Book Description
A lost masterpiece and one of the major achievements of Russian literature in the second half of the 20th century.
Summer in Baden-Baden was acclaimed by The New York Review of Books as "a short poetic masterpiece" and by Donald Fanger in The Los Angeles Times as "gripping, mysterious and profoundly moving."
A complex, highly original novel, Summer in Baden-Baden has a double narrative. It is wintertime, late December: a species of "now." A narrator—Tsypkin—is on a train going to Leningrad. And it is also mid-April 1867. The newly married Dostoyevskys, Fyodor, and his wife, Anna Grigor'yevna, are on their way to Germany, for a four-year trip. This is not, like J. M. Coetzee's The Master of St. Petersburg, a Dostoyevsky fantasy. Neither is it a docu-novel, although its author was obsessed with getting everything "right." Nothing is invented, everything is invented. Dostoyevsky's reckless passions for gambling, for his literary vocation, for his wife, are matched by her all-forgiving love, which in turn resonates with the love of literature's disciple, Leonid Tsypkin, for Dostoyevsky.
In a remarkable introductory essay (which appeared in The New Yorker), Susan Sontag explains why it is something of a miracle that Summer in Baden-Baden has survived, and celebrates the happy event of its publication in America with an account of Tsypkin's beleaguered life and the important pleasures of his marvelous novel.
Customer Reviews:
Tough but beautiful.......2007-10-07
This book was a difficult read but in the end it was well worth it. I don't think I would recommend this book for everyone, but if you like Dostoevsky and his writing style with the long sentences and paragraphs that never seem to end then I think you can handle this book and will get some enjoyment out of it. If you don't like this style then stay away from this work because I don't think you will enjoy it.
I did have some problems with this book which is why it doesn't get five stars. Like when the book changes from the first person to the third person so seamlessly that you don't realize it has happened for half a page. I found this to be quite irritating and hurt the flow of the book. I would have to stop my reading and sort of reorient myself to what was happening and start over from where the change occurred.
The long sentences and paragraphs require a lot of focus and the book was a difficult read. This book is certainly not a lazy Sunday read by any means. It takes a lot attention and concentration to really get everything out of this book that is in it. Be ready for an amount of dedication that is not commensurate with the size of the book.
This book has some of the most beautiful phrasing and wordplay of any book I have ever read before, and this is the reason why the book gets four stars instead of three. It is really amazing. The level of attention that the author must have put into every single word is astounding.
I found this book to be a strange but seductive and enchanting novel. It is truly a masterpiece. A wonderful work that I wish I could be more generous with but can't.
This book is certainly not for everyone but for those intrepid souls who are brave and enduring enough to take on this small but mighty work you will be greatly awarded.
Transcending.......2007-06-01
The author relates his journey following the steps of his favorite writer. Throughout the narration, convoluted bits of the present, past events, and thoughts are bound by Leonid's overt devotion for Dostoyevsky, an aging, ambiguous man crushed by his gambling addiction, his love for his young and beautiful wife, his epilepsy, his literary pride and jealousy, and a dearth of writing.
Susan Sontag - At the Same Time - introduced this book to me, a sophisticated piece of literature with smooth paragraph-long sentences that led me one page after another to better grasp the complex character of a mythical writer.
A superb work of art.......2006-12-18
Leonid Tsypkin, who died in 1982, was a great admirer of Dostoyevsky's work, and one winter he set out for a train journey from Moscow to what was then still Leningrad to visit the Dostoyevsky Museum there, a building which also includes the flat in which Dostoyevsky died. And we embark on two interwoven `streams of consciousness', the author's and the great writer's. The sentences are enormously long, often running for pages at a time, but we are never lost, and their powerful rhythm carries us along (which, incidentally, is a great tribute to the translators, Roger and Angela Keys.)
It must be admitted that, if one did not know that Dostoyevsky was one of the greatest and most profound writers of the 19th century, one could not guess it from the description of the very unpleasant figure who emerges from these pages, gripped, as he was, by what the blurb describes as `the destructive demons that beset him late in life'. He is unattractive in voice and appearance; he is clumsy; he is foul-tempered and shouts when angry, even in public places; he is paranoid, always suspecting that people - even those who love or admire him - are laughing at him (and indeed sometimes they do, so gross is his behaviour); his literary success notwithstanding, he is deeply insecure and unsure of himself; he alternates between arrogance and obsequiousness; he bullies his timid second wife, Anna Grigorievna (and then abjectly pleads for forgiveness); he is a compulsive, frenetic and largely unsuccessful gambler, demanding money for this obsession from his wife and pawning even her clothes (and towards the end of his life will be equally incontinent in the alms he gives to beggars); and this man, who was `so sensitive in his novels to the sufferings of others, this jealous defender of the insulted and the injured' was a rabid anti-Semite (which troubled Tsypkin who, like so many of the ardent admirers of Dostoyevsky, was himself Jewish).
What, then, makes reading a book about such a person so rewarding an experience? In the first place, Tsypkin has a Dostoyevskian compassion for his hero's suffering (and for that of his young wife). The story is set for the most part in the gambling resort of Baden-Baden in the summer of 1867. Dostoyevsky was still deeply marked by the appalling experience of his exile in Siberia from 1849 to 1859, and especially by a humiliating flogging that had been inflicted upon him there. In moments of stress, he identifies those around him with the ghoulish and mocking faces that had witnessed the flogging. And of course he suffers terribly from his addictions, from his sensitivities, from his own obsequiousness, from his epileptic fits, and finally from the lung haemorrhage that killed him. (While most of the book is set in Baden-Baden, the last part of it describes his death 13 years later).
And because this is a stream of consciousness book, we enter into both Dostoyevsky's and Tsypkin's dreams and flights of imagination, which are beautiful and poetic, and often surrealistic. Equally wonderful are the descriptions of the Russian winter - the frozen landscape Tsypkin can see through the misted windows of his railway carriage, and the crispness of the snow in Leningrad.
If you know Dostoyevsky's novels, then the allusions to them will further enrich your appreciation of this gripping book. You will then realize how much of Dostoyevsky's own life-experience is mirrored in them. If you don't know the novels, it may lead you to read some of them, and to understand why this deeply flawed man was nevertheless one of the towering figures in European literature.
Genius and emotional imbalance.......2006-08-09
In this novel-dream, the narrator (Tsypkin himself) interweaves the story of the time spent by Dostoevsky and his second wife, Anna Grigoryevna, in Germany, with his own trip to Saint Petersburg (then called Leningrad, in the 70's) in search of the footsteps of his favorite writer. Based on Anna's own diaries about that time and about the last days of D. back in Russia, the author gradually builds a vivid and faithful portrait of D.'s and his wife's characters. In long paragraphs, many of them in the form of "stream of consciousness", Dostoevsky is revealed as a tormented man, with profound emotional imbalances. Epilepsy, chronic poverty, and especially the terrible vice of gambling, cause in him acute periods of euphoria and unfounded hope, mixed with deep depressions who lead him to moments of abject repentance before the stoic, loyal, and resigned Anna. Meanwhile, through jumps in time interwoven without previous notice with the narrative about D., the author-narrator reveals something about the sad and somber life in the last decades of the USSR.
Of course the depiction of gambling and its consequences is very sad and hallucinating, in paragraphs where Tsypkin accurately pictures the nightmare of hopeless delusion. There is always one last coin to beg from Anna, the one that will finally make their fortune. And always, the last disappointment comes about, since everyone that gambles out of necessity, necessarily loses.
Finally, D. and Anna return to Russia, where he goes on writing and they have their children. In the last part, the last days of D. are narrated. The story of his final agony and death is masterful, almost as good as that of The Leopard in the eponymous novel by Lampedusa. In spite of the hurried, hallucinated and Joyce-like style, the book is very readable and little confusing. It is written with good poetic qualities and is highly recommended.
Hmmm..........2006-02-12
I purchased and read this book because of my World Lit class, and I have to say that at first, I wasn't impressed. I couldn't get over Tsypkin's writing style! One sentence can span multiple pages and he switches from 1st person narrative (when he's talking about his own life) to 3rd person (when he "goes to the past" and is talking about the Dostoyevksy's) with no transition whatsoever! There was absolutely no lead in to when he would switch time periods (although a helpful hint is that when Tsypkin says "I" he is talking about himself and the novel is in the present and when he says "he/she/they" he's talking about Anna and Fedya and the novel is back in the past-it seems easy to figure out but it was very confusing). BUT I have to say that IF you can get past all of that (it took me a little while, I'll be honest) the novel does become fairly interesting.
It starts out with the narrator (Tsypkin) on a train headed to Leningrad to see the last place that Dostoyevsky lived. It switches from the narrators "pilgrimage" to Leningrad to the Dostoyevsky's summer stay in Baden-Baden (hence the title). Like I said before, once you get past all the confusion of the writing it gets interesting. Tsypkin delves into Fedya's gambling promblem and his mental and physical illnesses (Dostoyevsky was obsessive and had epilipsy) and depicts the emotional abuse that he subjects his wife Anna to (who is a saint in this book, because if I was her I would've left Fedya on day one). Tsypkin also focuses a lot on Russian nationalism in the novel.
All in all I can't "highly reccomend" this book because I know that it doesn't appeal to everyone, but if you are adventurous and determined enough you just might get something special out of the experience of reading it.
Average customer rating:
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The Earrings
Eric Koch
Manufacturer: Mosaic Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
 General
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Jewelry
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ASIN: 0889627754 |
Book Description
All the big names of 1883 are at the opulent Baden Baden spa, the summer capital of European high society: • Napoleon and Josephine • Brahms and Wagner • Nietzsche and Dostoievsky
Suddenly, there is a missing - or stolen? - set of earrings. Mystery, intrigue, fantasy and also farce combine to weave a tapestry of treachery, decadence and decay, where fortunes and reputations are made and lost.
Average customer rating:
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A summer at Baden-Baden,
Eugène Guinot
Manufacturer: J. Mitchell
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding
Germany
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ASIN: B00085X0NG |
Book Description
The true story behind the famous novel The Last of the Mohicans-"a vivid account of the raid that gained Rogers fame" (Boston Globe)
In North America's first major conflict, known today as the French and Indian War, France and England-both in alliance with Native American tribes-fought each other in a series of bloody battles and terrifying raids. No confrontation was more brutal and notorious than the massacre of the British garrison of Fort William Henry-an incident memorably depicted in James Fenimore Cooper's The Last of the Mohicans. That atrocity stoked calls for revenge, and the tough young Major Robert Rogers and his "Rangers" were ordered north into enemy territory to take it. On the morning of October 4, 1759, they surprised the Abenaki Indian village of St. Francis, slaughtering its sleeping inhabitants without mercy. When the raiders returned to safety, they were hailed as heroes by the colonists, and their leader was immortalized as "the brave Major Rogers." But the Abenakis remembered Rogers differently: To them he was Wobomagonda-"White Devil."
Customer Reviews:
White Devil--More than just a good overview........2007-04-12
I have been interested for along time in the factual details of Major Robert Rogers' activities during the French and Indian War (Seven Years War). I have lived in New England all my life and many of my ancestors arrived in New England from Old England during the earliest of colonial times. Some of them took part in the events of the French and Indian War. I first saw the 1940 Spencer Tracy movie on TV when I was just a youngster. Later when I was a bit older but still a boy I remember the TV series. I think it starred George Montgomery. So quite a bit of fiction has crept into the story of Rogers over the years. Yet, I always wanted to have the facts seperated from the myths. This book has all the facts on Rogers between two covers. Yet, it is much more than just a summary. The accounts of Rogers and his Rangers and their military missions during the French and Indian War seem to be fully covered and explained in an easy to follow and often vivid narrative. Also outlined are the major events of the Seven Years War in the North American Theather. It was after all a war that had several theaters around the globe and has been called the first world war. The bibliogrphay and notes are also valuable because anyone wanting to read further has now a referecne list.
Must read about Major Rogers.......2007-01-12
Very well reasearched, interesting, sweeping narrative. Highly recommended for everyone who is interested in the French and Indian War.Nothing to add.
Exciting Story of George Rogers and His Rangers .......2006-12-30
The author provides a terrific history of George Rogers and his Rangers along with a finite history of the French and Indian War. The author writes a very readable account of the French and Indian War primarily about Rogers and his Rangers who go well into the wilds behind enemy lines on raids and reconnaissance missions against the French and their Indian allies. These Ranger companies were virtually alone and totally unsupported in their forays risking not just capture but also violent deaths by the French's Indian allies, primarily the St. Francis Abenakis who at one time were the terror among the English settlements. While covering the overall campaign in America, the author covers in detail Roger's amazing exploits. Of particular note is Rogers and over 200 Rangers making a strike against the Abenakis' town over 100 miles from their landing point and then after being discovered having to change direction traveling over 200 miles over rough wilderness terrain while being pursued by the vengeful Abenakis and the French. Incredible hardships and an amazing story of survival and after this harrowing exploit, Rogers goes back into the wilderness to fight again. The War against the French and their Indian allies is violent particularly if their prisoners are not of value or if vengeance is preferred. Capture did not necessarily end up being better than a quick death in combat. The author includes a fascinating discussion of the alliances between the various tribes and the French and English. The first chapter of the book starts off with a thrilling description of the capture and imprisonment of the Johnson family of settlers and their experience traveling through the wilderness with their captors and their experience in captivity. The author describes Rogers as a man highly capable, a leader and motivator in war but literally without a business rudder in peace suffering financially and choosing the wrong side during the revolution due to pension and perhaps mistreatment by his countrymen after the French and Indian War. This is an engrossing book, fraught with adventure with some shocking detail on how the Rangers survive their most brutal campaign. This book is an immensely entertaining history where the truth goes beyond the legend. Spencer Tracey's 1940 classic movie, Northwest Passage, is the subject of Rogers' attack on the Abenakis and the harrowing journey of his Rangers to escape, a movie well worth seeing.
A Mind Gripping True Story of Robert Rogers and The French & Indian War.......2006-11-03
In the book "White Devil", author Stephen Brumwell takes you to the French & Indian War. Where we read about the Abenaki Indians and their brutal ways, and another side the Abenaki's not always heard of. Brumwell gives you the history of the infamous Rogers Rangers, and their historic raid on St. Francis which will keep you on the edge of your seat as you read this book about Robert Rogers and his band of Rangers. I would absolutely recommend this book to anybody looking for a wonderfully detailed and historical novel of the French and Indian War, and Robert Rogers, the Father of America's Special Forces, and the United States Army Rangers.
-George
Stellar research, tricky writing...........2006-05-09
Mr Brumwell, who's jacketnotes describe him as an "independent historian", has done an excellent job researching what for me was a little-known period of America's history...easily 5 stars. I can only begin to imagine and appreciate the depth of research that the author went through in order to synthesize this information.
WHITE DEVIL struck a wonderful balance (for me) between academic research and spinning a lively yarn.
The reason that I gave it three stars was that I found the editing to be somewhat convoluted. While admittedly the cast of characters and behaviors that the author describes is complex and interwoven, I found that the book would jump around from person to person - and from time period to time period - too often for my taste. Individual's stories could have been more tightly woven together.
Overall, though, a fascinating read.
Hoorah for independent scholars!
Customer Reviews:
excellent reading.......2006-03-14
I loved this book ..Susan Edwards is right up there in stature with Cassie Edwards in my book.. Excellent reading
fine nineteenth century historical.......2005-12-24
In the 1860s Dakota Territory, Renait O'Brien struggles to keep her family together. However, when one of her siblings envisions their brother lying in a pool of blood, Renait knows she must find him to keep him safe. However, to succeed she must embrace her Sioux heritage that she has ignored in recent years.
Sheriff Tyler is attracted to Renny who rejects his offers to help her with her family. He accepts her refusals until he learns she is going on a quest into the Badlands alone. He insists on coming with her as he will never allow the woman he loves to travel alone into potential danger. He blithely ignores her rejection of his protection. On the trail, Renny struggles with her growing awareness of the half of her culture that she chose to ignore and with trepidation that her brother is going to die. Tyler keeps her focused except when he steals kisses that make her forget everything but him. However, he is a man of honor and knows the quest must come before his desire.
As always in a Susan Edwards' "White" tale, the reader receives a colorful vivid description of life, this time in the Civil War era Dakotas. Fans will also appreciate the fine starring couple as Renny is an intrepid individual struggling to do the right thing for her family, which in her mind meant ignoring her Indian bloodlines, and the man who would willingly die for her. Though the multitude of story lines including some that just disappear makes it difficult to track the escapades of the lead couple, the author's myriad of fans will enjoy her latest nineteenth century historical.
Harriet Klausner
Product Description
fantasy, black and white
Average customer rating:
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Unicorn Witches: The Vengeance of the Godhe
Derek White
Manufacturer: PublishAmerica
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
General | Fantasy | Science Fiction & Fantasy | Subjects | Books
General | Science Fiction | Science Fiction & Fantasy | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 1413769985 |
Book Description
In Unicorn Witch, Tyana Counter and her husband Marcus, an ex- Chicago Detective Sergeant discover that Godhe criminals are stealing theurgen, the hormone which gives the Refuge inhabitants their powers, and selling it to alleviate the pain the Godhe males suffer because of a genetic abnormality. Seven years later, in Unicorn Witches Krast returns to 'milk' the entire world. She has her advanced weapons: the inhabitants of Refuge have their 'magic'.
Product Description
When Union Colonel Andrew Keane led his blue-coated soldiers aboard the transport ship, he could not have foreseen that their next port of call would be neither in the North nor the South, but on an alternate world where no human was free. Storm-swept through a space-time warp, Keanes regiment was shipwrecked in an alien land, a land where all that stood between them and destruction was the power of rifles over swords, spears, and crossbows.
Into this serfdom ruled by nobles and the Church, Keane and his men brought the radical ideas of freedom, equality, and democracyand a technology centuries ahead of the world they must now call home. Yet all their knowledge and training might not save them from the true rulers therecreatures to whom all humans were mere cattle, bred for sacrifice!
Customer Reviews:
Rally Cry is Legendary Fantasy!.......2007-08-10
William R. Forstchen's Lost Regiment series was a breakthrough in this genre. This 1st of 8 or 9 books is the very best. Combining accurate historical Yankee troops that get lost out at sea and end up going through a rift into another world is fabulous unto itself, but adding new and thrilling elements of sci-fi/fantasy with a colorful backdrop of an alien world filled with Earth's lost children of mixed time periods, all battling giant alien overlords - and you have a surefire winner that so obviously thrilled many a reader.
Top-notch entertainment in all fields, from world-building to excellent characterization, and also loads of action/adventure, The Lost Regiment series would make a hallmark Hollywood movie film.
This is a must read if you are wanting to read one of the top writers of this genre.
The Best.......2005-11-01
It seemed a strange concept, New England Union soldiers from the 1860's transported to a Russian medievel world that is under the thumb of monstrous horse riding creatures that circle to globe. The closest human comparison would be to the ancient mongols. The story works so well, it is very intelligently written, and the characters really come alive. The battle scenes are awesome. You really can't go wrong with this one. It is a shame it is out of print, but pick this up used and you will find yourself collecting the rest of the series.
Aleksander Nevsky Meets The Killer Angels.......2004-07-10
This first book is unquestionably the best of the series. What makes it so rewarding is that the history is real on both sides of the story. Yes, as all the other commentators have noted, Andrew Keane and his Maine men are in every way equal in courage and idealism to Colonel Chamberlain and his team from THE KILLER ANGELS. It really is heart-wrenching and inspiring to see the events in this action-packed story give literal meaning to phrases like "we'll fill the vacant ranks with a million freemen more." The book shows that the "battle cry of freedom" was not merely an idealistic wish but a realistic and workable policy.
But what no one has noticed is that the book is at least as enlightening on the subject of RUSSIAN history and society. The Tugar hordes are an alien race, but Forstchen's stroke of genius was to make them human by giving them the culture, outlook and capabilities of Genghis Khan's Mongol hordes. Note that this author bucks fifty years of Science Fiction convention here. These space aliens are not little green men with huge, bulging craniums and ray guns. Rather they are eight foot giants who despise all learning, technology, and even basic handicrafts. They are trapped in a nomadic, essentially sterile way of life that goes nowhere, and little by little in each book you sense their increasing pessimism and despair. Sustained brilliance by Forstchen makes these "hordes" into characters as compelling as any in the works of Larry McMurtry or James Fenimore Cooper. The hordes are doomed to extinction just like the noble red men of the American west.
Returning to the Mongol hordes analogy, however, what makes RALLY CRY such an eye-opening book is Forstchen's analysis of medieval Russia. Here THE KILLER ANGELS meets ALEKSANDER NEVSKY. Forstchen shows how the unhealthy alliance between boyars and the church, and the suffocation of the peasants, is a long-lasting after effect of the terrifying threat of Mongol invasion. Never before did I see quite so clearly how and why Russia evolved into a backwards, impoverished autocracy. The unspeakable horror of the Tugar feasts allows the nobility and the church to rule unquestioned and with no accountability to their own people. Though this is science fiction, it is also superb social commentary and insightful history.
This book is a classic -- even if you hate science fiction, you will love this!
Dependable Serise.......2004-04-29
I must have had this book in my closet for up to five years. I brought a lot of this Author's books in a serge around that time when I was reading the Wing Commander serise.
If you like Harry Turtledove's "Lost Legion" you should not have a problem with this even though this book is not as indepths as Turtledove's stuff.
This is a story of good guys and bad guys, even though you could probably guess the ending already I do recommend it the charecters here are very fun and it helps pass the time.
Overall-Solid Book
Good read, some errors.......2004-04-10
Really good book. Forstchen did a good job of having a regiment of Civil War-era soldiers are able to convert a medieval Russian state into a 'Little America' with massive industry. The 35th is widley varried, with a history teacher, down to a circus worker. The ending part at the Battle of Suzdal was extremley surprising and shocking.
Product Description
Fiction, Science, Fantasy, Lost Regiment, Alternate History
Book Description
This digital document is an article from The Register-Guard (Eugene, OR), published by The Register Guard on February 22, 2005. The length of the article is 887 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.
Citation Details
Title: Rally cries pitch schools' funding needs.(Schools)(Community members yellow bus it to the state Capitol and urge lawmakers to avoid more budget cuts in education)
Publication:
The Register-Guard (Eugene, OR) (Newspaper)
Date: February 22, 2005
Publisher: The Register Guard
Page: d1
Distributed by Thomson Gale
Book Description
This digital document is an article from The Register-Guard (Eugene, OR), published by Thomson Gale on April 20, 2007. The length of the article is 540 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.
Citation Details
Title: Rally cry: End sexual assault.(General News)
Author: Gale Reference Team
Publication:
The Register-Guard (Eugene, OR) (Newspaper)
Date: April 20, 2007
Publisher: Thomson Gale
Page: D1
Distributed by Thomson Gale
Book Description
Radical optimism is our deepest response to the immense and threatening challenges of our contemporary world.
Customer Reviews:
The most accessible and realistic author.......2005-01-25
I've just discovered Bruteau and this is the first of her books I read. I read it 3 times in a row, not because it was hard to understand but because of the great clarity and depth of her insights. Now I'm going on to read the others--all so worthwhile. Great for Catholic contemplatives.
Beatrice Bruteau deserves much praise.......2004-03-31
In Radical Optimism, author and philosopher Beatrice Bruteau presents a persuasive argument for the necessity of meditation and comtemplation for the bringing about of a new world view that can truly celebrate the individual and the community. First, Bruteau discusses the concepts of leisure and silence (they are not what we normally think!) as necessary attributes for meditation. In her chapter describing meditation itself, she gives an example that I have found very useful. After discussing meditation, she moves into the both the mysticism and metaphysics of the human condition in relation to the divine. She brings her treatsie to a close by showing how a trinitarian God (One and Many in the same being) allows for the greatest of loves and the salvation of the individual human person and humanity as community.
Dr. Bruteau writes with amazing lucidity and concreteness. Her arguments follow logically and very analytically. I am a scientist, and although I appreciate the need of metaphor for describing the transcendent and love mystical poets like Rumi and Tagore, I really appreciated Dr. Bruteau's down to earth writing. For such complex subjects, Dr. Bruteau's style proved refreshing and easy to follow without ambiguity. Highly recommended.
a stimulating book.......2003-12-08
I bought this book not for the title but because I like the author. And when I started reading about leisure, stillness, meditation, I thought, well it may be interesting, but it is not for me. I don't have time to stand still and meditate, and even less for leisure.
But then, I began to feel concerned when I read for instance, that "the Sabbath is not a time among other times, but the underlying eternity; or that the Sabbath is there to remind us that our deepest reality is not to be identified with our works". I understood that this is something we should keep in mind at all times.
I also felt this book actually concerns me when she defines contemplation as being "not something that is done alongside or before or after our everyday action," but that "Contemplation is what we should be doing at every moment of our life". In other words, contemplation does not stop me from acting but enables me to act with a much more authentic awareness of the reality within which I operate.
Another positive development I found among others, in this book is about the Holy Trinity. Beatrice Bruteau offers some interesting insight on how the concept of trinity may operate as self-giving love, and why the relevant pattern requires at least three persons in order to be operative.
Then she wisely comes back to earth by connecting these highly speculative considerations to everyday life. She is convinced that comprehensive life-giving relationships among us, based on the Trinitarian faith, can gradually turn this world into a communion of saints.
Eventually, the radical optimism which makes the title, comes from the actual belief that if we have the will and a genuine faith in the indwelling Trinitarian God, we will be able to make this happen.
Un undiscovered gem.......2003-03-20
Beatrice Bruteau is a mystical genius. She writes with the authority of a woman who has deep knowledge of Christianity, Hinduism, Buddhism, and science, and her musings on meditation, stillness, the finite and the infinite are inspired. The section of the "mystery" of evil is alone worth the price of the book--a very timely analysis. Originally conceived as a guidebook for creating a retreat for yourself in your own home, this book goes far beyond the "spirituality lite" produced by many popular authors and will profoundly deepen your understanding of both human and divine nature. A book for the closet contemplatives among us.
a masterpiece..........2002-11-28
This is a work of synthesizing and expressing a deep spirituality out of the forms of the common religious experience of our day-- the writing is both scholarly and touching...a splash of color-- like the flower on the cover-- in world gone blue...highly recommended.
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Artemisia (Second Edition) (European Women Writers)
At the Same Time: Essays and Speeches
The Case of Comrade Tulayev (New York Review Books Classics)
Under the Glacier
Letters: Summer 1926 (New York Review Books Classics)
