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| 0099282798
| 9780099282792
| 0099282798
| 3.81
| 5,302
| Jul 1970
| Mar 11, 2001
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liked it
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I consider this novel as a kind of intermission between the high suspense and tension of the second part with the concluding fourth part. The plot was
I consider this novel as a kind of intermission between the high suspense and tension of the second part with the concluding fourth part. The plot was not much, but now the soul of Kiyoaki Matsugae has entered its third form; a woman. Naturally, the book was filled with questions of sensuality, of rationality's losing battle against lust and desire. A major part of the book was dedicated in further discussions and contemplation regarding the theme of transmigration and reincarnation. The second and the third book, I think, would not be excessive to be recommended as a soft introduction to the Buddhist/Hinduism questions of reincarnation. While the second book contemplated on the active part of Eastern thoughts; of the unity between thought and action (echoing Schopenhauer), the third part deals with a more esoteric side of it. Deep contemplation, after all, might be a symptom of the self engaging in an active crusade against the approaching carnalities, as Honda here in the novel. It is of no wonder then, that the Buddha under the bodhi tree, was tested by Kamadeva, the embodiment of lust and desire, hours before he gained enlightenment. This part focused on the school of Yushiki, "consciousness only", who finally solved the contradiction between Buddhist thoughts of anatman (denial of the existence of self) and reincarnation. If there is no such thing as individual self, then what is being carried from one stage of transmigration to another? Shakyamuni did not contribute much by swatting away all metaphysical questions asked by his disciples. The school of Yuishiki solved this intricate puzzle by their doctrine of alaya and the perfuming of seeds. This doctrine would be too complicated to be summarized here. In essence, the Yuishiki provided an important extension from the Buddhist elder's Nagasena parable that the self is like the many colors of fire burning on a wick. It could be of different colors and shape in the morning, the other in the night but it is of the same wick/essence. "The karmic existence of an individual is not substantive existence but merely a succession of phenomenon..." Despite the meagre plot, the discussion on unique Buddhist thoughts could be the redeeming qualities of the book. Now onwards to the final part. ...more |
Notes are private!
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Aug 26, 2021
Nov 20, 2018
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Sep 05, 2021
Nov 25, 2018
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Nov 20, 2018
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| 1846682576
| 9781846682575
| 1846682576
| 4.18
| 9,918
| Jan 01, 2011
| May 03, 2012
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it was amazing
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By God, reading this book is one of the most satisfying experience I ever had. I believe that there are, at the most fundamental level, two kinds of a By God, reading this book is one of the most satisfying experience I ever had. I believe that there are, at the most fundamental level, two kinds of a curious men. A historical and a polemical man. A historical curious man, ironically, interest himself with the problems of genesis, process and homeostasis. He is concerned with how something could arise and how it revolves. Belonged in this category were the founding philosophers (Plato, Aristotle, Kant, Hobbes), anthropologists, historians and empirical scientists. The second category, on the other hand, are more involved in the application and impact of idea rather than its genesis. This second category, by right, should only arise as an extension from the first category, for it is foolish to ruminate on application without a proper education on the issue he is concerned with. Unfortunately, this is no longer the case in our days. Belonged into this second categories were great man such as the later philosophers (Jean-Paul Sartre, Nietzsche, Hume), political theorists (Locke for his expansion of Hobbes, Rousseau for his critique on Hobbes), and the rest of literature movement in our days. This book is a haven for the historical curious man. Why? For it traced from the very genesis the author believed where political thoughts arise. The scope was gigantic, sprawling from 5 million years ago until the dawns of French and American Revolutions (in this first volume). I get the same feeling reading this book as I was reading Hobbes and Schopenhauer. They are both analytic and synthetical, their intentions were to provide, as best as they could, the picture of human’s thoughts. They were not afraid to present two opposing thoughts, even contrary to them, present these thoughts in the most impartial way (so the readers can really understand even their opponent first, and this primal principle regrettably absent in our days), and only then proceed to finish off the conflicting thoughts with their own apt and critical analysis. And so in this book. Our journey started with contrasting between Aristotle, on one hand, and Hobbes, Locke and Rousseau. Hobbes believed that the state of nature of man is of perpetual war and only by engaging in rational decision-making, man acknowledge the state to secure both his life and private property. Only through the Leviathan, can one’s life is guaranteed and man lived in a peaceful communality. Locke expanded on Hobbes by saying that this Leviathan can also bites, so justifying for an uprising against an unjust state. Rousseau, with his French romanticism, rebutted by saying the state of war Hobbes propounded his model on was not the state of nature, but a result of social institutions along the history. Man, in nature, was timid and reserved, according to him. Aristotle, on the other hand, believed that man has the innate ability to socialise with each other; humankind is political by nature. Our authors, seemed to be in agreement with Aristotle, provides a biological backing of this political state of nature thinking. All the first three modern thinkers committed a fallacy by believing that there is a pre-historic time where man are engaged in individual adventures and enterprises. But there is no evidence at all suggesting of this lonely archaic era. Humankind, if evolution to be taken as true, directly related to the chimpanzees, and even the chimpanzees has their own innate sense of social rules. These social rules could be traced back to two principles; kin relation and reciprocal altruism. Kin relation is that one does not simply fight for one’s survival, but also to protect one’s handing down of genes. This explained how animals possess the capacity to save their offspring in expense of their life and how animals and even humans, discriminates in their actions towards individuals that share more of their genetic relations. Reciprocal altruism, on the other hand, operated on game theory of tit-and-tat, where one can even engage in a beneficial relation with a total stranger proportional to trust and reliability the other party showed. From these two basic principles, Fukuyama expanded on the origin of religion, family and social cohesion. Not forgetting the newly founded ability of language, the primitive man has the ability not just in naming concrete things, he now can sequentially learn general classes of things (dogs, cats) and finally to a complete concepts of abstractions, that is both invisible and immanent. Fukuyama’s theory on political development initially started with three dimensions, which then would be added to it more factors. The factors are; state-building, the rule of law and accountability. Fukuyama started his elaboration on state building by examining a historical case of China, which he believed where originated the first state. But he soon later would compare and contrast the story of Chinese nation building with other states. In a way, this sort of narration provides a smooth transition from one case to another. Fukuyama proceeds with a wonderful style of prose and narration, successfully presenting increasing amount of information without causing the reader to lost themselves in it. I believe every enthusiast in the political world should have a read of this book. ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Oct 27, 2018
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Nov 03, 2018
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Oct 27, 2018
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| 0099282895
| 9780099282891
| 0099282895
| 4.22
| 8,128
| 1969
| Mar 11, 1999
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it was amazing
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Romantic but heroical. Reading through this novel, it seemed like I was immersed in a Homeric world, but instead of the plains of Troy, it brought me
Romantic but heroical. Reading through this novel, it seemed like I was immersed in a Homeric world, but instead of the plains of Troy, it brought me to the times of turmoil in Japan. This was the second book of the Sea of Infertility tetralogy. While the first book explored the theme of unhindered passion and beauty, the second book focused on the reincarnation of Kiyoaki in its most antithetical terms; fire of purity and zealotry. The novel was set in 1932-1933, during a time Japan was aching the most due to encroachment of the Western ideas of capitalism and communism. A band of like-minded youths, lead by Isao Iinuma, inspired by the book League of the Divine Wind, took under their hands to terrorize Tokyo and to press the corrupt nation to return executive and financial powers back to the Emperor. This book is beautiful in every aspect. The random discourse on Buddhism and Shinto philosophy, the exegeses of concepts such as Buddhism "nirvana" or the Wang-yang ming "congruity of thoughts and deeds" were scattered through out the novel, providing its flesh with ever more colours. Here exposed the full array of youth's unblemished and purity of spirit, so pure that even its formless abstraction could provide for a beautiful story. This is a novel of the youth spirit par excellence. It was somehow placed in an ideal world, where even this very act of sedition and insurrection could be pardoned in the name of patriotism and youth spirit. Here and there people were throwing reverence towards the group, saying things like "We wouldn't need to worry if Japan has youths like you!" and such. Even the old and immovable judge presiding the session, his splotched cheek burned with the colour of youthful emotion after hearing Isao's elaboration of his ideals. While in the first novel, the beautiful love story revolved around the temptation of a forbidden love, here it progressed to an analysis of women's psychology. In the character of Makiko, a maiden returned to her father's home from a failed marriage, she fall in love with Isao. A summary of a women's love would be in this apt dialogue, "...And so naturally, when a man she loves does come along, she wants to make sure that he stay hers and hers alone, even if he is put out of her reach, even if she has to bear the infinite suffering of not being to be with her man..." Here in this novel, is a display of raw love bordering on obsession. A woman's love knows no ideal, no abstraction, it is grounded to the earth. What is ideal, patriotism, reverence to the Emperor to Makiko compared to her feelings to Isao? Even to the level of disgracing and betraying Isao and his ideals, she recognised nothing wrong with it. It was near the end I understood the significance of Isao's dream of being transfigured into a women. After it was revealed that he was betrayed by his own father, Isao broke down and said with ruefulness, "Yes! Maybe I ought to be reborn as a woman. If I were a woman, I could live without chasing illusions...." Man's life has always been tainted for his drunkenness in his love for the Moon. The Moonshine disease, where adventurers and even a plain man looked in the great beyond, afflicted every man. This chasing of illusions is what fuels a man's life. In contrast, a woman's life is a paradise manifested here and in the flesh, she sufficed with being with the ones she love. But a man's paradise is his curse, for he would chase a shadow after another. I would also highlight the political theme in this novel. It was a reaction against the incursions of Western ideals, especially of capitalism and communism. Capitalism for its greedy nouveau riche who deemed to be unpatriotic and greedy to the point of sacrilege. Communism for its blatant show of irreverence towards the existence of the Chrysanthemum Throne. The clashes between right and left wings, while subsided to a great degree over the years, has shown a recent resurgence in Japan. The call for a more robust army and reverence to the Emperor has coloured Japan's political news in these few years. The world, it seem, is experiencing an innate recoil to the chimeras progressivism and pluralism commanded. Chimeras never work, it would remain an abomination. Updated second reading. ...more |
Notes are private!
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Aug 08, 2021
Oct 24, 2018
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Aug 16, 2021
Oct 27, 2018
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Oct 24, 2018
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| 0679753346
| 9780679753346
| 0679753346
| 3.96
| 2,409
| 1963
| Mar 29, 1994
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really liked it
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None
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1
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Oct 19, 2018
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Oct 23, 2018
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Oct 19, 2018
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| B0DSZYYH5W
| 3.86
| 138,303
| Oct 05, 1992
| 2003
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it was amazing
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Some people said that it was generic, but for me, it was spot on. South of the Border, West of the Sun is a revisionist work on the proverb "the grass Some people said that it was generic, but for me, it was spot on. South of the Border, West of the Sun is a revisionist work on the proverb "the grass is always greener on the other side". Living in an industrial and monotonous world, at times if you can stare intense enough, our world is not that different from the world of Murakami's. We were taught to dream big so we can live big, but nobody is mindful enough to remind us where's the line to stop. Perhaps, people are afraid to put a gentle reminder on that matter, fearing to be judged against the optimism spirit of our age. They also say to never interrupt a sleepwalking person. And so, we faced in our everyday life the incongruence between our ideals and reality. Love in our mind and love as applied in the world differed greatly, a large yawning abyss separating them. Which should we choose? For me, no material can exist without form but the rumination of mind are even short of having something to be called as form. People are getting more and more unsatisfied with their life from an ideal themselves never seek to define. And a form that has no definition, or at least limits and borders, by rule, must relinquish any hold to the empirical world. We seek love and we find someone, but yet we found something lacking. What is this something that lacks? From where we catch the glimpse of perfectness that now we are seeing something that is lacking? If there is no standard of perfection we derived our complaints, is it possible that the lack we've experienced is just a fragment of our imagination? When I see the crescent moon, I knew that it is lacking for I have seen the full moon. But, for an example, in the case of love, where have I seen perfectness in love that allow me to say confidently that now I am indeed experiencing a lacking in it? Here, in this novel, was narrated the story of Hajime. Hajime is the archetypical Murakami's hero, distant and offbeat. But in this novella, Hajime the hero was given the life a normal person should not have any complaints. He is not dirty rich, but he is making money. He has a loving wife and two lovely daughters. What else a man can ask for? Now enter, the Murakami-esque mystery woman, Shimamoto. Shimamoto is a limp lady Hajime known back when he was 12. Shimamoto bore an air of independence and self-conscious around her, effectively made a barrier from everybody else, and so Hajime was left with her. They would spend evenings together in Shimamoto's house, listening to records and talking about their futures... They felt a special bond towards each other, but the rashful bashfulness of youth prevented them to confess what's building in their hearts. As they grew up, they naturally went to their separate ways. From here, it would be spoilers so beware. And so, Hajime has lived his normal life until one day he caught a glimpse of Shimamoto in the streets of Shibuya. He tried to approach her but didn't have the courage, ending up following her for 40 minutes straight. After losing her, he was approached by a mysterious man quietly asking him to forget her while giving him an envelope of money to hush him up. His days, since then, was filled with recounting and reminiscing his moments with Shimamoto. And voila, Shimamoto appeared in his bar one night. They spent time together since then and naturally something sparked between them and to cut the story short, Hajime slept with Shimamoto. But, when it was morning, Shimamoto was nowhere to be found. Hunted by his guilt, Hajime confessed to his wife that he has somebody else he loved. Naturally, this cause a drive between the couple. Hajime spent his days waiting fruitlessly for Shimamoto. And towards the end, he remembered the envelope he was given to, perhaps there were some clues in it. And the envelope was nowhere to be found. Now, I have hinted that perhaps that ideal and standard we built, without limits and borders, resembled nothingness than concreteness. What else something without limits, borders, shapes and content can be called with, other than nothingness? Such is the identity of Shimamoto. The proverb "the grass is always greener on the other side" is an empty statement, designed to engulf everything yet mean nothing. Of course it is logical, of course Man is condemned to a Faustian race to always look beyond, and like Icarus, only to be burn and fall down back to Earth. The "South of Border" song Hajime and Shimamoto heard together when they were children was indeed the epitome of ideality, a land of unknown adventure and vast booty, but in reality, it was only describing Mexico and no Eden was there to be found. "West of the Sun" relates to the hysterica siberiana, where Siberian farmers were supposed to descent in madness chasing their dreams day by day. Hajime seek for the Edenic "South of Border" but all this time he is only going westward, "West of the Sun", only to be trapped in his rumination and ideals. I remembered I complained that in Hard-boiled Wonderland there was an obvious lacking of the Murakami-esque heroines, but boy, here we are blessed with 4 of them. The best of them was definitely Shimamoto, which Murakami put great care and thoughts in creating her characters. It was this feeling of disbelief of the non-existence of Shimamoto despite her organic and dynamic presence in the novel that make everything much more bittersweet. Shimamoto is an ideality, at its peak. ...more |
Notes are private!
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2
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Jan 02, 2020
Oct 17, 2018
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Jan 03, 2020
Oct 18, 2018
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Oct 17, 2018
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Paperback
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| 0394726251
| 9780394726250
| 0394726251
| 4.12
| 11,702
| 1983
| Feb 12, 1985
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really liked it
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When I flipped for the first time the pages of this book, and there's the title "Book I: Time", my body shuddered with excitement and in awe. Where ca
When I flipped for the first time the pages of this book, and there's the title "Book I: Time", my body shuddered with excitement and in awe. Where can we ever found another book that its author decided to start a chronicle of mankind's history, not with a material theme such as writing or metal-working, but with a theme much closer to man's being, that all-mysterious concept, Time? It was then, I knew, that reading this book would be a wonderful journey. And, it is. Starting from Time, Boorstin brought us into a journey recounting man's Promethean effort of freeing himself from first the binding of the moon (lunar year), and then overcoming the sun itself (solar year) and then stood at the peak with an affirmation of Man's independence from the nature with his inventions of minutes and seconds, free from the binding of Selene and Apollo. Then, he successively unfurled entire Man's history. Overwhelming at times, but the prose was extremely readable and you don't need to have prior extensive knowledge to know what's this journey is about. This journey is about us, after all. I highly recommended this book to everyone who wished to have a taste in this ocean of mankind's history. Boorstin successfully converting this vast ocean into a story each of us can enjoy. If you want to have a grasp on mankind's history, this book should be on top of your list. It is important to remember the title while reading the book. It is "The Discover-ers", rather than "Discovery" itself. So, while others were talking about how reading the book have a "Sid Meyer's Civilization" feel to it, the book was not arranged according to inventions or milestones. The chapters were arranged under a common theme while touching some of the important figures under the theme. After a while and the magic of Boorstin's prose kind of stabilized from its heady start, the book is starting to have a biography-like feel to it. And to narrate a string of eminent figures under a single chapter meant that the depth offered sometimes felt superficial, but most of the time never in a bad way. Even so, this is not a critique upon this book, as this book intended to provide the reader with a feel of mankind's vast history. Take the book as a good starting point to highlight parts of history or figures that we resonated with. A magnificent book never stood alone, for it would introduce us to his infinite friends and the story move on. I believe this book is one of those. ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Oct 10, 2018
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Oct 17, 2018
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Oct 10, 2018
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| 0375411224
| 9780375411229
| 0375411224
| 4.30
| 56,463
| 1872
| Oct 24, 2000
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it was amazing
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So, what’s this novel is about? This novel is a critique on nihilism, set in a parodical way but towards the end, it unfailingly touched my heart in ma So, what’s this novel is about? This novel is a critique on nihilism, set in a parodical way but towards the end, it unfailingly touched my heart in many ways I never imagined it to. This might be the best Dostoevsky’s novel I’ve read, even more than Crime and Punishment or The Brothers Karamazov. The novel was set in the mid to late 1800’s Russia, where liberalism and consequently nihilism were spreading rampant not just in the holy Mother Russia, but throughout Europe. This was a world of Marx and the Internationale, the anarchists Herzen and Bakunin and whole of Europe were still shaking in spasms of ruptures from the great and terrible French Revolution. Dostoevsky’s main novel were unfurled around a single event; murder. In this novel, the murder was based from a true event committed by a radical nihilist, Sergey Nechaev. Nechaev and his “fivesome” was convicted for the murder of a fellow student. This gruesome act of theirs was solely to usher in “…getting everything destroyed; both the state and its morality...” Putting the words of an idealist apart, the murder was just a naive act “…to better weld us together in blood..”, it even lacked a sound reason! And so, this novel’s plot is about the nihilist Pyotr Verkhovensky bustling about in a provincial town, trying to recruit fellow comrades to carry acts of subterfuge and rebellion in spirit of revolution. Of course, as other Dostoevsky’s novel, the main plot unfurled along anecdotes of domestic affairs, that at times fail to attract my attention. But, if the reader has the patience, this novel is totally worth to be read and kept dearly at heart. In my opinion, Dostoevsky was set upon to critique or at least to depict, three forms of nihilism, political, philosophical and lastly, apathy. The last of the three might be argued as not one of the forms of nihilism, but bear with me, for I have my own reasons to include it later in the essay. As this would be the last Dostoevsky’s novel (at least for now), please forgive me for the brevity of this modest composition. 1. Political Nihilism Political/societal nihilism can be defined, in Dostoevsky’s word, as “…a lackeyness of thought..”. In the context of this novel and other Dostoevsky’s novels, a nihilist is a brand of socialists, especially in Russia, who advocated the destruction of the existing social order without specifying what should replace it. Nechaev in this novel was adopted in the character of Pyotr Verkhovensky and his band or revolutionaries. The main idea of these solemn band of revolutionaries could perfectly summarised by the Jew Lyamshin, who out from his cowardliness rather than a moral and guilty conscience, snitched to the authorities about the murder. In the words of Lyamshin, this movement was all about “….for all the systematic shaking of the foundations, for the systematic corrupting of the society and all principles; in order to dishearten everyone and make a hash of everything, and society being thus loosened, ailing and limp, cynical and believing, but with an infinite unlearning for some guiding idea and for self-preservation- to take it suddenly into their hands, the banner of revolution..” This fiery and excesses of enthusiasm described perfectly the mood in 1800’s Europe. Europeans find themselves in a fever and anxiety wishing to be liberated from the old order in any ways and by any means possible. Somewhere in the novel, there was a poem reciting “…from Smolensk to Tashkent, the student is impatiently waited…” to take revenge on “…family, marriage and the church..” There is a caveat here. Dostoevsky intended to write this novel as a parody and so his depictions of the nihilist were sometimes exaggerated. But this by no means take away from the sharp wittiness of his, humour, is after all an art. The gang of nihilist were depicted to be sometimes solemn, sometimes babbled in nihilistic silliness. The nihilist midwife, for an instance, placed his lover in the same house as her husband, proclaiming the liberal right of a social marriage. Other anecdotes were also included, certainly delivering the message home on how absurd the whole idea of nihilism is if it had any chance to be realised, but some of revelation dropped are not to be brushed over. One of them is perhaps one of the most quoted words in this novel, where the nihilist Shigalyov famously said that how he “…started from unlimited freedom, I conclude with unlimited despotism...” His answer to the “liberty question” was to divide humankind into two unequal parts. One tenth is granted freedom of person and unlimited rights over the remaining nine tenths. The nihilists obviously understood that this enlightenment of theirs could be never understood by the entire masses of the human mob, but believing their cause is the cause, it would only be logical for these enlightened ones to guide the remaining parts to salvation. But, now as all the nine parts of humankind is no better than the herd, there would be no sooner than someone would suggest to “....take these nine tenths of mankind, since there’s really nothing to do about them, and blow them sky-high…”. I believe I have spoken enough, and perhaps too much in describing the nihilists as described in the novel. I would mention briefly about two matters as a closure for this current section. The first is regarding the origin of nihilism in Russia for historical purposes. The radicals’ head honcho Pyotr Verkhovensky was abandoned in his childhood by his father, Stepan Trofimovich. Stepan Trofimovich is a parody of the previous generation in Russia, who seemed to be in constant ruptures of the French liberalism and the German “the beauty and the sublime”. The people of this generation basked themselves in a total optimistic, artistic and romantic view of life, proceeding way beyond the vile sweetness of syrup water, but to a point of an Eden-like naivety. But this Olympian snobbishness was an aristocratic taste, its nectar was not shared to the vast masses of plebs. And so, the plebs quacked from their slumber in rebellion of their fathers and mothers. Secondly, on how nihilists despite all their shows of solemnity, were just humans. Perhaps, all-too-human. Towards the end of the novel, we were introduced to a new character, the nihilist wife of Shatov, Marie Ignatievna. She left his husband, Shatov after a mere two weeks in favour of the charming Nikolai Vselodovich, again invoking the right of liberty. She visited her abandoned ex-husband under the pretext of work, but really she was done wrong by scoundrels and now pregnant with a strangers’ child. She at first treated Shatov with disdain, with the tough image of today’s feminist, not wanting to be treated unequally from her male counterparts. Despite all this, she was touched with Shatov’s gentleness and reconciled with her husband. The scene, where she abandoned all of those nihilist’s acts and surrendered herself to this pure and joyful elation in celebrating the birth of a new life was so touching. 2. Philosophical Nihilism This form of nihilism need no introduction. This form of nihilism adopted the persona of Kirillov, a person who seems obsessed in killing himself. I’m not sure whether Dostoevsky purposefully wrote Kirillov’s philosophy as senseless blubber, but there is contradiction and doubts everywhere in his philosophy. His idea revolves around this; Jesus Christ is the highest man on earth, there is no greater miracle other than him before or after him. This great man, on the cross, believed so much that he utter “This day you will be with me in paradise” and then died. But, if the laws of nature did not pity even the Chosen One, made him live amidst a lie (considering if his teaching was from a mere epileptic fit) and even die for a lie, then this whole planet is “…a lie, stands upon a lie and a stupid mockery. Then the very laws of the planet are a lie and a devil’s vaudeville…” I think the above words described enough of this form of nihilism as depicted in the novel. I found it akin to Ivan Karamazov’s words of rebellion , that if a child should die from abuse just to prove God’s justice in the afterlife, to prove his Almightiness, then he would gently refused the ticket form Him. And this form of nihilism, I think, was even much raw than Nietzsche’ form of nihilism, for while Nietzsche denies any purpose to life, he affirms to life in a resounding “Yes!” as shown in his parable of eternal recurrence. 3. Apathy Now, maybe it is a bit of awkward to place apathy as one of the forms of nihilism. But aren’t nihilism is a pure negation of purpose in life and universe, and apathy is just a few brushes from that or even worse. For the nihilist while denying any purpose in life, put forwards the notion of “projects” (in Sartre’s words) to solve the contradiction of the need for action in a purposeless world. But the apathetical person, says nothing, feels nothing and worse, do nothing. It is not about the absence of contradictions that filled an apathetical person’s thought, but even an absence of problems. There can’t be any synthesis in the apathetic person, for there aren’t even theses or antitheses to begin with. Now then, what is morality, laws of nature, sensitivity and common sense to the apathetic man? Close to nothingness, because for him, it doesn’t make any damn difference to him. Nikolai Vselodovich is the paragon of apathy in this novel. He lived his life freely in debauchery, not because he can’t help it but only because he wants it. When he decided to had enough of it, he cease from doing such acts. When he is bored, he filled his time with pranks, love escapades and subsequent abandonment. The Appendix was the chapter where this apathetical man was revealed. Nikolai Vselodovich lodged in the house of landlady who frequently abused her daughter, Matryoshka. When he lost his penknife, he wanted to report the lost but found the landlady was whipping her daughter for hiding the rag. The child didn’t even scream, only whimpered. And the rag was found under the table. Furious now that she was being wrong in her prior whipping, boosted from Nikolai’s lost penknife, she proceeded to take a few twigs from the broom and whipped Matryoshka right in front of Nikolai. Again, she did not cry out and continue to whimper for the next whole hour. And, he did not utter a single word. Intrigued by this particular silence from Matryoshka, Nikolai was seduced by a new notion of pranks. He, one day, approached the child and kissed her. Matryoshka, perhaps confused from this sudden demonstration of affection she never received before, kissed this charming guy back. But then, something akin to fear and terror struck her. An antithesis was raised, and she fell into stupor saying that she “…has killed God…”. The next few days, Nikolai found a maid who was very much in love with him in his room and proceed to have an intimate relationship with her foolishly. All this was done in the same house as Matryoshka. A second antithesis was raised. And the result of this double antitheses was Matryoshka hanged herself. Troubled by this new sensation called guilt, Nikolai Vselodovich married a limp simpleton who he knew in love with him. The nihilist intended to break the societal laws and order because he perceived and affirm of their existence first, and to destroy them second. But to the apathetic man, what is laws and order, after all? Conclusion Now, I have elaborated about the three forms of nihilism depicted in this novel. But how about the title of the novel? Perhaps, the appellation Demons was reserved for the nihilists, especially Pyotr Verkhovensky. But I believed it is used in the context of the following conservation. “And is it possible to believe in a demon, without believing at all in God?” Stavrogin laughed. “Oh, quite possible, it happens all the time,” Tikhon raised his eyes and also smiled. Whether you are a believer or an atheist, the demons would always existed even while we bickering about whose God is the greatest. Now, I don’t know who are these demons and where are them and their whereabouts. But, I do know, at the vey least, that we are living in a madhouse. And so, it doesn’t matter at all anyway. ...more |
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| 4.13
| 6,041
| Dec 12, 1987
| Jan 15, 1989
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really liked it
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The book is literally Herculean in both of its size and its scope. The book covered an entire 500-years of history, from 1500 to its closing stage of W The book is literally Herculean in both of its size and its scope. The book covered an entire 500-years of history, from 1500 to its closing stage of World War II. The book's true nature, was however a mystery. It is not encyclopaedic, in terms of narrating the details as other history books did. Nor, did the pages enveloped as a purely speculative interpretations upon the events of history. Take it as a prolonged essay, written in a hurried flurry of recalling past events and linking them with economical interpretations. A history buff, while salivating on the vast scope offered by the review would ultimately shot down by passing mentions of key wars in European history. A student in politics, too would be disappointed by again passing mentions of manoeuvres and strategies deployed in dealing with those wars. From an ambitious book intending to cover a 500-years history, this might be the best we can get. We still can get the gist arguments from the book; that power is relative, that the world is moving from a bipolar to multipolar interactions; both hailed from the fact that economical and social factors are the driving force behind all-too-frequent hostile interactions between these nations. And that's about it. The book is nonetheless a classic in history and international relations. The scope was too wide and thus at times unfortunately superficial, but it provides a good overview of interactions between nations within the time frame. I wouldn't recommend the book to readers who hoped to get a clear narration before the explanation; key figures, wars, plans, strategies, narrations and explanation are mentioned simultaneously with an unforgiving speed. This book assumed the reader had at least a minimum knowledge on say, how World War I erupted, what is the Marshall plan or what the hell is Locarno treaty, frequently mentioned in the text. Finally, to picture an image of the book by comparison, I would say that this book kinda reminiscent the style or presentation as Locke's "An Essay on Human Understanding" rather than an Oxford/Cambridge Guide to Empiricism. ...more |
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| 0099448785
| 9780099448785
| B007YTFBOA
| 4.12
| 143,663
| Jun 15, 1985
| Sep 28, 2001
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really liked it
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This might be Murakami's most philosophical and introspective novel. This novel explores just about everything, from a 20-pages of summary explaining t This might be Murakami's most philosophical and introspective novel. This novel explores just about everything, from a 20-pages of summary explaining the subconscious, to the question of utopia. The theme jumped from time to time from self-introspection, parallel worlds, science fiction to fatalism. The novel might be a little slow for the most part, but the final 50 pages were one of the best twists I ever read. The main character mentioned Dostoevsky's Karamazov in these last pages, and the utopian plot has fully fleshed so I was thinking that perhaps the novel would ends like Dostoevsky's Note from the Underground rejection of utopia. But, it turned 180 degrees, ending the novel in a tragic tone mirroring Camus's "We must believe that Sisyphus is happy", which kinda bummed me but hey, that's majority of Japanese literature for you. For those who were wondering about Murakami's deadbeat main character, this novel explores in entirety the psychology behind his apathy, transforming his pathos into a succulent analogy which served as the primary plot. We could say that this novel is about the main character's introspection and self-discovering of himself, and after completing the novel, it is about embracing oneself, in extremity. All in all, I was still quite shook by the ending and are trying to fathom why is ended like that. Was there any significant allegory Murakami wished to impart to us readers? Or it was done like that, have to end like that, just to conform to the spirit of being peculiar, with no significance at all? 'Tis I can never know. Anyway, it was a good read. Really missed Murakami's usual line of Circe or Daphne-like of heroines, so distant and aloof, but the rare intimate connections between the main character and his female confidantes was done in the as always perfect crisp. ...more |
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| 0099282992
| 9780099282990
| 0099282992
| 4.16
| 20,932
| 1967
| Nov 2000
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it was amazing
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Every great works are indeed great because they escaped the distinctions that define the things humanly. An individual might live his life to the very
Every great works are indeed great because they escaped the distinctions that define the things humanly. An individual might live his life to the very end under the constrained specifications of things worldly. But a great soul is exactly great because they penetrate the veil, escaped from the straitjacket and found that beyond the veil there is nothing, but exactly because it is nothing, it is everything. Like the hungry vacuum which is nothing but ever-hungry, the constricted individual self experienced a heavenly expansive mode of existence; he embraced everything. The limiting forms of himself shattered, now bereft of direction, he is everywhere. Bereft of form, he is everything. Bereft of vector, he is no-where but a circularity. Here indeed lies the great idea of eternal recurrence; an extremely ancient idea that embraces the unity of existence but displayed in its monstrous occidental form by Nietzsche: “What, if some day or night, a demon were to steal after you into your loneliest loneliness and say to you: ‘This life, as you now live it and have lived it, you will have to live once more and innumerable times more; and there will be nothing new in it, but every pain and every joy and every thought and sigh… must return to you—all in the same succession and sequence—even this spider and this moonlight between the trees and even this moment and I myself. The eternal hourglass of existence is turned over again and again—and you with it, speck of dust!’ Would you not throw yourself down and gnash your teeth and curse the demon who spoke thus? In this novel, what allows it into the pantheon of immortality exactly because it captured the unity of existence with the exquisitely poignant oriental language. It is the curse of the occidental that their words conjure upon a concept, but it is the boon for the oriental for his self is a mirror, his words an image; his existence mirror Reality. With every turn, every drift, every suggestion in this novel, Mishima accomplished in conveying the sorrowful image of a tragic love story. This novel is the first of the tetralogy, Mishima's masterpiece collectively known as the Sea of Fertility. In my opinion, it captured the Hegelian notion of man's progress through the triad of thesis, anthesis and synthesis. Hegel only expressed the ancient notion of man's progress (or more accurately, his movement across planes of existence is really a circularity) in the encumbered Germanic language. This is an ultimate project of Mishima to capture the entire progress of human drama across the manifolds of existence. In this first novel, we are introduced with the protagonist Kiyoaki Matsugae, who is the paragon of beauty. His beauty was accurately and repeatedly repeated as perfect, but more accurately almost out-wordly. And this really symbolises Kiyoaki unbirth even as he lived his daily life. He is steeped in the unconscious dream-wordly, spending his days in the sheltered fortress of nobility. Conventionally, it is thought that man is the active principal, but this is true only when it is viewed from the movement of the mind. But the primal movement of man, simultaneously the flesh and the spirit, the feminine is thoroughly the active principal. And thus, Kiyoaki was stirred from his languid slumber by the injection of a feminine aspect in the form of Satoko Ayakura into his subconsciousness. A chick inside the shell, after a knock or twice, became convinced that he is eternally safe. He made the shell his Eden. But exactly to be born into the world, Eden must fall. Desperate to defend his eternal unbirthness, he rejected Satoko but news of his betrothal to an Imperial Prince awakened him. And the rest would be a spoiler, but a masterpiece throughout. This novel offered flavours of all taste and colours. We have the refreshing tragic love story, ever-made new by the continuous interest of mankind to flesh and spiritual movement of man. We have the exquisite discussion on the Buddhist doctrine of transmigration of soul. During my first reading, I was totally ignoring the complex expounding, but now I realised that those esoteric discussions are the gist and the key to this book. For Mishima certainly would not openly declare that the end of this tetralogy would be the end of his life just for a commonplace love story; there must be something great or even divine that pushed Mishima for such declaration. And the brazen declaration indeed because in this cycle, Mishima has captured the quintessence of man's transient existence, aptly described via two metaphors. First, the story on how an ancient traveller, desperate for water, frantically grabbed for a vessel containing water in the dark, and discovered the water to be oh-very-sweet. But, when dawn arose, he was shook to his very core that the delicious water he drunk was bore inside the skull of a man! The traveller realized that as long as conscious desire is at work, it will permit distinctions to work. But if one can suppress it, these distinctions dissolve and one can be as content with the skull as with anything else. The second metaphor is: “One could certainly think of a man not in terms of a body but as a single vital current. And this would allow one to grasp the concept of existence as dynamic and on-going, rather than as static. Just as he had said, there was no difference between a single consciousness possessing various vital currents in succession, and a single vital current animating various consciousnesses in succession. For life and self-awareness would fuse into a whole. And if one were then to extrapolate this theory of the unity of life and self-awareness, the whole sea of life with its infinity of currents—the whole vast process of transmigration called Samsara in Sanskrit—would be possessed by a single consciousness.” Thus, what Mishima trying to capture is the eternal human drama of progress and thus circularity, for lack of better word when the entire human conceptual individuations are abolished. This cycle is a masterpiece, par excellence. ...more |
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| 0739467352
| 9780739467350
| 0739467352
| 4.04
| 431,757
| May 09, 1997
| 2005
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it was amazing
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If you have to choose a single book that is both all-encompassing and readable in anthropology, I believe this book is a very good choice. Let us pictu If you have to choose a single book that is both all-encompassing and readable in anthropology, I believe this book is a very good choice. Let us picture a scenario. We wake up in the morning and suddenly greeted by a profound sense of awakening. What would be our first meditation? I believe, all of them meditations would converge on this single question; how and why everything that happens end up like today? How a single species of Homo sapiens end up with vast difference with each other, in terms of wealth, progress etc. This book embarks on an odyssey to find the exact reason of why. What makes this book special is the weight the author puts on knowledge of causality. He determined that there are two types of causes; proximate and ultimate. In his superb afterword, he brought up an anecdote. His wife is a clinical psychologists and couples who are thinking their relationship on the verge of breaking up seek her consultation. A husband complained that he could not be a relationship where his wife hits him in the face. The wife, in turn, pointed that the reason she slapped his husband was because the husband frequently cheated on her. Now, his wife the clinical psychologist would not solve anything at all by asking the wife to stop slapping his husband's face. Yes, the slapping of face would be a proximate cause in their marriage problems but not the ultimate causes. She has to dig deeper to search for ultimate causes, whatever it is, to solve the problem. By applying this knowledge of causality, we are able to track back to the very beginning by asking the right questions. A socialist might argue that inequality present today caused by capitalism, and the capitalist the other way around. Both parties are arguing that the institutions at fault are the cause, but how capitalism and socialism arise in the very first place? And so, this book brought us to the very beginning to determine the factors behind why, for an instance, it is European guns and germs that killed the Aztecs instead of the other way around? The work's thesis is this; that the differences among the peoples of the world are not from innate or biological deficiencies in certain people, but lies from the geographical or environmental factors. Why agriculture only arises independently from 9 areas in the world, were not because the people from the rest of the world are unable in terms of intelligence to gain knowledge of agriculture, but because of the following two big factors; the domestication and availability of edible plant and animal species. Out of many plant and animal species, only a handful are suitable for mass production and domestication. And as plant and animal's distribution relied heavily on the climate, the availability of those suitable items are limited to certain places that ticked all of the conditions, so on and so forth. An example would be that the Native Americans essentially never met with horses nor guns prior to European invasion, but merely years after the collision between the two civilisations, the Native Americans swiftly take up the images of brave warriors and marksmen on horsebacks. Another example would be that wheat are not native to Egypt, but as soon as wheat are introduced to Egypt from the Fertile Crescent, the Egyptians are able to adopt the innovation. Both examples pointed that there's no such intellectual deficiencies in people who historically didn't develop agriculture independently. How about the remaining primitive societies in the present world, such as the Andaman Islanders or the Australian Aborigines? They have gained enough exposure with other civilisations that brought with them better technologies, why they didn't adopt it? The Aborigines and the Tasmanians are still armed with primitive wood or stone equipments, while living in the same land with modern Australians. Is this a proof that certain people really aren't equipped intellectually to learn modern technology? The book answered in the negative. As there are geographical limitations as we elaborated above, there are also cultural limitations. And these cultural limitations are not restricted only to these "recalcitrant" primitive societies, but also prevalent in other civilisations. The British only adopted electrical street lighting replacing the gasoline ones in the early 1900's, far later than the rest of Europe. The QWERTYUIOP was invented to the sole purposes to reduce efficiencies among typist to prevent the typewriter becoming stuck, and when a far more efficient keyboard are proposed, they were rejected and thus we end up with the same keyboard. The scope of the book is vast; starting from 7 million years ago when modern human (supposedly) branched off from apes to explaining why some societies in the world today remain primitive. While the information and facts in this work seemed bottomless, the process of understanding human history as a whole made easier by the help of useful analogies, maps and charts that are provided generously in this work. Almost everything in the book could be recalled by understanding a single "Mother of all chart" in this work, where it describes the sequential stages of human societies pre and post mass food production. Of course, many connoisseur, ever sceptical, would condemn this book as oversimplification and gross generalization. But think for a while, aren't even our letters and words are mere notation, a convenient invention used to simplify the items of our thoughts? We all know that the word "I love you" aren't doing any justice to this brimming feeling inside our chest, but it does its work. It delivers the message, and the receiver can understand it. To call this work as an oversimplification is one thing, but how many pages do they think would count as not simplifying it? And if such feats are possible, would any of us able to read those un-simplified version of our human history? ...more |
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Aug 11, 2018
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Aug 19, 2018
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Aug 11, 2018
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Paperback
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| 8806216694
| 9788806216696
| 8806216694
| 4.05
| 94,066
| Oct 13, 1988
| Mar 19, 2013
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it was amazing
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It was an amazing ride. The Rat trilogy/tetralogy were Murakami's first four novellas/novels. And so, we are rewarded not only in witnessing Murakami's It was an amazing ride. The Rat trilogy/tetralogy were Murakami's first four novellas/novels. And so, we are rewarded not only in witnessing Murakami's growth as an author, we also got the chance to see the protagonist's growth, first as a simple offbeat man and finally, in this novel, as a person finally prepared to take a step into the real world. The protagonist's bizarre adventure since the beginning was perhaps a rite of passage towards his "second birth" in the world. We modern people are mythologically lonely, in terms that we do not have our own cosmology and mythology to live by. Joseph Campbell has magnificently showed in his Hero with a Thousand Faces, on how the journey of the mythological hero parallels with a person's stages and moments of life. Murakami, in a sense, wrote this whole adventure with a purpose to supply the protagonist with his own mythology, his own rite of passage into the world. Thus, everything till the last pages of this fourth book was a prequel to the protagonist's life. A man's life starts essentially when he has prepared for what is coming for him. Anytime before that, is just a trial, a test, a simulation, an idyllic teenage dream. We could take this adventure as a call for private mythology to live by, or on the other hand, the necessity of such frameworks and principle in living life. It doesn't matter which is the right one; it was never an either/or question. The either/or worldview, I believe, is something that is exclusive to the Western mind. Murakami's work, if I am allowed to exaggerate here, is a hallmark of Eastern synthetic worldview; to bring the West to the East, East to the West. An annihilation of polarity. I am totally invested in this tetralogy yet lacking the words and expertise to comment more on that. The best I could say is that I thoroughly enjoyed reading them and the experience is exquisite. I really love how everything in this novel symmetrically growing from one novel to the next, paralleling Murakami's growth. I really enjoyed in the refreshing conversation between Yuki and the protagonist. Imagine smiling while reading Murakami! For a while, I was afraid on this calm before the storm, to the point, I was expecting all hell would break loose in the conclusion in the story. How can a happy ending can ever occur in this tetralogy universe, after all? But, consider me surprised. As a silent reader following the protagonist's life, I am genuinely happy that he can finally be happy. We must believe, after all, that Sisyphus is happy. ...more |
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| B0DT1291G6
| 4.12
| 27,310
| 1978
| May 2003
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really liked it
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A little while ago, there’s a video hosted by a right-wing figure in America asking the question, “Is it really true that there’s only a minority of M
A little while ago, there’s a video hosted by a right-wing figure in America asking the question, “Is it really true that there’s only a minority of Muslims that are radical?” The term “radical Muslims”-alongside with its polar opposites e.g. liberal, progressive Muslims- served no basis or reason as it is, but never wanted to be called as a person who jumped the gun too early, I relented to hear what he meant as a “radical Muslim”. It turned out that what he meant as “radical” was that of any Muslims who believe the necessary implementation of the Sharia laws. And of course, as to believe in Islamic laws is what makes a person Muslim, the host eventually drew a conclusion with an apparent satisfaction on his face, that there’s almost 60% of the Muslim population believed in the implementation of the Sharia laws, thus majority of Muslims are indeed radical Muslims. First of all, wouldn’t it be absurdly contradictory for me to call myself a citizen of a nation while refusing to accept certain parts of the country’s laws? For an instance, I would like to be a Malaysian citizen but I am insistent to refuse the taxation laws, because I don’t like it. It is the same with the Sharia laws, there are no provision whatsoever for a Muslim to reject the laws, you aren’t being progressive nor radical in rejecting or accepting the laws, because essentially, being a Muslim is to accept everything that has been revealed in the Book and the Tradition. The host’s act of freely interpreting and classifying a culture/religion that is alien from him without proper context and to top it all, to draw a conclusion, based a set of values totally alien to the target (or subjugated, for the religious group in question did not have the chance to speak for their own) group speaks loudly of a relationship of power, rather than an effort to ameliorate an understanding towards the differences in cultures and religion. This act of representing and interpreting an alien culture according to one’s own worldview and standards, when executed macroscopically whether in a scholarly or recently, polemically, is essentially what Orientalism means. This book, ironically, is an effort of the subjugated to understand how and why they are being subjected as such since the first contact with the Western civilisation. How indeed that the Orientals are called Orientals, with its set of preconceived notions and stereotypes? Said offers a number of definitions of Orientalism throughout his books, and Orientalism as I understand from this book is, a system of interpretations and representations framed by a host of force that brought the Orient into the Western consciousness. “Interpretations” are a keyword here for it bears a different meaning, say, to transcriptions. An interpretation could be close or further than the real material; it implies an addition, an active process that converts free-floating observations and objects to a synthetic framework. Orientalism, crudely speaking, is the Orientalist involving himself in a constant charade where he seems to forgot (or pretends to) that his observations are not a merely pure perception, but a composite of action made up by his own sense and also, his own prejudices and familiar notions. It is a laughable seriousness, it is like the chemist persistently insists that he views the food on his tables are a mere arrangements of atoms and chemicals, and not a particular dish that its taste invokes memories and attachments- in short, the human part. It is not the matter that all scholarly effort is in actuality futile and useless, but it is this charade of seriousness and forgetfulness that earns our laugh. The mechanism of Orientalism, to put it in brief words are as follows; there exist contacts between two civilization in terms of geopolitical, cultural, military and economical factors. It wouldn’t be long before the two contacting civilizations to realize the incongruence between their own and the other's factors. Reinforced by the incongruence, disparity between the two factors allow interaction of powers according to man’s natural inclination towards hierarchy and ordering of things. It is from these sequences of Contact→Incongruence→Power relationship that nurture the practice of viewing the other party from the war binoculars. It must be "objective", but necessarily from a certain distance. Reinforced by the principal that we nurture our own identity by contrasting with everything that is not us, the distinction of “us” and “them” are formed. And this would result into the fourth sequence, which is Intervention. Owing from the results from previous exchanges of powers, there would exist hierarchy and the result would be as we can witness today; the superior speaks and frame an identity for the inferior.The last stage would be Incorporation, where the “them” now made a mere extension of the superior culture and its values are interpreted from the superior culture’s values. And it is from this that “Mohammed-ism” is a corrupted form of “Christ-ianity”, and every peculiar form arise from the “them” would be view as an incomplete, corrupted imitation of everything from the superior culture. It is akin watching a comedy, the Orientalists magicians, like our American figure, became genuinely surprised upon pulling the rabbit out from the hat they put the rabbit in the very first place. They became genuinely appalled upon finding the Orientals seemed to be “incapable of self-government” and “readily submit to despotism” from a standard they themselves put in the very first place. Said’s analysis in this present work is extremely far-reaching, starting from the Crusades to Sacy, Renan, Flaubert, Nerval etc. It is not his intent to provide a historical account on how Orientalism was born, but his survey to show us the milestones on how Orientalism evolves over time are generous. We can clearly understand from his sometimes flamboyant prose of the history of Orientalism. For an instance, how there are two components to Orientalism, latent and manifest. Latent Orientalism is more or less uniform as it is powered by preconceptions of Oriental backwardness, sensuality and despotism while manifest Orientalism, as the name suggest, differs in its form based on the circumstances and historical context. For an instance, Islam emerged in the earlier pages of Orientalism as purely an ecclesiastical threat, Mohammed was seen as an imposter and a heretic, the entire history of Islam was interpreted as a second-rate Arian-like heresy. It is here we can see how Massignon’s rejection of Mohammed and his glorification for al-Hallaj, from how al-Hallaj’s defense of individualism strike resemblance to the Christ figure. And it is also in this stage we can see how Mohammed was depicted in Dante’s Divine Comedy in a Christian hell, as a heretic. Paralleling with the Western’s later secularizing tendency, Islam was afterwards viewed as a political threat, instead of a religious one. While he then was seen as an epileptic heretic, now he was seen a power-hungry warlord. The third image of Mohammed was a ruthless and casuistic pseudo-Jesuit. The Orientalist Smith mentioned, no doubt from his high pedestals, that while “…all national feeling [and later he mentioned clothing] assumes a religious aspect…it would be a mistake to suppose that genuine religious feeling is at bottom of everything that justifies itself by taking a religious shape…” Aside from the implicit claim that all Muslims are essentially hypocrites, he, in a larger scope, touched on one of the cornerstone of Orientalism. What he essentially meant is that no matter what veils the Arabs, or the Orientals take (in his case, he meant Islam), there would always be an irreversible and deterministic preconceived notions that the Orientals would eternally possessed. Even if the Orientals finally relent to the mantle of modernity, he would always be the Oriental, who owing from the discovery of racial theory, originated from an arrested race. [Renan insists that the Semitics is an arrested race]. Never mind the differences, the Orientals were still left without their own voice and their images rebounded to and fro according to the Western ever-changing temperaments. What, then, are we to make of all these labels and subjugation thrown to us, merely because we aren’t privileged to be one of “them”? Reading through this work, it really felt like a helpless woman trying to find reason for her abuse. The Orientals have always been symbolized as an all-too-willing female, anyways. We all have to read Flaubert’s description of Kuchuk Hanem and this quote by Leroy-Beauliau, to demonstrate the masculine-feminine innuendoes in Orientalism and imperialism. “…A society colonizes, when itself having reached a high degree of maturity and of strengths, it procreates, it protects, it places in good conditions of development, and it brings to virility a new society to which it has given birth...” To return to our question, what should we do? What ever can be done to affect an almighty entity that refuses to see, to hear and to feel but all too ready to impose and judge? To finish this book, only to swagger contently and laments oh how much we have been wronged, or how the entire Orientalism tradition is evil, is not to say to think as such is mere self-congratulatory pat-in-the-back, it is also a lazy reasoning and to top it all, contributes none whatsoever to the betterment of understanding. The moment our fingers blatantly point to the other side for every fault, the battle is already lost. Orientalism perhaps, just an ideological fiction carved from abstraction, but we must remember there can be no abstraction without materials to be abstracted in the first place. Self-introspection and the courage to be better would be the best arsenal in facing these coming turbulent years. I believe we must now stand in our own feet, brave the opposite waves and pave new roads. We must believe in our roots and traditions, and to not succumb to the perils of peer (or world) pressure saying that we can’t. Just like the West earned the bragging rights from modernity (which is just a part of their history, not their identity); we must believe in ourselves that self-determination and improvements must bear golden fruits to us. And even if there’s no golden fruits, let our will to have a good and healthy fight bears the mark of our peaceful resistance. ...more |
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| 0375413928
| 9780375413926
| 0375413928
| 4.21
| 197,209
| 1869
| 2002
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really liked it
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The Idiot is Dostoevsky's fourth novel that I have read. The novel again was presented where many characters are involved, in an everyday life setting
The Idiot is Dostoevsky's fourth novel that I have read. The novel again was presented where many characters are involved, in an everyday life setting where one might not even think such big questions presented in the novels can ever happen in. Conflicts in interaction between the characters are the staple in this novel, it is in these conflicts the big questions and themes Dostoevsky's trying to convey are presented. Dostoevsky gained inspiration to write the novel after he saw a painting by Holbein the Younger, depicting the Christ after brought down from the cross. And this painting seemed to shock Dostoevsky so much that her wife thought he was having his epileptic fits. It is from this painting the central question of the novel was raised; how infinite and natural goodness can ever blend in in the real world? You should see the painting. Echoing Prince Myshkin, the protagonist of the novel, "One could lose his faith seeing this painting!" And he's right. The realistic details in the painting made questions struck in the viewer's mind. If the Christ could see his state after his ultimate sacrifice, would he gone through it all? Is this world is a right place for goodness, in the very first place? Wouldn't infinite goodness would be absurd when standing in stark realism of the world? Salvation and Romance In this novel, Dostoevsky materialised Christ into the character of Prince Myshkin, who main attributes were "infinite trustfulness and simple-mindedness". The plot could be summarised to the Prince's interactions with others in the earlier parts, mainly to accentuate and to demonstrate to the readers of his "holy foolishness" and the crux of the novel would be his dilemma in choosing one of the two women; the Hetaira-mistress Nastasya Filippovna and the Virgin-wife Aglaya Ivanovna. It is his decision in this matter that truly bestows him the epithet "the Idiot". Of course, he was already an idiot since childhood physically, owing from the fact that he is an epileptic. But, it is here that he became the true idiot; a Christ-like innocence. One of the first words the Prince spoke to Nastasya is this; “You are perfection...” and he correctly deciphered the innermost thoughts of Nastasya; that she was trapped in a vicious cycle of her vanity to believe that she was disgraced, a monster. It was from this shock that made Nastasya fall in love with him, but almost instantaneously, felt that she was not worthy of the Christ-like Prince and so made her reject him and went after Rogozhin. For to love him is to discard her very own core of being (or at least the identity she tried to cultivate all this while), and also her vanity prevents her to love a mere simple-minded person, a fool that is the Prince. Aglaya, on the other hand, fall in love with the Prince precisely from the Prince’s compassion towards Nastasya. In her own words, “I guessed after what he said that anyone who wanted to could deceive him, and whoever deceived him he would forgive afterwards, and it was for that I loved him…” The Prince’s simple-mindedness and infinite trustfulness are the very attribute every woman under such archetype covets, but in this case however, Aglaya unfortunately was in the third wheel’s position, or the third position. It is unfortunate that she falls in love from the act of the person she loved towards another woman. For, this puts her very own essence into conflict. The name “Aglaya” itself meant light, and the Prince, too, described her as a being of light, wouldn’t it be contradictory if this light selfishly wanted the Prince all for herself, even though knowing clearly that the Prince’s love to the other woman would bring salvation to her? Wouldn’t if she wanted the Prince to choose her, she would destroy her own essence, sacrificing other people’s salvation for her own personal happiness? Wouldn’t of the Prince choose her instead, she would later abhor the Prince for turning his back from the his very ideal she falls in love with in the first place? Aglaya-Myshkin pairing, in another setting, would be double the light and merry and happiness, due to the very fact that both of them are beings of light. But, unfortunately, in this scenario, it is unhappy yet a necessity that the Prince must choose Nastasya and Aglaya must let him go. The Prince must choose Nastasya, the hetaera, despite everybody’s indignation to show to world of the possibility of salvation through compassion. He is in this ironical position where he must choose the world over his personal happiness, and it must be so. It is in this paradox, unfathomable by our personal love of freedom, the Prince must be called as the Idiot.. He is an Idiot, by all means, but remember he is a Savior, too. This is the only way for all parties to gain redemption. Nastasya to be saved, the Prince to redeemed and Aglaya to concede and forgive. The Idiot explored the questions of natural goodness and sacrifice really well. Personally, I was not that interested in the plot until the climactic stand-off between the two heroines. At that scene, every previous mundane scenes and anecdotes made sense; everything was prepared for this moment. It allows the attentive readers to judge, and most importantly, think on whether the Prince's decision is the right one or not? Did the Prince really loved Nastasya, or Aglaya, or neither? I was truly invested in the characters and their fate, though Aglaya's final fate was no more than a side remark. A tragic story, indeed. To answer Dostoevsky's question; how natural and infinite goodness stands before the world? it is to be answered with the Prince's madness. As necessary as the Prince to choose Nastasya over Aglaya, it is of a necessary that his bountiful naivety to end with insanity. Nature, was never a place for extremes, whether it is of extreme evil or goodness. Infinite notions which revealed itself in a finite time-space limit must conclude in absurdity, in this case insanity. ...more |
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Jul 28, 2018
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Aug 04, 2018
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Aug 01, 2018
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Hardcover
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| 0753829150
| 9780753829158
| 0753829150
| 4.28
| 4,381
| 2014
| Jan 01, 2015
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really liked it
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My decision to read about Augustus was a really prompt decision, one I made few hours after waking in Dublin to a morning filled with hashtags and com
My decision to read about Augustus was a really prompt decision, one I made few hours after waking in Dublin to a morning filled with hashtags and comments of the "New Malaysia" in social medias. Never was a fan of politics, I lived all this while with a phrase to summarise politics and every schemers in that field as "there's never anything new under the sun". Yet, I can't help myself to be attracted (to their peculiar way to win the goals for their ambition, instead of personal admiration) to few personalities that rise way above all of those mediocre shadows in the Forum. And, when I saw those seasonal interest in the social medias and the naming of the new Prime Minister, immediately crossed in my mind this bust of an ancient person. It was Augustus. I never knew much of Augustus except this one perhaps fractured trivia: that people practically begged him to continue to be their leaders, even at the cost of sacrificing their Liberty and essentially throwing that precious Republic of theirs to the fire. Who is this person who is so great that people voluntarily (most of them) yoked their necks to him? At this point, my rumination usually stopped. But after all those guffaws and bellowing past-elections, I decided to read about him. This edition splendidly unravels Augustus' complex life. We had this particular habit of knowing Julius Caesar and then the later emperors, sometimes proceeded all the way to the Byzantines, skipping Augustus. We subconsciously knew that there must be someone that oversaw the transition from the Roman Republic to the Roman Empire, and we usually associated that role with Julius Caesar. But Caesar failed, he stopped only at being a military dictator. Augustus Caesar outdid his stepfather successfully, becoming an emperor in all but name. What surprised me is the contradictions and somewhat mediocrity in this great person. His military might came not from personal contribution in the battlefield, but his supreme aptitude of delegating the brunt of the work to loyal personnels and his efficient handling of the legions to ensure their loyalty to him. He gaining numbers of legions exceeding those of Marc Antony's in his earlier years was not from an act of personal valour in battlefield, but from an execution of a masterful political manoeuvre. The Augustus I read in this book is a man of flesh, not of a deified person free from faults. If we are to learn something from history, it must be this single fact; that we are all mortal human beings and we can and must along somewhere make mistakes. But, we are indeed divine if post committing these mistakes, we still rise back from the ground. This is the essence of Augustus' deification. Regarding this edition, it is a tour de force covering Augustus' long and fruitful life. There's many too cover and even this 400-pages work wouldn't be enough. To my surprise, the chapter dealing with the Battle of Teutoburg Forest and Augustus' sorrowful lament, "Publius Quinctilius Varus, give me back my legions!" are dealt in some 15-odd pages. But this is a mark of the authors' brilliance in presenting such complex characters eloquently. I can't bring myself to agree with the author's belief that Augustus' success was from him being a military dictator. He even reminded the readers in the conclusion to not forget that Augustus was essentially a military dictator who managed to remain in power solely from being as such. This conclusion, perhaps is all good with the Western love of liberty, but it is hard to imagine that if the Romans- being the very crucible the West spilled over from- were so infatuated with liberty, why they didn't opt to assassinate Augustus? Killing two Caesars, that epithet I imagine would sit well in that people who readily love blood and the macabre. Yet, they didn't kill him and the author himself acceded that this is so because the Romans are not willing to return back to the chaos of the civil wars. Even this great predecessors of the West, would voluntarily succumb to hegemony if it provided stability. Man, (not just the people of the West) desire stability. I really hope that one day the West would wake up, washed their face in their beloved Roman washing basin, and wiped off their ideal sense of freedom. The West must stop scrutinising other people from their high horse, wondering and puzzled why these "lesser peoples" readily accept dictatorship? What disgusts me is the Western people really and genuinely sympathised other people from facts and standards that they themselves cooked. That scene is ludicrous, it is like an ape watching with puzzlement why another ape blissfully looked for fleas in another ape's fur. ...more |
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Jul 24, 2018
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Jul 29, 2018
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Jul 24, 2018
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Paperback
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| 1529957729
| 9781529957723
| 1529957729
| 3.94
| 132,926
| Oct 13, 1982
| Oct 04, 2012
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really liked it
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Well, colour me surprised. I never felt any attachments to the characters in the Rat series. Perhaps, Murakami never intended for us to feel so, in the Well, colour me surprised. I never felt any attachments to the characters in the Rat series. Perhaps, Murakami never intended for us to feel so, in the first place. The void of name of the protagonist, the Rat as the only appellation we know of the guy and the many women who appear and then, almost without failure, to disappear; all of them are nameless. Yet, after finishing the novel, I was moved. Perhaps the namelessness and the hollowness of the characters are so empty (as Murakami intended) allowed reader's psyche to flow into that empty chalice. And it works so well. As this is the third instalment in the Rat trilogy (or tetralogy), I can't comment too much without spoiling it. It follows the perspectives of our unnamed protagonist from Hear the Wind Sing and Pinball, few years after both of the novellas. Our protagonist ran a business, which flourished from a humble translation service to an up-and-oncoming advertising agency. One day, a black-suited man inquire after him. He apparently used a picture of sheep with a pasture as its background for one of his bulletin and to his surprise, there's something weird about one of the sheep. It is this peculiar sheep, the mysterious guy wanted him to find within a time limit, or everything will be over for him. And so, our monotonous antagonist departed with his girlfriend with the beautiful ear, for a wild sheep chase. Women in Murakami's always come and go without proper introduction, development and closure. It was from the lack of those elements that made the women in Murakami's novel so mysterious, even divine sometimes. One perhaps would relate this with the gods of the old who spent intimate yet ephemeral time with mortals. But this time, the girlfriend character was explored and presented with depths, making a fresh addition. Though, knowing Murakami, all these blessed sunlights might be snatched away anytime... And of course, the novel was allegorical. One doesn't need to venture long before recalling the association between sheep and Nietzsche's "herd morality". The number one sheep perhaps is the most dominant one, yet a sheep nonetheless. Once he tasted power and lost it eventually, he returned to the pen only to be beat up by other sheep. Despite his own share in power, the fact he can be beaten by the sheep he once trod upon, proves that he never so much as departed one inch from the sheep-dom. The tone hasn't changed much, but like everywhere told you, this is the novel that Murakami fully fleshed out his style and his confidence in writing novels. His previous novels make me think, as every new authors wanted to prove that reading his work can make you think. But this one, it makes me feel, and that's a lot. ...more |
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Jul 22, 2018
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Jul 24, 2018
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Jul 22, 2018
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| 0915145197
| 9780915145195
| 0915145197
| 4.11
| 19,255
| 1677
| Jan 01, 1982
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really liked it
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One sentence aptly describes Spinoza, in the words of Novalis, “…He is a God-intoxicated man”. Spinoza, one of the most brilliant thinkers, and yet it
One sentence aptly describes Spinoza, in the words of Novalis, “…He is a God-intoxicated man”. Spinoza, one of the most brilliant thinkers, and yet it is a mark of the brilliant to be ridiculed. For, when the brilliant breaks every label and boundaries, the masses and the on-lookers strive to perfectly fit everything into their neat little compartments. Spinoza’s pantheism, for an instance, would be swatted away by strawman arguments such as, if everything’s a manifestation of the Divine, would the stone, excrements, or even Hitler is one of His many images? Spinoza never explores his thoughts in that naive way of thought, his exploration stretched way beyond that. The only reason I could think that his ideas has always been greeted with such ridicule is that there is no one who can take his argument seriously. But of course, his ideas are not without many glaring contradictions. One of the hardest philosophical works, it is not advised to read this without previous exposure and investigation. For starters, referring back to Novalis’ words, Spinoza is a mystic, of a sober kind. In Islamic Sufistic tradition, there are generally two main tradition; the “sober” or rational Sufism led by the Junayd al-Baghdadi and the “intoxicated” or rapturing schools, commonly said to be originated from Yazid al-Bustami or the Iraqi mystic, Rabia al-Adawiyah. Rarely, an accomplished acolyte would experience a state called as “syatahat” where he seemed intoxicated and utter blasphemous words, sacrilegious sometimes, especially by ones in the latter school. Rabia was noted for her referring God as a lover, and al-Hajjaj, later executed, claimed in this state of rapture; “Ana al-Haq”, I am the Truth. And so, people who are acquainted with Sufistic tradition might not feel as alienated and appalled by what Spinoza trying to convey. The doctrine of “Wahdatul Wujud” or the Unity of Existence, affirms that particular existence has no particular essence, everything was a manifestation of the Divine. This is the central theme of Spinoza; Unity. Spinoza’s penchant for the theme Unity was a response to a long philosophical and scholastic tradition dating back to Aristotle; the duality between the divine and the mortal. The incumbent philosophy can be aptly described with the famous fresco in the Sistine, of God and Man so close, only separated by a finger’s breadth space, yet too far. There’s a sharp distinction between the divine and mortal. Where the mortal is extended and corporeal, the divine is unextended and incorporeal. The question Spinoza aptly asked was; if man and God are so different, how the divine can act on the mortal? How something incorporeal and self-subsisting can reacts or acts or even bothered with something corporeal and finite? This dualism also involved in the mind-body problem. Descartes, for an instance, claimed that man is a union between two different substances; mind and body. But if oil can never mixed/united in water, how can mind and body? Structure. The book is composed of 5 inter-connected parts, which wrap the entire book in a dense yet neat arrangement. Each chapter is presented in the geometrical order, akin to Euclidean’s propositions, where the chapter started with Definitions, followed by Axioms, Propositions and then Proofs, Scholium (or Notes) or Corollary. As with Euclid, Spinoza’s strategy is to explore the subject by using commonsensical notions that can be known intuitively rather than abstract concepts and ideas. He was, after all, one of the Rationalists. This form of geometrical order single-handedly bestows this work a kind of charm and allure to anybody who loves symmetry and order. It is very hard to ignore the way each of the propositions within one part or between parts intertwined beautifully with each other. This kind of arrangement helps us to understand better of his arguments, but considering the heavyweight subject, difficulties must be expected. This edition. This edition includes a superb introduction, extremely essential for every beginner wishing to understand Spinoza. The introduction is impartial and clear, armed with arsenals of clear analogies and explanation. Without this introduction, reading Spinoza would be a bloodbath. It also includes an incomplete work of Spinoza, A Treatise on Emendation of the Intellect, which while in here his pan-in-theism was still not fleshed perfectly as in the Ethics, the latter themes in the Ethics especially regarding emotions are elaborated here, in a much more engaging way than Ethics’ Euclidean geometrical order method. Part I: God, or Nature. It is here that Spinoza’s unique ideas regarding God is explicated. To summarize, he believed that substance is the thing where all attributes are laid into. Everything that we see in a something is the attribute, as when I see an apple, I could see the redness or the roundness of the thing through my senses (its nominal essence) but not the thing-in-itself, or its real essence. It is absurd to suppose that these attributes are the thing-in-itself, for attribute must “latch” itself on substance; attributes are dependent on the substance. And then he proceeds to show that substance is infinite, indivisible and thus singular. A thing is called as finite when there is something other that limits itself, as a ruler is called finite as we can see its limits as compared to a tree, for an example. Then, if substance is finite, we then presuppose that there is other substance that can limit this substance, and this is absurd. Substance is indivisible because as we already established that substance is infinite, if we divide the substance then we would have two infinite parts, which is double the infinity than the first, and this is, too, absurd. And so, God is the infinite and indivisible substance where infinite of attributes are attributed to him. Thus, everything (for everything that we know to exist must possess substance, but in the same time, substance is singular and indivisible) is within God. Spinoza's ideas as the preface suggested, would more accurately called as pan-in-theism rather than pantheism. Part II: Nature of Man. If we are to accept the first part, the first thing we need to address is the obvious question, how do we stand as a creature in the light of this revelation. How can particular entities arise from a unity of substance? Think of it this way. Our arm can be flexed and extended; yet it is the same hand. A person could be said to be rich and benevolent alongside with other qualities, yet he is the same person. God, as the absolutely infinite being has at least two attributes; thought and extension. Man thus, is a particular manifestation of a mode of divine attributes. And so, there’s no dualism between mind and body and how they can both united while being so different. Man, as far as he is performing mental activities, is a mode of the thinking attribute of the divine, and if he is a physical activity, he is a mode of the extension attribute of the divine. Ignoring Spinoza’s thinking that God is extended, man, like God, is a united being that exists, from time to time, in a different mode, yet from a single homogenous essence. Part III: Concerning Emotion. Here Spinoza is trying to elaborate on why the book is called as Ethics; to show the way for happiness and right conduct in life. His entire theory of psychology, though original, shares so many similarities with the Stoic practical philosophy. He believed that the abrupt and tempestuous nature of emotion can be thwarted by deliberation and especially, knowledge. He started with defining desire or appetite as the very essence of our being. If we are to contemplate on who we really are, we don’t really picture of mini version of ourselves within, or a random flying of qualities, but this single inclination to continue to persist and exist. And so, from this conatus, this primal instinct to preserve and persevere in being, rise pain and pleasure. Here Spinoza offers an original idea. He defines pleasure as that that increases the power of mind from a state of less perfection to greater perfection, while pain is the checking of the power of mind from a state of greater perfection to lesser perfection. He also believed that pleasure only arises from adequate knowledge while pain from inadequate knowledge of external causes. This is so because he believed that everything that occurs occurs necessarily and according to its own nature. It is our subjective standards that define this one thing as bad or good, just or unjust. This would be elaborated later. If everything occurs according to its nature, there is no reason to feel pain, and there’s pleasure in discovering that this assurance that everything that occurs, occurs necessarily and eternally. Pain only arises from inadequate knowledge from external causes. One of the emotions derived from pain is anger. We become angry when there’s an external cause produce affectations to us e.g. smacked on the head, which is inadequate knowledge for we are ignorant for the causes for us smacked in the head, and thus we become angry. But, if we are to inquire for the causes, to yield adequate knowledge, anger will subside and there’s pleasure in knowing that even the smacking of head occurs as necessarily as every parts of nature persists in moving unless there’s something that stop it. Part IV: On Good and Evil. Part III elaborates on the definitions of emotions which arise from the basic emotions of desire, pleasure and pain. He believed that our conception of bad and good is from our own faulty and ignorance knowledge of causes, especially in teleology. For an instance, we believed that everything is made with an end in mind, or in God’s mind. And so, a house is made so we can take shelter in it. But this is an erroneous thought. For, the notion that everything is made with an end is no other than our own belief of wanting to see such. We see that the rain falls and made prosper the crops, and thus we conclude that the rain is made to prosper the crops. But this amounts to no more than our imagination of believing it so, rather than knowledge of the thing in itself. Returning to our example, the house is no more than our urge to build a house so we can take shelter in it, not that the house is made for us to take shelter in it. And so, the notion of bad and good arise from our imagination, our belief from how the thing affects our body. When we build the house, when it is finished and everyone can agree from inspecting the house that it is done, we would call it perfect of good. If it were not the case, we would say that it is not perfect or bad. Good or bad is framed from preconceived ideals in our imagination rather than the knowledge of the thing itself. And so, the notions good and bad are not suitable in determining the right conducts in our life. The only way is to prescribe a psychology from the necessary parts of us, the basic emotions of desire, pain and pleasure and their derivatives. Passive emotions are the effects of inadequate knowledge on the external causes affecting on us body, as we mentioned above. On the other hand, active emotions are produced by our own activity to understand and inquire for adequate causes. And after knowing the true causes, it could elicit in ourselves nothing but pleasure. And so, this is the only way in controlling our passion; to engage in an intellectual activity to gain adequate knowledge from an event so we can indulge in pleasure in knowing the eternal truth behind everything that occurs. Part V: On Freedom and Intellectual Love of God. The conclusion from this book is this; now that we know that the only way to love life is to gain adequate knowledge, aren't everything in Nature can only be conceived in God, as Part I proved? And so, the natural conclusion of the wise man that loves life is that he must love God. Not in the terms of lust or emotion, but in an intellectual love. The wise man is now happy, not just because he now can be calm now that he knows that every of his passive emotions can be thwarted by exercising his intellect and reason, but he is in the utmost elation when in this very act of gaining adequate knowledge, he catch a glimpse of God’s direct work. After knowing this, how could he not love God? ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Jul 17, 2018
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Jul 22, 2018
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Jul 17, 2018
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Paperback
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| B0DLT6GJM5
| 3.98
| 21,876
| 1956
| Jun 29, 2011
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really liked it
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“Because of the boyhood trauma of seeing his mother make love to another man in the presence of his dying father, Mizoguchi becomes a hopeless stutter
“Because of the boyhood trauma of seeing his mother make love to another man in the presence of his dying father, Mizoguchi becomes a hopeless stutterer…”. Yes, this one sentence on the back of the book did really well in explaining the main plot of the book. Everything spiralled from that one night Mizoguchi saw hell. I think we all could agree on why family institution is the center of everyone’s life, because it is the very first circle a person is exposed to the world. The home itself is a microcosmos of every child. If grains of malice and chaos have infected the microcosmos, it’s very hard to see the macrocosmos, the world beyond the lawn with hope. A cynic, an apathetic man is born. A stutterer. The novel follows the life of Mizoguchi, who joined as an acolyte in the infamous Golden Temple. His father, who himself a priest and an old acquaintance with the Temple’s Father Superior, said, “…the Temple is the most beautiful thing on earth.” Coming from a man who saw the hellish deed that night and can only react by covering Mizoguchi’s eyes with his hands “…from love, compassion or shame…”, Mizoguchi already guessed perhaps the Temple was not beautiful as claimed. And, while the Temple was indeed not the beautiful thing on earth, he was appalled on how mundane it was. Crossroads between Westernization and cultural heritage and identity. Mishima was born from a samurai family that practiced strict code of the Bushido and loyal reverence to the Emperor. Mishima himself died at the age of 45, committing seppuku in the name of the Emperor. So, from my opinion, his short years and backgrounds would not allow him to stray too much from the critique of Western encroachment in Japanese traditional life. And so, we have Mizoguchi’s father who was a Zen priest, representing the traditional society and the man who made love to his mother, a failed businessman from a fledgling capitalistic middle class. Mizoguchi’s mother, the adulterer, in association with the mythical images of Gaia, Mother Nature and fertility goddesses, represents the land itself. The whole novel perhaps centered on this, bastardization of the nation to Western ideals. And Mizoguchi, the unfortunate war/post-war generation bears the brunt of this unholy union, became a stutterer and worse, a cynic. The sublime and the beautiful. Sometimes I wondered that the remaining legacy of the Romanticists and Idealists traditions are to become those corpses where future generation, having exposed to countless atrocities, genocides, world wars, kick. For these modern/post-modern generations, the notion “the high and the lofty” is so out of touch with reality, deserve only to be scorned and ridiculed. The ridicule of the ideals materialized in this novel in the form of the Golden Pavilion, the flagship of eternal tranquility and peace. Mizoguchi, himself one of the cynics, was totally disappointed that the Temple did not burn from the air raids. No matter how strong the cynical attitude prevalent in a generation, ideals can never be vanquished solely because they themselves are ideals; supra-natural entities which man can either covet or hate, but to never reach them. And this is what haunts Mizoguchi. The incongruence between ideals and reality that simultaneously cannot be embraced nor rejected leave him hanging between crossroads. He found himself in constant battle with the object of his obsession; the Temple. In moments of lust, the Temple appears and this natural impulse for life and procreation subsides in front of that far greater and opulent image. Mizoguchi, thus was left with impotence and scornful looks from the women/life who offered their bodies to him. The novels follow his inner conflict on the definition of beauty. Beauty itself an ideal, a quintessential entity which existence cannot be doubted. But, on what standard, scales and measure such notion develops? The holy fool and the devil. In traditional churches and religious literature, the saint was usually described, as the holy fool while the devil was the cunning, industrious and the wise one. In Goethe’s Faust, it was Mephistopheles the devil who offered Faust knowledge in return for his soul. The saint, on the other hand, works miracles and procure manna from the heavens in his aloof naivety. In this novel, the holy fool appears in the form of Tsurukawa. Tsurukawa was described as having a round face and his eyebrows are shaven off of its top and bottom, almost clearly describing the appearances of the Buddha. Mizoguchi has always mentioned Tsurukawa as the only thread connecting him to light. Kashiwagi, one of the celebrated Mishima’s characters, plays the role of Mephistopheles, offering Mizoguchi his own perverse version of Zen anecdotes and theory of beauty. In conclusion, this novel is so pregnant with vivid imagery and Zen references that sometimes everything just fly over my head. Yet, it did not hamper me from enjoying the book and its subtle arguments on the questions of beauty, love and obsession. ...more |
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Jul 14, 2018
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Jul 16, 2018
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Jul 15, 2018
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Paperback
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| 1945054840
| 9781945054846
| 1945054840
| 4.24
| 758
| Dec 25, 2010
| May 29, 2018
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it was amazing
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None
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Notes are private!
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Jul 13, 2018
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Jul 14, 2018
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Jul 13, 2018
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| 087220216X
| 9780872202160
| 087220216X
| 3.86
| 16,774
| 1690
| 1996
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really liked it
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What daunts each of us in reading philosophical text could be outlined as follows; its readability and also of its relevance. Both of these main chall
What daunts each of us in reading philosophical text could be outlined as follows; its readability and also of its relevance. Both of these main challenges, could more or less, traced back to one problem; limitation on resources whether financial, time to read (in the former) or the time to digest and apply (in the latter). Before we elaborate on those two points, we could take a cursory glance on the main idea that Locke tried to present to us in this essay. Empiricism John Locke is one of the earliest and perhaps, most well-known among British empiricist. Now, empiricism is a belief that claims we gain our knowledge only through experience (either by sensation or reflection, or both), and there’re no innate or inherent concepts in us. An apt example could be taken from a contemporary scientific experiment. A dog that is exposed to a certain hues of colors or patterns of lines since birth could only identify those that it has been exposed, while the brain remained irresponsive towards the colors or lines it never encountered previously. Locke also answered in the negative in a case his friend and scientist, Molyneux asked, “If a man born blind and taught to feel for this one object from his sense of touch and successfully identified that the object has four equal sides etc., and if he is made to be able to see, would the man recognize this same object solely from his new sense of sight? The man cannot recognize the object from his sight, Locke answers, but if he is allowed to touch the object, he would immediately recall that this object has been acquainted to him before. Both of these examples are demonstration of Locke’s belief and his famous expression, tabula rasa, that man has no whatsoever preconceived notions in him, like the dog has none of the notions of color other than what he encountered in experience. Readability What is meant as readability is this; am I able to read, complete and digest the content of the book? This of course, depends on the scope and challenges in the book. If the scope exceed our exposure, training or span of attention, the book is not readable. If we can't find solutions to the challenges inherent in us or the book, we can't finish it either. Scope. This book's scope is massive. It is not excessive to say that this book is a world-building book, that it tries to elaborate and include everything within the reach of humankind in it. While Hobbes' Leviathan is a political thought world-building book, Locke's essay is on a journey to dictate the history of the entire human understanding. It starts from what is the material of the mind (sensation) so it can gain cognition of the world without, to the question of freedom of human will. So, if we are expecting Locke to elaborate on empiricism alone, it would be a bummer for he elaborated on it most of them, only in Book I and Book II, the rest are the application or how the world fits in Locke's empirical framework. Notable arguments he presented other than his empiricism is as follows; the question of freedom of the will, language as a tool for communication, scope and extent of our human reasoning etc. But above all is his elaboration on the unity of consciousness, which is superb, a prototype of Humean later doctrine of consciousness and Kant's "transcendental unity of perception". Challenges.There are a few of challenges and difficulties that perhaps hamper our progress in completing the book. They are, (in my opinion): 1. Sentence structure, punctuation and vocabulary. While the text has been adjusted to an almost similar vocabulary as of modern usage, the sentences structure had mostly remain intact for the sake of preserving the flavor of Locke’s argument. One example would be abundance of commas in one sentence. While the purpose of the commas were to emphasize on the nuances in that one particular sentences, more than often they didn’t help me. 2. Elaboration on subtle arguments. Most of people, including me, perhaps wanted to read Locke for an introduction to his empiricism. As Locke embarked on a project to elaborate on the history of our understanding, from its conception to its modifications and applications, he cannot escape from mentioning and elaborating on many things that perhaps do not interest the modern reason. Examples would be his defence on the existence of vacuum space, or that solidity and extension is not body etc. The upshots in the text almost, or already excelled its challenges. Locke’s style of arguments are very refreshing and light-footed, elaborated in an innocence yet sharp and precise to the point manner. An example. If we are to be asked why there should not be any innate ideas, we would perhaps, tried to explain in a very academic and dense way. But, Locke started his argument with; if there’s innate argument, why children can only comprehend something when they are encountered it enough to reason on it? If we indeed can comprehend something but only to not be conscious of it (as in innate ideas), would it not be just a complex way of saying that we do not comprehend anything at all? The tone throughout the book is discursive rather than polemical, so I think it really help us to digest his entire point rather than his version of rebuttal against someone else. The lingo used in this essay, the archaic vocabulary aside, is pretty much readable, compared to Kant's arsenal(s) of new terms. Speaking of Kant, people usually either lump him in the rationalist or in a some kind of reconciliatory position, a bridge between empiricism and rationalism. But what Locke has been trying to convey in this book shares a lot with Kant's ideas. So, it really helps to understand Kant even a bit further. But compared to Kant, Locke's style of prose is much more sprightly that I can't help to admire him more than Kant. To a drowning man, even the sight of a simple plank is much more welcoming than the entire sea, no matter how picturesque the view in the ocean bed at all. Conclusion While the scope of the book is massive, I do think it is very worthwhile to spend our time in reading this book. I made a mistake for reading Kant before Locke, and hey there you go, I think I am able to further understand where Kant's coming from after reading Locke. As one person commenting on Schopenhauer's style of prose, it is a sign of a great author if he not only make an effort to make the reader to understand his point, but also after reading his work, one become much wiser in other author's ideas, even of his opponents'. ...more |
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Sep 05, 2021
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Jul 12, 2018
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