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Norman Lebrecht 'The Maestro Myth'
As has been frequently observed conductors are the strangest of classical musicians, they make no sound and yet are frequently the most revered and highly paid person on the stage. Few positions attract so much adulation, and few are so venerable to the charlatans. In this book Norman Lebrecht charts the rise, and in his belief fall, of the conductor. Unfortunately, Mr Lebrecht mars his story by rarely putting his prejudices to one side. He parades before us the conductor as megalomaniac, as charlatan, as weakling, as villain; rarely as whole human being. Lebrecht appears to be both drawn to and repulsed by the figure of the conductor. If he can ascribe a base motive to something, he will. For example, Stokowski laced his programs with modern pieces, a laudable idea surely, but at the end of a paragraph almost praising Stokowski Lebrecht adds the little sting 'His eye was ever on the press box.' There is much too much of this sort of thing, if an act appears praise worthy then Lebrecht adds a little rider, which frequently has no relevance but serves to tarnish the conductor. And if in defense of a conductor one might point to the mass of critical praise they have garnered, well the critics are wrong, too in awe of the conductor, or even effectively bought out. In describing the critical praise that von Karajan's recording of Mahler's ninth symphony received Mr Lebrecht reports 'Those whose devotion to Mahler transcended their thanksgiving for Karajan's survival emerged deeply perplexed', so there you have it. As well as being rather snide the author reveals himself as being something of a snob, Riccardo Chailly is described as 'the kind of cosmopolitan near-intellectual that educated Hollanders aspire to become.' Sad to report that an intellect as great as Mr Lebrecht's is unable to unable to ensure that the 17 chapters are self-consistent, and I was left with the feeling that the book had been cobbled together from material written for other occasions.
Pocket Books, 393 pages
Paul van Valkenburgh 'Race Car Engineering & Mechanics'
This is not a book I can recommend; it is comprehensive and detailed, but it is often confusingly written and plain dull. If you come to the book with a pretty clear idea of what anti-roll bars do, you may well leave it more confused than when you started. That Mr Valkenburgh knows his stuff is very clear, unfortunately he cannot stick to a clear narrative and for me at least, seriously muddied the waters.
Published by the author 168 pages
John Henry 'Moving Heaven and Earth'
This is the story of Nicolaus Copernicus and how his radical idea that the Earth goes around the Sun changed the World. The book is well written and places Copernicus' ideas in their historical context by charting the development of man's view of the universe from the ancient Greeks onwards. Since Copernicus's ideas led eventually to the trail of Galileo it would be very easy to present this story as the conflict of Church versus enlightenment. This is not how John Henry presents it, indeed he shows how it was Kepler's very faith that led him to his laws of orbital motion. Recommended.
Icon Books, 156 pages
Ray Bradbury 'Something Wicked This Way Comes'
This is a great book to read in the foggy autumn evenings, when it's easy to imagine Cooger & Dark's Pandemonium Shadow Show coming to town. I last read this book years ago and wondered how it would seem now. In fact, I think I enjoyed it more second time around. I highly recommend this nostalgic, Faustian, autumnal tale.
Grafton, 200 pages
Written by Neil Gaiman & illustrated by Dave McKean 'The Wolves in the Walls'
"If the wolves come out of the walls, then it's all over."
"What's all over?" asked Lucy.
"It," said her mother.
There are wolves living in the walls, by night Lucy can hear them moving, by day she can feel them looking at her through the cracks in the walls and the eyes of the painting. There are wolves in the walls, but no one believes her, until one night the wolves come out of the walls.
This is a wonderful gothic picture book for children of all ages, except perhaps the very young who may be truly frightened. The text is punchy and well written, and the illustrations dark and atmospheric. Like all fairy stories there are layers and ambiguities. There are wolves in the walls, and perhaps we should encourage them to come out more often.
Bloomsbury, 56 pages
M.I. Finley 'The Ancient Greeks'
I should begin this with a warning; any history book from 1963 is bound to have been overtaken by more recent discoveries. In fact, I think that even the first line concerning a southward migration of Greek speaking people around BC1900 is now open to discussion. But even though this book is not filled with the most recent ideas it is still an excellent read. Intelligently and clearly written it covers all aspects of ancient Greek civilization; from history and culture to philosophy, science and technology. Finley is particularly interesting when addressing two of the paradoxes of the Greeks; why despite being extremely advanced in philosophy was Greek science and technology never fully developed; and biggest of all, how could a civilization with a highly developed concept of liberty also support wholesale slavery?
Penguin Books, 204 pages
Plutarch 'The Rise and Fall of Athens: Nine Greek Lives' (translated Ian Scott-Kilvert)
'... a man who occupies himself with servile tasks proves by the very pains which he devotes to them that he is indifferent to higher things. No young man of good breeding and high ideals feels that he must be a Pheidias or a Polycleitus after seeing the statue of Zeus at Olympia or Hera at Argos'
Just before I left Cambridge, I was very struck by a notice pinned up in my college listing where that year’s graduates were going. As I read down the one hundred or so names and future occupations a clear pattern emerged; some were moving on to an academic position, many were moving into the financial sector, almost none were going into manufacturing. Here was the supposed cream of Britain's youth voting with their feet, away from manufacturing and into service industries. During my time at two British universities I received two very clear impressions, a high regard of a 'Classical Education' and a near contempt in certain quarters for Science and particularly Engineering. Are these two linked? I wonder how much uncritical study of the classics by certain sections of the British population has instilled nonsense like the quote above into the British psyche?
Plutarch was writing a set of morally bettering histories and so Lives are in no sense objective history; Plutarch did not let anything get in the way of a good story. And this collection is full of good stories. Despite my suggestion above that Plutarch's ideas may not always have had a positive influence on modern society I thoroughly enjoyed these biographies; from the just and upright Aristides to the fast and loose Alcibiades these are all terrific stories. The characters may have lived from ca 640 to 395 BC, but so much of what happened has a modern ring about it. For example, Solon the great Athenian law-giver getting involved in what was in effect insider trading and later on trying to get Athens out of dept by using inflation. Or Pericles presenting the renovation of the Acropolis as a job creation scheme, and a touch of 'jobs for the boys' in giving the role of 'chief creator' to his mate Pheidas. Incidentally this all rebounded rather badly when the rumour began to circulate that Pheidas was arranging assignations for Pericles with free born Athenian women who were coming to the Acropolis on the pretext of 'looking at the works of art'; certainly a step up from 'come up and see my etchings'!
Penguin Classics, 318 pages
Christopher Logue 'The Husbands'
The Trojan War almost ended when Hector stepped out of the Trojan lines and challenged the Greeks to nominate a hero to fight with him man-to-man, the victory deciding the outcome of the war. In 'The Husbands' Christopher Logue focuses on this brief moment near the beginning of the Iliad where another outcome seemed briefly possible. I've written about Logue's Homer above in the context of 'War Music' and 'Kings' so I won't go over it again. Powerful, pithy and very readable, Logue's Homer is terrific!
Faber & Faber, 55 pages
Caesar 'The Civil War' (translated Jane F. Mitchell)
History, they say, is written by the victors. That being so 'The Civil War' should be taken with a large dose of salt. Here is Caesar presenting for posterity his side of the story. It makes an interesting story, but I kept wondering, 'what about the rest?', could Caesar really have been so much the 'good guy' as he pretends? Caesar takes great pains to show himself as just, at one-point delaying battle to minimize bloodshed, always making fair judgments, magnanimous in victory. Others are presented in a far less positive light, with the excesses that were possible clearly shown.
In some ways the three other histories included here 'The Alexandrian War', 'The African War' and 'The Spanish War', written it is thought by Caesar's lieutenants, makes more interesting reading. Here political correctness, particularly regarding barbarian foreigners is replaced by a gritty directness which may better represent the Roman feeling common at the time. Caesar is still the hero, but his control is less than perfect and he is unable to prevent his troops killing enemy soldiers who have come begging for protection. Unfortunately, these three histories are frequently much less well written, and for a clear and concise description of troop deployments and battle tactics 'The Civil War' is hard to beat.
Although I kept wondering how objective the writing is, I certainly enjoyed this book and can recommend it, especially to anyone who enjoyed 'Time Commanders' on the BBC, this is the real thing!
Penguin Classics, 360 pages
Lesley & Roy Adkins 'The Keys of Egypt, The Race To Read The Hieroglyphs'
This is the story of Jean-Francois Champollion who deciphered the lost language of the Ancient Egyptians. It is almost as much the story of his elder brother Jacques-Joseph who provided him with so much help and support, and of Champollion's rivals especially Thomas Young. The book paints a wide picture, fully taking into account the broader scientific and historical background to Champollion's work. This was the time immediately following the French revolution, a time of rapidly shifting political fortunes. Champollion was fortunate indeed that Jacques-Joseph was as skilled in politics and he was clumsy. The steps along to path to the decipherment of the hieroglyphs is well described, as is the rest of Champollion's life personal and private. I was particularly interested that the Rosetta Stone was more of an inspiration than the real key to understanding hieroglyphs. It was really Champollion's genius at languages applied to other inscriptions that made decipherment possible. I can highly recommend this book to anyone with an interest in ancient history.
Harper Collins, 335 pages
John Tipler 'Lotus 78 and 79, The Ground-Effect Cars'
Air had always flowed under racing cars, but it was not until 1977 that a racing car appeared that really took advantage of it. By incorporating inverted wings into each side of the car and critically, by sealing these to the ground with a vertical skirt Team Lotus rewrote the rules of single seater car design. While the Lotus 78 came close to winning the World Championship in 1977, it successor the Type 79 gave Lotus a season of real dominance wining six out of sixteen Grand Prix and taking Mario Andretti to the F1 World Championship. The following year though was a disaster, the Type 80 was a total failure and Lotus began a long slow fade that would result in the team disappearing at the end of 1994.
This book covers the genesis of the Types 78 and 79, the unsuccessful Type 80 and the ill-fated Type 88. As well as the strengths of the Team Lotus designs, this book casts a strong light on their weaknesses and makes the reasons of the team's loss of performance much clearer. Colin Chapman, head of Lotus, is painted as a flawed genius. A man able to grab a new idea and to inspire those around him to achieve new heights, whilst being unable or unwilling to see critical points himself. The story of the Type 80 is very illuminating; rather than producing an improved Type 79, Lotus innovated for innovations sake and produced a car physically totally unable to handle the loads its advanced aerodynamics imposed on it. It was left to less original teams such as Williams to produce improved Type 79s and they used them to humble the once mighty Team Lotus.
As well as being highly a recommendable treatment of some classic F1 cars, this book also contains some sobering lessons concerning management in a high-tech environment.
The Cronwood Press, 208 pages
Iain M. Banks 'Look to windward'
This is not really a bad book. The story is well told, the ideas and characters fairly interesting, everything is wrapped up in a satisfactory way. So why damn it with faint praise? Because it is much much too long. Iain M. Banks is 'A Serious Writer' who has turned the humble Space Opera Sci-Fi novel into 'Great Art'. The dust jacket tells us that the book is 'a gymnasium for the imagination' and 'confirms Banks as the standard by which the rest of SF is judged'. All I can say to that is Bull! Other, lesser writers have said much more in far fewer words. To be verbose is not the same as being profound, nor is pretentious the same as clever.
Orbit, 403 pages
Derek Walcott 'The Odyssey, A Stage Version'
It's difficult to judge a piece written for the stage by reading the written word, but my impression is that Derek Walcott's adaptation of Homer's epic works very well. Much is re-imagined for example the Underworld becomes the Underground with the shades stepping on and off trains. Some of the violence is toned down, so that the serving women who have slept with the suitors are not slain by Odysseus as in the original, but are saved at the insistence of Penelope. The Odyssey has undergone many transformations, oral epic to written classic, to movie and to play. It has survived the total destruction of the culture which gave it birth and yet still it remains able to talk to us today. I found Derek Walcott's adaptation an interesting new look.
Faber and Faber, 160 pages
Lt. Gen Harold G. Moore (Ret.) and Joseph L. Galloway 'We Were Soldiers Once… And Young'
'They are the Gold Star children, war's innocent victims, and their pain shimmers across the years pure and undimmed. They pass through life with an empty room in their hearts where a father was supposed to live and laugh and love.
All their lives they listen for the footstep that will never fall, and long to know what might have been.'
On the 14th November 1965 the 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalry was helicopted into the Ia Drang Valley, to a small clearing code named LZ X-Ray. They were immediately attacked by a vastly larger Vietnamese force and one of the bloodiest battles of the Vietnam War started. After two a half days of intense fighting the Americans drove off their attackers. But for the members 2nd Battalion, 7th Cavalry, brought in to LZ X-Ray to support their sister battalion, the horror was only beginning. Told that the march of two and a half miles to LZ Albany would be a walk in the sun, they were well strung out when they marched straight into the North Vietnamese camp.
This is an impressive, disturbing and moving book. Almost every page has an act of extreme heroism and self sacrifice. But this is not for a second a book that glorifies war, far from it. Both authors were there and experienced much of the fighting; Harold G. Moore as commander of the 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalry in LZ X-Ray and Joseph Galloway as a press photographer, and they paint a grim picture.
Moore himself comes over as a career militarily. He is never really openly critical his superiors, nor the commander of the ill fated march to LZ Albany, but in his understated way he makes his anger and his feelings quite plain. 'War is hell' he is telling us. At one point there is a miss-call and the plane dropping napalm bombs the US lines, horribly burning several soldiers. Moore turns to man responsible for co-coordinating the bombing and tells him to forget it and just carry on; for without air support they would all be dead. After the battle Moore personally scours the battlefield, untangling the human remains, until he is certain that every American has been found, no one can go unaccounted for.
The story does not end with the fighting but continues on into the lives of those who lost loved ones. One of the final chapters allows the relatives to tell their stories in the hope that they may offer some comfort to others in their position. When the son of one of the dead soldiers describes the Vietnam War as "Senseless" his words are allowed to speak for themselves.
This is an uncomfortable book, but I do recommend it.
Corgi Books, 483 pages
Pierre Boulez 'Boulez on conducting, conversations with Cécile Gilly' (translated by Richard Stokes)
'It seems wrong to me systematically to equate expressiveness with dynamics: to play each crescendo as loudly as possible does not increase the expressive power of the music but literally clubs it senseless and annihilates it through overemphasis.'
I must come clean and say that I am a big fan of Boulez the conductor. I find his blend of precision and cool detachment pay huge dividends; to my mind his Mahler recording are amongst the best on record and live he can be even better. This short book records a series of conversations on various topics related to conducting. From the question of tempo in Wagner's Parsifal to Stravinsky's recordings, to the problems of conducting his own works Boulez covers a lot of ground in an interesting and concise way. I was surprised at Boulez's wide musically knowledge and interest, particularly in his discussions of Schumann and Mendelssohn, composers I would never associate with him. All-in-all a very interesting book and highly recommended to anyone with an interest in modern music and music making.
Faber & Faber, 150 pages
Xenophon 'A History of My Times'
Xenophon's 'Hellenica' (here translated as 'A History of My Times') covers 411 to 362 BC. A period which begins with the fall of Athens and ends with Sparta, Corinth and Athens all reduced to a similar level of impotent petty wrangling. Although Xenophon could not have known it, the time of the City States was almost over, and the stage was set of the rise of Macedon, of Philip II and his son Alexander the Great.
Xenophon's book is an engaging guide to this time, but is it reliable? Apparently not at all. Even to a lay reader like me it was clear that Xenophon misses out great chunks of history. He's not writing a history in our sense of objective history at all. Instead, one can imagine Xenophon towards the end of his life discussing the old days with his mates over a couple of bottles of wine, then writing it down. This is not history, perhaps not even memoirs. Acts worthy of report of included, all else is omitted; Xenophon censors by silence. As he says himself 'I shall pass over those actions not worth mentioning, dealing only with what deserves to be remembered'.
So, engaging as this book is, I really can't recommend it, there must be much better, clearer and more detailed histories of this period; even if they are written twenty four centuries later.
Penguin Classics, 425 pages
Gregory Benford 'Foundation's Fear'
This is rubbish do not waste your time.
Orbit, 620 very tedious pages
Philip Pullman 'The Shadow in the North'
This, the second book in the Sally Lockhart series, takes place a couple of years after the events in 'The Ruby in the Smoke' (see above). The mix of adventure and mystery is as potent in this as in the previous book. Added in are heroism and tragedy to make a moving and satisfying whole. If you enjoyed 'The Ruby in the Smoke' then you are bound to enjoy this book and want to read more in the series; I know I do.
Scholastic, 286 pages
H. C. Robbins Landon '1791, Mozart's Last Year'
This excellent book chronicles Mozart's final year. A year in which he wrote 'The Magic Flute', 'La clemenza di Tito' and the unfinished Requiem. In an informal, but scholarly way H.C. Robbins Landon elucidates the origins of these works and as far as possible separates out fact from fiction. After such 'cod history' as 'Amadeus' this book comes as an informative relief. Although surprisingly Robbins Landon concludes that much of the legend surrounding the genesis of the Requiem is true. It is also good to read such a vigorous defense of Constanze. This is a detailed and scholarly book, but that never gets in the way of the story. For example, the revenue sources that would have been open to a composer are that time are described in detail, but Robbins Landon makes this interesting and explains why it is important.
Perhaps what has remained with me most from this book is not so much Mozart's towering genius and the tragedy of his early death, but that in a way his talent was squandered. To quote from early in the book;
'When one examines the list of music that Mozart composed in these first three months of 1791, it is the lack of symphonies, quartets, quintets, masses, operas … which is curious and depressing. Is that all the court expected from its official chamber composer – minuets and German dances, however magnificent? … The Nissen biography refers to a receipt for such dance music, on which the composer wrote: 'Too much for what I did, not enough for what I could do.'
This is an excellent book and I highly recommend it.
Flamingo, 240 pages
Arthur C. Clarke and Stephen Baxter 'Time's Eye'
This is a book for which the term 'so so' could have been coined. It's not bad, far from it; but then it's not all that great either. Time's Eye reads very much like the first of a series, which it is; but wouldn't it have been possible for the story to have more point and why are characters just forgotten about when they are no longer useful? It also might have been better for the authors to have avoided a couple of heavy-handed references to Clarke's earlier '2001 A Space Odyssey'.
It may be worth considering that this hardback edition comes with a free CD-ROM containing a couple of essays, a rather pointless interview with Clarke and Baxter and two Baxter novels ('Evolution' and 'Manifold Time'). The combined cost of the paper versions of the two novels is about £9.50 which considerably offsets the £13.20 cost of Time's Eye and maybe makes it a good economic choice for Baxter fans.
Del Ray, 335 pages
Joyce Tyldesley 'Nefertiti, Egypt's Sun Queen'
Nefertiti is probably antiquity's most famous face; her bust, now housed in Berlin instantly recognizable. Surprisingly, the woman herself is shrouded in mystery. Even her fate is obscure. In year 12 of the reign of her husband Akhenaten she suddenly vanishes from the record. Did she die, was she banished for some heinous but now forgotten crime, did she continue to live on, to rule as the shadowy Smenkhkare? Despite over a century of intense scholarly activity Egypt's Beautiful Woman is as obscure as ever.
By sticking to the facts Joyce Tyldesley could have finished up writing a very dull book. Instead she has produced an excellent and readable account of what is known about Nefertiti. Alterative theories are examined and compared with the archaeological evidence. It is clear that Tyldesley has her own ideas, but these never get in the way of the facts. Only in her discussion of the enigmatic tomb KV 55 did I find her analysis of the evidence questionable; here she rejects the most recent estimate of the age of the body found in KV 55 and instead uses a kind of rough average of all the estimates, so ruling out the possibility that the body is that of Akhenaten and strengthening her argument in favour of Smenkhkare.
In general, however this is an excellent and extremely interesting book. I definitely recommend it.
Penguin Books, 232 pages
Naguib Mahfouz 'Akhenaten, Dweller in Truth'
Unlike the previous book this is a work of fiction. Mahfouz his picked is way through the available evidence to produce a coherent whole. No matter that some of his choices are questionable, here for example Akhenaten really looked like the official images; this book works excellently. At a time when we are becoming more and more familiar with official enquires, when bureaucrat after bureaucrat gives their own subtle gross on events, and the truth remains hidden somewhere between the lines, it is interesting to read Mahfouz's own take on events.
Set just after the death of Akhenaten, this book takes the form of a series of interviews with the surviving protagonists of the Amarna Heresy. Each describe their experiences of the events that brought Egypt to the brink of civil war and so discredited Akhenaten that generations to come would simply refer to him as 'The Heretic'. Some remember Akhenaten with affection, even love; others with contempt; others still as a path to power and influence. In each account the events remain essentially the same, only the colouring is different. Finally, the author interviews Nefertiti herself, living in isolated splendour amid the decaying ruins of her late husband’s dream city Akhetaten.
Was Akhenaten a visionary or a madman, a saint or a sinner? Each interview gives its own view; it is left to us to decide.
Highly recommended; a book to return to.
Anchor Books, 168 pages
Christopher Logue 'All Day Permanent Red, War Music continued'
I've already related the virtues of Logue's retelling of Homer. This is a worthy addition to his canon.
Recommended.
Faber and Faber, 39 Pages
John Keay 'Sowing the Wind. The Mismanagement of the Middle East 1900-1960'
Time and again during this book I asked myself 'How could they be so stupid?' Perhaps the recent history of the Middle East really is like that; major powers involved for their own short-term gains, more interested in gaining votes from the folks back home than fixing the problem? As it stands this book gives little reason to suppose that today's leaders are displaying any more foresight than their predecessors. And maybe that's the problem with this book, has it been written to show that today leaders are following in a well-trodden path? All history involves interpretation, but I here I have the sense of an author setting out to prove that the Great Powers have consistently messed up. Perhaps I'm too optimistic, preferring to balance 'How could they be so stupid?' with 'Were they really that stupid?'
Despite the doubts raised above this book is still well worth reading. Crammed with fact and anecdote it makes interesting and amusing reading. The author displays a dry humour and an eye for anecdotal details. The pioneering days of the Middle East seemed to have had more than their fair share of larger than life characters. Obviously, events such as the Suez Crisis are covered in detail, but Keay is particularly good at bringing out the background and painting the characters. But again, there is that doubt 'Was Anthony Eden really so driven by his personal dislike of Nasser?', 'Was Eisenhower really so interested in winning domestic votes?'.
Still at a time when the Western leaders seem so intent on denying history, I think it is critical to try to understand how we got where we are and therefore, I certainly recommend this book. I may doubt its objectivity from time to time and it is certainly a bit too long, but overall, I'm glad I read it.
John Murray, 506 pages
Joyce Tyldesley 'The Private Lives of the Pharaohs'
This is the accompanying book to the Channel 4 series of the same name. I found the series promised far more than it delivered; unfortunately, the book does the same. After an introduction the book falls into three sections which reflect the three parts of the TV show. These cover the building of the Pyramids, the medical evidence concerning the end of the 18th Dynasty and the investigation of the mummy of the Chantress Asru. The first part is the most satisfactory and seems to give a reasonable overview of current ideas concerning the construction of the pyramids. The third part concerning the investigation of the remains of Asru is also interesting but far too short for my taste. It does present some fairly recent data concerning narcotic use in ancient Egypt and certainly presents a compelling counter view to the healthy strapping individuals usually portrayed in Egyptian art, but it is still not really satisfactory (Christine El Mahdy's 'Mummies Myth & Magic is a far better, although rather older treatment of this area). The second section is by far the weakest. If it had focused on DNA profiling and the demands of applying it to ancient Egyptian remains it would have been well worth reading. Instead very inconclusive DNA results are presented and the rest hangs on the anatomical evidence which was already, and better, covered in the same authors 'Nefertiti, Egypt's Sun Queen' (see above).
So interesting, but I'm sure each topic is better covered in other books.
Channel 4 Books, 192 pages
Philip Pullman 'Lyra's Oxford'
This is a short story set a few years after the events of 'The Amber Spyglass'. Although only a quick read it is certainly worth the time. The book is nicely packaged with a map, a postcard of Oxford and a couple of other things. Some have a clear link to 'His Dark Materials' the rest maybe is a teaser for the forthcoming 'Book of Dust'.
David Fickling Books, 49 pages
Karl Sigmund 'Games of Life, Explorations in Ecology, Evolution and Behaviour'
This is an interesting book and I would like to whole heartedly recommend it, but like a lot of modern popular books on science it presents the results of the science but without really explaining how the results were obtained. Science becomes a 'gee-wiz' topic in which the results must be taken a faith. A good book on science makes the reader think and stimulates them to explore for themselves. Not here; instead on page 75 the reader is presented with a series of paradoxes. A reader with some knowledge of statistics and probability with be able to resolve them, but the rest will come away with the idea that science is a closed book. This is not what popular science writing should be about. The tragedy here is that much of this book is very interesting especially the chapters of Cellular Automata and the evolution of co-operation. But finally, I just found this book too frustrating. 'Dear Prof Sigmund, please try again. Cover less material more completely; give worked examples and when so much of the material can be presented on the computer point the reader to where they can find the software so that they can explore cellular automata or the prisoner's dilemma for themselves. That is what science writing is about.'
Penguin, 244 pages
Aaron Copland 'What to listen for in Music'
If the preceding book is an example of how not to write for the lay reader, this is a triumphant example of how to. Aaron Copland deals with all aspects of appreciating classical music in a sensible and intelligent way. The reader is meant to understand and should come away with a new and deeper understanding. Copeland writes in a popular way, but does not talk down, nor avoid the technical. Instead topics like Sonata Form or Counterpoint are tackled head on. Of course, the topics are much deeper than they are presented here, but so what? I at least feel that I have gained a lot from this little book. If you're interested in classical music but find most commentaries either too trivial or too complex, then this could be the book for you.
New American Library, 192 pages
Raymond E. Feist 'Krondor, Tear of the Gods'
I think that Raymond E. Feist's greatest achievement is his involvement in the game 'Betrayal at Krondor'. This was a computer adventure game that had a real story, that could be played a second time and give a different experience, that totally avoided the 'pick up the stick, to throw to the dog, to save the ant hill, to befriend the King of the Ants, to find the golden needle in the haystack…' nonsense.
Sadly, in this book he shows that as well as being able to produce a computer game that can play like a novel; he can produce a novel that can read like a computer game! The formula is the standard 'find a clue, go somewhere, kill something, find a clue…'. On top of that it's pretty unimaginative and poor written. A shame really since I've enjoyed some of his other novels.
Harper Collins, 372 pages
Suetonius 'The Twelve Caesars'
As private secretary to the Emperor Hadrian Suetonius would have had plenty of access to the imperial archives, not to say a first-hand view of the court in action. In this book he paints portraits of the first twelve, all too human Emperors, from Julius Caesar through to Domitian. Does a common picture emerge from the portraits? Unfortunately, even worryingly, yes; insanity. Even if the prospective Emperor was not mad to begin with, and the Roman habit of popping off their nearest and dearest can hardly have helped a healthy emotional development, a couple of years at the helm seems to have left most of them pretty much barking! After a while the stories become depressingly familiar, get to the throne on a wave of popularity, try and maintain that by having almost continuous public holiday and ever more elaborate games, followed by disenchantment, increasing cruelty, brutality and madness. The message seems clear, 'all power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely'. There are a few exceptions, but the pattern is pretty clear. One can only suppose that the Romans much have had a lot of good middle level administrators or the whole thing would have come crashing down. Or perhaps Suetonius's love of a good tale results in an over emphasis on gore, after all just getting on with the job wouldn't make for a very interesting story. Still Suetonius is considered to be a reliable source.
In Robert Grave's translation the work is very readable and as well as some chilling studies of growing insanity the book is full of interesting little asides. For example, for a quick action Augustus would say 'Quicker than boiled asparagus', or Vespasian, who comes over as an exceptionally good and sane ruler, demonstrated a dry wit to the very end by saying on his death bed 'Dear Me, I must be turning into a god'. Julies Caesar, we are told, 'collected the huge skeletons of extinct sea and land monsters popularly known as 'Giants' Bones'; and the weapons of ancient heroes.'
Penguin Classics, 363 pages
Mike Lawrence 'Colin Chapman, Wayward Genius'
As the founder of Lotus Colin Chapman is a legendry and heroic figure in the history of motor sport. An engineer, designer and team leader who transformed the sport and produced along the way a string of classic racing cars. Yet, as this book shows he had a darker side; wide boy, womanizer, stealer of other people's ideas and glory, who was saved from a prison sentence for his part in the DeLorean scandal only by his premature death.
Mike Lawrence paints a 'warts and all' portrait of Chapman from his early days selling second-hand cars whilst still at school, though the glory days of team Lotus, to the Delorean affair. However, despite Chapman's obvious human failings I felt that the book dwelt on them too much. I was already aware that much of Chapman's glory was largely the work of others, but in a sense that was his genius; Chapman could produce an environment in which others were inspired to give their best. Take 'ground effect' both BRM and March had most of the pieces years before Lotus, but Chapman was the first to assemble the right team in the right conditions for it to work.
So I would say that this is an interesting book on Chapman, but one that frequently gives the impression of being poorly researched, especially the very perfunctory treatment of the DeLorean affair which is mostly from a single source. Although not about Chapman John Tipler's 'Lotus 78 and 79, The Ground-Effect Cars' (reviewed above) gives a clearer and more concise view of Chapman.
Beedon Books, 255 pages
Nicholas Wright 'Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials'
I was lucky enough to see this stage version of Philip Pullman's trilogy performed at the National Theatre in London just before Christmas 2003. Although I was very impressed, I was also a little disappointed. Particularly the first part had something of the sense of being a travelogue, the majesty of Pullman's vision was somehow diminished, in a sense this was a kind of 'His Dark Materials Lite'. Thus Nicholas Wright's play sat on a shelf unlooked at for nearly a year. A few days ago and with no great expectations I started to read it. To my surprise I was drawn straight into the drama. Perhaps the National's production was just too cluttered and energetic for the play itself to work, or perhaps for me it was just too soon after reading the books. Anyway, I really enjoyed reading this adaptation. Certainly, there are many changes to Pullman's novel. Mary Malone, for example, is absent; her role as the tempter is taken by Serafina Pekkala. That alone removes one of the most interesting characters from the drama. But no matter, I was gripped by this adaptation. It's not the same is Philip Pullman's books, but neither is it 'Pullman Lite'. Recommended, but only after a reasonable interval from reading the books,
A Nick Hern Book, 236 pages
Claire Squires 'Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials Trilogy, A Reader's Guide'
Filled with enthusiasm I also pulled this unread 'HDM' book off my shelves. Frankly, it would have been better to have left it there. This book has little to recommend it; a few workman-like chapters on Pullman, his books, the trilogy… but nothing especially original or thought provoking. Perhaps useful as a revision aid before an exam, but no more. Not recommended.
Continuum, 95 pages
Henk Tennekes 'The Simple Science of Flight'
The greatest compliment that I can pay this book is that as soon as I had finished it, I immediately began to re-read it. This book is excellent. The science of flight is clearly explained in an interesting and thought-provoking way. For Prof Tennekes there is no artificial distinction between birds and planes; both are solutions to the same engineering problems. In a series of comprehensive graphs, he shows there to be a continuum from butterflies, though birds to light aircraft and on to commercial jet airliners. Although there are formulas given, the level of mathematics required for this book is not high. On the other hand, an interest in calculation is required. If you are the sort of person who wonders why things fly faster as they get bigger, how much power a budgerigar expends or why hovering birds are all small, then this is the book for you. And by-the-way did you know that while you're reading this your body is dissipating about 2 Watts of power per kilogram; or that a train requires about 1.6 mega Joules of energy per person per mile, which is about half that of a car, so is a half empty train really greener than a full car? Thought provoking like I said.
The MIT Press, 137 pages
Greg Bear 'Darwin's Radio'
What links a mass grave in the Caucasus; a mummified prehistoric family and a strange disease causing women to miscarry and then spontaneously re-conceive without intercourse? Well, if you read the back cover you'll know; it's that 'Old Devil Evolution' up to his tricks again. And that's it; the only vaguely original part of this 'tense technothriller' is given away on the back page. If you don't read dust covers, don't worry the author repeats it enough times that you can hardly miss it. And after that it's just a question of wadding on while the characters fall in love with one another, have babies, run away from the law, etc. Thanks to Greg Bear's turgid adjective laden prose all this requires over 400 pages. Take the following as a sample;
'He sat with his head in his hands in a pale bleached oak armchair beneath a pastel seascape framed in ash and hung on pleasantly light and neutral stripped wallpaper'.
I guess that the front cover gives it away when it says 'Whatever Bear touches turns epic'!
HarperCollins, 439 pages
Robert Axelrod 'The Evolution of Co-operation'
This is an interesting and important book. With the aid of computer modelling and some mathematics Robert Axelrod shows how co-operation can get started, what maintains it and what can stop it. Covering areas as diverse as WWI trench warfare, politics, biology and economics, Dr Axelrod shows how the same rules apply; all can be modelled as an iterated Prisoner's Dilemma. Axelrod shows how the most successful way of handling the dilemma is though co-operation: work to maximize both your score and your rival's and you will both to well; work to take advantage of your rivals and you'll do badly yourself. In summary
Don't be envious
Don't be the first to defect
Reciprocate both cooperation and defection
Don't be too clever
This book should be compulsory reading for policy makers and politicians.
Penguin, 241 pages
Adrienne Mayor 'Greek Fire, Poison Arrows & Scorpion Bombs. Biological and Chemical Warfare in the Ancient World'
Those looking for an illustration of the old maxim that the preoccupations of the present can colour the interpretation of the past could do a lot worse than examine this book. With a mixture of cod science and tabloid journalism Miss Mayor trawls through ancient history and mythology looking for 'weapons of mass destruction' and she finds plenty; or does she? In any factual book the reader must continually ask if the author is really a reliable guide. In my opinion Miss Mayor is not. Take her interpretation of the myth of Medea. Jason, Medea's husband has left her and plans to marry the Corinthian princess Glauke. In revenge Medea prepares a wedding gift for the unfortunate girl, a poison robe, which when Glauke puts it on bursts into flame and sticks to her skin so that she is unable to remove it. Both she and her father who attempts to help her are consumed. The parallel between the poison robe and modern napalm is indeed striking, but does it show that 'the myth of Medea was based on arcane knowledge of the destructive burning nature of petroleum', and did it 'symbolize for the ancients the horrors of nefarious toxic weapons'? Surely Miss Mayor has totally missed the point; the myth of Medea is not a text on incendiary weapons, but a psychological study of a wronged woman driven over the edge. The ancients did not need to know about petroleum, in a time of clothes made from flammable natural fabrics and when naked flames were used for illumination tragic accidents must have been all too common. The point is not how Glauke died but that Medea is capable of cold bloodedly inflicting such a fate.
In this book Miss Mayor employs a kind of von Daniken like logic to find chemical and biological weapons everywhere. Her arguments are weak and her knowledge of chemistry shocking. Throughout the book there is a liberal scattering of scientific terms, frequently used incorrectly; and a large number of bio-this and bio-that, bio-hazard, bio-toxin, bio-weapon, bio-bullshit…
I am sure that the ancients really did make use of chemical and biological weapons; however, this book is not a good place to read about those attempts.
Overlook Duckworth, 319 pages
Umberto Eco 'Baudolino' (translated by William Weaver)
'Many relics that are preserved here in Constantinople are of very suspect origin, but the worshipper who kisses them perceives supernatural aromas wafting from them. It is faith that makes them true, not they who make faith true.'
This excellent book tells the story of Baudolino, a man with the gift of telling the right lie at the right time. A chance meeting with the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick Barbarossa sends our hero on a fantastic adventure across the known world and off in the search for the mystic kingdom of Prester John. Throughout, Umberto Eco shows a wry sense of humour, as our heroes go from one adventure to the next, always arguing about some philosophical point like the shape of the cosmos or the existence of the vacuum. Eco, like our hero weaves a rich fabric in which fact and fiction blend. Take one of Baudolino's travelling companions Kyot, is he the 'Kyot of Provencal' who inspired the medieval writer Wolfram von Eschenbach's 'Parzival'?
I suspect that someone with more knowledge of medieval history than I (which would not be difficult) would find many more subtleties in this book that I did. Still, I enjoyed this book hugely and can whole heartily recommend it.
Vintage, 522
Christopher Logue 'Cold calls'
A further instalment in Logue's ongoing Homer series. This is certainly the briefest, but by no means the weakest volume. It is like a vista seen in a lightning flash, powerful, startling and dramatic. Recommended.
Faber and Faber, 44 pages