What Book Are You Currently Reading?

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

In no particular order, these are the books I have started or re-started reading this summer:

The Origins of Totalitarianism, Hannah Arendt
On Revolution, Hannah Arendt
The Rise and Fall of the Soviet Empire, Bryan Crozier
Injustice: The Social Origins of Democracy & Dictatorship, Barrington Moore, Jr.
The CIA in Guatemala: The Foreign Policy of Intervention, Richard H. Immerman
Piercing the Reich: The Penetration of Nazi Germany by American Secret Agents During World War II, Joseph E. Persico
Lord and Peasant in Russia from the Ninth to the Nineteenth Century, Jerome Blume

I doubt I will finish most of these.

Arendt is great - I really like Benhabib, who builds off and is influenced by her.

I was introduced to her in a political theory class my junior year, where we read parts of "Totalitarianism" and "On Violence" (an article which I read in full this summer). She was the one that most gripped me--outside of perhaps Hegel--out of those we reviewed, and her choice of subject matter was right up my alley. Most of what I read seemed to be either things I had thought but never put into words, or observations that made sense when articulated--others might disagree. I picked up both of the books I have by her from a used bookstore in Seattle last summer, and I'd like to finish at least one this summer. I also have a printed version of an article she wrote in the wake of the Hungarian Revolution.

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

Our Kind of Traitor by John LeCarre

I read Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy in December and have been meaning to pick up the other two books of the "Smiley" trilogy. How you like?

I just used my Amazon Christmas money to order the following:
Democracy, Charles Tilly;
Social Origins of Dictatorship & Democracy, Barrington Moore, Jr.;
The Devil in History: Communism, Fascism, and Some Lessons of the Twentieth Century, Vladimir Tismaneanu;
The Soviet Century, Moshe Lewin;
Fascism: Comparison and Definition, Stanley G. Payne

I've already read the Moore book, but the copy that my school's library has I most recently saw split in two halves, so I figured I'd better get my own copy. All of the books can, in some sense, be rationalized as feeding into my thesis work. The Tismaneanu book is the one exception; a political theory professor of mine introduced me to his work--or rather, his Amazon author's page--so I'd been meaning to read something by him for a while. As I'm not in the business at this point of comparing Nazism and Communism, I guess that would be my only specifically "pleasure" order. The rest are to be used, to some extent or another, as "background material".

I had to dump some books on Central Asia and the Transcaucasus into my "save for later" bin; I'll grab them eventually in my search for sources for my master's thesis.

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

I’ve been reading Peter Hopkirk’s The Great Game at a pace of 30 pages per day for about two weeks now. At that pace I should be done around Friday.

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

The Spy Who Came in from the Cold

Nice! Been meaning to borrow a Le Carre book from my library for a while. Drowning myself in non-fiction.

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

The Spy Who Came in from the Cold

Nice! Been meaning to borrow a Le Carre book from my library for a while. Drowning myself in non-fiction.

Picked up “The Honourable Schoolboy”. 140 pages in since Wednesday.

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

Our Kind of Traitor by John LeCarre

FInished: Watsons Go To Birmingham-1963

Current:

Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy
The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle

Just finished The Honourable Schoolboy. Very interesting setting and enjoyable characters, but with an ending nowhere near as satisfying as TTSS.

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

I got “Armageddon Averted” by Stephen Kotkin and “Great Games, Local Rules” by Alexander Cooley in the mail the past few days. Almost done with an early edition of “The Resurgence of Central Asia: Islam or Nationalism?” by Ahmed Rashid. I also ordered a compilation of Mike Allred’s “Madman” comic.

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

“Perelandra” by C.S. Lewis. Old paperback edition my dad used to own; includes some barely legible notes written on the margins. Decided to give it a try after hearing it twice-references within a few days on various media. Over halfway through “Great Games, Local Rules”. Recently started reading a compilation book on Tajikistan published in 1997. Some interesting chapters.

Finished “Madman”, “Armageddon Averted”, and “The Resurgence of Central Asia”.

Probably ordering another book on the Caucasus and maybe some more comics soon. Maybe a Skocpol or stilly book.

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

Started reading “The Bourne Ultimatum” last night because I was tired of non-fiction and I own incredibly little fiction these days (that being one example). Finished Perelandra pretty easily earlier in the week.

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

Dr. Zhivago, Boris Pasternak
Kim, Rudyard Kipling
The Russian Revolution, Sheila Fitzpatrick

There are other non-fiction books lying around my bed that I’ve started but are essentially on pause.

I just recently started a reread of Russian literature marathon. I started Crime and Punishment yesterday, and plan to reread Anna Karenina, The Brothers Karamazov, and War and Peace in that order. Among my favorite books, especially Crime and Punishment and War and Peace.

I’ve been meaning to break into some Dostoevsky and Tolstoy, but figured the twentieth century would be an easier entry into Russian literature. This summer I read The Master & Margarita.

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

All the Kremlin's Men, Mikhail Zygar;
A Storm of Swords, George R.R. Martin;
The Global Cold War, Odd Arne Westad;
Anatomy of Revolution, Crane Brinton.

Thinking of ordering some Marvel Omnibus collections for Spider-Man, Daredevil, or X-Force when the post-vacation paycheck comes in.