Tag Archives: books

BOOK: “Tribe” by Sebastian Junger

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Tribe: On Homecoming and BelongingTribe: On Homecoming and Belonging by Sebastian Junger
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Author site

This book reflects upon how we are evolutionarily optimized to live in tribal communities, and how life in super-tribal societies (ones in which no one can know everyone else, where one has no shared fate, and where – for better or worse – one can easily end up invisible) is doing us in. The book sprang from an article Junger wrote about Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD,) an affliction Junger found himself with after working as a war correspondent in Afghanistan (pre-911) and elsewhere. It might seem like there is a large leap from human social structures to PTSD, but it turns out where a community’s experience is all tied together, PTSD is relatively rare and / or fades quickly. It is because the afflicted soldier is going from the tribal entity (military unit) back to a decidedly conflicted super-tribe that trauma is so pernicious. Junger explores cases such as the bombing of London in WWII and the shelling and sniper attacks in Bosnia in the 90’s, where such afflictions were far rarer than one would expect because there was — to some degree — a shared experience of the traumatic events.

I found this book fascinating. It’s quite short. It has just four chapters. The first discusses the importance of tribe in human development, generally. It then looks at war, PTSD, and the challenge of returning home (and why so many soldiers have such difficulty doing so, though one would expect a peaceful world would be decidedly preferrable to a warring one.)

I found this book to be gripping and intensely thought-provoking, and I’d recommend it for all readers.

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BOOK: “A Poetry Handbook” by Mary Oliver

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A Poetry Handbook: A Prose Guide to Understanding and Writing PoetryA Poetry Handbook: A Prose Guide to Understanding and Writing Poetry by Mary Oliver
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Publisher site — Ecco

This is an excellent soup-to-nuts primer on poetry writing. While it would be a great tool for someone just beginning their poetic journey — i.e. one who didn’t yet know iambic pentameter from trochaic tetrameter — it also offers some nuggets of wisdom for one who is farther down the road. Mary Oliver had some unique ways of thinking about, or expressing thoughts about, the art.

The book does cover ideas relevant to both modern and traditional poetry. In this regard it has an advantage over, say, Stephen Fry’s The Ode Less Traveled in that Oliver considered both free and metered verse to be poetry.

The author uses the occasional poem or fragment from a variety of poets to make her points but doesn’t get bogged down in examples or analysis of poems.

Among the discussions that seemed better or more insightful than those in other such books were reflections upon the role of imitative exercises as well as exploration of the value of workshops and feedback.

I’d highly recommend this book for poets and serious poetry readers.

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BOOK: “Senjutsu to Ninjutsu” by Doshi Shigetsu (Trans. by Eric Shahan)

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Senjutsu to NinjutsuSenjutsu to Ninjutsu by Doshi Shigetsu
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Author’s Amazon Site

This essay presents thoughts about the practices of what Taoists would call “Immortals.” (The work was apparently created as a speech or lecture.) The translation used in the book is “mountain ascetics,” which might lead readers to believe that it is talking about Shugenja or Yamabushi. I don’t know a great deal about the Japanese language or those systems, but the character used — 仙 (Xiān, in Chinese) — is almost always translated as Immortal in the Chinese language. Shugendo is a syncretic tradition of Esoteric Buddhism, Shinto, Taoism, and folk religion, and it certainly has some overlap (mountain setting, Taoist influence, harsh training practices, etc.) but I don’t know that the two systems would be viewed as equivalent. (Though maybe they were considered so at the time and place of publication.) The author does try to clarify who it is he is talking about, largely by distinguishing them from Celestial Maidens (天人) and Tengu (天狗, crow-goblin-swordsmen.)

At any rate, the primary objective of the lecture / essay is to counter the tendency to be dismissive of these systems. The piece is dated 1901, and so there was an increasing proclivity to dismiss the supernormal as mere superstition. The author argues that practitioners who develop unwavering self-confidence through the practice of intense / death-defying activities (e.g. fasting) may be capable of things that would be unfathomable by ordinary people, leading ordinary lives.

The “ninjutsu” bit of the title results from the proposition of a linkage of the methods and approaches between Japan’s famous caste of warrior-spies, i.e. the ninja, and the ascetics / immortals discussed throughout most of the book.

This is an interesting read, particularly so because of its timing (after the era of Samurai and Ninja, but before modernity so advanced that the supernatural was entirely relegated to a societal fringe.)

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PROMPT: Want to Read

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How do you write what people actually want to read?

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Step 1: Accept the fact that the overwhelming majority of people don’t want to (or like to) read. The only items I put up in paragraphs (these days) are book reviews. People will read reviews to know what a book says without having to actually read it. The book review is considered the lesser of two evils by those who don’t love reading.

Step 2: Read anything that’s more than a few punchy lines for the “reader.” (i.e. use audio files or YouTube-style video segments.) 

Alternatively: Don’t give a rat’s ass and write for yourself.

BOOK: “Health, Healing, and Beyond” by TKV Desikachar (Trans. by R.H. Cravens)

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Health, Healing, And Beyond: Yoga and the Living Tradition of KrishnamacharyaHealth, Healing, And Beyond: Yoga and the Living Tradition of Krishnamacharya by R.H. Cravens
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Publisher Site – FSG / North Point Press

I was eager to read this book because I found Desikachar’s “The Heart of Yoga” to be one of the most important books for yoga practitioners. The book under review is in large part (but not entirely) a biography of T.T. Krishnamacharya — T.K.V. Desikachar’s father and arguably the most important figure in the development of modern yoga. Krishnamacharya was sponsored by the King of Mysore to build a school at the palace, and luminaries such as B.K.S. Iyengar (prop yoga,) Pattabhi Jois (Ashtanga Vinyasa,) Indira Devi (the Russian-born Johnny Appleseed of Yoga,) and others came to be his students.

The book not entirely a biography. It might more accurately be described as an exploration of Krishnamacharya’s philosophy that use stories from his life to elucidate his lived philosophy. Readers will find that the building and maintaining of health is a major element of Krishnamacharya’s philosophy, but perhaps not so much that they find the title apt. The book also spends a fair amount of time on other topics such as yogic ethics and an approach to teaching.

I continue to respect Desikachar’s candor and lack of dogmatism. He discusses his father as a teacher and parent, warts and all. The lack of dogmatism seems to reflect the apple not falling far from the tree. Throughout, Desikachar emphasizes that his father, whatever his faults may have been, was tolerant and saw yoga as a no-strings-attached gift to the world. Krishnamacharya did not require his students, not even his son, to adopt any particular religious belief – despite being a believer himself.

I’d highly recommend this book for all yoga practitioners.


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BOOK: “The Tao of Bill Murray” by Gavin Edwards

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The Tao of Bill Murray: Real-Life Stories of Joy, Enlightenment, and Party CrashingThe Tao of Bill Murray: Real-Life Stories of Joy, Enlightenment, and Party Crashing by Gavin Edwards
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Publisher site – Penguin Random House

This book lays out Bill Murray’s philosophy of life as revealed by his quirky, daring, and spontaneous approach to living. Much has been made of the influence of the mystic philosopher G.I. Gurdjieff on Murray’s thinking. This background is discussed a little in Edwards’ book, but mostly this is a book that uses anecdotes from Bill Murray’s life to make a case for a philosophy of life that involves spontaneity, generosity, service, and connection. (Furthermore, it’s not clear to what degree Gurdjieff influenced Murray’s thinking, versus Gurdjieff’s ideas appealing to Murray because of the way the comedic actor already experienced the world.)

The author organizes the book around what he calls “The Ten Principles of Bill,” a set of ideas that Edwards argues can be seen cutting across Murray’s working and non-working life (and most of the stories are from his interactions with everyday people in everyday [but often unexpected] settings, and not from Murray’s acting work.)

I found this book to be highly readable and illuminating. The stories are funny but also offer a distinct approach to experiencing the world. I’d highly recommend this book for those interested in living a more spontaneous and rewarding life, or just those who like Bill Murray.

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PROMPT: Fictional Character

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Daily writing prompt
If you had to switch lives with a fictional character for a week, who would you choose?
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Sun Wu Kong. Unmitigated mischief might make a nice change. It’s obviously not for the immortality.

PROMPT: Longest Book

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Daily writing prompt
What’s the longest book you’ve ever read?
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I’m not sure. I’ve read a few north of 1,000 pages. 1Q84 by Haruki Murakami and Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand leap to mind. I don’t read too many very long books as I generally find they are badly in need of editing. [That is certainly the case for Atlas Shrugged.] And, you know, they take a long time to read.

The fattest book on my physical bookshelf at the moment is Stephen Wolfram’s A New Kind of Science, but I’m pretty sure I never got through that one.

BOOK: “Biological War” by Annie Jacobsen

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Biological War: A ScenarioBiological War: A Scenario by Annie Jacobsen
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Publisher site — Penguin

As in her last book, Jacobsen builds a horrifying scenario that is made all the more horrifying by a well-researched examination of the possibilities and probabilities of Weapons of Mass Destruction. The previous book imagined a hypothetical nuclear war started by North Korea. This one begins with an accidental lab leak of a “chimera” (a biological weapon that combines infectious agents to increase contagiousness, lethality, incurableness, or some combination thereof) from a Russian laboratory.

One might wonder how apt a title with “war” in it is for an accidental even. It turns out that even an accident might have to be treated an act of war. (Imagine the nation in which the accident takes place has built a working vaccine. That country might not have intended to release the weapon, but they may come to see military advantage in keeping the vaccine to themselves, letting enemies be weakened as other nations have to develop their own countermeasures from scratch [which we know from COVID can take many months — if not longer.])

Jacobsen does a fine job of mixing in moments in which outcomes are worse than one might expect with instances in which luck shines on people (i.e. the way the real world works.) In many cases, Jacobsen was able to draw from real world events that happened during the COVID pandemic, making adjustments for the very different nature of the infectious agent in this scenario. Building from the “fog of war” of COVID, the reader is shown how events might go wrong in ways that could at first blush seem unrealistic — except for the fact that similar missteps already happened in the real world.

As with Jacobsen’s book on nuclear war, the whole scenario takes place over only a few days, with an epilogue that reflects on the longer-term ramifications of the scenario.

I found this book hard to put down. It reads like a novel but with the added feasibility that comes with interviewing experts and studying the relevant history and policy. It is a scary scenario to be certain, but it keeps the reader engaged throughout. I’d highly recommend this book for all readers who can handle reading a doomsday scenario.

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PROMPT: Regretted Reading

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Have you ever regretted reading a book — which one and why?

“Hostage” by Robert Crais. The ending was terrible. The protagonist had zero agency in his own survival. They made a movie with Bruce Willis which improved the defect. While the movie may not have been good, per se, it’s my go-to refutation whenever someone squawks that pretentious cliche, “The book is always better than the movie.”