What, Why & How do we Know ?
Just updated my link to David Lavery‘s Owen Barfield site a couple of days ago. Today Robert Pirsig himself recommended David Lavery’s “Evil Genius” site via Ant McWatt on the MoQ Discussion Board. Who is Joanna Climacus ? Real or fiction ? (Or is it Johanna Climacus – both spellings on the site ? The … Continue reading “David Lavery’s Evil Genius”
Read Owen Barfield’s “Poetic Diction” and “History in English Words” a year or so ago, and blogged several items. [here][here][here]. I was doing a search on Barfield today in preparation for reading more of his work and came across two interesting sites. This review of Barfield’s “Saving the Appearances – A Study in Idolatry” on … Continue reading “Words as Idols”
BBC Radio 4 Today programme, yesterday (6th Sept 07:44) discussed this list of books assembled by Penguin as representing the works with most impact on the world, in chronological order. After some debate it was concluded that perhaps these were the easier appetisers, rather than the less digestible main-courses, from these specific authors or schools … Continue reading “20 Works With Most Impact on the World”
I dropped the inklings line of research a couple of months ago when I noted the JRR Tolkien / CS Lewis / GK Chesterton angle leading off down a strongly theistic / catholic path, despite the interesting connection with Owen Barfield, and the Cambridge connections of Lewis / Barfield and (non-inkling) McLuhan. In response to … Continue reading “JRR Tolkien and The Pickerell ?”
Just read Yann Martel’s “The Story of Pi” in one sitting on one day. The essence is about how “good” a story needs to be to be considered true or, expressed in reverse, there is no truth, only a good story. A recommended read whatever – an unputdownably good story as you “suspend disbelief”. I … Continue reading “A Good Story”
Have Aryan’s been air-brushed from history ?(Apparently the term is no longer PC – Indo-European is preferred – but was this just a region containing a group of peoples, or a people consiting of a common culture and language ? – a key point blurred by the PC term – thanks to LanguageHat.) I’m reading … Continue reading “Aryans ?”
Language Hat – Interesting linguistic site blogged here by the Apothecary. In view of the Owen Barfield posts below, and coming next, you’ll understand why this post on an (sic) obscure word struck a chord too. If we only ever read writers who only ever used words we already knew in contexts we already knew, … Continue reading “Language Hat”