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Computational Materials Science, Volume 15 (Theoretical and Computational Chemistry)
Manufacturer: Elsevier Science
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Book Description
Computational tools have been permanently deposited into the toolbox of theoretical chemists. The impact of new computational tools can hardly be overestimated, and their presence in research and applications is overwhelming. Theoretical methods such as quantum mechanics, molecular dynamics, and statistical mechanics have been successfully used to characterize chemical systems and to design new materials, drugs, and chemicals. This volume on Computational Material Sciences covers selected examples of notable applications of computational techniques to material science. The chapters contained in this volume include discussions of the phenomenon of chaos in chemistry, reaction network analysis, and mechanisms of formation of clusters. Details of more practical applications are also included in the form of reviews of computational design of new materials and the prediction of properties and structures of well known molecular assemblies. Current developments of effective computational methods, which will help in understanding, predicting, and optimizing periodic systems, nanostructures, clusters and model surfaces are also covered in this volume.
1. Reviews of current computational methods applied in material science
2. Reviews of practical applications of modelling of structures and properties of materials
3. Cluster and periodical approaches
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Richard Feynman, the rock star of theoretical physics, has left an image that belies his nerdy side. Not many bongo-playing surfer beatniks would have spent hours of their spare time proving Newton's law of elliptical planetary motion using only plane geometry. But Feynman's Lost Lecture: The Motion of Planets Around the Sun shows that the great man did just that. Originally delivered to an introductory physics class at Caltech in 1963, this 76-minute CD and book set contains everything the math-savvy listener needs to savor the pleasures of applied math. Caltech physicist David L. Goodstein and archivist Judith R. Goodstein found the notes and tape amid another professor's papers and set to work making sense of them; unfortunately, photographs of the blackboard drawings didn't survive. The book briefly covers their find and recovery work, then presents the proof as reconstructed--crucial reading if one is to follow the lecture. There's nothing easy about it, as Feynman acknowledges in the lecture:
I am going to give what I will call an elementary demonstration. "Elementary" means that very little is required to know ahead of time in order to understand it, except to have an infinite amount of intelligence.
He means, instead, that he is strictly using geometrical methods to reach his destination, which explains why it was so difficult to reconstruct without his diagrams. His charming Brooklyn accent and good humor show through in this lecture, even if the material is quite a bit drier than his fans might expect. Still, those interested in adding a new dimension to their understanding of this brilliant scientist--and those with a deep interest in Newtonian physics--will find The Motion of Planets Around the Sun a rare and unexpected treat. --Rob Lightner
Book Description
Rescued from obscurity, Feynman's Lost Lecture is a blessing for all Feynman followers. Most know Richard Feynman for the hilarious anecdotes and exploits in his best-selling books "Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!" and "What Do You Care What Other People Think?" But not always obvious in those stories was his brilliance as a pure scientist--one of the century's greatest physicists. With this book and CD, we hear the voice of the great Feynman in all his ingenuity, insight, and acumen for argument. This breathtaking lecture--"The Motion of the Planets Around the Sun"--uses nothing more advanced than high-school geometry to explain why the planets orbit the sun elliptically rather than in perfect circles, and conclusively demonstrates the astonishing fact that has mystified and intrigued thinkers since Newton: Nature obeys mathematics.
David and Judith Goodstein give us a beautifully written short memoir of life with Feynman, provide meticulous commentary on the lecture itself, and relate the exciting story of their effort to chase down one of Feynman's most original and scintillating lectures. David and Judith Goodstein live in Pasadena, California.
Customer Reviews:
If you are a Feynman fan.......2007-09-04
This is a lot of fun -- if. If you are pretty good at mathematical games and have a love for all things Feynman. What makes it work is the CD with Feynman giving the lecture. He goes at the speed of light, but he is always amazing, even when you have no idea what he just said! I can't imagine what it was like for the young folks trying to make sense out of what was going on. But, I bet he inspired them for the rest of their careers. He still does that to people today. If you want a sample of the Feynman magic this is a tough place to start. But do find a way to start.
Feynman's proof of the law of ellipses.......2007-02-04
First we see that planets sweep out equal areas in equal times, following Newton's easy proof. Now to prove that planets move in ellipses. Cut the orbit into infinitesimal, equiangular pieces (as seen from the sun). Each little piece of the orbit corresponds to the velocity vector at that point. Draw a velocity diagram by moving all of these velocity vectors so that they have a common origin point. Obviously, as we move around the orbit, the velocity vector will make one revolution around the origin. In fact, it will trace out a circle, as we shall now prove. The orbit is cut into infinitesimal triangles with equal angles at the sun, so clearly these triangles are similar with a scaling factor r, i.e. an area scaling factor r^2. But time is the same as area, so time also varies as r^2. The change in velocity in one of these pieces is force*time=(1/r^2)*(r^2)=independent of r, so the dv steps in the velocity diagram are all of equal size, and because of the equiangular division they all make equal angles with each other (dv parallel to PS), so the velocity vector does indeed trace out a circle, and the equiangular division of the orbit as seen from the sun translates to an equiangular division of this circle as seen from its center. Of course, the center of the circle is not the origin of the velocity vectors; in particular, the velocity vector going through the center of the circle is the longest velocity vector, so it corresponds to the position on the orbit closest to the sun (as is obvious by the law of equal areas). If we turn the orbit diagram so that this position is straight to the right of the sun, then the longest arrow in the velocity diagram points straight up, since the velocity vector drawn in the orbit diagram will of course be parallel to the tangent to the orbit. When we have advanced a given angle beyond this starting point on the orbit (as seen from the sun), the corresponding velocity vector (i.e. the tangent to the orbit at this point) is found by advancing the same angle in the velocity diagram (as seen from the center of the circle) and connecting this boundary point with the origin of the velocity vectors, and conversely. So the velocity diagram contains complete information about the tangents of the orbit, so it contains complete information about the orbit up to scaling. So the problem becomes: for any velocity diagram, to recreate the orbit. To do this we turn the velocity diagram 90 degrees to the right. To recreate the orbit we must now find a curve that is always perpendicular to the velocity vectors. This can be done as follows. For any point p on the circumference of the velocity diagram circle, draw the line connecting it to the origin O of the velocity vectors and the line connecting it to the center C of the circle. Mark the point P where the perpendicular bisector of Op cuts Cp as a point on the orbit. Now we prove that the orbit generated in this way, as p moves around the circle, is an ellipse (we assume O to be inside the circle; if it was on the boundary the orbit would be a parabola, etc.). The perpendicular bisector cuts the triangle OPp into congruent halves (SAS), making OP=Pp, so CP+OP=CP+Pp=radius of the circle=independent of p, so P traces out an ellipse with foci C and O, and the perpendicular bisector is tangent to this ellipse (because all its other points are outside of the ellipse because they have greater sum of distances to the foci), as required. QED.
Lucid explanation of Feynman's proof of the law of ellipses.......2003-09-11
The book first walks you through the works of Copernicus, Galileo, Brahe and Kepler. Then it gives a brief account of Feynman's life and his work. Then, through numerous diagrams, the authors clearly explain Feynman's ingenious proof of the law of ellipses. Finally, the book presents Feynman's lecture "The Motion of Planets Around the Sun".
It is amazing how Feynman, starting on the lines of Newton, and then not being able to follow Newton's reasoning, devised a different but elegant proof of the law of ellipses.
An Entertaining And Captivating Lecture.......2003-04-04
This Review refers to the paperback edition of Feynman's Lost Lecture: The Motion of Planets Around the Sun with audio CD.
The title of Goodstein's book, Feynman's Lost Lecture, may be a bit misleading in terms of the overall content. The book is, in truth, mainly an explanation of the elliptic patterns performed by the planets, among other things, that an unpublished Feynman lecture originally referred to (although the lecture is included in text and on CD, the lecture is only a fraction of the overall book). Goodstein provides a geometrical means of explaining elliptical patterns that even a non-physicist will find easily comprehensible, especially considering the frequency of companion diagrams. The book also includes a rather unique introduction providing a brief biography of Feynman along with the author's personal experiences related to the well-known physicist. An unexpected, but greatly appreciated, addition is Feynman's original notes regarding his lecture contained in the back of the book.
Feynman's Lost Lecture details how to use geometric proofs to find answers to problems such as the speed of a planet when in motion around the sun and how to prove geometrically that an object is an ellipse. The author properly explains and demonstrates these concepts throughout the book via written and visual examples.
Goodstein presents the topics in such a fashion that the reader can easily try for himself\herself the idea portrayed. This is generally due to a generous selection of diagrams and exemplary situations, which properly convey the ideas that Goodstein presents (although it would probably be much more beneficial if more of the diagrams accompanied Feynman's actual lecture). The main text is also of a form easily understood and more than adequately conveys the topic that the author presents. However, the literary style is slightly lacking - in that it often becomes a bit informal in description and detail.
Overall, the literary shortcomings do not interfere with the author's ability to convey the topic and makes for a rather interesting read. Yet another above-par lecture accompanied by a surprisingly above-par explanation, Feynman's Lost Lecture: The Motion of Planets Around the Sun is more than worth it's price and should be a welcome addition to any reader's (both physicists and non-physicists alike) personal library.
authors create a labour of love for Feynman.......2002-07-22
This book is a labour of love by Judith and David Goodstein for their friend Richard Feynman. I really enjoyed the revelations of the human side of the great physicist, especially the 20 page reminiscene by David Goodstein (a fellow physicist at cal tech) and Feynman's sometimes gruff answers to questions after the lecture. A different view of the human side of Feynman than what you read in "Surely, you're joking". I found the technical side of the book even more rewarding (see next paragraph) but be warned: this is pretty intense geometry and logic - I have a hard time imagining anyone without at least a couple years of post secondary math or physics or engineering following all the arguments.
But if you have the background and patience, it's some pretty cool stuff. Like many folks, I learned planetary dynamics using calculus, not geometry, and so this was my first exposure to the elegant relationship between velocity diagrams and orbits. While Feynman's lecture is somewhat unorganized and not entirely clear, the book does a great job filling in the blanks. There are certainly some rough spots (way too much time on the initial simple properties of ellipses, the argument connecting Kepler's third law to the law of gravitation is not clear, and more) but anyone with sufficient background willing to invest a few hours will be able to get past these minor problems. I kind of like how the pace accelerates to a ridiculous level by the end, leaving you to pretty much work out all the hard details of Rutherford's law of scattering for yourself.
Listen to the lecture, scratch your head wondering "what the heck was that", then read the book and study the arguments, then listen again and feel enlightened.
Product Description
A CD containing 36 applets packaged with the book. This book engages the reader in a journey of discovery through a spirited discussion among three characters: Philosopher, Teacher and Student. Throughout the book, Philosopher pursues his dream of a unified theory of conics, where exceptions are banished. With a helpful teacher and example-hungry student, the trio soon finds that conics reveal much of their beauty when viewed over the complex numbers. In their odyssey, they uncover a goldmine of unsuspected results. They experience a series of Aha! moments as they stumble upon living brothers to familiar conics objects like foci and directrices. They also discover a normally-unseen ellipse spanning the gap between the branches of any hyperbola. On the applied side, they learn how two interfering wave sources create systems of hyperbolas; these are used in making astonishingly precise astronomical observations. All these discoveries are profusely illustrated with pictures, worked-out examples, a generous selection of exercises, and a CD containing 36 applets. If you've ever needed a conics formula for area, eccentricity, curvature and the like, look in the formula appendix. Here are dozens of useful formulas-a set for each of eight different ways of looking at a conic: as a cone slice; as the path of a planet moving under the influence of a fixed sun; constructed using two stakes and string; plus five other sets. CONICS is written in an easy, conversational style, and many historical tidbits and other points of interest are scattered throughout the text. Many students can self-study the book without outside help. This book is ideal for anyone having a little exposure to linear algebra and complex numbers. System Requirements for running the applets 128 MB of RAM Windows: Pentium 4: Windows NT/2000, or Windows XP Macintosh: G4 or G5 processor: Mac OS X v. 10.3.4 or later Safari browser recommended for the Mac
Product Description
Newton's Principia: The Central Argument makes the great adventure of Principia available not only to modern scholars of history of science, but also to nonspecialist undergraduate students of humanities. It moves carefully from Newton's definitions and axioms through the essential propositions, as Newton himself identified them, to the establishment of universal gravitation and elliptical orbits. The guidebook unfolds what is implicit in Newton's words as he himself would have filled in the steps and completes the argument in ways that are authentic and not anachronistic, exactly following Newton's thinking rather than substituting tools of modern calculus or the formulations of modern physics. It is Newton in his own terms, allowing students to reconstruct Newton's propositions authentically. It is not a commentary or a presentation of Newton's propositions as they might appear in a modern textbook. Rather, this guidebook unfolds what is implicit in Newton's words as he would have filled in the steps, while completing the argument in ways that are not anachronistic. The third edition of this guide to Newtons magnum opus has been completely redesigned for ease of study. Newtons text appears in color with a distinctive antique font, while the notes and expanded proofs are set in the highly-legible Stone Sans typeface. In response to requests by numerous readers, this new edition has been significantly expanded to include and discuss additional portions of the Principia.
Book Description
Illustrated with interesting examples from everyday life, this text shows how to create ellipses, parabolas, and hyperbolas. It also presents historical background on their ancient origins and describes the reflective properties and roles of curves in design applications. Only a basic knowledge of plane geometry needed. 1993 edition. Includes 98 figures.
Customer Reviews:
Practical Conic Sections: The Geometric Properties of Ellipses, Parabolas and Hyperbolas.......2007-02-16
this product can not be rated and reviewed because I didn't receved this book yet(as of tday 2/16, 2007).
Book Description
Conics and Cubics is an accessible introduction to algebraic curves. Its focus on curves of degree at most three keeps results tangible and proofs transparent. Theorems follow naturally from high school algebra and two key ideas, homogeneous coordinates and intersection multiplicities.
By classifying irreducible cubics over the real numbers and proving that their points form Abelian groups, the book gives readers easy access to the study of elliptic curves. It includes a simple proof of Bezout’s Theorem on the number of intersections of two curves.
The book is a text for a one-semester course. The course can serve either as the one undergraduate geometry course taken by mathematics majors in general or as a sequel to college geometry for prospective or current teachers of secondary school mathematics. The only prerequisite is first-year calculus.
The new edition additionally discusses the use of power series to parametrize curves and analyze intersection multiplicities and envelopes.
Customer Reviews:
Welcome Addition to the Literature.......2000-06-11
This book may be the most elementary introduction to algebraic geometry. Still it is roughly senior level and unlike the review above I am not sure that it is suitable for students in secondary education. Nonetheless, it fills a niche that has been largely vacant in the undergraduate literature and I recommend it to serious students and undergraduates alike.
Book Description
This Elibron Classics book is a facsimile reprint of a 1773 edition by J. Nourse, London.
Book Description
This Elibron Classics edition is a facsimile reprint of a 1869 edition by Macmillan and Co., London and Cambridge.
Book Description
This volume is produced from digital images from the Cornell University Library Historical Mathematics Monographs collection.
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- The master of making great literature of great literature
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The Aleph and Other Stories 1933-1969
Jorge Luis Borges , and
Norman Thomas di Giovanni
Manufacturer: Plume
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The master of making great literature of great literature .......2005-01-11
There is no Borges like Borges and Borges is his only Borges. In these tales one becomes acquainted with a mysterious mixture of concepts and conjectures, of footnotes and findings which combine to move the mind and soul to pure love of reading.The title story alone ' The Aleph' contains in it a hint of containing everything, and yet the finding of it leads us not only to the Kabbalah but to a certain very specific cellar in the imagination of Borges. All the games and tricks of mind cannot conceal from us how wisely and wonderingly this great man has read and written.
Who reads this book touches the work of one of the great literary geniuses of mankind. The pleasure is all the reader's.
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- english?
- The path you are to take is endless
- Interesting collection of ideas
- Maker of Stories
- Borges and the 'Aleph"
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The Aleph and Other Stories (Penguin Classics)
Jorge Luis Borges , and
Andrew Hurley
Manufacturer: Penguin Classics
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Ficciones (English Translation)
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ASIN: 0142437883
Release Date: 2004-07-27 |
Book Description
Full of philosophical puzzles and supernatural surprises, these stories contain some of Borges's most fully realized human characters. With uncanny insight he takes us inside the minds of an unrepentant Nazi, an imprisoned Mayan priest, fanatical Christian theologians, a woman plotting vengeance on her father's “killer,” and a man awaiting his assassin in a Buenos Aires guest house. This volume also contains the hauntingly brief vignettes about literary imagination and personal identity collected in The Maker, which Borges wrote as failing eyesight and public fame began to undermine his sense of self.
Customer Reviews:
english?.......2007-06-10
I was trying to get this book in Spanish,the language it was written .I didn't .
The path you are to take is endless.......2007-03-17
Trying to full describe the writings of Jorge Luis Borges is like trying to explain exactly why Leonardo da Vinci's art still captivates. The man wrote works of art.
"The Aleph and Other Stories" includes two different books of Borges', very different in their styles -- one is rich and epic, while the other is sort of short and quirky. But this collection is a shining example of why people enjoy Borges -- magical, rich in language, and lets us glimpse the minds of anything and anyone he can conjure up.
The title story involves a sort of fictional version of Borges, who makes regular pilgrimages to the house of a woman he loved, and encounters her slightly nuts first cousin Daneri, who is composing a horrible epic poem describing the whole world. When Daneri's house is threatened, he reveals how he's composed the poem -- the Aleph, which he discovered as a child, and he allows Borges to catch a glimpse of... everything.
The other stories have tales of heretics and holy men, of a man's last days awaiting an assassin's bullet, of a girl who coldly seeks revenge for her father, and the Zahir (the opposite of the Aleph), which can cause an all-encompassing obsession in the one who sees it, until they shut out reality.
And in the second book, he spins up a long string of very, VERY short stories (some only a paragraph). Some are musings on his toes, and nothing much more. But there are also brief stories of startling depth, such as God speaking to Dante and the "Divine Comedy's" leopard, and assuring them of their literary immortality.
The main flaw with this collection is that it's basically split into two very dissimilar styles -- some of them are short and relatively plain, while the others are dense pockets of philosophy. In fact, all the stories in the first portion of the book are based on the idea of shared experiences and infinite time, where there are no "new" experiences but only repetition.
And Borges wraps these stories in lush, digified prose that takes a little while to wade through, but the richness of the words he uses is worth it ("every generation of mankind includes four honest men who secretly hold up the universe and justify it"). And his writing takes on many different people's selves -- he even makes readers squirm by taking us into the mind of a loyal Nazi.
It's almost like another world, Borgeworld, which is almost like ours, but where magical items are hidden in the cellars, soldiers are forgotten, the Minotaur plays in his maze, and God dreams of mortal lives. The most entrancing foray into Borgeworld is "The Immortal," about a Roman soldier who goes searching for a city of immortals, and finds an ancient poet who seems very familiar.
"The Aleph and Other Stories" is a brilliant collection of Borges' exquisite stories. Magical and gritty, beautiful and haunting -- this collection should be cherished.
Interesting collection of ideas.......2007-01-03
This collection of short stories covers a huge array of concepts and ideas, ranging from history and religion, through philosophy to science. One recurring theme involves taking a well known story or idea and looking at it from a different angle or viewpoint.
The translation is well handled and the translator's notes are designed to give a background to place names or people that a non Argentinean would not necessarily know without getting in the way of the text.
This is the first of JLB's books that I have read; I will certainly look out more.
Maker of Stories.......2006-06-29
I was surprised to find when I picked up this book that it is not the same selection of stories as the earlier published THE ALEPH AND OTHER STORIES 1933-1969, translated by Norman Thomas di Giovanni in collaboration with Borges himself. Instead, it is a translation of two volumes published by Borges in Argentina, THE ALEPH and THE MAKER (EL HACEDOR), translated by Andrew Hurley.
As for the stories themselves, I can say only that they are some of the most magical tales written in the last hundred years, perhaps even ever. Stories like "The Immortal," "Story of the Warrior and the Captive Maiden," "The Zahir," and "The Aleph" are worthy of being read over and over again.
Since I already have these stories in other form by other translators, I wanted to determine how good Hurley's translation is. To that end, I'll compare some of my favorite passages. Let's start with the title story in the Hurley translation:
"Under the step, toward the right, I saw a small iridescent sphere of almost unbelievable brightness. At first I thought it was spinning; then I realized that the movement was an illusion produced by the dizzying spectacles inside it. The Aleph was probably two or three centimeters in diameter, but universal space was contained inside it, with no diminution in size. Each thing (the glass surface of a mirror, let us say) was inifinite things, because I could clearly see it from every point in the cosmos."
Here di Giovanni with the same paragraph:
"On the back part of the step, toward the right, I saw a small iridescent sphere of almost unbelievable brilliance. At first I thought it was revolving; then I realized that this movement was an illusion created by the dizzying world it bounded. The Aleph's diameter was probably little more than an inch, but all space was there, actual and undiminished. Each thing (a mirror's face, let us say) was infinite things, since I saw it distinctly from every angle of the universe."
I'd say that Hurley did a workmanlike job, but I like di Giovanni, especially with "the dizzying world it bounded," much more idiomatic than "the dizzying spectacles inside it." Now here's Hurley with "A Biography of Tadeo Isidoro Cruz":
"As Cruz was fighting in the darkness (as his body was fighting in the darkness), he began to understand. He realized that one destiny is no better than the next and that every man must accept the destiny he bears inside himself."
From di Giovanni's "The Life of Tadeo Isidoro Cruz":
"Cruz, while he fought in the dark (while his body fought in the dark), began to understand. He understood that one destiny is no better than another, but that every man must obey what is within him."
Again, I accept the Hurley, but prefer di Giovanni."Every man must obey" is simpler, more idiomatic than "every man must accept the destiny."
One complaint I have against both translations is that neither bothers to provide translations of quotations from the Latin. This is particularly disturbing in the case of "Story of the Warrior and the Captive Maiden," in which two four-line excerpts are taken from a Latin tomb of a Lombard warrior that turn out to be quite interesting. I finally had to turn to Thomas Hodgkin's THE BARBARIAN INVASIONS OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE to find the whole epitaph Englished.
In summary, it is better to read Hurley than not to read Borges at all; but, given the chance, I would prefer di Giovanni by a slight margin.
Borges and the 'Aleph".......2005-10-28
It was as if in the writing of many stories he was seeking to conceal the fact that he had only one story to write. And in that one story was contained the essence of all stories, so that to read it and understand it was to become the story itself.
So too with the Aleph the single letter in which the whole of the Universe is contained. Once one finds it and reads it and loses oneself in it one has read all stories and need not read any other again.
Yet when the other stories come, and they do come, and they have letters and shapes 'The Aleph' itself does not know,they remind us that basically the 'Aleph ' is at best a metaphor, and in its heart of hearts ,unreal.
All of us today are readers of Borges. And as such we are contained in the Aleph of his work.
But he is far away and above us all.
For he is the great literary genius whose works will be read and reread.
And it is fair to say that the letter 'Aleph' alone is not enough to contain him.
Customer Reviews:
Imaginative, intellectual, innovative: Inadequate adjectives.......2004-06-09
Twenty stories, several translated for the first time into English, a commentary by Borges himself on each story, and a fascinating autobiographical essay make this an exceptional collection. Several stories are classics, others are quite good, and a few lesser stories reveal Borges' early experiments with the short story form.
The Aleph and Other Stories marginally overlap the stories found in Ficciones, Labyrinths, and A Personal Anthology. The title story, The Aleph, and five other classics - The Approach to al-Mu'tasim, The Circular Ruins, Death and the Compass, The Other Death, and Borges and Myself - are likely to be familiar to many readers, however.
In many cases the early stories explored themes and ideas that Borges would later develop more fully. We readers encounter mazes and labyrinths, observe trivial events that unexpectedly have profound implications, and see reality made nebulous by impressions, memories and dreams. This collection should appeal to both new readers, and those already familiar with Borges' wide ranging imagination.
I found Borges' earlier stories of the myths of the outlying slums, stories like Streetcorner Man and The Dead Man to be more conventional (to the extent that Borges can ever be called conventional), and not his best work. However, The Challenge, written on the same theme nearly twenty years after Streetcorner Man, is quite good. It offers a thoughtful, sympathetic look at the tradition of knife fights, dueling, and courage. Rosendo's Tale, a variation on Streetcorner Man, is also good.
Biography is not my favorite genre, but Borges' self-appraisal in his Autobiographical Essay, especially his humorous reflections on the younger, impressionable Borges, was fascinating. His youthful works embarrassed him; he would buy used copies of his early books and burn them. He says, "Today I no longer feel guilty over these (stylistic) excesses; those books were written by somebody else."
This translation was a joint effort of Borges and Norman Thomas di Giovanni.
Excellent introduction to Borges.......2003-02-23
This collection is an excellent introduction to Borges, and clearly shows how he revolutionized the short story and became the pater familias of a new genre classification.
"The Aleph"--Like most of his stories, this one is brief but packs a lot of information into its short length. (For those who don't read outside of SF, imagine a J.G. Ballard condensed novel with more connections and a higher sense of the fantastic. Hmm, that was a worthless description. It is hard to find a match for Borges in the genre, because he was always succinct, and could never have survived in the dog-eat-dog world of pay by word.) The gimmick is simple--the aleph is to space what eternity is to time--but the method by which the author discovers it is unusual. I like Borges because his approach to a fantastic concept is unlike any found in the genre. Genre writing seems to emphasize the gimmick, in mainstream writing it is simply one part of the landscape against which the characters are placed. Only in Borges do all elements seem equal, similar in concept to his own aleph, to return in a style similar to Borges himself.
"Streetcorner Man"--A first-person tale of one night in the barrio, when the ones who talk big get their comeuppance by the quiet ones. OK, but I like my stories to have a little something more.
"The Approach to aI-Mu'tasim"--A review of a fictional book which reads, again, like a condensed novel, only in this case it truly is one. The literary device is ingenious, allowing Borges to comment on literary criticism at the same time he is creating literature.
"The Circular Ruins"--One of Borges' favorite subjects is the concept of infinity, another is creation. Here he bends the two together in a story that is also a metaphor for the process of setting and achieving goals.
"Death and the Compass"--A logic problem to a mystery story, almost like Poe. Poe, though, would have stretched it out to twice its length.
"The Life of Tadeo Isidoro Cruz (1829-1874)"--I did not quite follow this one. At one point I thought that maybe Cruz was going to be killing his own father, but instead he goes to the aid of himself?
"The Two Kings and Their Two Labyrinths"--A fable, or a sermon, that addresses what is a labyrinth. Highly appropriate subject for a Borges collection.
"The Dead Man"--A gaucho story. Think of it as a Louis L'amour story with Argentines and Brazilians instead of Mexicans and Texans. Okay, but it's still a western at heart.
"The Other Death"--This is what I look for in Borges: a fantastical study of memory and history, reality and dream. Pedro did not act like a hero in the battle... or did he?
"Ibn Hakkan al-Bokhari, Dead in His Labyrinth"--Another great story of mazes and mystery. Borges has an unusual way of framing his tales, usually with an objective third person narrator, that shortens the stories tremendously. I guess he did not get paid by the word.
"The Man On the Threshold"--Another mystery, but not quite as fantastic as the others. Some Of these stories are morality or revenge plays, that do not require much speculation.
"The Challenge"--A rehash of some of the gaucho themes, certainly my last favorite of his tropes. What I find interesting is the references to other stories flirt makes this seem like a reference article instead of a story.
"The Captive"--A short short about a boy captured as a young child by natives. Borges here formulates a question about the nature of memory.
"Borges and Myself"--Here, as in "Isidore Cruz" above, Borges talks about the nature of identity. When you look at how others perceive you and realize that that is not how you perceive yourself is a crisis of identity (as in here), or how people might perceive a younger version of you. I often look at my current life and wonder. There is no way that Glen circa. 1980 could have ever dreamed of becoming the Glen of 1998. Thoughts and hopes and goals are all so mutable. The funny thing is that I will reread these words 10 or more years from now and be struck by the same strangeness.
"The Maker"--A discussion of what it means to go blind, nominally about Homer, but also about Borges' own condition. I had not realized that Borges had gone blind before his death.
"The Intruder"--Borges says that his mother, who he dictated this story to, hated it, and I can see why. It's not something I would recommend to any woman, as it is quite misogynstic. However, it is an incredible story, and a fairly straightforward one for Borges, about friendship and brotherhood.
"The Immortals"--A science fiction tale, strangely incongruous here. Well done, but it seems much more dated than almost everything else in this collection (stories from 1933 to 1969).
"The Meeting"--Clever little tale about people and weapons. Almost a trick story, because the title refers to something other than what you expect.
"Pedro Salvadores"--Short short about dictatorships and living "underground" (actually, both literally and figuratively). Borges had a real knack for the short short, never an easy thing to write.
"Rosendo's Tale"--To come almost entirely full circle, this tale is a sequel or antidote to the second story, "Streetcorner Man." The gaucho here is more realistic, not so macho, and I find myself appreciating this more because of having seen the Hemingway-ish earlier story.
Finally, there is an autobiographical essay at the end, for those of us who wonder how Borges evolved (as Borges himself does in "Borges and Myself").
Books:
- Computational Methods in Physics, Chemistry and Biology: An Introduction
- Computerized Quality Control: Programs for the Analytical Laboratory (Computers and Their Applications)
- Copolymerization: Toward a Systematic Approach
- Cosmetic Regulation in a Competitive Environment
- CRC Handbook of Organic Photochemistry and Photobiology, Volumes 1 & 2, Second Edition
- Cyclopolymerization and Cyclocopolymerization
- Data Evaluation in Light Scattering of Polymers (Macromolecular Symposia 162) (Macromolecular Symposia)
- Degradable Polymers, Recycling, and Plastics Waste Management (Plastics Engineering, 29)
- Dynamic Spin Chemistry: Magnetic Controls and Spin Dynamics of Chemical Reactions
- Enantioselective Synthesis: Natural Products from Chiral Terpenes
Books Index
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