Reading:
Besides still being in the middle of Crime and Punishment, I'm also reading a set of essays by Jonathan Franzen collected as How to be Alone. According to the book jacket they deal with "the erosion of civic life and private dignity and the hidden persistence of loneliness in postmodern, imperial America" but as you could guess it's a little more complicated than that.
They really are very good so far. One in particular discusses the fact that we have more privacy in our day to day lives that ever before - it really puts the claims of privacy alarmists to shame. I'd like to outline the various points raised, but I wouldn't do it justice.
There was one particular essay that made references to the gulf war that were rather enlightening looking back from a post 12/9 perspective. Probably the only thing I find hard to deal with is his persistent reference to America as his sole setting and audience, but that's to be expected so it's not worth bitching about.
Anyway, definitely worth checking out.
They really are very good so far. One in particular discusses the fact that we have more privacy in our day to day lives that ever before - it really puts the claims of privacy alarmists to shame. I'd like to outline the various points raised, but I wouldn't do it justice.
There was one particular essay that made references to the gulf war that were rather enlightening looking back from a post 12/9 perspective. Probably the only thing I find hard to deal with is his persistent reference to America as his sole setting and audience, but that's to be expected so it's not worth bitching about.
Anyway, definitely worth checking out.