spaziolibero

[c ensurato] anni fa, in occasione del mio quarantaduesimo compleanno, masterizzai una quindicina di copie di un Cd da distribuire ai miei colleghi. Qui di seguito le brevi note che scrissi all'epoca per spiegare perché avevo scelto proprio quelle tracce, e perché, come dicevo nell'introduzione , "mi rappresentano, mi fanno tornare indietro nel tempo, mi evocano ricordi o, semplicemente, mi piacciono."   Finora le avevano lette solamente i colleghi di cui sopra, ma ho realizzato che se dovessi rifare oggi quel Cd, metterei più o meno le stesse tracce, e più o meno per le stesse ragioni, quindi ecco le liner notes della #42 compilation anche per i miei dodici lettori. Qui, se volete, il Cd sotto forma di playlist YouTube . 1) Ludwig Van Beethoven - V Sinfonia, I movimento [Carlos Kleiber, Wiener Philharmoniker, registrata nel 1974] Se qualcuno mi chiedesse di indicare una prova che gli esseri umani non sono solo scimmie nude, gli farei ascoltare questo b...

Come tanti, in questi giorni di clausura domestica, sto cercando di tenermi impegnato. Poteva andarmi peggio: già di mio sono uno che sta bene in casa, quindi mi pesa senz'altro meno che ad altri; in più tra un po' di lavoro a distanza, letture amene ( Spillover , di David Quammen, sulle zoonosi ), film e serie, i giorni passano. Oggi, dopo aver visto Jojo Rabbit , che mi è piaciuto tantissimo, e su cui magari scriverò qualche riga nei prossimi giorni, ho rimesso mano a un documento che avevo iniziato mesi fa, e che era finito nel dimenticatoio: un elenco di tutte le nomination all'Oscar come miglior film , indicando quali ho visto. L'idea è di partire dal 1929, anno dei primi Academy; per ora sono arrivato al 1970, anche perché ho visto che dagli anni precedenti il numero di film visti cala a picco*. Qualche considerazione sparsa. - Solo per il 1998 ho visto tutti i film nominati: Titanic (che ha vinto), Full Monty , L.A. Confidential , Qualcosa è cambiato , Wil...

Zitkála-Šá was a woman belonging to two worlds: born in an Indian Reservation, aged eight she went to study in a Quaker boarding school, and later became a teacher and an activist for Native American rights. In the first half of this book, (a collection of two of her works) she describes her experience at the school, and her struggle to conform, or at lest get used, to the "paleface" rules; in the second half she puts in writing, I think for the first time, some of the Sioux child's tales and stories she grew up with. Both halves are enthralling: the first one because it puts, for once, we "palefaces" in the shoes of the stranger; the second one because it reveals a genuinely original mythology. The book, long out of copyright, is easily available for free, and it's less than two hundred pages long: there are really no excuses for not reading it. // Zitkála-Šá era una donna in bilico tra due mondi: nata in una Riserva Indiana, a otto anni di e...

This third book by Harari is an exposition of some of the basic issues that humankind is facing right now, or will be facing very shortly. It bears a somewhat misleading title: as written by Bill Gates in this review , more than delivering lessons, Harari is interested in "defining the terms of the discussion and giving you historical and philosophical perspective". Not least because they are issues with no clear and definite answer: who can honestly claim to have the solution to the problems arising from climate crisis, or from immigration, or from the increasing automation of jobs? It's not an easy book (but it is a brilliantly written one), and it poses more questions than it answers, but I think that's what makes it valuable: in a time of oversimplicistic answers, having the courage to tackle complexity is necessary and almost heroic. // Questo terzo libro di Harari presenta alcuni dei problemi fondamentali che l'umanità sta affrontando in ques...

Homo Deus , which I read in 2017, and which I really should have read after this, speculated on the future of humankind; Sapiens tells its history, shaped by the three Revolutions: Cognitive, Agricultural and Scientific. It's a fascinating read, and Harari's point of view is often controversial but always original and insightful. Just to mention two of his most audacious ideas: he posits that one of the worst mistakes in the whole of human history has been abandoning the hunter-gatherer way of life in favour of agriculture and city-building; and he speculates that the great (and only) real advantage Homo Sapiens possess towards other animals is its ability to build and share narratives. I won't spoil further the pleasure of discovering a tale told countless times, but perhaps never with this ambition and this scope: go read it for yourself, and I'm prepared to bet that it will change the way you look at humankind and its achievements. // Homo De...

Since a nasty shoulder fracture in 2009, I became quite interested in medicine history, and I had this book in my to-read list for a few months. A friend of mine recommended it, so off the list and into my hands it went, and I'm glad it did (thanks Jo!). It's a biography of Joseph Lister, a British medic who in the mid-XIX century championed the then far-fetched idea that antisepsis in surgical procedures was desirable, thus paving the way, together with the introduction of anesthesia a few decades before, to modern surgery. Before Lister's campaign, the very concept of sterilization was unknown, and it was common practice to operate on a patient with knives and saws still soiled with the blood of the previous one, not to mention the surgical apron, which, never washed as tradition required, sported the bloodstains of decades of amputations and incisions. Dr. Fitzharris clearly has a passion for her subject, and it shows in the way she writes about the most ...

[Nota: so di essere mostruosamente indietro con le recensioni di Goodreads, e temo che non riuscirò mai a recuperarle tutte, anche se ci proverò comunque. Spero che lo #stareacasa da Coronavirus mi aiuti.] Every once in a while, Stephen King (yes, the Stephen King) recommends a book he particularly liked from his Twitter account. I got a few, but this is the first I actually read. It's a dystopian warning about the unbridled power of megacorps meets a techno-spy-thriller, and as I wrote about Vox , works more as the first than as the second. It's more coherent than Dalcher's book, doesn't suffer of any obvious slip (here it's clear how the bracelets are powered), and the three-voiced narration is compelling and well built; on the whole it is an enjoyable book, even if the plot just didn't blow my socks off. But taken as a just-around-the-corner dystopia... boy oh boy, does it deliver (pun definitely intended). It describes the sort of hell on earth...