Axel's Interesting Reading

Interesting Reading?

Here is an excerpt of a list of books/papers that I find very interesting. I decided to insert dividers between "versions" of this list, to make it easier to find new stuff. If you think you have any that fit vaguely into what I seem to be interested in, (or if you want notification when new versions come out) please drop me a note...

November 97
Accordion Crimes
E.Annie Proulx
I like how she describes various immigrant groups in the US in the early days.

Die Zeitstruktur in narrativen Texten
Patricia Hallstein
belleville ISBN 3-923646-80-1
If you can read German and are a computer science person, read this.
(Otherwise bug her to translate into English: patricia at 2far.com)
This was not the intention of the author, but I think the notion of
time in computer science has some catching up to do, and
what a better place to start than with its usage in narrative texts.

September 97
The Shipping News
E.Annie Proulx
Read while travelling through Nova Scotia. Makes you wanna go north.

March 96
Smilla's Sense of Snow
Peter Hoeg
Wonderful winter reading.
Take a walk, see some ice on the Hudson,
take a flight across the Atlantic and see some icebergs...

Der Plan von der Abschaffung der Dunkelheit
Borderliners (in the english translation)
Peter Hoeg
At times disturbing, but such wonderful insights about time.
Thanks Patricia for pointing me to this book.

The Music of Chance
Paul Auster
I like this one better than City of Class...

September 95
Paul Feyerabend, Briefe an einen Freund
Herausgeber Hans Peter Duerr, edition suhrkamp
"Alles was man tun kann ist Märchen erzählen und sich und andere so vorübergehend unterhalten. Manchmal glaubt man die Märchen für einen Tag oder zwei Tage, wie ein Schauspieler sich in seiner Rolle vergißt, aber nie sosehr, daß man nun glaubt die "Wirklichkeit" gefunden zu haben."

Lila
Robert Pirsig
My recent vacation reading. Very interesting!!!

Architectural Study Drawings
Daniel M. Herbert
So, how come he is not referring to Schön? Good book
even though I don't like some of the cog-psych undertones.
Thanks Ellen for pointing this out!

The Web that has no Weaver
Understanding Chinese Medicine
Ted.J.Kaptchuk
Exploring two alternate views on "reality"
I read this long time ago, should be in June list

My Journey to Lhasa
Alexandra David-Neel
Wonderful travel story
I read this long time ago, should be in June list

June 95
Killing Time
The Autobiography of Paul Feyerabend
This got me totally hooked for almost 24 hours straight...

Muddle Earth, Stand on Zanzibar, The Shockwave Rider
John Brunner
Great SciFi, addiction category

Ficciones
Jorge Luis Borges
Confusing stuff

The Act of Creation
Arthur Koestler
Where does it come from, that thought, that idea...

Visual Thinking
Rudolf Arnheim

Love in the Time of Cholera, 100 Years of Solitude
Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Addiction category

The Monkeywrench Gang
Edward Abbey
Less radical these days...

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance
Robert Pirsig
Just started to re-read after n-years. Touch.

The Algorithmic Beauty of Plants
P.Prusinkiewicz, A.Lindenmayer
Unbelievable and beautiful

Byte Magazine, Special Issue Smalltalk
August 1982
One of the things that got me where I am today...

The Reflective Practitioner
Donald Schön
Out there, fighting the rigid guys and gals...

I'll think about more, this is it for now...