Library

⋆✴︎˚｡⋆2026 ⋆✴︎˚｡⋆

Regarding the Pain of Others by Susan Sontag

"Let the atrocious images haunt us. Even if they are only tokens, and cannot possibly encompass most of the reality to which they refer, they still perfom a vital function. The images say: This is what human beings are capable of doing- may volunteer to do, enthusiastically, self-righteously. Don't forget."

My notes

Really insightful perspective on how to approach living in a time when we are surrounded by horrible images of suffering around the globe. I enjoyed her take on Baudrillard. I think it is more empowering and realistic to set aside his idea that we live in a time of pure spectacle, and to acknowledge that the suffering people whom we see through images are real, and we are fully capable of engaging in struggle against violence and oppression. Reading this made me feel more mature.

There Is No Antimemetics Division by QNTM

"There are ideas which cannot be spread. There are entities and phenomena which harvest and consume information, particularly information about themselves. You take a Polaroid photo of one, it'll never develop. You write a description down with a pen on paper and hand it to someone— but what you've written turns out to be hieroglyphs, and nobody can understand them, not even you. You can look directly at one and it won't even be invisible, but you'll still perceive nothing there. Dreams you can't hold onto and secrets you can never share, and lies, and living conspiracies. It's a conceptual subculture, of ideas consuming other ideas and... sometimes... segments of reality. Sometimes, people."

My notes

I really wanted to like this, and I did for the most part, but it doesn't really stick the landing. Like the concept is incredible but I think the decision to have epic, apocolyptic violence, body horror, etc and then have no living people able to remember it is really silly. There's many things that make no sense and are just sort of hand-waved away as part of the "antimemetics" of it all. There's angels? Idk. I did not enjoy the ending.

Game of Thrones by George R.R. Martin

"'You cheated me. You murdered my child within me.'
'The stallion who mounts the world will burn no cities now. His khalasar shall trample no nations into dust.'
'I spoke for you', she said, anguished. 'I saved you.'
'Saved me?' The Lhazareen woman spat. 'Three riders has taken me, not as a man takes a woman but from behind, as a dog takes a bitch. The fourth was in me when you rode past. How then did you save me? I saw my god's house burn, where I healed good men beyond counting. My home they burned as well, and in the street I saw piles of heads. I saw the head of a baker who made my bread. I saw the head of boy I had saved from deadeye fever, only three moons past. I heard children crying as the riders drove them off with their whips. Tell me again what you saved.'
'Your life.'
Mirri Maz Duur laughed cruelly. 'Look to your khal and see what life is worth, when all the rest is gone.'"

My notes

Reread this because I can sense in my heart that George really is going to release The Winds of Winter in our lifetimes. There's a lot to be said about how different the books are from the show, but what really jumped out at me in this one is how they didn't include Tyrion's backflip scene. What happened to that. Also what the hell is an auroch?