----- Original Message ----- From: Thomas Seay <entheogens at yahoo.com> To: <lbo-talk at lists.panix.com> Sent: Friday, November 29, 2002 10:09 AM Subject: Re: The Mystery of Hitchens's Mind (was: Re: Bush Names Kissinger to Head 9/11 Probe)
>
> --- Anthony Tothe <yankee at webspan.net> wrote:
> Maybe "Empire"
> > being the most recent and prime example.-Tony
> >
>
> Personally, I never found Hitchens THAT difficult to
> read. Can you provide an example of a difficult text
> by Hitchens?
No I can't since I have none of his books. Its just my personal observation based mainly on his old Nation article. Not that he didn't have anything of value to say. So his article in "Blaming the Victims..." as one example was very good.
I will admit that I have read very few
> things by him...some of his Nation articles, some of
> his stuff in Vanity Fair, and his book, "The
> Missionary Position".
>
> "Empire" is at times difficult to read. However, that
> is mostly because it assumes a working knowledge of
> certain terms particular to the Italian workerist and
> autonomist movements, as well as some background in
> post-structuralism.
I guess so...I don't have a clue what "post-structuralism" is, but I'll bet it isn't worth my time to find out.
.I read 50 or so pages and gave up.. came off as gibberish to me..and anything that has the word "post" attached to it makes me wince. Also, judging from some of the reviews of it-like the one on the Znet home page-it didn't seem like they had all that much to say. But whenever anyone starts using dense language and concepts when discussing world affairs-this isn't physics-I get very skeptical that they really have anything of value to say.
I dont blame Hardt and Negri for
> that part. Every book can't start from scratch, can
> it?
No...but books can be written so that anyone-like a nomal working person-can understand it.....I don't have these problem with say books by Walden Bello or Arundhati Roy or Howard Zinn or John Dower or Robin Hahnel or Michael Albert or Noam Chomsky to name a few.
It strikes me as needless careerism written for the benefit of other intellectuals. I really don't have time for books like this.
Any book by those that I mention above can be used as educational tools in order to raise consciousness in others so that they might want to get involved in changing the world for the better. If some book written by someone who is suppose to be on the left does not do this then I don't see the point of them. I think they hurt more than they help. but that is just my opinion on the matter.
Though it might have been helpful to put a
> glossary in the book, such as the one Michael Hardt
> added to his "Radical Thought in Italy".
Maybe so.-Tony
>
> -Thomas
>
>
>
> =====
> "Nothing is true, everything is permitted."
>
> "Money eats quality and shits out quantity"
> -William Burroughs
>
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