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abgushte's reviews
122 reviews
Dune by Frank Herbert
5.0
Second time through the book I'm a lot older and wiser and understand politics and religion differently. For me this book is one of the quintessential examples of what science fiction can be, and I will always love rereading it.
Patriotism by Yukio Mishima
4.0
This story makes me wonder if Mishima wasn't just some big jokester, and him committing seppuku was his final prank on the world. I think the biggest mistake people make in regards to Mishima is taking him way too seriously.
Who says that he has to kill his friends? He's not even sure if he's going to be ordered to kill them, or if he's going to be leading the unit. So why is he going to kill himself? It surely can't be out of patriotism--or at least our definition of patriotism: "love of one's country." Japanese uses a few different characters to describe patriotism, and I think this story outlines the patriotism that is a sort of gloomy grief and sorrow for one's country, except Mishima makes a mockery of it through his extremely flat and exaggerated characters.
And if you've ever seen the movie version (starring The Man Himself), you'll realize that he really sexualizes seppuku, an act of penetration; there are two sexual climaxes in the film and he makes them painfully obvious.
Again, don't take Mishima too seriously. I'm not saying he's a clown or anything, but he messes with the notions of purity of thought and action, pushing them past the points of absurdity, in other stories as well. If you take him seriously, he's pretty hardcore; if you don't, he's one badass dude.
Who says that he has to kill his friends? He's not even sure if he's going to be ordered to kill them, or if he's going to be leading the unit. So why is he going to kill himself? It surely can't be out of patriotism--or at least our definition of patriotism: "love of one's country." Japanese uses a few different characters to describe patriotism, and I think this story outlines the patriotism that is a sort of gloomy grief and sorrow for one's country, except Mishima makes a mockery of it through his extremely flat and exaggerated characters.
And if you've ever seen the movie version (starring The Man Himself), you'll realize that he really sexualizes seppuku, an act of penetration; there are two sexual climaxes in the film and he makes them painfully obvious.
Again, don't take Mishima too seriously. I'm not saying he's a clown or anything, but he messes with the notions of purity of thought and action, pushing them past the points of absurdity, in other stories as well. If you take him seriously, he's pretty hardcore; if you don't, he's one badass dude.
Green Grass, Running Water by Thomas King
4.0
A great example of Native American literature. I love his play on Native American and Christian religious mythology.
The Art of Practicing: A Guide to Making Music from the Heart by Madeline Bruser
4.0
When I first read this book, it provided me with the tools and inspiration to finally learn and perform music in a more complete and fulfilling way.
If only I could have held on to that...
If only I could have held on to that...
What Is Meaning?: Fundamentals of Formal Semantics by Paul H. Portner
Interesting to read for a non-major...but I eventually stopped doing the class readings. If you have any basic understanding of linguistics and you're interested in semantics this would be a good book, supplemented with Heim and Kratzer and some Partie.
Dead Until Dark by Charlaine Harris
3.0
Better than TruBlood in many aspects, but still pretty shallow. Does not necessarily make it less addictive.