Philip Athans > Recent Status Updates

Oh, wow, this is good so far! (Rocannon’s World)

Every pages of this book is immensely dense and fascinating and triggering--making this 50-page chapter on the history of depression just a haul for me.

This book takes a lot out of me.

"…science is simply a matter of intellect, and that the intellect is only one among several fundamental psychic functions and therefore does not suffice to give a complete picture of the world. For this another function—feeling—is needed too. Feeling often arrives at convictions that are different from those of the intellect, and we cannot always prove that the convictions of feeling are necessarily inferior."

Starting with Rocannon's World and wow--GREAT start!

Solid first chapter.

How do you know an author is flailing his way through a plot? When he writes a sentence like this:

Rhodan decided to ignore the mysterious beings.

The giant dinosaur was fun!

since leaving my native place I’ve labored to no purpose,
in the end done nothing to better the world’s plight.
Why be forever like duckweed on the waves,
never like a stone unmoving in the stream?

—Po Chü-I, 822 C.E.

I didn't really just read 54 pages of this book… I skipped the 44-page introduction to read at the end (if at all). I'll decide what to think of what Jung thinks on my own.

I keep having to stop reading my old copy of this book to glue it back together. Hopefully this last repair will do it and I can really get into it because Im loving it so far.

…and then the default sexism, also in Base on Venus:

They established thirty hour time periods, and during two of them they advanced about fifty miles. This was a remarkable accomplishment, considering that they were traversing impenetrable jungles and were burdened with the presence of a woman.

The poem “In the Midst of Illness, Grieving for Golden Bells” is immensely sad.

Ten years, nothing but grueling study;
a mistake perhaps, but suddenly my name's on the list.
Just passing is no real prize, though;
true glory comes when you break good news to parents.
Six or seven friends who passed at the same time
see me off from the imperial city.
Canopied carriages set out in procession…

Written in China 1226 years ago, the first poem is instanty and entirely relatable.

Sneaking in a chapter of this book here and there between editing sprints.

Phil will READ again!

I'm reading this slowly so I can just live in here as long as I can.

Grant Snider just gets it.

The chapter on suicide was… rough.

Is it narcissistic to say I love the way Grant Snider thinks when clearly he thinks exactly like me?

About books, at least.