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May 23, 2005
England Can't Be That Boring
A few weeks ago I finished listening to In a Sunburned Country by Bill Bryson, which is his account of his travels around Australia. It was full of great stories and gave a good general history of Australia based on its different regions. My favorite story was of Harold Holt Australian Prime Minister from 1966-1967 who disappeared while swimming of the coast of Victoria and was presumed drowned. Another interesting story included what is known of the early history of the Aborigines. They appear to be one of the first people groups to master ocean travel, but then remained technologically stagnant for thousands of years afterwards. I was disappointed when the book ended and I wanted it to keep going.
After loving In a Sunburned Country I listened to Notes From a Small Island, which is a similar book based on Bryson's travels in the UK. Although parts of the book were good, I was not sad when it ended. Some of the more interesting parts of the book involved Bryson's job at an asylum and his arguments with different boarding house owners. His histories of different cities like Liverpool and Oxford were well written as well. I could still tell that Bryson was a good writer from this book, but did not want to see the places Bryson described. Part of it might be that Australia is such a new nation and is still growing, while England has fallen far from the heights it reached as recently as 70 years ago. Many of Bryson's histories of towns were based around the fact that an industry that used to dominate the particular city was now gone and the city was still trying to figure out what to do with itself without that industry.
The other book I actually read was The Anabasis (or The Persian Expedition) by Xenophon. I had long heard that it was a classic tale of Ancient Greek ingenuity and courage and it did not disappoint. To those of you unfamiliar with the story it tells the tale of a group of Greek Mercenaries who went to Persia only to have their side lose the war. They then had to fight and pillage their way across hundreds of miles of unfamiliar territory to get back home. They had to fight of various armies they met along the way as well as natural problems like frostbite and hunger. None of the book was that surprising although I still am sometimes shocked the casualness of many Greeks towards what would now be considered the molestation of young boys. Xenophon seems to think it almost cute how much one of his soldiers is willing to sacrifice in order to keep a handsome young boy he has found. It was also tough to root for the Greeks sometimes because of the pillaging. Xenophon makes it sound like the Greeks tried to be fair to some of the villages they encountered and the Greeks probably would have died had they not pillaged, but they still stole food and provisions from some groups that seemed to not be bothering anyone.
I have not decided what book to read next, but I am listening to Emotional Intelligence by Daniel Goleman and am getting a lot out of it.
Posted by Pete at May 23, 2005 04:00 PM
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