R Books

I keep this book handy for a quick read and the perusal of some wonderful art. It's colorful, restful, and thought-provoking. It keeps reaffirming for me that reading is definitely a passion to be pursued amid all the busy-ness and daily stresses. It's a terrific gift to give your book-lover friends and family!

It would be difficult for a book lover not to thoroughly enjoy this collection of writings about books. A great resource for thinking about books, reading and writing, for ideas about how to go about reading and writing, and for just finely crafted writing by lovers of books.

Bascove's art which adorns this collection creates a marvelously private, cozy, bookish world where voices seldom sound aloud, and the world outside is muted, allowing the reader or writer to be in the world on the printed page.

I am pleased with the handling of my order of "Where Books Fall Open". The book arrived in a timely manner and in good condition. I will always buy from Amazon.

This is a gorgeous book! It is filled with essays and poems and thoughts on reading, writing, and the love of books. The writings are from various authors some classic and well known and some I haven't heard of before. Some writings I liked a lot better than others. (-Regardless of the ones that didn't 'speak' to me, I still consider this a great collection of writings on the subjects I love.) The paintings are rich in color and detail and anyone who loves books/reading/writing will enjoy these highly eye appealing pictures that depict people with books! I'd love to have some of these to hang in my home!

This is a beautiful gift for yourself or someone you know who loves the literary world.

Buy it and enjoy!

This anthology of prose and poetry starts out strong .... prose selections from Italo Calvino, Lynne Schwartz, Roy Blount and Anne Fadiman are wonderful, affectionate tributes to reading, Also, I think this is the first time Steve Martin and Jane Austen have appeared together, and both are fine. There are also a LOT of poems here, and some are better than others, as with all poetry. This is a mix of contemporary (Fran Lebowitz, Billy Collins) and classic (Cervantes, Elizabeth Barret Browning) selections that explore reading, writing and books. Artwork by Bascove is of a style consistent with the cover -- bold, colorful and primitive, sixteen paintings that also feature books. A percentage of the profits go to First Book, a literacy program for children.

I'd say the quality of the selections is uneven, but you will undoubtedly find something, and probably many things, that will please you. This is a small volume that can be read quickly, or savored, and as an object it is very pleasing. This would make a fine gift for a bibliophile you know.

Lots of fun at a friend's birthday party! Really took us back to our high school days!

I was one of those 1980s teenagers who watched MTV when it used to play music videos 24 hours daily, and this book has a lot of the music artists who performed on MTV, including the song titles in the book. It even has a picture of Ronald Reagan, the Rubik's Cube, and other 1980s nostalgia that I remember so well. Oh yeah, it also made me remember seeing Courtney Cox on that Bruce Springsteen music video doing that swinging dance on his stage when I read about Bruce in this book...also that old Madonna look complete with the Boy Toy belt and wedding dress. :) If you want to remember the great music artists of the 1980s, their songs, and the memories, get this book!

"Who Can It Be Now?," named after the Men at Work song, is just over 200 pages of music and pop culture trivia taken from the '80s. Most of the book is devoted to just one-liners (not the entire song), with the lyric on one side of the page and the song title, band/artist, and bits of trivia on the opposite side. Some of the sections in the book feature one-hit wonders (like Kajagoogoo {"Too Shy"} and Toni Basil {"Mickey"}), actors-turned-singers (like Patrick Swayze {"She's Like the Wind" in 'Dirty Dancing'} and Rick Springfield), as well as bits of movie, TV, and celebrity trivia, but only if it pertains to a certain '80s song. There are also lots of black-and-white photos (pretty much on every page) of singers/performers/actors, like Debbie (Deborah now) Gibson, Michael and Janet Jackson, Mr. T, Weird Al, and the Brat Pack, just to name a few.

Despite some of the catty remarks and photo alterations (see Mary Lou Retton and Lionel Richie), this book will certainly make you laugh and reminisce if you're a child of the '80s. It's hard to digest all of the info in this book in one sitting (flipping back and forth between the lyrics and answers does lose its appeal after awhile), but halfway into it, you'll be dusting off your old CDs/cassettes/vinyls and playing them while reading this book. The only gripe I have is that there's no index or table of contents to find certain pages quicker; other than that, "Who Can It Be Now?" is a fun and nostalgic trip back to the '80s. Worth reading if you're an '80s fanatic like I am.

This book brought back memories of some great times. I love the many references to "Proctor" from the Police Academy movies. I forgot what bumbling idiots those Police Academy characters were!!!

If my review title makes you scratch your head and say to yourself, "hmmm, where do I know that from?", you should really buy this book. (It's from Styx.) Anyway, this book is a little tongue in cheek, obviously, but it does more than just make fun of Tommy Tutone, Bananarama, The Human League, songs like 867-5309 Jenny, etc. It has dozens of little quizzes, where you see the lines from songs on one page, and then when you flip to the next page you find out the names of the groups that sang them. Interspersed throughout the book are tons of little articles (blurbs, really) about various groups, which tell you, in all likelihood, more than any human would ever want to know about, say, Spandau Ballet. But it's still a good book. I recommend the living daylights out of this one, it's hilarious, especially at parties.

Will Work for Fun: Three Simple Steps for Turning Any Hobby or Interest Into Cash

This is not only fun to read due to Alan Bechtold's unique
writing style, it is chocked full of tips, tricks, and tools
that have transformed him from a newbie marketer to a highly
respected millionaire. You have to love that!
If you want to learn how to beat the recession as an
online entrepreneur, get this book.

[...]

I love this book. It's very inspiring, and it provides an outstanding overview of one major aspect of the internet marketing field -- from the perspective of someone who's been in it for both fun and profit for longer than the internet even officially existed.

When Alan Bechtold says "Fun," he means it. And he spends a good part of the book laying out the process of how to find the subject area that excites you that also provides you with a market interested in buying your products -- eventually.

The idea is this: if you have fun doing what you're doing, it's not really work. And if there are longish hours involved, at least initially, you may not mind all that much -- after all, it's fun and something you're passionate about. All true, of course, at least to a point.

When Bechtold says "3 simple steps," he's correct on one hand (they really aren't rocket science), yet I wonder how many people's idea of "simple step" includes "write book" or "write sales letter."

Okay, so the simple steps aren't quick steps necessarily, and getting them all done properly can take a while.

Then again, this isn't a get-rich-quick book, but one on finding a way to make a living while pursuing your passions. Not that the possibility of riches isn't also there, but the focus isn't on rich so much as on fun. Making a comfortable living is definitely part of the plan though, so he's got us covered there.

The three-step process is also not quite as tedious as it may seem at first. We're given a number of short-cuts that do make things a whole lot easier than it would seem from the "write book" step.

In fact, writing that book can be a lot less work than you'd expect, and Bechtold provides the step-by-step instructions on possible ways to do it very quickly and easily, without much writing at all.

The instructions are embedded in an ongoing storyline, where we follow 3 cubicle slaves from their J-O-B-S to liberation as they turn their hobbies and passions into incomes. It makes for entertaining reading and it also makes the potentially abstract process really come to live. Especially when it comes to Jenny and her Strawbarbie Barbie doll custom clothes, who is the primary example and whose progress is spelled out in great detail.

Can it work? A particularly inspiring aspect of the book: several profiles of people who have actually successfully achieved their work for fun lifestyles. It shows that Bechtold's system is not just theory but that it really can be done.

I think his approach has merit and I plan to try it myself. Make sure you put some thought into his early exercises because the time will pay for itself once he explains what you are to do.

I find it very easy to become motivated by what I read initially. I find such great stuff that I get fired up about it and this book is no exception because it appears to be the bible to a business I can actually do well. However, do the products actually deliver what they promise? I don't think I have ever seen a review that is approached from the standpoint of the longevity of the product. How does it rate 6 months after you buy it and have used it for awhile?

I can say that some of the links in this book are outdated already and this book is hot off the press! Overture is gone, it was bought out by Yahoo so if you want keyword searches, you will be required to pay for it. Fortunately there is a free 7-day trial period you can sign up for which might just give you the time you need to make your initial searches.

It is all about figuring out what it is you are passionate about and combining it with skills you have. This books teaches you how to publish without actually having to write a book to establish yourself as an expert, publish an e-zine and give the info away for free. After you draw people in with your free information, you will be able to sell them product.

It also teaches you how to come up with a brand identity for yourself that your competition will be unable to touch and it will be difficult for them to take business away from you because of it.

So, I thought I would use part of this review to actually make updates about my process and how the book worked for me so that others can get the layman's view of this. I will adjust my rating as I go along to help you make your decision about whether this book is right for you. Maybe I've already tipped your decision one way or the other. At any rate, I hope this information will be helpful to others.

Step 1: My chosen field of expertise will be altered art/paper art. Paper art is my passion and can be adjusted to a variety of subject matter plus I've been creating it for over 10 years.

To be continued . . .

Alan Bechtold's "Will Work For Fun" is the most powerful book I've read to date when it comes to launching your very own Fun Business. When I was only half way through the book I already had a rough business plan in place that will allow me to wipe out the competition in my home town.

Will Work For Fun has revealed how easy it actually is to create a business you'll have a passion about that pays you to have fun at the same time! Thanks a ton Alan for writing this book, it is sure to change the outlook of the many people who are stuck being wage slaves.

Theo Baskind

I was curious what one would do to survive six months if the normal system broke down and contact with people and stores was not possible. This book helped in this research. However I consulted many sources and none answered some questions.

I loved the wood cookstove on page 37. I immediately wanted one

This book, even though geared for Y2K type expected disaster, still has many useful tips for emergency preparedness. I found the food prep and storage section particularly useful. Also it had an excellent section on waste disposal which is often overlooked in other emergency preparedness books. Small and portable enough to take with you.

In addition to the recipes and food tips that could keep a diverse group of survivors happy for years (who wants plain ol' Chili gets that, and who prefers dishes like Rice Noodle Pad Thai will be satisfied also), there is an excellent overview of food storage techniques that includes charts I've never before seen on the shelf life of edibles, from an individually wrapped apple to nuts in airtight packages.

While Dorothy and Albert have given us lists, lists, and more lists to follow and yet others to create lists of our own, throughout their little treasure of a book is a taste of the loving, compassionate sensibility without which any attempt to survive is bound to be futile.

The Y2K Survival Guide and Cookbook (Ecovillage, TN) by Dorothy R. and Albert K. Bates is not your usual recipe collection. With the savvy of environmentalists ad the frenzy of those expecting emergency, Dorothy and Albert Bates cover every area of survival and food preparation. Expecting the worst case scenario - rolling brownouts and total black outs, failed utility systems and water purification problems - this book provides natural alternatives: food storage, chlorine bleach to purify water, using wood stoves, building your own composting toilet, and gardening. There are even first aid and Morse code directions in the final pages. After coping with any Y2K calamities, it's time to cook. In between survival guidelines, the Bates' book is filled with hearty recipes reminiscent of campfire food. As computers buzz blank, you can enjoy split pea soup from melted icicles, marmalades from sun-dried fruit, or shiitake joes from home-grown mushrooms. Even though The Y2K Survival Guide and Cookbook is intended for the millennium-minded cook, it is an eccentric volume any eco-conscious chef should add to their library.

Jung was meticulously looking for psychological patterns of thinking. These patterns he called archetypes. Like the instincts have influence on the physical body, the archetypes should have their influence on the thinking mind. They have their origin in what Jung called the collective unconscious.

While the personal unconscious is made up of contents which have at some time been conscious but which have disappeared from consciousness through having been forgotten or repressed, the contents of the collective unconscious have a collective, universal and impersonal nature which cannot be reduced to experiences in the individual's past.

All original mythological revelations have their source in the collective unconscious. Metaphorical mythology is needed in expression of the complex archetypal contents. Even though the cultural surroundings have their influence on various myths, too, it seems like the collective unconscious was identical in all individuals.

Although Jung was a real pioneer in his field, I find his (translated) style of writing slightly 'dry'. Especially the last chapters on mandala symbolism were boring. -I suggest you highlight the most interesting contents, so you'll find them easily later again.

Jung's books are not easy reads, but they are almost invariably eye-openers. I recommend first reading his student's works (von Franz, Barbara Hanna, Joland Jacobi), his "Man and His Symbols," & (especially with respect to this book) Joseph Campbell & Jean Shinoda Bolen. It helps a lot to understand mythology when exploring the collective unconscious. Jung goes to great lengths to show how the denizens of the collective unconscious (archetypes--universal images~Plato's view) map onto very different cultures throughout time & space--appearing in art, dreams, visions, etc. Bolen uses Greek goddesses & gods to depict these. Jung disliked neologisms (creating new words) instead he transplanted them from other disciplines to map into his psychological theories & constructs--thus, "archetypes" & "complexes"--paralleling General Systems Theory (cf. biologist von Bertalanfy's works). "Complex" comes from mathematics' complex numbers. Jung knew & conversed with physicist Pauli, Kabbalah professor Scholem, & many other famous, high-caliber scholars. It is important to realize, when reading this book, the important differences between archetypes of the collective unconscious & complexes of the personal unconscious--though they have the same names! Thus, the mother archetype is the pure image of motherhood--with both positive & negative aspects. But, each person has an actual, individual mother (or lack thereof--absent mother). The interaction or combination of these two forms one's mother complex. As in math, it has a rational part (actual mother) & an imaginary part (archetype). In math, the imaginary part is multiplied by i, the square root of minus 1--which cannot exist, yet mathematicians use it creatively! So does Jung. Even modern works by "post-Jungians" often confuse or confound these two. The Anima/animus is particularly prone to this confusion. Unfortunately, Jung added to this confusion IMHO by calling the anima soul & the animus spirit. The anima/animus use gender & projection to enable people attune to the Self, the overarching archetype (others are essentially subsets). It is the image of wholeness &, thus, the object of psychological individuation--not integration. Jung says one cannot integrate the entire unconscious--that is beyond human capability. This is more subtle than it seems--esp. regarding western mystics' unio mystica (union with God) & eastern enlightenment. Jung attempts to assist people evolve, ~the U.S. Army: "be all you can be," rather than a thin veneer of civilization--p. 269 "Outwardly people are more or less civilized, but inwardly they are still primitives." Further, p. 322 "The view that we can simply turn our back on evil & in this way eschew it belongs to the long list of antiquated naiveté's. This is sheer ostrich policy & does not affect the reality of evil in the slightest." Therefore, Jung includes the negative aspects of both archetypes & complexes. Finally, as scientific psychologist, Jung notes that p. 269 "We should never forget that in any psychological discussion we are not saying anything about the psyche, but that the psyche is always speaking about itself."

This intriguing study of the archetypes of our collective human unconscious is FASCINATING. Here we confront the fountainheads of the hypostasis of dreams and the active genesis of fecund mythology. The collective unconscious differs from the personal in that it is not constituted of repressed or forgotten complexes but of inherited archetypes that were never a part of your conscious life. Anyone who plans to study mythology should be required to read this book... ignorance of it would prevent your comprehension of the primitive man and tribes' living mythology and religion. (Also would be an essential tool in exploring dreamwork or human nature) The archetypes are felt in our most personal life and encountered in dreams. Unconsciously, unprojected, it turns out that our own minds have a "sea of possibilities", and that they assume definite forms only in projection. The archetypes are vessels that we can never empty or fill, having only potential existence, taking shape they become no longer what they were. They need be interpreted anew throughout the ages. They are the imperishable elements of the unconscious, but they change their shape continually, being the "treasure in the realm of the shadowy thoughts" which Kant spoke of, and among the highest values of the human pysche. They are the simple solution of how archaic myths, far from being merely historical remnants or allegories of physical processes, still grasp us with profound effect in all levels of society and eras. Awareness is needed of these jewels to understand the unconscious' interconnectedness with our conscious life and the fact that the human pysche is not born tabula rasa. This is a classic work, that some may not adhere to, but far from being a philosophy, and me far from being a pyschologist, I would not take the bold step here to criticize Jung's work. Jungian or not, I give it my stamp and seal of approval guaranteeing your utmost interest.

This work, along with _Modern Man in Search of a Soul_, is one of the best places to start if you are new to reading Jung. It is also the companion piece and predecessor to _Aion_, which is another spectacular and groundbreaking work. If you want to read _Aion_, it would make sense for you to read this one first, since it is part 1 of volume nine, while _Aion_ is part two. Overall, I would say that both parts 1 and 2 of volume nine are absolutely essential reading for any Jungian, and if you're going to buy one, go ahead and buy both.

As for the actual content of _The Archetypes of the Collective Unconscious_, I would describe it as an overview and recapitulation of many of Jung's key concepts. As the title implies, the main concepts are archetypal images (as revealed in to people in dreams) and the collective unconscious. These are trademark Jungian concepts, and Jung devoted a large portion of his writings to explaining what he meant by Archetypes and the collective unconscious. If I could explain it to you right here I would, but Jung spends a the first two hundred pages of this book simply explaining and defining "archetype" and "collective unconscious". These are key concepts in understanding the human mind, and may help unlock the mysteries of conscious existence; it is by no means superfluous to devote such rigorous study to these ideas. _The Archetypes and the Collcetive Unconscious_ is NOT a narrowly focused, specialized, or jargonistic work. It deals with ideas that are central to understanding the human psyche or soul, and applies universally to all of mankind.

There is also a pictorial section of the book in which Jung actually shows examples, in the form of paintings, of archetypal images that were seen by his patients in their dreams and subsequently drawn by the patients themselves. Some of these paintings are very artistic, and there are uncanny similarities among many of them. This pictorial section occurs about 200 pages in. After the pictures, Jung goes into a detailed explanation of each one, which I found to be somewhat tiresome, especially considering many of the paintings were extremely similar. Overall, the final, brief, section of the book in which the paintings are described is quite boring, and I would recommend that the reader simply look at the paintings and forego the final explanations, which are extremely redundant. In other words, read the first two hundred pages, look at the pictures, stop, and then move on to _Aion_. The weakness of this final section is not enough to justify removing a star from my ratings, however, simply because of the utter profundity and potency of the first 200 pages, which represents the majority of the book anyway. Keep in mind that the vast majority of Jung's writings consist of essays not more that 100 pages long each. You will find that most of his complete works contain numerous profound and insightful essays, occasionally laced with the odd, specialized, highly esoteric essays. When you come across one of these rare but unreadable essays the best idea is to just skip it rather than get bogged down. This is not to take anything away from Jung and his great, prophetic works; I am just trying to give you the heads up on how to avoid some of the rough patches.

It's a book of essays on a theme, like most of his other books. Here's an attempt to describe the whole theory in a few paragraphs. Jung suggests the existence of a 3-layered psyche consisting of (1) the conscious (active part of the mind), (2) the personal unconscious (thinking over which we have little or no control), and (3) the collective unconscious (unevolved, animal-instinctive mental activity). The collective unconscious is "collective" in the sense that humans resemble each other the most at the lowest, biological levels. "The body's carbon is simply carbon" (pg. 173). We inherit the collective unconscious from the common pool of human characteristics, like morphological aspects of the body such as arms, legs, etc.

The "archetypes" originate in the collective unconscious and are the psychological equivalents of Platonic Forms. (I realized about halfway through the book that archetype-figures also appear in the personal unconscious, where they're called "complexes"). The most important archetypes appear to be the Shadow (the inferior aspects of the self which we hide from others), the Anima/Animus (our object(s) of desire), and the Wise Old Man (e.g., teacher, medicine man). He also discusses a Mother archetype and a Child archetype and indicates the existence of numerous others. Identifying strongly with an archetype leads to psychosis.

The heart of the book is in the first essay, but the rest is useful in fleshing out descriptions and giving examples. The collective Anima archetype, for instance, can be found among movie stars and in the general pop culture. Devils and tricksters often represent the Shadow archetype. Tolkien's Gandalf is a good instance of the Wise Old Man. It's not so easy to identify a particular individual's Anima complex or Shadow complex.

A few things bothered me about the book. For one, Jung indicates that the "Primitive mentality differs from the civilized chiefly in that the conscious mind is far less developed in scope ... The Primitive cannot assert that he thinks; it is rather that something thinks in him" (pg. 153). This is a dubious kind of distinction between civilized and uncivilized states of mind that seems to have gone out of fashion over the decades. Also, I couldn't tell from this book what methodology Jung used to determine the significance of dream symbols. Does every dream about climbing a tree represent the psyche climbing the "World Tree" toward higher states of consciousness? Do snakes always represent the unconscious? Is every old woman in a dream an example of the Mother archetype? Etc.

One of the more interesting and also frustrating essays describes a case study of a woman who paints mandalas over a period of 16-plus years. Why mandalas? Jung says the mandala represents the Self, and painting them is useful for determining the contents of the psyche. He discusses the first dozen or so in detail (reprinted in color), but then glosses over the rest, which came into his hands after the patient had died from cancer!

This is an excellent book, well written, clear and concise. It focuses on the Year of the Terror during the French Revolution.

There are several strengths to this book.

First, Palmer does an excellent job of giving short biographies of the major characters that ruled France as a committee during this period. They include Carnot,the military officer who maintained the war office during the terror,including defending the northern border of France. Collot D'Herbois, the ex-actor and fanatic had a very different temprement from the monk-like Robespierre. Saint-Just's attacks against the Dantonists was fascinating. The fall of Herault de Sechelles, the philosopher former aristocrat is very interesting.

Second, the chapters are very well organized. They are aranged around topics, including a hyistory of how the Comitteee for Public Safety evolved in the fifth year of the revolution; three chapters on maintaining control of the other regions of France during the revolution; chapters on foreign conflicts; a chapter on wage and price control and maintaining a central economy, are all well written and interesting.

I read the book after reading Hilary Mantel's novel "A Place of Greater Safety" regarding the relationship and competition between Robespierre and Danton. The two books perfectly compliment each other.


This is a very accessible history of this portion of the revolution and is extremely informative. It was written in 1941 but is fresh, current, and alive with detail.

I agree with all of the amazon reviews as to this being a compelling narrative. Most interesting was Palmer's argument that the CPS wasn't merely Robespierre's beard. Palmer is mostly persuasive in his suggestion that power was more or less equitably diffused throughout the committee and that facesaving hindsight by CPS members is the reason why history has affixed sole blame for the terror on Robespierre's shoulders. Less convincing is Palmer's portait of Jacobin ideological purity. Robespierre and St.Just are presented as Spartan warriors with spotless souls even as he details their forgeries and chicanery in railroading their political rivals. Palmer often protests too much, bemoaning the miniscule percentage of victims of the terror and blaming CGS members, representatives on mission, anyone really but Robespierre. One can never escape bias in French revolution histories-so this criticism should certainly be taken with a grain of salt. Palmer's book is unique and refreshing however, meticulously and cogently argued.

In print since 1941, this fine book is a group portrait and analysis of the Committee of Public Safety, the most important organ of government in France from the fall of 1793 to the summer of 1794. Writing at the end of the 1930s, Palmer was particularly interested in the psychology of dictatorship and how much governments emerge.

When the members of the Committee took their seats, France and the French Revolution appeared headed for disaster. There was widespread dissent in the provinces, and in some, outright revolt. The chaotic politics in Paris made government from the center difficult and the armies of almost every other major European state seemed poised to dismember France. The members of the committee were on the face of it, an undistinguished lot of modest prior accomplishments. Almost exclusively middle class, none of them would have been able to rise high under the Ancien Regime. Most were lawyers or had legal training. Several were simultaneously minor provincial intellectuals. Two were army officers whose plebian origins would have prevented them from attaining significant rank in the Royal Army. As a group, and despite significant internal political strains, they proved to be an energetic and capable group of administrators and politicians. Palmer does very well in describing the considerable obstacles to success, the enormous efforts made by most of the Committee, and their considerable success as administrators.

Over the course of a year, the committee met the great challenges in front of them more or less successfully. Revolts in the provinces were crushed, often with great brutality. Though the Parisian political scene remained volatile, it did stabilize and the Committee was able to construct a reasonably effective central government. Assisted by dissent and incompetence among the monarchial opponents of France, the Committee found the resources and military leadership needed to prosecute the war successfully. The Committee arguably saved the Revolution and went a long way towards the construction of a powerful, centralized French state.

But what kind of Revolution did they save? Palmer shows very well that the Committee were not merely reacting to the pressure of events but were all committed Republicans of varying degrees of radicalism. It is impossible to understand their actions without recognizing their ideological commitment to a new kind of Republican society informed strongly by Rousseauist ideals. Detestation of inherited privilege, anti-clericalism (though not atheism), worship of the idea of virtue, a commitment to some form of popular sovereignty, and the pursuit of a strong state were common ideals of the Committee. As is often the case, war produced radicalization and these ideals would also justify the Terror and the ruthless suppression of provincial revolts, and encourage French armies in practices that anticipate the brutal behavior of Napoleon's armies in occupied Europe. In a few cases, the Committee made pragmatic choices that contradicted some of their earlier convictions. Most of the committee disliked the violent de-Christianization carried out by some radicals but did not interfere in some cases to maintain their political support in Paris. All the Committee members would have prefered an economic system based on free trade but the exigencies of war resulted in the first systematic and partially successful effort at a planned economy.

Palmer both describes the actions of the committee well and writes well about the individual members. His objective treatment of Robespierre is particularly good. This book is a model in terms of melding biographical information with the broader context of historical events. As a study of revolutionary psychology and a case example of how dictatorships form, this book is excellent.

I decided to read R.R. Palmer's The Twelve Who Ruled after having it recommended to me in class. The Year of the Terror and the Committee of Public Safety are often overlooked or not given enough description in history classes and it wasn't until my senior year in college that I had even heard of the Year of the Terror. Palmer's book is great for the student because he includes enough background information so that one can understand the information without feeling overwhelmed. The text deals almost exclusively the events from the summer of 1793 through the summer of 1794. Because so much happened in this one year period, Palmer presents it on an almost day-to-day status.

Originally written in 1939 and 1940, Palmer mentions in the Bibliographical Essay how difficult it was to gather information from the French archives, but upon reading this book and having some basic knowledge of the events of the period, one finds it difficult to find any deficiency in Palmer's work. The 2005 edition of The Twelve Who Ruled opens with a new foreword by Isser Woloch, Moore Collegiate Professor of History at Columbia University. In this foreword, Woloch gives the reader a little history of Palmer's book, as well as a brief overview of the events detailed in the book.

Palmer begins his book with a one page list, titled "The Twelve", of the members of the CPS and gives a brief one-line description of each. On the next page is a sketched map with the locations and provinces mentioned in his book, as well as a translation of the Republican Calendar. I don't want to go into detail about all of Palmer's 15 chapters, but some need mentioning. The first chapter, "Twelve Terrorists to Be", gives a detailed description about the history of each member of the Committee of Public Safety leading up to the Revolution. The subsequent chapters describe the different political groups of the Revolution and how the CPS came to be as powerful as it did.

Chapters 6-9 deal with the individual missions of the CPS members to different parts of France. Chapter 6, "Republic in Miniature", describes Georges Couthon's mission to his native region of Clermont-Ferrand and his attempt to turn Puy-de-Dôme into a model for the Republic. Chapter 7, "Doom at Lyons", is self-explanatory and deals with Collot d'Herbois and the Committee's shocking actions in Lyons. Chapters 8 and 9 deal with the missions of Committee members to Alsace and Brittany to deal with the army and naval affairs in those regions, respectively.

The beginning of the end becomes apparent in chapter 11, "Finding the Narrow Way". In this chapter Danton makes his return to Paris and Robespierre and other members of the Committee are becoming more and more adamant in their positions. The remaining chapters detail the downfall of the Committee of Public Safety and the numerous executions that take place. The exception to this is chapter 14, "The Rush upon Europe", which describes the military events during the spring and early summer of 1794.

During the epilogue, Palmer sums up the lives of the eight of the original twelve that were remaining after 10 Thermidor and the different ways each one went. It is interesting to see how some of the members played a part during Napoleon's reign. Palmer end's the book with discussing Barère, him being the last surviving member of the Committee (passed away in 1841), and his last days.

Readability was something that I was looking for when I was choosing a book for this assignment. I didn't want a book that would be so in depth that it would be a chore to read, yet I didn't want a book that would have less information than my textbook. The Twelve Who Ruled was perfect in that sense and Palmer kept it interesting by including many quotations from meetings and correspondence of the period in his book. I haven't read any other books on the Year of the Terror, but I would have to recommend this book to anyone interested in the French Revolution, or even political science.

This may have been the best book that I have ever read. Palmer does a great job of portraying the characters, the times, and the decisions they made. The last chapter is absolutely riveting. One of if not the best book I've ever read!

In 1979 Alexandr Romanovich Luria's autobiography "The Making of Mind" was published. Luria, no question about it, represented during the XX century one of the most influential researchers in social, behavioral, and neurological areas. His theoretical approaches and clinical interpretations, as stated in this book, continue being contemporary ideas.

Luria lived one of the most exciting historical moments that any person can live, not only from the scientific, but also from the social point of view. It was a time of rapid scientific development and profound social changes. He developed different research programs and worked in different environments. But throughout his life, his contagious enthusiasm in understanding human cognition was his life passion; this passion was the guiding thread in all the different research programs that he developed across his life: measuring emotions, comparing identical twins, studying conceptual abilities in illiterate people, testing patients with brain pathology, analyzing mental retardation, approaching the role of frontal lobes in behavior, and others.

Now, his 1979 autobiography becomes alive, visual, and real, with the DVD that is included in this book. Michael Cole -very likely the person who best knows about Luria's life and work- initially makes an extraordinary presentation of Luria's life and research. It becomes easy to understand Luria's scientific career and social context since his beginning in Kazan until his death in Moscow. Further, a series of interviews with people who worked with Luria or had some significant professional relationship with Luria are included. Luria's life appears as something direct, and specially, very real. His enthusiasm, generosity, and profound understanding of human's nature, are repeated over and over by all the people who had the opportunity to meet Luria, or had any type of relationship with him.

It is true -as Luria frequently stated- that people come and go and only the solid work remains. But in human history some times a unique combination of scientific understanding, intelligence, and personality characteristics is found. Those people do not simply "come and go", but become a symbol of the most significant human endeavors: to understand the world, to understand ourselves, and to understand that we socially share our lives.

This book is, simply speaking, a unique book about a unique person.

This autobiography with introduction and epilogue plus DVD is essential Luria reading. It brings him to life in the present era when traumatic brain injuries in Iraq make Luria's work more relevant than ever. Beyond simplistic brain localization of psychological functions, Luria attuned us to the fundamental importance of phenomelogical processes essential in rehabilitation.

The book is a second addition of Luria's autobiography that was first published in 1979 under the tile " The Making of Mind. A personal account of Soviet Psychology", accompanied with the attachment "Luria in retrospect" written by a distinguished American cross-cultural researcher and theoretician Michael Cole and a Russian science journalist Karl Levitin. Of special interest is the Preface, in which the above authors set up an ambitious goal of bringing together Luria's own account of his scientific life and "the extraordinary social context that accompanied and often shaped the lines of work" described in that account.
The new materials included are of great interest, particularly for western readers whose ideas about being a scientist in the Soviet Union tend to be limited by stereotypes, such as GULAG and Stalin's repressions. In reality, the link between a social context and the development of scientific ideas is a complex and indirect one. For instance, a prominent Russian and Soviet philosopher Alexej Losev went all the way through GULAG, yet he remained faithful to the great traditions of European philosophy and published his top class philosophical works at the same time with Luria. While I agree that Luria's work has indeed been framed in an extraordinary social context (the Russian revolution, the Great and the Second world wars, Stalin's persecutions), I don't think that this context had a final word in shaping Luria's evolution as a scientist. For instance, the episode when Luria is persuading his student Goldberg to join the Communist Party, with Goldberg politely avoiding the offer, is curious and a characteristic feature of that time, but the reader learns little from it about either Luria or Goldberg as scientists. It is true that Luria's life and career were aggravated by the political situation in the country, but so were the lives of most Russian intelligentsia, among whom Luria was yet one of the luckiest. The Epilogue written by Michael Cole is interesting and rich in personal detail but tends to explain major shifts in Luria's science career by changes in the political atmosphere in the Soviet Union rather then by the inner logic of Luria's growth as a psychologist. For instance, the late 1930th, when Luria dropped his cross-cultural research, was a tough time indeed, but this does not explain why Luria never returned to these studies in later and much easier times. Most importantly, the new materials miss the real drama of Luria's life as a scientist - the drama that, indirectly, emerges from Luria's own account.
This drama began in the 1920, when Luria, as a young scientist, was confronted with the two possible ways of approaching the human mind: the explanatory and the "descriptive" ones. The explanatory mode modelled a study of the mind on the study of natural phenomena, by establishing "causal" links between stimuli (the causes) and reactions (the effects), and the descriptive mode drew on the fact that an individual (a scientist) has a privileged access to his or her own mind and can therefore, directly observe the effects that the stimuli produce. Having tried himself in both approaches (reactological and phenomenological ones), Luria dreamed of finding "a third way" - an objective way of studying human emotions "that were an integral part of people's real life"(p.36). The way that Luria followed in his studies of "The nature of human conflicts" (1976) (establishing the links between verbal stimuli and combined verbal and motor reactions) was objective but completely within the existing "reactological" approach. This way did not satisfy Luria as it was missing the rich phenomenology of human emotions (e.g., was not part of people's real life), and the phenomenological approaches offered by psychoanalysis and Dilthey's "descriptive psychology" seemed to lack objectivity. He was not clear about what this third way should be like. Luria was unaware that the impossibility of the "third way" had been shown three hundred years ago by Renee Descartes (1993/1641), and even in greater detail about a hundred years later by Immanuel Kant (1929/1781). More strangely, he paid no attention to the important and philosophically profound works on that matter published by his older contemporaries and compatriots Grot, Lopatin, Astaf'ev, and Chelpanov (see, for instance, Grot, 1889, and others in this volume). It is also clear from Luria's account that both Chelpanov and Pavlov, though from two opposite positions, clearly understood the inevitability of the dual (e.g., mentalistic and behavioristic) way of studying the mind. Coincidentally, Chelpanov (a founder of the first Russian psychology institute) fell a victim of the revolutionary political games for his "philosophical idealism", and the whole line of the Russian neo-Kantian tradition in philosophy and psychology was terminated. In his memoirs, Luria mentioned this tradition only collaterally, as an influence of German psychology of the XIXth century on psychology in Russia - the factor that in his view was impeding, rather then promoting, progress of psychology. "I found little of value in the dry, pre-Revolutionary academic psychology..., which was strongly influenced by German philosophy and psychology" -- Luria writes (p.21). "Most psychologists were still working out problems that had been set many years before by Wilhelm Wundt, the Wurzburg school, and the neo-Kantian philosophers" - he continues. So, when young Luria entered the battlefield of methodological debates in psychology, he was full of energy and hope to find his own way to the human mind - the way different from those two that have been found before.
One can only speculate to what extent Luria could have benefited in his later career had he considered seriously the lessons of the European philosophical tradition of approaching the mind. For instance, Wund published a fundamental multivolume "Volkerpsychologie" in which he showed that individual psychology can not be understood properly without taking into account the fact that it is influenced by cultural traditions, myth and religion (see Green, 2001). So, there was no need in rediscovering the cultural-historical approach. There was also no need in wasting time for the search of the "third way" - the two ways that existed were good enough to accommodate Luria's great talent as an experimental researcher.
In his struggle for the "third way to the human mind", Luria put his hopes in Vygotsky who was obsessed by the same idea of "revolutionizing" psychology via finding the objective way of studying subjective phenomena. For some time, it seemed to Luria that Vygotsky found the solution: "The naturalists and mentalists had artificially dismembered psychology. It was his goal, and our task, to create a new system that would synthesize these conflicting approaches" (p.41). Of course, Vygotsky's "third way" to the human mind (which he called "cultural-historical" or "instrumental" approach) was an illusion. The "instruments" or "mediators" -- language being by far the most powerful of them -- were nothing but auxiliary attachments to stimuli that made the connections between stimuli and reactions more complex and less predictable. In the extreme case, predictive power of these overcomplicated stimuli, such as culture, becomes so poor that it enters the grey area of guesses. For instance, in his classic cross-cultural study of thinking Luria assumed that analytical (formal logical) orientation of thinking is a result of the western type school education, yet recent developmental research has shown that this orientation can be traced even in 4-year-old children (Harris, 2000).
When Luria started his studies on the brain localisation of psychological functions, he was faced with a dilemma again: the phrenology type "strict localisation" theorists versus holistic theorists who "assumed that the brain functions as a whole to produce the psychological functions expressed in behavior" (p.120). As before, Luria voted for the "middle way" - this time quite successfully, as long as both of the extreme theories, as well as Luria's own "functional system" theory, sat comfortably within the reactological paradigm of studying the human mind. Although Luria never stopped mentioning his work with Vygotsky, since the late 30th his romance with the "cultural-historical" theory was over, and he was well back on the track of the reactological approach, by developing behavior based methods for diagnostics and rehabilitation of brain disorders. Here, Vygotsky's concept of higher mental functions proved useful, because it rejected the idea of a rigid link between brain and behavior. Instead, the idea of the systemic structure of "higher mental functions" implied that the link between a function (behavior) and the brain is loose and flexible, and, if damaged, can often be restored by using various auxiliary stimuli. Developing and using these methods, for which Luria coined the term "neropsychological", resulted in his most outstanding achievement: the book "Higher cortical functions in man" (Luria, 1980). Studies on orienting reflex (in cooperation with Sokolov), and on the executive function in children proved quite fruitful as well. Yet, Luria realized that explanatory approach that he devoted most of his studies to was still missing the most important and essential part of the mind - phenomenalistic experience. This realization resulted in his two essays "The Mind of a Mnemonist" and "The Man with a Shattered World', both of which relied on the phenomenological descriptive method which Luria now called "romantic science". However, Luria never considered these phenomenological writings as a match to his reactology based neuropsychological research.
I was a student of Luria in 1971-1973. On Luria's suggestion, we studied the development of programmed behaviour in 2- to 5-year-old children. As a method, we used the "double stimulation" (by visual and verbal commands) of children's actions, similar to that used in the studies of frontal lobe patients. Thought in his early 70th and suffering from a hart condition, Alexander Romanovitch was as energetic and enthusiastic as ever when talking about his beloved executive function and the regulatory role of speech on behaviour. The results of this study were quite interesting (Luria and Subbotsky, 1978), yet very soon I got bored of this approach, viewing it as a version of Luria's earlier studies on the regulatory role of speech in children. But whenever I tried to persuade Luria to change the emphasis of our research in the direction of social, moral and personality development of children, Luria was reluctant to talk about it - reluctant to the extent that suggested a complete lack of interest. Having acquired a worldwide recognition of his studies, Luria was already too tired or too busy to attempt something really new. Or was venturing in these areas going too far away from the solid ground of brain functions and into the misty territory of philosophical debates? In my premature interest to theoretical issues, did I remind him the early years of his own career when theoretical mistakes hade been made? I don't know. But I do remember that Luria was never tired of saying to me "Hold on a theory, attend to simple methodical issues first, the theory will come later". So, how did it happen that a scientist whose attitude towards deep theory was rather cold still managed to achieve so much?
Saying he was well educated and talented is saying not enough. Luria had extraordinary intuition for what they now call experimental cognitive research. It is true that his studies on combined motor reactions, cross-cultural studies on thinking, studies on identical twins were decades ahead of his time. In the 1950th, just before Piaget's studies on cognitive development came into fashion, he and his students extensively studied the development of executive function in children - a hot topic in contemporary cognitive developmental research. His battery of neuropsychological tests is still in great demand in both clinical practice and experimental research. He was a workaholic as well.
In the end of his Epilogue, Michael Cole recalls being present at a dispute at the University of California when the same dilemma of "explanatory versus descriptive approaches to the mind" was discussed that Luria had been faced with more than half a century before. Well, some lessons are never learned. At least, there was no a "third way" proposed in this discussion. "It is indeed ideas that endure. But it is human beings who give them life" - Cole concludes. May be yes, may be no. Perhaps, Plato was right and ideas exist independently of man. Even so, only chosen are lucky to catch a glimpse of them on a back wall of the cave, and Luria was one of them.






Bibliography

Descartes (1993). Meditations on first philosophy. Selected philosophical writings,
Cambridge University Press. (Original work published in 1641)
Green, D. (2001) Classics in the History of Psychology.
YorkUniversity,Toronto,Ontario http://psychclassics.yorku.ca/Wundt/Folk/intro.htm
Grot, N.Ja. (1881). The critique of the concept of free will. In "Works of the
Moscow Psychological Society", Moscow, issue III, p.1-96.
Harris, P.L. (2000).The work of the imagination. Oxford: Blackwell.
Kant, I. (1929). Critique of pure reason. London: MacMillan (original work published
in 1781).
Luria, A.R. (1976). The nature of human conflicts, or emotion, conflict and will. New
York: Liveright.
Luria, A.R. (1980) Higher cortical functions in man. New York: Basic Books.
Luria, A.R., and Subbotsky, E.V. (1978). Zur frühen Ontogeneze der steuerden
Funktion der Sprache. In: Die Psychologie des 20 Jahrhunderts, Zürich: Kinder Verlag, pp.1032-1048



Eugene Subbotsky
Lancaster University, Psychology Department
Lancaster, LA1 4YF, UK
E.Subbotsky@lancaster.ac.uk

Luria's Autobiography is an immensely readable book. It is also very informative about the lasting contributions that Luria made in many fields of psychology, from his work on language and thinking to the neurosurgical rehabilitation of traumatized victims of the Second World War and the resulting creation of the discipline of neuropsychology. For me personally, the most valuable feature of the autobiography was Luria's account, in Chapter 3, of the work that he did in collaboration with Vygotsky, which provides an easy to understand and succinct overview of their aim "to create a new, comprehensive approach to human psychological processes." Having read what Luria did, both in his own work and in preserving the sociohistorical tradition that he, Vygotsky and Leont'ev initiated, one can see why Toulmin wrote "Luria was Beethoven to Vygotsky, and Vygotsky can be seen as the Mozart of psychology."
This new edition of the Autobiography is subtitled A Dialogue with the Making of Mind. The dialogue takes the form of several chapters: a preface that puts Luria's text in its historical and intellectual context; an Epilogue by Michael Cole entitled A Portrait of Luria; and two further chapters by Cole and Karl Levitin, which provide a rounded picture of Luria as a human being and of his intellectual and moral tenacity in managing to sustain his driving interests through the changes in the nature of his professional work that were forced on him by the political upheavals that took place during the years of Stalinism.
It is to Luria, in great part, that we owe the survival of Vygotsky's work. What this autobiography makes clear is how much Luria himself contributed to that legacy and to the evergrowing, world-wide interest in socio-cultural-historical theory and its conceptualization of the Making of Mind.

In this 2005 book, the life of Alexander Romanovich Luria is composed through various attempts to understand and preserve that life. With the additional sections of this book (prologue, epilogue, DVD) that enhance his original autobiography, the reader comes away with the notion that it often takes a few different versions and perspectives to weave together a mosaic of a life and come away with a more complex picture than any one perspective can offer. Therefore the prologue, epilogue and two chapters that put Luria's life in social and personal context breathe life into the otherwise dry and distant autobiography.
In the final section of the book entitled "Luria in Personal Context," the reader learns that Luria "could not write truthfully about the linkages between his personal experience and his scientific work without sever reprisals from the State." Although Luria never states this fact in his own 1979 autobiography, the pressures of the times in the USSR become especially apparent to the reader in the epilogue and the two following sections of the 2005 book. Thus studying an autobiography from a man who lived in a severely repressive social context is a very interesting exercise in observing what happens to a life story when pieces are left out or the life is censored. In Luria's case, his life was censored by the Soviet copyright agency (VAAP) but also by Luria himself, who "firmly believed that the facts of his personal life were of fleeting interest . . ." (255). Luria's telling of his life focuses mainly on his academic studies and research in neuroscience and psychology and therefore comes across as a sort of skeleton of a life story. In reading the epilogue and especially the last two sections and also watching the interviews on the DVD, the reader is able to connect to the life of Luria much more and begin to piece together a more comprehensive picture of his life.
Thus Luria's life is revealed in a much fuller and more personal way by outside people such as Cole, Levitin and the interviewees. Because it is very difficult to relate to the Luria in the 1979 autobiography on a personal level, the interviews really give life to the personal struggles and political pressures faced by this leading Soviet psychologist during his tumultuous lifetime.
Furthermore, with the 2005 book the reader is given fragments of a life that range from clinical research, personal interviews, entries from "The Great Revolution" diary written by Luria during the period of civil war in Russia, an account of a young American psychologist and an attempt to put Luria's life into a social and personal context. Therefore the reader is given a range of perspectives that show Luria as the psychologist, the Russian intellectual, the friend, the father, the teacher and the husband whose environment brought chaos and fear alongside of excitement and invention. Finally, Luria says on page 43 that "Man in not only a product of his environment, he is also an active agent in creating that environment." Thus it becomes very clear that his life was driven by what the social and political context of the times allow but also by individual agency. It was Luria's passion and ambition to create a well-rounded and complex psychology that combined laboratory analysis with simple observation and considered the influence of the social environment that allowed this man to make long-lasting contributions to the field of psychology. Furthermore, the realization that he could have control over what he chose to do in the given circumstances of his environment also allowed Luria live in various directions, engaging in different fields of medicine and psychology and interacting with many patients, colleagues, students, friends and admirers.
Furthermore, Michael Cole's investigation into Luria's work and life is motivated a passion to figure out and do justice to the life of this Soviet psychologist. In Cole's contributions to the 2005 book, it is as if he is trying to fill in the blanks of Luria's life left by the ellipses in the 1979 autobiography. Thus the 2005 book comes across as an attempt to know the person, not only the milestones and accomplishments of a life but also the motivations and emotions that drove such a life. Therefore Cole's curiosity and need for a personal connection to Luria, which is difficult to extract from the 1979 autobiography, allows this story to come alive. Cole immediately puts Luria's life story is into context in the preface, using orientation clauses in a very comprehensive and straight-forward narrative, telling the reader that Luria was born in Kazan in 1902, that he was one of the leading psychologists of the 20th century and that he died in 1977. Cole also points out to the reader that "No where did Alexander Romanovich hint at the complex ideological and institutional constraints that had produced his various research careers . . ." (222). This great difference between what the two men thought a life story should contain is especially apparent in the motivations given by each man to write the two books: First, Luria states in his autobiography, "People come and go, but the creative sources of great historical events and their important ideas and deeds remain" (188). He calls this his "excuse" for writing his life story and therefore one comes to realize why he focuses on his ideas and studies rather than his personal life. Similarly, Cole reveals his own reason from writing the 2005 book in the last sentence of the epilogue: "It is indeed ideas that endure. But it is human beings who give them life" (225). Therefore Cole is interested in giving life to the human being behind the ideas by paying homage to Luria himself with a completely different version of his life. With this motivation to look at the human being, Cole softens Luria's autobiography by guiding the reader to see Luria in a new way by revealing personal information about the focused life.
After reading Cole's prologue and epilogue and realizing that Luria was a very passionate and humanistic neuropsychologist, a good host, a great "adopted father" and teacher to many pupils and a loyal friend, the reader realizes that the 1979 life story of Luria that relies solely on his work is a self-effacing and therefore incomplete representation of this man. It therefore takes Cole's contribution to this life story along with the interviews by Cole and Levitin to fill in the personal life of Luria, which nicely complements his own autobiography.

I'm soooo happy that I bought this book! It's a very thorough combination of a library of signs we can use to communicate with infants, beautiful music to use with the signs, and a lot of VERY GOOD ideas for crafts to accompany the related topic. The author was right, "Roll the Ball" is a HIT in any small child class. The book also has an index of related sources, websites and ect for signing for children. Though this book is designed for "babies" I think it's also good for toddlers (or the almost walking age). I mentioned this book on a discussion for small children and the discussion about the book is REALLY picking up!

Tim's Kids
Children's language circle
Japan

I am very excited about this book as I am a music teacher always looking for new things. Although I haven't yet incorporated this in my classes I cannot wait to start as the ideas in this book has given me renewed enthusiasm and I feel energised again.

This book and the music CD is a staple at our house. My daughter has loved all the music since she was under 1, and now she is 2 and still asks to listen to it. My daughter started signing at 7 months and knew more than 25 signs at a year old.... and I owe it all to the Sing and Sign program. It is fantastic! You can't go wrong with this book... especially since it also has a great music CD to listen to anytime.

I am a music therapist in Kansas City and also a mom to a 3 year old and 1 year old. This book gets as much use in the classroom as it does at home!

I teach special needs children ages 3-12 and I have used this book and the accompanying recording in all my classes. Several teachers have purchased the book themselves! My own children love the songs and and the signs. I get frequent requests at school and at home for the Baby Sing and Sign!

I was lucky enough to take this author's class with my son in KC. After a few months of signing to him, he began signing nonstop around age 11 months. It helped immensely to reduce his frustration (and mine!) in communicating his needs and wants. He learned new signs quickly and his vocabulary/recognition of new objects grew immensely in the months to follow. Now that he is 2, his verbal skills are highly advanced (he speaks very clearly and can compose complex sentences), and I firmly believe this is due to the strong language base he started with the signing programs.

The songs and games in this book are still some of his favorites! Glad to see this great resource is available to parents everywhere! Thanks Anne!

"The Bachelor of Arts" is the second of a thematic trilogy that begins with "Swami and Friends" and ends with "The English Teacher"--three novels that collectively take their characters from the innocence of youth through the disappointment of love to life's first tragedy. Yet this tale of Chandran, a college graduate unlucky in love, is (as Graham Greene notes in his introduction) "a funny and happy book" at its core--particularly when compared to Narayan's later melancholy, tragic books--yet a closer reading shows us the "shadow [that] had been there from the beginning."

The first part of "Bachelor" is an unexpected treat: a farcical, satirical look at the sillier, exhausting rituals of academic life in colonial India. The opening scene features a debate on whether "historians should be slaughtered first"--and Chandran, a history student himself, is required to argue in the affirmative. From there, our poor student is appointed by his professor as secretary of the school's new Historical Association, an honor that adds to his duties but hardly helps his studies. In between, he frequents the cinema with his best friend and dutifully maps out a grand plan for exam preparation--a plan that is revised daily due to the impossibility of following it.

The debate society, his friends, his academic career--all has been poor preparation for life's setbacks. ("The classroom or the club or the office created friendships. When the circumstances changed the relations, too, snapped.") The giddiness of the novel takes a sharp turn when the circumstances do change: Chandran falls in love at first sight and is rejected, causing him to cast aside the comforts of life and to leave home. The rest of the novel follows our Bachelor of Arts (still a bachelor in life) as he educates himself about the one subject neglected during his collegiate career: himself. It's such a simple and simply told story, but it illustrates beautifully the complexities of finding one's place in the world.

A very pleasant and interesting look at the life of a young man in South Asia. Only moderately engaged by his studies at the university, Chandran spends most of his time going to movies, staying out late, drinking at the café, and generally socializing with his friends. With some prodding from his father, he overcomes his laziness sufficiently to graduate, only to find his problems just beginning.

Chandran's predicament should be very familiar to many readers. Bright and charismatic, but lacking any real focus, he has difficulty finding employment. Upon graduation his peer group separates, and he needs to make new friends. And his parents, who are only eager to see him make something of himself, can't help but find fault with his carefree, unproductive lifestyle. What's a Bachelor of Arts to do? His unrequited love for a young girl named Malathi makes for an interesting look at how courting was handled in traditional Indian families not so many decades ago, complete with horoscopes and dowries and class consciousness. But ultimately, isn't it the couples' willingness to commit to each other that matters, and not how they happen to meet? Every bit as fascinating is Chandran's sojourn as an ascetic, which is reminiscent of a Hermann Hesse novel, but with a uniquely critical perspective that only a native Indian could provide.

Narayan's prose has a warm serenity that never fails to evoke small-town South Asia. What his plots lack in excitement and intensity, they make up for in geniality. This particular novel has perhaps a little more excitement than some of the others, and would be a good entry point for young people just discovering Narayan.