Pretentious yet Fascinating
Nov. 30th, 2007 08:13 amWhenever I go visit my parents, we always end up at a bookstore, much to my mom's exasperation. (Everyone in my family is a big reader, including her, she just doesn't graze the bookshelves for hours like a choosy bison the way my dad and I do.) And I have to say that the Borders in Novi is superior to the Borders, Barnes & Noble or even Books & Co. here in Dayton. At least in its selection of nonfiction. And that, in the middle of Nano is very bad for my checkbook.
Anyway, the upshot of this is that I found a very interesting magazine while I was looking to see if there was a new issue of Archeology. It's called Lapham's Quarterly, and from what I can tell the idea is to take some issue in the news and on people's minds, and then go through historical writings to see what has been said about it in the past. The first issue is about war, and has bits from everyone from Homer to Patton.
And it is really interesting to see everything juxtaposed like that. The first piece is a speech by a British General at the beginning of the Iraq War, and then directly after that is a speech by a British commander liberating Baghdad from the Turks in World War One. I still haven't gotten very far through it since it's very dense and it's still nanowrimo, but I think it's a really interesting idea and I'm curious to see what else they'll do.
Anyway, the upshot of this is that I found a very interesting magazine while I was looking to see if there was a new issue of Archeology. It's called Lapham's Quarterly, and from what I can tell the idea is to take some issue in the news and on people's minds, and then go through historical writings to see what has been said about it in the past. The first issue is about war, and has bits from everyone from Homer to Patton.
And it is really interesting to see everything juxtaposed like that. The first piece is a speech by a British General at the beginning of the Iraq War, and then directly after that is a speech by a British commander liberating Baghdad from the Turks in World War One. I still haven't gotten very far through it since it's very dense and it's still nanowrimo, but I think it's a really interesting idea and I'm curious to see what else they'll do.