What are you reading now - and then

[sukumvit boy]

Very interesting post and links.
Your mention of "Leaves of Grass "reminds me of a time in my teenage years when I carried that book with me wherever I went , like a Christian Evangelical carries his bible ( no offence to Christian Evangelicals).Along with Alan Watt's , "The Way of Zen" and Bertrand Russel's ,"Why I Am Not a Christian" , LOL adolescent rebellion of a former Catholic alter boy.
Also , although I'm familiar with Hubert Selby Jr. , I can't remember ever reading "Last Exit to Brooklyn" , need to give that a look. I read pretty much all of Allen Ginsberg and William S Burroughs ( some of that stuff is virtually unreadable ) and other Grove Press authors but "Last Exit " looks like a good read . Selby's "The Room " also looks interesting.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hubert_Selby_Jr.
All of Orwell , Including," Down and Out in London and Paris" is in a class by itself. I loved "Burmese Days".

[sukumvit boy]

This is a good thread. So I will post this here.
I need some tips about Some really good Queer/non-binary authors to read (but not books). Like blogs, sites or medium. Transwomen, cis women, WOC or whatever.
Any help?

Hey , josehip , welcome to the thread . Are you looking for erotica or something more along the lines of social commentary or journalism ?
You are certainly on the right Forum as far as sites and blogs go . With regard to authors to read , "but not books" I would suggest posing the same question to Google and see what it comes up with.

[trish]

Currently I’m doing a little light reading: Legacy of Spies by John Le Carre’. Although it’s set in the current day, the story harkens back to an operation that took place during the ‘Cold War.’ The good guys aren’t so good and neither are the bad guys. I’m not a Le Carre’ reader: the only other book of his I ever read was The Delicate Truth.

[gaiseric]

I've just finished reading the 6 available novels in the Peter Grant series by Ben Aaronovich. The main theme of these books is magic and weird stuff in the criminal world being dealt with by a sceptical police force. They're a really good read. There are also 3 complete graphic novels available as well.

I am now reading Sahara by Clive Cussler which is set in Mali in Western Africa.

[ILuvGurls]

"The Late Show" by Michael Connelly

[Ts RedVeX]

[sukumvit boy]

Currently I’m doing a little light reading: Legacy of Spies by John Le Carre’. Although it’s set in the current day, the story harkens back to an operation that took place during the ‘Cold War.’ The good guys aren’t so good and neither are the bad guys. I’m not a Le Carre’ reader: the only other book of his I ever read was The Delicate Truth.

I hope you enjoy that , I like his more recent work and non fiction much more than the earlier George Smiley spy novels and I am looking forward to reading "Legacy...",his latest.
His real life is almost more interesting than his novels , "The Pigeon Tunnel : Stories From My Life" 2016 was fascinating . His father Ronnie Cornwell was an amazing character and con man.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/the-li...b_9643316.html

[Stavros]

Some of you may have read the brief exchange I had with RedVex on Solidarity in the thread on the Las Vegas massacre. I did not respond to one post because I felt the thread had lost its way and did not want to push it further away from the event in Las Vegas. It does, however, raise interesting questions about Solidarity (to give it its English name) and the transition in Poland, not least because RedVex has a radically different view from most, and one that I think is both mistaken and confusing.

The sources I have used for my initial comments are worth reading in their own right, and are Archie Brown: The Rise and Fall of Communism (2009), and Tony Judt: Postwar: A History of Europe Since 1945 (2005). Both historians attribute the collapse of communism to a combination of factors, with the economic incompetence of central planning at its core, combined with Gorbachev's internal reforms and foreign policy (Afghanistan being a disater for the Soviet military). Nevertheless, this does not lessen the importance, in Poland of the Solidarity movement and the role it played in breaking the back of the Polish United Workers Party and seeing it off in the elections of September 1988.

This is what RedVex wrote (I have edited out irrelevant passages):
1. You wrote "Solidarity" rather than solidarity, so no, you were indeed referring to the party rather than solidarity or empathy.
2. Originally, Solidarity, was called PPS (Partia Pracownicza Solidarnosc) and itwas indeed a communist labour party of comrades. There isn't much resources in about that one so that people don't have many opportunities to know it even existed. The Solidarity that was formed in 1980, NSZZ Solidarnosc (Niezalezny Samorzadowy Zwiazek Zawodowy Solidarnosc), after PPS had been dissolved, was merely a medium for transferring power from the state to someone the state could easily control, e.g. by blackmail, so to agents of the Secret Police, SB (Sluzby Bezpieczenstwa), and petty snitches like Lech Walesa. Such operation was necessary as people had enough of "the system" and would not trust anyone related to it (such as gen. Jaruzelski). They would however trust an simple electrician from the shipyard.
General Wojciech Jaruzelski's decision about overthrowing the communist regime by introducing martial law was a partially successful attempt to liberate Poland. Otherwise, NSZZ Solidarnosc, which consisted of gen. Czeslaw Kiszczak's agents, would have taken over. Unfortunately no reforms took place under Jaruzelski's reign until 1988.

-I concede I had not heard of the PPS and cannot find much on the internet in either Polish or English, and it could either be the early attempts at an independent trade union that flourished briefly in 1978-79, or the first grouping in the Lenin Shipyard in 1980 prior to the formal creation of Solidarity that year.
-What I find odd is the designation of Solidarity as merely a medium for transferring power from the state to someone the state could easily control, when the reality is that what Solidarity exposed was the weakness of the Polish United Workers Party and the fact that it was not controlled by the party at all. It is just as odd to claim that Jaruzelski's decision about overthrowing the communist regime by introducing martial law was a partially successful attempt to liberate Poland when he successfully rounded up and imprisoned those leaders whom we were earlier told were stooges of the government, and delayed the transition in Poland rather than hastening it.

-A signal problem that I find with the language of RedVex's interpretation is the inability to distinguish between Communists and whoever else lives in Poland. The point may relate to the 'problem' for her, that as with Gorbachev in Russia, many if not most of Solidarity's members wanted to reform the system rather than to replace it. If many were themselves members of the PUWP but defected to Solidarity or worked for the state, then in a sense they were 'communists' by employment and affiliation. But what RedVex does not mention, is that most of Solidarity's members, whatever they job or party affiliation before 1980, would have claimed to be Roman Catholics. Indeed, a passionate fidelity to Catholicism was one of the key components of the transition in Poland which undermines the attempt to smear Solidarity as, in effect, just a tool of the Communists. The role played in all this by the Polish Pope hardly needs a reference.

-Where it becomes intriguing is in the relationship the church had with the State, from the (Stalinist) attempt to crush the church after the war, to the accommodation that was eventually reached in 1956 which became crucial in creating a space between the Party and the People in which Poles were free to express their faith, to the extent that one can see how this space (also found in a vibrant arts scene, notably in film and theatre) became vital for the anti-party protests in the 1970s and 1980s -mostly caused by price rises for basic commodities- which led in time to the eclipse of the party itself, while the Roman Catholic Church went from strength to strength. There is a brief overview of this here-
https://chnm.gmu.edu/1989/exhibits/r...h/introduction

-In other words, I am confused, because a Communist cannot also be a Catholic, so why has RedVex dismissed the Solidarity movement as a Communist outfit when if anything, it could be re-designated a Catholic one? And all this without discussing the conspiracy theorists who see a conduit of CIA money via the Catholic Church to Solidarity members and other dissidents as also playing a role in the 1980s.

[Lk123456779]

Right now I'm reading The 16th Round by Rubin Carter and The Undisputed Truth by Mike Tyson

16th round is The book/story the holllywokd Denzel Washington movie was based on.

Really good book. Interesting and I've blasted through heaps of pages without feeling like I've been doing so. The pages have passed by easily.
Im not the biggest reader so when I get engaged in a book and don't realise how much I'm passing through it's always a good Sign.

I'm only a couple chapters into Mikes book but enjoying it so far. Will probably put it down until I finish 16th first as I don't want to split my thoughts between 2 books at once.


As for what books I like reading. For me it's exclusively autobiographys with the ocasional biography written by someone else (as I did with Unforgiveable Blackness the biography written about the first black heavyweight boxing champ). I have no interest in reading some made up story.

[sukumvit boy]

Welcome to the Forum and this thread ,Lk123456779.
I have noticed that as I get older I have less interest in reading fiction , no matter how well written I know it is.
Also enjoy autobiography , and it is so satisfying to find an author who has both an interesting story to tell and the ability to tell it well .