soaring crane Posted December 23, 2014 Does not Mistress Crane grumble regarding the great pile of books by the side of the bed? Mistress Chang is always on at me to have a clear out. I also am something of a Jack London fan. Have you read The Sea-Wolf? She's got the Kindle, lol. I read Sea-Wolf years ago, yes :-) 1 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
manitou Posted December 23, 2014 I am on my fifth reading of 'Radix'. I have an old paperback copy in my truck along with a Kindle ebook. Any of his works are well worth reading. http://www.amazon.com/RADIX-A-Attanasio/dp/1604504595 Anything a Bum would read five times must be one of those that has something different for you every time you read it. I followed your link, Ralis, and I just ordered it used for one cent, lol. It sounds really powerful - although I don't usually go for the stuff that's set way ahead in the future. But this one sounds worth it - very worth it. 1 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
ralis Posted December 23, 2014 (edited) Anything a Bum would read five times must be one of those that has something different for you every time you read it. I followed your link, Ralis, and I just ordered it used for one cent, lol. It sounds really powerful - although I don't usually go for the stuff that's set way ahead in the future. But this one sounds worth it - very worth it. His site has all his books listed. http://www.aaattanasio.com/index.htm Quote by A.A. Attanasio from the front page of his site. The bedrock of the universe is the Uncertainty Principle, which guards a secret: reality. Heisenberg, Gödel, Wittgenstein demonstrate that Nature is unknowable. This is the empirical fact to which we wake each day. Not truth but story connects us to the core of events. Narrative defines our identities and drives our behavior. So, who is telling our story? Enclosed by the fitful dark of the unconscious – a night (a reactive history lacking self-awareness) fourteen billion years deep! – the ego eventually realizes someone is breathing for the ego, someone scripting dreams every night that command the ego’s conviction and full participation. Who is the I? Who wakes the transparent, original, formless psychic space we call consciousness – and who subsumes us in deep sleep? From fMRI studies of unconscious intent, we know that the Other is not a ‘what’ but a ‘who.’ Our meta-cognitive capacity to influence our personal narrative is a confrontation with this Other, who is I. All effective meaning comes from this encounter of the epiphenomenal ego and the phenomenal self. Waddya think? Edited December 23, 2014 by ralis 2 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
doc benway Posted December 23, 2014 My definition is well written, entertaining, and with something to say beyond plot points. Here's a few fiction books I liked: Catch-22 by Joseph Heller The Razor's Edge by Somerset Maugham The Name of the Rose by Umberto Echo The Yiddish Policeman's Union by Michael Chabon Ever read anything by Jose Saramago? Amazing fiction - especially Blindness. I wish I could read it in Portuguese... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
manitou Posted December 23, 2014 His site has all his books listed. http://www.aaattanasio.com/index.htm Quote by A.A. Attanasio from the front page of his site. Yes, that bedrock of the universe Uncertainty Principle sounds just like it's down my street and up my alley... 1 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
ralis Posted December 24, 2014 Went to see the 'Hunger Games Mockingjay' tonight and will be adding those books to my list. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Owledge Posted December 30, 2014 (edited) "The Book On Your Nightstand" by Reverend Self "The Role of Books In Contemporary Bed Lamp Elevation" by Reverend S. A. Gain Edited December 30, 2014 by Owledge 2 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
mysterie Posted December 30, 2014 'journey to ixtlan' - carlos castaneda 1 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
manitou Posted December 30, 2014 Mysterie - just about to do a re-read on that one myself! I'm going through the whole series again. Owledge - very wise choices! Have you tried "Under the Bleachers" by Seymour Butts? 2 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Owledge Posted December 30, 2014 The Hobbit (quick revisit before seeing the final film) Reading the books before seeing the movie - Why are you doing this to yourself? ^^ Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
silent thunder Posted December 30, 2014 Reading the books before seeing the movie - Why are you doing this to yourself? ^^ Yea, I've since decided against it. I'll enjoy the film more if I give it a miss. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Taomeow Posted January 9, 2015 After a few rotations on the side table: The War of Art, by Steven Pressfield Letters to Vera, by Vladimir Nabokov T'ai Chi according to the I Ching, by Stuart Alve Olson The Chen-style Taijiquan for Life Enhancement, by Chen Zhenglei Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Vanir Thunder Dojo Tan Posted January 9, 2015 Dune (mine)Secrets of the I Ching (Library book) Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
thelerner Posted January 16, 2015 From the online 'Humble Bundle' I bought a pdf of the graphic novel 'Saga, Book One'. Its very well done, harsh, scorched earth, sexy anti war novel. Its themes come to bare on discussions we're having on the bums now. Enemies, pawns really on two warring sides, come together and have a baby. Both soldiers who've abandon there posts and warlike philosophy they pledge love to each other, see the destruction of creed and violence and try to escape it. Despite there enlightenment and morals, to survive they have to get violent, increasingly so. Growing up and working in the sometimes mean streets of Chicago, I've learned 'Don't be so good, so altruistic that you make yourself a target.'. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Taomeow Posted January 23, 2015 A new addition: The End of Time: The Next Revolution in Physics, by Julian Barbour Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Spotless Posted January 23, 2015 (edited) I have quite a few books I downloaded to my iPad - stuff I particularly like to reread on a plane or in the middle of the night when waking my wife up with a reading night won't do. I have downloaded most of them for free from: The Project Gutenberg Thousands of free out of print books - including nearly every classic. I believe I have downloaded all of the Theosophical works free at that site and particularly enjoy the works of Annie Wood Besant, Charles W. Leadbeater, George William Russel, Mabel Colin, L. W. Rogers, Edward T. Bennett, Claude Fayette Bragdon. In fact the entire works of the Theosophical Society are perhaps the finest compilation of metaphysical collective teaching in all of modern Western culture. The quality has been astoundingly good and the accuracy I have verified so many times as to trust it perhaps more than any other large grouping of works. Obviously Helen Blavatsky should be in this group but her stuff was not free from The Project Gutenberg and I have now enough treasure on my iPad for the rest of my life - though I may add many more to come. I also have on my iPad the following: Rudolf Steiner (originally associated heavily with the Theosophical Society and then creating his own Anthroposophical Society) Plotinus, Plato and J Krishnamurti. On the nightstand: Experience and Philosophy by Franklin Merrell-Woff. (must have in your Library) story and a study in itself of Awakening - two of his books combined - extremely fine writer - also from Theosophical background. Various Qi Gong / Chi Kung works by Wong Kiew Kit - so far vey good! The Spiratual Legacy of Shaolin Temple by Andy James Another Qi Gong book by Shifu Yan Lei - (also Shaolin - my Master is Shaolin Grand Master and former head teacher) The Spark in the Machine by Daniel Keown And a holiday gift book - The Voice of Knowledge by Don Miguel Ruiz When Fear Falls Away by Jan Frazier - story of Awakening Tai Chi by James Drewe Booklets: An exercise for karmic insight by Rudolf Steiner A simplified course of Raja Yoga by Wallace Slater Regarding Mudras "Health at your Fingertips" by Dr. Darien Gala and another called "Ngondro Practice" from a Rigpa Buddhist Meditation Center. also "the path without steps of Siddartha" by Tom Gilmore. My wife made me put the other stacks on the shelves. Edited January 23, 2015 by Spotless 3 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Nikolai1 Posted January 23, 2015 Hi spotless -could you recommend a good representative book from the theosophists? Thanks Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Spotless Posted January 23, 2015 (edited) Hi spotless -could you recommend a good representative book from the theosophists? ThanksI have not found any that were not at least very good, though for quite a time I had only read Blavatsky and Leadbeater and if I had it to do over again I might have skipped Blavatsky for the other works. The Secret Doctrine is what most associate with the Theosophical Society but for the most part it is over-engineering - of little practicle value by comparison to the amount of detailed but highly unverifiable information (it is verifiable but lightyears from the entrance exams). (Blavatsky is excellent in any case). All of Leadbeater is interesting and verifiable and helpful - and where the rubber meets the road. This is also true of Annie Besant - she is great - very clear headed and disciplined in her wording but as ballsy as Blavatsky. Blavatsky was a drinking smoking piece of work - I can see why Gurdieff was so jealous! The following are good and I think free at The Project Gutenberg: Elementary Theosophy by L W Rogers would be a good start - free for certain and more than just elementary. An introduction to Yoga. By Annie Besant - free for certain - very good from time to time for helping one to keep on track. An outline of occult science. By Rudolf Steiner - he can come in handy. If you are well along - purchase Experience & Philosophy. By Franklin Merrill Wolff Actually you should have this in your library regardless. If you break through to Awakening or not it is remarkably fine and disciplined in how it is written and inclusive of the experience. It is also two books: One is a very fine accounting of the happening from the days weeks and months following. The second is two years later - a recounting of the same Awakening from the more seasoned perspective of several years. Most of the translations from Eastern works are so entirely far from the mark in describing larger events within practice and including culminating pinnacle events. So much time is devoted to the minutia that one does not get the greater picture - and the descriptions a just so far off as to make the student unable to have a clue as to what might have just happened. Edited January 24, 2015 by Spotless 2 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Nikolai1 Posted January 25, 2015 Thanks spotless - I didn't know Merrell-Wolff but I've Ben reading him and it's awesome. Very philosophical/ intellectual which is how my path has been. The books you must pay for but it seems they are worth it! 1 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Spotless Posted January 26, 2015 Thanks spotless - I didn't know Merrell-Wolff but I've Ben reading him and it's awesome. Very philosophical/ intellectual which is how my path has been. The books you must pay for but it seems they are worth it! "Very philosophical / intellectual" - my path as well. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Banjobum Posted January 26, 2015 (edited) This week I 'as bin mostly readin' Tai Chi Classics - Waysun Liao The Collected Songs of Cold Mountain Seven Taoist Masters - T. Eva Wong Opening the Energy Gates of the Body - Bruce Frantzis One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish - D. R. Tzeuss Edited January 26, 2015 by Banjobum Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
silent thunder Posted January 26, 2015 I just added The Web of Life by Fritjof Capra to my pile. I was looking for The Turning Point, which was the basis for the script to one of my favorite films of all time, Mindwalk, but they didn't have it. For my son, I found Tesla and the Taming of Electricity and Nikola Tesla: A Spark of Genius, he's got a biography report due next month. plus a big ass picture book of European Castles... Libraries for the win... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Dainin Posted February 12, 2015 This week's stack: Reality-Peter Kingsley What is Chi?-Max Gaofei Yan Dr. Fuhrman's Nutritarian Handbook-Joel Fuhrman The Japanese Art of Reiki-Brownen and Frans Stiene Liberation-Father Yod Seiki Jutsu-Bradford and Hilary Keeney Physicians of the Heart: A Sufi View of the 99 Names of Allah-Wali Ali Meyer, et al How to Eat, Move, and Be Healthy!-Paul Chek 1 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
willem20 Posted March 6, 2015 The brothers Karamazov by Dostojevski (600/900 now) Farewell to arms by hemingway Story by robert McKee Hitchhikers guide by Adams 1 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
dogson Posted March 12, 2015 the alchemical body - david gordon white sinister yogis - david gordon white at zero - joe vitale sugar blues - william dufty soundworks magazine - for those who have ears (audio engineering / pirate radio zine) bitcoin: the future of money - jose pageliery songwriters on songwriting - paul zollo Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
