Category Archives: B - READING

READINGMAY 2023

25143. (Jean-Paul Gagnon & Emi­ly Beau­soleil) West By Not West: Comparative 
. . . . . Demo­c­ra­t­ic The­o­ry is Con­stel­la­tion­al [arti­cle]
25144. (Damon Knight) The Oth­er Foot [nov­el ver­sion; short sto­ry ver­sion read at 14153]
25145. (Fred­er­ic Charles Schaf­fer & Jean-Paul Gagnon) The Hege­mon­ic Con­cept of 
. . . . . Democ­ra­cy has Dis­solved, What Hap­pens Now? [arti­cle]
(Stephanie Dal­ley ‑ed. & –tr.) Myths From Mesopotamia:
. . . . 25146. [2] (Stephanie Dal­ley) Intro­duc­tion [pref­ace]
. . . . 25147. [2] (attr. Nur-Aya) Atra­ha­sis [c. 1700 BC]
. . . . 25148. [6] The Epic of Gil­gamesh, Stan­dard Akka­di­an Ver­sion from Nineveh
. . . . 25149. [7] The Epic of Gil­gamesh, Old Baby­lon­ian Version
. . . . . . . . . [see oth­er trans­la­tions at 1792, 1808, 14000, 20700–20705]
. . . . 25150. [3] The Descent of Ishtar to the Under­world [see Speis­er tr. in 1808]
. . . . 25151. [3] Ner­gal and Ereshki­gal, Stan­dard Version
. . . . 25152. [4] Ner­gal and Ereshki­gal, Amar­na Ver­sion [see Grayson tr. in 1809]
. . . . 25153. [3] Ada­pa [see Speis­er tr. 1808]
. . . . 25154. [2] (attr. Lu-Nan­na) Etana
. . . . 25155. [2] The Epic of Anzu, Stan­dard Version
. . . . 25156. [2] The Epic of Anzu, Old Baby­lon­ian Version 
. . . . 25157. [3] Enu­ma Elish, the Epic of Cre­ation [see Speis­er tr. in 1808 and 
. . . . . . . . . Addi­tion, Grayson tr., in 1809]
. . . . 25158. [3] Theoge­ny of Dun­nyu [see Grayson tr. in 1809]
. . . . 25159. [2] (attr. Kibti-ilani-Mar­duk of Dabibi) Erra and Ishum
. . . . 25160. (Desiree Simp­son) A Jour­ney Guid­ed by Grat­i­tude [arti­cle]
25161. (Mat­ti Charl­ton) A Frame­work for Drug Pol­i­cy Reform in the City of Toronto 
. . . . . [arti­cle]
25162. (Germ Lynn) What You Call
25163. (Bhagya M. Sub­rayan, et al) Scary Bar­bie: An Extreme­ly Ener­getic, Long-Duration 
. . . . . Tidal Dis­rup­tion Event Can­di­date With­out a Detect­ed Host Galaxy at 
. . . . . z = 0.995 [arti­cle]
25164. (Mat­ti Charl­ton) A Com­pre­hen­sive and Inno­v­a­tive Approach to Address 
. . . . . Home­less­ness in the City of Toron­to [arti­cle]
25165. (Ali Akbar & Ben­jamin Isakhan) The Islam­ic State, Shia Reli­gious Cler­ics and the 
. . . . . Mobil­i­sa­tion of Shia Mili­tias in Iraq and Syr­ia [arti­cle]
25166. (Mat­ti Charl­ton) Pro­pos­al for the City Peace Corps [arti­cle]
25167. (Umber­to Saba) Ernesto
25168. (Ter­ry Deary & Peter Hep­ple­white) The Awe­some Egyptians
25169. [2] (Gabrielle Roy) Rue Deschambault
25170. (Iain Thom­son) Frank Lloyd Wright Year By Year
25171. (George Hart) Ancient Egypt ― Eye­wit­ness Guide
25172. (Paul Duval) The Tan­gled Gar­den ― The Art of J. E. H. MacDonald

READINGAPRIL 2023

25131. (Dmit­ry Dubrovsky) Escape from Free­dom. The Russ­ian Aca­d­e­m­ic Community 
. . . . . and the Prob­lem of Aca­d­e­m­ic Righst and Free­doms [arti­cle]
25132. (David K. Wright) Impact of Farm­ing on African Land­scapes [arti­cle]
25133. (Joseph Kel­ly) Amer­i­ca’s Longest Siege ― Charleston, Slav­ery, and the Slow 
. . . . . March to Civ­il War
25134. (Clau­dia Chang, Sergei S. Ivanov & Per­ry A. Tourtel­lotte) Land­scape and 
. . . . . Set­tle­ment over 4 Mil­len­nia on the South Side of Lake Issyk Kul, Kyrgysztan: 
. . . . . Pre­lim­i­nary Results of Sur­vey Research in 2019–2021 [arti­cle]
25135. (Mat­ti Charl­ton) Dendrome
25136. (Meh­di Hasan) Win Every Argument
25137. (Pavla Peter­le Udi­vič & Miran Erič) Log­boat from Ižan­s­ka I {SI-81} from 
. . . . . Ljubl­jana: New Evi­dence for Iron Age Trans­porta­tion on the Ljubljana 
. . . . . Marsh­es, Slove­nia [arti­cle]
25138. (James Ker-Lind­say & Miku­las Fab­ry) Suc­ces­sion and State Creation
25139. (Tris­tan Carter) Obsid­i­an Con­sump­tion in the Late Pleis­tocene ― Early 
. . . . . Holocene Aegean: Con­tex­tu­al­is­ing New Data from Meolith­ic Crete [arti­cle]
25140. (Michael R. Waters, Thomas W. Stafford Jr. & David L. Carl­son) The Age of 
. . . . . Clo­vis ― 13,050 to 12,750 cal yr B.P. [arti­cle]
25141. (Mike Park­er Pear­son, et al) The Stone­henge River­side Project: Explor­ing the 
. . . . . Neolith­ic Land­scape of Stone­henge [arti­cle]
25142. (Tomas Lars­son & Stithorn Thananithi­chot) Who Votes for Virtue? Reli­gion and 
. . . . . Par­ty Choice in Thai­land’s 2019 Elec­tion [arti­cle]

READINGMARCH 2023

25104. (Kirsti Mäki­nen) The Kale­vala: Tales of Mag­ic and Adventure 
. . . . . [ill. Pirkko-Liisa Suro­je­gin] [tr. Kaa­ri­na Brooks] [prose re-telling of 
. . . . . Elias Lön­nrot’s Kale­vala with verse samples] 
. . . . . [see oth­er trans­la­tions: Bosley at 27 & 8563; Kir­by at 391; 
. . . . . Friberg at 18426]
25105. (Mat­ti Charl­ton) The Dark Woods ― A Very Light Bed­time Children’s 
. . . . . Story 
(William M. Brei­d­ing ‑ed.) Portable Stor­age Nine:
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25074. (Matti Charlton) You’re Mine ― A True Story for Brave Little Ones

There are not many books for chil­dren in which death is the main top­ic. Mar­jorie Kin­nan Rawl­ings’ 1938 nov­el The Year­ling, which dealt with death from a child’s point of view, comes to mind, but it was not con­ceived by it’s author as a “chil­dren’s book.” It is today gen­er­al­ly shelved with “young adult” fic­tion in libraries, but that was not a cat­e­go­ry in use at the time of its writ­ing. The author was address­ing adults in a sto­ry writ­ten from the point of view of a child. Its clar­i­ty and emo­tion­al inten­si­ty allowed it to reach a younger audi­ence. We expect a teenag­er to have some con­cern with the idea of death.

But when it comes to books for younger chil­dren, death is still a taboo top­ic. It is some­thing that, many believe, chil­dren should not be exposed to in fic­tion, or even allowed to think about. This pre­sumes that no small child will encounter death, or have to think of it, or need to under­stand it. Except, of course, the chil­dren in Uvalde, Texas, and Sandy Hook, Con­necti­cut. Except, of course, the mil­lions of small chil­dren who have had to expe­ri­ence a death in the fam­i­ly, or even the death of a beloved pet. And that does­n’t even take into account parts of the world torn up by war, where small chil­dren are drenched in the stench of death. There aren’t many chil­dren in Ukraine or Yemen, today, who are obliv­i­ous to death. Reli­gion is of lit­tle help, here. It is far more con­cerned with deny­ing death than with under­stand­ing it, or prepar­ing for it. At its worst, it attempts to dis­miss life as a mere pre­lude to an imag­ined eter­nal exis­tence … at once oblit­er­at­ing death from thought and oblit­er­at­ing life from significance.

So I would rec­om­mend Mat­ti Charl­ton’s  You’re Mine. I wish I had such a book avail­able to me when I was very young. In very straight­for­ward lan­guage, it explains death, how it is inevitable, and why its exis­tence under­lies the pre­cious­ness of life: “Be grate­ful for your life. Every day. Every sec­ond. Cher­ish every moment while your life is still yours.” The nar­ra­tor is death itself, por­trayed as a mon­strous beast, speak­ing to the read­er, “Lit­tle One.” While the art­work of the book is designed to be just scary enough for a child to han­dle, it also evokes the beau­ty of life in a way that a child can under­stand. It is refresh­ing­ly free of eva­sion, deceit, or exis­ten­tial­ist blar­ney. Many adults would ben­e­fit from read­ing it, since, as the author says in a post­script: “..we are all Lit­tle Ones, after all.

READINGFEBRUARY 2023

25089. [2] (Robert McClod­key) Homer Price
25090. (Rose­mary Sut­cliffe) Beowulf [sto­ry]
25091. (Peter S. Ungar) Evo­lu­tion’s Bite ― A Sto­ry of Teeth, Diet, and Human Origins
25092. (Jesús Gil Fuen­san­ta, Alfre­do Mederos Martín & Otabek Ukta­movich Muminov) 
. . . . . Not Far from the Lim­its of the North­ern Uruk Cul­ture in the Middle/Upper
. . . . . Euphrates: the Lat­er Cal­col­ith­ic Lev­els of Surte­pe [arti­cle]
25093. (Susan Dewey, et al) Con­trol Creep and the Mul­ti­ple Exclu­sions Faced by Women 
. . . . . in Low-Auton­o­my Sex Indus­try Sec­tors [arti­cle]
25094. (Raziel Reid) When Every­thing Feels Like the Movies
25095. (Joseph R. Bish­op & Pas­cal Gag­neux) Evo­lu­tion of Car­bo­hy­drate Antigens ― 
. . . . . Micro­bial Forces Shap­ing Host Gly­comes? [arti­cle]
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READINGJANUARY 2023

25071. (John Wilkins) The Dis­cov­ery of a New World: or, a Dis­course tend­ing to Prove, 
. . . . . that it is Prob­a­ble there may be anoth­er Hab­it­able World in the Moon [1638]
25072. (Mike Cura­to) Flamer [graph­ic novel]
25073. (Richard Thomp­son, et al) In Search of Pleis­tocene Remains at the Gates of 
. . . . . Europe: Direct­ed Sur­face Sur­vey of the Mega­lopo­lis Basin [arti­cle]
25074. (Mat­ti Charl­ton) You’re Mine ― A True Sto­ry for Brave Lit­tle Ones [graph­ic story] 
25075. (Eber­hard Zang­ger & Serdal Mut­lu) Putting the Luwian Cul­ture on the Map 
. . . . . [arti­cle]
25076. (Ben­nett Bacon, et al) An Upper Palae­olith­ic Pro­to-writ­ing Sys­tem and 
. . . . . Phe­no­log­i­cal Cal­en­dar [arti­cle]
25077. (Mat­ti Charl­ton) The Bal­last Boy [novel­la]
25078. The Voyn­ich Man­u­script [fac­sim­i­le]
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Tuesday, January 3, 2023 — The Remarkable John Wilkins

I do seri­ous­ly, and upon good grounds affirm it pos­si­ble to make a fly­ing-char­i­ot; in which a man may sit, and give such a motion unto it, as shall con­vey him through the air. And this per­haps might be made large enough to car­ry divers men at the same time, togeth­er with food for their viaticum, and com­modi­ties for traf­fic. It is not the big­ness of any thing in this kind, that can hin­der its motion, if the motive fac­ul­ty be answer­able there­un­to. We see a great ship swims as well as a small cork, and an eagle flies in the air as well as a lit­tle gnat.
 This engine may be con­trived from the same prin­ci­ples by which Archy­tas made a wood­en dové, and Regiomon­tanus a wood­en eagle.
 I con­ceive it were no dif­fi­cult mat­ter (if a man had leisure) to shew more par­tic­u­lar­ly the means of com­pos­ing it.
 The per­fect­ing of such an inven­tion, would be of such excel­lent use, that it were enough, not only to make a man famous, but the age also where­in he lives. For besides the strange dis­cov­er­ies that it might occa­sion in this oth­er world, it would be also of incon­ceiv­able advan­tage for trav­el­ling, above any oth­er con­veyance that is now in use.
 So that not­whith­stand­ing all these seem­ing impos­si­bil­i­ties, it is like­ly enough, that there may be a means invent­ed of jour­ney­ing to the moon; and how hap­py shall they be, that are first suc­cess­ful in this attempt?

― John Wilkins, The Dis­cov­ery of a New World: or, a Dis­course tend­ing to prove, that it is prob­a­ble there may be anoth­er Hab­it­able World in the Moon, with a Dis­course of the Pos­si­bil­i­ty of a Pas­sage thith­er (pub­lished in 1638)

Though Wilkins pub­lished this half a cen­tu­ry before the pub­li­ca­tion of New­ton’s Prin­cip­ia, he had a pret­ty good grasp of grav­i­ta­tion, though it remained unnamed and its nature baf­fled him, and could pic­ture well enough the behav­iour of bod­ies in space. He explic­it­ly stat­ed that if there were a tun­nel dug through the Earth that inter­sect­ed its cen­ter and end­ed at its antipodes, an object thrown down it would come to rest, hov­er­ing, exact­ly at the cen­ter. Wilkins was a math­e­mati­cian, and ten years after the Dis­cov­ery of a New World, pub­lished a vol­ume called Math­e­mat­i­cal Mag­ick, in which he explained the gen­er­al prin­ci­ples of mechan­ics, spec­u­lat­ed on pos­si­ble tech­no­log­i­cal advances in the future (includ­ing flight), and urged his read­ers to pur­sue sci­en­tif­ic studies.

READINGDECEMBER 2022

25053. (Nushin Arbabzadah & Nile Green) Between Afghan “Idol­og­ra­phy” and Kafir 
. . . . . “Autoethnog­ra­phy”: A Mus­lim Con­vert Describes His For­mer Reli­gion [arti­cle]
25054. (George Mag­nus) Red Flags ― Why Xi’s Chi­na Is in Jeopardy
25055. (Clau­dia Chang) Inner Asian Pas­toral­ism in the Iron Age: The Tal­gar Case, 
. . . . . South-East­ern Kaza­khstan [arti­cle]
25056. (Dan Davis) The Wolf God
25057. (Oula Seit­so­nen) Change and Con­ti­nu­ity in the Holocene Lithics Use in the 
. . . . . Nyan­za Province, Kenya: A Gen­er­al Overview [arti­cle]
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READINGNOVEMBER 2022

25034. (Nile Green) The Lan­guages of Indi­an Ocean Stud­ies: Mod­els, Meth­ods and 
. . . . . Sources [arti­cle]
25035. (Jere­mi­ah Cur­tain) Myths and Leg­ends of Ireland
25036. (Sergei B. Kli­menko, Maria V. Stanyukovich & Galian B. Sychenko) Poetic 
. . . . . Lan­guage and Music of the hud­hud ni nosi, a Yat­tuka Funer­al Chant, 
. . . . . the Philip­pines [arti­cle]
25037. (Christi­na Papou­lia) Sea­ward Dis­per­sals to the NE Mediter­ranean Islands 
. . . . . in the Pleis­tocene. The Lith­ic Evi­dence in Ret­ro­spect [arti­cle]
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READINGOCTOBER 2022

25000. [2] (Antoine de Saint-Exupéry) Le petit prince
25001. (Jor­rit M. Kelder) An Argu­ment for a Bronze Age Intro­duc­tion of the Chicken 
. . . . . in Greece [arti­cle]
25002. (Nigel Gor­ing-Mor­ris & Anna Belfer Cohen) “Far and Wide”: Social Networking 
. . . . . in the Ear­ly Neolith­ic of the Lev­ant [arti­cle]
25003. (Lau­rent Binet) Civilizations
25004. (André-Yves Bourgès) À pro­pos d’une clé de l’œu­vre de sir Wal­ter Scott. L’origine 
. . . . . angevine des Fraz­er d’E­cosse — nais­sance d’une tra­di­tion [arti­cle]
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