books I read 'The Weather Makers too, made alot of sense to me. But why buy it? Just get it from your local library , I did. And think of all the trees you'll save by doing this. (or is it made of recycled paper, I should think so!) anyway save your money. Any books they don't have, keep them busy and give them a list, they always try n get them in for ya (well my library does, small town one too). Infact after reading all these posts I have quite a long list for my library. Heres another one you can all add to your lists.....'Red Sand, Green Heart' by John L Read, and you guessed it.......from my local library!
I've heard this mentioned before, Stephen. Thanks for the reminder. I'll put it on my library list. For anyone who wishes to purchase 2nd-hand books (world-wide), check out abebooks, they have a really good search facility. https://www.abebooks.com/ Oh, and please dont forget to support your local library. The staff will most likely bend over backwards to help, and we really are reducing emergy (embodied energy) by utilising these facilities. Cheerio, and happy reading, Mark
If you continually have issues trying to get it Christopher let me know - we can always arrange something along the lines of me picking the book up here and posting it to you - by courier this time :lol:
Re: books Thanks for your thoughts on the Weather Makers Teela. I was wondering if after reading it you changed any thing about how you live your life or have made plans for any changes? The book was a Giftmas gift, most of our books are second hand - alot of which we then donate to our little growing local library.
Fran The seed was a token of your goodness and genersoity, your not quite random act of targeted kindness manifested in physical form, and your sending it was warmth and love and good. That it has not gotten here yet does not negate all of the embodied goodness involved... I will try again in a month, and if it doesn't work, yes, yes, you can deliver it in person.... C
Fran, Hi. To answer your question........well no haven't really made any changes, I think people who like to read these type of books already try to tread lightly on the earth already. Have always wanted a solar hot water service, after reading the weather makers its made me more determined to do so. But sometimes it feels like what we (us environmentaly friendly) try and do is such a drop in the ocean, when I told my family I wanted to go solar they asked why I was wasting my money when I could just get another electric unit at below half the price of solar. (sigh)[/quote]
Thank you Christopher. Let me know how you go - I would love to hand deliver it! (however that is unlikely to happen ) Teela, I know how you feel. My inlaws can not understand how my partner and I can be happy living in 'the middle of nowhere' in a solar powered mud brick 'shack' without a flushing toilet... :? The power of one is still a great thing though - every thing we do can influence others. I appreciate you sharing your thoughts.
Bills Big Book was my intro, tho the 70s series The Good Life planted the seed David Holmgrens books and writings, Principles and Pathways is nearly as dog eared as the Designers Manual Pretty much any book on permaculture or by Tim Flannery A Pattern Language - Alexander etal. His new website is another great resource https://www.livingneighborhoods.org/ht-2/home.htm Architecture For The Poor - Hassan Fathy An Encyclopedia Of Country Living - Carla Emery Community Development, community based alternatives in an age of globalisation - Jim Ife Ecocities - Richard Register Powerdown - Richard Heinberg Learning To Listen, Learning To Teach - Jane Vella A Truly Civil Society - Eva Cox In The Tigers Mouth, an empowerment guide for social action - Katrina Shields Stranger In a Strange Land - Robert Heinlein Anything by Wendell Berry - https://www.oriononline.org/pages/om/arc ... omyPR.html Ack.. this could take a week and I'd still miss some favourites
G'day Everyone I have only just last night finished reading Tim Flannery's 'The Weather Makers'. If you have not already read it, may I suggest you do. Borrow it, buy it, steal it... but please read it! Once you have read it, hand it on to your kids, your wife, husband, lover, nieghbour... Information is power! Empower yourself and read Cheerio, Mark.
I read this some years ago Since Silent Spring https://www.amazon.com/Since-Silent-Spring-Frank-Graham/dp/0395077532 https://www.amazon.com/Since-Silent...=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1293587496&sr=1-1 It was printed originally in 1976 and tells the story of Rachel Carson and how Chemical companies tried to silence her. It then takes up the story from where she left off I wonder if it is time for Since, Since Silent Spring?
Good 'bump', Mick. Happy (insert ideologically-preferred term here) to you and yours. Well, it's been about 3.5-years since I last posted in this thread, and since then I have completed my degree. As such, I have (literally, from cover to cover) read hundreds of books in the interim. Here's a few 'standouts' for me in terms of responding to the original thread question "What books, authors have been important to you?", and the reason/s why: Pittock, particularly: Climate Change: The Science, Impacts and Solutions (2009) Why? Because I trust the man and the peer-reviewed science that he produces, and because he is 'easy' to talk with, about anything. Most of Bookchin's work: Bookchin Archive Why? Because I believe in (almost) everything he had to say. He was a man born well before his time in terms of vision and passion. He is like the grandfather that I never had. Mumford, especially: The City in History (1961), The Culture of Cities (1938), and The Condition of Man (1944). Why? If Bookchin is like one grandfather to me, then Mumford is like the other grandfather that I never had. His work (even to this day) remains relevant to our present (and future) position. Carson, particularly Silent Spring (1962) Why? Because she stared the ball rolling (in my mind), and her work continues to inspire thousands of anti-corporate watchdogs the world over. Holmgren, especially: Permaculture: Principles and Pathways Beyond Sustainability (2002) Why? The man has vision, integrity, and a way of connecting with people that does justice to the notion of what it means to be a truly 'compassionate' human being. I continue to work hard in trying to emulate his chosen ways - I have a long way to go before I can hope to match him. HH The Dalia Lama, particularly: Freedom In Exile (1990) Why? As an atheist, I find that I can relate well to many of his 'teachings'. I admire him (as I do all the people of Tibet) for remaining so compassionate in the face of prolonged cultural genocide. Budge, see: Trevor Budge - Publications Why? Because he is my teacher, my mentor. He has taught me so much, and he has put up with (nay, encouraged) my incessant questioning. If there were more of his kind in the world, the world would be a better place to live (now, and into an indefinite future). Klein, especially: No Logo (2000) Why? Because she has thus far remained true to her convictions, and she is relatively 'easy' to read and therefore accessible to a very wide audience. Kropotkin, in particular: Mutual Aid: A Factor of Evolution (1902) Why? Because he is the great-grandfather that I never had. His work on communalism/mutualism reminds me that for all that we think we have learned, we have a long way to go. And to the hundreds of others that I have read, thank you. To those that I have read, and not necessarily agreed with (to a much greater or slightly lesser degree - examples of the former include: the Bible, Qur'an, Bhagavad Gita, and parts of the Torah), thanks to you too. You have all been instrumental in my ongoing education and my life-long pursuit to 'ask the questions that nobody seems to want to answer'. Markos
I really liked King Solomons ring by Konrad Lorenz. James Baldwins The Fire Next Time The Grapes of Wrath John Stienbeck Politics..Kropotkin as well Markos but Fields, Factories,Workshops I seem to recall the first lines being prophetic as he visions the worker attached to the machine almost part of it,it was almost true to the word.
Yes, Fernando. Kropotkin's Fields, Factories and Workshops remains an all-time classic. For those that are interested, much of Kropotkin's work can be found here: Kropotkin Archive I also enjoyed Steinbeck's Grapes of Wrath, although it has been a very long time since I read it.
Sometimes I think a book appears just at the right time, the book may not itself be a masterpiece but it can seem like it was written just for me right at that time. The combination of the book and my state of consciousness and being becomes grater than the sum of its parts. I can think a particular instances of this for me. I was feeling a little 'fed-up' with the way things seemed to be going... I was laying awake in bed at about 4am and decided to get up and for some reason grab a book off the shelf that had sat there for year. Richard Hittleman's Introduction to Yoga. I read the first part of the book and watched as the seas of my mind parted and saw into myself for the first time. A few years later, I was working at a retail nursery (after throwing in my well-paid public service job because my supervisor was a Prat. I had bought a guitar and a motorbike and took a year off to garden.) cleaning and straightening up the fridge-magnets when I read this simple phrase Be the change that you wish to see in the world - Ghandi. BAM! it hit me again only this time harder, it really rocked me, and that sent me on a course of amazing synchronicity that lasted for a couple of years. I changed completely in that time. Some of the books I experienced in that time were... David Suzuki's Good News For a Change, this really was the first time I had read something positive, that something could actually be done, that people were doing things already. Deepak Chopra's Ageless Body, Timeless Mind and later Synchrodestiny along with a bunch of his other books. And a plethora of other folks like him. I felt I had struck gold when I found Julia Cameron's The Artists Way. This one was a life changer Most of the things I read in that golden time were not directly about permaculture, but they helped to transform me into a permaculturist at the core, even if I had very little idea about it as a design science. I believe the greatest obstacle to permaculture being a mainstream philosophy and practical science is the mind and spirit of people, not the lack of a better technology. I finally got around to reading David Holmgren's Permaculture: Principles and Pathways Beyond Sustainability (2002) after claiming for years to be interested in Permaculture but in hindsight having no real understanding of what it meant beyond companion planting. (Remember when you thought permaculture was all about putting tomatoes with basil? :rofl. And that was when I was ready for the deeper meaning of permaculture, I was ready mentally and spiritually to accept it as a set of ethics. It fit with everything I had 'concluded' about mind body and spirit, with all the investigations I had done into spiritualism, of Buddhism, of religion in general. Since then it has been more about learning the specifics of how to go about 'Being the change I wish to see'. How do I manifest the inherent permaculture I feel within me into the physical universe. I return to those spiritual texts from time to time and also discover great new stuff like Eckhart Tolle's work. I think this sort of spiritual nutrition, adds to, is required for and enables me to grow the physical nutrition my body requires. It has been an awesome journey and I thank each and everyone of those very special teachers who have been there for me when I was ready to listen. I trust that one day I will be able to return even a fraction of it to someone else on their path. It's part of the reason I bother to post here. I know some of my posts are just rubbish, but I trust that sometime I may write something that someone is ready to hear and it thrills me to think that someone may be sent on such a journey of sychronicity and discovery by reading just a few words of mine. This is a pretty great forum in many ways (not many like it on the whole inter-webs probably). Sometimes I recognise that my posts and the posts of others can stir up negative emotions, but they are the emotions of the reader and if the reader is prepared to look at how they react to such posts then they can probably learn as much if not more about themselves and their world than some of the most profound pieces of prose will ever offer them. Peace out homies and read the books that come your way, especially if they 'jump out at you'.
I haven't been able to read all this thread yet but this is one of the more interesting book threads i've come across in my time on forums. I think. I haven't been able to formulate a response yet because I am not in the mood to think that long and hard recalling which books have affected and influenced me most. I might do it piecemeal as particular books come to mind. One book that has given me deep insight into human psyche is Crime and Punishment by Dostoyevski. I think its a most excellent psychological novel. I don't know if i already knew the truth which the book is about when i read the book and the book merely confirmed it and demonstrated it for me, or if the book showed it as a thing I hadn't understood before. I read this book only about 15 years ago now. Essentially this book is about guilt and redemption. Guilt is a powerful feeling or can be, as the novel shows. The guy committed a murder. The guilt just about drove him mad. Most guilt gives rise to a degree of psychological disturbance that affects our moods and behaviour. Its not that i am more guilty than other people. I've lived a fairly law abiding life. Its just that i think this book shows this issue that touches all people, except psychopaths, brilliantly. For a long time now I try to live by the prescription recommended by this book. (note by being a bit vague, I am merely trying not to give the story away).
For me a book that changed the way I think was "If the shoe fits" (the foot is forgotten) by Oso. Since then "easy is right" has been my mantra.
The Drifters by James A Michener and A Bike Ride by Anne Mustoe I have wanted to travel for as long as I could remember. And as a teenager I used to dream of long walking journeys. It wasn't long after reading The Drifters that i had the money to go overseas for the first time. In the Drifters the young people travel in a van and in a group and in Spain. It was so romantic. Although i never got a van or in a group of van travellers, i pursued the idea and travelled with a guy on a motorbike through scandinavia for a couple of months. I would never have done that were it not for the Drifters. Ok, its not a big deal that trip. About a year later i pursued another dream of sailing around the world, albeit without the influence of a book, and found someone to sail home with. I didn't travel anywhere for years after returning home. Then i went to India for a few weeks. It was such a tiny taste and I had to go back. I heard Anne Mustoe talking about her book on radio national and decided I would bicycle around India. Reading her book was reassuring more than anything else though good too. I had already read Dervla Murphy's book about cycling from Ireland to Tibet but it didn't hit me the same way. Probably because the book was so old by the time I read it. But i was influenced by another book she wrote. Muddling through Madagascar made me want to travel in remote undeveloped places. I try to do this on my journeys though i've hardly gone as far off the beaten path as Murphy. Its not even easy these days to find such places. On my travel forum, another aussie girl did find a place recently. She had the misfortune of being bitten by what might have been a rabid fox for her troubles.
