My second favorite!
Category: Book Reviews
This book is not a book, but a monument. I have been reading rules from it for 10 years.
1) Never read a book that can be adequately summarized 2) Never read a book you would not reread 3) No book that can be shortened survives4) Never read a book written by a journalist 5) Never read a book if you understand the table of contents 6) Never read a textbook as if you were reading a book 7) Never read a textbook in the sequence prescribed by the author(s) 8) Never read a book if you know what you are getting out of it. 9) Never read a book if you don’t expect to be surprised by something in it, while reading it.
I made a deal with John Gray where I would stop writing nontechnical books and just promote his as they read as if I wrote them myself.
When people ask me “what should I read”, I used to avoid responding. Now, here is something necessary in anyone’s ed
Only Gibbon: Twenty-two acknowledged concubines, and a library of sixty-two thousand volumes, attested the variety.. Yes, Gibbon has mistakes. So does Thucydides! On top of his skeptical charm, he led me to find holes in his acct. My favorite prose style!
Notes on one of Elster’s books. He is the MAIN social science thinker; gets Lindy Effect
Excellent! Only read on mathematicians by insiders.”Math=Youth”disappears when adjtd by life expect
Rest in Peace, Jacques Le Goff, Medieval Historian, Luminous Mind. — He is the author of this passage on the contrast between the true scholar and the professor: “There is nothing more striking than the contrast between images which show the intellectual in the Middle Ages and the humanist at work. The former is a professor, caught up in his teaching (…) The other is a solitary scholar, in his calm chamber, at ease in the midst of the private, luxurious room where his thoughts can move freely about. The former shows the tumult of schools, the dust of classrooms, the collective worker’s indifference to beauty, The latter shows all is order and beauty, Luxe calme et volupté” I wish you eternal “Luxe calme et volupté”, Jacques Le Goff.
