DarkObserver, 10. Oktober 2002 um 00:42:45 MESZ

Getting bookish

This is a list of the books currently in my reading pool. Ah, I should explain first: My reading pool is a stack of books all of which I am in the process of reading, some more or less continuously, others according to my mood. Here it goes:

• Friedrich Nietzsche, "Also sprach Zarathustra" (German, so-called 'critical studies edition')

• Dante, "Inferno", English translation by John Ciardi (almost finished)

• Stephen King, "The Stand" (almost finished)

• Neil Gaiman, "American Gods" (up next)

• Douglas Adams, "Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency"

• Joanne K. Rowling "Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire"

• Johannes Lehmann "Buddha - Life, Teachings, Impact" (German)

• John Steinbeck, "The Long Valley"

• Joseph Conrad, "Heart of Darkness"

• Craig Kree Strete, "Burn down the Night" (a curio that is actually out of print, but I found it on the Net as a PDF! It's a story written by a guy who met and befriended Jim Morrison and it describes the crazy things they lived through together)

Also three comics series: "Hellblazer", "Lucifer" and "Legends of the Dark Knight"

Am I crazy or do I just like to read?

DarkObserver, 10. Oktober 2002 um 00:25:38 MESZ

Another "cool" website (originally posted August 28th 2002)

Check out

www.teleport-city.com

This site covers "cult" in the medium of film, music, literature and "life". They do it in style and with a mixture of high- and lowbrow demands.

Their reviews of movies and music are really good fun -read for example the over-long review of "1990 Bronx Warriors", a post-apocalyptic gang movie from the 80's, that I actually own myself.

Under www.teleport-city.com

you can find a five-part-travelogue of a trip to Japan!

Isn't it interesting, how we tech-types are all similarly fascinated by this culture? And this has been so even before Anime became a Western mass-phenomenon

DarkObserver, 10. Oktober 2002 um 00:21:40 MESZ

William Gibson (originally posted August 26th 2002)

I've been a fan of the American Sci-Fi author William Gibson for a long time. Some of you may have heard about him, because he coined the term "cyberspace". Along with Bruce Sterling (with whom he collaborated on the novel "The Difference Engine"), Gibson used to be the spearhead of a literary genre known as "Cyperpunk", because it mixes elements of 80's punk counter-culture with esoterical concepts of elevating one's mind to a higher form of being, obviously reminiscent of 60's psychedelic soul searching. The medium this time is not drugs, but technology. Gibson's anti-heroes roam a virtual plane called cyberspace, the sum total of all the world's stored information, where they are hackers in a sense, but also fed up with civilization and longing for catharsis, which at least some of them find by "uploading" their minds, leaving their body behind and becoming a part of "the matrix".

Since his first ground-breaking novel "Neuromancer", Gibson has explored many implications of the way we use and perceive technology and it is his theory, that all social change is technology-driven. He -like myself and many others- is fascinated by the Japanese way of adopting and assimilating new technology and his books show it, often featuring Japanese characters, lingo and locations.

Numerous movies, like "Matrix" asf. owe a lot to William Gibson's ideas although he's rarely credited for them.

Although his later novels lack the innovative power of his earlier works, they still offer cool ideas for people who like to be compelled to think.

I could say a lot more about Gibson and my view of his work but instead I recommend:

This fantastic website, run by a German gentleman, currently living in Japan, has collected all sorts of information about William Gibson that one can think of (and wish for). Please visit

www.antonraubenweiss.com

and see for yourself.