951 ratings (3.40 avg)
979 reviews
Goodreads librarian

Michael

https://www.goodreads.com/popegrutch

Michael’s Bookshelves

to-read‎ (39)
currently-reading‎ (10)
read‎ (841)
read-grad-student‎ (85)
reference‎ (32)
read-part‎ (21)
read-to-nephew‎ (2)
politics‎ (206)
literature‎ (161)
academic-history‎ (154)
science-fiction‎ (144)
fantasy‎ (117)

fascism‎ (114)
popular-history‎ (94)
role-playing‎ (78)
classics‎ (69)
pulp-fiction‎ (67)
left-hand-path‎ (52)
german‎ (49)
biography‎ (47)
feminism‎ (47)
memoirs‎ (46)
philosophy‎ (46)
magic‎ (43)

media-studies‎ (40)
satire‎ (38)
conspiracy-theory‎ (36)
religious-studies‎ (32)
anarchism‎ (29)
choose-your-own-adventure‎ (29)
information-science‎ (26)
drama‎ (24)
mystery‎ (23)
self-help‎ (22)
how-to‎ (21)
literary-studies‎ (21)

poetry‎ (20)
textbooks‎ (20)
film-guides‎ (19)
psychology‎ (16)
anthropology‎ (15)
sociology‎ (14)
true-crime‎ (10)
kkk-studies‎ (9)
russian‎ (8)
biology‎ (7)
comics‎ (6)
tv-series‎ (6)

Stats | More…

Michael is Currently Reading

Michael is currently reading

28-Day Diabetes Diet Plan for Weight Loss: Recipes to Control Blood Sugar and Improve Your Health

by Brittany Poulson

bookshelves: currently-reading

Rate this book

Clear rating

1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

progress:

(page 43 of 206)
"Tried one recipe: Skillet Pork Chops with Green Beans, which is yummy. Not sure why a book on lowering carbs would advise you to serve it with a baked potato, however (I skipped it)." — Nov 30, 2025 03:37PM

Nov 23, 2025 11:08AM

Michael is currently reading

The Hunchback of Notre Dame (Bantam Classics)

by Victor Hugo

bookshelves: classics, literature, currently-reading

Reading for the 2nd time

read in December 2009

Rate this book

Clear rating

1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

Michael said: " As I have commented elsewhere, nothing gets me to read classic literature faster than a good monster movie. Now that I've read it, I'm going to have to go back and watch all those film versions (well, the 1923 Lon Chaney, the 1939 Charles Laughton, a As I have commented elsewhere, nothing gets me to read classic literature faster than a good monster movie. Now that I've read it, I'm going to have to go back and watch all those film versions (well, the 1923 Lon Chaney, the 1939 Charles Laughton, and the 1959 Anthony Quinn versions at least) to confirm that I'm remembering correctly - so far no one has made a movie which is as tragic as the book. Everyone puts a sort of "happy ending" on it, even if one or more of the characters dies. I have to admit, the actual ending is pretty grim, and I can certainly see Hollywood producers shying away from it. But, in a sense, that was Hugo's point - his was an Enlightened critique of Medieval society (and its various vestiges in modern France, especially the Church). Without the ending, the story loses its focus, and, in fact, the Hunchback is an odd sort of monster in all the movie versions - sympathetic, victimized, driven to extreme acts, but never truly despicable. If I were writing a movie review, I'd take any one of those movies to task for their failures.
Beyond that observation, the book is charmingly satirical - I don't know if Hugo invented the concept of the tragi-comedy or "black comedy," but this is unquestionably an example thereof. As I say, the ending is tragic, monumentally so, but there are many points at which the reader will be laughing along the way. Hugo's characters are also largely caricatures (although, he seems to say, medieval people were caricatures in real life, due to their ignorance and lack of cosmopolitanism), but painted with the loving care to make them fun, rather than simply annoying. His situations are a blend of the likely, the outrageous, and at times the almost fairy-tale fantastic (doubtless these are the parts seized upon by the Disney version). I particularly enjoy the character of the young playwright, almost the only male character not smitten by Esmeralda, but who falls in love with her pet goat instead. I rather suspect he was either a parody of someone Hugo knew in his own time, or perhaps a tongue-in-cheek autobiographical portrait. ...more "

progress:

(page 36 of 367)
— Nov 30, 2025 03:31PM

Dec 23, 2009 10:53AM · see review

Michael is currently reading

Fascism: A Readers' Guide : Analysis, Interpretations, Bibliography

by Walter Laqueur

bookshelves: currently-reading

Rate this book

Clear rating

1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

progress:

(page 409 of 478)
— Nov 30, 2025 03:36PM

Oct 19, 2025 11:10AM

See all 10 books that Michael is reading…

Michael’s Quotes

“...What disturbed him was the discovery that in sensibly ordering his affairs he had got out of step, and not into step, with Life.”
― Dashiell Hammett

tags: pulp-wisdom

14 likes

“The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents. We live on a placid island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity, and it was not meant that we should voyage far. The sciences, each straining in its own direction, have hitherto harmed us little; but some day the piecing together of dissociated knowledge will open up such terrifying vistas of reality, and of our frightful position therein, that we shall either go mad from the revelation or flee from the light into the peace and safety of a new dark age.”
― H.P. Lovecraft

tags: dread

475 likes