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ethanhedman's reviews
148 reviews
Fidel:: A Critical Portrait by Tad Szulc
medium-paced
3.0
A bit like if Piers Morgan interviewed and wrote a book on Gustavo Petro, which is an equivalency that is somewhat offensive to Tad Szulc and Massively offensive to Fidel Castro.
Occupied Voices: Stories of Everyday Life from the Second Intifada by Wendy Pearlman
5.0
The pain and loss and displacement that Pearlman found during the second intifada and put into text could have been nearly unaltered and published today.
Two passages stood out to me in my first reading.
“You know, I think that peace would be the most dangerous thing for the Israeli community. Peace means that the outside enemy is no longer there. If they didn't have an external enemy, then they would probably have to look for another enemy among themselves. This was the psychological process behind the killing of Rabin. Rabin was serious about making peace with Arabs and Palestinians, and that is why an Israeli killed him.”
“In the West they may have luxury and security. But all of those luxuries can make people forget what "homeland" means. It can keep them from truly feeling for their neighbors or caring about their own people.”
Two passages stood out to me in my first reading.
“You know, I think that peace would be the most dangerous thing for the Israeli community. Peace means that the outside enemy is no longer there. If they didn't have an external enemy, then they would probably have to look for another enemy among themselves. This was the psychological process behind the killing of Rabin. Rabin was serious about making peace with Arabs and Palestinians, and that is why an Israeli killed him.”
“In the West they may have luxury and security. But all of those luxuries can make people forget what "homeland" means. It can keep them from truly feeling for their neighbors or caring about their own people.”
Debt: The First 5,000 Years by David Graeber
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
4.0
“Capitalism’s inveterate propensity to imagine its own destruction has morphed, in the last half-century, into scenarios that threaten to bring the rest of the world down with it”.
Graeber wrote this book in 2008/09 during the global financial crisis, a time when more people than ever questioned dollar hegemony, money as a concept, and debt as something more than a nebulous concept (student loan mvmt). By dissecting and rebuking the crux of Adam Smith’s “An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations” and the ‘common sense’ idea that all primitive communities through the Axial age resorted to bartering before the invention of money because they had no other options, Graeber is imploring us to ask large questions about the moral, social, and economic relationships that are associated with usury, debt, and money lending from the smallest scale to the largest. RIP.
Graeber wrote this book in 2008/09 during the global financial crisis, a time when more people than ever questioned dollar hegemony, money as a concept, and debt as something more than a nebulous concept (student loan mvmt). By dissecting and rebuking the crux of Adam Smith’s “An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations” and the ‘common sense’ idea that all primitive communities through the Axial age resorted to bartering before the invention of money because they had no other options, Graeber is imploring us to ask large questions about the moral, social, and economic relationships that are associated with usury, debt, and money lending from the smallest scale to the largest. RIP.
2666 by Roberto Bolaño
challenging
dark
mysterious
reflective
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.5
Bolano did not write one book before he passed. He wrote 5 that all intertwine in one larger tapestry. Not only that, 3 of them are great books. One of the best works of fiction I have ever read.
From the Ruins of Empire: The Revolt Against the West and the Remaking of Asia by Pankaj Mishra
challenging
informative
fast-paced
3.5