HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: chucks@acd.acd.ucar.edu (Chuck Smythe)
Subject: Re: Alaska (books sought)
Organization: Ntl Center for Atmospheric Research, Atmospheric Chemistry
Date: Tue, 13 Oct 1992 16:14:37 GMT

In article <Bw0o3o.9rp@news.cso.uiuc.edu> mbvg9741@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (M. Vincent Busenbark ) writes:
>
>I may be moving to Alaska in less than a year, and would
>appreciate information about works of literature that focus 
>on life in the state, primarily among the inuit or native Alaskans.
>(I don't suppose it has to be limited to the Inuit in Alaska,
>by the way.)

Nelson - Hunters of the Northern Ice.  
Anthropologist learns the hunting methods of the Inuit by undertaking to earn
his own living that way.

Freuchen - Book of the Eskimo
Account of the Inuit by a Hudson's Bay trader who more or less became one 
of them for a generation.  

Mowat - People of the Deer (and others)      
Accounts of the inland peoples of the Northwest Territories.  Especially
their decimation by starvation after the collapse of fur trading.

Mowat - Tundra
      - The Polar Passion
      - and a third about the Northwest Passage
A trilogy of original sources by the explorers of the American Arctic.
Principally about Canada, and principally about Anglos, but includes a lot
of material you'd be interested in.

And others, not principally concerned with the Native Americans, but each
excellent in its own way,

McPhee - Coming into the Country
McGuiness - Going to Extremes
Lopez - Arctic Dreams
Muir - Travels in Alaska
Murie - The Wolves of Mt. McKinley
      - The Grizzlies of Mt. McKinley
      - Two in the Far North
From: br@bnr.co.uk (Brian Robertson)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: Seeking: incisive essayists, any race, creed, or gender
Date: 15 Oct 92 13:16:47 GMT
Reply-To: br@bnr.co.uk (Brian Robertson)
Organization: BNR Europe Limited, London Road, Harlow, Essex, GB

oliver@redwood.CS.Berkeley.EDU (Oliver Sharp) writes:
> 
> Any suggestions?
> - Oliver
>

Try some of the Italian authors such as Umberto Eco (Travels in Hyperreality)
and Primo Levi (The Mirror Maker and The Periodic Table especially) for essays
on everything from the Holocaust to Marshall McLuhan. Most of these books
have been translated into English.

I find them very similar to George Orwell's essays in books such as Inside the
Whale...

Good reading

	Brian
From: heath@athena.cs.uga.edu (Terrance Heath)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: Not exaclty a repentance....
Date: 7 Oct 92 15:25:53 GMT
Organization: University of Georgia, Athens

In article <16069@mindlink.bc.ca> Crawford_Kilian@mindlink.bc.ca (Crawford Kilian) writes:
>Hello again, Terrance! Good to hear you're enjoying the 17th-18th century
>guys. Proof, if proof were needed, that you don't have be Mexican to like
>enchiladas...

	No, but I can bring my own insights into the discussion of
these canonical works (No matter how much deconstruction makes my
profs scream).

>At the risk of launching another loose canon, any comments on Shelby Steele's
>book The Content of Our Character? It's a collection of his essays on being
>black in America...I'm almost finished with it, and find it applies painfully
>well to Canada as well--to the predicament of our native Indians and other
>minorities. But I can well imagine that Steele bothers a lot of people.

	I've not read much Shelby Steele, except for one exerpt of an
essay, which appeared in "the Utne Reader".  I've been meaning to read
his book, and when I do I'll comment on it.



-- 
"Black men loving black men is THE revolutionary act!"
			-Joseph Beam_
Terrance Heath 
heath@athena.cs.uga.edu
From: ndrose@husc8.harvard.edu (Nathan Rose)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: Neither_Here_Nor_There
Date: 15 Oct 92 22:32:41 GMT
Article-I.D.: husc3.1992Oct15.183241.16427
Organization: Harvard University Science Center

I believe Bryson is a freelance journalist. I've seen pieces by him in a
couple of places ( a good one lately appeared in National Geographic
about the Rhine-Danube canal).
From: lew@cbnewsd.cb.att.com (lewis.h.mammel..jr)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: Once I put this book down, I could not pick it up again.
Summary: Jude the Obscure
Date: 9 Oct 92 19:59:56 GMT
Organization: AT&T

In article <Bvs8Jy.9Kz@mentor.cc.purdue.edu>, nickles@sage.cc.purdue.edu (john a nickles) writes:
> 
>  My choice for great yet unreadable book is (hands down) Thomas Hardy's
> Jude The Obscure. I refer specifically to the Little Father Time incident.
> When I read "Becus we are too meny", I had to throw the book across the room.
> I eventually finished the book, but it didn't get any better.
> 

I read this book maybe 25 years ago, when my sister had a copy
for an english class.  It is one of those books that made a lasting
impression. I remember a lot of vignettes from it, as well as the
mood of unrelieved pessimism. I had forgotten the apellation,
"Little Father Time", but not the significance of "Becus we are too
many".  It escapes me why this incident would incite such
a display of ballistics.

One scene I often think of is the "Eat little birdies" incident,
( or the "so it's 'Eat little birdies,' is it?" incident, if you
prefer. ) For me it  powerfully evokes that yearning for a
(ahem) kinder, gentler world that we so often feel. ( Don't we? )
Plus, I really dig birds.



Lew Mammel, Jr.
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: cb@tamarack13.timbuk (Chris Brewster)
Subject: Re: Oh yeah, *great* book ...
In-reply-to: marcy@sqwest.wimsey.bc.ca's message of Tue, 13 Oct 1992 20:32:38 GMT
Organization: pubs
	<92805@netnews.upenn.edu> <1992Oct13.203238.1274@sqwest.wimsey.bc.ca>
Date: 13 Oct 92 16:40:40 CDT

Marcy Thompson writes:

   The reason I *know* I'd rather hear _Tess_of_the_d'Urbervilles_
   discussed than read it is...

Footnote: the movie of Tess was great.

Chris Brewster
cb@cray.com
Xref: sparky rec.arts.books:18329 talk.politics.soviet:8448
From: weemba@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu (Matthew P Wiener)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Painful but good reading
Date: 9 Oct 92 16:37:36 GMT
Reply-To: weemba@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu (Matthew P Wiener)
Organization: The Wistar Institute of Anatomy and Biology
In-reply-to: jane@bohra.cpg.oz.au (Jane Lean)

In article <1992Oct9.012051.6207@bohra.cpg.oz.au>, jane@bohra (Jane Lean) writes:
>Sorry, I have to take issue with this one.  Something can be movingly, 
>soul-wrenchingly, beautifully written ("Good" in most people's estimation),
>and yet not _enjoyable_.  I can't think of an example off the top of my
>head, but do people know what I mean?

Max Frisch I'M NOT STILLER is an outstanding example in this category.
-- 
-Matthew P Wiener (weemba@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu)
From: wojdylo@maths.uwa.oz.au (INFIDEL)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: Only Connect
Date: 13 Oct 1992 10:59:47 GMT
Organization: The University of Westrn Australia
NNTP-Posting-Host: madvax.maths.uwa.oz.au

kate@cactus.org (Katherine M. Catmull) writes:

>In article <1b0qt1INNs55@uniwa.uwa.edu.au> wojdylo@maths.uwa.oz.au (John Wojdylo) writes:
>>>
>>
>>
>>Does "being connected" in the sense of Forster entail one has to be as
>>scatterbrained as Margaret?
>>
>>Stupid bitch.
>>
>>
>>
>> 


>I just read Howard's End this weekend. Margraret is passionate, strong,
>kind, and proud; and she makes a mistake or two as well. She is
>however anything but scatterbrained. Helen, perhaps; not Margaret.

Right. I meant Helen.


>Kate


jw


Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: trb@cbnews.cb.att.com (tom.balent)
Subject: Re: Mr Roberts (was: Re: Books in the time of school)
Organization: AT&T
Distribution: na
Date: Thu, 8 Oct 1992 11:34:46 GMT

In article <6OCT92.22394179@vax.clarku.edu> hhenderson@vax.clarku.edu writes:
>wismith@amelia.nas.nasa.gov (William R. Smith) writes:
>
>>Most of the action takes place during World War II aboard the cargo ship
>>USS Reluctant, 
>
>I enjoyed the book in high school too.  Written by Thomas Heggie, or Heggen?
>I don't believe he wrote anything else.  

mainly because he committed suicide after the book was published...

>Could be seen as a precursor to
>the later style of war "comedies" such as "MASH" and "Catch-22", at least
>in regards to the portrayal of individualism vs. the military.
>
>The movie, with Henry Fonda as Mr. Roberts, William Powell as the doctor,
>and Jack Lemmon as Pulver (and of course Cagney as the evil captain) is
>excellent and I've seen it many times.  However, I'm told by my dad that
>the Broadway play which preceded the movie was far superior.
>

Heggen based the story on his own experiences as an officer on a 
transport in the back waters of the Pacific during WWII.
From: lnh@soliton.physics.arizona.edu (sometimes a Wombat)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: The Richardson Thing
Date: 5 Oct 92 17:25:24 GMT
Distribution: na
Organization: Society for the Appreciation of Janni Lee Simner

James P. H. Fuller writes:
>
> That'sa me-a:
>
>>find it so unbelievable that I threw my last copy across the room 3
>>times.  The dents in the wall were nearly as large as those made by 
>>the CRC.
>
>     Your address is physics.  Do you mean the CRC Handbook?  Why are you
>tossing it around?  Did it fail you somehow?

CRC Handbook -- the BIG thing.  I was venting my frustration at a
really grungy particle physics problem set, and had been looking up 
meson quantum numbers.  It made a hefty dent in the thin plaster walls
of my student apartment, even though it landed face on.

To be fair, it was mid-terms, and I was not handling an affair with a 
girl with yellow hair very well.  The same one I mentioned in the Books
in the Time of Love thread.

	Larry "CRC in the time of cholera" Hammer
--

                          \   Absence diminishes small loves and increases
LNH@physics.arizona.edu    \  great ones, as the wind blows out the candle 
sometimes a Wombat          \ and blows up the bonfire. --La Rochefoucauld
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: baker@Xenon.Stanford.EDU (Andrew Baker)
Subject: Re: Enforced Shakespeare?
Organization: Computer Science Department, Stanford University.
Date: Mon, 12 Oct 1992 00:50:51 GMT

In article <1992Oct11.172651.11264@cmcl2.nyu.edu> cruz@lab.ultra.nyu.edu (Nancy Cruz) writes:
>In article <JMC.92Oct7113942@SAIL.Stanford.EDU> jmc@cs.Stanford.EDU writes:
>>Surely it is projecting to say that Shakespeare had a vision of
>>capitalism.
>
>I'm sorry, what I mean is the values that were evolving that later
>became the backbone of capitalism.  I did not mean to imply that
>Shakespeare was aware that this was the case, rather that his insight
>showed a keen intuitiveness into what was occurring and what was to occuur
>(whether he realized it or not).

I am not sure what you have in mind.  But Shylock does give an
eloquent statement of the subjective theory of value that is the
base of modern free-market economic theory:

SHYLOCK: . . .
	You'll ask me, why I rather choose to have
	A weight of carrion flesh than to receive
	Three thousand ducats: I'll not answer that:
	But, say, it is my humour: is it answer'd?
	What if my house be troubled with a rat
	And I be pleased to give ten thousand ducats
	To have it baned? What, are you answer'd yet?
	Some men there are love not a gaping pig;
	Some, that are mad if they behold a cat;
	And others, when the bagpipe sings i' the nose,
	Cannot contain their urine: for affection,
	Mistress of passion, sways it to the mood
	Of what it likes or loathes. Now, for your answer:
	As there is no firm reason to be render'd,
	Why he cannot abide a gaping pig;
	Why he, a harmless necessary cat;
	Why he, a woollen bagpipe; but of force
	Must yield to such inevitable shame
	As to offend, himself being offended;
	So can I give no reason, nor I will not,
	More than a lodged hate and a certain loathing
	I bear Antonio, that I follow thus
	A losing suit against him. Are you answer'd?

Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: wismith@amelia.nas.nasa.gov (William R. Smith)
Subject: Re: Book on time management?
Organization: NAS, NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, CA
Date: Thu, 15 Oct 92 15:09:26 GMT
Distribution: rec

Jin S. Choi writes:

	Anyways, can anyone recommend a good book on time management? I
	mean, are there any established classics on the subject? I'm referring
	to personal time management here, not in the corporate sense.


"How to Manage Your Time and Your Life".  I came across this several
years ago when I took a stress management class.  The preface of the
book asked a question that stunned me.  I closed the book and thought
about it for several hours, and still think about it occassionally
now.  It asked:  What are you going to do with all the time you save?

Stupid as that sounds, I never thought about it.

In the first chapter it asked what were your life goals.  What did you
want to do in the next X years (I forget what X was, maybe 10).  Then
what did you want to do in the next 3 years, or some nearer time frame.
Then what would you do if you found you only had 6 months to live.
Write all these answers down.  I still look at mine and revise them
from time to time.

I recommend the book even though its one of the much maligned "self-help"
books.



William Sburgfort Smith
Intel, SSD
From: maverick@fir.CS.Berkeley.EDU (Vance Maverick)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: Literature Students/Small World
Date: 7 Oct 1992 18:20:08 GMT
Organization: University of California, Berkeley
Distribution: world
NNTP-Posting-Host: fir.cs.berkeley.edu

In article <1992Oct7.180005.4102@u.washington.edu>, twain@milton.u.washington.edu (Barbara Hlavin) writes:
|> Vance:
|> >
|> >Now of course I realize I was being extreme, but I think it's worth
|> >our while as readers to ask, "So how accomplished a storyteller can
|> >she really be, if she doesn't make me want to read to the end of
|> >her stories?"  
|> 
|> Can't we just call this a matter of taste?

Sure, though in Auden's terms (cf. Fuller) I question the validity of
judgment when it runs counter to taste.

|> >Isn't the possibility of judgments like this the
|> >result of a fallacy of reification -- the isolation as a thing of a
|> >distinct "skill" like storytelling?
|> 
|> Are you saying that we can't meaningfully talk about abstractions 
|> like talents and abilities?  Or that there is not such a thing as 
|> a storytelling skill?  Or that we're defining it incorrectly?  
|> I'm not clear on what you're saying here.  

Something like your first two options -- that things like talents, in the
sense of a "talent for" something, and skills "at" something, have the
same dubious claim to thinginess as intelligence, or beauty.  They're
heuristically useful in exploring our enjoyments -- to say "Tchaikovsky
was a great orchestrator" can help elucidate the pleasures of the _Nut-
cracker_, but to say that, oh, Respighi, was a great orchestrator but a
weak composer verges (IMNSHO) on nonsense.

|> You've been channeling Borges again, haven't you? 

Actually, it was the medieval monk Jorge of Burgos.

	Vance
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: hhenderson@vax.clarku.edu
Subject: Ted Williams (was Re: Baseball etc. etc.)
Organization: Clark University
Date: 9 OCT 92 21:29:25 GMT


From: mtaranto@shearson.com (Mark Taranto):

>there are a lot of books which discuss the Red Sox.  One of my
>favorites is THE SUMMER OF '49 -- which discusses the rivalry between the
>Yankees and the Red Sox.  It concentrates on Joe DiMaggio and Ted Williams.
>Ted Williams was always one of my favorites (and remains the best hitter
>whom I've ever seen play <thought I'd throw that in to make some of you
>jealous>).  

I am.  Ted is God.  (Or one of them, anyway.)  The best book on him is still
the one he wrote with John Underwood, MY TURN AT BAT.  It's one of the best
sports autobiographies, in that the subject's personality comes through loud
and clear, the flaws as well as the greatness -- the complaining hero.

A bunch of Ted Williams books came out this year, and I bought the one I
liked the most, THE SEASONS OF THE KID.  It has amazing pictures, plus a
wonderful opening essay by Richard Ben Cramer.  Ted's inspired a lot of good
writing.  Here's one of my favorite baseball poems:

          COUPLET  by Donald Hall

          _Old-Timer's Day, Fenway Park, 1 May 1982_

          When the tall puffy
          figure wearing number
          nine starts
          late for the fly ball,
          laboring forward
          like a lame truckhorse
          startled by a gartersnake,
          -- this old fellow
          whose body we remember
          as sleek and nervous
          as a filly's --

          and barely catches it
          in his glove's 
          tip, we rise
          and applaud weeping:
          On a green field
          we observe the ruin
          of even the bravest 
          body, as Odysseus
          wept to glimpse
          among shades the shadow
          of Achilles.

Heather
HHENDERSON@vax.clarku.edu
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: mnemonic@eff.org (Mike Godwin)
Subject: Re: Fictitious Fiction
Originator: mnemonic@eff.org
Keywords: Morgenstern, Garp, Trout
Organization: Electronic Frontier Foundation
Date: Wed, 14 Oct 1992 19:29:50 GMT

In article <1992Oct14.144505.1348@netwise.com> hilary@netwise.com (Hilary Lane) writes:

>I also participated in a book discussion group about Byatt (whose sister is
>Margaret Atwood??? I think).

Her sister is Margaret Drabble. Atwood is Canadian.

> A lot of people think that she actually hates
>women because she makes them into unpleasant characters. I didn't catch
>that when I read it, but on reflection, that could be true. 

By the same reasoning, a man who writes about unpleasant male characters
must actually hate men.



--Mike



-- 
Mike Godwin,    |"I can solve this Orient Express thing without
mnemonic@eff.org| breaking a sweat. It's that simple."
(617) 864-0665  | 
EFF, Cambridge  |                           --Hercule Perot
From: pscchris@ubvmsd.cc.buffalo.edu (Christopher Holoman)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: The Philosophy of Science (was Re: Once I put this book down, I could not pick it up again.
Date: 15 Oct 92 16:36:00 GMT
Organization: University at Buffalo
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41

In article <9210142042.AA10178@cfdev1.shearson.com>, mtaranto@shearson.com (Mark Taranto) writes...
> 
>Christopher.Carne@brunel.ac.uk (Christopher J Carne) writes:
> 
>> Well, "The Structure of Scientific Revolutions" may be a landmark, but hey
>> its a bit long in the tooth by now, Both the philosophy and sociology of

[parts of original post deleted

> 
>As I've already mentioned, I'm no fan of Kuhn's.  But it should be noted
>that, like Christopher, Kuhn came at this topic from the social sciences,
>not from Philosophy.
> 

Just a quick note that this is not right.  Kuhn was trained as a physicist, 
and then moved to history of science and then to philosophy of science
(See _Structure_, 2nd ed., pg v.)  This is important because Kuhn  
objected to the use of his paradigm concept in the _social_ sciences,
where it was taken up with great relish,
although he later seemed to decide it was O.K.

(We'll set aside the fact that many people and universities consider
 philosophy a social science :-) )


>As for philosophers lurking around labs to see how science is done, most

[other points deleted]
>Mark


Chris
From: fuller@athena.cs.uga.edu (James P. H. Fuller)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Grendel
Date: 16 Oct 92 12:03:17 GMT
Distribution: na
Organization: University of Georgia, Athens


trb@cbnews.cb.att.com (tom.balent) writes:

>My recomendation is - if nothing else, read Grendel.


     Explain Grendel to me.  How can he be so bold and insightful in
his existential attitude toward the cosmos and his disdain for the 
retainers in Hrothgar's hall because they are ignorant thugs willingly
lost in muddy dreams -- and in practically the same breath be so
stupid and neurotic in disliking Hrothgar's wife just because she is
female?  Doesn't this ruin his magic?  I mean, the irony of the story 
is that the monster is so much more rational than the humans:

     Professor:  "Wait, General!  Before you fire let us try
                  reasoning with the monster."

     General:     "Don't be silly.  We won't be capable of reason
                  for a thousand years.  If then.  Fire away, boys...."

    But the first time Grendel's (self-proclaimed) enlightened Buddha
nature is at all challenged -- in having to come to terms with the exis-
tence of creatures like Hrothgar's wife -- he fails as badly as Fred
Flintstone.  So where's the irony now?  If his character is this badly
flawed when a real test comes along this makes it look as if his
alienation from the biker gang soaking up the brew down in Heorot is
based on nothing but inflamed ego and not any substantive superiority
of insight.  If the book is merely the tale of Grendel's *own* muddy
dreams of being ubermensch-Grendel why should we care about him?

     Just asking....
                  
                                                      -- jf
From: wojdylo@maths.uwa.oz.au (INFIDEL)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: Books in the time of love
Date: 13 Oct 1992 10:51:48 GMT
Organization: The University of Westrn Australia
NNTP-Posting-Host: madvax.maths.uwa.oz.au

msmorris@watsci.uwaterloo.ca (Mike Morris) writes:

>                                 Sunday, the 11th of October, 1992

>Yeah, John, you're right. It was just 'cause I was jealous that
>Mark gave you an opium den in Burma translating Chinese.


Turgenev was a wee youngster when he grew out of your kind of crap. 

"We weep for ourselves."   -- 'First Love', I. Turgenev.

Read it and feel sorry for yourself, wee-willy vici.



>                     Mike Morris
>              (msmorris@watsci.uwaterloo.ca)


jw
From: cramer@optilink.UUCP (Clayton Cramer)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: Once I put this book down, I could not pick it up.
Date: 13 Oct 92 20:50:41 GMT
Organization: Optilink Corporation, Petaluma, CA

In article <1992Oct9.095419.19647@klaava.Helsinki.FI>, amnell@klaava.Helsinki.FI (Marko Amnell) writes:
# ##speak up for the Bear-guy.  I LOVE _Beowulf_.  The range of emotional colors
# ##in _Beowulf_ is exactly the same as in Robert E. Howard's Conan novels,
# ##which I also love for precisely the same low, bestial reasons.  Beowulf
# ##and Conan alike transport you back to the days when you *could* solve all
# ##your major problems with a grunt and a bludgeon.   
# 
# It is my understanding that many Americans still do, but with a gun.
# Marko Amnell

Many?  Hmmm.  You must have an odd definition of "many."  From the
1991 edition of Uniform Crime Reports (the FBI's solution to
insomnia), I find that 14,265 murders were committed in the U.S.
last year with firearms.  That's about .0057% of the people in
the U.S.  (Actually less, because some murderers kill multiple
victims).

Perhaps you watch too much American TV?
-- 
Clayton E. Cramer {uunet,pyramid}!optilink!cramer  My opinions, all mine!
Lesson learned from Gov. Wilson's signing of AB 2601: if you don't get 
your way, have a riot.  Next time, Gov. Wilson will cower appropriately.
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: chucks@uars2.acd.ucar.edu (Chuck Smythe)
Subject: Re: Books in the time of school
Organization: Ntl Center for Atmospheric Research, Atmospheric Chemistry
Date: Thu, 8 Oct 1992 15:42:18 GMT

Katherine Catmull poses a question:
>As for books: I have an old habit of asking people "What's the book
>that got you through high school?"--you know, the book that
>kept you going, made you strong; that you re-read when in need of bucking up,
>perhaps even returned to in college like a teddy bear once in a
>while, maybe even occasionally now . . .

Not exactly a buck-uppo; Korzybski's _Science and Sanity_.  A dreary read, and
I'm astounded I got through it at sixteen. He taught me the habit of 
asking "how can he possibly know that?" or even "what, precisely, (if anything)
can that possibly mean?" and so immunized me agains politicians, preachers,
and gurus until I reached the Age of Reason.

			Chuck Smythe
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books