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Post by Cloudbuster on Mar 23, 2021 19:04:25 GMT
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Post by Cloudbuster on Mar 24, 2021 22:16:32 GMT
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respect77
The Legend Continues
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Post by respect77 on Mar 27, 2021 21:20:45 GMT
I like the story, but I'm disturbed by what appears to be racism in the book. What I mean is every time black people are mentioned they are portrayed in a negative way, as either brutes or ugly and undesirable. It's a tendency in the book and is probably telling of the author's own racism and prejudice, because in Ancient Egypt they didn't have the same concept of races as we do now and they didn't hierarchize people by race like this book seems to. In fact several pharaohs seem dark skinned in their portrayals on ancient Egyptian artifacts, while this book seems to place black people at the bottom of Egyptian society. It's a shame because the story would be good,but this is bothering me and it's disappointing.
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Post by Russg on Mar 28, 2021 6:21:42 GMT
Been reading a lot of Stephen King lately.
Not a fan of his newer work, but his old classics are mostly untouchable. Currently reading Pet Semetary for the third time.
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Post by butterflies2 on Apr 2, 2021 0:31:38 GMT
Hey, it’s butterflies, couldn’t log back in so made a new account
I finally finished the rupi kaur book and recommend it!
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respect77
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Post by respect77 on Apr 4, 2021 5:01:01 GMT
I like the story, but I'm disturbed by what appears to be racism in the book. What I mean is every time black people are mentioned they are portrayed in a negative way, as either brutes or ugly and undesirable. It's a tendency in the book and is probably telling of the author's own racism and prejudice, because in Ancient Egypt they didn't have the same concept of races as we do now and they didn't hierarchize people by race like this book seems to. In fact several pharaohs seem dark skinned in their portrayals on ancient Egyptian artifacts, while this book seems to place black people at the bottom of Egyptian society. It's a shame because the story would be good,but this is bothering me and it's disappointing.
I finished it. Other than this issue mentioned above I quite enjoyed it, it takes you right back to not only ancient Egypt, but also Babylon, Mitanni, Syria, Hatti and Kreta. Also to the time of Aehnaton, which is one of the most fascinating periods in Ancient Egypt with Aehnaton's (failed) attempt to change Egypt's religion to monotheism. So overall it was a very enjoyable historical novel, a shame for the issue I mentioned above. It spiked my interest in Ancient Egypt and now I'm planning to read more books on the subject.
Now reading:
It means "Quarantine In The Grand Hotel" by Hungarian pulp fiction writer Jenő Rejtő. He lived between 1905-1943 and one of the most popular writers in Hungary still, due to his extremely funny, satirical pulp fictions.
I see it has English translation:
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respect77
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Post by respect77 on Apr 5, 2021 8:33:35 GMT
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Post by Liberian Girl on Apr 13, 2021 15:51:56 GMT
I recently read The Apparition Phase by Will Mclean and it's seriously one of the best I've read in ages. It's kind of a coming of age story, but very dark and creepy in parts.
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respect77
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Post by respect77 on Aug 28, 2021 7:39:02 GMT
Reading now: The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins
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respect77
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Post by respect77 on Sept 12, 2021 17:35:15 GMT
José Saramago: Blindness
It's a distopian novel about a pandemic that causes blindness.
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Post by pg13 on Sept 24, 2021 22:57:07 GMT
Currently reading "Unhappy The Land: The Most Oppressed People Ever, The Irish?".
Written by an academic who grew up in Tipperary, Republic of Ireland and lectures at Queens, Northern Ireland.
I tend to read a lot of political history.
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respect77
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Post by respect77 on Sept 25, 2021 3:57:50 GMT
Currently I'm reading Lost Christianities by Bart D. Ehrman. Ehrman is a New Testament scholar and he's got a few lectures on YouTube that I always enjoyed and that definitely changed my perspective on the Bible a lot. When I grew up in the evangelical church I was taught the Bible was the inerrant word of God and I was also taught the gospels were written by eye witnesses, that all of the Epistles and Gospels were written by the people they are attributed to etc (apostles, Jesus's desciples etc). Boy, I was wrong! After I deconverted, although I didn't think any more that the Bible is the inerrant word of God, but I still believed the books were written by the people they are attributed to. I simply didn't know any better. Then I discovered Ehrman's lectures. They were so eye opening. It turns out, none of the gospels are eye witness accounts. Even the earliest, Mark, was written several decades after Jesus's death. Neither of the New Testament books are contemporary to Jesus. The earliest NT books are some of Paul's epistles and they were written in the 50s, some 20 years after Jesus's death. Of course, Paul himself never even claimed to have personally met Jesus, only in vision. But even the gospels aren't eye witness accounts, and they weren't written by Jesus's desciples or followers or the people they are attributed to. Some of Paul's epistles in the Bible are real, but some are forgeries, they weren't really written by Paul. Neither of Peter's epistles in the Bible was really written by Peter. Etc. A couple of years ago I used to read another book by Ehrman, called "Forged" and in that he extensively talks about which books are forgeries and which aren't. He also talks about how the books were changed over time. Sometimes by mistake (let's not forget at the time books were copied by hand), sometimes deliberately. For example the Gospel of Mark, the earliest gospel, ends where the tomb is empty. No explicit claim of a resurrection. The tomb is empty and the women who go to visit it get scared and run away. That's where Mark originally ends. At Mark 16:8. The following verses are later additions. There are several later additions elsewhere as well. For example, the famous story of Jesus forgiving the adulterous woman is a later addition too. So all this is very interesting and I really enjoy learning about early Christianity through modern scholarship. Very eye opening. For a fundamentalist, evangelical Christian probably Earth shattering. Mind you, a lot of what Ehrman says is not some novel claim or claims that are uniquely made by him. Many of these things are known to scholars for a long, long time and are not controversial at all among them. Hell, even many non-fundamentalist, Christian scholars accept these things. For fundamentalists, on the other hand, these things would create a big problem, so they try to debate them. This book that I'm now reading by Ehrman, Lost Christianities is about how many different competing branches Christianity had early on in its first centuries. Because Christianity didn't start out as some unified organized religion with set doctrines. There were lots of different groups and beliefs. It's interesting to think about how Christianity and the Western world would have turned out if some other branch of Christianity had won the battle for dominance rather than the type of Christianity we know now. For example, there were the Marcionites who believed in two Gods (one, the evil creator God of the Old Testament, the other the good, merciful God of Jesus). Marcion, by the way, was the first who compiled some sort of New Testament out of certain Christian books that were circulating, but his teachings were later declared heresies. Then there were the Gnostics, who are possibly the weirdest. LOL. Lots of others. Ehrman goes through these "lost Christianities" in his book, using the books of these different groups. For example gnostic gospels etc. Because as you may imagine, the books that made it to the New Testament are just a fraction of Christian books that existed at the time. (It's also an interesting subject in itself how, when and by whom it was determined which Christian books are canon and which aren't. As you can tell by the fact that forgeries made it to the New Testament, it turns out that that process wasn't at all divinely inspired either.) Ehrman here focused on these books that were left out of the New Testament, and what they teach. Lost Christianities has a companion book to it, that I just ordered, called Lost Scriptures, that's basically a compilation of all this apocrypha books, that Ehrman references in Lost Christianities. So all this I find very fascinating now. www.amazon.com/Lost-Christianities-Battles-Scripture-Faiths/dp/0195182499
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Post by Cloudbuster on Sept 30, 2021 11:06:00 GMT
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respect77
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Post by respect77 on Oct 5, 2021 7:02:39 GMT
Reading The Handmaid's Tale now by Margaret Atwood.
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Post by HIStoric on Oct 5, 2021 13:17:34 GMT
Currently reading Walter Isaacson’s biography of Steve Jobs, have been for just over a week. Coincidentally, he passed away ten years ago today. Time sure does fly. He never ended up reading it, with it only coming out about 3 weeks after he passed.
Really enjoying it so far. Because Jobs contacted Isaacson and gave his blessing to do a biography, he gave Isaacson many interviews. He also let Isaacson interview anyone and everyone in his life, but best of all he didn’t try to get involved in the book. The only thing he ever had a say in was the cover of it.
It’s quite good because it means it paints a far more balanced and honest portrayal of a pretty complicated man from all of the people in his life. A man who could be a cruel asshole with his words one minute, yet the next minute be utterly captivating and inspirational, pushing his coworkers just that little bit further or to approach the product in a different way that would make Apple products stand out from the rest. And there’s that whole ‘reality distortion field’ he wields too.
Definitely looking forward to the section where he returns to Apple in around 1997 onwards, and so begins development on the iMac, iPod, iTunes, and even the iPhone and iPad. I’m halfway through the 1980s, but that’s the time period of his life I’m most interested in.
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