Wednesday Media Consumption Roundup

[mousetrappling]

Books

Fiction: Still reading "House of Chains" Steven Erikson - almost finished though, I'm into the mop up bit after the climax of the book. The Crippled God's assumptions about how he'd set up the House of Chains haven't gone quite the way he'd anticipated... Several more of the loose ends from the first three have been tied up in this book, even as it opens out the story in other ways. I think I started reading these the first time while the Wheel of Time series was still in its "never going to end" phase of ever widening storylines with ever increasing numbers of characters, so I inevitably compare the two while I'm reading because these books provide a sense of forward momentum and of stories coming to conclusions despite the widening story overall.

Non-fiction: Still reading "The Making of the Middle Sea", Cyprian Broodbank - didn't get much read this week, the bit I did read was talking about how in the early 3rd Millennium BCE the society of the northern Mediterranean shores underwent a fragmentation from big-ish villages into many smaller hamlets with maybe just a couple of families. And that that then drives increasing inequalities.

Shakespeare: Much Ado About Nothing: Act 5 Scenes 1-4 - and the whole play wraps up with villainy found out and couples marrying after all. And as has been the case reasonably often in the plays I've read so far, I'm left wondering why she'd still want him (in the case of the Hero/Claudio pair). Quite fun though, I enjoyed this one.

Love's Labour's Lost: Introductory Material & Act 1 Scene 1 - the intro material makes me wary of this one as it was saying it was the connoisseur's play and full of witty jokes that we now need footnotes for. But this first scene amused me with its immediate puncturing of the king's pretentiousness.

Listening

Podcasts: ep 265 of The History of England - the few months left to Queen Jane after Mary deposes her, and her poise & bravery as her father's blundering brings about her execution.

ep HoS31 of The History of England Shedcasts - Jameses I & II, and their attempts to reassert royal authority, also the beginnings of Scotland's parliament.

ep 69-79 of The History of China - he's finished up the Southern & Northern period, and China is finally reunited under the Sui for the first time in 300 years, which of course involves reintegrating parts of the country that have drifted far from each other in their idea of what it is to be Chinese.

bonus ep of The History of Byzantium - covering Jews in the Byzantine empire who are actually better off there than in other parts of the Christian world at the time (not a high bar) and better off than any other non-Orthodox Christian group within the empire (also not a high bar).

ep 103 of The History of Egypt - a tour of the palace of Amenhotep III at Malqata, which is the best surviving Egyptian palace from Pharaonic times.

ep 211 of The China History Podcast - continuing his series about Jewish refugees in China including looking at the ways that the "Jew secretly rule the world" conspiracy theory was part of why the Japanese weren't as down on the Jews as their German allies in the run up to World War II.

ep 119 of The History of English - returning to the narrative history where we're up to Edward III and the start of the Hundred Years War. Things I didn't know included how the word "gun" ultimately derives from the name of a ballista kept at Windsor which was the Lady Gunhilda.

Sunday Podcast: an episode of In Our Time about The Fable of the Bees - the book by Bernard Mandeville in the 18th Century which postulates that the economy depends on people's private vices and on them being consumers, so encouraging everyone to be frugal and virtuous merely encourages the ruin of the country. At the time it was scandalous.

Music: While running I listened to a metal compilation called "Corrosion". While writing I listened to more Beth Orton EPs (I'd forgotten how much I liked her stuff), the X-Files album (a track by Better Than Ezra on this, which passed me by a bit), an EP by someone called Bettie Serveert which I don't think I'd ever heard before but J has had since uni (perfectly pleasant but didn't grab me), a Biffy Clyro album "The Vertigo of Bliss" (first couple of tracks didn't grab me but I enjoyed it overall) and a compilation album called "Big Blue Ball" which is mis-tagged with that as the artist as well, but it's actually got tracks by people like Peter Gabriel on it.

Watching

ep 4 of the Mediterranean with Simon Reeve - Morocco, Spain, Corsica and the south coast of France through to Monaco. Good series, though even for Simon Reeve it was a depressing look at how the world is fucked up and it's all our fault.

ep 6 of The Hairy Bikers' Asian Adventure - finishing up in Korea. Enjoyed the series, even if they were a bit over intense for bits of it.

ep 4 of The Lakes with Paul Rose - finishing up with Eskdale. A bit of an odd series, mostly quite fluffy and enjoyable.

ep 2 & 3 of Digging for Britain - the west & the east respectively. The one about the east was the best of the series so far, I was particularly intrigued by the prehistoric earthwork/water feature discovered near Woodbridge.

ep 1 of The Art That Made Mexico: Paradise, Power & Prayers - this episode was looking at art of the Mexican landscape throughout the sweep of Mexican history. The presenter, Alinka Echeverria, wasn't someone I'd heard of before, but I am enjoying her style so far. Entertained in particular by the description of the Aztecs as the "last of the great empires to rule the Mexican valley".

Primal Scream: The Lost Memphis Tapes - not quite sure what I expected from this programme, but it was interesting. Apparently Primal Scream's second album as released wasn't at all what they initially recorded, this programme was both a history of that album (and its eventual release as originally intended) and a history of the band.