Some things I’ve read over the last few months I thought worth sharing.
The Maniac: Benjamin Labatut. A novel about John von Neumann and his impact on our world. From his childhood as prodigy and genius and into his work as a physicist and mathematician. Inventor of game theory, cellular automata and the first programmable computer and early pioneer of AI. He sounds horrendous to be with. Fiercely intelligent, intolerant and a workaholic. The novel also roots the creation of computing at the heart of warfare and draws out the implications of that for us and society.
The novel takes an interesting turn in its final third long after Neumann’s death, covering the showdown between the South Korean Go Master Lee Sedol and the AI program AlphaGo (which is largely based upon JvN’s original theories). Humans wrestling with the implications of a machine ‘intelligence’. It’s very good. Entertaining and thought provoking.
The Stirrings: Catherine Walker.A fantastic memoir about growing up in Sheffield in the late 70’s, 80’s and 90’s. Walker is a superb writer and for all of us who live(d) in Sheffield, especially in the 80’s and 90’s it’s a rich and accurate description of the place and times. The backdrop though is Peter Sutcliffe and the violence of men. It’s really quite brilliant, enjoyable and disturbing at times. Highly recommended.
High Weirdness: Erik Davies.An edited-for-readability version of Davies’ PhD thesis on the “High Weirdness” of the 1970’s expressed through the lives of Terence McKenna, Robert Anton Wilson and Philip K Dick. I was right into RaW in my teens and early twenties of course so I enjoyed this one a lot. Rather than try to prove or disprove anything, Davies adopts a phenomenological stance toward the experiences of these men (he does acknowledge it is men and has a great chapter on why that might be and the privilege extended to them and himself as the writer). It’s pretty mad and both entertaining and serious at the same time.
Sparks of Bright Matter: Leeanne O’Donnell A new novel set in the 1700’s around the time of the Jacobite rebellion centered around a budding alchemist Peter Woulffe who has his copy of the Mutus Liber (a real alchemical text) nicked before he can deliver it to Baron (Emmanuel) Swedenborg. On one level it can be read as a historical romp adventure yarn. Another level as a critique of social class and the mores of the time. The sequences in Ireland are brilliant and rich. Finally on another level, the story and characters themselves play out the alchemical transformation portrayed in the Mutus Liber itself (I’ve got one at home). I enjoyed it and suspect it’d make a good holiday read. I’ve never read Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell but “Sparks” has been compared favourably, so if you liked that I suspect you’ll like this one.
American Cosmic (UFOs Religon and Technology) : Diane Pasulka. Pasulka is a professor of religous studies whose research and previous books were about Catholicism and purgatory. Someone suggested she should take a look at the UFO/UAP phemomenon which she did and has written this brilliant book. A reviewer at Vox described the book as not "so much about the truth of UFOs or aliens as it is about what the appeal of belief in those things says about our culture and the shifting roles of religion and technology in it. On the surface, it's a book about the popularity of belief in aliens, but it's really a deep look at how myths and religions are created in the first place and how human beings deal with unexplainable experiences."
I really enjoyed it and then went on to read…
Unidentified Hyper Object: James D Madden.Madden is Professor of Philosophy at Benedictine College in Atchison, Kansas. His research has included phenomenology, philosophy of mind, analytic philosophy, and cognitive science. After reading Pasulka’s book, Madden decided to risk sticking his head above the parapet of the academy and bravely takes a look at the UAP phenomenon from a philosophical perspective. I loved it of course, especially the sections on Graham Harman’s object oriented ontology and Timothy Morton’s related development of the notion of a hyperobject. The proposal here is that “the UFO/UAP is not the many, disparate things that barely show up in our Umwelt, but one gigantic thing, a hyperobject, existing on a scale and complexity that defies our understanding”. It’s pretty mindbending, but serious and grounded in solid theoretical discipline.
And then I went on to read…
Notes on Complexity, A Scientific Theory of Connection, Consciousness, and Being: Neil ThieseA professor at New York University’s Grossman School of Medicine, pathologist and stem cell biologist, Thiese has written this quite brilliant work on complexity and its implications for us as human beings. Many of the boundaries we take for granted are not just scientifically artificial but intellectually, spiritually and psychologically suffocating (there’s a parallel here with Iain McGilchrist’s hemispheric studies and theories). It’s a theory that attempts to provide rigorous scientific underpinnings to timeless questions of consciousness, of being, self and our place in the world and the universe. Very good.
How we break. Navigating the wear and tear of living: Vincent Deary.The sequel to his quite brilliant “How We Are” from 2014 that I must have reviewed several pages back on this thread. Deary is a psychologist who works in the fatigue clinic in Durham or Northumberland. Here’s a good review in the Grauniad
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2024/feb/01/how-we-break-by-vincent-deary-review-look-after-yourself . Be gentle with yourself and others.
Derek Jarman: Pharmacopoeia (A Dungeness Notebook).A beautiful collection of Jarman’s journal entries, poems and prose from his time at prospect cottage on the shingle isle of Dungeness. He was gardening, planting and tending to the cottage he built and lived out the remainder of his life after the HIV diagnosis.
“I waited a lifetime to build my garden,
I built my garden with the colours of healing,
On the sepia shingle at Dungeness.
I planted a rose and then an elder,
Lavender, sage, and Crambe maritima,
Lovage, parsley, santolina,
Hore hound, fennel, mint and rue.
Here was a garden to soothe the mind,
A garden of circles and wooden henges,
Circles of stone, and sea defences.”
Lovely stuff.
Frontičres, the food of France’s borderlands. Alex Jackson.Have we had a recipe book on this thread before? I’m a keen cook so like to read these things as well as cook the dishes. Jackson is the chef at Noble Rot and this book contains recipes and history from the edge lands of France. The South coast with its North African influence (my partner W is French with Morrocan parents - she’s a Berber), the Southwest and Spanish plus Basque influences, the Alps and Alsace. Mouthwatering and full of interesting history, people and places.
Right now I’m halfway through
Hellhound on his trail by Hampton Sides. A non-fiction account of how Martin Luther King and James Earl Ray (his assassin) came to be in the same place in Memphis and what happened afterwards. It reads like a taught thriller and is really worthwhile, not just on the people but the atmosphere and politics of the time.
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