Mary Beard: humour in ancient Rome was a matter of life and death

So, Slate Magazine is using the publication of this as an e-book as an excuse to promote/write about it.

Good for them. One of my favorite books of all time. I love books that make you think. This one definitely does. If you haven't read it, you should.

The Sixth Extinction - An Unnatural History

David Bowie recently put together a list of his 100 favorite books, listed chronologically from most recent to oldest. It's a pretty interesting list, and here's the article about it. 
 

• The Age of American Unreason, Susan Jacoby, 2008
• The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, Junot Diaz, 2007
• The Coast of Utopia (trilogy), Tom Stoppard, 2007
• Teenage: The Creation of Youth 1875-1945, Jon Savage, 2007
• Fingersmith, Sarah Waters, 2002
• The Trial of Henry Kissinger, Christopher Hitchens, 2001
• Mr. Wilson’s Cabinet of Wonder, Lawrence Weschler, 1997
• A People’s Tragedy: The Russian Revolution 1890-1924, Orlando Figes, 1997
• The Insult, Rupert Thomson, 1996
• Wonder Boys, Michael Chabon, 1995
• The Bird Artist, Howard Norman, 1994
• Kafka Was The Rage: A Greenwich Village Memoir, Anatole Broyard, 1993
• Beyond the Brillo Box: The Visual Arts in Post-Historical Perspective, Arthur C. Danto, 1992
• Sexual Personae: Art and Decadence from Nefertiti to Emily Dickinson, Camille Paglia, 1990
• David Bomberg, Richard Cork, 1988
• Sweet Soul Music: Rhythm and Blues and the Southern Dream of Freedom, Peter Guralnick, 1986
• The Songlines, Bruce Chatwin, 1986
• Hawksmoor, Peter Ackroyd, 1985
• Nowhere To Run: The Story of Soul Music, Gerri Hirshey, 1984
• Nights at the Circus, Angela Carter, 1984
• Money, Martin Amis, 1984
• White Noise, Don DeLillo, 1984
• Flaubert’s Parrot, Julian Barnes, 1984
• The Life and Times of Little Richard, Charles White, 1984
• A People’s History of the United States, Howard Zinn, 1980
• A Confederacy of Dunces, John Kennedy Toole, 1980
• Interviews with Francis Bacon, David Sylvester, 1980
• Darkness at Noon, Arthur Koestler, 1980
• Earthly Powers, Anthony Burgess, 1980
• Raw (a “graphix magazine”) 1980–91
• Viz (magazine) 1979-
• The Gnostic Gospels, Elaine Pagels, 1979
• Metropolitan Life, Fran Lebowitz, 1978
• In Between the Sheets, Ian McEwan, 1978
• Writers at Work: The Paris Review Interviews, ed. Malcolm Cowley, 1977
• The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind, Julian Jaynes, 1976
• Tales of Beatnik Glory, Ed Saunders, 1975
• Mystery Train, Greil Marcus, 1975
• Selected Poems, Frank O’Hara, 1974
• Before the Deluge: A Portrait of Berlin in the 1920s, Otto Friedrich, 1972
• In Bluebeard’s Castle : Some Notes Towards the Re-definition of Culture, George Steiner, 1971
• Octobriana and the Russian Underground, Peter Sadecky, 1971
• The Sound of the City: The Rise of Rock and Roll, Charlie Gillete, 1970
• The Quest For Christa T, Christa Wolf, 1968
• Awopbopaloobop Alopbamboom: The Golden Age of Rock, Nik Cohn, 1968
• The Master and Margarita, Mikhail Bulgakov, 1967
• Journey into the Whirlwind, Eugenia Ginzburg, 1967
• Last Exit to Brooklyn, Hubert Selby Jr., 1966
• In Cold Blood, Truman Capote, 1965
• City of Night, John Rechy, 1965
• Herzog, Saul Bellow, 1964
• Puckoon, Spike Milligan, 1963
• The American Way of Death, Jessica Mitford, 1963
• The Sailor Who Fell From Grace With The Sea, Yukio Mishima, 1963
• The Fire Next Time, James Baldwin, 1963
• A Clockwork Orange, Anthony Burgess, 1962
• Inside the Whale and Other Essays, George Orwell, 1962
• The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, Muriel Spark, 1961
• Private Eye (magazine) 1961 –
• On Having No Head: Zen and the Rediscovery of the Obvious, Douglas Harding, 1961
• Silence: Lectures and Writing, John Cage, 1961
• Strange People, Frank Edwards, 1961
• The Divided Self, R.D. Laing, 1960
• All the Emperor’s Horses, David Kidd,1960
• Billy Liar, Keith Waterhouse, 1959
• The Leopard, Giuseppe Di Lampedusa, 1958
• On the Road, Jack Kerouac, 1957
• The Hidden Persuaders, Vance Packard, 1957
• Room at the Top, John Braine, 1957
• A Grave for a Dolphin, Alberto Denti di Pirajno, 1956
• The Outsider, Colin Wilson, 1956
• Lolita, Vladimir Nabokov, 1955
• Nineteen Eighty-Four, George Orwell, 1949
• The Street, Ann Petry, 1946
• Black Boy, Richard Wright, 1945
• The Portable Dorothy Parker, Dorothy Parker, 1944
• The Outsider, Albert Camus, 1942
• The Day of the Locust, Nathanael West, 1939
• The Beano, (comic) 1938 –
• The Road to Wigan Pier, George Orwell, 1937
• Mr. Norris Changes Trains, Christopher Isherwood, 1935
• English Journey, J.B. Priestley, 1934
• Infants of the Spring, Wallace Thurman, 1932
• The Bridge, Hart Crane, 1930
• Vile Bodies, Evelyn Waugh, 1930
• As I lay Dying, William Faulkner, 1930
• The 42nd Parallel, John Dos Passos, 1930
• Berlin Alexanderplatz, Alfred Döblin, 1929
• Passing, Nella Larsen, 1929
• Lady Chatterley’s Lover, D.H. Lawrence, 1928
• The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald, 1925
• The Waste Land, T.S. Eliot, 1922
• BLAST, ed. Wyndham Lewis, 1914–15
• McTeague, Frank Norris, 1899
• Transcendental Magic, Its Doctrine and Ritual, Eliphas Lévi, 1896
• Les Chants de Maldoror, Lautréamont, 1869
• Madame Bovary, Gustave Flaubert, 1856
• Zanoni, Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1842
• Inferno, from the Divine Comedy, Dante Alighieri, about 1308–21
• The Iliad, Homer, about 800 B.C.

ScottFromWyoming wrote:


Sadly, this is very true.

I am loathe to admit that I haven't read a book in ages.
I got into reading only non-fiction for a long time.

And then stopped entirely....

However, I actually bought a book early this week, a work of fiction, by a South African writer....now to read it....

Lynda Barry: The 20 stages of reading

Two recently read books:

Pure by Julianna Baggott - If you like the description, you'll like the book.  If you don't, you won't.  It is YA and not nearly as deep (philosophically, politically, culturally) as I would like.  But if you are into dystopian futures you'll enjoy.  And if you aren't, there really isn't anything else in the book.  I mean, you know how there are some books that transcend genre?  This one doesn't.  But for what it is, it is good.  Totally my kind of book and I will be sending it off to one of my favorite people for Spring Break reading.

A Discovery of Witches - This book I super-duper enjoyed.  It is written by a historian and it shows.  The plot?  Yawn.  But all the details are fantastic.  Her descriptions of Oxford will have you seeing the buildings, her descriptions of rowing will make you feel like you are on the water, and wine - oh my! what she does to wine.  However, you never get bogged down in the details.  At least I didn't.  She is no Tom Clancy, thankfully.  The book falls under the very trendy "paranormal romance" banner but I would say that it transcends the genre and I will be gifting it to those who might not normally read books of that genre.
  

 winter wrote: 
I'll second that for The Magus, as MsLilly well knows.
 
Fowles also wrote The French Lieutenants Woman. Haven't read that yet, or even seen the movie, to my shame.

 ScottN wrote: 



I loved “Shadow of the Wind" and "The Angel's Game".

Lily, to answer your question: haven't read "The Magus" yet. It's on the list.

 lily34 wrote:Lily, Have you read Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafim?  I highly recommend it to all.  I loved The Magus too, btw.

 romeotuma wrote: 
In a way it made me feel better

 winter wrote: 
i need to check this out.

have you read The Magus, bri? because it is soooooo up your alley. my all-time favourite book. close seconds are The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera and The Secret History by Donna Tartt. 

 romeotuma wrote: 
I lived with one, remember? I did read this too.

"The Chronicles of Amber" by Roger Zelazny. Classic fantasy/adventure. 10 books or one very big book. Just a great story I've read twice.

Well, the long-awaited A Dance with Dragons is out now. I've been waiting for it since 2005, and now that it's in the stores I can't afford it because of that pesky "no job" thing.

On the plus side, I have a hold on it at the library. So once the 89 people ahead of me on the list are done with it, I get my chance!  

A dear friend of mine, and a wonderful writer, has put out his latest book, In the Fall They Come Back for Kindle and other devices. It's only $8.99. I'm going to get it and use the option to view it on my PC, since I don't have a Kindle. I hope some of you will consider buying his book, too.

For anyone that may be interested Diane Rehm is having an hour long readers roundtable on The Girl With the Dragon Tatoo, tomorrow (Wed 7/21). 

You can listen via your local NPR station if they carry it (check for times) or by going HERE and listening to the live stream which will be at 11:00 AM EST tomorrow, 7/21.

I listen to her show almost everyday and it is very insightful. I always enjoy her occasional Reader Roundtables and this should be a good one.

 Manbird wrote: 
An excellent book investigating the structure of DNA as revealed through Ayahuasca experiences.