Arthur Janson itibaren Caimitillo de Guzman, Panama

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11/05/2024

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Arthur Janson Kitabın yeniden yazılması (10)

2019-04-26 23:41

Ana Muhalefet İmgesel Açıklarda Sahici Izdıraplar TrendKitaplar Kütüphanesi

Tarafından yazılmış kitap Tarafından: Broy Yayınları

I went into this book with high hopes - despite reading some very mixed reviews of it. I decided to not let them cloud my judgement and go ahead anyway. Well, that was a mistake. Don't get me wrong, I am not sad I have read this book. There were definite good points; however the gratuitous rubbish sprinkled liberally through it spoiled it for me. William Hamleigh was such a caricature that I never really felt him to be a threat, more of an annoyance in the story. Same for Waleran Bigod for much of the book. There were characters thrown in apparently for the sake of it and other characters died 'off-screen' during the timeskips. The timeskips often came in places that made little to no sense and cut out bits of the story that I would actually have been quite interested in. (Details not included due to spoiler issues) Jack Jackson was the highlight of this book but even he got a little irritating part way through. His "exile" to Santiago de Compostela was far too short considering how much of an influence it had on the rest of the book. The bit where he befriended Rachid and his daughters seemed only put in there for two plot points. One for a statue and the other to make Aliena jealous - which was unecessary. Much of it seemed contrived and the several instances of rape got seriously annoying. Yes, we get the point that William is a terrible person who murders and rapes at whim. His character seemed to exist solely to do these two things in much of the book. Once was enough, we get the point but to have him rape in detail several times almost made me put the book down. Leaving William, we come to the monk. Far too perfect, far too sinless. Putting him opposite Hamleigh only served to make their differences exaggerated once again to the point of caricature. The plot was unwieldy and seemed at times to meander. That said, cut out the gratuitous rape scenes and tone down the extremes of character and this book would be good. It is sad to have something that has so much potential all-but-ruined by often pointless timeskips and an obsession with rape...and Aliena's boobs which are apparently so perfect that they require several paragraphs about them.

2019-04-27 00:41

Hayallerin Karın Doyursun Restoran-Kafe Açma Rehberi TrendKitaplar Kütüphanesi

Tarafından yazılmış kitap Tarafından: Çizgi Kitabevi Yayınları

I am of two minds about this book. There is no denying that as an overview of the final years of the Roman Republic, running from roughly the time of the Social War to the establishment of the principate, it's a fine achievement. Holland takes events which have been recounted many times over the last two thousand years or so, and makes them fresh and interesting, even to someone like myself who has read of them more times than I care to think about. There is a great sense of narrative verve and energy to the book, and certainly if I were to recommend a starter book on Republican Rome to someone, this would be one of the first I would pick off my bookshelves for that very reason. The intricacies of the various triumvirates and factions can be bewildering at times, and Holland handles them all skilfully. I did have some problems however, with Holland's style, which came across at times as being overly sensational, as if he was trying to shock the reader with some of the more unsavoury (to us) aspects of Roman life. He descibes some things in ways that are, to my mind, too anachronistic and exaggerated to give an accurate picture of what was going on at this period in history. Describing Caesar's legionaries as stormtroopers is dramatic, but it gives a completely false idea of the organisation of the Roman army, its function, and projects back the loyalties of the legionaries towards the end of Caesar's life too far back towards the beginning of his career. Caesar was certainly popular with his men, yes, but to imply with the word 'stormtrooper' that his men were fanatically loyal to him when he was just setting out on the trip to, say, Bithynia? Anticipates too much. No one at that stage could possibly have guessed that he would use the loyalty of his men to manoeuvre his way into a pre-eminent position in the political system of the republic. Holland's translations of some of the primary sources also tended towards the, how shall I put this, ribald, at times. Often unnecessarily so, I think - there's a difference between describing Clodia as flirtatious and as a cocktease, for instance, and I don't think it's a word you can apply backwards to first century BC Latin with any great efficiency. There are also one or two instances of a slight cultural bias sneaking through, despite Holland's best efforts at cultural relativity - as far as we are concerned, yes, the marital practices of the Ptolemies are incestuous. They weren't considered so by the Ptolemies. I think the author would also be well advised to have a quick glance at Said's Orientalism. If I had to read the phrase 'Oriental decadence' once more, I would have thrown the book across the room, I think. In all, it's a good, mostly intelligent popular history. I wouldn't rely on it for much more than that, though.

Okuyucu Arthur Janson itibaren Caimitillo de Guzman, Panama

Kullanıcı, bu kitapları portalın yayın kurulu olan 2017-2018'de en ilginç olarak değerlendirdi "TrendKitaplar Kütüphanesi" Tüm okuyucuların bu literatürü tanımalarını tavsiye eder.