Westerns Books

I used this book a semester ago in my probability class and I must say this is one of the worst textbooks I've come across with. There are plenty of exercises in the book and like the reviewer above said, it covers a lot. However, my friends and I all find the explanations are unclear and unhelpful.

The book did not include the online content access and was damaged when I received it. When I returned the book I was charged for shipping, despite the damage (which I did not cause). The text itself is written well and lends itself to a quick and easy grasp of the material. The chapter ending exercises, both brief and extended, expand well upon the material covered in the text.

I have used all the verions of this reference bible, so to speak, for 20 years. My entire (well over 300) CD Library was based on this book. Yes, they favor British and European artists, but they work extensively with the BBC and its treasure trove of 'live' recordings over the last 60 years. The bonus is, they now include DVD reviews.

Still a good guide to classic recordings and now includes DVDs, but many of the recordings cited are unobtainable. Reviews now seem to focus on musical integrity and make no mention of the sound quality of the CDs. Still, a lot better than just guessing!

I agree with the negative reviews posted here. I have been buying this guide regularly for decades, and look forward to each new issue avidly, despite the ever-lengthening trail of nonsensical statements that have survived cut-and-paste editing as recordings are added or (especially) deleted from the list. I can kind of forgive this particular widespread mess, as the task of editing such a huge volume with less than an army of editorial staff is truly daunting. Despite the ever-worsening series of little faults, it has always been the Gold Standard for serious collectors of classical recordings. But the latest edition has finally toppled over into the mud. For the first time there are fewer entries rather than more compared to the last full edition, and the ax has been wielded completely to several composers. Adios, Alberto Gerhard! The Guide has always been good about covering new recordings very promptly, but this time there are many, many important new issues that have not been included. The bulk is just as great as before, but that is because the space is used up with larger typeface and the introduction of superfluous boxes around chosen recordings. The plethora of distinguishing marks given to different recordings is almost impossible to parse and borders on the comical. Three stars for a fully recommended recording, three stars with a key for "key recordings", now FOUR stars for fully fully fully fully recommended recordings, and four stars with a rosette for, well, gosh, if everything else is so fully extra-special wonderful, these must be guaranteed to change your life. The evaluation process has degenerated into a form of hype. Since almost all recordings that previously received a less-than-three-star rating have been dropped, this leaves this as pretty much a Guide to Recommended Recordings. You might think it is not much of a loss to drop listings of less-recommended recordings, but it was always possible to develop an understanding of the well-marked biases and limitations of the three editors by seeing which kinds of interpretations they tended to give lower ratings, and therefore to compensate for the basic dullness and correctness of their very British critical bias. This strategy is no longer available for readers.

So, after many, many years of excitedly snapping up each new edition, I will probably not be buying any more Penguin Guides to Classical Music. (The sad demise of one of the two editors of the Penguin Guide to Jazz probably puts an end to that wonderful publication as well.) I am seriously disappointed, and, considering the hundreds of hours I have spent with the various editions of this publication, I actually feel I have lost a small corner of my life that has given me a lot of pleasure.

It may be that the Guide is still useful to newer collectors, but it a sad comedown from its own established level.

After purchasing The Penguin Guide to Jazz Recordings: Eighth Edition (Penguin Guide to Jazz Recordings) and being very happy with it, this was an obvious choice for me to start getting a handle on my classical music collection. The book is well organized and attempts to be comprehensive, but given the expanse of classical music available, invariably some of your personal favorite recordings will be left out of this tome. (One of my all time favorites, and a recurring title of many "must have" classical music lists, Mussorgsky: Pictures at An Exhibition was left out, for example.) This volume uses a box summary with symbols and abbreviations that allow them to distinguish certain recordings from others, and it is very useful with a not-too-steep learning curve. Unlike the jazz version, this does not attempt to establish a "core collection", leaving the digging and experimenting to the reader/listener. All in all, anyone who purchases classical music on a regular basis would serve themselves well to have this book handy.

I'll make this short and sweet. This guide is not worth purchasing anymore because reissues of old recordings are rarely included, plus, a good many of brand new recordings are not included. I really thought the Penguin Guide was superb in the early 90's but no more. When they include the same old recordings they just use the review that they previously did and don't have to write anything new, so they look like they're a bit lazy. If they get their act together one of these days you might want to try them again but I'm sure that will be a good long time in the future.

In this book written by Plato, Socrates is again proving his brilliance (as Plato always has him doing). Phaedrus brings to Socrates a letter from a man claiming that it is better to have sex with a man who doesn't love you than one who does. Socrates then gives his response as to why it is better to be lovers with someone who loves you. A challenging read at points of Socrates speech because he uses crazy metaphors but a wonderful read.

_I have heard some call this work a confused jumble of unrelated concepts. These people just didn't get it. There is one unified theme to the Phaedrus: without a deep connection to the soul and to the higher Reality only accessible to the soul, then all human endeavors are in error.

_The first part of the dialogue deals with three speeches on the topic of love. This is used only as an example and is not the primary theme (though it is an extremely thorough and compelling examination of the subject.) The first speech (by Lysias) is clearly in error- it is badly composed, badly reasoned, and supports what is clearly the wrong conclusion. The second speech (by Socrates), while an impeccable model of correct rhetoric, and reaching the correct conclusion is also essentially flawed- for it makes no appeal to the deepest fundamental causes of things. Simply put, it lacks soul. The third argument (attributed to Stesichorus) however, delves deeply into the soul. In fact, the core of the argument is centered around the proof of the existence and nature of the soul. That is the consistency here- unless you are Philosopher enough to have looked deeply within your own soul, to have made contact (recollection) with ultimate Reality (Justice, Wisdom, Beauty, Temperance, etc.) then your arguments are just empty words- even if you are accidentally on the correct side.

_The second part of the dialogue concentrates on showing how true rhetoric is more than "empty rhetoric" (i.e. just clever arguments and tricks used to sway the masses.) True rhetoric is shown to literally be the art of influencing the soul through words. It also reads as the perfect description, and damnation, of modern politics and the legal system. No wonder Socrates was condemned to later take poison- he actually BELIEVED in Justice, Truth, and the Good. As a Philosopher he could not compromise on such things for he knew the profound damage and that it would do to his soul and to his "wings."

'Phaedrus' is the first work ever to provide an explanation to how we organise our ideas, speeches and use our knowledge in a general sense. It explains the basics of an arguing and convincing, within the context of Greek politics and society.

As I said, it's division and gathering that is evident in all of our arguments. We make our claims based upon the similarities and differences in things, and this is the core of argumentation.

In his dialogue style, Plato talks about many other things, that range from what makes a good writing a good one, to the heritance of knowledge. How should knowledge be attained from others? How should we present our knowledge for new generations to understand us? These are some of the questions that come up in Phaedrus.

Plato, one of the clearest writers in philosophy, wrote yet another beautiful work. I've started reading Plato when I was thirteen, and I really enjoy reading his works, which just flow.

I recommend not only this book, but almost any book of Plato's, for all philosophy lovers out there, and all those that would like to make their first attempt in understanding some philosophical issues, which build the base of our living.

This books attempts to answer a question that was apparently very important in ancient Greece:

When an older man wants to seduce a beautiful boy should the older man be in love with the boy or should they just be friends ?

Then it gives this analogy of the feelings of the seducer sprouting like wings from his soul.

All of this was actually quite repugnant for me so I took off a few stars.

If someone were to right a book like this today they would probably be thrown in jail.

Socrates was thrown in jail and executed. I don't know if there's a connection.

It sounds like Socrates was into that man / boy stuff.

I doubt if Plato was into it. He was probably just recording information about the beliefs and customs of the times.

Then again it's hard to really learn much about Plato from these dialogues since they are accounts of conversations between Socrates and someone else (Phaedrus in this case).

I'm planning on reading a few more of these short dialogues before I read "The Laws".

"The Laws" was I think one of Plato's last works so it should tell what Plato finally decided about a lot of issues before he died.

This is the first time I ever read a book where the introduction and editors' notes are longer than the story itself.

However that introductory and additional information was very helpful.

I'll probably order these same authors' version of "Symposium".

Jeff Marzano

In Phaedrus, Plato records the conversation of love and rhetoric between Socrates and Phaedrus. Socrates uses love as a metaphor for rhetoric by categorizing the differences between love and lust, as well as the differences between a philosopher who pursues divine truth, and a poet who forgoes truth for ostentations. Then Socrates and Phaedrus eventually conclude the requirements for being a dialectician. In the course of defending proper love and truth, Socrates pointes out that beauty and truth are divine. Whoever pursues reality would worship beauty and truth with reverence, and his admirations of divinities yield pleasures. Then in order to receive the blessing from gods, the proper lover and the philosopher must overcome desires with reasoning. Conversely, those commoners who are tempted by earthy imitations of the reality would be trapped by carnal or linguistic pleasures, as the improper lover and the poet, who lack reasoning would drown in the momentary enjoyments of their own wantonness.

I'm still waiting for the book on sacred sexuality that doesn't talk to me like I don't know where my own vagina is. I'm from a freak scene where men aren't afraid to indulge their feminine sides and neither are the women, where walking around naked ain't no big deal and many of us have found our g spots and prostates and are happily stimulating them.

It seems that this book targets the same audience as practically every other mainstream "sacred sexuality" book out there - middle-aged folks bored with their sex lives and with the kind of money necessary to attend these sorts of workshops (and the illustrations reflect that - I'm not complaining though, I'm happy to see realistic folks getting down!)

So be it - I'm happy to know that Margot Anand is doing the work that she does, even if I couldn't ever afford one of her workshops. Like I said, I'm still waiting for a book that ups the ante on sacred sexuality and I might just have to write it myself. If that were the case, I'd want this woman right by my side to help me out. I know she knows what she's talking about.

Btw, folks, let's not confuse today's "sacred sexuality" with real, true tantra (Anand makes this difference clear). Sexuality IS sacred, however, and realizing it as such will definitely change your life. However, sex is merely a small part of the TRUE practice of Tantra.

Margot Anand has several books available to keep intimacy fresh for couples. This book is the best of it's kind. Even for people who roll their eyes at the "spiritual" aspects of sex, this books advice on sensuality, intimacy and arousal can bring a revived freshness into relationships even after years with the same partner.

The "Ritual of the Senses" itself is worth the price of the book. Guys that don't think they have anything to learn about sex REALLY should read this book...

I have owned this book for years and finally found a partner 6 years ago who was open enough to try some of the practices with me. It is chock full of fantastic exercises and ways of percieving and looking at things, with tools for opening your heart and mind to true intimacy.

We liked it so much that we went to a workshop with Margot last week. Of course, we came home and got the book out right away to see what else we can use to add to our relationship and our lives together.

I think this book is made up of a bunch of baloney. I don't believe a word of it. I think that way too much importance is placed on sex, to the point of being obsessed with it. It's about a bunch perverts, in my opinion. The author's interest and obsession with sex is not normal. It appears she thinks of nothing else in life, except sex, and who to have it with.

This book is a complete sacred sex course in itself. With lots of meditations, activities, and exercises, it is particularly suited for couples who want to open up to each other emotionally as well as physically.

When I first tried to tackle this book I was a first year undergrad philosophy and logic student - I declared Derrida my arche-enemy.
Three years later I am devoted to Derrida.
I eventually managed to push down the frustration (and at times, the blind rage) I felt at reading his stuff and took my time to follow him where he wants to take us.
Derrida is important for thinking, whether or not you agree with what he is saying.
Derrida's greatest lesson is forcing us to look closer, he wants us to pay attention to what is really going on (or at least, to pay attention to other possibilities that may be at work)

The importance of Derrida and his movement is monumental - not for the term "deconstructionism" (heard frequently without a clue to its true meaning) but for how he has influenced (Western) society. Derrida, like Marcuse, Chomsky, Foucault and others, has moved from his original study to a broader agenda and, like many intellectuals, considers his mastery of one subject transferrable to another. He managed to survive the embarrassing Paul de Man fiasco and has since wisely avoided mention of the "Hitler in all of us". He has remarked on the authoritarian anti-democratic nature of deconstructionism, treating the subject ironically.

This is, allegedly, a textbook of post-Modern thought on language but reads like a didactic, out-of-focus Proust. The writing is nebulous, self-referential, unreadable. He speaks in Orwellian terms equating opposite qualities and words. It is so ephemeral as to lack certitude and for this very reason many commentators fear definitive statements on the subject. Deconstructionism is, despite all the twaddle, inherently subjective. He muses on expression, anxiety, emotions, signs and existentialism, finding meaning and interpretation where there is none. His popularity rests entirely on academia and like-minded camp followers in the media. I mean, how many Iowans care about the "ultimate" meaning of allusions? The problem with the ouevre is that when taken seriously, it literally make mountains of molehills.

Such as, well, equating fairy tales to S&M sagas, symphonies to invitations to rape, skyscrapers to phallic power trips, signs of "white" recycled paper as racism and stuttering as aggression. Allusions are, in Derrida-speak, fraught with deep meaning. To accomplish this one must divorce words from their sources and stated intent. The critic has been necessarily elevated above the author since only he can provide a "true" meaning. It is so outrageous that few outside of the Ivory Towers give it credence. That would be a mistake. Language is perhaps the most human of all abilities and its interpretation affects our personal and collective consciousness. His method has been called the "language of cultural Marxism" and is a necessary component of modern leftist ideology. At any time I expect Jacques Derrida to announce, like Alan Sokal, that it has all been a collosal joke on both the true believer and the reader.

While it's certainly true that there will always be a gulf between reality and words, communication between reader and writer is nonetheless very real and potentially profound, thanks in no small part to empathy and the imagination. Deconstructionism, by denying presence and instead proposing unlimited differences between signs, dismisses any connection between readers and writers and turns language into a hermetic system separated from the outside world which is, of course, inhabited by people who read and people who write. This is exactly what makes deconstructionism so empty and hypocritical: It rejects traditional metaphysics while adopting a pseudo-mystical position which regards language as some unstable and solipsistic alien creature independent of everything and everyone.

Derrida's thought is the primary reason why I inevitably feel an urge to put quotation marks around so many of the conceptual labels in my own writing; he initiates a needful misgiving: Do we really know what we are speaking about when we attempt to speak philosophically? Or is our language so subverted, displaced, and otherwise (blindly) ideological that a lot of the theoretical malarkey that academics put forth just seems to beg the age-old questions of knowledge, truth, meaning, etc.? But wait. We shouldn't lose sight of the fact that Derrida's writing shies away, almost essentially, from authoritative positioning in such matters because his own writing is subject to the same blind alleys and provisionalism that all writing is. In this respect, his writing is always, in a way, winking and playful, but admittedly in an rigorous and sometimes difficult way.

Is this book difficult? Yes, you bet it is! But I assure you that it's is as close to entry-level Derrida as any other book written by him. I first encountered the thinking of Derrida in a very watered-down gloss on his theory in postmodernist primer; this intrigued me to pursue him further, to read such things as Beginner's Guides and Short Introductions (which I definitely recommend to those who have either no prior experience with him or no great familiarity with the other thinkers he addresses in Of Grammatology--Saussure, Rousseau, etc.). Of course, you'll discover that these tidy little intros can be oversimplifying in places, but they at least get you to the general neighborhood before your set out on your own.

Derrida's writing, because of its inherent need for argumentative clarity and rigor, can at times be difficult to decipher; therefore, do not obsess over every sentence; the overall meaning of the argument is much more important and often becomes clearer if you just plow through difficult passages.

Every writing, especially philosophical writing, and even of course Derrida's, is by nature ideological; it works outward from a set of assumptions. There is no other alternative. We cannot start from scratch, from some dreamed-of ground zero where there is no preceding meaning and out of which we may deduce all the truths of the universe. Derrida's ideological vantage is then what appealed to me about him; perhaps never in black and white, but always and everywhere his thinking seems to question authoritative accounts, seeks to expand upon the marginalized element in any discourse, and foregrounds the difficulty in making large and almost mathematical pronouncements in philosophical and other supradisciplinary affairs. These are certain dispositions which align with my own particular perspective, and if they have some resonance with you, and if you come to Derrida having completed a little homework and bringing along a good dose of patience and effort, then you'll likely find this book rewarding as well.

A final note on the opposing opinion: Although there is no one camp of thinkers or philosophers which opposes Derrida's thought for one and only one reason, some of the most vocal of his detractors (and I will temporarily assume their voice here) regard him as a proponent of relativism or an attempted (but miserably failed) assassin of the western philosophical tradition. They are less skeptical of a fundamental faith in the general structures of meaning and in the rudimentary capabilities of the rational mind to attain to some variety of truth, however limited. Also, opponents often regard Derrida as a kind of interloper in the field of philosophy, that he should putter around with his obscurantist games in the narrow field of literary theory where he belongs. Therefore, if Plato, Descartes, and Locke seem like more feasible philosophical pursuits, Derrida probably (1) won't convert you and (2) won't be to your liking. He doesn't put forth a philosophical system, and neither does he assert an epistemological framework, so you won't find the kind of concrete, axiomatical philsophical claims common to pre-modern and early modern philosophy.

Of grammatology is a tour-de-force of Derrida's ideas about reading and writing; it encapsulates his view of de-construction, and his reformulation of such complex issues as phenomenology and structuralism. I have to admit that there were times when I felt that I was just turning the pages. I needed to go back several times just to get a sense of what I had just read. Spivak's introduction is a gem as she makes Derrida more accessible. Reading Derrida places a real strain on the reader because he assumes the reader is well informed and has an academic sense of the writers he engages in like Ferdinand de Saussure, Claude Levi-Strauss, and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. For Derrida, structuralists - particularly Levi-Strauss take for granted that speech is more direct than written script. Derrida critiques this sense of logocentrism that privileges the spoken word where the sound and meaning exist side by side. On the other hand, writing for Derrida creates an interstice between the sign and its meaning. Logocentricism and the accompanying phonologism are the seed of Derrida's deconstruction. Derrida sense of grammatology is that it is a soft science, one of writing. In this really complex mélange of engagements by Derrida, he problematizes Saussure's structural linguistics and goes to town on the notion of 'presence' that he feels has dominated the West since the Greeks, down to Heidegger and eventually culminating in the structuralism of Levi-Strauss. The notion of deconstruction is, for the most part attributed to Derrida. Deconstruction feeds into a much larger and more involved intellectual school of thought commonly known as poststructuralism. Postructuralism's genesis appeared with Derrida's exegetical critique on Strauss's the notion of, 'structure.' Taking the Saussure's lead, Levi-Strauss took structuralism into the field of structuralist anthropology - of which Levi-Strauss is said to have pioneered. In Of grammatology, Derrida portrays structuralism as the culmination of a tradition of structuralities, and reduces all to a fixed point of presence. This fixed point is effectively its center - calling for Derrida to move to de-center. To return to the issue of the sign, Derrida sees signs as random, in that they are defined not by essence but by or in comparison to something else. The solidity of the binary opposition between signifier and signified, which binds the sign, cannot be sustained unless we are prepared to grant that there exists some form of transcendental signified which would kill the play of signification. Derrida's analysis compels us to be aware that every signified is also in the position of a signifier. According to Derrida, the meaning of words is really dependent on how they are used. Derrida claims that everything is what it is, based on what it is not, - or difference. In a nutshell, Derrida is positions himself on the notion of the perennial postponement of signification - or "differance" -- or the outcome by which an opposition constantly repeats itself inside each of its component terms. In French, the word is in a liminal space between "to differ" and "to defer," as if saying there is yet one more thing to consider one more difference to account for. Moreover, Derrida seeks to de-construct claims of fixed truths. However, as a caveat, the critique on logocentrism, the practice of deconstruction, is really aimed at language, and to use it within and around other areas without really understanding Derridian de-construction is dangerous.

Miguel Llora

At first I wasn't sure I could get into it, Lonesome Dove set the bar pretty high, but after the first few pages I was back into the characters (old and new). Well done! A must if you want to follow up with Call, Lorie, and Pea.

I originally read this 10 years ago and I remembered not liking it, but I decided to sit down and read the Lonesome Dove trilogy back to back. Lonesome Dove is an incredible book. You feel like you are there with the characters. Commanche Moon is a blood bath, but at least the writing is good. Streets of Laredo, on the other hand, is one huge disappointment. The plot line itself is at least tolerable, however it appears to be one big advertisement to try to sell more Lonesome Dove copies...whereas the book ought to be able to stand on its own, the reader is constantly treated to gratuitous dull flashbacks to scenes from Lonesome Dove.

very interesting book. keep your wanting to know whats next. the story about the early life of the settlers. how they endured early life of weather, indians, no water.

The author has delivered a good book that is appealing to readers. The ending is bizarre. Cut a man's leg off and walk 100 miles without him bleeding to death, farfetched. But otherwise a decent book.

It's obvious that the author wishes to damage western sentimentality. All his novels have a bitterswwet flavor, with guaranteed tragedy at the end of the book to beloved characters. It's a shame he reduces the main character to such an unsatisfying ending.

His side characters are less appealing than those portrayed in Lonesome Dove. And the book feels rushed at times. Why he chose 17 years post-Lonesome Dove limits our involvement in the story. Wouldn't 5 years post lonesome Dove been more appealing to his readers? A 70 year old bounty hunter in the 1800's. Not very appealing.

The plot of STREETS OF LAREDO seems simple enough. Captain Woodrow Call, bounty hunter extraordinaire, is hired by Colonel Terry, the president of a railroad, to capture train robber and serial killer, Joey Garza. But there are enough twists and turns in Larry McMurtry's novel to turn a simple situation into a complex, risky adventure where both laws and human endurance are stretched to the limit, and often broken.

From the start, Call's quest is filled with obstacles. His colleague, Pea Eye Parker, refuses to join him on the hunt for the first time in years. Like Call, Pea Eye, is getting old and isn't sure he's up to another hunt, especially one that will take him far away from his wife and their five children. Call is also accompanied by Colonel Terry's New York accountant, Ned Bookshire, a man who knows he's out of his depth in the rugged west, but who must accompany Call to keep track of expenses for the Colonel, or else lose his job. From there, things get worse, especially when more than one serial killer arrives in the area to cause trouble.

I've never read a Larry McMurtry novel before, and although I'm told STREETS OF LAREDO is a sequel to LONESOME DOVE, this novel stands well on its own, despite occasional references to the past. Especially interesting was McMurtry's use of back story to provide intriguing and useful details about main characters and a few secondary characters. I have to admit that some back stories were too long. Also, while POV changed often and smoothly, nearly every character used the word "foolish" to describe their past mistakes. By the time Joe Garza reflects on his "foolish" mistakes, I'm wishing McMurtry had kept a thesaurus nearby while writing. Still, McMurtry's talent for detail, narrative description, and riveting storytelling made this novel a great read.