The Early Days of a Better Nation

Sunday, May 29, 2005


Meme infection

I've been book-tagged by Thomas Knapp. Here goes:

1. Total number of books I own: At least a thousand.

2. The last book I bought: Portraits and Pamphlets, by Karl Radek, (London, 1935). I picked this up in a second-hand bookshop a couple of days ago for four pounds. Soviet journalist and soon-to-be Moscow Trial victim Radek on Stalin, intellectuals, wreckers etc. Irony of history - no, the bitter and twisted sarcasm of history.

3. The last book I read: Russia's War by Richard Overy.

4. Five books that mean a lot to me:

On the Nature of Things by Titus Lucretius Carus, translated and introduced by Martin Ferguson Smith, Sphere Books, London, 1969 (Rome, circa 59 B.C.)

The Origin of Species, by Charles Darwin, sixth edition (1872), with a foreword by George Gaylord Simpson, Collier Books, NY, 1962, 1967.

(As with the Lucretius, it's the only edition I've read.)

History of England by Lord Macaulay.

Discovering the Scottish Revolution by Neil Davidson.

The Poverty of Theory and other Essays by E. P. Thompson.

5. Tag five people and have them do this on their blogs:

Charlie Stross (Declined.)
Farah Mendlesohn
Kevin Carson (Responded.)
Ellis Sharp Responded.
Cheryl Morgan (Declined.)

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