What I Have Been Up To...

What I have been reading from mid-January till now...? A lot but none is finished...shame...

Frazer, The Golden Bough: A study in magic and religion (Abridged Edn). The religious life has never been so much exposed and so touchable to me. Descriptive and rich, it is to me a state-of-the-art anthropology reading. Although at the meantime I went to talks brought by the Christian Society, this reading is yet to have much connection with the speeches.

Gandhi, An Autobiography: The Story of My Experience with Truth. A very striking work - yet he tells his story in a most modest manner. It is not the words but something behind them are inspiring. '...there's no other God than Truth.'

McMahon, The Pursuit of Happiness: A History from the Greeks to the Present. We all long for certain kind of happiness, but do we? We think the pursuit of happiness is human instinct, but is it so ever since? From McMahon's book you start to realize how happiness has become our desire - it is a late awareness of the human being. This book is rather psycor than history, to me.

Coyle & Morrow, The Philosophical Foundations of Environmental Law: Property, Rights and Nature. It focuses on an interesting question of the relationship environmental law is governing. As a (very) contemporary division of law, environmental law or the law concerning the environment does not seek to home itself to a philosophical theory, since it appears always policy-driven. The authors argue that it concerns the relationship between human and nature, in adjusting the ownership and the use of (nature as) 'property'.

Bahn (Ed.), The Cambridge Illustrated History of Archaeology. An account of archaeological exploration and research. With maps, charts, index and a wide range of other visual support, it illustrates the history of the subject of archaeology. Sooooo interesting.



Besides, I got really good bargin on 7 new books from DSU. (They sell really good stock/used stuff at DSU. e.g. the weekly CD stall where I got 1950s old movies and high quality Eagles CDs for Mo.) Books are priced from £2 to £4, and the vendor sold me some items for £1 or for free, since I am his big customer:P Books I got are:

Tolstoy, War and Peace
Gandhi, An Autobiography: The Story of My Experience with Truth
>>p.s. was reading the copy from library, and saw it sold for £3.5 today...
Barrow, The Romans
Kitto, The Greeks
Brondsted, The Vikings
>>p.s. this series of history from the 'Pelican Original' is so good...am fan of Penguin Books
Slovo, Red Dust (novel about truth and lie, and uncertainty...)
Szpilman, The Pianist (novel of a Jewish pianist...is now a film)