by Edogawa Rampo (1956)
A lucidly-translated collection of short mystery stories , Japanese Tales gives English-language readers a spell-binding peek into the works of Edogawa Rampo, “Japan’s most famous mystery writer”. (I first knew about the name from the Indonesian-licensed manga Detektif Conan by Aoyama Gosho, and Febby then acquaint me further to Rampo’s popularity among Japanese readers.)
by Mark Cousins (2004)
Taking his cue from H.R. Gombrich’s The Story of Art, Mark Cousins paints a broad sweep of film history, chronologically arranged from its conception in late 19th century, “silent” to “sound” and then “digital” in 21st century, focusing on those whose originality — “schema with variations” instead of Gombrich’s “schema with corrections” — he considered has altered the landmarks of film-making.
A Political History
by Hamid Reza Sadr (2006)
From the infamous introduction of cinema to Iran through the Iranian monarchy in the early twentieth century to the worldwide acclaimed post-revolutionary era, Sadr presents us with a highly readable history of Iranian cinema with its embedded and reflected social, political, cultural and economic contexts, lucidly written in a comprehensive book.
Film Festivals and the World They Made
by Kenneth Turan (2002)
In this book Kenneth Turan presents us with “insider’s view” of twelve film festivals. Divided into four sections, part one studies “festivals with business agendas”: Cannes, Sundance and ShoWest; part two “festivals with geopolitical agendas”: FESPACO, Havana, Sarajevo, Midnight Sun; part three “festivals with aesthetic agendas”: Pordenone, Lone Pine and Telluride. The concluding part four, “the politics of festivals”, is dedicated to the past Florida French film festival.
by Cormac McCarthy (2006)
A father and his son wander through a charred, ravaged post-apocalyptic world, where all matter of wildlife is extinct and the rain ashen. Scavenging the scarce food that is left and, with a pistol, fending of the lawless “bad guys” — lawless, plundering bands of cannibals, they continue their journey to reach the coast, despite not knowing what awaits them there.
by Orhan Pamuk (1998)
In Istanbul, in the late 1590s, the Sultan secretly commissions a book to Enishte Effendi, instead of his head illustrator, Master Osman. Working with the most prominent miniaturists of the day: Elegant, Butterfly, Stork, and Olive, Enishte is to create a book that will display the Sultan’s prominence and power to the infidel Venetians — illustrated in the Frankish manner, i.e. using shadows, perspective, etc. to make the subjects recognisable and representational.
by John Updike (2006)
Ahmad Mulloy Ashmawy is the son of an Irish-American mother, Teresa Mulloy, and an Egyptian father, Omar Ashmawy, who disappeared when Ahmad was three. Taken under the strict guidance of Shaik Rashid when he was eleven where he begins his bi-weekly Qur’an and Arabic lessons, Ahmad moves through the post-9/11 “New Prospect” in New Jersey with the (typical) revulsion for the materialistic, hedonistic “Americanism”.
Non-Fiction 1922-1986
by Jorge Luis Borges
This is a collection of more than 150 non-fiction pieces (critical essays, movie & book reviews, prologues, introductions) grouped chronologically from his earlier (disowned) writings to the year of his death in 1986. Some of these pieces have also appeared in Labyrinths. Most are short, with longer pieces dedicated to certain subjects well-associated with Borges (The Thousand and One Night, time, dreams, labyrinth…).
Joy, Sorrow, and the Feeling Brain
by Antonio Damasio (2003)
Having been familiar with the prominence of (both Hanna and Antonio) Damasio’s names in neuroscience, I picked this book expecting a popular science book that provides insights into the neurobiological underpinnings of memory and emotions, something like Damasio’s colleague’s work, Joseph LeDoux’ Synaptic Self (maybe with some accounts of Spinoza). I was wrong — the book instead focuses on some basic points which are somehow, in an almost Whiggish manner, related to Spinoza’s ideas.
by Danilo Kiš (1972)
The book starts with a prologue that muses on the chalice/faces optical illusion, which then proceeds to interspersions of Travel Scenes, Notes of a Madman, and Criminal Investigation, each one with its own distinctive narrative (3rd-person narrative, 1st-person, silent dialogue), sometimes short sometimes running for pages. We are introduced to he protagonist, a railway clerk known as E.S., inquiring indignantly to the authorities for his reduced pension, and in his narrative also reveals other mundane day-to-day concerns (his quarrel with his sister and nephew) that he seems absurdly obsessed with, that at initial glance looks arbitrary but slowly and chillingly grows into dawning comprehension, that this is a futile defiant thrashing of a condemned man in the face of the implicit story that was taking place — the extermination and the massacre of the Jews.
