Pompeii

Pompeii: A Novel
© 2003 , Robert Harris
274 pages

In May 2007 I read Fatherland, an mystery book set in an alternate history setting in which Nazi Germany prevailed in World War 2 and the S.S. Holocaust is largely unknown. Last week I read Imperium: A Novel of Ancient Rome, by the same author, and commented that I would not expect two books in such different settings to be from the same author. I enjoyed Imperium tremendously, though, and this week continued with Pompeii. Pompeii, you may know, was a city depopulated, partially destroyed, and partially preserved by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius. I am not giving anything away here: it is fairly common knowledge, and the book itself has an erupting volcano on the cover.

The book is set four days before the eruption, in the general region surrounding Pomepii. The book holds a map in the beginning that shows the ancient towns that dotted the countryside, along with old roads and -- more related to the plot -- the old aqueduct. The book is told in the third person and is chiefly concerned with Marcus Attilus, the new aquarius of the region -- replacing the old aquarius, who stopped believing in the zodiac. An aquarius is someone who is concerned with the Aqueduct, and Attilus is very concerned with his. His family have worked with the aqueducts for at least a century, and the duct to which he has been assigned has stopped running -- and the man whose job he now holds has vanished. Although Attilus is the central character of the story, Harris also takes time to depict a local businessman and Pliny the Elder, among other characters.

For most of the book, there are several dramas unfolding. Attilius is anxious to find out why the water flow has been broken, but he can't resist poking around and trying to find out where the former aquarious has vanished to. His questions draw the ire of a local businessman, who is an ex-slave and apparently the progenitor of John Gotti. Much of the action takes place in Pompeii, and Harris paints a detailed picture of it, rendering a breathing city. What is eerie is that while I read about the half-finished baths and the graffiti on the walls, I know in the back of my head that these details have been preserved by the lava. All of the characters know that something is going to happen: they can smell sulfur, hear the rumbles of the Earth.

Although a friend of mine who enjoys Harris as much as I prefers Imperium over this, I am not so sure. While set in the same general time period as Imperium and being about more anonymous characters, it has an interesting quality all of its own. It read very well until after the actual eruption: it is more difficult to render the devastating eruption of a volcano than it is what passed before. I can't really picture what it was like in my head. I enjoyed the book immensely. Harris has earned my devotion, and I will read the other two books he has published.

To end, a picture from Civilization III that I took many months ago. I titled it "Tempting Fate".



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Evolution for Everyone

Evolution for Everyone: How Darwin's Theory Can Change the Way We Think About Our Lives
© 2007 David Sloan Wilson
390 pages

It's more difficult to look for science books on an online catalouge than any other, partially because I can't access the book to see how readable it is. Consequently I don't order many online and those I do tend to fall into the same category. As it happens, books on evolution are easy to come by. The author -- who, as it turns out is not related to E.O. Wilson -- begins the book by stating three things: one, science and religion are not necessarily foes; two, that the principles of evolution are actually easy to understand; and three, that those principles can be used to understand life in far broader ways than just biology.

I agree with the author that evolutionary principles are easy to understand: I am wholly self-taught in that field, gaining my literacy by reading library books. He does a good job of explaining them, and then suceeds (I think) in justifying his assertion that evolutionary principles can be applied on a broader context. The rest of the book, save the conclusion, uses evolutionary princples to address a number of issues: just a few are beauty, cooperation, ecology, religion, and egalitarianism. One of the examples he used that sticks in my mind is that of morning sickness. While we think of morning sickness as an abberant state that should be "cured", Wilson begins with evolution: if morning sickness can exist, there must be a reason why susceptibily to it is part of the human genome. He then writes on an exploration of the subject and reveals that "morning sickness" is the body rejecting foods with elements that adult bodies can tolerate but that could kill babies. He then establishes a correlation between mothers who had morning sickness and the health of their babies and ends by pointing out that miscarriages rise when anti-morning-sickness pills are consumed in a population.

The book is very readable, quite informative, and interesting.

Desire of the Everlasting Hills

Desire of the Everlasting Hills: The World Before and After Jesus
© 1999 Thomas Cahill

I've never expected to read the words "his silly circumcised penis swelling for all to see" in connected with Jesus Christ, but I have now, after reading Desire of the Everlasting Hills: the World Before and After Jesus. Cahill is one of those authors who can manage to intrigue me, somewhat annoy me, and leave me thinking -- did he really just say that? I had to read about Jesus' silly circumcised penis swelling a few times before accepting that yes, Cahill was pondering and writing on the penis of his god -- and calling it silly, yet.

Cahill begins his conversation with the reader at the twilight of the "Axiol Age", his term for that period that witnessed the flowering of philosophical, intellectual, and religious thought that gave us Buddha, Confucius, Plato, and their kin. Our story is set a Judea that has become partially Hellenized by Alexander the Great -- who Cahill spends time on -- and which is now a Roman province. He tells us of the rise of the Maccabees, who I had heard of but knew nothing about. According to Cahill, a man named Judeas Maccabee organized an insurrection against their Selucid rulers when said rulers attempted to refile the temple in Jerusalem. Judeas triumphed and his family became the rulers of the area, albeit ruling under the Roman thumb. Herod, Cahill tells us, is the last of that line -- meaning Herod is actually Jewish.

Since Christianity began as a Jewish sect, Cahill explores the various branches of Judaism that are flowering now that there are no Orthodox priests to keep people in. The two I remember most are the Essenes and the Pharisees. The Essenes resemble monks in that they retire in the wilderness to contemplate YHWH and so forth, while the Pharisees are alarmed at the growing lack of respect for the law and attempt to restore the old practices. The Pharisees will be the main villains in the New Testament, for those unfamiliar with it. He then explores the changing perception of Jesus and Christianity among the disciples and the Early church. I realized as the book wound to an end that the reason I don't know much about the early church is not that I haven't really looked before, but because there's not much information to draw on. The evidence is scant, and Cahill seems to restrict himself to it. There's no real wild speculation here -- no stories of Mary Magdalene leading the church and being ousted and driven into exile by Peter. Cahill's Catholicism does intrude at a couple of points, most notable when he addresses Martin Luther and ritual in the Catholic church.

I enjoyed the book quite well until the last chapter, when he attempts to attribute to Jesus and his followers (like Paul) everything from universal suffrage to tolerance. Looks to me to be an example of selective reading. The case of Paul is especially interesting, given that he writes to the members of one church and advises them that women shouldn't speak in church. That letter is written off by Cahill as being attributed to Paul but not really being his. Regardless of who wrote it, its precense in the Christian canon is fairly damning to Cahill's idea. An idea that occured me while reading was that I can understand why religions like Christianity were able to catch on. Following explict rules set forth in sermons is easier than contemplating Buddhist or other philosophical principles and then behaving in accordance with them.

Although the last chapter is forced and Cahill needlessly insults humanist ethics*, the book on the whole was fairly interesting.



* He recounts somene named Malcolm Muggeridge who visited a leper colony being run by Christians. Muggeridge apparantly stated that no humanist could do this. According to Wikipedia, he converted to Christianity. According again to Wikipedia this meant he could not enjoy Life of Brian, so it is entirely his loss. The International Humanist and Ethical Union's work in southeast Asia and Africa leaves me with no doubt that empathy is just as powerful as perceived divine command at inspiring people work for one another, and my personal conceit is that empathy is natural and thus more sustainable. The book is described as being a work of "reconciliation" between believers and nonbelievers, so Cahill's attitude there is questionable.

The Compleat Gentleman

The Compleat* Gentleman: The Modern Man's Guide to Chivalry
© 2004 Brad Miner
256 pages

I have a friend in love with the idea of chivalry, and he often asks me to comment on the rise of chivalry given my tendency to engage in medieval reading. He recently mentioned that he is doing research into the idea on his own, and brought up this book. Unthinkingly, I mentioned that it was part of my Amazon wishlist** and he asked me if I wanted to read it. Partially out of curiosity and partially out of politeness, I agreed. I should explain why a book on chivalry was on my Amazon wishlist: back in high school, I became infatuated with the cult of the southern gentleman. Part of it stemmed my religiosity and part of it stemmed from my brief relationship with southern nationalism (an affair that has left me feeling dirty ever since). I am no longer concerned with being a "manly man" or a "gentleman", but out of curiosity I decided to read the book.

The book is written by Brad Miner, formerly of the National Review and the editor of a conservative encyclopedia and a conservative bookclub. (This is the description on the back of the book, not mine.) He calls himself a "conservative liberal", which means he gets to question the Church while grumbling about the neo-Marxist Titanic and the "so-called sexual revolution". This is funny at first, but grows tiring the more he indulges himself. He begins with "Massed Against the World", writing about how men of virtue are now completely marginalized and ignored in a culture of depravity and egalitarianism run amok. He then spends a number of chapters on the history of chivalrism, beginning with ka-niggits and moving on to Victorian gentlemen, simultaneously dragging Stoicism along for the ride. He then writes on the three basic parts of the "compleat gentleman": the warrior, the lover, and the monk, ending with "Chilvary in the Modern Age" and "The Art of Sprezzaratura".

Miner is quite the romantic. Although he admits that knights and Victorian gentleman did not live up to their ideals, he sees their attempt to be good as admirable. I would, too, if I thought knights and Victorian gentlemen were attempting to be good. According to the rear flap of the book, he is "inspired by tradition but not bound by it", which sounds good but doesn't appear to mean anything. Miner comes off as self-congratulatory, a trait I sympathize with. He wants very badly to be a member of an "aristocracy of virtue", but judging by "Chivalry in a Democratic Era", his "code of honor" is there for his convenience. It does gives him room to snub those he sees as unvirtuous and to act in ways I personally see as uncivil. He also sees violence as honorable in many circumstances. There is also the fixation on "manly" ethics: where do women fit into his worldview? His ideal woman seems to have the virtues of a godly woman with some 21st century sensibilities thrown in.

The book grew rather boring after a while: while Miner and I share a commitment to virtue, his code seems to me to be hypocritical and impotent. I'm curious as to what my friend thinks, though.


* Miner's odd spelling is apparantly based off of a Victorian book about The Compleat Gentleman, but my etymological dictionaries show that "complete" was never spelled like that.

** I was mistaken. The two books on my wishlist were The Modern Gentleman: A Guide to Essential Manners, Savvy, and Vice by Phineas Mollod and Jason Tesauro
and The Gentleman's Guide to Life by Steve Friedman.

Lost on Planet China

Lost on Planet China: One Man's Quest to Understand the Most Mysterious Country in the World
© 2088 J. Maarten Troost
382 pages

While looking for a book on Chinese history, I encountered this travelogue and decided to give it a go. Lost on Planet China is the account of J. Maarten Troost's extended stay in China, which spans weeks at the very least. In beginning the book he writes on the subject of China's changing image in the world. He knows that China is not what it was during his childhood -- during the Cultural Revolution and Great Leap Forward -- and given its rising prominence in world affairs, he decides to visit it. Troost's perspective is an interesting one: both of his parents were European (Czech and Dutch) and he apparently spent his childhood in the Netherlands, although he now lives in the United States. The book is quite funny: he documents his initial reactions (and acclimated responses to) to various aspects of Chinese culture: the language barrier, the idea of children urinating in the street, the complete normality of dead livestock blocking sidewalks, the presence of street lamps decorated with Tibetan swastikas, and the art of haggling for the "Chinese price".

Although the book is entertaining and funny, it is also informative in that Troost adds commentary to what he observes. He sees China still trying to create an identidy for itself -- embracing the wild materialism of the United States while hanging on to the Cultural Revolution and trying to decide whether to divorce itself from or embrace the past. It was well worth the time I spent read, and if you are at all interested in what experiencing China is like, I reccommend it.

This Week at the Library (2/3)

Books this Update:

• What the Buddha Taught, Walpola Rahula
• The Gifts of the Jews, Thomas Cahill
• 10 Things Your Minister Wants to Tell You, Oliver Thomas
• Imperium, Robert Harris
• The Roman Mind, M.L. Clarke

This week's reading was an interesting selection: philosophy, religious and otherwise, dominated. I began with What the Buddha Taught in the interests of increasing my cultural literacy. Outside of a familiarity the foundational tenets of Buddhism (the Four Noble Truths and Eightfold Path) I know very little about it. The book has been very well-received, but I wasn't really able to build on what I know. Much of the book was an explanation of the Four Noble Truths, and although I generally understood what was being said, I never had an "A-HA!" moment where it all made sense. How the idea of no-self meshes with the idea of reincarnation is still beyond me, despite Rahula having committed a chapter to it. I think I am more interested in practice than in theory.

Next I continued in Thomas Cahill's Hinges of History series, reading The Gifts of the Jews. The book was not what I expected: rather than focusing on Judaism in the late classical era, Cahill examines the Hebrew mind using the Christian "Old Testament" as his source. While his information on Sumerian culture was informative, his view of the developing Jewish mind seems overly romantic and quite forced. I cannot make an informed comment on some of his interpretations in regard to religious worldviews of the Sumerians, but there are some about which I am informed and here I disagree with Cahill. He sees western civilization coming out of Jerusalem, while I see it coming out of Athens. I do not see how the idea of the individual can be more attributed to the Hebrews than the Athenians, based on my study of Greek philosophy and my knowledge of the Hebrew scriptures, which I have read since I was a child. While Cahill weaves a tight narrative as usual, here the threads of that narrative seem to be complete fabrications -- imposed upon the text rather than gleaned from it.

Having contemplated Buddhism and Judaism, I next moved to liberal Christianity with Oliver "Buzz" Thomas' 10 Things Your Minister Wants To Tell You. In the book Thomas addresses ten issues concerning Christianity today. The issues range from biblical literalism to homosexuality and the afterlife, but it is the first -- biblical literalism -- that I deem most important. Thomas is not a biblical literalist, which I see as perfectly reasonable. Despite knowing that the bible is a book written and translated by men with agendas, Thomas still sees it as a message from God, with some of it being lost in translation and warped by human culture. Having established that the bible must be interpreted, Thomas proceeds to interpret it according to 21st century standards. You may be able to see where that leads: the flames of Hell are quenched, women become people instead of things, homosexuality is regarded as natural, and suddenly it's perfectly okay to eat lobster and wear mixed threads. Thomas' religion is a progressive and ennobling religion, but -- unhappily for the world -- progressive and ennobling religion isn't what people want. As a result, Thomas comes off as preaching to the choir.

Taking a break from all of the philosophy, I read a historical thriller: Robert Harris' Imperium. Imperium is the first in a trilogy about the life of Cicero, one of Rome's finest statesmen and philosophers. Imperium is executive power, and in this first book we see Cicero's quest to achieve it. He begins as a young senator from a backwater province, ignored by his fellows. In the opening chapters he is still being schooled in philosophy, and he and his servant/slave Tiro begin a long working relationship. The book is written in the first person, from Tiro's perspective, and according to Harris Tiro really did write a book on Cicero's life. Tiro tells us the story of Cicero's slow and never certain rise to power in the changing political theatre that is Rome. This is excellent fiction.

Lastly, and accompanying Imperium, I read The Roman Mind by M.L. Clarke. Clarke is a professor of Latin -- or was. This book was published in 1956 when Clarke held that position, so unless he has extraordinarily longevity he is probably only with us in the past tense now. Clarke begins by opining that although the Romans are remembered for their administrative prowess, they were also thinkers. They came to philosophy and literature late, and when they did they built upon Greek culture, but the result was still distinctly Roman. They took the teachings of Epicures and Zeno and the legends of Homer and made them Greece. Most of what we know of Stoicism comes to us through the Romans, and that Stoicism is subsequently rather Roman, with an emphasis on duty and practical living than the theoretical ideas Zeno and Chyrsippus wrote on. Clarke's book takes us through decades of Roman philosophy, political thought, religion, and some literature, ending with the death of Marcus Aurelius, the "last philosopher". I thought the read very enjoyable and informative. It went well with my reading of Imperium.

Pick of the Week: Imperium, Robert Harris
Quotation of the Week: "The art of life is to deal with problems as they arise, rather than to destroy one's spirit by worrying about them far in advance." - Cicero, as quoted in Imperium.

Next Week:

• Desire of the Everlasting Hills, Thomas Cahill
• Evolution for Everyone, David Sloan Wilson
• Lost on Planet China, J. Maarten Troost
• Pompeii, Robert Harris

The Roman Mind

The Roman Mind: Studies in the History of Thought from Cicero to Marcus Aurelius
© 1956 M.L. Clarke
168 pg.

While Rome is known for its administrative prowess, author M.L. Clarke wants to remind us that they were thinkers, too: philosophers, borrowing from the Greek tradition. Their philosophies, while beginning in Greece, gained a Roman-ness to them when they were transmitted to Italy. After establishing background and introducing the reader to the two most influential philosophies adopted by Rome -- Epicureanism and Stoicism -- Clarke introduces us to the first true Roman philosopher, Cicero. We see in Cicero's time a Rome just beginning to be shaped by Greek philosophy, a Rome where traditional Romans have become strangers in their own city. Their culture is in the process of changing, and many are uncomfortable with this. But Greek philosophy and the Roman mind will meet and merge, and in the next chapter -- "Philosophy in Augustus' Time" -- we see that a distinctly Roman Stoicism has established itself, while Epicureanism -- once much more popular than Stoicism -- has exhausted itself and is fading into the bakcground.

This book is not simply about Roman philosophy, however. Clarke also addresses Roman religion, the Roman national spirit, the growth of political ideas, the idea of fate, and "Humanitas". All of these things work on the other, and Clarke makes this clear. The book ends with the death of Marcus Aurelius, the "last philosopher". In his epilogue, Clarke points out that Stoicism was a doctrine that was passed down from teachers to students -- and with the death of the last Stoic, Stoicism itself would pass on -- but not before shaping some of the new religion taking hold in Rome, that of Christianity.

I found the book to be well-written and quite interesting. It may be difficult for other people to find, though: I found it through my university's academic library.