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Tuesday, April 29, 2008

A little library culture

So I saw this picture while I was on the St. Louis County Library's website, here.

Best picture of April 2008 for sure. I wish I could have been there.

I was on the St. Louis County Library's website looking up books on graffiti. I want to read some biographies on graffiti artists. I think that sounds interesting. It's not like I have two books that are waiting to be read on my desk or anything.

So encase you were wondering here is what I'm reading now.


I'm not even on page 100 so don't ask what I think about it quite yet. I will tell you it is about Bruce, who grew up Jewish but is not practicing anymore goes to the middle east to explore where the first five books, the books of Torah took place. It is really interesting reading it from a somewhat neutral point of view. Here is a great excerpt from what I read today...(Bruce Feiler is interviewing an archaeologist who he met while in Beersheba, Eliezer Oren. He has a Ph. D. and attended Harvard, NYU, and Penn.)
"I'm going through a certain transformation," Eliezer said. "When I was younger, I was in my rebellious phase. In my lectures, I kept saying that since we don't have evidence, these stories did not take place. That goes for patriarchs, the Exodus. The older I get, perhaps I get more stupid. But I feel that my archaeological experience only enhances my understanding that even if I cannot relate a certain event, or personality, in the Bible with a specific archaeological stratum, it doesn't matter. At the end of the day, the question is this: Is the Bible unusual for its time and place? And the answer is: It's not. It's part of it. Dating is becoming secondary in my opinion. When I'm digging here, I'm digging with Abraham."
"So what effect has that had on your faith?" I asked.
"Those are different camps, " he said. "But I can tell you this: today I treat the Bible with much more respect."
"Can you give it a grade, in terms of archaeological accuracy?"
For the first time all morning he grinned. "A plus plus."

How is that for food for thought.

This is the second book I have in line to read....

I know I have very eclectic taste and like to read a wide variety of things.

While on the library website I was looking at books like this...

I don't know if any of these are good, or what they are really about, I'm just exploring for now.

4 comments:

  1. I heard about a book recently that interviews and tracks the work of grafitti artists who work specifically on railroad cars. It's illegal to paint on them of course... so it's kind of an underground thing... but the person telling me about it was an artist and said some of the work in the book is fantastic.

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  2. You should look at Banksy's website. It's amazing. We have a few Banksy like images around STL. I'll have to show you sometime.

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  3. Kayleigh

    This is sean. Wall and piece is really good. Its worth checking out. It has a fantastic quote on the cover jacket of the book.

    "There's no way you're going to get a quote from us to use on your book cover" - Metropolitan Police Spokesperson

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  4. Awesome, I'll definitely put it on my lists of upcoming books to read.

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