A History of the Next 100 Years
On first glance, George Friedman’s The Next 100 Years: A Forecast for the 21st Century looks like one of those instantly obsolete titles commonly found at thrift stores and garage sales: The Inevitable Economic Crisis of 1996, The Inescapable Y2K Apocalypse!, How to Profit from Global Cooling.
As far as wildly speculative and often hilariously detailed non-fiction ”histories of the future” go, it’s actually quite a compelling read.
Friedman is founder and CEO of STRATFOR, described as a “leading private intelligence and forecasting company” and immodestly repped in some circles as “the shadow CIA.” In the book’s slightly ponderous introduction, the author describes his methods of prediction based on “identify(ing) major tendencies” and “transmit(ting) a sense of the future.” Once the book proceeds with its galloping 200 pages of prognostication, though, its matter-of-fact tone and slightly guarded outlines of upcoming geopolitical events actually become rather convincing.
In his especially interesting opening chapter, Friedman chalks up the essential elements of the United States’s international primacy to its unique, straddling dominance of the Atlantic and Pacific sea lanes. Despite temporary doom-and-gloom reports of the 24-hour news cycle, according to Friedman this fundamental geographic fact is likely to make the the 21st century at least as much of an “American Century” as the previous 100 years.
The book also rapidly dismisses fears of Chinese, Indian, or Russian threats to American dominance with reference to their own geographic and demographic limitations, while counter-intuitively forecasting a global population downturn in the next several decades. The implications of this for Friedman’s narrative include massive robotics programs, serious cultural strife between traditionalists and social libertarians, and an ironically desperate future need for increased immigration.
As the book quickly moves through the 2030s and 2040s, seeing the rise of surprising new international powers like Poland and Turkey, it takes on more of a sci-fi/alternative history tone. For readers who can dig this material without a simultaneous need for flowery, fiction-y prose, Friedman’s work becomes compulsively readable.
To my surprise, I could hardly put the book down until I found out how the Global War of the 2050s would turn out, with a sneak attack from Japan’s secret bases on the far side of the moon devastating America’s orbiting “Battle Stars” in an upper-atmospheric sequel to Pearl Harbor. Readers may half-expect Kirk and Spock to come to our rescue by the third act, and Friedman’s stone-cold seriousness can stretch plausibility to the breaking point, but not a chapter goes by without several fascinating speculations that can’t be dismissed out of hand.
By the end of his tale of the 21st century, Friedman openly admits his predictions cross into the realm of pure imagination. Nevertheless, his anticipation of the rising economic power of Mexico and its inevitable clash with U.S. interests in the 2080s makes for a compelling series of “What Ifs” that turn current conventional wisdom on its head. His speculations on future energy sources, weapons systems, and demographic trends combine the imagination of sci-fi/fantasy with some fairly serious analysis of our present and recent past.
In this YouTube video, the author gives a quick and interesting gloss of his book’s forecasts. This San Antonio Express-News review details more of the book’s predictions through the next 100 years.
The E-Book Future
In a recent Wall Street Journal piece, author Steven Johnson described some of the ways the E-Book “will change the way we read and write.” Johnson argues that E-Books are a technology that, like the Internet itself, fundamentally changes the rules of communication.
In addition to making it easier and incredibly immediate to purchase books, Johnson sees E-Book technology being able to create a searchable, “shadow version” of the entire library of books one has read from childhood to the present.
“It is hard to overstate the impact that this kind of shift will have on scholarship. Entirely new forms of discovery will be possible. Imagine a software tool that scans through the bibliographies of the 20 books you’ve read on a specific topic, and comes up with the most-cited work in those bibliographies that you haven’t encountered yet.”
Johnson also notes data from Amazon showing Kindle owners buying far more books since purchasing the device. The flipside of the ease of impulse buying is the equal ease the author finds in jumping from book to book. As if our attention spans weren’t shrinking enough already, Johnson points out the difficulty in maintaining “linear, deep-focus reading” on a device in which the reader can instantly switch to almost any other book in the world — or easily jump online to surf the web.
E-Books are also beginning to impact the library world, as noted in the April 13 issue of the journal Library Hotline. A piece here notes Amazon’s mixed responses to libraries who are checking out Kindles to their patrons.
Apparently, Amazon does not pursue enforcement of their policy excluding library lending, thanks in part to a grey area of interpretation of their Terms of Service. The policy blocking “distribution” to any third party is vague enough for some libraries to have begin lending the devices, a service one library director in New Hampshire describes as “a great opportunity” for patrons to discover that they like the new technology and consider purchasing their own.
Library E-Book lending could also be a cheaper alternative to Inter-Library Loans and expensive newspaper subscriptions, but the $360+ replacement fee for returning a damaged Kindle rather dwarfs the usual ten-cents-per-day overdue fee so many of us have gotten used to.
Johnson’s Wall Street Journal piece also notes the possibility of E-Books ushering in a “standardized micropayment system” for online content that could even, in a happily ironic twist, help make newspapers profitable again.
J. G. Ballard: 1930-2009
The Independent UK’s obituary of J. G. Ballard questions how much the 21st century will be “Ballardian,” whether humans can overcome the violent natures so memorably and disturbingly drawn by the author, or if we are doomed according to the prophecy of his last novel, 2006’s Kingdom Come:
“The human race sleepwalked to oblivion, thinking only about the corporate logos on its shroud.”
Ballard’s dystopian novels and short stories portray a mechanized world in which technology provides both a civilized mask and a tool for mankind’s basest instincts. His work has been cited as a major influence on cyberpunk writers and like-minded musicians from Joy Division to Radiohead.
While one publisher described the author as “beyond psychiatric help” in a rejection of his controversial 1973 novel Crash, Ballard’s best work challenges readers to confront the implications of mass consumerism, ecological destruction, and the human urge for violence.
Ballard’s most popular work was probably the autobiographical Empire of the Sun, which draws on his experiences as a child in a World War II Japanese prison camp in China. In this fascinating interview with Terry Gross on NPR’s Fresh Air, Ballard notes the differences between his novel and the Steven Spielberg film version, and he describes how his later experiences in a British boarding school were not dissimilar to his life as a prisoner of war.
Ballard’s official website features a number of interviews and essays about his work, and the Ballardian site is a terrific resource for fans with a large collection of memorial links.
Animals Make Us Human
Author Temple Grandin has been described as “the most accomplished and well-known adult with autism in the world.” Grandin has written numerous books on autism issues, and her newest book, Animals Make Us Human, explores the ways animals think, act, and feel based on the author’s unique studies and perspective.
Grandin’s book describes ways she believes humans can give animals the happiest possible lives, on the animal’s terms rather than the human’s. Chapters describe the “core emotional needs” of dogs, cats, farm animals, and some zoo animals, and the author identifies emotions shared by both animals and humans. Grandin’s work draws on her own insights into autism to consider the ways animals emotionally experience their worlds.
“The rule is simple,” Grandin explains, “Don’t stimulate rage, fear, and panic if you can help it, and do stimulate seeking and also play.” The author also provocatively compares the relative quality of life of livestock versus that of “pampered pets” like trophy dogs who end up “alone all day with no human or dog companions.”
This interesting piece from slate.com discusses Grandin’s book and her work as a consultant within the meat industry to improve the conditions of American livestock.
In this NPR interview, Grandin talks about how her autism has helped her see things the way animals do, using a ”sensory-based thinking” process she believes animals also share.
Grandin’s academic homepage shows examples of her handling, restraining, and transport systems along with links to her research articles. The essay “Thinking in Pictures” explains Grandin’s process of translating spoken and written words into images, a process that has allowed her to design invaluable equipment for humane livestock treatment and veterinary care.
Dead Philosophers
Two subjects that, taken on their own, are quite sufficient to send readers on a beeline to another shelf–any other shelf–are combined by Simon Critchley’s new book in surprisingly entertaining and enlightening ways. Critchley’s Book of Dead Philosophers combs through a wide-ranging assortment of thinkers both legendary and obscure to see what can be learned about our own mortality from their thoughts and the manner of their deaths.
In his funny and thoughtful introduction, Critchley explains how philosophers have for thousands of years attempted to “learn how to die” in order to make sense of life. From the very beginnings of philosophy in the accounts of the death of Socrates, Critchley outlines humanity’s attempts to overcome the essential fear of death through religion, psychology, sophistry, and the hardcore reasoning of his favorite philosophers.
The book’s short entries on “190 or So Dead Philosophers” describe the central ideas of thinkers from Pythagoras to Descartes to Sartre, stopping along the way to consider a number of overlooked female and non-Western philosophers. In linking their major themes with the facts of their deaths, Critchley finds plenty of evidence of one of his own recurring ideas, that “it is the fear of death and the longing for immortality that ruins life.”
Along the way the author catalogs a number of bizarre, comical, and even inspiring tales of the deaths of the philosophers themselves. The 4th century female Greek philosopher Timysha, for instance, was persecuted and tortured for her unorthodox beliefs. Critchley notes that before she was finally killed, she bit off her own tongue and spat it in the face of the Sicilian tyrant who had hounded her family and community.
Less incandescent manners of death include tales of drowning in cow dung, eagles dropping tortoises upon philosopher’s heads, and grisly suicides too numerous to mention. Critchley’s descriptions of the many ways thinkers have come to terms with death ultimately attempt to find a way towards the possibility of happiness. Whether laughing at death; writing Zen haikus on their deathbeds; or finding peace in nature, art, or pure thought, Critchley’s anecdotes are ultimately as much concerned with how to live well as with how to die.
This Guardian UK piece outlines the author’s “Top 10 Philosophers’ Deaths.”
In this interview with The Believer, Critchley discusses the possibility of either finding meaning in life or figuring out how to deal with meaninglessness itself.
Ann Patchett, Keith Richards, and Your Public Library
At Tuesday night’s Literary Voices fundraising dinner benefiting the Metropolitan Library System, best-selling author Ann Patchett made a case for public libraries as among the best and most important services offered by a community.
Patchett pointed out the inarguably unequal health care services available in our society, as well as the fundamental inequalities in educational opportunities and legal services. On the other hand, for Patchett the public library offers an ideal of equality, a sanctuary open to anyone and a repository of the broadest possible resources for learning, job-hunting help, or limitless entertainment.
Patchett also discussed the value of reading fiction in answer to folks who insist they have to “learn something” from picking up a book. The author argued that readers of fiction are forced to empathize with and inhabit the lives of people they would never otherwise meet — in the case of her own remarkable novels, readers confront terrorists, opera singers, magicians, politicians, unwed mothers, and wayward Nebraskans. In Patchett’s view, fiction offers a window to the human condition every bit as valid and informative as a history book or a how-to manual.
In this podcast from the Wall Street Journal, Patchett discusses the particular value of reading in tough economic times. In this PIF magazine interview, Patchett discusses her writing career and some of the sources of inspiration for her novels.
Patchett’s passionate advocacy for public libraries also reminded me of one of my favorite quotes, Rolling Stones guitarist and indestructable human debauchery machine Keith Richards’ thoughts about the proud institution where I work:
When you are growing up, there are two institutional places that affect you most powerfully — the church, which belongs to God, and the public library, which belongs to you. The public library is a great equalizer.
Rock on, public libraries.
Tear Down This Myth
Will Bunch’s Tear Down This Myth is sure to inflame the legions of Ronald Reagan’s admirers who have invested two decades of effort in burnishing the former President’s controversial legacy. The book’s subtitle explains its thesis–How the Reagan Legacy Has Distorted Our Politics and Haunts Our Future–and his study offers lessons for both liberals and conservatives who can look back on Reagan’s policies and politics with a perspective untainted by myth-making.
Bunch’s book describes the large-scale efforts of Reagan’s conservative progeny to polish the legacy of the quite divisive President who left office with a lower approval rating than would a post-impeachment Bill Clinton 12 years later.
Along the way the author visits the Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, CA, which features a massive statue of Reagan originally planned for Oklahoma City’s Cowboy Hall of Fame, as well as a large section of the Berlin Wall which the President famously urged Mikhail Gorbachev to “tear down” in one of the iconic speeches of the 1980s. Tellingly, no official mention is made on the premises of the Iran/Contra scandal that nearly led to the President’s impeachment and crippled the last years of his administration.
Part of Bunch’s study is dedicated to pointing out the complexities of the fall of the Soviet Bloc, a historical turning point far more complicated than the simple mythology of Reagan single-handedly destroying Communism. Another interesting theme Bunch pursues is an examination of the many ways post-Reagan conservatives have turned away from the actual policies of the Reagan Administration, particularly on foreign policy, while still carrying the banner of “Reaganism.”
Bunch points out Reagan’s oft-stated hesitance to involve American troops in foreign conflicts, particularly after the tragic truck-bombing of the U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut in 1983 led him to withdraw troops from that intractable conflict. The author convincingly argues it is a grievous misuse of history to suggest Reagan would have ever enthusiastically supported large-scale military intervention in the Middle East, given his stated policies and beliefs on the region.
In this Q & A with Vanity Fair, Bunch discusses elements of Reagan’s legacy left unmentioned by his myth-makers, particularly his willingness to compromise politically on key issues while maintaining uncompromising rhetoric.
This episode of NPR’s Fresh Air features an interview with Bunch as well as a counterpoint from historian Douglas Brinkley, who considers Reagan one of the top five presidents of the 20th century.
Bunch’s acclaimed Attytood blog ranges over the author’s obsessions, from politics and world affairs to sports and music.
Author Confidential, with Ann Patchett
Next Wednesday, April 15, Oklahoma City’s Downtown Library is hosting a very cool program featuring award-winning author Ann Patchett.
The “Author Confidential” speaker series has previously brought notable authors like Sue Grafton and Scott Turow to the library for speaking appearances, question-and-answer sessions with guests, and book-signings. This year’s event features acclaimed novelist, essayist, and speaker Ann Patchett for a 10:00 a.m. talk in the library’s 46th Star Auditorium that is free and open to the public.
Ann Patchett won the 2002 PEN/Faulkner Award for her amazing novel, Bel Canto, which is currently being adapted into a film. Her most recent novel, 2007’s Run, was another highly acclaimed best-seller.
Patchett has also written interesting non-fiction works, including 2004’s Truth & Beauty: A Friendship, which chronicles her friendship with the late writer Lucy Grealy. Her most recent book, 2008’s What Now?, is an adaptation of a commencement speech Patchett gave at her alma mater, Sarah Lawrence College.
What Now? is not only an interesting compilation of Patchett’s thoughts about dealing with uncertainty and major life transitions, but it also reveals some autobiographical details and explains the inspiration behind some of Patchett’s fiction. The book was designed by book cover guru Chip Kidd, whom Patchett credited as a major contributor to the project.
The “Author Confidential” event generally plays to a packed house, and doors open at the Downtown Library at 9:00 a.m. for guests who would like to get good seats. Overflow seating with closed-circuit video screens will be available around the corner in the Friends of the Library meeting room.
Ann Patchett will do a short Q & A session and will also be signing books after her talk. Full Circle Books will have an extensive selection of Patchett’s books on hand for purchase before and after the event.
This interview with Ann Patchett from powells.com features some of her thoughts about Bel Canto and her earlier writing. This Q & A from 2008 is a wide-ranging discussion about book tours, Patchett’s favorite reads, and other inspirations. In this segment from NPR’s great ”You Must Read This” series, Patchett describes her feelings about Henry James’s The Ambassadors.
Losing His Religion
In the recently crowded field of atheism apologetics, William Lobdell’s Losing My Religion is a particularly thoughtful, personal tale of faith going stale and doubt bringing peace.
Lobdell’s subtitle basically outlines the book’s story: How I Lost My Faith Reporting on Religion in America–and Found Unexpected Peace. The former journalist “on the religion beat” for the Los Angeles Times relates his journey toward sincere, born-again Christianity for much of the first half of the book, until unanswerable questions and an up-close look at a variety of church scandals rendered him unable to believe in “the placebo of faith.”
One of the great values of Lobdell’s book is his sensitive and fair treatment of people of faith. His evangelical background and deep study of the Catholic church served him well in his initial years as a reporter on religious issues, and he exerpts several fascinating stories he reported on faith-driven social activists and extraordinary individual acts of forgiveness.
Lobdell’s personal religious journey brought him to an appreciation of Catholicism so profound that he underwent the extensive training required to join the church. At the same time, his reporting on the mushrooming sex scandals of the Catholic church brought him face-to-face with victims of abuse whose experiences made the stated values of the ancient church seem like a cruel farce.
In one especially harrowing chapter, Lobdell details his trip to “The Edge of the Earth,” an isolated northwestern Alaskan community on St. Michael Island where a generation of Alaskan Native boys were sexually abused in a diocese the author describes as “a dumping ground for molesting priests.”
As the corruption and hypocrisy he witnessed overwhelmed his faith, Lobdell corresponded with an equally thoughtful pastor in an attempt to recover a sense of belief. The book excerpts much of this interesting correspondence in one of its final chapters, and readers are gently challenged to evaluate truths on both sides of the seemingly intractible argument.
Lobdell’s story is a valuable contribution to a field where angry polemics and harsh judgements are thrown back and forth without the contenders on either side stopping to listen. His description of the sense of peace and gratitude he found after giving up making excuses for his wavering faith seems not unlike similar testimonies of believers who swear by the peace brought by theirs.
This Los Angeles Times article outlines Lobdell’s experiences as a religion reporter whose faith was profoundly tested. The author also discussed his journey in this NPR piece from 2007. Lobdell’s homepage features a wide-ranging blog and links to other interesting resources.
Book Covers Hall of Fame
After looking over Chip Kidd’s awesome book cover designs, I engaged in lengthy deliberations with a hand-picked panel of experts (basically myself, Mrs. Bookmarking, and the Google Images search engine) in order to announce the first annual inductees in the Bookmarking Book Covers Hall of Fame.
The very first Baseball Hall of Fame class in 1936 included Babe Ruth, Ty Cobb, and Christy Mathewson. The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame’s inagural class featured Elvis Presley, Chuck Berry, and Sam Cooke. In other words, only the heaviest of the heavyweights need apply for this pinnacle of achievement in the art, science, and witchcraft of book cover design. I fully expect the controversial results to cause more bar fights in Oklahoma City than a “Switzer vs. Stoops vs. Wilkinson” free-for-all.
This inagural class must represent the absolute icons of the field, book cover designs that define their accompanying volumes so completely that generations of cut-out-bin knock-offs and cheap paperback hack jobs should offend the sensibilities of millions of readers and forever be consigned to fishwraps and birdcage liners.
For my exhaustively subjective Book Cover Hall of Fame Board of Trustees, the first choice was obvious – Michael Mitchell’s first edition design for The Catcher in the Rye:
There’s something almost nightmarish about the carousel horse looming over the New York skyline, an image at least as enigmatic as the book’s title and as memorable as Holden Caulfield’s catalog of phonies. It’s the kind of design I don’t even want to study too closely or learn too much about, better to keep its weird mystery intact.
This website features an amazing collection of Catcher in the Rye covers from dozens of editions published all around the world. The standard paperback edition’s maroon and gold cover might be even more iconic for generations of schoolkids like me who read it in that bulk-purchased-for-public-schools format, but the original design is the gold standard in unforgettable book cover imagery.
Similarly, James Joyce’s Ulysses may be better recognized in its almost sickly sea-green cover design, but for me this version’s weird combination of fonts and uneven type is really unsettling and memorable:
The final inductee of my Hall of Fame’s inagural class also features a haunting figure floating over New York City: Francis Cugat’s definitive Art Deco dust jacket design for F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby:
This essay describes the design as “the most celebrated and widely disseminated jacket art in 20th century American literature,” and it discusses the interesting connections between the cover image and the book’s themes.
Scholars believe the design was completed before Fitzgerald had even finished the novel, and its portrayal of a “girl whose disembodied face floated along the dark cornices and blinding signs” of nighttime New York may have informed the author’s own descriptions of Daisy Buchanan. A closer look at the irises of the “Celestial Eyes” reveals a little of the designer’s mysterious intent.
This website features an excellent collection of 150 of the “Greatest Book Covers,” some of which will jockey for position in my next class of Hall of Fame honorees. On the other side of the coin, this display of “The 15 Worst Book Covers Ever” features some equally unforgettable images, particularly the children’s recipe collection, Cooking with Pooh.
