Book Café

[Smartie7]

good point .. I don't exactly like the POV (first person point of view) of the book...

I've read the original books and listened to the Ebooks and I agree with you .. JK writes better.. specially I like her witty dialogues .. something Twilight seriously lacks...

Definitely! JK is ten times better than Stephanie (IMO)

instead we're stuck with description of the heavenly beauty of Edward for the thousandth time!!

Now you mentioned it !

* my favorite character is Alice

Yeah, Alice is nice

[Antonio Andolini]

Symposium
Plato
It's hard to say the best book but I can say it was the most impressive book that I've read ... the main theme of this book is a symposium(I dun think party can be a good definition )between Socrates,Agathon and some other famous Greek artists,philosophers and writers that they are describing love by their own words ...
all of the definitions were beautiful but as always in Plato's books,Socrates' definition is sth else ..
here is the two parts that quaked me the most!

  محتوای مخفی: wisdom 

(آگاتون):ای سقراط بیا در کنار من بنشین ،شاید که من هم بر اثر مجاورت با تو از آن خلسه ی خوبی که در آن لحظات خلوت حاصل کرده و به ارمغان آورده ای بهره مند گردم، زیرا بدون شک اندیشه ی ناب و علمی جدید بدست آورده ای و آن چه را به دنبالش گشته ای به دست آورده ای،وگرنه به این زودی ممکن نبود که دست از تفکر برداری
سقراط:چه خوب بود اگر حکمت همانند آب می بود که چون از یک ظرف لبریز گردد بتواند به ظرف خالی دیگری ریخته شود تا هردو به اندازه ی یکدیگر از هم بهره مند شوند.در این صورت،من خود را به تاثیر مجالست با تو،از نیکبخت ترین خلایق می شمردم.زیرا تو با لبریزی علم و حکمت خودت،ظرف خالی مرا سرشار می ساختی.چه حکمت من چیزی پیچیده،مبهم،نامفهوم و به خیال نزدیک تر است تا حقیقت.ولی حکمت تو دارای تابشی فروزنده و پاینده است که با فضل و ادب از وجودت تراویده،و با اینکه هنوز جوانی،بر پیران سبقت گرفته یی.چه در همین دو روز پیش،همراه با نشاط جوانی ات-در جشن سی هزار نفر از یونانیان-بس جلوه فروخت.
.
.

and this part of Socrates' definition about love: .. Socrates describe his definition by a story that he has heard from Diotima-an illiterate old woman- and after that he asks too many question and she answer them excellently!
.

  محتوای مخفی: love 

عشق از پدر و مادر خود به ارث می برد.میراث او از مادر این است که همیشه تهیدست بماند و از لطافت و زیبایی هم بی نصیب باشد.و این درست برخلاف آن چیزی است که بسیاری می پندارند.او نیز خشن است و رنگ پریده،نه کفش به پا دارد و نه برای آرمیدن مسکن و ماوایی.بر روی زمین عریان زیر آسمان می خوابد.گاه در کوی و برزن و یا در رواق خانه ها شب را به روز می آورد و همانند مادرش بی نوا و تهیدست است
اما از طرف دیگر همانند پدرش شکارگر زبردستی است که با کمال دلیری و نشاط در جست و جوی خوبی و زیبایی است،هر لحظه چاره تازه یی می اندیشد و هر روز از راه دیگری وارد میشود و لحظه یی از جستجوی دانش و معرفت باز نمی ایستد ،در عین حال جادوگری زبردست و حیکه گر است.
نه به خدایان شباهتی دارد و نه به آدمیان.بلکه عینا چون پدرش می ماند که اگر در یک روز تیرش به هدف بخورد شادی و شعفی بی پایان پیدا می کند و شکفته می شود و گاهی هم پژمرده می گردد و دوباره سرزنده می گردد هرچه به دست آورد زود از دست می دهد،به طوری که عشق همیشه نه تهیدست است و نه توانگر و در دانایی و توانایی نیز وضع به همین گونه است.یعنی بین این دو قرار دارد.

the books is not very heavy(about140pages) but too heavy in purpose of meaning that it is hard to go from one page to the next page so quickly!
despite the Socrates' definition,I liked Eryximachus' views about love that he believed love is creating harmony among everything,both good things and bad things .His main belief was that everything is good and the problem is where we should use them!
The version of this book that I read is translated By Mohammad Ali Foroghi and The editor,Mehdi Vafaee, has put good information about some Greek expressions by comparing this translation with the English and Greek versions of the book
I do recommend you to read it!

[seymour]

I've finished Twilight (I preferred the movie - this one was so talkative!) .. and now I'm reading this:

Stories Hollywood Never Tells by Howard Zinn

very nice book ... it talks about possible motivations and intentions of Hollywood (and Western culture as a whole) in preferring some issues to others (probably more important ones) .. I know it sounds abstract and boring .. but actually it's fun!

Symposium
Plato
It's hard to say the best book but I can say it was the most impressive book that I've read ... the main theme of this book is a symposium(I dun think party can be a good definition )between Socrates,Agathon
......

it's a very good book .. I've read it many years ago, but still check it out time to time...

[SCYTHE]

The best book I have come across is Thus Spoke Zarathustra by Friedrich W. Nietzsche, a book for all and none. I also have read Beyond the Good and Evil by him but I prefer the former for so many delicate metaphors and his gripping, convoluted style of writing, yet in the latter book his views are more elaborately elucidated

[sepid12ir]

Symposium

that was really a great one; simple n short but deep meaning; n as u said n Seymour kinda mentioned it's a book which may never finish; u can go thru it several times; I liked that; one of the best books I've read so far;

Thus Spoke Zarathustra by Friedrich W. Natchez,

when I started reading that for a while I got mad; I wasn't myself; my mind was occupied with every little word of the book; kinda heavy n deep in meaning; nice words n a worth reading book ..... gotta mention that the very first days I couldn't finish it n recently I again went thru it n FINALLY finished the book i
//

btw, I've just started reading 'a portrait of the artist as a young man' by 'James Joyce' ... of course I'm reading the original Version in English; that's kinda hard but liked to know yr idea if u've read that

[SCYTHE]

btw, I've just started reading 'a portrait of the artist as a young man' by 'James Joyce' ... of course I'm reading the original Version in English; that's kinda hard but liked to know yr idea if u've read that

Yeah I have read so much greatness of his works and if I have time, I am so enthusiastic to read "Ulysses", and I also prefer original books to the translated versions, but what is frightfully sad is that in Iran you cannot find the books in foreigner languages except for few books taught in the universities

[sepid12ir]

Yeah I have read so much greatness of his works and if I have time, I am so enthusiastic to read "Ulysses", and I also prefer original books to the translated versions, but what is frightfully sad is that in Iran you cannot find the books in foreigner languages except for few books taught in the universities

unfortunately; that's one of the biggest problems that we have; even at uni we are sorta limited in choosing the novels we read through the term since the books are not available; n even finding this one was not that easy i
Ulysses is of course Joyce most Popular book; but his books are kinda hard to grasp bcuz he's been so creative in shifting the time n using 'stream of consciousness' in his novels; I get so confused while reading his works;i

[SCYTHE]

Since I am in love with Nietzsche I would like to add some of my understanding from him. Without attempting to formulate him, what he wants to teach is new positive existentialistic looks toward life new perspectives that oppose especially concepts of Christian morality... Additionally, he has his unique style of writing he leaves the reader to judge and conclude by him/herself, he wants the reader to think, he wants companions not followers. What he writes is not philosophy but literature and no science but art as he believes there is no truth but interpretation therefore he leads us to his earthly breezy interpretation that he sees in overman or Ubermensch

[SCYTHE]

I am currently reading a book called "Free Will" published by Cambridge Press as a series of very short introduction to philosophy. I like this concept of writing a book which contains say 120-140 pages and you get familiar with different notions of different thinkers from medieval time to modern times very briefly but clearly, plausibly.....By the way, which subjects in philosophy mostly interest you? I for one enjoy reading subjects on metaphysics, ethics

[Smartie7]

I went to the bookstore today to buy some books then I saw the translated version of this book. There was only one left. It was kinda expensive for me so I put it back in and after a while a lady came to me asking whether I bought the book and I said no ... when leaving the bookstore I asked her whether she bought it ot not, she said that she had read different tanslations of it and she wanted to buy that for someone as a present but then she changed her mind. I asked about the story of the book and she said it's a romantic story and there is a movie based on that ... she said the book has been censored so has the movie. She thought I'm a schooler because she advised me not to watch the movie .

I have the original ebook version. Considering that it has over 700 pages, does it worth reading or not?
(You know I have difficulties reading ebooks that's why I ask this)
A short summery of that would be nice