by Anthony F. Aveni ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 15, 2003
Relating familiar material in self-conscious prose, this falls between the cracks of scholarly work and engaging popular...
A muddled chronology of annual holidays that connects, among other things, Groundhog Day to an Irish saint and May Day to 19th-century labor legislation in the state of Illinois.
Aveni (Astronomy and Anthropology/Colgate Univ.; Behind the Crystal Ball, 1996, etc.) follows the usual routes back through Babylonia, ancient Egypt, and Rome to pinpoint the origins of modern celebrations and trace their distortion over time by the vagaries of social change. Organized by month, this begins with a chapter considering the question of why January launches the new year. “February” explores the origins of both Groundhog Day and Valentine’s Day, “April” covers Easter/Passover, “June” portrays a time of mating, “October” unleashes the spirits of the underworld (Halloween), and “November” (The Day of the Dead) contemplates mortality. Not surprisingly—Aveni is an astronomer, after all—most of the holidays are tied historically to a solstice or an equinox, or to long-forgotten agricultural calendars. (The first of February, for example, began the new year in old Celtic reckonings.) The author uses myths and legends from China, Arctic peoples, and the Maya, among others, to compare how various civilizations recognized or organized the course of the sun’s annual journey. A dramatic description of Serpent Day, celebrated at the spring equinox at the great pyramid of Chichen Itza, shows the sun’s course bringing to light an image of a great serpent along one of the pyramid’s edges. Unfortunately, such rewarding moments are rare; Aveni too often mixes his solid nuggets of information with pompous attempts at humor and commentary on such over-obvious aspects of contemporary culture as the (oh, no!) commercialization of Christmas.
Relating familiar material in self-conscious prose, this falls between the cracks of scholarly work and engaging popular history. (20 b&w illustrations, not seen)Pub Date: Jan. 15, 2003
ISBN: 0-19-515024-4
Page Count: 192
Publisher: Oxford Univ.
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2002
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by Paul Kalanithi ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 19, 2016
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular...
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A neurosurgeon with a passion for literature tragically finds his perfect subject after his diagnosis of terminal lung cancer.
Writing isn’t brain surgery, but it’s rare when someone adept at the latter is also so accomplished at the former. Searching for meaning and purpose in his life, Kalanithi pursued a doctorate in literature and had felt certain that he wouldn’t enter the field of medicine, in which his father and other members of his family excelled. “But I couldn’t let go of the question,” he writes, after realizing that his goals “didn’t quite fit in an English department.” “Where did biology, morality, literature and philosophy intersect?” So he decided to set aside his doctoral dissertation and belatedly prepare for medical school, which “would allow me a chance to find answers that are not in books, to find a different sort of sublime, to forge relationships with the suffering, and to keep following the question of what makes human life meaningful, even in the face of death and decay.” The author’s empathy undoubtedly made him an exceptional doctor, and the precision of his prose—as well as the moral purpose underscoring it—suggests that he could have written a good book on any subject he chose. Part of what makes this book so essential is the fact that it was written under a death sentence following the diagnosis that upended his life, just as he was preparing to end his residency and attract offers at the top of his profession. Kalanithi learned he might have 10 years to live or perhaps five. Should he return to neurosurgery (he could and did), or should he write (he also did)? Should he and his wife have a baby? They did, eight months before he died, which was less than two years after the original diagnosis. “The fact of death is unsettling,” he understates. “Yet there is no other way to live.”
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular clarity.Pub Date: Jan. 19, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-8129-8840-6
Page Count: 248
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Sept. 29, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2015
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by Abhijit V. Banerjee & Esther Duflo ‧ RELEASE DATE: Nov. 12, 2019
Occasionally wonky but overall a good case for how the dismal science can make the world less—well, dismal.
“Quality of life means more than just consumption”: Two MIT economists urge that a smarter, more politically aware economics be brought to bear on social issues.
It’s no secret, write Banerjee and Duflo (co-authors: Poor Economics: A Radical Rethinking of the Way To Fight Global Poverty, 2011), that “we seem to have fallen on hard times.” Immigration, trade, inequality, and taxation problems present themselves daily, and they seem to be intractable. Economics can be put to use in figuring out these big-issue questions. Data can be adduced, for example, to answer the question of whether immigration tends to suppress wages. The answer: “There is no evidence low-skilled migration to rich countries drives wage and employment down for the natives.” In fact, it opens up opportunities for those natives by freeing them to look for better work. The problem becomes thornier when it comes to the matter of free trade; as the authors observe, “left-behind people live in left-behind places,” which explains why regional poverty descended on Appalachia when so many manufacturing jobs left for China in the age of globalism, leaving behind not just left-behind people but also people ripe for exploitation by nationalist politicians. The authors add, interestingly, that the same thing occurred in parts of Germany, Spain, and Norway that fell victim to the “China shock.” In what they call a “slightly technical aside,” they build a case for addressing trade issues not with trade wars but with consumption taxes: “It makes no sense to ask agricultural workers to lose their jobs just so steelworkers can keep theirs, which is what tariffs accomplish.” Policymakers might want to consider such counsel, especially when it is coupled with the observation that free trade benefits workers in poor countries but punishes workers in rich ones.
Occasionally wonky but overall a good case for how the dismal science can make the world less—well, dismal.Pub Date: Nov. 12, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-61039-950-0
Page Count: 432
Publisher: PublicAffairs
Review Posted Online: Aug. 28, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2019
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