What I Heard

November 20, 2021

Fiction

Lately, I’ve been working my way through H.P. Lovecraft, The Complete Fiction, collected by The H.P. Lovecraft Historical Society and read by their two founding members. The entire audiobook is over 50 hours, and, needless to say, I’ll probably be listening intermittently for the next year, at least. That said, there is a baby coming in just a few weeks to this family  (a sort of Lovecraftian situation in its own right), so, well… we’ll see.

Nonfiction

My nonfiction consumption has been somewhat lacking as of late, though I do have my eyes on a few recent releases. The New York Times recently Collected and revised essays and stories from The 1619 Project into a complete text. Paul Bloom’s The Sweet Spot is also on my radar. His interviews in several podcasts, reviews in The New Yorker and other publications, Bloom’s past writing—plus the subject of suffering, in general—make this one a must-read in the near future. Finally, David Graeber’s posthumously published The Dawn of Everything seems to have been well-received. When I’m in the mood for my next megahistory, this should fit the bill.

Journalism

Two stories stand out over the past month (though there have been some incredible pieces written recently). First, “Last Dance” by Alice Robb in Vanity Fair covers a couple—Ashley Byers and Doug Benefield—who met on the Trump 2016 campaign trail, formed a ballet company together, and the alleged murder of Benefield by Byers. The second, “The Bad Guys Are Winning” By Anne Applebaum in The Atlantic covers authoritarian leaders around the world including Alexander Lukashenko of Belarus, Nicolás Maduro, and others. Left- and right-wing authoritarianism juxtaposed against the dysfunction in “Last Dance” makes for curious reading—can so many of our problems, both personal and societal, be boiled down to a lack of moral clarity?

Podcast

On the 11/12/2021 episode of Africa Daily, the show explores differences in rhino and elephant conservation policy between a few nations in Southern Africa, namely Botswana and South Africa. In Botswana, it is actually legal to shoot and kill poachers on sight. In South Africa, a person can only defend themself (respond to direct fire) and not the animals directly. 

It turns out that this has led to a significant decrease in poaching in Botswana. Elephants, it seems, have figured this out and have begun to cross the border seeking safety. I’ve been saying for some time now that elephants—as well as animals like whales and some others—should actually be considered to be people (in the strictest sense of the word) and granted rights typically assigned to humans.

October 9, 2021

Fiction

Still working through The Science Fiction Hall of Fame, Vol. 1, 1929-1964, edited by Robert Silverberg and, let me just say, my holdups about early-20th century science fiction were, at best, misguided. Most of these stories are engaging in a way I’d generally only expect from contemporary fiction. Sure, there are a lot of “I’ll take the next rocket to Mars” lines, but otherwise have aged quite well. “Nightfall” by Isaac Asimov and “The Roads Must Roll” by Robert A. Heinlein are a couple of standouts so far. I’ve also just started The Exorcist by William Peter Blatty. Fantastic so far, and appropriate for October. No observations so far except that Blatty’s reading is perfect.

Nonfiction

I recently finished Bonnie Tsui’s short memoir/history Why We Swim. In Six sections, Tsui describes the evolutionary, historical, medical, and cultural reasons people swim—interwoven with her personal history as a lifelong swimmer, including in open water. I started swimming “right out of the womb,” as my parents say. Some amazing facts include: one style in Japan date back to samurai swimming in full armor, and some famously accomplished open water swimmers have extra thick layers of fat that act like internal wetsuits.

Journalism

One article I’ve read in the past couple of weeks seems particularly memorable. “Who Is the Bad Art Friend?” by Robert Kolker, published in The New York Times Magazine. The piece covers the conflict between writers Dawn Dorland and Sonya Larson. Dawn donates her kidney to what is essentially a pool for the next necessary transplant recipient. Live organ donation is incredibly rare, for obvious reasons, and Dorland writes publicly about the experience. Later, it comes to light that Larson’s story, “Kindness,” seems to be based on Dorland’s experience and even takes some text from one of Dorland’s letters. The question becomes: who gets to tell certain stories?

Podcast

Kara Swisher, along with Pivot co-host Scott Galloway, held her Code conference last week and is beginning to release the audio from various conversations at the event. First up was Elon Musk. I don’t think there’s another person I’m as conflicted about. On one hand, his goals are admirable—become a multi-planetary species, escape great filter(s), and, in the short term, dramatically reduce the cost of getting material into orbit. The problem is that he doesn’t seem to care much for the humans that are already here, seems quite flippant about our existing institutions, and doesn’t seem to care about the fact that his tweets can move markets. Musk has some real haters and some rabid followers, but I think both sides seem to be caught up in their own narratives about the man.

September 12, 2021

Fiction

Currently listening to a collection, The Science Fiction Hall of Fame, Vol. 1, 1929-1964, edited by Robert Silverberg. Early sci-fi has been something of a dark spot in my reading career, and this seems to be a great place to fill in some gaps. A little while back, I read Bradbury’s The Illustrated Man, and, though a book published in 1951 demands to be read in context, I have to admit I struggled with it a bit. Some of the stories were quite interesting (i particularly enjoyed “The Veldt” and “Marionettes, Inc.”), others, like “The Other Foot” read very strangely in a post-George Floyd environment.  Whatever the case, contemporary sci-fi is some of the best fiction out there right now, and getting some of the 20th century’s best is worth the indulgence.

Nonfiction

I’m about halfway through People Who Eat Darkness by Richard Lloyd Parry.. The book covers the disappearance of Lucie Blackman, a 21-year-old British woman who traveled to Tokyo in the summer of 2000. An extended piece of journalism in many ways, one of the most shocking elements of the book, especially to an American liberal like myself, is how illiberal the Japanese justice system seems to be. Of course, one can’t draw too many conclusions from a single text, but this is one of the first nodes of many in my network of thinking about Japan and the region as a whole.

Journalism

A few things stand out as I write this on September 12. First is the coverage of the American/NATO withdrawal from Afghanistan 20 years after 9/11. Though coverage has been different in various outlets, it seems quite clear that Biden’s first major mistake was the handling of the withdrawal. Of course, it is reductive to say the execution was entirely “his fault,” but, surely, we could have evacuated more of our allies over the past few months and sped up the SIV process… at least. Much of my attention is being consumed by politics and Biden’s domestic agenda—the pandemic, the Democrats’ hard and soft infrastructure bills, and the California recall election (please, dear God, no…).

Podcast

In Harris’ recent episode of Making Sense, 259 with Balaji Srinivasan, we got a hilarious/horrifying look into the mind of the tech/crypto-bro. OK, cryptocurrency and blockchain are obviously important technologies, but these evangelists sure seem to be utterly insane. Srinivasan envisions (dystopian) crypto-powered governments, the demise of institutions (apparently a good thing), and the collapse of the United States into a fractured collection of municipalities resembling Germany pre-Bismarck by 2040 (maybe even 2030). And, this is all a good thing that will preserve liberalism by the way….

Spring 2021

Fiction

Currently listening to The Beautiful Thing That Awaits Us All by Laird Barron. A collection of horror short stories I read previously in undergrad, I am listening now because 1. the audiobook was on sale, and 2. there is probably something I missed or did not appreciate before.

Nonfiction

Currently listening to The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins. I never read this book back during the “New Atheist” hay day of the mid-2000s and was curious to see how it stood up after 15 years. I recently described it as “not not good” to friends. Of course, Dawkins is a giant in his own right and I don’t mean to be overly critical of the book, but both I and we as a culture have, I think, moved on from such a book being necessary. Maybe I’m naïve.

Journalism

Whether it’s the algorithms feeding me or just chance, there seems to have been a swath of religion-skeptical or related pieces in a number of magazines, including “America Without God” by Shadi Hamid in The Atlantic which discusses the decline in traditional religious thinking among Americans being replaced by polarizing ideological politics and “Can Religion Give You PTSD?” by Stephanie Russell-Kraft in The New Republic about “exvangelicals” raised in rigid Christian environments. 

Podcast

I recently finished the current season of  “The Uncertain Hour” and am considering if it is worth the time investment to go back and listen to the previous three. Season four focused on the nature of employment as a contemporary and historical concept in the United States. Though I’d still call myself a capitalist, the failure of the market to incentivize humane work arrangements—from independent janitorial contractors to chicken catchers—seems like a test society and government are failing.