Neşeli Tarih Dizisi 4 Gizemli Kent Hattuşa kitap serbest oDF biçim

Charlotte Lao leyeeye — Good book, interesting topic, especially since I have just visited Paris. She has potential, but some of her plots are a bit fantastic/improbable, and the book closed with all sorts of loose ends...

Q Lin linqing — I was definitely fooled by the cover and overview. It was awful and I quit reading it. It zoomed through so much in the first 12 pages, diving deeply into sordid subjects the author used as light subject matter. Not my idea of a good read or even a tolerable diversion.

Ashra Mcavinue ashramcavinue — This book begins with much promise but ultimately ends in disappointment. Prince begins by stressing the importance of historically-based analysis. He suggests that one understand Kurosawa's films as "address[ing] the Japan shattered by World War II and [as helping] reshape society." (8) This is a most interesting, preliminary claim that initially promises certain fascinating paths of reading. Also, Prince begins by criticizing 'auteurism' and naive assumptions of 'authorship'. He notes that the formation of 'film studies' as an academic field imposed a "major code" that reduced all Kurosawa films to "the ideal of humanism". Now this is also promising - finally, a comprehensive work on Kurosawa, other than that of Donald Richie, that gets beyond 'auteurism'. Unfortunately, Prince's book does not live up to these introductory assertions. First, Prince continually makes use of terms like "Zen Buddhism", "heroic ideal", "warrior ideal", instead of terms like "humanist universalism" as if they were more accurate interpretive concepts for understanding Kurosawa's films (see pp. 10, 11, 28, 30, 115). However, he never 'historicizes' these very concepts but treats them as somewhat static and a-historical. I don't think that one would find it completely convincing or that interesting if some critic put to use concepts like "Christian providence" or "protestant individualism" for the purposes of deciphering the work of Orsen Welles without demonstrating first the historic intricacies of such empty concepts and second their specific, contextual relevance to a given Welles' film-text. Thus, it must be asked: why make use of analogous empty signifiers of Japanese history and culture so carelessly in relation to Kurosawa's films? Ultimately, Prince's interpretive framework remains less than convincing , for his initial imperative to read "against the grain of history" is violated repeatedly throughout the book. Also, it is disappointing that right after Prince criticizes the usual appeal to authorship or auteurism he categorically states, "Kurosawa's films form a series of inquiries on the place and the possibilities of the autonomous self within a culture whose social relations stress group ties and obligations." (27) From this Prince establishes his own master code for interpreting the totality of Kurosawa's work based upon the supposed `intentions' of Kurosawa-as-author. It is a code that reads Kurosawa's films as being primarily about the negotiation of the ego in the modern world. Prince continues, throughout the work, to make sense of the rich diversity of films in terms of this restricted framework. He writes, "Kurosawa's world is an arena where his characters must be tested , where they must be victorious in their goals or must be broken and defeated." (116) Later, he reduces the entire complexity of Kurosawa films into a `meta-narrative' that is "...the passage from willed optimism of the early films to the ethic of resignation and despair that pervades the late works..." (154) The meaning that Prince detects in these films is not wrong per say but way too limited and reductive. There is a vast complexity of meaning and significance in Kurosawa's diverse catalogue of films, and some of it is in direct contradiction to Prince's `auteurist' thesis. I cannot say that I was satisfied with Prince's analysis for these reasons. However, if one is sympathetic to auteur forms of criticism, then this book may be for you. Just remember what Foucault says in `What is an Author?': "the author serves to neutralize the contradictions that are found in a series of texts." Personally, I think the "contradictions" that one might locate in a series of texts serve as the sites of most interest in any interpretive investigation; thus, they should not be effaced by way of some reductive narrative of authorship.

Casual Vacancy mmbyx — This book is one of the 16 in the Morning News Tournament of Books. I decided to attempt to read as many of the 16 before the tourny ends, and this was my first. I actually purchased it at the now bankrupt and closing Borders, which is new for me, since I never buy books. Long story short, this book was pretty phenom. I really didn't like it at first. It was too much nature, too much backwoods country life, too much witchcraft. The backcover toted the story as something like a version of Practical Magic, but down South. But the story really sucked me in and all of the sudden I was up till the wee hours, not wanting to let go of the story. It's pretty sad, and depressing, but it's excellent writing. I like how the author laid things out, sort of anti-chronologically. Kind of messes with your head, but damn creative. The book is pretty intense, to the point I actually had a nightmare afterwards, but all in all I really enjoyed it. Now this is writing!