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Wednesday Reading Meme
Nov. 4th, 2015 08:21 amWhat I’ve Finished Reading
Sarah Vowell’s Lafayette in the Somewhat United States, which did not skyrocket to the same heights in my esteem as her earlier books Assassination Vacation or The Wordy Shipmates, but is nonetheless pretty fun. Her writing reminds me of Bill Bryson’s: they both write hilarious travelogues interspersed with history (Bryson heavier on the travelogue, Vowell heavier on the history) and political commentary, although Bryson political leanings tend to be liberal while Vowell shoots straight past liberal into straight-up leftist.
Vowell is therefore more trenchant, but I would be hesitant to recommend her to someone whose political leanings I didn’t know well.
What I’m Reading Now
I didn’t actually intend to read Vowell’s Revolutionary War book to coincide with my own Fourth of July NaNo novel, but having noticed the pleasant coincidence, I’ve decided this would be a good month to read more Revolutionary War stuff. (It is perhaps troublesome that I managed to acquire an American History MA while having so little knowledge of the Revolutionary War.)
To this end, I’ve just started David McCullough’s 1776, which is charmingly readable so far. He kicks off the book with a defense of King George III: an interesting choice for a book about the American Revolution.
I’ve also started reading A. R. Luria’s The Making of Mind: A Personal Account of Soviet Psychology, which is interesting although I often feel I only halfway understand what’s going on. He’ll be all “We read the work of Tweedledum and Tweedledee and it gave us Thoughts about the relationship between language and action,” and it would probably make a lot of sense if I knew who the Tweedles were, but he’s talking about guys who were au courant in 1910 or so, so aside from Freud I’ve never even heard of them.
However, I’m moving out the part where he talks about his influences and into the bit where he talks about his experiments, so I feel at least a little less at sea.
What I Plan to Read Next
I’m...actually not sure. I’m waiting for a bunch of holds to get in at the library (Andy Weir’s The Martian, Rainbow Rowell’s Carry On, Robert Galbraith’s Career of Evil, L. M. Montgomery’s The Golden Road, so this is largely dependent on what gets in first.
I’d like to continue my American Revolution reading also. I feel like I might hit on some useful and interesting tidbits for my Fourth of July book. And everyone wants their romances sprinkled with fun historical facts, right? Yes? No? Maybe?
Sarah Vowell’s Lafayette in the Somewhat United States, which did not skyrocket to the same heights in my esteem as her earlier books Assassination Vacation or The Wordy Shipmates, but is nonetheless pretty fun. Her writing reminds me of Bill Bryson’s: they both write hilarious travelogues interspersed with history (Bryson heavier on the travelogue, Vowell heavier on the history) and political commentary, although Bryson political leanings tend to be liberal while Vowell shoots straight past liberal into straight-up leftist.
Vowell is therefore more trenchant, but I would be hesitant to recommend her to someone whose political leanings I didn’t know well.
What I’m Reading Now
I didn’t actually intend to read Vowell’s Revolutionary War book to coincide with my own Fourth of July NaNo novel, but having noticed the pleasant coincidence, I’ve decided this would be a good month to read more Revolutionary War stuff. (It is perhaps troublesome that I managed to acquire an American History MA while having so little knowledge of the Revolutionary War.)
To this end, I’ve just started David McCullough’s 1776, which is charmingly readable so far. He kicks off the book with a defense of King George III: an interesting choice for a book about the American Revolution.
I’ve also started reading A. R. Luria’s The Making of Mind: A Personal Account of Soviet Psychology, which is interesting although I often feel I only halfway understand what’s going on. He’ll be all “We read the work of Tweedledum and Tweedledee and it gave us Thoughts about the relationship between language and action,” and it would probably make a lot of sense if I knew who the Tweedles were, but he’s talking about guys who were au courant in 1910 or so, so aside from Freud I’ve never even heard of them.
However, I’m moving out the part where he talks about his influences and into the bit where he talks about his experiments, so I feel at least a little less at sea.
What I Plan to Read Next
I’m...actually not sure. I’m waiting for a bunch of holds to get in at the library (Andy Weir’s The Martian, Rainbow Rowell’s Carry On, Robert Galbraith’s Career of Evil, L. M. Montgomery’s The Golden Road, so this is largely dependent on what gets in first.
I’d like to continue my American Revolution reading also. I feel like I might hit on some useful and interesting tidbits for my Fourth of July book. And everyone wants their romances sprinkled with fun historical facts, right? Yes? No? Maybe?
