Very readable intrigue, bolstered by logic and calculations.
Latest in the authors’ ongoing study of the major Egyptian monuments at Giza (Voyages of the Pyramid Builders, 2003, etc.), which challenges the mainstream picture of civilization’s earliest days.
With diligence and patience, geologist Schoch (Mathematics and Science/Boston Univ.) and his writing partner, McNally, have produced some of the most entertaining and, in net, enlightening examples of what might be called advocacy science. One need know very little about ancient history or Egyptology to be drawn into their revisionist argument, which has its roots in Schoch’s observation that parts of the Great Sphinx show water weathering rather than the constant sandblasting of an essentially desert environment. From this observation, he initially concluded that the Sphinx must have been built when heavier rainfall was the norm in Egypt, several millennia earlier than the date traditionally assigned to its construction. Now he focuses on the Great Pyramid and its smaller relatives, also at Giza. Why, he wonders, was it built over a previous mound structure rather than on a flat bedrock site, which would have been far easier? Why is its base almost as perfectly square as even modern engineering could have made it? Why is it oriented to the cardinal compass points within a fraction of a degree? Could 100,000 men working 20 years with 20-ton blocks really have built what was not only the heaviest earthly structure but, until the Eiffel Tower, the tallest? And most importantly, why have no proven remains of any pharaoh, let alone those to whom the structures are attributed, ever been found in a Giza pyramid? The authors point out that the first available accounts of the Great Pyramid, by Greek historians, were removed from its actual inception by the same span of time as ours from the birth of Christ. His ideas on who may originally have built it, and when, follow a fascinating compendium of speculations (power plant? military Death Star?) by others, dutifully debunked.
Very readable intrigue, bolstered by logic and calculations.Pub Date: June 1, 2005
ISBN: 1-58542-405-6
Page Count: 384
Publisher: TarcherPerigee
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2005
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A very welcome instance of philosophy that can help readers live a good life.
A teacher and scholar of Buddhism offers a formally varied account of the available rewards of solitude.
“As Mother Ayahuasca takes me in her arms, I realize that last night I vomited up my attachment to Buddhism. In passing out, I died. In coming to, I was, so to speak, reborn. I no longer have to fight these battles, I repeat to myself. I am no longer a combatant in the dharma wars. It feels as if the course of my life has shifted onto another vector, like a train shunted off its familiar track onto a new trajectory.” Readers of Batchelor’s previous books (Secular Buddhism: Imagining the Dharma in an Uncertain World, 2017, etc.) will recognize in this passage the culmination of his decadeslong shift away from the religious commitments of Buddhism toward an ecumenical and homegrown philosophy of life. Writing in a variety of modes—memoir, history, collage, essay, biography, and meditation instruction—the author doesn’t argue for his approach to solitude as much as offer it for contemplation. Essentially, Batchelor implies that if you read what Buddha said here and what Montaigne said there, and if you consider something the author has noticed, and if you reflect on your own experience, you have the possibility to improve the quality of your life. For introspective readers, it’s easy to hear in this approach a direct response to Pascal’s claim that “all of humanity's problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone.” Batchelor wants to relieve us of this inability by offering his example of how to do just that. “Solitude is an art. Mental training is needed to refine and stabilize it,” he writes. “When you practice solitude, you dedicate yourself to the care of the soul.” Whatever a soul is, the author goes a long way toward soothing it.
A very welcome instance of philosophy that can help readers live a good life.Pub Date: Feb. 18, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-300-25093-0
Page Count: 200
Publisher: Yale Univ.
Review Posted Online: Nov. 24, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An erudite and artful, though frustratingly restrained, look at Old Testament stories.
The Book of Genesis as imagined by a veteran voice of underground comics.
R. Crumb’s pass at the opening chapters of the Bible isn’t nearly the act of heresy the comic artist’s reputation might suggest. In fact, the creator of Fritz the Cat and Mr. Natural is fastidiously respectful. Crumb took pains to preserve every word of Genesis—drawing from numerous source texts, but mainly Robert Alter’s translation, The Five Books of Moses (2004)—and he clearly did his homework on the clothing, shelter and landscapes that surrounded Noah, Abraham and Isaac. This dedication to faithful representation makes the book, as Crumb writes in his introduction, a “straight illustration job, with no intention to ridicule or make visual jokes.” But his efforts are in their own way irreverent, and Crumb feels no particular need to deify even the most divine characters. God Himself is not much taller than Adam and Eve, and instead of omnisciently imparting orders and judgment He stands beside them in Eden, speaking to them directly. Jacob wrestles not with an angel, as is so often depicted in paintings, but with a man who looks not much different from himself. The women are uniformly Crumbian, voluptuous Earth goddesses who are both sexualized and strong-willed. (The endnotes offer a close study of the kinds of power women wielded in Genesis.) The downside of fitting all the text in is that many pages are packed tight with small panels, and too rarely—as with the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah—does Crumb expand his lens and treat signature events dramatically. Even the Flood is fairly restrained, though the exodus of the animals from the Ark is beautifully detailed. The author’s respect for Genesis is admirable, but it may leave readers wishing he had taken a few more chances with his interpretation, as when he draws the serpent in the Garden of Eden as a provocative half-man/half-lizard. On the whole, though, the book is largely a tribute to Crumb’s immense talents as a draftsman and stubborn adherence to the script.
An erudite and artful, though frustratingly restrained, look at Old Testament stories.Pub Date: Oct. 19, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-393-06102-4
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Norton
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2009
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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