Cultural Books

I highly recommend this book. It covers the psychological aspect of living under the current regime in Burma, which many people studying and following the events in Burma forget to cover at times. I even recommended this to my parents. We're Burmese. It's well written and thought out, and the author is knowledgeable about the people.

Cristina Fink's book Living Silence: Burma Under Military Rule is a hard-hitting examination of what life was (and perhaps still is) like under the repressive rule of the Burmese military. Using an extensive set of interviews, and the underground writings of dissidents, Fink outlines and looks at the real psychological consequences of years of repression. Perhaps the closest real world example of what Michel Foucault would call a "carceral society". Fink brings the Panopticon to life. My understanding of the issues in Burma was greatly enhanced by reading this book and I recommend it highly.

Miguel Llora

The book can provide an insight of Burma under military rule.
The author has learned much about real concerns and issues in the country. The interesting is that the author was able to inform the rarely known rituals of the Junta. Many interviews were done and good and first-hand informations can be seen on the book.

This book takes one to a country that is "a world apart" in a multitude of ways from what we know here in America. A fascinating read that is sure to captivate and enrich the reader with newfound knowledge and awareness. A brilliant debut by an author I hope we'll see much more of in years to come.

A facinating, well written book that sheds light on an area of the world I knew little about. I usually find scholarly works somewhat dry and hard to get through. This book was hard to put down. I won't launch into a lecture on why you SHOULD read this or try to impress with my newfound knowledge of the struggles of the Burmese people. I will tell you that this a great, readable book that will educate you and hold your interest. Buy it.

It's hard to imagine how anyone could think of anything else to say on the subject of the Mountjoy depositions, now that Charles Nicholl has had his say. It's a relatively minor incident in the life of Shakespeare, but it offers several advantages, even over the kind of detailed analysis of a single period that James Shapiro offered in "1599". For one thing, as Nicholl notes, it's one of the only times on record that people quoted Shakespeare directly -- not his plays, but his everyday conversation. It's the only time on record that he offered an opinion about another human being. The neighborhood, the business, and the associates open up fascinating avenues of inquiry into what life was like for someone living in London in the early 17th century.

The analysis is based on Nicholl's examination of primary documents from legal and other archives. It corrects and extends the basic known facts of the case. Every lead is assiduously pursued until it reaches a natural point of diminishing returns. Hence my description of it as "definitive." (On the other hand, there's always the possibility of fresh discoveries, hence my putting that description in quotes.)

As a species of biography, Nicholl's book is at the other end of the pole from Stephen Greenblatt's "Will in the World." To me, the comparison is all to Nicholl's advantage: firmly anchored in documented fact; based on primary documents; admitting when leads have reached dead ends, rather than continuing to build them up into layer upon layer of speculation. It's instructive to note that the incident on which Nicholl's book is based rates barely a mention in Greenblatt's biography -- even though it was one of the best-documented incidents in Shakespeare's life, even BEFORE Nicholl took up the case.

This book offers a fascinating look into everyday life in Shakespeare's London, specifically the few years Shakespeare lived as a lodger on Silver Street. The book is very well researched, and while Mr. Nicholl sometimes speculates on how events in Shakespeare's life may have affected his work, Mr. Nicholl is always cautious about doing so. Because any information about Shakespeare's life is so precious, I highly recommend this book, even though it is more about the people who surrounded Shakespeare than about Shakespeare himself. Finally, I always find it interesting how the sleazy side of life went hand in hand with perhaps the greatest literary renaissance of all time. It certainly adds to my belief that great literature is not reserved for the few, but for the many.

Charles Nicholl is on a roll. This is at least the fourth Nicholl book I've read (the others being "Borderlines," "The Reckoning," and "Somebody Else"), and each has been better than the last. Nothing could be more mundane, on its surface, than a book about one of the houses where Stratford property owner and family man William Shakespeare lodged when writing his plays in early Jacobean London. Surprisingly, however, the story of how he tendered his services in bringing about a "handfasting" (or betrothal) of his head-tire-making landlord's daughter and his apprentice, and the subsequent story of the couple's suing (some eight years later) of that landlord for failing to pay a promised dowry, makes for compulsive reading. Along the way, we learn something about the seamier side of Shakespeare's neighborhood, as well as the surprising character of some of his neighbors and acquaintances. These latter include a fortune-telling "doctor," Simon Forman, who had the ear of England's distaff elite, and a brothel-keeping poetaster (and the bard's collaborator on "Pericles"), George Wilkins. How all these characters come together makes for a fascinating journey into research on one of literature's most enigmatic geniuses, William Shakespeare himself. The text is supplemented by "the chief documents relating to the Bellott-Mountjoy case," most notable of which is the playwright's own 1612 deposition, signed "Willm Shaks." Francis Bacon could never have made this stuff up.

THE LODGER SHAKESPEARE starts with a clever insight. While we have millions of words written by Shakespeare, we have only a few words--a deposition in the case of Belott versus Mountjoy--that may reflect Shakespeare's spoken words. In TLS, Charles Nicholl builds from this deposition to create a story about the world of Shakespeare in 1603-1605, when the Bard rented a room from Christopher Mountjoy on Silver Street and had a role in persuading Stephen Belott, Mountjoy's apprentice, to marry his daughter. In the deposition, Shakespeare testifies about the shortchanging of the dowry.

Overall, I'd say Nicholl has mixed success with this story. On the plus side, Nicholl makes ingenious use of old maps, church registries, court records, and contemporary descriptions of Elizabethan and Jacobean London to create a plausible version of Shakespeare's life on Silver Street. In particular, I enjoyed his chapters on the probable appearance of the Mountjoy house, its neighborhood, its household stuff, and even Shakespeare's chamber--including the books on the Bard's shelves. This stuff is fantastic.

Further, Nicholl explains Shakespeare's decision to rent from the Mountjoys--a French couple in xenophobic London--with great insight. And, he shows how elements of the Mountjoy's trade--the creation of stylish and elaborate female headgears called tires--became metaphors in Shakespeare's plays. In TLS, Nicholl also offers perspective, establishing that the GREAT MAN was, in his days in London, a person in the entertainment business with a mere foothold at court. He was a good match for the Mountjoys who counted the Queen as a client for their tires.

On the other hand, the book does develop information about the Mountjoys, as well others who were deposed in this case, at greater length than this reader needed. While Shakespeare clearly knew and worked with these deponents, these were also ordinary people that Nicholl has pulled from history's dustbin. Yes, their stories enable Nicholl to identify subjects influencing Shakespeare's work. But the plays themselves get pushed to the side, as we learn about tire-making, prostitution, marriage customs, and so on in Jacobean London.

THE LODGER SHAKESPEARE is based on conscientious and inspired research and is a good read. Still, I think I learned more from A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare: 1599, Will in the World: How Shakespeare Became Shakespeare, and Shakespeare the Man.

Search the name "William Shakespeare" on Google and you will obtain 46,300,000 hits. The Library of Congress lists 7,000 volumes with Shakespeare as their subject. He is the most celebrated playwright in the English language, yet the mysteries of his life are such that Shakespeare scholar Charles Wallace observed that "every Shakespeare biography is five percent fact and 95 percent conjecture." In this vast ocean of material, one would think that there could be little new information about the man who lived and wrote more than four centuries ago.

THE LODGER SHAKESPEARE by Charles Nicholl offers insight into a little-known episode of Shakespeare's life and provides readers with something truly unique. In his plays and sonnets, Shakespeare gave his audience over one million written words. This book offers something far different: the actual spoken words of the man who still remains a mystery as a person to those who know him well as a writer.

During the early years of the 17th century, around the period when he was writing "Othello," "All's Well that Ends Well" and "Measure for Measure," Shakespeare lodged in London with a French family named Mountjoy. Christopher and Marie Mountjoy's daughter, Mary, was involved in a romantic relationship with Stephen Belott, the Mountjoys' apprentice. The young Belott appeared reluctant to enter into matrimony, and the senior Mountjoys sought Shakespeare's help to convince the reluctant suitor of the wisdom of marriage.

It turned out that Belott's reluctance was due in part to his concern that the father would not honor his obligation to provide the promised dowry. Shakespeare assured the young couple that "they should have a sum of money for a portion from the father." Not only did Shakespeare encourage the marriage, he had Mary and Stephen join hands and swear commitment, a legally binding ceremony identical to the one lightheartedly undertaken by Orlando and Rosalind in "As You Like It.

In 1612 Shakespeare was called upon to give testimony concerning the dowry that Belott had never received. His statement, what the law would now call a deposition, was transcribed by a court clerk, reviewed by the 48-year-old playwright and then signed. The document is one of six known Shakespeare signatures, the earliest discovered.

While knowledge of Shakespeare's involvement in the Mountjoy family battle has been common knowledge since the discovery of the court papers in 1909, Nicholl provides readers with a vivid portrayal of the Bard's life and times during the period when he resided with them and wrote several of his greatest plays. Scholars have long debated how Shakespeare came to write many of the plays that bear his name. The theories surrounding authorship of his work range far and wide. Regardless of one's views, there can be little debate that events inspired his works. It is Nicholl's view that the time spent living with the Mountjoys may have influenced some of his later plays. "All's Well that Ends Well" features a young man being forced into marriage, a not-uncommon event during the Elizabethan times when Shakespeare lived. Perhaps his experience with the young couple he met on Silver Street shaped that play.

THE LODGER SHAKESPEARE is very much like the plays Shakespeare crafted in his lifetime. At one level, it is simple and straightforward and can be enjoyed by ordinary readers. At a higher level, Shakespeare scholars will find important biographical materials. In either respect, the characters introduced in this historical biography will provide readers a few more glimpses into a life that remains one of the most scrutinized in literary history.

--- Reviewed by Stuart Shiffman

Rowan Williams, current Archbishop of Canterbury, wrote the book 'Lost Icons: Reflections on Cultural Bereavement' while he was Archbishop of Wales, primate of a national church in the Anglican Communion outside of England. In his preface, he states that he was working on this book for the greater part of a decade: 'There have been times when I thought this book might more honestly have been presented as a sort of journal of the 1990s.' Of course, during this time, Williams wasn't even Archbishop of Wales; he spent much of the decade of the 1990s as Bishop of Monmouth.

This was the era of the Spice Girls, of the death of Prince Diana, of Madonna (the singer, not the Blessed Virgin Mary) and of other media sensations that came to be called 'icons'. An icon used to be used in terms almost exclusively for those images that Eastern Orthodox (among selected others) hold for veneration and prayer. Now it is more likely referring to a computer graphic image; even the media 'icons' have fallen. Williams resists the urge to set out a complex theological and aesthetic theory of iconography, but rather, more accessibly, looks at areas that are more particularly associated with everyday life and ways of thinking.

Williams looks at issues of identity, choice and will, society encroachments upon these aspects as well as the recognition of the other, that part of the world and society (including pieces of ourselves) that are outside of us and our own control. Finally, Williams looks at the issue of the soul, hoping to recover a 'lost language of the soul', taking secular language construction to task in theological as well as historical and psychological terms.

'So, this is an essay about the erosions of selfhood in North Atlantic modernity.' This involves issues in politics, economics, and philosophy as well as religion and theology. Williams' grasp of the fundament issues is strong, and his breadth of knowledge to draw these disciplines together in a useful and thoughtful way is impressive. Williams calls for a kind of cultural discourse that goes beyond the modern slogan and sound bite; this may seem radical, but in fact is what the true founders of modern society were calling for against the backdrop of medievalism. Who are we? Do we as individuals each have a self?

This is an important consideration - just what does our self consist of? Quoting Joseph Needleman, Williams states that 'Christian doctrine and exhortation are meaningless in our present context so long as we have no idea of what sense of self such teaching is address to.' We are called by Williams to build a new self different from that which media-saturated, postmodern society imposes upon us. Williams finally relates his argument back to the Eastern-style icon and what that means for us today. We have lost focus, lost a luminosity that these icons embody and demonstrate.

How can one not love a book in whose index Madonna, John Major, David Mamet, Thomas Merton and the Muppet Workshop appear virtually side by side (not to mention Roald Dahl, Jacques Derrida, and Diana, Princess of Wales)? Despite the references to Hegel and Derrida (among others), Williams text remains accessible and inviting to the general reader, and a real gift to those who have an interest in theology, spirituality, and culture.

This book is well written and easly understandable, +Williams presents his arguments clearly and constructs a good framework from the begining. This is not a scholarly work, in the sense that it is written in a more relaxed style, but Williams does a great job in using points made previously in the book to illuminate his current arguments. Although this book is written with a focus upon happenings in Great Britain it is still very helpful for people in the US. I would reccomend reading this book along with some Stanley Hauerwas and other Post-liberal thinkers as there are many points of contact between Williams' critisicms and those made by post-liberals.

I highly recommend that everyone read this book; after all, how can I be wrong when I'm so sincere? :-p

This is the second book by Archbishop Rowan Williams that I have read and, regardless of what one may think of the Anglical Communion, someone such as Rowan Williams must give one some level of hope for its continued (and hopefully unified) existence. Although this work is less theological than a book such as _Resurrection: Interpreting the Easter Gospel_ (the other book by him that I have read), it is nonetheless still relevant as it finds its roots in a Christian worldview.

What I find both interesting and refreshing about the Archbishop is that he seems far more willing to listen to both sides of an issue than many other religious thinkers. I have heard him referred to as a "post-liberal"; although the usage of the word "post" is all too chic these days, it does seem to designate a type of continuity with a tradition while at the same time a certain level of discomfort with it. Particularly refreshing is his brief discussion about the use of the word "choice" in abortion debates and how the use of the word "choice" presupposes the action/s of an individual are divorced from a social context. Such an understanding of "choice" is, of course, naive; the result of such thinking can all too quickly become an ethics of power, which is contrary to so much of feminist ethics.

Williams seems to have a particular interest in language and its place in community, culture, and relationships - not in the purely romantic sense, but in the more general sense of relating one person to an other. He notes several times the place of language in expressing and sharing one's self with others and how certain dispositions - such as a lack of remorse - result in the inability to accurately and fully articulate one's existence in language to another person. His points are well thought out and touch something deep within not only the self, but within the soul as well (for a fuller discussion of the soul and the self, read the last chapter).

Disappointingly, the layout of this book is rather frustrating - there are several formatting errors that are completely unnecessary. While the Archbishop's writing makes this book well worth the read, it would have been nice if those that formatted the book had done a higher quality job - a job that matched the Archbishop's work.

All in all though, this book is another one by Rowan Williams that is well worth reading - and, perhaps as another reviewer has written, worth reading twice.

I think this is one of the most invigorating books I have ever read. It is totally uncompromising and incredibly impressive in its breadth and depth of thought. It presents an intellectual and moral structure that goes further than any other I know in explaining personal identity, amongst a host of other things. I very much like its humanity - this is a world view that allows the possibility of remorse that has real meaning, of change and redemption. I don't think it's possible to read this book intelligently without measuring yourself against what it says, but falling short of its high standards does not leave one without hope - the roadmarks are there. This is an honest, kind, and above all brave book. It's also delightful to be given, along the way, a bibliography of other interesting titles. I shall be rereading many times, I suspect, and finding new depths each time.

Rowan Williams, current Archbishop of Canterbury, wrote the book 'Lost Icons: Reflections on Cultural Bereavement' while he was Archbishop of Wales, primate of a national church in the Anglican Communion outside of England. In his preface, he states that he was working on this book for the greater part of a decade: 'There have been times when I thought this book might more honestly have been presented as a sort of journal of the 1990s.' Of course, during this time, Williams wasn't even Archbishop of Wales; he spent much of the decade of the 1990s as Bishop of Monmouth.

This was the era of the Spice Girls, of the death of Prince Diana, of Madonna (the singer, not the Blessed Virgin Mary) and of other media sensations that came to be called 'icons'. An icon used to be used in terms almost exclusively for those images that Eastern Orthodox (among selected others) hold for veneration and prayer. Now it is more likely referring to a computer graphic image; even the media 'icons' have fallen. Williams resists the urge to set out a complex theological and aesthetic theory of iconography, but rather, more accessibly, looks at areas that are more particularly associated with everyday life and ways of thinking.

Williams looks at issues of identity, choice and will, society encroachments upon these aspects as well as the recognition of the other, that part of the world and society (including pieces of ourselves) that are outside of us and our own control. Finally, Williams looks at the issue of the soul, hoping to recover a 'lost language of the soul', taking secular language construction to task in theological as well as historical and psychological terms.

'So, this is an essay about the erosions of selfhood in North Atlantic modernity.' This involves issues in politics, economics, and philosophy as well as religion and theology. Williams' grasp of the fundament issues is strong, and his breadth of knowledge to draw these disciplines together in a useful and thoughtful way is impressive. Williams calls for a kind of cultural discourse that goes beyond the modern slogan and sound bite; this may seem radical, but in fact is what the true founders of modern society were calling for against the backdrop of medievalism. Who are we? Do we as individuals each have a self?

This is an important consideration - just what does our self consist of? Quoting Joseph Needleman, Williams states that 'Christian doctrine and exhortation are meaningless in our present context so long as we have no idea of what sense of self such teaching is address to.' We are called by Williams to build a new self different from that which media-saturated, postmodern society imposes upon us. Williams finally relates his argument back to the Eastern-style icon and what that means for us today. We have lost focus, lost a luminosity that these icons embody and demonstrate.

How can one not love a book in whose index Madonna, John Major, David Mamet, Thomas Merton and the Muppet Workshop appear virtually side by side (not to mention Roald Dahl, Jacques Derrida, and Diana, Princess of Wales)? Despite the references to Hegel and Derrida (among others), Williams text remains accessible and inviting to the general reader, and a real gift to those who have an interest in theology, spirituality, and culture.

I suppose I was always going to say that, having already been converted myself to Louie Louie as "the only rock and roll song you'll ever need" (collected 60+ versions to date). It's just a fascinating journey with so many unexpected twists and turns but the ever present "duh duh duh". And still amazingly relevant today. And funny!

A new preface by the author graces the pages of Louie Louie: The History & Mythology Of The World's Most Famous Rock N Roll Song. While it's hard to see how any song, however famous, could earn an entire book discussion, once you delve into Dave Marsh's Louie Louie, with its intrigue, high drama, and twists and turns, it's hard to see what took so long for the full tale to come to light - and yes, it earns its own book. This new edition provides a new preface by Marsh as it covers the complexities of a song which involved even the FBI.

Okay--truth be told, I bought this book as a joke. This book is no joke. Dave Marsh, an excellent writer, put together a real page-turner. (...)

By following the fate of one song Marsh gives us an excellent feel for how culture operates at a middle scale, somewhere between the micro-scale of individual performances and listenings and the macroscale of decades-long changes in musical styles. If you're interested in "memetics" but tired of empty bloviation about mind viruses and such, read this book and follow one musical meme on its tour of the memesphere.

Half way through this book I knew more about this rock song then I had ever wanted to know and then it kicked in to the history of Paul Revere and the Raiders. I keep on and she what other obscure trivia is to be revealed.

I just bought this book last week, but I tore through it in about two days -- it covers hundreds of words from the amorous arts, and explains where they all came from, and how they've changed meaning over the centuries. For instance, I never knew that so many words for the penis existed (or used to exist)! And it's amazing to learn that the word "testicle" is related to the word "testify" (both come from a Latin source that means "witness," because according to the book the testicles were considered a "witness" to a man's virility in ancient times.) The book does a good job, too, of discussing how cultural attitudes are revealed through the language we use. It mentions, for instance, that the word "pudendum" comes from a Latin source that means "to be ashamed," which obviously reflects a negative cultural attitude toward women's genitalia! Not all of the words that are discussed in the book are so explicit, though -- lots of them are about love words, too. There's a chapter on terms of endearment, and one on words of desire, and one on words of beauty, and so on. The introduction also includes a web site address where you can go to read some samples from the book, and where you can also suggest other words that might be included in the next edition. It's http://io.uwinnipeg.ca/~morton/lovers_tongue.htm in case you want to check out some sample excerpts. The book is often hilarious -- the author has a wicked sense of humor! I highly recommend this book for anyone who's interested in language (though it'd also make a good gift at a wedding shower or for valentine's day)! -- W.A.

The Lover's Tongue was reviewed by Michael Posner in The Globe and Mail on October 20, 2003. Here is the text of that review:

The word clitoris made its first appearance in the English language in the early 17th century. Now that I have your attention, let me add that its spelling is a straight anglicization of the Greek word kleitoris, which likely evolved from another Greek word meaning hill and, in turn, from an even older Indo-European word, klei, meaning to lean or slope (and from which some modern words, like recline and decline, are derived).

The word penis, on the other hand, is Latin, and means, for obvious reasons, tail. In common parlance, of course, synonyms for penis are frequently associated with weapons. In fact, the Hebrew word zayin, a slang word for penis, actually means weapon. Not incidentally, the letter zayin -- the seventh letter of the Hebrew alphabet -- is shaped like a rod with a crown on it.

I learned much of this thanks to The Lover's Tongue: A Merry Romp Through the Language of Love and Sex (Insomniac Press), a new book by Mark Morton, a mild-mannered assistant professor of English literature at the University of Winnipeg. I'm not sure how merry it is, but it is certainly exhaustive, a complete inventory of how words like clitoris, penis -- and scores of others that respectable family newspapers are not in the habit of printing -- arrived in the language.

Morton, who earlier wrote Cupboard Love: a Dictionary of Culinary Curiosities, as well as The End, a book about how previous eras celebrated the end of their millennia, says he was drawn to writing a book on the etymology of sex for a simple but compelling reason: He thought it would sell.

"I don't see much reason to write scholarly articles that nobody probably is going to read," says Morton. "But I like taking the academic research and making it accessible to people. Everyone is interested in sex and even people who don't know what etymology means are interested in it."

But, as he prudently notes in his introduction, it's a book that best lends itself to an occasional, well, probe, rather than an extended sitting. Dipping in and out, one can learn that the origin of the infamous f-word is probably not, as is commonly thought, an abbreviation of For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge, but more likely derives from old Scandinavian words fukka (Norwegian) and focka (Swedish) meaning to copulate.

Similarly, you may be both surprised and enlightened to learn that the word orchid comes from the Greek orkhis, which means testicle. And orkhis itself evolved from an older Indo-European word ergh, meaning to mount. Thus, explains Morton, who for 10 years has also been resident etymologist on CBC Radio's Definitely Not the Opera, do we have the modern English word orchestra -- evolved from the Greek orkheisthai, meaning dance -- perhaps owing to how dance simulates sex.

There are dozens of such linguistic jewels sprinkled through Morton's breezily readable text. He spent three months writing it, another nine months researching, a task greatly facilitated, he says, by the Internet. The Oxford English Dictionary is available on-line, which allowed him to rummage through its entire data base in quest of words with sexual connotations.

Other books on language, of course, have taken titillating aim at the subject of sex. There are densely academic three-volume sets to be digested on sex in English literature under the Stuarts, for example, as well as myriad titles taking a popular approach to sexual slang. But The Lover's Tongue may well be the most comprehensive etymological treatment. Anal, oral, body parts -- it's all here in what amounts to a linguistic history of smut.

Some words now effectively taboo in civilized discourse were once in common usage, including the vulgar term for the female sex organ. The precise origins of that well-known c-word, Morton concedes, are obscure, with possible Greek, Latin, Arabic, Germanic and Sanskrit antecedents. Morton posits that it may also be related to the word quaint, which was used in 14th-century England to mean intricately designed, and which in turn developed out of the Latin cognitum, meaning knowledgeable.

And in modern times, at least, he notes, many common descriptives of the vagina carry decidedly negative associations, including gristle-grabber, snatch, red snapper and dick muncher. "They're all manifestations of what Freud called the vagina dentata."

Working in the basement of his north-end Winnipeg home, Morton says, he found nothing remotely erotic about the enterprise. And it shows: His tone throughout combines detached bemusement with scholarly, straight-ahead explication. "Even if you're dealing with a word that denotes extremely erotic activity, you're thinking about it in a way that somehow blunts all that. But now that I read it, I'm sometimes shocked, even to the point of thinking, 'I don't know if I want my mom to read this.' I don't know if she'll be buying copies and sending it to friends."

Even Morton's colleagues at the U of W, he hints, are having some trouble with it, though that may be less a function of its salacious content than the fact that so commercial an exercise strays dangerously off the traditional academic paths.

There is little in Morton's background that would make him an obvious candidate for writing a book of sexual etymology. He grew up on a wheat farm outside Weyburn, Sask., a vast, treeless plain that prompted the young Morton to wonder about his own origins and how he ended up there. "I think that's somehow related to my interest in etymology."

And although there was no library in the house, there was "a big, old dictionary which even as a child, I remember poring over." He taught himself Latin phrases and tried to learn Greek at 12. "The fascination with language is very deep in me."

Now, he intends to broaden his range with his next book, a cultural history of emotions. Says Morton: "I think it's a much bigger subject than just etymology."

I just bought this book last week, but I tore through it in about two days -- it covers hundreds of words from the amorous arts, and explains where they all came from, and how they've changed meaning over the centuries. For instance, I never knew that so many words for the penis existed (or used to exist)! And it's amazing to learn that the word "testicle" is related to the word "testify" (both come from a Latin source that means "witness," because according to the book the testicles were considered a "witness" to a man's virility in ancient times.) The book does a good job, too, of discussing how cultural attitudes are revealed through the language we use. It mentions, for instance, that the word "pudendum" comes from a Latin source that means "to be ashamed," which obviously reflects a negative cultural attitude toward women's genitalia! Not all of the words that are discussed in the book are so explicit, though -- lots of them are about love words, too. There's a chapter on terms of endearment, and one on words of desire, and one on words of beauty, and so on. The introduction also includes a web site address where you can go to read some samples from the book, and where you can also suggest other words that might be included in the next edition. ... The book is often hilarious -- the author has a wicked sense of humor! I highly recommend this book for anyone who's interested in language (though it'd also make a good gift at a wedding shower or for valentine's day)! -- W.A.

The Lover's Tongue was reviewed by Michael Posner in Canada's national newspaper, The Globe and Mail on October 20, 2003. Here is the text of that review:

The word "clitoris" made its first appearance in the English language in the early 17th century. Now that I have your attention, let me add that its spelling is a straight anglicization of the Greek word "kleitoris," which likely evolved from another Greek word meaning "hill" and, in turn, from an even older Indo-European word, "klei," meaning "to lean or slope" (and from which some modern words, like "recline" and "decline," are derived).

The word "penis," on the other hand, is Latin, and means, for obvious reasons, "tail." In common parlance, of course, synonyms for "penis" are frequently associated with weapons. In fact, the Hebrew word "zayin," a slang word for "penis," actually means "weapon." Not incidentally, the letter zayin -- the seventh letter of the Hebrew alphabet -- is shaped like a rod with a crown on it.

I learned much of this thanks to The Lover's Tongue: A Merry Romp Through the Language of Love and Sex (Insomniac Press), a new book by Mark Morton, a mild-mannered assistant professor of English literature at the University of Winnipeg. I'm not sure how merry it is, but it is certainly exhaustive, a complete inventory of how words like clitoris, penis -- and scores of others that respectable family newspapers are not in the habit of printing -- arrived in the language.

Morton, who earlier wrote Cupboard Love: a Dictionary of Culinary Curiosities, as well as The End, a book about how previous eras celebrated the end of their millennia, says he was drawn to writing a book on the etymology of sex for a simple but compelling reason: He thought it would sell.

"I don't see much reason to write scholarly articles that nobody probably is going to read," says Morton. "But I like taking the academic research and making it accessible to people. Everyone is interested in sex and even people who don't know what etymology means are interested in it."

But, as he prudently notes in his introduction, it's a book that best lends itself to an occasional, well, probe, rather than an extended sitting. Dipping in and out, one can learn that the origin of the infamous f-word is probably not, as is commonly thought, an abbreviation of For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge, but more likely derives from old Scandinavian words "fukka" (Norwegian) and "focka" (Swedish) meaning "to copulate."

Similarly, you may be both surprised and enlightened to learn that the word "orchid" comes from the Greek "orkhis," which means "testicle." And "orkhis" itself evolved from an older Indo-European word "ergh," meaning "to mount." Thus, explains Morton, who for 10 years has also been resident etymologist on CBC Radio's Definitely Not the Opera, do we have the modern English word "orchestra" -- evolved from the Greek "orkheisthai," meaning "dance" -- perhaps owing to how dance simulates sex.

There are dozens of such linguistic jewels sprinkled through Morton's breezily readable text. He spent three months writing it, another nine months researching, a task greatly facilitated, he says, by the Internet. The Oxford English Dictionary is available on-line, which allowed him to rummage through its entire data base in quest of words with sexual connotations.

Other books on language, of course, have taken titillating aim at the subject of sex. There are densely academic three-volume sets to be digested on sex in English literature under the Stuarts, for example, as well as myriad titles taking a popular approach to sexual slang. But The Lover's Tongue may well be the most comprehensive etymological treatment. Anal, oral, body parts -- it's all here in what amounts to a linguistic history of smut.

Some words now effectively taboo in civilized discourse were once in common usage, including the vulgar term for the female sex organ. The precise origins of that well-known c-word, Morton concedes, are obscure, with possible Greek, Latin, Arabic, Germanic and Sanskrit antecedents. Morton posits that it may also be related to the word "quaint," which was used in 14th-century England to mean "intricately designed," and which in turn developed out of the Latin "cognitum," meaning "knowledgeable."

And in modern times, at least, he notes, many common descriptives of the vagina carry decidedly negative associations, including "gristle-grabber," "snatch," "red snapper" and "dick muncher." "They're all manifestations of what Freud called the vagina dentata."

Working in the basement of his north-end Winnipeg home, Morton says, he found nothing remotely erotic about the enterprise. And it shows: His tone throughout combines detached bemusement with scholarly, straight-ahead explication. "Even if you're dealing with a word that denotes extremely erotic activity, you're thinking about it in a way that somehow blunts all that. But now that I read it, I'm sometimes shocked, even to the point of thinking, 'I don't know if I want my mom to read this.' I don't know if she'll be buying copies and sending it to friends."

Even Morton's colleagues at the U of W, he hints, are having some trouble with it, though that may be less a function of its salacious content than the fact that so commercial an exercise strays dangerously off the traditional academic paths.

There is little in Morton's background that would make him an obvious candidate for writing a book of sexual etymology. He grew up on a wheat farm outside Weyburn, Sask., a vast, treeless plain that prompted the young Morton to wonder about his own origins and how he ended up there. "I think that's somehow related to my interest in etymology."

And although there was no library in the house, there was "a big, old dictionary which even as a child, I remember poring over." He taught himself Latin phrases and tried to learn Greek at 12. "The fascination with language is very deep in me."

Now, he intends to broaden his range with his next book, a cultural history of emotions. Says Morton: "I think it's a much bigger subject than just etymology."

Have you ever wondered where the word vagina comes from? Me neither, but after reading Mark Morton's new book, The Lover's Tongue: A Merry Romp Through the Language of Love and Sex, I can tell you.

Vagina is a Latin word, which means sheath, or scabbard-basically a holster for a sword. Pretty vivid imagery, huh? After reading Morton's book, I can assure you that the imagery becomes even racier (racy is a seventeenth-century word describing wine, specifically, a sprightly wine).

Morton's book reads like a dirty dictionary. He describes all of the bad words you know, and then a whole lot more which you've probably never even heard of. The subjects range from words related to anatomical parts, to sexual acts and even to words describing sexual orientation. Did you know that heterosexuals are known as straight because homosexuals used to be called "bent"?

Morton not only fills readers in with this fun trivia, but he provides highly researched histories of each word. He explains the etymological links between words in language easy enough for his bawdy readers to understand. Best of all, Morton writes with a relentless, self-aware humour. When describing the word tongue and all of its dirty counterparts, he notes, "As for the phrase tongue-in-cheek, fear not: that idiom has nothing to do with the buttocks, so you can continue to use it in polite company." Morton's prose is subtle, eloquent, but sure to take every opportunity for a below-the-belt pun.

Throughout the book, Morton quotes classical writers, celebrities and historical figures to provide another take on the subject. These are separated from the central text in small text bubbles, so that if you become extremely engrossed in the chapter about copulation words, you can just skip over the line from Shakespeare.

The biggest problem with Morton's book is that it is essentially a reference book without an index. While he acknowledges that readers will likely not want to read through the whole work in one sitting, he doesn't realize they might not want to sit through one even chapter. I would like to be able to pick up the book when I have an itching to know about a particular word, and then be able to find that word quickly.

Despite the lack of `quick-access,' this book is very tempting. It's fun, sexy and laugh-out-loud funny. This is linguistic entertainment at its best. After all, where else could you find five pages of words for the penis? For your ribald friend, this will make a perfect holiday gift.

[The preceding review first appeared in The Link, authored by Karen Bisken, and published by Concordia University.]

I though that some parts overdone with comic characters and Japanese attitudes but overall fascinating. I loved examining the photos of some of the earlier robots over 200 years old. Some look incredibly intricate as well as beautiful.

I also felt inspired to get one of these modern robots too.

All of my life, I have been promised that the age of the robot is just around the corner. It seems like one of those things that is always in the immediate future, and always just out of reach, an eternal carrot that we keep moving towards, always one step ahead. Fifty years ago, they figured we would all be living with robots in our homes by now, doing domestic chores, entertaining us, educating us. Our plastic pal whose fun to be with!

"Loving the Machine" again makes this promise, and again I am inclined to believe it. Author Timothy Hornyak plays show and tell, taking you on a guided tour through robotics from the primitive first attempts to the modern marvels of Asimo and the semi-android Replee Q1expo. They really are stunning, and one can almost feel the fire of creativity and inspiration driving modern robotics research. The scientists are building robots out of passion, out of a real sense of discovery rather than commerce, and that is what always drives technology forward. All of the different fields are coming together, mixing software with hardware, sharing breakthroughs and triumphs that far outnumber failures and disappointments.

Ostensibly, "Loving the Machine" is also about Japan's relationship with the robot, and it is. Japan's culture of robots stretches back into its distant past, with the Karakuri automatons that are still wonders of ancient technology, unable to be replicated today. Whereas Western cultures have Superman, Japan has Mighty Atom, the robot superboy. Whereas the US has GI Joe, Japan has the super robots Gundam and Mazinger Z. Japan has nurtured a deep-seated love for the robot, and the whole country holds its collective breath waiting for the first truly intelligent robot to announce its own birthday. However, in attempting to contrast cultures, this is where the book loses its footing. The author makes much of The Terminator and the Replicants from "Blade Runner", stressing the West's fear of technology out of control, but never mentions R2-D2 and C-3PO from "Star Wars", Rosie the Robot Maid from "The Jetsons" Johnny 5 from the films "Short Circuit," Bender from "Futurama," or Isaac Asimov's heartbreaking hero from "The Bicentennial Man" There is not even a mention of how the fearsome Terminator returns for a second movie, this time as the hero saving a young boy. While not on the same level, the West has also long had a love affair with cute, friendly robots who are friends and companions rather than just functional machines.

I've been let down before, but "Loving the Machine" has given me a boost, returning me to the childhood where, when asked to draw a picture of what I thought life would be like in the year 2000, I drew a happy home complete with robot butler and flying car. The flying car may be out of the question, but there is at least still some hope that I might live to see the first truly intelligent robot announce its own birthday. Frankly, I can't wait.

What else can I say that my title doesn't convey?

My only carp--perhaps--is that the author fails satisfactorily to address the issue of why robots, so very hyped (albeit less so than, say, thirty years ago), have failed to establish significant inroads in domestic settings. Visit a Japanese automobile factory and you'll see robots everywhere--mounting parts, soldering, painting (even painting one another--accidentally, one hopes!). But in the home--as comedically immortalized in Woody Allen's 1974 hootfest, "Sleeper"--you don't see robots other than as curiosities, such as non-pooping "dogs."

Hornyak could have made the book more entertaining by including the anecdote about Herbie--had he known it. Herbie was a non-anthropomorphic robot that delivered inter-office mail in an AT&T facility in Silver Spring, Maryland. His route was not preprogrammed, but was "taught" to him by spray-painting a gradually fading metallic stripe onto the carpet: Herbie would follow the stripe, stopping whenever someone stood in his path. (Herbie was very polite: not only did he move slowly, but he did not step on feet.) One conniver thought it would be funny to spray-paint the stripe right over to the fifth-floor picture window, whereby Herbie committed hara-kiri in a spectacular blaze. (The jokester was less upset at being fired than at the eighty-thousand-dollar legal judgment.)

Do you want to know what's going on in the world of human-like robots? This book will bring you up to the present and it's happening in Japan. It's good light reading with the right balance of photos of robots. Not any kind of depth - just a light entertaining read. Kid's will like it as well as any adult who's interested in cartoon robots and real cutting edge human-like robots.

The book really shows how easily human-like robots are slipping in the psychie of Japan (and eventually the rest of us). Are we really ready for the coming robot world? Doesn't matter. We're all being softened up by these friendly and so nice robots. Nice, nice robots. Step by step with the help of their human inventors and advertisers, they've started their march into human society. I'd suggest watching the movie "I Robot" after you've read the book, or give both as a gift.

Loving The Machine: The Art And Science Of Japanese Robots is a fascinating and informative tribute to Japanese popular culture and its love affair with humanoid robots ranging from anime's Astro Boy to automatons imagined in speculative fiction to have existed in the Edo period of Japanese history. In stark contrast to American movies portraying robots as ruthless, Terminator-style killing machines, Japanese cinema and television has a tradition of gentler robots that mimic human activities. Full-color photographs on every page illustrate this unique analysis of what Japanese culture celebrates robots, Japan's historical connections to robots, and what modern technology indicates the future holds. Loving The Machine is very highly recommended reading -- especially for modern Japanese culture buffs.

Escher's work is so engaging and interesting. Everyone has seen Escher's work, even if they don't know the name. I've used his work to teach math, graphics, and problem solving. My college students love analyzing his work.

I bought this book as a gift, and it was an excellent choice. There are many example works in the book, plus interesting explanations.

In The Magic Mirror of M.C. Escher, Bruno Ernst, an acquaintance of Escher's until Escher's death in 1972, presents a thorough summary of the life and work of Escher. Ernst devotes a chapter to the life of Escher, and uses the rest of the book to describe his amazing work. He includes the different themes and styles that Escher used, and devotes a good amount of space to each work discussed. The book is extremely thorough and includes large clear illustrations of the works themselves and also of earlier drafts of the works and mathematical descriptions to assist the reader. This is the most concise book of Escher and his work I have ever seen, and Ernst has done a fabulous job on it.

The work of Escher has captured the imagination of many people and in this book Bruno Ernst (a personal friend of Escher) expands our understanding of the artist. After a brief but concise biography, the author throughly analyses the most important facets of Escher's artistic output: the illusion in drawing, the use of perspective, the creation of impossible realities, simultaneous and contrasting realities, crystals, and the infinite. Escher was an artist who was unique in in his work, he stands by himself, and this book is a helping tool in understanding and appreciating the unparalleled magic of his work.

I just picked this book up thinking that there has been a "NEW" book published on M.C.Escher's work.When I got it home ,I checked it against other Escher books and was disappointed to find it is the same book published several times before and by different publishers.
As you can see the ,publication date of this edition is shown as April 6,2007.Therefore, the reviewers here must have been looking at a previous publication,possibly the one also listed here as a paperback in 1987.The copy I had was even earlier,published by Ballantine in 1976.
The quality of this Taschen Edition is very good, in fact, superior to the paperback editions I have seen; and will be enjoyed by anyone who likes M.C. Esher's work ;but the material included has not changed.
I believe this is an excellent book ,and agree with the reviews already written on other editions.
I guess what we have here is A 25 Year Celebration of its first publication.
This is an excellent chance to obtain this book and will be enjoyed,particularly by people new to Escher's work.The fact that this edition has now come out speaks volumes about what a great book this was,and it's great to see it available again.

The greatness of this book on the work of M.C. Escher is that it shows how he worked up his ideas for various pieces. It also gives a thorough explanation of his thought and design process. It is truely a shame that this book has gone out of print. I sincerely hope that the publisher brings it back.

I have found that once a novice witch has settled into the Pagan path, the next thing they look for is community. Many a new witchling yearns for a coven to call home. Many try and start one on their own, thinking that all they have to do is show up and -whala- instant coven. Sadly, most of these fledgling covens never make it past 6 months when the real world work of running a religious organization becomes apparent.

Ms. McSherry has succinctly taken her own experience as a coven leader and put it in an accessible and wonderfully complete book. This book covers all the essentials to forming, running, maintaining and even dissolving a coven. The author's voice is pleasant and informative, making the material in this book easy to read and understand. Many books of this nature tend to be on the dry side, but Ms. McSherry has an upbeat manner, which includes spells and rituals designed to further the coven's aims and purpose. Pitfalls and things to be aware of in forming and running a coven are briefly touched upon and explained. Solutions and alternative examples are provided for many situations that can arise.

The only drawback to this book that I can see is that the work is aimed to the cyber-world coven. Little is said of the real life duties of a High Priest or Priestess in regards to counseling or midnight phone calls for help. As a former roommate to a coven's High Priestess, I can tell you, her duties never ended. There was many a time when she was called away to help a covener with only a moment's notice. Aside from this, I found the book to cover most aspects of running a spiritual group.

The book also has several appendices taken from JaguarMoon, the author's own coven. They are the various application forms sent out to prospective coveners to weed out the less serious applicants. They are an excellent jumping off place to coming up with your own requirements for membership in your own coven.

I would recommend this book to anyone considering forming a coven, whether online or in the real world. There are many things brought to a reader's attention to consider before taking the leap into a leadership role.

W. Lyon Martin author of Ordinary Girl - A Magical Child and Aidan's First Full Moon Circle

New age readers interested in building a strong magickal group will find much to learn from priestess/teacher Lisa McSherry, who provides a survey of the mentoring relationship of group work and the communities which can enhance an exploration of magic. Chapters discuss how to make contact with a magickal group, how to resolve predictable conflicts and overcome obstacles, and how to assess and encourage group strengths.

New age readers interested in building a strong magickal group will find much to learn from priestess/teacher Lisa McSherry, who provides a survey of the mentoring relationship of group work and the communities which can enhance an exploration of magic. Chapters discuss how to make contact with a magickal group, how to resolve predictable conflicts and overcome obstacles, and how to assess and encourage group strengths.

This is the newest of a number of books that have come out in recent years on effective creation and management of pagan and occult groups. The author has been the high priestess of an online Wiccan coven for the better part of a decade, and speaks with good authority on the topic.

There's a LOT of good material in here. McSherry blends straightforward advice, anecdotes, and exercises and rituals to aid the reader in hir endeavours. She's adamant about the fact that starting a coven (or any other group) is not an easy task, and any HP/S is in for a LOT of work, even if s/he does manage to find people to distribute the work among. However, for those willing to take on the work of leading and administrating a group, there are some definite gems in this book.

Where she really shines is communication. A lot of the reason for the success or failure of any group, pagan or otherwise, is the communication involved. McSherry covers many angles of the emotions involved, as well as techniques for more effective communication, both in person and online. And, true to her first book, The Virtual Pagan, she does offer particular advice for cyber covens, though I'd also recommend her earlier book for a more in-depth view.

Do be forewarned--although the cover says that the book covers "groves, covens, temples, and magickal families", a lot of the material is more "coveny". This is understandable given McSherry's extensive experience in a coven setting. However, those who are interested in starting magical orders or other types of non-coven group may want to supplement their research with materials that are more specific to their type of organization. (Don't skip over this book, though--the more general information is very worth it!)

My only other complaints have nothing to do with the author and everything to do with the publisher. I found a number of typos throughout the book; another copy edit may have cleaned those up. However, the real downer is the actual physical quality of the book--the paper for both the pages and the cover is incredibly thin, enough that you can see the next page faintly through it. And the ink on some of the pages is smudged. The layout and cover design, on the other hand, are excellent, and easy on the eyes.

But don't let the paper quality deter you--this is a wonderful book, and a must-have if you're thinking of starting a coven. Reading this and using the advice given should help nip a lot of problems in the bud.

This book is an excellent complement to Nick Farrell's Gathering the Magic, but is also unique enough to stand out on its own when it comes to group dynamics. Lisa breaks group dynamics down, explaining the different types of groups, the strengths and weaknesses of those groups, and providing exercises the reader can use to assess the health of a group as well as why the reader is forming or joining a group.

My only complaint has nothing to do with the writing. The quality of ink and the printing sometimes created issues for me in reading this text. The ink would blur words. The paper is very thin as well, which is unusual for traditional publishing.

This book sat on my shelf for two years before I finally read it. I was suspicious that the writing would be workmanlike or that it would be merely admirable. Similarly, I'm not a big reader of sports biographies as many tend to be shallow. All of those concerns were quickly allayed when I began reading the book. Not only is the story extremely compelling, but Ritchie actually does a wonderful job of exploring Taylor's life and times. I found it difficult to put down, and upon finishing it I can say the book definitely merits another read. The story is painstakingly researched (and Todd Balf's biography on Taylor that is immanently coming out must rest on Ritchie's shoulders). Occasionally Ritchie does squander potential usage of suspense and sometimes he repeats himself. But these are minor quibbles. The only real difficulty with the book is reading about Taylor's demise. After reaching protracted heights of fame and heroism, the way his life ends is very sad indeed.

If you liked this book, also see "Unforgivable Blackness," the documentary by Ken Burns about the boxer Jack Johnson--an amazing film about another black champion living in racist America.

As Ritchie points out himself, it is surprising that it took a white englishman to compile such a comprehensive history of an American black man who was one of, if not the first black world champion in any sport and one of cycling's orginal superstars.

While the book makes for a good short history of the early years of cycling as a sport and how it has evolved, Taylor's transcends the sport of cycling and provides a rich glimpse into early 20th century racial issues, the development of transportation in the US, the twighlight of the Guilded Age and the onset of the Great Depression. Ritchie weaves all of these together in a compelling manner.

In hindsight, while the likes of Jesse Owens and Jackie Robinson are often credited with being the original trailblazers for black athletes, they owe much to the brave steps taken by the now sadly little remembered Major Taylor. This book is long overdue.

This is a very enjoyable book. Very well researched and documented (almost to a fault). Anyone who is serious about the history of bicycle racing in the USA must add this book to their library. After reading this book one must wonder how great Major Taylor would have been if the playing field was equal. Highly Recommended!!

I found this story of a black man in this early 1900 era extremely fascinating. His beliefs in fair play, extrodinary dedication to his faith and his hobby made him a role model for any and all to follow. his persistance in perfecting his beloved sport despite all of the negativity of this era, to me was unbelieveable. I read few books cover to cover but I have had the pleasure of reading this one 4 times. Ritchie has this book so well documented that anyone reading it would have no problem of becoming totally engrossed in it. A well done from me.

This book was originally published by Bicycle Books in San Francisco. I would hope that it would still be available, even though 5 years ago hardback copies were selling at chain bookstores for as little as $4 a copy. The Ritchie book is written not just from the perspective of bicycling history (although it is well-researched from that point of view), but as an important social history. In addition, it reminds us of the history of the development of transportation and how bicycles were eventually pushed out of the public vision of having right-of-way to being relegated to the closed track of the velodrome so they wouldn't get in the way of the growing automobile culture. Major Taylor's career is important in the history of racism and attempted and often effective exclusion of Blacks not just from racing opportunities, but from the subsequent business opportunities that followed on the heels of the age of the turn-of-the-century racers. The largest reason that Major Taylor died a pauper was because he was not allowed to participate on an equal level with White businessmen in the developing automobile industry, according to Ritchie's research. Turn of the century bicycle racers, as Ritchie points out, were instrumental in contributing to the design of the shock system and the use of pneumatic tires, among other features, of the emerging American automobile. They also were some of the large investors in the industry upon their retirement from active racing status. Taylor wanted to participate in the design process and applied to a university for formal education in engineering, but was denied access, despite his hard-won efforts, previous inventions in bicycle design and testing, and celebrity status. The fact that the man died early of a stroke and alienated from his family and community in the end can only speak of a man who, after putting out his entire life, had finally been broken by the pressure of living in a racist society. Yet, writing his autobiography and selling it door to door evokes the phoenix-like quality of many members of the Black community who survive and thrive in spite of great hardship, even in our present times.

Overall I was pleased with Roszak's book. Most of the pieces i've read about the sixties and the "hippie" era focus only on the sex, the drugs, and the music. While Roszak did dicuss this, his book was quite different because it focused mainly on the politcal and social issues of the time. Roszak include everything from the Vietnam War to how the counter culture has affected the lifestyles of the typical American family. Although Roszk is clearly on the far left side of the political spectrum, it is obvious that he tries his best to be objective and is sure to back up most of his points and information with credible sources. What I admire most about Roszak's book is the tone he takes. In my experience, many adult pieces concerning this era in history and the taboo, radical things that went on are often full of criticism towards that particular generation. Roszak did not criticize the protestors or the acid droppers, like most do. In his book, he carefully explained and supported the motives for these people, suggestng his approval and admiration for those who weren't afraid to stand up for what they believed in, no matter how much society frowned upon it.

This book offers a highly detailed examination of the relationship of the late 1960's counterculture to cutting-edge intellectual ideas of the same era; Roszak discusses Herbert Marcuse and Norman Brown, among others, in great detail and shows very lucidly how their ideas influenced intellectual and political movements on college campuses in both America and Europe. Roszak's prescience here is amazing, considering that he wrote this book in 1967-68, while the phonemena he discusses were still unfolding! It would be interesting if Roszak were to write a response to his own book today, considering how the counterculture of the early 1990's has been so rapidly devoured by the mainstream--Roszak foresaw the possibility of this happening to the 1960's counterculture, but it took far longer then than it has now. Roszak's ruminations on the absurdity of the Alternative Nation would be welcome with this reader!

Roszak's "Making of a Counter Culture" defined an era and the youth society that composed it. A thrilling expose' of Counter Culture Philosophy and oreintation, this is where the discussion all began. His bent on analysis of cultural differences and tendency to omit much of the political implications necessitated the need for a library of text thereafter.
Timothy Fitzgerald

read this still inspiring report on the counterculture and own its potential for self-transformation in your own life and the life of our global society.

I read this book in 1979 and it helped me to make sense of the 60s landslide in my own life. Re-reading it many times over the years, together with Roszak's other very insightful work (Unfinished Animal, 1975) is always an inspiring reminder of the counterculture's deep potential for cultural renewal. Forty years after the Summer of Love, Roszak's insights are still right on.

This book is by far the most seminal book one can read in attempting to get an accurate and unvarnished understanding of the sixties counterculture; the social and historical reasons for its rise, its intellectual underpinnings, and the way in which its actions were informed and indeed propelled by its unique constellation of integrating values into a cultural ethos.

Recently the counterculture has been viciously attacked, intellectually trashed and intentionally trivialized by a series of books and articles by mainstream neoconservatives who wish to discredit the counterculture once and for all by blaming it and the "permissiveness" it spawned for the manifest ills the mainstream society has actually engendered through the evolution of its own corrupted, nonrepresentative, and nondemocratic political process. Many ignorant youthful authors have succumbed to attributing fallacious ideas and notions of this ethos in a way that is not only inaccurate and disingenuous, but which serves to trivialize the quite serious cultural critique it comprised.

All that is set aside here. Remember, this book was written more than 30 years ago, even as the counterculture was rising, so it is very much a observational history, one done at ground zero of the demonstrations, sit-ins, when the tumult and strident calls for radical new solutions rang clear, and the heady air of nascent social and intellectual revolution was in the air.

Here one finds the counterculture placed in its proper context, and not just discussed 'en passant' as the demonized triage of sex, drugs, and rock and roll'. One can hardly understand the sixties in such simplistic terms, and Roszak helps one to understand the complex welter of social, economic, and political factors that led to its emergence. In its essence the counterculture was a social and political reaction to the hypocrisy of the mainstream materialistic culture from which it sprang, and as sociologist Philp Slater has commented elsewhere, most of the individual elements of the value system of the counterculture stem from values the mainstream culture in fact claims to hold but actually does not practice and employ.

This, then, is book with remarkable insight, perspective, and historical verve. Rosazak nails quite accurately the tensions, problems and contradictions associated with the rise of the counterculture and the innate problems its continued existence eventually portended for the materialistic mainstream culture. Of course, as history shows us, the sixties ethos was flattened by the overwhelming onslaught of the establishment and the Ohio National Guard, and the political and social ethos of the counterculture melded into the domain of increasingly isolated private and personal philosphies of hippies being assimilated into the mainstream.

The fact that its ethos is now blamed for much of the discontent and confusion of contemporary America is a likely result of what happens when one tries to merge antagonistic ideas and notions into a cultural system that is inconsistent with its own. This is a wonderful book, and one needs to read before the victors of those fractious times so revise the official version of the history of the 1960s that those of us who were there will no longer recognize it.