Stephen Pinker- The Language Instinct

The Language Instinct: The New Science of Language and Mind

Penguin

Stephen Pinker
1994

"In the speech sound wave, one word runs into the next seamlessly; there are no little silences between spoken words the way there are white spaces between written words. We simply hallucinate word boundaries when we reach the end of a stretch of sound that matches some entry in our mental dictionary.”

I've had a somewhat spotty history with educational non-fiction books in the past; for some reason rather than do the decent, useful thing and absorb the potentially useful information like a pink sponge, my brain has a nasty habit of actively rebelling against things that have the bare-faced cheek to try and teach me anything, kind of like Homer Simpson running outside to chase a squirrel. Things like autobiographies are usually fine, and literature about pop-culture generally get a pass, but scientific fact is always at risk; for example, while I greatly enjoyed Richard Dawkins' fantastically argumentative The God Delusion, when I followed that up with his next book, the more science fact-based The Greatest Show on Earth, my attention struggled. The message? Pop-culture has destroyed my brain.

Nevertheless, linguistic psychologist Stephen Pinker's breakout (and highly regarded) publication captured my attention through its subject matter and promises of scientific revelation in the field of language. The premise of The Language Instinct is Pinker's highly developed take on a theory introduced by Noam Chompsky that the human capability for language exists innately, produced through evolutionary forces to exist as a genetic capability. I won't try to cover the rational or evidence that Pinker uses to argue his hypothesis, but his arguments are extensive, logical, written in an interesting fashion, and occasionally complicated enough for me to give up on trying to follow for the sake of assuming they're probably right.

It's a combination of the last two factors which were the key for me to proceed to the end of the book and emerge from it with a sense of satisfaction. Pinker's writing is generally very personable, sometimes funny, and clear without being condescending. He's like Dawkins in that respect. I can't say I massively enjoyed this book though, partially because Pinker sometimes does delve into the deep end of linguistics and semiotics, analyzing aspects of language in a very practical manner that cannot help but seem a little confusing and dull for anyone without a natural inclination towards such things. Despite my love of literature and wordplay that category includes me I'm afraid. While Pinker tries to include some amusing anecdotes, it seems that the well for such things is  a little shallow.

On the other hand, it seems churlish of me to criticism this book for not being entertaining enough, because that's not really the point; Stephen Pinker's task is to discuss some complicated science (of which he is clearly an expert) in a tone appealing enough for the layman to embrace without sacrificing the integrity of the subject. With that in mind I think he succeeded in creating a though-provoking and well-balanced book that isn't always as quite amusing as the reader might like but is certainly one that he or she can take a lot out of; including telling all of their friends that they've read it in order to sound clever at parties. 

Terry Pratchett's Discworld 05- Sourcery

I seem to be in danger of turning this into a fantasy fiction blog, which is kind of odd because I don't even like fantasy that much.

Sourcery

Corgi

Terry Pratchett
1988
Other Terry Pratchett Reviews- The Colour of Magic - The Light Fantastic - Equal Rites - Mort - Sourcery - Wyrd Sisters - Pyramids - Guards! Guards! - Eric - Moving Pictures - Reaper Man - Witches Abroad - Small Gods - Lords and Ladies - Men At Arms - Soul Music - Interesting Times - Maskerade - Feet of Clay - Hogfather - Raising Steam - A Blink of the Screen - Sky1 Adaptations- Dodger - The Long Earth (w Stephen Baxter)

"I meant," said Iplsore bitterly, "what is there in this world that makes living worthwhile?" Death thought about it. "CATS," he said eventually, "CATS ARE NICE."

After the morbid brilliance and series high of Mort, Terry Pratchett's satirical fantasy Discworld series returned to its adventure-orientated routes with Sourcery, which also marked the first return of Rincewind since the opening Colour of Magic/Light Fantastic two-part story. On the Discworld, wizards are the patriarchs of magic, controlling its use through a careful hierarchy at the Unseen University, while aiming to master the art by studying book after book and memorizing complex magical spells. Wizards are typically born as the eighth son of an eighth son, but are forbidden to have any children themselves. Sourcery gives us the reason why, through the emergence of the character Coin, and eighth son of an eighth son of an eighth son (or, as Pratchett puts it, 'a wizard squared').

Coin is a sourcerer, a kind of super-wizard who controls the flow and form of magic on a whim and who quickly takes control of the sycophantic wizard community of the city of Ankh-Morpork, declaring that wizards shall rule the whole Disc at the cost of a kind of magical nuclear war. It therefore becomes the task of Rincewind, the world's worst wizard, to stop the very best. Inadvertently gathering a troupe of strange associates, such as Conina the Barbarian (daughter of Cohen, wishes she was a hairdresser) and Nijel the Destroyer (trainee barbarian hero, has read half a book about it), Rincewind goes on another miniature tour of Discworld in his unwanted quest. If this plot sounds somewhat similar to CoM/LF, that's because it is.

Sourcery attempts to replicate the fun and action of the first two Discworld novels but the law of diminishing returns perhaps ensures that just isn't as interesting, as Pratchett's rehashing of his previous formula fails to capture the imagination as wildly as it did before. That's not to dismiss it completely, as  certain aspects of it are completely excellent, particularly the story of the young villain (or, as the plot leads, young victim) sorcerer Coin, and the wonderfully despicable and cowardly wizards who quickly fall under his reign. Rincewind's still as likable and cowardly as ever, of course, but his hangers on aren't particularly inspiring (and they fail to reappear in any future Discworld books) and much of their trekking about just seems like padding before the final confrontation. While I can't say I didn't enjoy this book, it is very derivative, certainly the least-interesting of all the Rincewind books because of its lack of individual characteristics.

George R. R. Martin- A Song of Ice and Fire 03- A Storm of Swords- Book One

A Song of Ice and Fire- A Storm of Swords: Book One- Steel and Snow

George R.R. Martin
1999

Game of Thrones - A Clash of Kings - A Storm of Swords: Book One: Steel and Snow -  A Storm of Swords: Book Two: Blood and Gold - A Feast for Crows

"The war has been waged since time began, and before it is done, all men must choose where they stand. On one side is R’hllor, the Lord of Light, the Heart of Fire, the God of Flame and Shadow. Against him stands the Great Other whose name may not be spoken, the Lord of Darkness, the Soul of Ice, the God of Night and Terror. Ours is not a choice between Baratheon and Lannister, between Greyjoy and Stark. It is death we choose, or life. Darkness, or light.”

While I'm really enjoying making my way through George R.R. Martin's epic fantasy series, I've realized that the impending difficulty in continuing to review each installment as I finish it is the fact that there's not a huge amount of new information to say that doesn't involve giving out massive spoilers. While I know that there's only about five people who read this blog, including my grandparents, they might one day decide to take on the odyssey of reading the thousands of pages that comprise George R. R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire series, and I can't in good conscious dare to reveal some of the twists and turns of this fantastic soap opera for men. Hey, there's one paragraph finished already, I'm doing well.

Anyway, Steel and Snow picks up where A Clash of Kings so dramatically left the reader, and, like its two predecessors, the narration bounces all around Martin's fictional world tracking the adventures of its many leading characters, almost all of whom swept up in the bloody wars over the crown. Two of my favourite characters stand outside of the land of Westeros, exploring the fringes of the world and biding their time before a probable and powerful return to the forefront. In the middle of the steel and bloodshed, magic seems to be creeping into the world through the seems, as certain characters show off unexpected talents, changing the shape of the landscape and all the while building and building further plot and intrigue. Characters grow and develop, some meet their end. There are twists and turns with varying levels of surprise, and like the soap opera I'm determined to describe it as, it keeps on building to the next episode. The only criticism I have (which isn't really a proper one) is that the ending to this book is somewhat subdued compared to those prior, but then that's only because this is merely part one of two; the UK publisher split A Storm of Swords into two. This might seem a bit of a rip-off to some, but considering this book is about 600-pages long as it is, it's not much of a rip-off.

In terms of quality, this book isn't really any different to A Clash of Kings (which was better than A Game of Thrones, in my opinion). The writing style is unsurprisingly the same, including the sometimes hokey dialogue, and occasional snippets of sex and uber-violence. There's quality of consistency, which is obviously key to building a devoted fan-base as Martin has. There's perhaps less action in this volume than I might have expected, but that didn't really affect my reading. And that's about it. There's no real point in recommending this book to anyone because you either didn't like or aren't interested in the first book, or you do enjoy the series and you're going to get around to it anyway. It's quite good.

George Orwell- A Clergyman's Daughter

I've been away from book blogging, instead lying in a hospital bed bored out of my mind. But enough of that, here's a new look at an old book;

A Clergyman's Daughter

Penguin Modern Classics

George Orwell

1935

Other Orwell Reviews- Burmese Days - A Clergyman's Daughter - Shooting an Elephant and Other Essays

"But after all there must be SOME meaning, SOME purpose in it all! The world cannot be an accident. Everything that happens must have a cause--ultimately, therefore, a purpose. Since you exist, God must have created you, and since He created you a conscious being, He must be conscious. The greater doesn't come out of the less. He created you, and He will kill you, for His own purpose. But that purpose is inscrutable. It is in the nature of things that you can never discover it, and perhaps even if you did discover it you would be averse to it. Your life and death, it may be, are a single note in the eternal orchestra that plays for His diversion. And suppose you don't like the tune?"

Like most fans of Orwell, I began my exploration of his work about five or six years ago with his two most famous pieces, and two of the most important and influential novels to ever have been written, in Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four. I was immediately blown away with how much mesmerizing enjoyment I got from reading them, and through the realization of just how much those books had effected so many other things I'd both read and seen in popular culture and its analysis. Regardless of what you might think of theories of Big Brother and our future, Orwell infiltrated how people look at modern day society. Hungry for more of his work I read through most of his earlier work, and it became clear that these books were leading up to his future legacy, talking about similar topics of society in similar ways, crafting and presenting his ideas through personal experience, carefully written non-fictional essays like Down and Out in Paris and London, and through the almost black-humoured attack on society of Keep the Aspidistra Flying. It took me a while to find a copy of A Clergyman's Daughter, only his second work of fiction (after Burmese Days, which I still haven't read), and I wasn't sure what to expect from this novel that Orwell himself had later disowned as something he wasn't at all happy with.

Orwell, looking homeless.

A Clergyman's Daughter, despite having a title that makes it sound like a bottom-rate slice of romantic fiction written for frustrated forty-year-old housewives, fits into the developing pantheon of Orwellian fiction with the same style and prominence of every other entrant in his bibliography. Although it's all fiction, Orwell uses his personal experience to address around three particular social topics that together combine into the same sort of overall (mostly damning) study of 1940's English society as do his other earlier, more realistically set novels. The story revolves around the adventures and misfortunes of Dorothy Hare, daughter of a Parish rector in a small countryside town, following a brief period of turbulence in her life in a manner reminiscent to me of an abridged Dickens book. The opening (and closing) chapters bring into focus one of Orwell's key themes; the helpless plight of women like Dorothy who have no real freedom or power of their own and seem destined to live a hard, uninteresting life stripped of potential for the sake of a form of personal sacrifice bordering on slavery. Dorothy's life changes quickly when a quick series of events leave her stranded and homeless on the streets of London, temporarily stripped of her memory.

This address of the issue of poverty and homelessness isn't without some power, and the reader is definitely made to feel for Dorothy, but it's just not as interesting as the non-fiction of Down and Out in Paris and London, and for me was the weakest segment of the book. Things become far more interesting when Orwell has his lead catch a break, getting a job as a teacher in a small private school, which exists as an opportunity for Orwell to direct a tirade of stinging criticism at the school system, ripping it apart with his trademark direct arguing and very personal narration. For me this was the most interesting portion of the book. I don't wish to spoil much more of the plot (because this book is so new and all), but things eventually come full circle and we're given an ambiguous ending.

This book isn't one of Orwell's best by any means, instead languishing in the lower reaches of the quality of his bibliography. But then this is George Orwell, and his worst literature is still going to be far more interesting and thought-provoking than 99% of anything else anybody writes, so that's not really a criticism per se. As a result, I wouldn't recommend this to anyone looking for their first taste of Orwell because clearly Nineteen Eighty-Four is essential, but this is certainly going to appeal to anyone who's enjoyed some of his other works.

Terry Pratchett's Discworld 04- Mort

Mort

Corgi

Terry Pratchett

1987

Other Terry Pratchett Reviews- The Colour of Magic - The Light Fantastic - Equal Rites - Mort - Sourcery - Wyrd Sisters - Pyramids - Guards! Guards! - Eric - Moving Pictures - Reaper Man - Witches Abroad - Small Gods - Lords and Ladies - Men At Arms - Soul Music - Interesting Times - Maskerade - Feet of Clay - Hogfather - Raising Steam - A Blink of the Screen - Sky1 Adaptations- Dodger - The Long Earth (w Stephen Baxter)

 

"'Sir, what is a curry?' asked Mort.
HAVE YOU EVER BITTEN A RED HOT ICE-CUBE
'No'
CURRY IS LIKE THAT"

With the fourth book in his fantasy-satire series, Terry Pratchett reached his then-creative zenith, taking his first concrete steps into the macabre with this creative and dark coming-of-age adventure story telling the tale of what happened when Death decided to hire an unsuspecting apprentice. Mort, our lead character, is thrown into the deep end of the work of the Grim Reaper, exploring the weirdness that is Death's home, meeting his family, and inevitably causing universe-endangering problems that I won't spoil here. While the themes of exploring the unfamiliar (and hastily running away in fear) from the previous three books still remain, Pratchett embraces his black, Gothic environment to great effect.

The cast of characters is inspired, from Mort, who's a relatively normal, inexperienced country lad who's in way over his head, Albert, grizzled man servant to Death, and the scythed one himself. Previously appearing in each previous Discworld book as the somewhat two-dimensional anthropomorphic personification of death, here Pratchett takes his first step on a character odyssey of massive ambition, creativity and philosophy, as Death starts to really experience the many faucets of humanity and tries to understand it. 

I love this book because it works so equally well on two different levels; on one, it's a dark tale about the life in the dark side, on the mythological edge of reality where any mistakes have apocalyptic reactions. On the other it's about the problems and fears that every youth faces when they get their first real job and, as Mort does here, conspires to royally mess it up as quickly as possible. The stakes are a little higher here, as Mort's disgust at the unfairness of who dies and who doesn't encourages him to try and buck the system (with predictably disastrous results) but it's extraordinary how a book that's literally about death is also so charmingly humane. From Equal Rites onwards many of Pratchett's stories are variations on the classic coming-of-age theme, and early explorations into the idea of narrative causality.

While the character of Death himself would be developed further and perhaps better later on in the series, this is a brilliant beginning and certainly the best of the four books so far, and I (biased fan I am) don't really have any criticism to level at the book whatsoever. A superb title, and one that would be a great choice as a first book to read for anyone looking to get in to the series.

Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave

Over the past couple of years I've very much been in to reading a selection of classic twentieth century American fiction, from the likes of Updike, Fitzgerald and Auster. As a result I haven't read much of anything older than that in a while, so this entry is a trip back in time to an earlier example of truly fascinating US literature...

Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave

Penguin Classics

Frederick Douglass

1845

 "We were all ranked together at the valuation. Men and women, old and young, married and single, were ranked with horses, sheep, and swine. There were horses and men, cattle and women, pigs and children, all holding the same rank in the scale of being, and were all subjected to the same narrow examination. Silvery-headed age and sprightly youth, maids and matrons, had to undergo the same indelicate inspection. At this moment, I saw more clearly than ever the brutalizing effects of slavery upon both slave and slaveholder."

I first came across this book about five years ago during my first year of University, during an American Literature study module. My experience consisted of a single chapter (placed in one of those over sized anthology texbooks that cost so much and are used so little), I thought it was fantastically interesting, then promptly forgot about it. Fast-forward to the present day and I found a copy of the full text sitting on the shelf at the charity bookshop in town that I regularly help finance, picking it up to not only finish what I briefly started, but because it seemed like an excellent choice for a book that could make me look intelligent and cultured to anyone who'd spy me reading it, and isn't that what really matters?

In all seriousness though, Narrative is a fascinating book that is as enjoyable as it is an important piece of history. Frederick Douglass was born into slavery, and for twenty years was owned, used and abused in the state of Maryland, until he finally decided upon the time and method to escape and travel north to freedom. Despite living in captivity, an environment where any type of education for slaves was discouraged with suspicion by their owners, Douglass taught himself to read and write, and so seven years after his successful escape he wrote the story of his life, and in essence much of it is story of the lives of thousands of his kin.

Though Narrative is a very short book (my Penguin Classics version clocks in at 158 pages, including a 30-page introduction), Douglass is able to capture the essence of his storied life with a clearness of prose and drama that is astonishingly good, considering Douglass' limited self-education. Douglass doesn't describe the minutia of his life, instead bringing up specific incidents which helped shape his personality and strengthen his resolve over the years. He also doesn't write much about the personalities of his fellow slaves, but Douglass does tell of the few different owners he had, most of whom are larger-than-life, deathly cruel figures of hate. It's compelling reading, made only more so when considering its place in history. I recommend this book to anyone, such is its power, clearness and historical importance.