Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Do you read?

news.ycombinator.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

91–100 of 105 posts

Re: Do you read?

#91

Post by wheels »

decode wrote: post #33
danteembermage wrote: post #18

I read and I read fiction for the most part. I want to make the case though that fiction is not necessarily non-educational and is rather uniquely educational or educates in a unique way. One common excuse for fiction reading is to suggest you learn passive facts about the setting as you progress pleasantly through the story, but that's not a particularly strong argument in favor or reading fiction. Sure I could pick…

Here's the problem with learning through fiction: the only thing you can learn about through fiction is the mind of the author. When you read a Rand novel, you don't learn anything about how objectivism works, you only learn about Rand's imagination of how it works. Similarly, sentience may in fact be mutually inclusive or exclusive of understanding; just because you can describe a circumstance in which something is…

But that's also the beauty of fiction in some contexts is that it allows one to explore ideas outside of their usual context and often within the realm of suspended disbelief.

Aldous Huxley, for instance, both in his fiction and non-fiction, and I see no great gap between them other than the mechanisms employed, has profoundly shaped my thought with his writing.

Re: Do you read?

#92

Post by ice_man »

nicko wrote: post #84
ice_man wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I read non-fiction books exclusively. I find them to be a nice break from my imagination. I tend to look down upon people who look down upon people.

> I tend to look down upon people who look down upon people. nice quip, until followed to its logical conclusion ;-)

What can I say? I hate myself. ;)

Re: Do you read?

#93

Post by swombat »

colortone wrote: post #77
swombat wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Make sure you take a peep at Hesse too. Narziss and Goldmund is a must-read - the kind of book that changes your perspective on life. He's Thomas Mann's intellectual equal, I would say. As for Joseph , a word of encouragement: the further you get into it, the more the story starts to come together and pick up pace. The first 300 pages or so, it feels like you're reading random shreds of a story... but keep faith, it'…

Narziss... looks good, I put it on my list. It's going to be a good while before I get back into classic fiction though ;-) You might like Eco's "The Name of the Rose" since you seem to be into really good fiction set in Medieval Europe ;-)

Read it, of course :-)

I still need to read his other book, the Pendulum...

Re: Do you read?

#94

Post by paraschopra »

I always avoid reading fiction. When there are non-fiction books which are as gripping as the fiction ones, why read the latter as you get knowledge plus pleasure reading the former.

Examples of the books I am talking about are: The Black Swan, Brief History of Time, God Delusion, Selfish Gene, Predictibly Irrational, etc. etc.

Re: Do you read?

#95

Post by nicko »

I’m currently reading ‘The 4 hour work week’ and I just purchased ‘God created the integers’. I tend to read most of my non-fiction in bits and pieces when i have spare chunks of time. I tend to do most of my light reading on holiday and go cover to cover in a couple of days. I’ve followed Grisham for what seems like forever, and while its a bit hit and miss i’ve liked alot of the short stories by stephen king / richard bachman. Over the past couple of years I’ve enjoyed ‘making money’ - Pratchett, ‘The Godfather’ - Puzo, ‘grapes of wrath’ - Steinbeck, ‘vernon god little’ - Pierre & ‘shogun’ - Clavell. Whenever I travel I’ll try and read a book set in the country I’m traveling to.

As a child I just couldn’t put down the Macdonald Hall series of books by Gordon Korman - they were side splittingly funny. Highly recommend Christmas present for any child you know.

Re: Do you read?

#97

Post by Tichy »

decode wrote: post #33
danteembermage wrote: post #18

I read and I read fiction for the most part. I want to make the case though that fiction is not necessarily non-educational and is rather uniquely educational or educates in a unique way. One common excuse for fiction reading is to suggest you learn passive facts about the setting as you progress pleasantly through the story, but that's not a particularly strong argument in favor or reading fiction. Sure I could pick…

Here's the problem with learning through fiction: the only thing you can learn about through fiction is the mind of the author. When you read a Rand novel, you don't learn anything about how objectivism works, you only learn about Rand's imagination of how it works. Similarly, sentience may in fact be mutually inclusive or exclusive of understanding; just because you can describe a circumstance in which something is…

What about fiction that simply describes how people feel, act and behave? Not every story has to be a metaphorical attempt to explain some philosophical concept.

Re: Do you read?

#98

Post by MikeCapone »

colortone wrote: post #72
swombat wrote: post #9

I'm currently re-reading Joseph and His Brothers , a 1200-page heavy-weight monster of a book by Thomas Mann (himself a heavy-weight monster of an author). Do I recommend it? Yes, but not for everyone. The preface itself is one of the heaviest essays on theology/philosophy out there, but the whole book is crammed with brilliant ideas/wisdom and is a masterpiece of literature (but it's heavy and the story moves fairly…

I read Mann's "Doctor Faustus" and it was SO rich...every sentence needs to be read 2x to be internalized. 2400 pages of Mann sounds insane! ;-) (thanks for the tip, I'll try and peep the preface at least)

In the "huge book filled with brilliant stuff but not for everybody" genre, I recommend ADA by Vladimir Nabokov. Great stuff.

Re: Do you read?

#99

Post by MikeCapone »

electromagnetic wrote: post #54

I love to read, in fact I think reading is the reason I love writing too and keep looking up jobs in the writing business ever since I left one (money reasons). Currently I'm reading New Moon from the Twilight series, my girlfriend got me to read the first book because of the movie coming out and it's a seriously great read, hence why I'm reading the second book about 2 years before she forces me to because of the 2n…

Well, that was a bit all over the place, and I would have appreciated a spoilers warning, but thanks for sharing.

Where in Canada are you going to?

Re: Do you read?

#100

Post by kqr2 »

DanielBMarkham wrote: post #4

I love books and reading, although I'm finding as I get older I'm much more willing to "bail out" of a book. I also find myself in multiple books. Quite honestly I think this is due to a decreasing attention span. I think there are two types of reading. The first type is conversational or fun reading. It's like having a dialog with the author. The second is structured reading, where the goal is information transfer a…

I'm a lot more selective these days. Since time is valuable, it's worth doing a little research on the book before I begin.

The book gets added to my to-read list if:

* it has received a a good recommendation from someone I respect

* the author has a good interview on a program such as KQED's Forum or NPR's To the Best of Our Knowledge

* has generally good reviews on amazon.com

The more criteria it matches, the higher it sits in my list.

Post reply on HN