Literature

On Pharyngula, PZ Myers examines the work of Yoshinori Ohsumi, who was awarded the prize in Physiology for his studies of autophagy in yeast. Autophagy, or self-consumption, is a strategy used by all cells to recycle malfunctioning bits of themselves, or to survive during times of starvation. But autophagy is also involved in cancer metastasis and may play a role in other diseases such as Parkinson's. Meanwhile, the Nobel prize in Physics did not go to LIGO and the observation of gravitational waves as widely expected. Instead it was divided between three individuals for "theoretical…

One benefit of spending a lot of time lying down waiting patiently for your back to feel better is that you get a lot of reading done. I just polished off the novel Main Street by Sinclair Lewis, published in 1920. (Short review: Enjoyable, but not as good as Elmer Gantry.) Anyway, the main story follows Carol Kennicott, a city-girl who finds herself living in the small town of Gopher Prairie, MN, after marrying the town's doctor. She finds it hard to adjust to the insularity of her new home. The following paragraph jumped out at me as being pretty timeless. Carol is at a family…

By now I'm sure you have heard that Ray Bradbury has died. I can't say that I was ever a huge Bradbury fan. I recall being a bit bored with Farenheit 451 when I tried reading it in middle school, but I was probably a little too young to appreciate it. I enjoyed The Martian Chronicles, though I read it so long ago that I only remember bits and pieces of it today. But I did have a chance to see Bradbury speak when I was in college, and he said something that didn't mean much to me at the time, but which now has considerable resonance. You see, I am the sort of writer who is constantly…

As swamped as I've been for the past two weeks, I nonetheless found time to visit the Virginia Antiquarian Book Fair on April 28. It was held at the Library of Virginia in Richmond. The drive to Richmond is a little over two hours each way, and I had to leave the fair early to hold a Saturday office hour for my students with Monday finals (are you impressed by my dedication?), but it was well worth the trip. Somewhere between thirty and forty book dealers were represented. Unsurprisingly, there was a heavy emphasis on American history, especially books related to the Civil…

Jimmy Carter has a new book out about the Bible. He discusses it in this short interview over at HuffPo. He takes a straightforward approach to dealing with morally or scientifically troubling passages: Thank you so much for talking with me President Carter. As I warned, I am going to be asking the tough questions. So ... Did God write the Bible? God inspired the Bible but didn't write every word in the Bible. We know, for instance that stars can't fall on the earth, stars are much larger than the earth. That was a limitation of knowledge of the universe or physics, or astronomy at that…

If anyone reading this lives near Harrisonburg, Virginia, let me encourage you, in the strongest possible terms, to check out the high school's production of the musical Les Miserables. You have until Sunday. I've seen some good high school shows in my time, but this is really something special. The high school seems to have an exceptionally deep bench of very talented people this year. I am something of a Les Miz aficionado. I regard it as quite simply the finest novel ever written. I haven't decided what number two is, but it's pretty far back. I even have a vague idea for a book (…

Time now for the third installment in my series about great short stories. (Previous installments can be found here: Part One and Part Two.) Today we focus on “The Nine Mile Walk,” by Harry Kemelman. If you are familiar with Kemelman it is probably because of his series of detective novels featuring Rabbi David Small. Kemelman originally wanted to write books about Judaism, but found it too difficult to get such things published. So he embedded discussions of Jewish thought into his mystery novels. The Rabbi novels were also memorable for their subplots, which typically involved the…

Today we continue our series about great short stories. (Click here for Part One.) For several decades Fredric Brown was a prolific author of mysteries and science fiction, producing most of his work in the 1940's and 50's. I could have chosen several of his works for inclusion in this series. “Arena” s perhaps his most famous story, both for its own merits and for its adaptation into a memorable episode of Star Trek (Captain Kirk vs. the Gorn!) And while I have quite a few of his novels and story anthologies sitting on my shelf (lovingly rescued from the shelves of various used…

This is the first in what will be an occasional series about some of my favorite short stories. These are the sorts of stories that remind me of what I aspire to as a writer. They are the ones I enjoy partly for their engaging plot lines, and partly for the skillfulness of the writing itself. The ones I go back and reread periodically even though I've already memorized most of the dialogue. They have given me so much satisfaction over the years that I feel compelled to share them with everyone else. This first entry addresses my very favorite short story of all time: “The Problem of Cell…

I'm pathetically excited about this: The last we heard of the troubled and mystical Danny Torrance, he had just conquered the malicious Overlook Hotel, losing his father, Jack, along the way. Over thirty years later, his story will be continued via Stephen King's sequel to The Shining, titled Doctor Sleep. I've been a big Stephen King fan ever since high school. The shine has come off a bit with his recent novels, but I still read them as quickly as King can publish them. The Shining is one of my all time favorites. The sequel's plot? Young Danny is all grown up and uses his powers to…

The Bronx Zoo has misplaced one of its cobras: Lookout, New York -- a poisonous cobra snake may be on the loose today from the Bronx Zoo. In a statement released Saturday, the Bronx Zoo said that their reptile house was closed after a staff member noticed that an adolescent Egyptian cobra was missing from an off-exhibit enclosure. "After learning the snake was missing yesterday afternoon, we immediately closed and secured the building as we took steps throughout the evening to recover the snake," the statement read. Egyptian cobras are known for being uncomfortable in open areas, so the…

A physicist friend of mine recently lent me a copy of Harry Frankfurt's "On Bullshit", which purports to be the only ever philosophical analysis of "bullshit". This former essay turned teeny tiny hardback book reaches such profound conclusions as: 1) bullshit is sort of like humbug, only more excremental; 2) bullshit is worse than lying, because liars know the truth, while bullshitters just yak away without regard for the truth or non-truth of what they are saying; and 3) that since a person cannot ever really know him/her self, any sincere expression of one's feelings is bullshit. This…

It's that time of year again-- the Swedes will be handing out money to famous scientists, with the announcements of who's getting what starting one week from today. Thus, the traditional Uncertain Principles Nobel Prize Picking Contest: Leave a comment on this post predicting the winner(s) of one of this year's Nobel Prizes. Anyone who correctly picks both the field and the laureate will win a guest-post spot on this blog. The usual terms and conditions apply. If you don't have anything you'd like to guest-post about, you can exchange your guest post for a signed copy of How to Teach Physics…

I only have time for a quick post today, so how about another quote from Elmer Gantry? Keep in mind that this was published in 1927. See if it sounds familiar: In some ways he preferred New Thought to standard Protestantism. It was safer to play with. He had never been sure but that there might be something to the doctrines he had preached as an evangelist. Perhaps God really had dictated every word of the Bible. Perhaps there really was a hell of burning sulphur. Perhaps the Holy Ghost really was hovering around watching him and reporting. But he knew with serenity that all of his…

Over the past week or so I have been dutifully plugging a hole in my literary education. I am reading Sinclair Lewis' novel Elmer Gantry. If you are unfamiliar with the story, the title character is a rudderless, narcissistic, unsavory fellow who, through a series of somewhat implausible events, gets ordained as a Baptist minister. Mayhem ensues! The book was somewhat controversial when it was first published, since it does not exactly make evangelical Christianity look good. I am currently halfway through it and loving every page of it. In reading the following brief excerpt, keep in…

Andrew Carnie, Magic Forest, 2002, via Neuroculture.org   Do we live in a neuroculture? Of course we do! Coming from a blog named Neuron Culture, this is obviously a set-up question â my excuse to call attention to a post by Daniel Buchman that offers a brief review article on the question. It seems that everywhere I look nowadays, Iâm seeing images of, or reading descriptions of, the brain in some shape or form. Buchman links (at the post's bottom, as is now the practice at NCore) to several good reads and sites, including Neuroculture.org, which has some lovely stuff, and â curse those…

Julia is going overseas for most of the summer, and she is putting together her reading list. I'm sure she'll put together a fine list. But we live in a culture in which we are compelled to suggest to high school students what they might want to read, especially in preparation for college. I've looked at a couple of those lists, and they are dismal. Some seem to be lists of works that are especially long, challenging of language, in many cases unpublishable in the modern market, out of date, and boring. I mean, really, Moby Dick? Watch the movie, dude, the book is a bear. However, the…

In the New York Times today there is an interesting article about Helene Hegemann whose debut novel, "Axolotl Roadkill," drew wide praise. You know this story: turns out that the book contains plagiarized passages (plagiarism: check, sales rising: check.) What I find fascinating about the story, however, is not this rehash of a tried and true marketing tactic, but Ms. Hegemann's defense of herself, summarized in this quote: "There's no such thing as originality anyway, just authenticity," said Ms. Hegemann in a statement released by her publisher after the scandal broke. Why do I love this…

I saw the new movie Sherlock Holmes over the weekend. Short review: I liked it far more than I expected to, though it is a bit silly in places. Longer review, with a few spoilers, below the fold. A number of years ago there was an atrocity of a movie called Young Sherlock Holmes. Though it made a few gestures in the direction of the original Conan Doyle stories early in the film, it ultimately came down to young Holmes battling a bunch of Satan worshippers, or some such nonsense. The opening scene of the present film features Holmes stopping someone named Lord Blackwood from carrying out…

(Ten Best of the Decade from Half of the World's Fair) This series began with the kindness of a friend who agreed to let me ask him about his book about Barry Commoner, science, and modern environmentalism. It then spawned a series of 17 interviews with authors of books in science studies, environmental history, the history of science, and all combinations in between. Every one of them was enjoyable to do; every author was generous and insightful. I've been able to use some of these as thumbnail sketches of readings I use in class. In that, they stand as the best example of blogging as a…