There are not a lot of comments over there, but here's the one with the most up votes, and it went up 2 days ago:
Maybe very few people care about actually buying books anymore, or maybe the book-buying public waits until it gets the hard copy of the NYT Book Review, which is part of the Sunday NYT. (Sunday is the 27th; the article went up on line on the 25th.)
But it amazes me that having the pretense of erudition —opining on which new books are worthy — the NYT doesn't monitor the comments and fix errors like this.
By the way, here's the subheadline for the article: "Two journalists dive into George Floyd’s life and family; Viola Davis reflects on her career; a historian explores the brutal underpinnings of the British Empire; and more." For a moment there, I thought the NYT was recommending 2 books about George Floyd's life. But it's just one book with 2 authors.
I'm guessing the headline writer thought it was important to use the active voice and to maintain parallelism. So if Viola Davis reflects and a historian explores, then 2 journalists must dive. The authors all simply wrote, but there's an idea out there that says you ought to use vivid verbs, so "write" is systematically converted to metaphor: dive, reflect, explore. That desire for vigorous activity dictated a structure with the writer coming first in the phrase, and that created the ambiguity that made me think there were 2 books about George Floyd.
So the subheading begins "Two journalists dive into George Floyd’s life and family; Viola Davis reflects on her career...." and the poor NYT reader must struggle not to feel that the newspaper is force-feeding anti-white-fragility medicine. But hang on: There's also "the brutal underpinnings of the British Empire; and more." And more! AND. MORE...
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27 comments:
There were rocks and birds and plants and.
Things
1. People are still buying books and doing so through the Althouse AMZN portal.
2. Who cares about George Floyd’s life? All the Left cared about was his death. If this book is honest, it would give all the details of his crimes and drug use.
3. Lawyers know some Latin.
And More
David Begley said...
2. Who cares about George Floyd’s life?
i would think, that readers of the NYTs would actively Want, to NOT learn about his life
The man was a Saint.. To learn what he was would be the definition of iconoclastic
What the line? This is the West, sir. When the legend becomes fact, print the legend.
I had occasion to use et al. the other day and needed to check the correct spelling. Too many years from Latin 101 I suppose.
I love the cover of the Frans de Waal book. You know women are different: We like to get completely naked, join hands, and dance in a ring. Woohoo!
(I know it's a Matisse, but Matisse was basically (inanely) saying that.)
"and the poor NYT reader must struggle not to feel that the newspaper is force-feeding anti-white-fragility medicine"
When I first read that, I paused, a little confused. Then the sarcasm meter in my brain kicked in, and I chortled.
Re NYT readers/commenters: Homines libenter id quod volunt credunt.
Caesar in The Gallic Wars.
Men easily believe what they want to.
Gender through the eyes of a primatologist. Seriously? This is the sort of topic the NYT says the public should be chomping at the bit to read this season? And why this season? Why not next winter, when they're all shuttered in and huddled around their fires trying to get warm (as there will be no heating oil for the northeast by next winter).
Anyway, the NY Times bestseller lists are famous these days for omitting or not accurately reporting on books of which they may not agree, or condone. For instance, Publishers Weekly also prints a bestseller list. It is actually a best selling book list. Imagine that. On their current list, Glenn Beck's, "The Great Reset" is #4 and the "1619 Project, a new origin story" is #17. On the NY Times list, "The Great Reset" is #15, while "The 1619 Project" is #3.
Kinda makes you wonder what's going on here. And how people can continue to use the NY Times as the standard when they are so clearly in the business of fabrication.
But...back to Frans de Waal. It appears he knows how to hit the hot button for the NY intelligentsia. A prominent(?) primatologist stating that based on his life studies, there is no scientific evidence that men are men and women are women! A book about inclusiveness. How very...predictably evolved of him. I think he knows exactly how a primatologist gets a bestseller and gets on TV all around the Western world. Look for him soon on a show you like.
It's hard for me not to be cynical about all of it these days.
From the promo material in De Waal's book: "despite the linkage between gender and biological sex, biology does not automatically support the traditional gender roles in human societies."
Judging human societies in all its complexity and use of technology compared to animals living in the wild seems reductive to the point of absurdity.
"De Waal peppers his discussion with details from his own life"
Oh goodie, more naval gazing.
Perhaps as an experiment, he should found a chimpanzee colony on the Upper East Side. Teach them how to use money and credit, introduce them to the internet, find them jobs, and see how their power dynamics and gender roles change as a result.
Temujin @..3/27/22, 7:42 AM
My thoughts exactly.
''' diving into the life of George Floyd...". Now how do you think the author will present Floyd's life?
Option 1, an honest appraisal:
The shower following should include HOT water, strong cleanser and repeated risings....
Option 2:
The early, misunderstood life of a saint.
I suspect number 2 is more likely the path the author takes.
What is a woman?
I don't know, I'm not a primologist....
George Floyd- clean and sober for 2 years now.
What is a woman?
I don't know, I'm not a gynecologist...
The book review section of the NYT once got me out of bed on Sundays. It was really excellent. And then it wasn’t. Maybe a crap review section reviews mostly crap books. In any event a disappointment.
As for dead sainted George I give not a damn. A thug. A criminal. An asshole. Revered by the black “community”. Fitting.
Maybe very few people care about actually buying books anymore, or maybe the book-buying public waits until it gets the hard copy of the NYT Book Review, which is part of the Sunday NYT. (Sunday is the 27th; the article went up on line on the 25th.)
I buy a lot of books. The last place I would look for ideas is the NY Times. I can only imagine what crap a "biography of George Floyd" will be. Right now I am reading "The last King of America" and a biography of Samuel Chase.
I'm in the middle of a bunch of books right now. Some are re-reads... some are things I experimented with starting... some are things I'm deliberately reading in pieces...
The last book I really read through in the classic, normal way was something I finished on March 1st.
I thought I was reading a book, but I see I hit a wall on page 35. It amuses me to see what it was that slowed me to a halt:
"Because she knows only life on earth, the moon seems dull and barren, with no grass, flowers, trees, swallows, or cats. She remembers the flowers with all their colors, the songs of birds, and mammals — their smells, their warmth, their quarrels, the fun they have playing — and feels so homesick that she decides to go back to earth. I planned to draw the sequel when I returned from Trier. At the time, I thought I would be coming back to Odense right away. But although “Odense” has four letters in common with “Odyssey,” I never suspected that this would be the beginning of the story of a long, long journey, in which I would play the central character."
---But it amazes me that having the pretense of erudition —opining on which new books are worthy — the NYT doesn't monitor the comments and fix errors like this. [AA]
But it amazes me that
Yes, the "pretense of...." Always a key part of their model, ohlwaze. Even so, the word choice to describe your reaction suggests that you still overestimate the newspaper you are reading. It is not Scotty Reston's Times and hasn't been for 40 years or so. Nor was his version perfect, far from it!! But they were mostly trying to be serious -- while still proselytizing fashionable leftism and indulging error-riddled but "beneficial" reporting as on the Kitty Genovese murder.
Or is even that a too-kind overvaluation? At least they did copy reading and -editing. 'Course, NYT today would probably sniff that this was no error, it was Art.Director.Styling.
Thinking about the old paper caused me recently to reread Russell Baker's Growing Up. Superb little autobiography, time capsule of 20th century America, and even more touching than it seemed when I first read it after publication in 1982. Wonderful stuff.
"I buy a lot of books. The last place I would look for ideas is the NY Times. I can only imagine what crap a "biography of George Floyd" will be. Right now I am reading "The last King of America" and a biography of Samuel Chase."
I bought the Chase book too, Salmon P Chase, Lincoln's Vital Rival. Chase was a lot better man than I had previously assumed.
Books for people who read with their pinkies up...
"Who cares about George Floyd’s life? All the Left cared about was his death. If this book is honest, it would give all the details of his crimes and drug use."
Floyd's criminal acts and drug use is immaterial to the fact that a police officer murdered him while he was restrained.
"Floyd's criminal acts and drug use is immaterial to the fact that a police officer murdered him while he was restrained."
Except he actually died of a drug overdose.
"Books for people who read with their pinkies up."
Up what?
Just be careful turning the pages.
"Brutal Underpinnings" would be a good name for a band.
Given the book by the French maybe hermit cited in another Althouse post today, I would put in a good word for the nonfiction book about the Maine hermit who lived alone in the woods for decades. The Stranger in the Woods is the title of the very good book about him from around 2014. Here's a link to the book author's initial article about the subject, but it might tell a little too much of the factual outline of the story if you are considering reading the book. I thought the book was remarkable, engrossing, and very different! https://www.gq.com/story/the-last-true-hermit
Plus another good word for the Russell Baker autobiography I mentioned in a comment above here: Growing Up describes a Depression and post-Depression youth that seems, and may be, out of a vanished America. And it's often amusing reading, given how good Russell Baker was as a humorist "Observer." Reading it made me feel good, so that's a recommendation.
I bought the Chase book too, Salmon P Chase, Lincoln's Vital Rival. Chase was a lot better man than I had previously assumed.
Yes, I misspelled his first name. The other book is a combined history of George III and the American Revolution from an English POV. My father-in-law many years ago took a course on that exact topic at Oxford one summer.
I recall Baker. He, Buchwald, and Royko were the big three between the two daily papers we had here.
The George III bio is by Roberts, the prolific. I saw him talk about it on CSpan, and have put it on my list.
His bio of Napoleon is a good read; Roberts is pro-FrenchRev and pro-Boney for an Englishman, and puts his opinions forthrightly.
Prof, thanks for that excerpt. It's a stunner.
The two books on the right look interesting. The one on the left, not so much; I suspect it more of a lecture than a book.
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