"Studying to get a grade was always an entirely different matter, not at the slightest entering my decisions about what to read. I still believe this approach is good."
When I was a teacher's assistant at university, I tried to put this to the first-year students. I'm not sure I converted any of them, most of whom were first-generation Americans, studying business.
Confirmation bias, perhaps, but I also know this to be the best approach.
This is a beautiful and fascinating piece, Branko. And now I'm weeping for the all the wonderful old bookshops of Charing Cross Road, now almost all gone (not Foyle's, though!). Thank you!
With digital content, the "police" no longer needs to descend into bookstores, a single bureaucrat can affect what is published in real time.
Consider using public libraries, those are great resources. One of my friends decided to buy all the books she finds noteworthy in physical format, because they may be edited in later edition.
I am grateful for this window into a different world, and not a little embarrassed about my own profligacy where book buying is concerned -- both as a teenager and still today whenever the stacks of books I have accumulated but not yet read reproach me.
I rarely laugh out loud when reading, this here triggered a big laugh:"That struck me as entirely disrespectful of writers. I would not like my books to be bought in such a way."
Verovali ili ne gospodine Milanoviću, i danas, 2024, u Beogradu Širerova knjiga može da se nabavi samo online naručivanjem iz Engleske. U gradu već duže od 5 godina knjiga se može nabaviti samo iz antikvarnica, mahom zagrebačka, svakako preskupa izdanja iz sedamdesetih.
Samo mala napomena, možda će biti interesantna.
I možda pitanje ako budete raspoloženi, kako danas gledate na tu knjigu. Njena popularnost, a i "aktuelnost" bez obzira na sve svakako ne opadaju.
* Once upon a time people lived in villages and small towns and if they went to the local bookseller etc. to buy a book or a magazine or a newspaper (or anything else), the bookseller would report any suspicious or even all purchase the the lord of the village and the priest of the village, and the name of the buyer, because he would know all of them.
* Then most people moved to bigger towns or to cities, and anybody could wander into any bookseller and make an anonymous purchase of any random book or magazine or newspaper (or something) for cash.
* Currently nearly all purchases of books (or something) are paid for by card, online ones are of course logged by name of purchaser, for digital editions even which pages the buyer reads and how often are tracked; and everything that is tracked eventually goes into some security service database.
«everything that is tracked eventually goes into some security service database»
Damian McBride "Power Trip", 2013, page 124: “In all the controversy in June 2013 over the US security services accessing people’s social media interactions through the PRISM system, it’s often forgotten that they had since 9/11 been accessing details of most of our financial transactions through the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication system (SWIFT). [...] But it also raised uncomfortable issues around America’s potential access to the private finances and spending records of prominent politicians and businesspeople around the world. All that made this a difficult secret for Gordon and the Treasury to be sitting on, even more so when Mervyn King, the Bank of England Governor, was informed. [ ... ] At that precise moment, Mervyn’s conscience told him that he had a duty to blow the gaff on the SWIFT deal, and tell the British people that the CIA had — with the Treasury’s connivance — been secretly accessing that financial data.”
NN Taleb, 2020: “every financial transaction done on Planet Earth since 2005 is traceable (the aftermath of Sep 11). Even if one uses prête-noms. Even if one uses cryptocurrencies, art work, etc. You cannot hide anything anymore.”
Anything that Marx has written is a threat to capitalism. If he was in fact read and discussed on a wider scale anti-Marx campaigns and political censorship might kick in real quick. Towards the end of the 19th century when the first copies of russian translations of Marx’ Kapital found their way into tsarist Russia the otherwise very strict tsarist censors let them through arguing it was not much of a threat because people would not understand it.
Marxism may have had enormous caveats but at least Marxist organizations taught their members – and by diffusion, the whole society, I think – that there were structural flaws and bad societal routines, and that bad things weren't caused by evil people in the Hollywood way. This is a kind of wisdom that seems to have evaporated nowadays.
I love this post. The importance of books and the pleasure of book stores.
"Studying to get a grade was always an entirely different matter, not at the slightest entering my decisions about what to read. I still believe this approach is good."
When I was a teacher's assistant at university, I tried to put this to the first-year students. I'm not sure I converted any of them, most of whom were first-generation Americans, studying business.
Confirmation bias, perhaps, but I also know this to be the best approach.
Interesting and poetical. Makes one realize that sources of fear change, but don’t go away. It’s the same brute with different masks.
This is a beautiful and fascinating piece, Branko. And now I'm weeping for the all the wonderful old bookshops of Charing Cross Road, now almost all gone (not Foyle's, though!). Thank you!
With digital content, the "police" no longer needs to descend into bookstores, a single bureaucrat can affect what is published in real time.
Consider using public libraries, those are great resources. One of my friends decided to buy all the books she finds noteworthy in physical format, because they may be edited in later edition.
It is true. I plan to publish my Substack in a print-book form and I insisted that nothing be changed (and the date of original publication be given).
I am grateful for this window into a different world, and not a little embarrassed about my own profligacy where book buying is concerned -- both as a teenager and still today whenever the stacks of books I have accumulated but not yet read reproach me.
I rarely laugh out loud when reading, this here triggered a big laugh:"That struck me as entirely disrespectful of writers. I would not like my books to be bought in such a way."
Verovali ili ne gospodine Milanoviću, i danas, 2024, u Beogradu Širerova knjiga može da se nabavi samo online naručivanjem iz Engleske. U gradu već duže od 5 godina knjiga se može nabaviti samo iz antikvarnica, mahom zagrebačka, svakako preskupa izdanja iz sedamdesetih.
Samo mala napomena, možda će biti interesantna.
I možda pitanje ako budete raspoloženi, kako danas gledate na tu knjigu. Njena popularnost, a i "aktuelnost" bez obzira na sve svakako ne opadaju.
Srdačno
There is a side argument to this story:
* Once upon a time people lived in villages and small towns and if they went to the local bookseller etc. to buy a book or a magazine or a newspaper (or anything else), the bookseller would report any suspicious or even all purchase the the lord of the village and the priest of the village, and the name of the buyer, because he would know all of them.
* Then most people moved to bigger towns or to cities, and anybody could wander into any bookseller and make an anonymous purchase of any random book or magazine or newspaper (or something) for cash.
* Currently nearly all purchases of books (or something) are paid for by card, online ones are of course logged by name of purchaser, for digital editions even which pages the buyer reads and how often are tracked; and everything that is tracked eventually goes into some security service database.
«everything that is tracked eventually goes into some security service database»
Damian McBride "Power Trip", 2013, page 124: “In all the controversy in June 2013 over the US security services accessing people’s social media interactions through the PRISM system, it’s often forgotten that they had since 9/11 been accessing details of most of our financial transactions through the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication system (SWIFT). [...] But it also raised uncomfortable issues around America’s potential access to the private finances and spending records of prominent politicians and businesspeople around the world. All that made this a difficult secret for Gordon and the Treasury to be sitting on, even more so when Mervyn King, the Bank of England Governor, was informed. [ ... ] At that precise moment, Mervyn’s conscience told him that he had a duty to blow the gaff on the SWIFT deal, and tell the British people that the CIA had — with the Treasury’s connivance — been secretly accessing that financial data.”
https://twitter.com/nntaleb/status/1186271838386774018
NN Taleb, 2020: “every financial transaction done on Planet Earth since 2005 is traceable (the aftermath of Sep 11). Even if one uses prête-noms. Even if one uses cryptocurrencies, art work, etc. You cannot hide anything anymore.”
https://www.wired.com/1999/01/sun-on-privacy-get-over-it/
Scott McNealy, 1999: “You have zero privacy anyway. Get over it!”
Anything that Marx has written is a threat to capitalism. If he was in fact read and discussed on a wider scale anti-Marx campaigns and political censorship might kick in real quick. Towards the end of the 19th century when the first copies of russian translations of Marx’ Kapital found their way into tsarist Russia the otherwise very strict tsarist censors let them through arguing it was not much of a threat because people would not understand it.
Marxism may have had enormous caveats but at least Marxist organizations taught their members – and by diffusion, the whole society, I think – that there were structural flaws and bad societal routines, and that bad things weren't caused by evil people in the Hollywood way. This is a kind of wisdom that seems to have evaporated nowadays.