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Thread: Lockdown reading

  1. #31
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    I read a lot. In amongst the historical fiction and SF this last year I read "The places in between" by Rory Stewart.
    It is certainly an interesting tale and an impressive journey. I have read people describe Rory as either arrogant or brave for the way he made the journey by surviving on the local people's hospitality. Not knowing much about Afghan culture it is hard to make a judgement on that - perhaps that adds to the complexity of the tale. What I do applaud Rory for though, is that the book focuses on the peoples and cultures of the land he is travelling through rather than glorifying his endeavour.

  2. #32
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    Quote Originally Posted by PiesAreGood View Post
    I read a lot. In amongst the historical fiction and SF this last year I read "The places in between" by Rory Stewart.
    It is certainly an interesting tale and an impressive journey. I have read people describe Rory as either arrogant or brave for the way he made the journey by surviving on the local people's hospitality. Not knowing much about Afghan culture it is hard to make a judgement on that - perhaps that adds to the complexity of the tale. What I do applaud Rory for though, is that the book focuses on the peoples and cultures of the land he is travelling through rather than glorifying his endeavour.
    I read that on my sons reccomendation, Very good read and he must have balls of steel.

  3. #33
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    Quote Originally Posted by MattPo View Post
    I read that on my sons reccomendation, Very good read and he must have balls of steel.
    I was amazed at his bravery - he could so easily have been killed. As to relying on the local hospitality, it would have been insulting not to accept it.

    I have started Shuggie Bain - toeing the line between credibility and ridiculous, but then why should fiction be credible.

  4. #34
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    Quote Originally Posted by Mike T View Post
    I was amazed at his bravery - he could so easily have been killed. As to relying on the local hospitality, it would have been insulting not to accept it.
    Yes, brave on many levels. I probably wouldn't have the social skills to negotiate a place to stay with locals travelling the length of the UK nevermind Afghanistan.

  5. #35
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    The Motion of the Body Through Space - Lionel Schriver
    https://www.bookdepository.com/The-M...83657831707580

    I've just finished reading Lionel Schrivier's book. She (yeap I didn't know 'he' was a 'she' as I never read her award winning book - 'we need to talk about Kevin') at the age of 63 strikes many a chord with themes I'm guessing most of us on here have to contend with regarding exercise, what others label as 'obsessive' fitness and ageing. But it's so much more than that. She's razor sharp witty with a sardonic self-parodying humour and an incisive insight into life and contemporary issues.

    If you want a sneak preview into her writing style and mindset, here's a piece she wrote recently entitled...
    Your Gym routine is worthless https://unherd.com/2021/05/your-gym-...eid=6f90f4801e

    Here's a section from the above, in which she's also recommending and reviewing a book by Bechdel..

    "One reason people like Bechdel and me avoid competitive sports is that by nature we’re too competitive, and so might take conclusive defeat fatally to heart. Thus the rivalrous devil on my shoulder jeered over these pages, “Oh, yeah? You’ve biked a hundred miles in a day? Well, I’ve cycled so-called centuries cross-country for months!” I know. Pathetic. Indeed, an aim of both my novel and Bechdel’s is to question why we’ve come to invest so much status in fitness. How come many of us now compare ourselves to others in accordance with who does more repetitions of deltoid dips, even more so than with who earns more money or builds the more dazzling career?"
    Am Yisrael Chai

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    Lionel Shriver sounds a great writer and the book looks interesting but part of me wonders why she needs to (or anyone needs to) worry about being obsessively driven by wanting to keep fit. And the comparison with having lots of money and/or a successful career is bonkers too. What is she saying? Having lots of money and a successful career is normal and has more merit than just being a ‘non-normal’ fitness fanatic?

  7. #37
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    Quote Originally Posted by Fellbeast View Post
    Lionel Shriver sounds a great writer and the book looks interesting but part of me wonders why she needs to (or anyone needs to) worry about being obsessively driven by wanting to keep fit.
    I read it very differently. Firstly, I don't think she is 'worrying' about being obsessively driven by wanting to keep fit. She's actually a full-paid-up-member of the obsession/compulsive fitness club herself and, in part, the book is an enquiry into the phenomena of why she does it, but more widely why it has become a mass cultural phenomenon over the last 20 years or so. It probably helps to know (and this is all new to me too so I'm not expert on Schriver) that she regularly writes for The Spectator, gets invites to give talks and Q and As at the Oxford Union and is a commentary journalist as well as a novelist. I think she's an intellectual, often viewed with suspicion and considered a despised group these days.

    Quote Originally Posted by Fellbeast View Post
    And the comparison with having lots of money and/or a successful career is bonkers too. What is she saying? Having lots of money and a successful career is normal and has more merit than just being a ‘non-normal’ fitness fanatic?

    She's not saying that (to my reading). Asking a question as a means of entertaining a thought and commenting on it, doesn't mean that that's what you think - although that distinction is often lost in the social media obsessed world. Likewise, being able to hold two or more contradictory concepts in your head, doesn't mean you have signed up for any of them or that you have to become discombobulated and need lie down in a darken room. It used to be what good universities taught their undergrads to do.

    Many of us on here will, like Schriver, have been exercising for 40 years or more when, outside of school and the Army, 'keeping-fit' was seen as a bit oddball. Yet, maybe twenty years or so ago it became more mainstream and even mroe recently it's become a new social measure of one's self-identity (for some/mamy) rather than, say, someone's profession or wealth. She's not saying that's a bad-thing either, but is interested in the rise of obsessions with daily steps, fitbits, commercial event planning, like The Big Mudder, and Triathlons, etc.. I think you posted that great cartoon about performance obsession and watches https://www.flickr.com/photos/16716009@N03/51174693554/ That's the kind of cultural changes she's interested in and commenting on, even if speculatively. Not everyone's cup of tea I agree. Nuff said - sorry for droning on
    Am Yisrael Chai

  8. #38
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    Currently reading 'Gasping thin air' by Jo Bradwell. Mountain adventures by the Birmingham Medical Research Expeditionary Society detailing their many trips to the Himalaya, Alps and beyond in forefront of research into acute mountain sickness. Later chapters focus on more recreational trips nearer home including the Lakes and Scotland.
    I have to admit a slight bias (in that I used to work for the author) but it is a good read if a tad niche and definitely worth seeking out if you like that sort of thing.

  9. #39
    Quote Originally Posted by Marco View Post
    The 1860 Hub on the internet; the journal from the oldest bike shop in the world

    Starts with a black and white photo of Fausto Coppi, and then descends the rabbit hole from there

    For Graham, and other cyclophiles, only
    Out of interest - do you read Rouleur?
    "...as dry as the Atacama desert".

  10. #40
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    I used to but far too expensive now

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    Quote Originally Posted by Graham Breeze View Post
    Out of interest - do you read Rouleur?

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