This book is an amalgam of flaws and flawed thinking. For starters, the title is a complete misnomer: only two musical traditions are extensively analyzed while hundreds of musical traditions -Native American, South American, Aborigine, Middle Eastern, Tibetan, Asian, etc. are ignored. Not to mention the fact that the animal world -bees, whales, birds- is skipped entirely. Most of the book is spent bashing European music and society with the music and social arrangements of the Venda tribe in Africa. More exasperating, Blacking's method of proving a point is often simply to state it: "it is reasonable to suppose that music ... is a species specific trait of man." What seemed like a very interesting thesis is, for the most part, finished with this statement!

We are treated to page after page of Venda music, and told such earth-shattering truths as when analyzing music, we have to take into consideration the society that produced it. Maybe this book can be forgiven for expecting this to be a momentous insight because it was written in 1974 before cross cultural studies were common. Reading this in 2002, Blacking is simply a preaching to a bewildered crowd of the converted.

Blacking also fails to make any distinction between songs composed for dance, for opera, for solo or choral performance, for ritual, for symphonies or any for any other type of music. He doesn't take into consideration that the inspiration for, say, blues, rock, and jazz, for classical and atonal Gregorian chanting may be quite different, that their functions may make for poor comparison. I lost the last of my tolerance for this book when, in the conclusion, Blacing decided to prove that purely musical considerations, such as "the logic of the melodic pattern" and tonal relationships, are not sufficient to analyze a song the Venda used to teach their children to count. Well, why should they be? This is the Venda version of Sesame Street ditties in which "on each half-note beat, a finger is grapsed and counted ... from the left little finger to the thumb ..." Who in the world would expect purely musical considerations to explain everything in such a pragmatic piece of work? Blacking utterly fails to take into account that virtually all of the Venda's music is of this sort-it serves a social or pragmatic function-whereas Western music has long since moved away from that into the realm of aesthetic expression.

Even the section of the book in which Blacking tried to decide whether there might be universal aspects to music was an abysmal disappointment because he fails in any way to expound on his idle musing that music may have universal elements.

By the time he gets to the conclusion, he will say a half dozen things about music that are either contradictory or simply hang there without any discussion, including the "hard task is to love, and music is a skill that prepares man for this most difficult task." He states this on page 103 (of 116) without any previous mention of love in the context of music. Nor will he go on to prove his point, instead he will briefly and tangentially discuss this before moving on to how music "may represent the human mind working without interference and therefore observation of musical structures may reveal some of the sturctual pinciples on which all human life is based." Indeed a revelation if only it weren't dropped on page 115 like paratrooper who finds himself utterly alone after the drone of the plane has faded into silence on the very next page. Perhaps the most absurd thing Blacking asserts in his conclusion is that "In order to create new Venda music, you must BE a Venda, sharing Venda social and cultural life from early childhood." It's no more absurd than the claiming that for an author to portray a believable male character, she must be a man.
"The chief function" -yet another chief function-"of music is to involve people in shared experiences within the framework of their cultural experience." Once again, he states this as if it were a self-evident truth and makes no attempt to sway anyone who might be skeptical. What about those of us who lean more toward the belief that music can be, if not a universal language, at least more mutually intellgible than, say, Turkish and German? In other words, the belief that a German musician can convey much much more with a musical composition than he or she can with a lecture given to a Turkish-speaking audience? Transcending culture, seems as much an element of music as perpetuating it. What a shame such a fascinating topic was given such unforgivably narrow treatment.

You are far better off reading what Mahler had to say about music (his are the most interesting quotes in this book) or, Igor Stravinsky's wonderfully concise and presented "The Poetics of Music."

This slim volume may be the be best single introduction to ethnomusicology we have. It is based on Blacking's fieldwork among the Venda, an agricultural people living in the African Transvaal. Blacking provides extensive musical examples and photographs covering children's music, ritual, spiritual possession, the musical calendar, etc. Unlike Westerners, who believe that only a few people are musical, the Venda believe that all people are musical and so all members of their culture actively make music.

The book is great if you really want to do a research paper on the musical history of Europe.

I feel quite strange presuming to give a numerical rating to a book by one of American literature's greatest authors.

It's important for readers to realize that White-Jacket is not what would, in the modern day, be considered a novel. There is essentially no plot structure. It's a melange of events, descriptive passages and polemic, narrated by the eponymous White-Jacket, whom I suspect of being Melville himself. At times the book is entertainingly humorous - as when the narrator tries to get rid of his famous jacket. And much of the description of life aboard a man-of-war is fascinating -- the book would make a helpful companion for people reading modern novels such as O'Brian's series. (And, of course, White-Jacket probably was one of the sources used by O'Brian and other aquatic novelists.) The polemic -- Melville's rants against flogging and his pacifist pleas -- I found tiresome, as I always find polemic, regardless of its aims.

If you find yourself in a position where the individuals in authority over you are, in the actual state of affairs, your moral inferiors, then on this level alone you will be able to appreciate this book.

Fascinating, entertaining account of life on a man-of-war. Hilarious in parts; always subversive. Melville's mock glorification of the U.S. Navy and its officers is brilliant.

There's no doubt that this is a beautiful book. How disappointing, then, that it could have been so much more beautiful were it not for the largely useless guidebook-style writing. What I had hoped for was a gorgeous photo-essay to inspire my future travels with places in the world that are not to be missed. What I got was a book with a split personality: one, a handsome book that belongs on a coffee table, the other, an overly ambitious guidebook to the world with no depth and mediocre writing. If only the authors had chosen one personality to go with (preferably the coffee table one), it might've worked. The problem with the guidebook strategy is that no one is going to use this as a guidebook-the dimensions, hardcover binding, and shallowness of content make that impossible. Therefore this information goes to waste, and the sacrifices that it requires, such as having text in every margin instead of full-page pictures, do the book much damage.

That the suggested places tend to be overly broad is a significant weakness. Amazingly, one of the featured places is actually the entire state of Florida. Not that Florida isn't lovely, but such a broad notion of a must-see place is hardly compelling to me as a traveler-It's not like I haven't heard of Florida before, and it doesn't give me any new ideas or highlight anything is sufficient depth to make it seem exciting. This lack of focus pervades the book, as the cities of Vienna, Prague and Warsaw are lumped together as another single destination. Still, despite these shortcomings, I do enjoy looking through the book. The selection of places are varied and well distributed around the world, and some of the photos really are breath taking, and so on the coffee table it remains.

This is the book I was looking for to give my mother for Christmas. I wanted something about world travel, with beautiful pictures, descriptions of places, and geological maps. This book has that and more.

In addition to these things, the book has a sidebar of facts on each place, summarizing climate, local language, currency, best time to go, health concerns and other useful information. There is also a world climate map in the front of the book which labels each area covered in the book.

The photography is excellent and I think the coverage is fairly well-rounded. The book opens with information on Banff National Park in Canada, proceeds around the globe in a more or less eastward direction and finishes in the Pacific with Tahiti and Easter Island.

A large spectrum of travel is covered, but there are some notable places missing. The authors left out some great cities in Europe, although they do cover Venice, Prague, Vienna and Krakow. These are all beautiful cities and deserve their place in this book, but absent are Paris, Rome, Athens, and London. It's easy enough to find books on these places though and I suspect the authors overlooked them for this reason.

One place conspicously absent, which I cannot forgive them for overlooking is the Caribbean. I may be biased, but I do think the Caribbean is one of the most beautiful places on earth. Any well-traveled soul must see at least one of the islands of the Greater or Lesser Antilles.

In spite of this, I still give the book 4 stars and feel that it is a wonderful place to look for travel ideas or to do some world exploration from the comfort of an easy chair.

This book sets forth the 47 places that you must visit in your lifetime. I am working on visitng all 47 places. Since I first reviewed the book some three years ago, my wife and I have visited six of the places--Tanzania, the west coast of Norway-the world's most beatiful voyage, Costa Rica, the Great Wall of China, the Yangtze Gorges and the Outer Hebrides. This is a wonderful book and makes a great gift.

Stoltenberg is the classic 'soft male' Bly speaks of so wisely. This book panders to women's fears and disempowers everyone by fostering shame for men's natural passions and joys. For millennia traditional arrangements between men and women were essential for survival - now, thanks to men's inventiveness, they're not. It is sad that Stoltenberg's construction of masculinity is so myopic that he sees only evil.

The other reviews that talk about the feminist straw woman of radical teachings should sit in on a few university classes where students are shamed just for having a penis. The hostility of academic feminism, idealized by Stoltenberg, is very real and helps neither women nor men.

This book is my bible. This is the best book I have ever known, and I carry it with me everywhere.

I also quote the author with complete citation as my signature quotations with e - mail. And every other opportunity given me to do so.

This author, his perceptions? Genius.

'Bout time, too, that there was a man so brilliant.

I have already put in, and am awaiting, an order for his Refusing to be a Man: Essays on SOCIAL Justice ... not yet out but soon!

Blue Maas bluemaas@truserve.com

I read Stoltenberg's book the same year I read Robert Bly's "Iron Yawn" (oops! I meant "Iron John"!) and frankly, I was shocked. Bly's book offended me by offering no real solutions to anything, whereas Stoltenberg not only provided creative and profound insights into the problem of gender ideology, he actually recognized and identified the real problem for what it is, something Bly seems incapable of doing. I was surprised, upon reading this book and seeing how strongly it resonated with my own experiences, to discover that I've been a "radical feminist" all my life. Like most men, I had used the "radical" label to demonize a straw man (or should that be "straw woman"?) version of feminism that no one anywhere actually espouses. It took reading this book for me to understand that I've been one of the radicals all along, and furthermore, that I shouldn't be ashamed of it. Stoltenberg's insightful, and often delightful, commentary on the idea of manhood and the social injustice required to meaningfully maintain it, forever altered my perceptions of the world around me. Goddess (or whoever) bless Stoltenberg! Find this book and read it as if your life depended on it, because it probably does.

This was a great story with wonderful drawings, it was intense and direct. Peter Parker thinking he is a clone with no ties to the real world. It brings back the feeling that Spider-Man comics should bring! Really enjoyed it! ...

The Clone Saga wasn't the best Spider-Man story, I'll admit. It had it's moments, but was mostly an incredibly disonant mess. But J. M. DeMatteis was able to take lemons (the Saga) and make lemonade with this amazing mini-series.

I am blown away by the story's content; it's characters, it's pacing, the parallel of Ben and Kaine, numerous plots colliding. It is truly amazing. Couple this with John Romita Jr's exquisite pencilling talent and "Spider-Man: The Lost Years" is a real winner!

I would give this book a much higher score than five stars if I had the capability.

i for one did not hate the spider-man clone saga. after all it's a story now i just wish there was more ben storys like this.so you know it is not spider-man its sorta the scarlet-spider wich is who he will be five years from now in the story it's a deep story ben thanking he is no one finds he is a hero that is the part he may be a clone but he's a hero that is who he is. i say five stars but it sould be 10 stars.

I have nothing against religion, but I was very surprised to see that a large portion of this book is a fictional account of Joseph writing about fathering Jesus. Yes, there are probably good lessons to be learned here, but I couldn't get past the religious aspects of the writing to see them.

Becoming a father is a very good book for those who has never been a father. I think this book can prepar you for a baby. It help me so much and i go back to the book to see how to deal with what ever come up. So if you are about to be a father read this and keep it near.

John Hart has written about being a father, but this is really about being a man. In a delightful style, this book touches the heart, engages the mind and moves the soul.

Stellar art, intrigueing plotting, and a story that isn't mired in too much continuity made for an excellent read. Both characters are handled extremely well. Perfect examples being the first story's use of Doom's obsession with his mother and the second's forcing of Iron man to reluctantly use magic.The book also made excellent use of playing two characters with many intrigueing parallels off one another.
The second story suffers slightly because it comes of as a slightly more light hearted sequel of the first, but the encounters between the Doom, Iron Man and their respective counterparts in the future more than make up for it.

Hey -- if David Michelinie and Bob Layton are doing Iron Man, you can rarely go wrong! This TPB features IM and Doc Doom being transported to the past -- King Arthur's time -- and then to the future of the year 2093. (The original comics were Iron Man #149-150, and then #249-250.) The tales are wonderfully woven, script and art both.

You may also want to check out a Marvel "What If?" that detailed Iron Man's adventures if he was *stuck* in the King Arthur past.

Collection of stories in this tradepaperback from the acclaimed David Michelinie/Bob Layton run writing IRON MAN, in which the Golden Avenger clashes with the metal madman from Laveria and end up going back in time and then to the future with King Arthur and the wizard Merlin. Great reading for Iron Man fans and one hopes they make an Iron Man film someday as the character could make an easy transistion from comics to film.

Bound in _A Cat, a Man, and Two Women_ are three stories by one of Japan's most esteemed modern writers, Junichiro Tanizaki. For anyone who has followed Tanizaki's work, the stories are ostensibly by a younger Tanizaki; the stories capture hints of the perverse and psychological drama, which he has mastered in his later work. I must admit, having read many of his later novels first, I found the stories in the collection a bit slow. Nonetheless, as admier of Tanizaki's literature, I felt the collection gave me a better understanding of his progression and maturity as a writer. His attention to the psychology of the women characters vis-à-vis the male protagonist in the title story, "A Cat, a Man, and Two Women," reminded me of his novel _Quicksand_, written much later. The story "Professor Rado" is arguably a nascent version of _A Diary of a Mad Old Man_, which centralizes trans-generational desire and foot fetishes. Out of the three stories, "The Little Kingdom" was my favorite -- it gives the impression that Tanizaki is both an astute and creative social critic. The story reminded me of the novel _Nip the Buds, Shoot the Children_, by another notable Japanese author, Kenzaburo Oe, where children rule the adult world around them. The collection is worth a read.

Although extremely well written, the point of these stories escapes me. And this coming from someone who has a fair familiarity with and appreciation for Japanese literature. Despite the book's short length, it took me several weeks to get through it -- my interest and intellectual curiosity were never truly aroused. I was particularly dismayed by the stories' endings, which struck me as rather arbitrary and gratuitously abrupt. To be sure, it is nowhere written in stone that a story must always provide some sort of resolution. That doesn't mean, however, that it should end more or less in mid-sentence -- and with a 'ho-hum' from the reader.

tanizaki is my most favorite author ever since reading some of his works in college. therefore, i have read "a cat, a man, and two women" for leisure. i would have to say this is one of tanizaki's shortest works but not short of complexities of relationships of all sorts. the main part of this book deals with the complexity of not only the relationship between a man and his present wife (cousin) and an ex-wife but with a long time cat companion named Lilly. i don't know if i can call this a love triangle, more like a love rectangle. the cat, Lilly, is used and abused in this story. Lilly becomes the reasons and emotional links of all the problems between the man (Shozo) and his women, Shinako and Fukuko. A helpless animal is being "abused" by these characters, the cat can be used to represent Shozo's "actual" wife, the cat was "used" to make both wives jealous by Shozo without him directly trying, and the cat was snatched by ex-wife to lure Shozo back to her. focus is driven away from the human players in this story and is mainly on helpless Lilly. I felt Shozo never needed a wife in first place, all he needed was Lilly, Shozo is a real cat lover and tanizaki did well describing all the feelings dealing with loving a feline.

Rocco Buttiglione is an absolute cretin. A servile henchman of the cancerous worldwide catholic lobby and a junior partner in Berlusconi's neofascist bloc, he contents himself with the few crumbs that fall from his master's table... like a faithful, mangy little dog. May Jah have mercy upon him and upon the misguided souls who have nothing better to do than to read his insignificant works.

The book is hard to understand not only in philosophical thought but also some polish history would help.
As a casual reader I found the book to be more of a task then I wanted.
A challenge is good if you have the patience for the subject mater. I rated the book high because it was well written and informative but a little over my head. I simply didn't have the back round knowledge I needed to get full understanding.
There are other books on Pope John Paul 2 that would be more beneficial for the causal reader.

The reader seeking to understand the thinking of Pope John Paul II will find no better introduction than this remarkable book. Buttiglione is a major philosopher in his own right--as if evident from his careful discussions of Adorno, Sartre, Marx, and other thinkers he brings into dialogue with Wojtyla. Highly recommended.

This book was a great tale of action and writing. The book is a must read which features four more great charachters added to the marvel lineup. It has action and humor in this awesome graphic novel showing the webslinger at his best . Excellently written and drawn no wonder it is a favorite of many fans of marvel.

Actually, This was a brilliant way to add life to the series. Before Identnty Crisis, the Sipder-Man books were going downhill, and fast. This book shows Marvel's ability to give a title a quick boost (Identity Crisis sold very well on the shelves) And then return to a normal storyline afterwards, regaining their reading audience. And the Slingers weren't totally random either, each of the four represented a specific portion of Parker's personality, or Spider Man's powers. An excellent collection.

Many are right when they say that Marvel has gone down as of recently, but this superbly written and illustrated book shows what Marvel can really do. Some of Spider-Man's best writers and artists got together on this book and forever made an imprint in the Marvel universe.