Ingvaras

My reviews

[ingvaras]

Deadliest Enemy: Our War Against Killer Germs

by Michael T. Osterholm, Mark Olshaker

5 / 5 my goodreads

I picked this up because of obvious reasons (current pandemic) to see what's what. At times I thought "why am I doing this?" when everything on the news is already pandemic-related, but on the other hand, the faster I'm up to date, the better? Also, books beat news.

Anyway, this is a great book by a great man. I'm giving it 5 stars because I think it's very important that many people especially politicians! read it and act on it. Also, it's nicely written too (probably because of a collab. with another famous author). The book is about infectious diseases and what is / can be done about them. It seems to have the right emphasis on the important stuff: flu pandemic (!), antibiotic resistance, vector-borne (mosquito) diseases, recent novel diseases (corona viruses (!)), HIV, zika, etc. Author goes to great lengths to show how important it is to be prepared for these challenges - some predictions are chillingly accurate. Esp. the hypothetical flu pandemic scenario is a bit pessimistic but not that far off from what we have. It is even predicted that it comes from China and there's this bit: By now, the outbreak is universally referred to as the “Shanghai flu,” except in China, where it is referred to as the “Western flu.” Sounds familiar, doesn't it? Unfortunately, Osterholm, other epidemiologists, even Bill Gates were not taken seriously years ago... I've learnt lots of things about infectious diseases recently, most of them from this book. For example, I never took flu seriously (it should be taken very seriously, just read about past flu pandemics... "it's just a flu"...). Another curious fact: most people know about antibiotic resistance, but they think the resistance applies to them rather than microbes... *facepalm* Finally, this one bit - turns out vaccines are essentially kind of made of eggs: Few people know that we maintain a strategic stock of chickens for this purpose, since you need a whole lot of eggs to produce sufficient stocks of vaccine. There's quite a bit of "politics" in this book, that is, lots of acronyms of various health organizations and how they did something, or were formed as a response to some outbreak, and how it worked, etc. Personally, that made it a little boring to me to read at times, but I see the point in having all that information in this book. Osterholm also proposes a form of a new inter-governmental organization, sort of like NATO but for disease control - not gonna lie, I'm sold. With this book Osterholm aims not only inform us but also to stir up some positive changes. Hopefully, at least after the current pandemic something will happen... Politicians should read this book!

[ingvaras]

The Republic

by Plato

That’s Plato’s head.

3 / 5

This was really the first proper philosophy book that I've read. Overall, it was good. Did not make a big impact on me though.

Overall, the Republic that Plato creates looks too much like a dystopia for me. Of course, having in mind that it was written 24 centuries ago, one can imagine why it would look like a good idea to make some of those decisions. Still, so little freedom, abolition of family concept, censorship - it's really underwhelming.

I disliked the format of dialogue used in this book, because for the most part, it was really a monologue, with other characters nodding in agreement. This seems to me like a cheap way to make your statements seem correct, when in fact, they are not justified at all. Of course, there were lots of good points made, and proven to a point, and it probably made it less boring to read. Nevertheless, it's easy to find arguments against everything Plato says...

The most interesting parts I found to be the way he described the 5 regimes, and potential transformations from one to the next. I feel that a lot of it is still very relevant to regimes of these days. Equally interesting I found his tripartite theory of the soul.

Completely disagreeable was the part where he disowned Homer, poets, and painters from his "republic" as third rate people... Plato, u ok?

I would not say that this book is a must-read. However, it is quite readable for a philosophy book, also if you're at all interested in ancient Greece, there's lots of references to Homer, etc., which makes it interesting from the historical perspective. It's a good book.

69/100 ≈ 3/5

goodreads

[ingvaras]

Procesas (The Trial) ballet review

Is it really a review if that’s the only ballet I remember ever seeing? I think I went to ballet once before... probably when I was like 10 years old... Anyway, I’ll try.

That’s the programme

Procesas is a modern ballet in 2 acts by Mindaugas Urbaitis (composer). It is based on a novel The Trial (Der Prozess) by Franz Kafka (!). It tells a story about a person being arrested and prosecuted by the authorities, without revealing the alledged crime.

It was amazing! Honestly, I went to see it for the music, and music I got! Also, I do like Franz Kafka quite a bit (although I’m not sure if I actually read this novel, or just read about it... perhaps I’ll update this when I read it (again)). And, having never seen a modern ballet, I was just too curious. I mean Kafka + ballet + modern music? Sure!

Scenography... Was very fitting. Moving concrete walls, shadows, and straight lines... Quite minimalistic, but conveyed the atmosphere of a bureaucracy that I expected, and was a good place to put all those mad bureaucrats. They just move the walls, change lights, and it feels completely different.

Music... I was not expecting that! I could listen to that thing on its own. Very modern, but not too modern, and lively where it needed to be. I can’t review music, but it was very nice. I saw lots of violins, but not all was played live, it contained a fair amount of strange noises, and probably instruments I can’t name. And it had a build-up and was quite dramatic at the end, too. Like avantgarde prog rock, but not rock.

Choreography maybe could have been better, I’m not sure. Being very modern and reflecting the absurdity feeling in the story, of course it had lots of strange movements, etc. But I think that maybe they overdid it a bit at times, esp. the quiet moments could have had less of it. Some scenes really etched into my memory, all dancers looking the same and moving in patterns around the main character with their unnatural robotic movements... I mean it’s hard for me to describe, but it felt right, the vibe was right and it fit the music. Maybe they could have added more... context? Because without reading the programme it’s pretty difficult to tell what’s happening.

And finally, it was the greatest feeling to meet the composer himself! I happen to know him, but I thought he’s probably not going to be there, it was not a premiere or anything... But there he was! And I told him it was amazing, in person ^^ Very nice

[ingvaras]

Norse Mythology

by Neil Gaiman

4 / 5

This book is really fun to read. You can get a decent impression of the main Norse gods, myths about how world began, etc. I mostly had difficulties with scales of things in this book. How some giants are so incredibly big, but then their children are like mice in comparison to them. At times it was not clear how to imagine things at all, but I guess it's a common problem with fairytales. I also found myself constantly comparing everything with Marvel's adaptation, which turns out to be quite decent, as it captures the essence of most of the things, but still quite loose. In the end you will learn how things really are. Overall, it was fun and educational.

goodreads

[ingvaras]

Blade Runner 2049 - 2049 minutes of identity crisis in darkness

Having rewatched the original Blade Runner last Sunday, and just seen the sequel today, I feel I should write a review! (I am not qualified to write reviews)

First of all, please don’t watch it in 3D... We went to see it in 3D because the time was convenient. I was never impressed with 3D in cinemas but I thought I’ll give it a try just to see if they improved at all during those many years I haven’t been to a 3D film. Apparently not, and furthermore, this was a bad choice to even try.

Anyway, well, I think it was great. It’s very long 2h 44min, definitely longest film I’ve seen since The Hateful Eight (3h 7min). Being that long of course it can’t be that fast-paced, it’s sort of like the original, with a slow build-up.

2049 is, I think, even darker (literally and figuratively) than the old one. Literally, because there’s even more haze in the city and some scenes are just really dark (also I might be biased because those 3D glasses make it worse), and figuratively, because Harrison Ford is at least 10x livelier than Ryan Gosling. Plus, this future seemed dirtier with all those hookers, extra nudity, and cruelty...

Unlike most sequels, this one doesn’t do away with the core ideas of the original. It goes even deeper into exploring the same topics - not only the morality of manufacturing replicants, but, especially, their identity (still not sure how I feel about that plot twist), and fake (?) relationships. Couldn’t help but think of today’s waifus,  AI-chan, and Siri, Alexa :D

On the other hand, although it had deeper meaning and cinematography was just as, on point, I feel like maybe it was a bit too much of everything. The original was somehow more crystalized, felt more artistic, and poetic. Which made it unforgetable. Not so sure how it’ll be with this one.

Well I don’t know what else to say, but it was cool, maybe I should have waited to write this review after I rewatched it. And the soundtrack - Hans Zimmer was pretty good as well, but he overdoes it a bit (but I always think that about his soundtracks)...

8/10

[vaporwane]

The Secret History (1996) dir. Donna Tartt

“Some things are too terrible to grasp at once.”

[ingvaras]

The Secret History

I hesitated giving it 5/5, maybe 9/10 would be more appropriate.

I loved the first book a lot more than the second. Author does a good job conveying beauty, and I'd say it would all make a good movie or TV series (was that their intention?), maybe something a bit like The Great Gatsby. I think the story would be a lot more interesting if told in third person. This is partly because I found the main character rather annoying, and after I finished the book, it seems to me that I still don't know him.

The second book seemed to me often too emotional and erratic (quoting Hannibal Lecter "The mathematics of human behavior... All those ugly variables"), somewhat repetative and quite American. But then again, it was supposed to be miserable, wasn't it? However, I couldn't stop reading so there's that.

Now back to Greek classics...

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