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Shakespeare is big game for Jones, the biggest. Most critics give up when they get to Shakespeare. Borges famously suggested Shakespeare in some crucial sense lacked identity. "I am not what I am," as he makes Iago say. It was the Argentinian's explanation for the mystery of how one person could create so many characters. As they used to say about Clapton, Shakespeare was God.
Jones doesn't cop out so easily. He tracks Shakespeare by his spoor, so to speak. The highlight of the book is the chapter where he looks at "Hand D" - a crowd scene in the fragmentary manuscript play "The Boke of Thomas More", echoes the convincing argument that it is by Shakespeare and persuades the reader that it is in many senses deeply revelatory of who Shakespeare was, or at least, how he worked (hence the title). The passage about "watery parsnips" is a gem. It's the most useful work about Shakespeare to be published in many years.
The price is prohibitive, I know, but get your library to order it!




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Extremely highly recommended -- the best musical history book I have read.
Also recommended: The Complete Stax/Volt Singles, Volumes I, II, and III (box sets with excellent liner notes by Rob Bowman)
Also -- It Came from Memphis' for a good background on the lesser known, but nonetheless important musicians who originated in Memphis.


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I read it in the Arden edition, edited by Honigmann. Honigmann argues that Othello has a strong claim at being Shakespeare's greatest tragedy and makes a strong case for the work. He has a good introduction that gives a quite balanced and clear overview on many topics regarding this play, from the "double" time method Shakespeare uses, overviews of the various characters, as well as a the stage history. Amazingly, he can be remarkably balanced, even when he is talking about his own views. While he is a decent writer, Shakespeare is better... In the text itself, he gives quite ample footnotes to help explain the language, why he picked particular readings, as well as where themes came from...
Like all scholarly Shakespeare editions, the notes are in danger of overloading the text. This reader, however, recognizes the distance between myself and Shakespeare and so I find it comforting to be able to look at the notes when I have questions. At times his "longer notes" were awkward, but there is no easy way to handle this amount of material.

This is what captured my attention when I read this play.It is very profound to realize the fact that Shakespeare uses Iago to set this stage on which Othello is a mere player.
I love the character of Iago. His total confidence, the superiority that he feels when psychoanalysing human nature, his rational thinking and intellectualism sways the reader to think: 'Wow, this is a compelling and sophisticated man we're dealing with here!'
However, my admiration of Iago does not in anyway undermine my love of Othello. His poetic and calm demeanor makes the reader feel the pity and terror for him when he falls from grace (catharsis). Yet, we are made to understand that the reason why he is made to appear a gullible and ignorant fool to some readers is that he does not have any knowledge of a delicate, domesticated life. Venetian women were foreign to him. This tragic flaw in Othello added to the circumstances used by Iago to destroy him.
The meaning, and hence the tragedy of the play is conveyed through the use of Shakespeare's language, style, literary devices and imagery. Without these dramatic effects, readers would never be able to enjoy the play as much, although the dialogue is at times difficult to decipher.
I thoroughly enjoyed Othello and it is my hope that more people find it enticing as I have. I would be delighted to contribute more of my reviews to that effect.

Othello's problems begin when he promotes one of his soldiers, Michael Cassio as his lieutenant. This arouses the jealousy and hatred of one of his other soldiers, Iago who hatches a plot to destroy Othello and Michael Cassio. When Cassio injures an opponent in a fight he is rebuked, punished, and subsequently ignored by Othello who must discipline him and teach him a lesson. Iago convinces Desdemona to intervene on Cassio's behalf and then begins to convince Othello that Desdemona is in love with Cassio.
This is actually one of the most difficult Shakespeare plays to watch because the audience sees the plot begin to unfold and is tormented by Othello's gradual decent into Iago's trap. As with other Shakespeare plays, the critical components of this one are revealed by language. When Othello is eventually convinced of Cassio's treachery, he condemns him and promotes Iago in his place. When Othello tells Iago that he has made him his lieutenant, Iago responds with the chilling line, "I am thine forever". To Othello this is a simple affirmation of loyalty, but to the audience, this phrase contains a double meaning. With these words, Iago indicates that the promotion does not provide him with sufficient satisfaction and that he will continue to torment and destroy Othello. It is his murderous intentions, not his loyal service that will be with Othello forever.
Iago's promotion provides him with closer proximity to Othello and provides him with more of his victim's trust. From here Iago is easily able to persuade Othello of Desdemona's purported infidelity. Soon Othello begins to confront Desdemona who naturally protests her innocence. In another revealing statement, Othello demands that Desdemona give him "the ocular proof". Like Iago's earlier statement, this one contains a double meaning that is not apparent to the recipient but that is very clear to the audience who understands the true origin of Othello's jealousy. Othello's jealousy is an invisible enemy and it is also based on events that never took place. How can Desdemona give Othello visual evidence of her innocence if her guilt is predicated on accusations that have no true shape or form? She can't. Othello is asking Desdemona to do the impossible, which means that her subsequent murder is only a matter of course.
I know that to a lot of young people this play must seem dreadfully boring and meaningless. One thing you can keep in mind is that the audience in Shakespeare's time did not have the benefit of cool things such as movies, and videos. The downside of this is that Shakespeare's plays are not visually stimulating to an audience accustomed to today's entertainment media. But the upside is that since Shakespeare had to tell a complex story with simple tools, he relied heavily on an imaginative use of language and symbols. Think of what it meant to an all White audience in a very prejudiced time to have a Black man at the center of a play. That character really stood out-almost like an island. He was vulnerable and exposed to attitudes that he could not perceive directly but which he must have sensed in some way.
Shakespeare set this play in two locations, Italy and Cypress. To an Elizabethan audience, Italy represented an exotic place that was the crossroads of many different civilizations. It was the one place where a Black man could conceivably hold a position of authority. Remember that Othello is a mercenary leader. He doesn't command a standing army and doesn't belong to any country. He is referred to as "the Moor" which means he could be from any part of the Arab world from Southern Spain to Indonesia. He has no institutional or national identity but is almost referred to as a phenomenon. (For all the criticism he has received in this department, Shakespeare was extrordinarlily attuned to racism and in this sense he was well ahead of his time.) Othello's subsequent commission as the Military Governor of Cypress dispatches him to an even more remote and isolated location. The man who stands out like an island is sent to an island. His exposure and vulnerability are doubled just as a jealous and murderous psychopath decides to destroy him.
Iago is probably the only one of Shakespeare's villains who is evil in a clinical sense rather than a human one. In Kind Lear, Edmund the bastard hatches a murderous plot out of jealousy that is similar to Iago's. But unlike Iago, he expresses remorse and attempts some form of restitution at the end of the play. In the Histories, characters like Richard III behave in a murderous fashion, but within the extreme, political environment in which they operate, we can understand their motives even if we don't agree with them. Iago, however, is a different animal. His motives are understandable up to the point in which he destroys Michael Cassio but then they spin off into an inexplicable orbit of their own. Some have suggested that Iago is sexually attracted to Othello, which (if its true) adds another meaning to the phrase "I am thine forever". But even if we buy the argument that Iago is a murderous homosexual, this still doesn't explain why he must destroy Othello. Oscar Wilde once wrote very beautifully of the destructive impact a person can willfully or unwittingly have on a lover ("for each man kills the things he loves") but this is not born out in the play. Instead, Shakespeare introduces us to a new literary character-a person motivated by inexplicable evil that is an entity in itself. One of the great ironies of this play is that Othello is a character of tragically visible proportions while Iago is one with lethally invisible ones.



Here in Northern New Jersey everyone knew, and still knows, all about downsizing and organizational flattening and outsourcing. Since the collapse of the tech-bubble, many of those independent contractors are now looking for work and escaping the computer field alltogether in the face of falling wage rates, excess supply and new entrants from college who expect a lot less!
Revisiting this book gives one the opportunity to rexamine it's claims and, not surprisingly, finds them lacking. To be fair, much of what the originator describes has come to pass but not in the way that he suggests.
The main lesson that I come away with from this book is that markets are so powerful that the competitive environment determines the shape of the organization. Obviously, some would say but this is only half of the story. Combine the power of markets which is, after all, only the result of individuals exercising choices, with a proactive government and you get a pretty unstoppable force. If the dollar is high then imports are [inexpensive] as compared to domestic goods which puts intense competitive pressure on companies who then must cut costs. Add to the mix a policy of a free trade area as NAFTA and a competitive labor market and there is even more pressure on costs. Finally have a boyant stock market and increased wealth and you have lots of venture capital looking for profit. The result, falling unemployment with little inflation and downward intense pressure on costs leading to more business. The picture is muddied somewhat by rising benefits costs but they become a force against rising costs too,
What I am describing is the pressure on business to focus on their core activities and float off internal activities which can be done by service companies contracted for the purpose. Wage bill too high - make workers contractors who then have to pay for their own benefits or better still get the states to introduce basic minimum health care schemes.
This nirvana of the dejobbed economy never really existed. Sure there are more small businesses and self-employed, sure there is more flexibility among the workforce but there is also compulsion, workfare, for the unemployed as well as the requirement for many families to work two, three or more jobs to make ends meet.
Hayek the Nobel prizewinner foresaw the person described in this book many years ago as did his mentor Mises. To be successful they argued the individual must market themselves as a self-entrepreneur. Very true.
This book is an excellent description of a possible future in the light of developments in business at the time. The author is to be commended for the clarity of his thought and exposition. However, he ignores the bigger picture and the implications of a global economy and powerful, interventionist governments. Perhaps he would like to write an update to this book in the light of the events of the last seven years.

This review was written as part of the Annotated Bibliography of Learning A Living; A Guide to Planning Your Career and Finding a Job for People with Learning Disabilities, Attention Deficit Disorder, and Dyslexia

This was one of the first ripples in what has become a massive wave of books on the changing business world, including recent examples like "Blur" -- but it's refreshing, easy to read, and can change your whole view of what "work" entails. I think it's especially important for young people still in school to read it: don't waste your efforts preparing for a traditional "career" that may not be there five years after you graduate; focus on developing your talents, your skills, and your entrepreneurial spirit instead, because those are what will be worth the most to you in the future.

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Excellent review coverage of pain, analgesia, monitoring, and anesthesia in general.
Detailed coverage of agent classes and anesthetic considerations by species.
I have many anesthesia books (both veterinary and human) on my shelf - but none better.

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