Thomas Jiang

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2019 Reading List

27 December 2019

One of my goals for 2019 is to keep better track of what I do with my time. Because I like curating my anime list so much, I figure I could do the same with books.

Death of a Salesman

Author: Arthur Miller
Date published: 1949
Date read: December 27, 2019

Reading this play brought to mind two books I read this year, Of Mice and Men and The Two-Income Trap. It’s very good.

Franny and Zooey

Author: J. D. Salinger
Date published: 1961
Date read: December 12, 2019

I once picked this up when I was in middle or high school and couldn’t decipher it. I’m older, more educated, but not much wiser. I think there’s something about where I am, mentally and emotionally, that makes this book hum the same frequency and pitch that my mind is at. I am glad that I picked it up again.

Poor Economics

Authors: Abhijit V. Banerjee and Esther Duflo
Date published: April 26, 2011
Date read: November 15, 2019

There’s some really interesting case studies about developing countries. At every level, the book talks about decision making. What kinds of decisions are poor people making? Why do they make them? What kinds of decisions are governments and NGO’s making. What kinds of decisions should you and others be making? While the book discusses many interesting policy ideas and their implications and findings, I found the following bits most relevant to my own life.

Information is king at every level of decision making and good information is invaluable. It is also scarce and undervalued. Case studies show that the press can be an effective mechanism to deter governmental corruption and show that telling parents about what expectations they should have about schools leads to learning gains. Information is vitally important because it allows individual action which can be more effective than top down mandates. It can be extremely effective to frame other problems as potentially problems of information delivery or at least try to tackle problems from that perspective.

Policy is made and broken by the details. Providing chlorine tablets to purify drinking water can be effective. It is significantly more effective if they are provided at the source of the water. Providing loans can be effective. But they are more effective if they are provided when fertilizer is available to be bought. Understanding the details is important to operating effectively. This is part of the reason why information transfer is so difficult. It is hard to know what details others care about.

I am convinced that most people are bad at making good decisions because it is so draining to be constantly making good decisions. As a result, sometimes the answer is to make it easy to not have to make decisions. Set up systems so that decisions default to the “best” option. Make system set up to prevent failure when people make a few bad decisions. We make a ton of decisions and it should be expected that some of them will be bad in the long run. We should expect that.

Oracle Bones: A Journey Through Time in China

Author: Peter Hessler
Date published: 2006
Date read: October 19th, 2019

I went into this book club book thinking that it was going to be a largely dry, historical account of China. Instead I got a thread of stories, one ending with

Your appearance lightened up my college life. It’s you that let me know that a teacher could get along with his students that way. You never know how much fun I took in reading your feedback in my journal book. It could ease my worries and make me think.

I always enjoy talking with, you are the one who knows my everything. . . . But everytime you went back to Beijing, I felt the panic of hollowness. As if I had given everything out but gotten nothing in return.

In this interview, Peter talks about a longform take on nonfiction that weaves in elements of structure and storytelling from fiction, saying

McPhee had a lot of technical lessons, but I think the most important thing was the deeper ways of thinking about writing. One of them, for me, was that you can do fascinating creative writing as a nonfiction writer.

I think that Oracle Bones is less a story about China and more of a story about some Chinese people. It leaves me wanting to find out more, which is high praise coming from me.

We

Author: Yevgeny Zamyatin
Date published: 1921
Date read: September 29th, 2019

A dystopian novel recommended to me by a friend. Seems to have been an inspiration to 1984 and also Brave New World among other dystopian novels. The style is a bit erratic and I had a harder time following the book, but I can definitely see how it would have been an inspiration for the books that followed it. It poses some really interesting personal and social questions that are echoed in its successors.

Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine

Author: Gail Honeyman
Date published: 2017
Date read: September 9th, 2019

This was a book club book that I finally got around to reading. If it hadn’t been a book club book I do not think I would have made it through all the way. And I would have missed out on a deeply compelling story. Full of notes of loneliness and loss, I think the book resonated with the part of me that worries about the fragility of the social ties I’ve made in life. There aren’t many books that I can point to that have touched on those themes in quite the same way.

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

Author: Lewis Carroll
Date published: November 26th, 1865
Date read: August 31st, 2019

A classic that I finally got around to reading. Surprisingly short.

The Screwtape Letters

Author: C.S. Lewis
Date published: 1942
Date read: August 31st, 2019

There was an offhand comment that I once read from a long forgotten place about religion that has stuck with me. It goes something like “physicists do not gather every week to affirm their belief in gravity.” I grew up in a non religious household and as I have gotten older, I have interacted with a number of people’s who have come to reshape my view towards religion and I have now come to respect and admire those deeply invested in their faith. Time and time again, those of Christian faith have told me to read The Screwtape Letters, and after a long time of having the intention to do so, I finally found the time to sit down and read it. And I have so very many thoughts. Many of them are surrounding this world of demons and devils that Screwtape’s correspondence makes sound so unbelievably rich and inventive. But more importantly, I think I have come to understand why that comment that has stuck with me all this while is so contemptuous.

The Screwtape Letters talks of many things. One of them I believe is therapy. I think that religion and therapy are so similar after reading The Screwtape Letters that I am unsure how I ever missed that connection. I can see how religion is not just a belief system, but it is a practice that is developed over time. It is a way of understanding your own thoughts and behaviors in ways that are productive to society. Religion can be many things, but I do not think it was anything close to what I thought of it as a child.

Attached

Authors: Amir Levine and Rachel Heller
Date published: January 5th, 2012
Date read: July 6th, 2019

I speed read most of the book - but still came away with an interesting perspective / dichotomy on anxiety and detachment. I’m not convinced that the book provides actionable advice or even a sound theoretical foundation to understand relationships, but it did offer some insight into anxiety in general and that might be worthwhile enough on its own.

The Martian

Author: Andy Weir
Date published: 2014
Date read: July 6th, 2019

Going from the dated style of Stevenson’s Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde to Weir’s modern, informal The Martial was striking. As I have begun reading more books, it is striking to me to see how writing and stories have changed over time. Stories can feel fresh after all this time and people are constantly creating newer and interesting narratives. It astonishes and awes me.

Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde

Author: Robert Louis Stevenson
Date published: January 5th, 1886
Date read: June 25th, 2019

Book club book. You can find Nabokov’s introductory analysis of the book online, which offers an interesting perspective.

Oryx and Crake

Author: Margaret Atwood
Date published: 2003
Date read: June 18th, 2019

I loved Oryx and Crake. I think it’s a beautifully constructed story. I could not anticipate how the story would play out; yet, when it was all said and done, everything felt like it belonged and there was no other way to tell it. It is the kind of work that I’m not sure whether it is crafted or inspired. I loved it that much.

1Q84

Author: Haruki Murakami
Date published: 2009-2010
Date read: June 9th, 2019

For other works, many people may have wildly different experiences despite reading the same story. For still others, people may all have similar experiences, but it can be hard to determine how aware of that experience the author intended when writing. With 1Q84, there can be no question because Murakami tells you as much directly. And despite this, the story still works. It speaks to Murakami’s understanding of the essential elements of storytelling.

Stories of Your Life and Others

Author: Ted Chiang
Date published: 2002
Date read: April 14th, 2019

Started out the short stories in this book a long time ago, when my friend sent me the reading for Hell is the Absence of God. I read a couple of the others last year. I finally finished the rest. I think I love the short story collection format because it shows the range of an author. Here, there were stories that I thought were terribly clever, mildly generic, and partially refined. The collection inspired me with its brilliance but also its foibles.

If you have some time, I loved Liking What You See: A Documentary. If you do read the short stories, I also loved the Story Notes at the end, which gives some insight into the author’s thoughts and inspirations. I think any amount of insight into an author’s thought process is centering.

The Name of the Wind

Author: Patrick Rothfuss
Date published: March 27th, 2007
Date read: March 29th, 2019

I previously read The Slow Regard of Silent Things without any context. So I figured it would be good to get some context on the novella by reading the story surrounding it. A fun read, even if it was a bit slower than I would have liked.

Modern Romance

Author: Aziz Ansari and Eric Klinenberg
Date published: June 16th, 2015
Date read: March 25th, 2019

Learned some interesting tidbits and statistics about the dating world, at least how it was in 2015.

Of Mice and Men

Author: John Steinbeck
Date published: 1937
Date read: March 23rd, 2019

A very tightly crafted piece with admirable symmetry.

Less

Author: Andrew Sean Greer
Date published: July 18, 2017
Date read: March 19th, 2019

Book club book.

It’s hard to write a funny book. It’s hard to pull off a 260 page pun. Less does both.

Never Let Me Go

Author: Kazuo Ishiguro
Date published: 2005
Date read: March 8th, 2019

A beautiful read. Full of hope and innocence and mystery and intrigue. It never quite lets you go.

Between the World and Me

Author: Ta-Nehisi Coates
Date published: July 2015
Date read: February 22, 2019

Book club book.

Blood, Sweat, and Pixels: The Triumphant, Turbulent Stories Behind How Video Games Are Made

Author: Jason Schreier
Date published: September 5, 2017
Date read: February 13, 2019

Video games are a big part of my life and the premise of this book was particularly intriguing. I previously interned at Activision|Blizzard’s Infinity Ward studio and there has been a significant news regarding them recently. It is a light, fun read with lots of little nuggets of insight. There was quite a bit in the book that reminded me of my incredibly brief time in the industry.

The Two–Income Trap: Why Middle-Class Parents Are (Still) Going Broke

Author: Elizabeth Warren and Amelia Warren Tyagi
Date published: 2004 (2016 Reissue)
Date read: February 10, 2019

A very captivating, interesting, worrying read.

Siddhartha

Author: Herman Hesse
Date published: 1922 (1951 USA)
Date read: February 6, 2019
Gutenberg Project

One of my friends’s favorites.

Interesting Quotes

I have already learned as a child. I have known it for a long time, but I have experienced only now. And now I know it, don’t just know it in my memory, but in my eyes, in my heart, in my stomach. Good for me, to know this!

Had his father not also suffered the same pain for him, which he now suffered for his son? Had his father not long since died, alone, without having seen his son again? Did he not have to expect the same fate for himself? Was it not a comedy, a strange and stupid matter, this repetition, this running around in a fateful circle?

Knowledge can be conveyed, but not wisdom. It can be found, it can be lived, it is possible to be carried by it, miracles can be performed with it, but it cannot be expressed in words and taught.

The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe

Author: C. S. Lewis
Date published: 1950
Date read: January 29, 2019

C.S. Lewis has always been an author that has been present but I’ve never read. When I was young, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe was immensely popular, but I never picked it up. As I got older, there was always someone in my life that was a devout Christian - one of my best friends in high school and then later, in the college, one of my college roommates, and then after I graduated, a good friend. All of them read and recommended Lewis’s The Screwtape Letters. So I figured it would be appropriate, after reading Pachinko, to read The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.

Pachinko

Author: Min Jin Lee
Date published: 2017
Date read: January 21, 2019

This was my book club’s read for January. In our discussion, we talked about identity, agency, and compatibility. For a book that covers so many people, so many generations, and so many situations, it would be interesting to look at how efficient Min Jin Lee is in her writing to cover all of these topics.

The Awakening

Author: Kate Chopin
Date published: 1899
Date read: January 6, 2019
Gutenberg Project

I was thinking about how to write compelling dialogue, a difficult problem for anyone just starting to pen their masterpiece, and was particularly keen on observing the dialogue in this piece. I have no idea whether The Awakening stands out in particular for its dialogue. More certainly, it is the feminist social commentary that has blessed the work with its longevity and cultural prestige.

Two works that I think to be read in comparison to The Awakening are The Story of an Hour (1894), a Chopin short story, and Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina. I think the three are strikingly similar.

Interesting Quotes

[Mademoiselle Reisz] “Why?” asked her companion. “Why do you love him when you ought not to?”

Edna, with a motion or two, dragged herself on her knees before Mademoiselle Reisz, who took the glowing face between her two hands.

“Why? Because his hair is brown and grows away from his temples; because he opens and shuts his eyes, and his nose is a little out of drawing; because he has two lips and square chin, and a little finger which he can’t straighten from having played baseball too energetically in his youth. Because–”

“Because you do, in short,” laughed Mademoiselle.

Furthermore, in one of the daily papers appeared a brief notice to the effect that Mr. and Mrs. Pontellier were contemplating a summer sojourn abroad, and that their handsome residence on Esplanade Street was undergoing sumptuous alterations, and would not be ready for occupancy until their return. Mr. Pontellier had saved appearances!

It was not that she dwelt upon details of their acquaintance, or recalled in any special or peculiar way his personality; it was his being, his existence, which dominated her thoughts, fading sometimes as if it would melt into the mist of the forgotten, reviving again with an intensity which filled her with an incomprehensible longing.

The Importance of Being Earnest, A Trivial Comedy for Serious People

Author: Oscar Wilde
Date published: 1895
Date read: December 25, 2018
Gutenberg Project

When Wikipedia’s article about the themes of a piece of work includes the following line, “Vice in Earnest is represented by Algy’s craving for cucumber sandwiches”, you know it’s going to be a thrill. Certainly, this should be flagged as [citation needed] because I’m sure that while bread and butter is most certainly not a substitute for cake, cucumber sandwiches and muffins should be exchangeable.

Honestly, there is no point in writing a review for this play. One seeks a review when there is some cost to experiencing the real thing - either time or money. The Importance of Being Earnest presents neither of those two problems. One can read it for free on the Gutenberg Project in a little over an hour. Be prepared though, The Importance of Being Earnest hits you out of the gate with this exchange:

Algernon. Good heavens! Is marriage so demoralising as that?

Lane. I believe it is a very pleasant state, sir. I have had very little experience of it myself up to the present. I have only been married once. That was in consequence of a misunderstanding between myself and a young person.

Algernon. [Languidly.] I don’t know that I am much interested in your family life, Lane.

Lane. No, sir; it is not a very interesting subject. I never think of it myself.

This style of witticism might not be everyone’s cup of tea. But I don’t think this is a sign that some people should not read The Importance of Being Earnest. In fact, I think that the people that wouldn’t enjoy it would be the ones most in need of reading it.

Every exchange, every scene is clever. Even the title is frustratingly clever. And when you have as much clever and funny packaged in a work as short as The Importance of Being Earnest, one can’t help but gush about it. But I’ll stop myself and let critic William Archer’s description do that for me. He writes, “What can a poor critic do with a play which raises no principle, whether of art or morals, creates its own canons and conventions, and is nothing but an absolutely wilful expression of an irrepressibly witty personality?” If that’s not a compelling enough incentive to read Oscar Wilde’s ultimate work, perhaps that Wikipedia quote about cucumber sandwiches was.

Favorite quotes:

Algernon. The truth is rarely pure and never simple. Modern life would be very tedious if it were either, and modern literature a complete impossibility!

Jack. That wouldn’t be at all a bad thing.

Algernon. Literary criticism is not your forte, my dear fellow. Don’t try it. You should leave that to people who haven’t been at a University. They do it so well in the daily papers. What you really are is a Bunburyist. I was quite right in saying you were a Bunburyist. You are one of the most advanced Bunburyists I know.

Jack. Gwendolen, it is a terrible thing for a man to find out suddenly that all his life he has been speaking nothing but the truth. Can you forgive me?

Gwendolen. I can. For I feel that you are sure to change.