to that it was the Diaries of Samuel Pepys; that was about 42 hours worth.
I like a bit of history.
@Tosh there is a mail in order pamphlet for Something Happened in the back of my book from 1985. Maybe I'll send it in!
Edit: I love history too. I have the first volume of HG Wells Outline of History. I also have several books on the history of American government. A book on the civil rights movement. A book called Transgender Warriors, which looks at gender variance throughout history. I'm currently trucking through a book called the Better Angels of Our Time about the history and future of war/violence. It is an amazing and important book.
I usually read multiple books at a time because what I am in the mood for changes all the time, lol. I'm reading a great book called "Finland Forever" by Hudson Strode, which is an account of a man's experience of Finland and its people around 1941. I'm Finnish so I find it quite entertaining and interesting. I'm reading "Little Boy Lost" which is a legal thriller that was a freebie from Kindle First. I'm following the group with the "The Buddha Before Buddhism" book which I quite like. And am also reading "The Awakened Family" (parenting stuff), "Big Magic" which is a book about helping with the fears and blocks surrounding creativity, and "On Trails" which is kind of a historical account of trails through human history from hunter/gatherers to the App. Trail and so on. Very good writing in that one.
I am mostly focused on Big Magic right now, as this past spring I started a blog that I haven't shared with hardly anyone, and a woman I know has asked me if she can share it on her page, which is much bigger (lol) and she was just featured in a Minneapolis newspaper. But I am terrified! So working through that.
Currently Reading:
The Hare with the Amber Eyes - a biography and/or history of a family of Collectors and their fascination with netsuke.
Book of Eights (But then, aren't we all...?
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Presently reading Hokusai - Life and Work, Hokusai, and The Hokusai Sketch Books - Selections from the Manga. Yeah, I know - they're picture books, but there's enough text to qualify as reading. Checked these out after seeing the animated film Miss Hokusai, which I also recommend.
Sooner or later I will be reading The Buddha Before Buddhism. I suggested to the library people that they get this book, and - much to my surprise - they actually did so.
Hasn't arrived yet - library gets slower mail service than I do, evidently.
@Tosh Since you have the time to listen to audio during your day and like history I can't recommend more highly the Hardcore History podcast by Dan Carlin. I'd recommend starting with his series on WW1, Blueprint for Armageddon. It's still free on iTunes probably for a few more months before it moves to paid. I also really enjoyed his series on the eastern front of WW2, Rome and a one off on the history of children. It's not simply a chronicling of events rather he takes you down to the ground level of what it was like to live through and relates the stories and lessons to broader historical themes.
If you end up liking that History on Fire is another podcast in the same vein.
@fosdick, I've also watched Miss Hokusai recently, I thought it was a very interesting portrayal of Japan as it used to be, seen through the eyes of the Japanese.
Let's see, recently I've read Thich Nhat Hanh's Living Buddha, Living Christ which I would heartily recommend to anyone interested in the ways in which Buddhism and Christianity interact. I'm still reading Magic and Mystery in Tibet by Alexandra David-Neel, a fascinating account of the guru's and yogi's of the Tibet of the 1920's. And for light relief I read The Thief of Time by Terry Pratchett.
I'm not a very fast reader now... I used to read a book a day, but nowadays it's more a book every three or four weeks. I put it down to middle age, my brain no longer has the same spongelike qualities it used to when I was young.
I've just finished reading, The Young T.E. Lawrence. A fine book describing his travels in Arabia. His wandering eg the crusader castle walk. Thence traveling to the Carchemish area where he was a part of some major archeological digs. The author Anthony Sattin introduces Lawrence prior to his eventual fame as Lawrence of Arabia.
Haha; I've listened to loads of them, a year-or-two-ago. And yes, they were excellent.
I am currently reading "The Path to Enlightenment" by Venerable Luangpor Pramote Pamojjo. Not too far into it.
BTW, when you guys meditate, do you often find your feet going to sleep? That happens to me when I go to chanting/meditation at the local Thai temple. I doubt that will be covered in the book listed above.
My feet actually fall asleep more when I sit on a cushion than if I just sit on the floor. I think sitting on the cushion puts pressure in just the right places on various nerves. I can't do a seiza because I can't be on my bad knee without it swelling and causing pain. So I just sit on the floor, no cushion. When it's a hard floor, I sit on a yoga mat. But I've been spending considerable time on the floor over the last many months so I've had time to adjust to those changes.
Iam reading Papillon by Henri Charrière, The novel details Papillon's incarceration and subsequent escape from the French penal colony of French Guiana, very good book I think, and macho
Read this a few weeks ago, nicked from my sister's box of yard sale things
Currently reading
I don't sit in the full lotus because of my knees. I kneel with cushion wedged between heel and butt. I usually don't have any problems.
I usually have a couple books on the go. Something dharmic along with something sci-fi or non-fiction for pure entertainment. Right now I'm reading Star Trek Savage Trade and Infinite Circle by Bernie Glassman. It has one of the best explanations of the Heart Sutra I've read. I highly recommend it.
Who Am I? (Nan Yar?) - Sri Ramana Maharshi
"The Breakthrough" by Ajahn Amaro
https://www.amaravati.org/dhamma-books/the-breakthrough/
"I would encourage you to consciously develop the intention to learn what every experience can teach you. Bring that intention to mind at the beginning of each day –whether you’re formally meditating, walking from room to room, eating your breakfast or drinking a cup of tea, bring that quality of inquiry and reflection into being. Thus we develop the tendency to examine our life. We notice the mind states that we are experiencing, and whenever the mind moves towards the creation of dukkha, the creation of discontent, which is usually built out of complaining, worrying or thinking that life ‘shouldn’t be this way’ and happiness is just out of reach, we notice that if the mind is doing that, it is creating a complaint. It’s creating the idea that happiness is somewhere else, that peace and fulfilment are somewhere else, somewhere off in the future, over there, next week. When you’ve noticed that thought, things become a lot easier. " ~ Ajahn Amaro
I'm reading Napolean's Buttons which is a look at chemistry in world history. It is not the history of chemistry rather it is some chemistry that affected history. For example the story of explosives in history which were used both in warfare and building projects. The Nobel prizes were actually established from a dynamite fortune. Dynamite was an explosive safer to use and manufacture. Before dynamite there was high demand for explosives but countries were banning their manufacture because factories making exposives were exploding.