Book Club

[paradox]

John Locke - An Essay Concerning Human Understanding

[Babaluma]

Austin Osman Spare - Two Grimoires
Philip K Dick - The Father Thing
George R. R, Martinn - A Storm Of Swords Part 1

[Chrrrles]

David Graeber - Debt: The First 5000 Years
Christopher Ryan & Cacilda Jetha - Sex At Dawn
Nathan Yau - Visualize This!
Steve Aylett - Slaughtermatic
Jack Womack - Ambient

[bluegreengold]

The Tale of Genji (1st novel written on earth with historical evidence)

[himog]

Leonard Susskind - The Cosmic Landscape.
Book about string theory etc. Highly recommended if you're into that kinda thing.

[bluegreengold]

The Conspiracy Of Art ~ Baudrillard
The Ticket that Exploded ~ Burroughs

[Martin Dust]

Reading God Is Not Great again

[cdw]

currently reading

The Art of Not Being Governed
An Anarchist History of Upland Southeast Asia - James C. Scott

For two thousand years the disparate groups that now reside in Zomia (a mountainous region the size of Europe that consists of portions of seven Asian countries) have fled the projects of the organized state societies that surround them—slavery, conscription, taxes, corvée labor, epidemics, and warfare. This book, essentially an “anarchist history,” is the first-ever examination of the huge literature on state-making whose author evaluates why people would deliberately and reactively remain stateless. Among the strategies employed by the people of Zomia to remain stateless are physical dispersion in rugged terrain; agricultural practices that enhance mobility; pliable ethnic identities; devotion to prophetic, millenarian leaders; and maintenance of a largely oral culture that allows them to reinvent their histories and genealogies as they move between and around states.

http://yalepress.yale.edu/book.asp?isbn=9780300152289

and

The Road to Serfdom - Friedrich August Hayek

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Road_to_Serfdom

[Babaluma]

Just read, reading now, on the pile for soon, or already ordered:

Brian Barritt - The Road Of Excess (Amazing autobiography from a true pioneer!)
Brian Barritt - The Nabob Of Bombasta (Psychedelic drug comedy porn)
Frater Shiva - Coruscatio: The Magical Cactus Voice (Deals with the use of Mescaline in occult ritual)
Frater Shiva - Inside Solar Lodge, Behind The Veil (Deals with the history of the Solar Lodge in the US in the 60's and 70's and their use of LSD in occult ritual)
Kenneth Grant - The Magical Revival (for the second time, reading all three trilogies in order for the first time)
Daniel Schulke - Ars Philtron (Deals with the use of sacred plants in occult ritual)
Gavin Semple - Zos Kia (Introductory essay to the art and magick of Austin Osman Spare)
Robert Ansell (Ed.) - The Exhibition Catalogues Of Austin Osman Spare
Austin Osman Spare - Visionary Memento (Catalogue of the Cuming Museum exhibiton from a couple of years back)

[bluegreengold]

Reading God Is Not Great again

If only your minds are truly accepted by God,
I shall sweep away any dust whatever.

Ofudesaki page 353 (XIII : 23)

[Martin Dust]

Even Satan rejected my mind

[penfolder]

next up for me, 'Plato - Timaeus & Critias'

[Bundy]

The Conspiracy Of Art ~ Baudrillard

How are you getting on with The Conspiracy Of Art? Would like to know what you think, it's on my reading list. I'm in the middle of Impossible Exchange by Baudrillard and I am finding him a bit infuriating at times...

[bluegreengold]

"The Conspiracy of Art" was a pretty easy read. It might help to have real simulacra and simulation, but stands well on its own.

I went to a Performance in Chelsea during the NYC Armory week a while back, and was kinda getting fed up with the bad vibes, and my companion was like -- what's cheezing you. We went across the street to a bookstore, and browsing I saw the that title. I took a quick peruse, and told my friend, well, this good, saves me having to write it.

Went to a used bookstore later and found it and the burroughs on discount. The ticket that exploded made a perfect pairing to the Conspiracy of Art really. As Burroughs projected a future run by artists rather than the ad men. Yet 'be careful what you wish for' as the artists just adopted the ad ment tality. (lots of talk about Dust in the ticket too ;-p).

Anyhow it's probably as good a sum up of Baudrilliard's thought and much of the contempory art scene in a pretty easy to digest package. He doesn't offer any alternatives really, but that's not his point. He does make his position as a ethical humanist clear enough.

[Bundy]

He doesn't offer any alternatives really, but that's not his point.

I think that's what I find infuriating about him....

He does make his position as a ethical humanist clear enough.

He comes across more of a solipsistic nihilist to me!

I've not read The Ticket that Exploded but if I see a copy I will pick it up.

[Chrrrles]

currently reading

The Art of Not Being Governed
An Anarchist History of Upland Southeast Asia - James C. Scott

Thanks for this suggestion - I am going to read this book.

[kendo]

currently reading

The Art of Not Being Governed
An Anarchist History of Upland Southeast Asia - James C. Scott

Thanks for this suggestion - I am going to read this book.

Same. Thanks for the tip, Graham.
Been reading a lot of fiction, fiction and fiction, myself. Partly the need to just read *stories*,
and partly the need to avoid the often excessive verbiage of science, intellectualism and philosophy.

[himog]

Just started 'Rat Scabies and the Holy Grail' by Christopher Dawes (AKA Push) - enjoying it so far.

[bluegreengold]

"The Human Use of Human Beings" by Norbert Weiner (1953)
&
"You Are Not a Gadget" by Jaron Lanier (2010)

If you're interested in how automation, computers, and the current state of internet design has influenced the culture and economies of the developed world, these two books are essential reading, and wise warnings for the future.

Both are fascinating reading by innovative leaders of the cybernetic revolutions, one from the original vanguard and one contemporary.

[paradox]

Holiday reads of 'From Hell' and 'Watchmen' skipped through in a week, first reading. Good dense information.

[Martin Dust]

Holiday reads of 'From Hell' and 'Watchmen' skipped through in a week, first reading. Good dense information.

If you layout all the panels from Watchmen it's perfectly symmetrical.

[penfolder]

The Gaol, the story of Newgate, London's most notorious prison.

[penfolder]

'The Picture of Dorian Grey'
Oscar Wilde