This is a lovely book... and, brief though it is, helped me to understand more about Gauguin's reasons behind his actions. I read it at a perfect time - when the Metropolitan Museum of Art in NY was holding one of their most important exhibits on Gauguin and featured his wood cuts. It's a colourful, passionate and painful journey.

This is a great book detailing a few pages from his journal. It has great wood-cut reprints and is a quick read. It puts you into the spirit of Tahiti.

Isabelle Eberhardt's collection of short stories is intriguing. It is a bit dark yet uses beautiful imagery, esp of the natural surroundings of the Algerian Desert (Sahara). However, be forewarned that most of these stories were put together after her untimely death, and may not all be her own. Only the last 2 can be confirmed as penned by her word for word.

Isabelle Eberhardt captures the oppressed spirit of the Islamic men within her description of the kif smokers holed up in a ramshackle shelter for the night. In this short story "The Oblivion Seekers" she paints a descriptive picture of the backward desert towns of Morocco and aptly draws a subtle metaphor between a captive falcon and the plight of the Arab men.
On a road to anywhere else is the town of Kenadsa in a desolate town with not even essential human comforts, here of all places, "where there is not even a café", Eberhardt discovers a kif den. The Islamic kif dens of the late 1800's were not unlike the crack houses of today; hidden away in unforgiving places, always in poor sanitary conditions. These places are the sanctuaries for the homeless, the lost, the spiritually bankrupt, the wanderers of our day. This one was similar at least with regards to décor. This particular kif den, despite it derelict location, was of higher quality than most. It was in a "partially ruined house behind the Mellah, a long hall lighted by a single eye in the ceiling of twisted and smoke blackened beams". Eberhardt's passage continues, "The walls are black, ribbed with light colored cracks that look like open wounds". Within this apparent squalor are collected together vagabonds, nomads, persons of dubious intent and questionable appearance for the purpose of smoking kif.
Among them, on a "rude perch of palm branches" is a falcon. The captive falcon is tethered to the makeshift perch by a string around one leg. When unencumbered, falcons spend their time surveying the land from the tall branches of mighty trees or soaring in the clouds, high over the desert cliffs, keeping dominion over their land. Surprisingly, a simple string keeps the falcon terrestrial and prevents him from living out his true destiny.
Just as the owner of the proud raptor goes untold in Eberhardt's story, the oppressor of the Islamic men is neither disclosed; only the oppressed condition in which they all find themselves is described. It could be the politics of the region, the occupation of the land by foreigners, or the poverty inflicted by the desert on all its inhabitants. Reason aside, even the "most highly educated" of Islam can succumb to the oppression of the spirit.
Gathered this evening in the den, among others, is a Moroccan poet, a wanderer in search of native legends; to keep alive he composes and recites verse. There is a Filali musician, rootless without family nor specific trade. There too, a Sudanese doctor who follows the caravans from Senegal to Timbuktu. All, men in search of a medicine to help them forget. To help them forget the futility of their existence - wandering from place to place with no good purpose. These men should be part of a thriving free culture, able to spread their talents to the ends of the Islamic world. The art, music and science are essential pinnings of the Islamic spirit. With a free spirit they wander to the horizons with purpose as surely they, or their predecessors, once did; free to dream and make real those dreams.
Eberhardt writes, "even in the darkest purlieu of Morocco's underworld such men can reach the magic horizon where they are free to build their dream-palaces of delight". The Islamic men are proud men, intelligent men, with dreams and aspirations of freedom and self-determination but their desires, just like the falcon, are restrained. They travel across the desert from country to country undeterred by political boarders. They live off the land - on what meagerness the desert will yield. Yet, a metaphorical string around their ankle binds them tight. The men of Islam can roam freely about the desert but it is their Islamic spirit that is tethered. Consequently, they pursue their dreams in the "clouds of narcotic smoke".

Numrich takes a look at two prominent immigrant Buddhist temples. While his views are interesting, he never really seems to get inside the true nature of the temples or their congregations. Also, he always seems to be looking in from an outsider's point of view, not being of either temple's primary ethnic makeup. Numrich doesn't really probe into truly examining the immigrants' point of view, depending instead on many surveys, figures, and tables.

I read this book because I am an Asian American member of one of the two temples studied and wanted to see how it was represented. It's an interesting viewpoint and raises worthy issues but probably should not be taken as an authoritative view on Buddhism in America or the Asian immigrant experience.

Numrich's book was right on the mark concerning the adaptation of Buddhism to America, in this case Theravada Buddhism. Like a potted plant that sits on a windowsill, Theravada Buddhism will remain in its pot until planted in the ground where it will grow. Numrich's investigation into two communities reflects this very dilemma facing Theravada Buddhism. Although both communities are reaching out to their own, the fashion in which it is being done relfects an Asian element and not an American element, which will keep Theravada Buddhism in its "pot on the windowsill." Numrich's indepth research concerning the issue of "adaptation" is a well documented field study that gives the reader a greater appreciation of the growth that Theravada Buddhism must experience if it wishes to take root in America.

If you are an eliminative materialist then you need help! Not that there aren't some interesting observations in this book - see the chapter with new data on "filling in" - but Churchland's tired example of Maxwell's discovery of electromagnetic waves only demonstrates how subjective the entire world of science really is. A more interesting example might be Maxwell's equations and how they relate to entropy, but I suspect that Churchland's actual knowledge of physics is more on the level of Betty Crocker's knowledge of microwaves...

As for neural nets: go read Perlovsky! I find it odd that Churchland, who loudly proclaims nets as the future of AI, doesn't appear to have read any of Perlovsky's papers; but I suspect he's too busy waving magnets in his living room generating EM waves.

A good collection of essays by recognized leaders in a burgeoning field of philosophy. Some are only useful if what the article is discussing is quite familiar to the reader. This holds in particular for some of the articles on qualia and the article on R. Penrose. It could also be said that the article on Dennett could have been marginally better if the last part, concerning his motivations, were snipped.

The downside to translation is that we always loose, in some amount, something of what the author(poet)is expressing. The translator did not try to maintain Velaine's essence...he tried to create a whole new poem from what he understood Verlaine is expressing.

The reader below from Puero Rico could simply not be more wrong--no less a poet than Seamus Heaney has praised quite highly the work of Norman Shapiro, who is universally recognized as one of our premiere translators of French literature, easily on a level with Richard Howard and Richard Wilbur and W.S. Merwin. Mr. Shapiro has won a National Book Award for his work, and his four volumes (thus far) of La Fontaine are superb, dazzling!

So, ignore the ill-informed reviewer below and proceed with confidence! And check out "Fifty Fables," "Fifty More Fables," "Once Again, La Fontaine," and "La Fontaine's Bawdy"--all translated by Shapiro--a heroic endeavor, and as good as French literature gets in English!!!

After reading lots of book written by journalists, I was almost floored by the impersonal way this book was written. At first, I was a little reserved, thinking it read more like a letter than a book, but in the end, Downings love for opals - and the enormous amount of information and entertaining stories in this book just suck you in and win you over!

There is no doubt Downing knows his stuff when it comes to opals. In this book, Downing starts by giving a bit of history about opals (prompted wisely by his wife, Bobbi), before delving into his adventures in the Australian outback. In fact, that would probably be the only complaint about this book - it focuses (apart from the history) exclusively on Australia and there is a smidgin of opal mining done in other parts of the world (Mexico, Nevada, Central Europe...).

However, that aside, Downing coveres the journey from beginning to end with opal - from getting down with miners, cutting, valuing and selling opals. And all of this 'insider' information is wrapped up in entertaining stories written by someone who has clearly fallen head over heels for opals and made a life-long commitment to this beautiful gem. What makes the book even more interesting is its a snap shot of Australia, before sealed roads connected the major tourist destinations of Australia

Well worth the read if you are even remotely interested in opals or thinking of visiting Australia for opals. You will learn more reading this book than anyone out there is probably going to be able to tell you.

good stories about the author traveling around searching for, buying, cutting, and enjoying opals. very nice color pictures. I not only liked the adventure stories, but learned about the history of mining, value of opals, and different kinds of opals. It's a great book if you have a casual interest. By the time you read this, you will probably want to own an opal if you don't already.

Carpenter proposes that self-conciousness and fear led to the entire world pantheon of different faiths.

"Naturally as soon as Man began to think about himself--a frail phantom and waif in the midst of tremendous forces of whose nature and mode of operation he was entirely ignorant--he was BESET with terrors...the natural defence against this state of mind was the creation of an enormous number of taboos...hardened down into very stringent Customs and Laws...avoidance not only of acts which might reasonably be considered dangerous, like touching a corpse, but also things much more remote and fanciful in their relation to danger, like merely...passing a lightning-struck tree; ... and acts which offered any special pleasure or temptation--like sex or marriage or the enjoyment of a meal.

"...Fear does not seem a very worthy motive, but in the beginning it curbed the violence of the purely animal passions, and introduced order and restraint among them. ...(F)rom the early beginnings (in the Stone Age) of self-consciousness in Man there has been a gradual development--from crass superstition, senseless and accidental, to rudimentary observation, and so to belief in Magic; thence to Animism and personification of nature-powers in more or less human form, as earth-divinities or sky-gods or embodiments of the tribe; and to placation of these powers by rites like Sacrifice and the Eucharist, which in their turn became the foundation of Morality...; observations of plants or of the weather or the stars, carried on by tribal medicine-men for purposes of witchcraft or prophecy, supplied some of the material of Science; and humanity emerged by faltering and hesitating steps on the borderland of these finer perceptions and reasonings which are supposed to be characteristic of Civilisation."

Carpenter goes on to compare Christian tenets with pagan practices around the world. You can see how fear of neverending winter, starvation, and death spurred belief in magic, ritual, animism, anthromomorphism, and today's conventional religions.

In his British imperialistic furor to spread civilization, Carpenter also predicts the emergence of a "Common Life" beyond self-consciousness, blasting the selfish motives of capitalism and actually hailing the practices of early Christian communities and the movements of the Communists in eastern Europe.

Granted, Carpenter's book was first published in 1920, just after WWI, before we could see Communism fall, and before Ayn Rand could inspire anyone to Constructivism. But Carpenter's view of religious history is useful. It certainly predates Campell's Hero of a Thousand Faces but has similar depth and scope.

I recommend this book along with:

* Joan O'Grady's "Early Christian Heresies" which examines the philosophies and turning points that molded Christian tenets during its birth and growth so that it could promise salvation to the masses. The scope includes Gnosticism, Marcionites, Montanists, Manichaeism, Donatists, Arianism, Nestorians, Pelagius, and more.
* Erik Davis' "Techgnosis: myth, magic + mysticism in the age of information" which proposes that forms of communication shape social and individual consciousness of reality. "It follows that when a culture's technical structure of communication mutates quickly and significantly, both social and individual 'reality' are in for a bit of a ride. ...The social imagination leaps into the breach, unleashing a torrent of speculation, at once cultural, metaphysical, technical, and financial."

I very much enjoyed reading this book, which, for its age, has held up rather well. I had always known that Early Christianity 'borrowed' from pagan religions some holidays and practices, but it was not until I read this book did I know the depth of theft. Almost like a plaigarism of faith intended to convert the masses (which it sadly succeeded in doing). The only part of the book I disliked was the final material, in which the author offers a new religion of sorts which is very metaphysical and a little dull. But the rest of the book is a keeper.

The Sugar Creek Gang and the Palm Tree Manhunt is a book about a gang of kids who tries to solve mysteries. In this one, they try to find Old Man Padder's long lost brother. Old Man Padder said his brother went to Palm Tree Island and never came back. They found a man that looked like his brother but claimed he was John Machete and he had been born a grown man in El Torro Castle. The gang still had a suspicion that he was Old Man Padder's brother. They could not prove he was until John Machete woke up and said he had amnesia. The gang then went back and told Old Man Padder that his brother was fine and well.

The Sugar Creek Gang series revolves around a group of young, Christian boys from the northern Midwest who solve crimes and mysteries and end up having all sorts of exciting adventures. The stories are much like the Hardy Boys or Nancy Drew. However, they are told from the perspective of one of the gang's members, Bill Collins. This narrative technique gives the stories a more authentic feel, at the expense of skipped plot details and simplistic descriptions.

In this edition of the series, the gang is sent to Palm Tree Island by a benevolent benefactor in Sugar Creek, Old Man Paddler. Old Man Paddler wants the boys to visit some missionaries on Palm Tree Island and experience a different culture. However, he also wants the boys to secretly look for his long lost twin brother who was last seen on the island over twenty years ago. The gang gets lost in the city, are attacked by a goat, and run into a crazy old man who calls himself John Machette.

Readers who enjoy series like the Hardy Boys will probably enjoy this book, as will most young boys. Even though the series was written over thirty years ago, it remains fresh and most young boys will be able to relate to the story's characters, who with their Christian values, provide decent role models.

Fourteen-year-old Lep is apprenticed to a village doctor, steadfastly following his father's dying dream for his son. However news arrives from Philadelphia that the city has been stricken with Yellow Fever, so Lep takes off to rescue his sister visiting there. His faith in medicine and his ability as a healer are put to the test in the infectious city. The citizens do not realzie the role of mosquitoes in spreading this deadly disease; thus they fall victim to quacks and their own unscrupulous servants.

Lep battles with more than malaria as he tries to covnince his older sister that she is the victim of a clever mountebank; and his kindly benefactor that his servants are plotting to rob him blind. Lep's fith in Medicine is severely shaken, but he learns about life, death and most importantly, himself, as he comes of age in the city named for Brotherly Love.

Not to be placed on any Must-Read list, this book still has much to recommend it in an elementary classroom. It represents Historical Fiction but also reveals to young people how primitive the medical practices were in post-Revolutionary times. How doctors treated malaria and other diseases is a topic often neglected in standard History books. An interesting tale with a good plot which will educate young readers.

This was a very good book about a boy who is an apprientice, who goes to philly to get his sister during a spell of the Yellow Fever. Along the way he gets seperated from his master, can't find him, and also can't find his sister

I remember reading "Paul Bunyan" stories in grade school. I find this video rendition a bit less charming than other Rabbit Ears stories, but I have to admit that it's very well done. One of the things that the Rabbit Ears series does very well is to match the actor/reader to the story, and Jonathon Winters--who is himself rather larger than life--is certainly the perfect choice to narrate the stories of Paul Bunyan and his giant blue ox, Babe.

What's particularly amusing is the political correctness of this video. After all, the Paul Bunyan stories are really meant to glorify the clear cutting of forests and to promote the idea that the frontier is something to be tamed and used by white settlers. (One of the stories concerns Teddy Roosevelt ordering Buyan to clear the Dakota territory for white settlers.) Rabbit Ears was clearly uneasy with the politics of these stories, and the ending has Paul Bunyan feeling sorry for his deeds and planting new forests. This is a nice environmental message for children, but it distorts what loggers actually did--rather like Disney's Pocohontas ending with the English and the Indians deciding to live together in peace and mutual understanding. Nice sentiment, but that's not quite what happened.

Still--a triumph of storytelling if not of history.

This version of some of the tales about Paul Bunyan is the finest I've heard. Jonathan Winters is a master at this type of story telling and he is in peak form here. Our 8-year old boy and 5-year old girl were enthralled with this story and frequently asked us to rewind the tape so they could hear the parts missed while laughing. I've lost track of the number of times we've listened to this tape. My only regret is that there weren't even more stories included. The accompanying music is also excellent.