L'Étranger--Albert Camus

Uno dei libri migliori che abbia letto. Immagino di non aver colto tutte le sfumature (ho letto una copia in francese, ed il mio francese non e' perfetto...) ma, nonstante cio', questo e' uno dei pochi libri che mi hanno lasciato qualcosa negli ultimi anni. E' un libro in apparenza semplice, costruito intorno ad una trama relativamente breve e scarna, ma che fa pensare molto, e che colpisce al ventre quando meno te lo aspetti. Forse queste mie impressioni sono influenzate da una relativa apatia in cui mi trovo ultimamente, ma dubito che questa abbia dettato piu' di un terzo di queste favorevoli impressioni che sto scrivendo. Come al solito riporto qua sotto alcuni degli estratti che mi hanno colpito di piu'.

"Aujourd'hui, maman est morte. Ou peut-être hier, je ne sais pas." (pg.9)

"Le soir, Marie est venue me chercher et m'a demandé si je voulais me marier avec elle. J'ai dit que cela m'était égal et que nous pourrions la faire si elle le voulait. Elle a voulu savoir alors si je l'aimais. J'ai répondu comme je l'avais déja fait une fois, que cela ne signifiait rien mais que sans doute je ne l'aimais pas." (pg.69)

"C'est alors que tout a vacillé. [...] J'ai compris que j'avais détruit l'équilibre du jour, le silence excepionnel d'une plage ou j'avais été heureux. [...] Et c'était comme quatre coups brefs que je frappais sur la porte du malheur." (pg.99)

"J'ai répondu cependant que j'avais un peu perdu l'habitude de m'interroger et qu'il m'était difficil de le reinsegner. Sans doute, j'amais bien maman, mais cela ne voulait rien dire." (pg.102)

"[...] en me demandant si je croyais en Dieu. J'ai repondu que non. Il s'est assis avec indignation. Il m'a dit que c'était impossible, que tous les hommes croyaient en Dieu, même ceux qui se détournaient de son visage." (pg.108)

"J'ai compris alors qu'un homme qui n'aurait vécu qu'un seul jour pourrait sans peine vivre cent ans dans une prison. Il aurait assez de souvenirs pour ne pas s'ennuyer. Dans ce sens, c'était un avantage." (pg.123)

"Mois j'écoutais et j'enntendais qu'on me jugeait intelligent. Mais je ne comprenais pas bien comment les qualités d'un homme ordinaire pouvaient devenir des charges écresantes contre un coupable. [...] Sans doute, je ne pouvais pas m'empêcher de reconnaitre qu'il avait raison. Je ne regrettais pas beaucoup mon acte. Mais tant d'acharnement m'éttonait." (pg.154)

"Il voulait encore me parler de Dieu, mais je me suis avancé vers lui et j'ai tenté de lui expliquer une dernière fois qu'il me restait peu de temps. Je ne voulais pas le perdre avec Dieu." (pg.182)

"Comme si cette grande colère m'avait purgé du mal, vidé d'espoir, devant cette nuit chargée des signes et d'étoiles, je m'ouvrais pour la première fois à la tendre indifference du monde. De l'éprouver si pareil à moi, si fraternel enfin, j'ai senti que j'avais été heureux, et que je l'était encore. Pour que tout soit consommé, pour que je me sente moins seul, il me restait à souhaiter qu'il y ait beaucoup de spectateurs le jour de mon exécution et qu'ils m'accueillent avec des cris de haine." (pg.186)

Brave new world -- Aldous Huxley

This books is a dystopic novel set in a future society driven by pragmatism and coldness. To be perfectly fair, I must say that I did not find the plot very convincing. The base story is a love story with some evolution and discoveries of the characters. However I found the plot hard to follow because of the numerous significant characters in the story. What I liked the most in this book (and I think that this is its strength) is the description of the features of this future society, where social relations (mostly family ones) are reduced to the minimum, emotional beliefs (including religion) are regarded as dangerous for society, and the happiness of individuals is ensured by the state by a systematic distribution of drugs. Another quite interesting feature of this society is that individuals are created in the lab, and that they are conditioned to fit the job (and the role within society) that they have been assigned before birth. Another way of looking at the (lack of) libero arbitrio. Overall, I personally liked this book a lot: I think it's inevitable for me to compare it to "1984". While 1984 had a powerful story and some important warnings about the future (and dangerous) directions our society might take, "Brave new world" has a less involving plot, but a more accurate investigation of the risks of the evolution of our society. The number of predictions that by now are almost facts is quite amazing, given the fact that this book was published in 1932.

As usual, I am reporting below the passages that I found to be the most interesting ones.



"We also predestine and condition. We decant our babies as socialized human beings, as Alphas or Epsilons, as future sewage workers or future..." He was going to say "future World controllers," but correcting himself, said "future Directors of Hatcheries," instead. (pg.13)

"Stability," said the Controller, "stability. No civilization without social stability. No social stability without individual stability." (pg.42)

"Yes, I know," said Bernard derisively. "'Even Epsilons re useful!' So am I. And I damned well wish I weren't!" Lenina was shocked by his blasphemy. [...] "what would it be like if I could, if I were free--not enslaved by my conditioning." (pg.91)

Bernard looked, and then quickly, with a little shudder, averted his eyes. His conditioning had made him not so much pitiful as profoundly squeamish. The mere suggestion of illness or wounds was to him not only horrifying, but even repulsive and rather disgusting. Like dirt or deformity, or old age. Hastily he changed the subject. (pg.138)

"[...] He's being sent to an island. That's to say, he's being sent to a place where he'll meet the most interesting set of men and women to be found anywhere in the world. All people who, for one reason or another, have got too self-consciously individual to fit into community-life. All the people who aren't satisfied with orthodoxy, who've got independent ideas of their own. Every one, in a word, who's any one. I almost envy you, Mr. Watson." (pg.227)

"[...] Universal happiness keeps the wheels steadily turning; truth and beauty can't." (pg.228)

Il mondo dei vinti -- Nuto Revelli

Ho appena finito di leggere "Il mondo dei vinti" di Nuto Revelli. Questo e' il primo libro che leggo dell'autore, e devo ammettere che mi e' piaciuto un sacco. Il libro presenta 85 testimonianze raccolte dall'autore negli anni 1970-72 tra persone (anziani a quel tempo) povere nella campagna cuneese. Come annunciato dal titolo, questo libro cerca di fornire un "resoconto" della storia (nel secolo che va approssimativamente dall'unita' d'Italia allo sbarco sulla Luna) vista e raccontanta dai poveri. Dalle persone che nelle pianure, colline, e montagne cuneesi sono stati dei "vinti", nel senso che hanno sempre subito gli eventi storici sulla loro testa, e le difficolta' e le miserie sulla loro pelle. Ogni testimonianza e' raccolta lasciando parlare piu' o meno a ruota libera ogni testimone, magari con solo una o due domande che l'autore pone ricorrentemente ("ci credevate alle masche?", "quanto contava il prete?", "ci crede all'uomo sulla Luna?"). Quello che ne viene fuori e' un quadro di quel secolo di storia completamente diverso da cio' che siamo stati abituati a studiare a scuola. Personalmente ho trovato questo quadro estremamente affascinante: ci si rende conto che quanto la percezione della storia provata dai "vinti" sia lontana dai libri di storia e dalla retorica, semplificata al minimo che molto spesso e' fatto di impressioni e fatti quotidiani. Semplificata e ridotta alla fame ed alla fatica, ai viaggi da emigranti ed alle sofferenze delle guerre, in generale al tentativo basilare di sopravvivere in un'inferno, no matter how, no matter where. Alcune volte in quest'inferno il dolore della carne marchiata a fuoco lascia delle impressioni che sono prettamente personali, ed i commentdi dei personaggi sono non cristallizzati o limitati da una visione (a volte forzatamente bigotta e miope) del(la) "vinto/a". Molto piu' spesso questi racconti sono tasselli che compongono un mosaico che e' testimonianza del fatto che queste vite sono state vissute in primo luogo subendo; rari sono i casi (per esempio la lotta partigiana) in cui i vinti hanno una partecipazione attiva (ed una presa di posizione, molto spesso parziale o minimale) in quelli che solitamente chiamiamo "i fatti storici". Se c'e' una frase che mi viene in mente leggendo questo libro e' quella dei CSI (da "Sogni e sintomi"):

"come un animale che non sa capire

guardo il mondo con occhio lineare

come un animale che sa cos'e' il dolore

guardo il mondo con occhio lineare

come un animale che non puo' capire

guardo il mondo con occhio lineare"

La prefazione (alle interviste) di Nuto Revelli e' molto interessante nel fornire un quadro complessivo del libro, ma io consiglierei di leggerla dopo le interviste (perlomeno questo e' cio' che ho fatto io). Su una nota strettamente personale: vedere il nome di mio nonno ("Eligio Gerbaudo, nato a Centallo, classe 1901, contadino") mi ha fatto provare una certa commozione (anche se la sua testimonianza non compare ne libro). In parte mi ha fatto capire il motivo per cui solitamente faccio il tifo per i vinti (o il disagio interiore che provo a tifare per i vincitori). O piu' egoisticamente il senso di colpa esistenziale che provo nel capire che oggi probabilmente io non sono piu' tra i vinti, e qualcun altro si trova in questa condizione.

Come al solito riporto qui di seguito alcuni dei passaggi che ho segnato a matita nel libro

(ma questa volta sono veramente troppi per segnarli tutti...).

"Li conosco i fascisti che mi hanno fucilato, alcuni li incontro per le strade di Cuneo. Quando li vedo li schivo. Una volta ho incontrato quello che guidava la moto-sidecar, e l'ho insultato. Mi voleva denunciare." (Bartolomeo Garro, pg. 66)

"Io nel 1930 non ho piu' preso la tessera, non mi piaceva essere comandato dagli altri. Eh, i contadini non capivano niente, non dicevano di no, stavano li' zitti." (Paolo Borgetto, contadino, pg. 130)

"Quattro giorni di viaggio, e poi arriviamo a Mauthausen. [...] Poi sono arrivati gli americani a liberarci. [...] Quando ero in montagna, da partigiano, pesavo ottantadue chili. Adesso ne pesavo ventisette, ero uno scheletro, solo pelle e ossa. [...] Ho cominciato a mangiare dieci volte al giorno, poco per volta, se no scoppiavo. Ero come un bamboccio, ero ebete. [...] Venivano gli amici a trovarmi, io li guardavo per ore e ore, in silenzio, senza parlare. Mi sono occorsi due anni perche' mi riprendessi un po'. Mah, non voglio piu' parlarne [...]" (Lorenzo Falco pg. 159)

"Compravamo solo trecce nel Veneto, i cavei del pentu non ci interessavano." (Daniele Mattalia, pg. 253)

"Per chi teneva la gente? In alto, sulle colline dell'alta Langa, tenevano per i partigiani. Qui la gente teneva alla pelle e basta: veniva il tedesco, gli davano quel che chiedeva; veniva il fascista, lo stesso; veniva il partigiano, lo stesso." (Pasquale Roggero, pg. 294)

"Io vivo con la pensione contadina [...]. Io non ho piu' paura di niente, io mangio, io vivo. E la mia idea non la cambio." (Angelo Fantino, pg. 305)

"Eh, 'n Merica se \"un l'\'e fol lu desfolu." (Maria Piemonte in Boeri, pg. 335)

"Eh, a chi deve combattere, al soldato semplice, la guerra non interessa. [...] Noi non ci interessava ammazzare gli austriaci, ma bisognava ammazzarli perche' se vengono avanti ammazzano te." (Giovanni Montanaro, pg. 340)

"L'atteggiamento del clero durante la guerra partigiana? Il clero ci ha subiti, proprio come ci ha subito il mondo contadino. [...] I preti non ci aiutavano [...] avevano una paura folle delle nostre armi. [...] I contadini ci hanno sfamati [...]. Dopo la Liberazione ho vissuto un anno drammatico perche' tutti mi giudicavano una di quelle, tutte le partigiane... erano puttane." (Tersilla Fenoglio Oppedisano pg.406)

"Eh, l'ambiente era difficile. Tutta la provincia di Cuneo era cosi', una provincia di gente chiusa, di individualisti. [...] Il vecchio dice [...] : I giovani dovevano restarsene nascosti in casa, in un buco, come ha fatto mio figlio. Ma que figlio si e' nascosto e si e' salvato proprio e soltanto perche' esistevano i partigiani. Mi spiace dirlo, ma la nostra gente di campagna non ha capito niente." (Carlo Altare, contadino, pg. 410)

A political life -- Norberto Bobbio

Curiously enough, I found this book on sale at the PU store, and I thought it would be interesting to read, because Bobbio is one of the best known thinker and professor in Torino.
The book was OK, but not great: there are quite a few passages that are interesting because they allow the reader to get an idea about Bobbio's thought, how his opinions came into being. On the other hand many passages are not very interesting (unless you are a specialist, I think), in particular when he writes about his speeches/communications/letters with people who are now perfectly unknown (but they probably were well know in the past, or in the philosophical/academic environment).

I report below some of the passages that I found the most interesting.

"On the right there is the the error of agnostic or conservative liberalism, which leads to freedom without justice. On the left there is the error of authoritarian collectivism which leads to justice without freedom." [pg. 40]

However, I am also unsuited to politics, because I suffer from the academic's typical profession deficiency, that of being an eternal doubter. If you carry out research, especially in the field of human sciences, you can, once you have examined all of the pros and cons, end your study with a question mark. As can be seen, there are profound existential reasons that have contributed to keeping me from public office: a politician has to be a man of action, which I am not by any stretch of the imagination. [pg. 141]

Day by day, I could see a moral problem emerging in which the Socialist were mixed up: the enforcement of moral standards in public life was a question of good government, and the basis of democracy. <...> (letter to Craxi) "It is not that I am an unaware of the objective difficulties that the party faces, caught as it is a rock and a hard place, and I therefore consider your concern over safeguarding the party's independence by not taking my part in any preconceived electoral programme to be correct. But the problem is that your unscrupulous exercise of power has made you less and less credible. Even you good intentions seem increasingly the ones that pave the way to hell. [pg. 148]

I argued that there had never been such a trend in democratic countries towards the integration of a great economic power and an equally great cultural power, through an extremely powerful instrument like television, with political power, as was occurring before our very eyes.This was the result of Berlusconi's 'entering the field', and, within the few months of an election campaign, becoming the prime minister of a government that even claimed to represent the quintessence of a liberal state. [pg. 158]

Cosmos

Carl Sagan--Cosmos

This one is a fascinating book. Carl Sagan writes beautifully, and the topics being discussed are some of the most fascinating questions about everything around us, from galaxies, to planets, to life on Earth (and eventually on other planets, and to human the limits of human knowledge. The book is divided in thirteen chapters: (1) The shores of the cosmic ocean (2) One voice in the cosmic fugue (3) The harmony of worlds (4) Heaven and hell (5) Blues for a red planet (6) Travelers' tales (7) The backbone of night (8) Travels in space and time (9) The lives of the stars (10) The edge of forever (11) The persistence of memory (12) Encyclopaedia galactica (13) Who speaks for Earth?.

I am jotting down here the passages that I liked the most.


For Ann Druyan. In the vastness of space and the immensity of time, it is my joy to share a planet and an epoch with Annie. (dedication)

Occasionally someone remarks on what a lucky coincidence it is that Earth is perfectly suitable for life--moderate temperatures, liquid water, oxygen atmosphere, and so on. But this is, at least in part, a confusion of cause and effect. (pg.14)

Many hypotheses proposed by scientists as well as by non-scientists turn out to be wrong. But science is a self-correcting enterprise. To be accepted all new ideas must survive rigorous standards of evidence. (pg.73)

"No one would have believed in the last years of the nineteenth century that this world was being watched keenly and closely by intelligences greater than man's and yet as and yet as mortal as his own; that as men busied themselves about their various concerns, they were scrutinized and studied, perhaps almost as narrowly as a man with a microscope might scrutinize the transient creatures that swarm and multiply in a drop of water." (pg. 86, quoting O.H.Wells, The war of the worlds)

I am a collection of water, calcium and organic molecules called Carl Sagan. You are a collection of almost identical molecules with a different collective label. But is that all? Is there nothing in here but molecules? Some people find this idea demeaning to human dignity. For myself, I find it elevating that our universe permits the evolutions of molecular machines as intricate and subtle as we. (pg. 105)

[About Huygens] "The world is my country," he said "science is my religion." (pg. 117)

"If a faithful account was rendered of Man's idea upon Divinity, he would be obliged to acknowledge that for the most part the word 'gods' has been used to express the concealed, remote, unknown causes of the effects he witnessed; that he applies this term when the spring of the natural, the source of known causes, ceases to be visible: as soon as he looses the thread of these causes, or as soon as his mind can no longer follow the chain, he solves the difficulty, terminates his research by ascribing it to his gods..." (pg. 133, quoting P.H.Dietrich, Systeme de la Nature)

The two Voyager interstellar spacecraft, the fastest machines ever launched from Earth, are now traveling at one ten-thousandth the speed of light. They would need 40,000 years to go the distance to the nearest star. [...] What is magic about the speed of light? Might we someday be able to go faster than that? (pg.166)

Europeans around the turn of the century generally believed in privileged frames of reference: that German, or French, or British culture and political organization were better than those of other countries; that Europeans were superior to other peoples who were fortunate enough to be colonized. The social and political application of the ideas of Aristharcus and Copernicus was rejected or ignored. The young Einstein rebelled against the notion of privileged frames of reference in physics as much as he did in politics. (pg.167)

Compared to a star, we are like mayflies, fleeting ephemeral creatures who live out their whole lives in the course of a single day. From the point of view of a mayfly, human beings are stolid, boring, almost entirely immovable, offering hardly a hint that they ever do anything. From the point of view of a star, a human being is a tiny flash, one of billions of brief lives flickering tenously on the surface of a strangely cold, anoumalously solid, exotically remote sphere of silicate and iron. (pg.178)

"We had the sky up there, all speckled with stars, and we used to lay on our backs and look up at them, and discuss whether they was made, or only just happened." (pg. 179, quoting M.Twain, Huckleberry Finn)

"I have...a terrible need...shall I say the word?...if religion. Then I go out at night and paint the stars." (pg.179, quoting V.Van Gogh)

The relative abundance of the chemical elements found in the Cosmos matches the relative abundance of atoms generated in stars so well as to leave little doubt that red giants and supernovae are the ovens and cricibles in which matter has been forged. The Sun is a second- or third-generation star. All the matter in it, all the matter you see around you, has been through one or two previous cycles of stellar alchemy. (pg. 191)

Ten or twenty billion years ago, something happened--the Big Bang, the event that began our universe. Why it happened is the greatest mystery we know. That it happened is reasonably clear.[...] The remnants of that fireball, the cosmic background radiation, emanating from all parts of the sky can be detected by radio telescopes today. (pg. 201)

Where is the center of the Cosmos? Is there an edge to the universe? What lies beyond that? In a two dimensional universe curved through a third dimension, there is no center--at least not on the surface of the sphere. The center of such a universe is not in that universe; it lies, inaccessible, in the third dimension, inside the sphere. While there is only so much area on the surface of the sphere, there is no edge to this universe--it is finite but unbounded. And the question of what lies beyond is meaningless. Flat creatures cannot, on their own, escape their two dimensions. (pg. 220)

There is an idea--strange, haunting, evocative--one of the most exquisite conjectures in science or religion. It is entirely undemonstrated; it may never be proved. But it stirs the blood. There is, we are told, and infinite hierarchy of universes, so that an elementary particle, such an electron, in our universe would, if penetrated, reveal itself to be an entire closed universe.[...] Our familiar universe of galaxies and stars, planets and people, would be a single elementary particle in the next universe up, the first step of an entire infinite regress. (pg 221)

To specify whether a lamp is on or off requires a single bit of information. To designate one letter out of the twenty-six in the Latin alphabet takes five bits (2^5 = 2 x 2 x 2 x 2 x 2 = 32, which is more than 26). The verbal information content of this book is a little less than ten million bits, 10^7. The total number of bits that characterizes an hour-long television program is about 10^12. The information in the words and pictures of different books in all the libraries on Earth is something like 10^16 or 10^17 bits. O f course much of it is redundant. Such a number calibrates crudely what humans know. But elsewhere, on older worlds, where life has has evolved billions of years earlier than on Earth, perhaps they know 10^20 bits or 10^30--not just more information, but significantly different information. (pg. 224)

"How vast those orbs must be, and how inconsiderable this Earth, the theatre upon which all our mighty designs, all our navigations, and all our wars are transacted, is when compared to them. S very fit consideration, and matter of reflection, for those kings and princes who sacrifice the lives of so many people, only to flatter their ambition in being masters of some pitiful corner of this small spot." (pg. 263, quoting C.Huygens, New conjectures concerning the planetary worlds)

"[...] A day will come, a day in the unending succession of days, when beings, beings who are now latent in our thoughts and hidden in our loins, shall stand upon this earth as one stands upon a footstool, and shall laugh and reach out their hands amidst the stars." (pg. 264, quoting H.G.Wells, The discovery of the future, Nature, 1902)

About two thirds of the mass of the human brain is in the cerebral cortex, devoted to intuition and reason. Humans have evolved gregariously. We delight in each other's company; we care for one another. We cooperate. Altruism is built into us. We have brilliantly deciphered some of the patterns of Nature. We have sufficient motivation to work together and the ability to figure out how to do it. If we are willing to contemplate nuclear war and the wholesale destruction of our emerging global society, should we not also be willing to contemplate a wholesale restructuring of our societies? (pg. 272)

We must learn the science and technology that provide he only conceivable tools for our survival. We must be willing to challenge courageously the conventional social, political, economical and religious wisdom. We must make every effort to understand that our fellow humans, all over the worlds, are human. (pg. 273)

The ash of stellar alchemy was now emerging into our consciousness. At an ever-accelerating pace, it in vented writing, cities, art and science, and sent spaceships to the planets and the stars. These are some of the things that hydrogen atoms do, given fifteen billion years of cosmic evolution. (pg. 283)

If a human disagrees with you, let him live. In a hundred billion galaxies, you will not find another. (pg. 283)

The God Delusion

Richard Dawkins--"The God Delusion"

When I started this book I was a little skeptical, since in the introductory part the author claims that he wants to prove some kind of rationale for an argument against religion. That sounded weird to me, as I was used to think that religion is usually part of a domain which is disconnected from the rational/scientific land. However I must say that the arguments that he brings are very convincing, and they tend mostly to point out the sociological/psicological/economical etc. consequences of religion. The book is divided in 10 chapters, which go from a description of the most important religions, to the confitation of the usual proofs of God's existence, a discussion of "morality", and the abuse of religion on most of the people. I copy below some of the passages that I liked the most.

"Here is an idea or a notion that you are not allowed to say anything bad about it; you're just not. Why not? because you're not! [...]Yet when you look at it rationally there is no reason why those ideas shouldn't be as open to debate as any other, except that we have agreed somehow between us that they shouldn't be". (pg.42)

Far better, of course, would be to abandon the promotion of religion altogether as grounds for charitable status. The benefits of this society would be great, especially in the United States, here the sum of tax-free money sucked in by churches [...] reach levels that could fairly be described as obscene. (pg.53)

"The priests of the different religious sects...dread the advance of science as witches do the approach of daylight, and scowl on the fatal harbinger announcing the subdivision of the duperies on which they live." (Thomas Jefferson) (pg.137)

The anthropic principle states that, since we are alive, eucaryotic and conscious, our planet has to be one of the intensely rare planets that has bridged all three gaps. [...] Other find this unsatisfying [...]uses the analogy of a man sentenced to death by firing squad. It is just possible that all ten men of the firing squad will miss their victim. [...] `Well, obviously they all missed, or I wouldn't be here thinking about it.' But then he could still, forgivably, wonder why they all missed, and toy with the hypotesis that they were bribed, or drunk. (pg.169-173)

Is religion a placebo that prolongs life by reducing stress? [...] It is hard to believe, for example, that health is improved by the semi-permanent state of morbid guilt suffered by a Roman Catholic possessed of normal human frailty and less than normal intelligence. (pg.195)

The antropologist Helen Fisher, in Why We Love, has beautifully expressed the insanity of romantic love, and how over-the-top it is compared with that might seem strictly necessary. Look at it this way. From the point of view of a man, say, it is unlikely that any other one woman of his acquaintance is a hundred times more lovable than her when 'in love'. Rather than the fanatically monogamus devotion to which we are susceptible, some sort of 'polyamory' is on the face of it more rational. (pg.214)

The following is a partial list of religious memes that might plausibly have survival value [...]: (*) You will survive your own death (*) Heretices, blasphemers and apostates should be killed (*) Belief in God is a supreme virtue (*) Faith is a virtue (*) Everybody, even those who do not hold religious beliefs, must respect them with a higher level [...] of belief. (*) There are some weird things that we are not meant to understand. (pg.232)

Arthur C. Clarke's Third Law:'Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.' (pg.235)

Why should a divine being, with creation and eternity on his mind, care a fig for petty human malefactions? We humans give ourselves such airs, even aggrandizing our poky little 'sins' to the level of cosmic significance! (pg.270)

As the Nobel Prize-winning American physicist Steven Weinberg said, `Religion is an insult to human dignity. With or without it, you'd have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, it takes religion.' (pg.283)

Religion has actually convinced people that there's an invisible man--living in the sky--who watches everything you do, every minute of every day. And the invisible man has a special list of ten things he does not want you to do. And if you do any of these ten things, he has a special place, full of fire and smoke and burning and torture and anguish, where he will send you to live and suffer and burn and choke and scream and cry forever and ever 'til the end of time...But he loves you! (George Carlin) (pg.317)

"There is in every village a torch--the teacher: and an extinguisher--the clergyman. (Victor Hugo) (pg.348)


"I believe that when I die I shall rot, and nothing of my ego will survive. I am not young and I love life. But I should scorn to shiver with terror at the thought of annihilation. Happiness is nonetheless true happiness because it must come to an end, nor do thought and love lose their value because they are not everlasting. Many a man has borne himself proudly on the scaffold; surely the same pride should teach us to think truly about man's place in the world. Even if the open windows of science at first make us shiver after the cosy indoor warmth of traditional humanizing myths, in the end the fresh air brings vigour, and the great spaces have a splendour of their own." (Bertrand Russell) (pg.397)

"That it will never come again/Is what makes life so sweet." (Emily Dickinson) (pg.405)

In the end: I enjoyed a lot this book, for the good points that it brings to the discussion, and for some of the awesome quotations that are in there.

Animal Farm

George Orwell -- "Animal Farm"

This book is awesome. It was first published in 1946, but it is still (or even more) actual nowadays.
The book is about the story of a farm where the animals, tired of being exploited by the owner (Mr. Jones), organize a rebellion, and kick him out of his property. The animals start then to manage themselves, with laws (the seven commandaments), with the organization of the work to be done, and planning the future. Even though everything is working perfectly at the beginning, when each animal is performing the task which best fits to his/her species, things start to become more complicated when the pigs, who are supposedly the smarter animals, and therefore are the ones leading the farm, start to take advantage of their position, and an oligarchic/dictatorial regime is established.
The power of this book, at least in my opinion, lies in the great representation (in between a tale and a sci-fi story) given by Orwell of the different attitudes of the animals, which reflect and represent the ones that human being have in a society. This representation also gives an excellent description of the steps that usually lead to any tyranny--and those steps have been and are always the same ones...

I report here few of the passages that I liked the most.

And remember also that in fighting against Man, we must not come to resemble him. [...] And above all, no animal must ever tyrannise over his own kind. Weak or strong, clever or simple, we are all brothers. No animal must ever kill any other animal. All animals are equal. (pg. 11)

The pigs had an even harder struggle to counteract the lies put about by Moses, the tame raven. Moses, who was Mr.Jones's especial pet, was a spy and a tale-bearer, but he was also a clever talker. He claimed to know the existence of a misterious coutry called Sugarcandy Mountain, to which all animals went when they died. [...where] it was Sunday seven days a week, clover was in season all the year round, and lump sugar and linseed cake grew on the hedges. The animals hated Moses because he told tales and did no work, but some of them believed in Sugarcandy Mountain [...]. (pg. 17)

But doubtless it ahd been worse in the old days. They were glad to believe so. Besides, in those days they had been slaves, and now they were free, and that made all the difference, as Squealer dod not fail to point out. (pg.113)

A thing that was difficult to determine was the attitude of the pigs towards Moses. They all declared contemptuously that his stories about Sugarcandy Mountain were lies, and yet they allowed him to remain on the farm, not working, with an allowance of a gill of beer a day. (pg. 118)


I enjoyed it at the same level as "1984", and it's richness is somewhat different: while 1984 is very powerful, but has to be read by somebody who is into this kind of topics, "Animal Farm" is powerful and easy to read at the same time. It would be a perfect book even for somebody in middle school.