Books I finished in April
mi sitelen ala lon tenpo suno ni tan pilin pona ala, li wile sitelen sin. ken la, mi toki taso e lipu lukin mi.
Haven't been blogging this year. I haven't been feeling good. Trying to get back into it, at least at the level of talking about books I read.
- Leviathan, Thomas Hobbes
- Stone Butch Blues, Leslie Feinberg
- Western Esotericism: A Guide for the Perplexed, Wouter J. Hanegraaff
- Gone to See the River Man, Kristopher Triana
mi open lukin e lipu Leviathan tan ni: jan sona Margaret Cavendish li toki e lipu pi jan sona Thomas Hobbes. tenpo pini la, mi pilin e ni: jan Hobbes li jan sona ike. ni la, mi wile ala lukin e lipu ona, taso sona musi lili li insa lipu ona. ona li toki e nasin pi lawa wan, e nasin sona pi lipu sewi. tenpo pi lukin lipu li ike ala tawa mi.
I mainly started to read Leviathan because I was reading Margaret Cavendish, and Hobbes was a contemporary philosopher that she engaged with. I used to think of him as a philosopher I'd never bother with, but there was a lot of interesting stuff in there. Justifications for monarchy, biblical interpretations I hadn't heard before. It was definitely worth reading.
lipu Stone Butch Blues li lipu musi suli pi tenpo pini kule. mi lukin e ona lon tenpo ni tan lipu pi jan Talia Bhatt lon insa lipu Trans/Rad/Fem. (mi lukin lipu ni lon tenpo pini lon tenpo suno ni.) lipu Stone Butch Blues li toki e tonsi, e kulupu jan pali. ni li pona tawa mi. open lipu li pana e pilin ike tawa mi. oko mi li pana telo lon tenpo mute. taso ni kin li pona.
Stone Butch Blues is an important historical queer novel that I've been meaning to read for a while. Part of what pushed me to read it now was Talia Bhatt's essay about it in Trans/Rad/Fem, a book I read earlier this year. In addition to the gender stuff, the portrayal of working class struggle in the US was really good. There was some stuff that happened in it early on that made me cry really hard for a long time, which the horror books I read rarely manage to do. But even that was ultimately a rewarding experience.
lipu Western Esotericism li toki e sona len tan ma Elopa. mi wile kama sona e ni lon tenpo pini, taso wile mi li kama weka. lipu li musi ala tawa mi, taso mi pana e lipu mute tawa lipu lipu mi. jan Hanegraaff toki e ni: sona len tan ma Elopa li sona weka, li insa ala e sona suli, e sona sewi, e sona sona. ni li sama sona pona tawa mi. ken la, mi kama sona mute e sona ni lon tenpo sin pi wile mi.
Western Esotericism is something I've wanted to learn more about for a while, but tbh I've kind of lost interest. The book felt like a bit of a slog for some reason. I did add several other books to my reading list, though. Hanegraaff argues that what has been called western esotericism primarily consists of rejected knowledge, things that fall outside of or cannot be fit into the major categories of knowledge like science, religion, and philosophy. Seems like a good analysis, I'll probably read more deeply into it whenever I start to feel a real interest in it again.
lipu Gone to See the River Man li lipu musi monsuta mute. mi lukin e lipu mute sama. toki musi lipu li pona, taso toki toki lipu li musi ala. kin la, lipu Stone Butch Blues li monsuta suli tawa mi.
Gone to See the River Man is an extreme horror novel. I've read a few books that fall into that genre, this one felt quite typical. The storytelling was good enough to keep me engaged, but the prose wasn't very interesting. And Stone Butch Blues actually managed to upset me more.
ma mute li kama ike tawa jan tonsi, tawa jan pi ma ante, tawa jan pi mani lili, tawa jan ken ala. mi wile pona tawa jan ni. mi wile e ni: jan lawa ike li kama weka. taso mi pilin ike e ni: ike li kama suli lon tenpo kama. tenpo kama la, mi tawa ma ante tan awen pona. mi pilin monsuta mute. ni la, mi weka. mi weka.