The Varieties of Scientific Experience: A Personal View of the Search for God by Carl Sagan. Ann Druyan, editor

"...we have a theology that is Earth-centered and involves a tiny piece of space, and when we step back, when we attain a broader cosmic perspective, some of it seems very small in scale. And in fact a general problem with much of Western theology in my view is that the God portrayed is too small. It is a god of a tiny world and not a god of a galaxy, much less of a universe." (30)

"Does trying to understand the universe at all betray a lack of humility? I believe it is true that humility is the only just response in a confrontation with the universe, but not a humility that prevents us from seeking the nature of the universe we are admiring. If we seek that nature, then love can be informed by truth instead of being based on ignorance or self-deception. If a Creator God exists, would He or She or It or whatever the appropriate pronoun is, prefer a sodden blockhead who worships while understanding nothing?" (31)

"You start out the universe, you can do anything. You can see all future consequences of your present action. You want a certain desired end. Why don't you arrange it in the beginning? The intervention of God in human affairs speaks of incompetence." (165)

"I think if we ever reach the point where we think we thoroughly understand who we are and where we came from, we will have failed." (221)

(New York: Penguin Press, 2006)

The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson

This book was in some ways like The Fountainhead come to life. It was incredible to read quotes and anecdotes from the architects of the Chicago World Fair: about their passions, their pain, their frustrations with neverending deadlocked committees and with those who sought to modify their art. I loved how each chapter ended on a cliffhanger -- really kept the pages turning. And there's just something about turn-of-the-century America that thrills the imagination. Fun book!

This bit here made me laugh out loud at the time, though it was late at night and I was hopped up on club soda and tom collins drink mix (sans alcohol...), so maybe it's not so funny. It's not profound and not very exciting, but I just imagined these folks (including the entire city council of Chicago and other fair officials) in stuffy old suits and hats at the opening of the very first Ferris Wheel, toasting eachother and carousing:

"When Ferris blew the whistle, the [forty-piece] Iowa State band [who had also boarded the wheel] launched into 'America,' and the wheel began to turn. The group made several circuits, sipping champagne and smoking cigars, then exited the wheel to the cheers of the crowd that now thronged its base." (279)

(New York: Vintage Books, 2004)

Sons and Lovers by D.H. Lawrence

I identified with almost every single character in this story. Lawrence gets to the heart of our emotions and intents with jaw-dropping honesty. The story offers very little in the way of happiness and much in desolation, but I couldn't put it down. Parts that roused me --

The father comes home:

"Morel, at these times, came in churlish and hateful.
'This is a nice time to come home,' said Mrs. Morel.
'Wha's it matter to yo', what time I come whoam,' he shouted.

And everybody in the house was still, because he was dangerous. He ate his food in the most brutal manner possible, and when he had done, pushed all the pots in a heap away from him, to lay his arms on the table. Then, he went to sleep.

Paul hated his father so. [...] If anyone entered suddenly, or a noise were made, the man looked up and shouted:

'I'll lay my fist about thy y'ead, I'm tellin' thee, if tha doesna stop that clatter. Dost hear!'

And the two last words, shouted in a bullying fashion, usually at Annie, made the family writhe with hate of the man.

He was shut out from all family affairs. No one told him anything. The children, alone with their mother, told her all about the day's happenings, everything. Nothing had really taken place in them, until it was told to their mother. But as soon as the father came in, everything stopped. He was like the scotch in the smooth, happy machinery of the home. And he was always aware of this fall of silence on his entry, the shutting off of life, the unwelcome. But now it was gone too far to alter." (87)

Feelings of protection towards the mother:

"He [the son], in his semi-conscious sleep, was vaguely aware of the clatter of the iron on the iron-stand, of the faint thud, thud on the ironing-board. Once, roused, he opened his eyes to see his mother standing on the hearthrug with the hot iron near her cheek, listening as it were to the heat. Her still face, with the mouth closed tight from suffering and disillusion and self-denial, and her nose the smallest bit on one side, and her blue eyes so young, quick, and warm, made his heart contract with love. When she was quiet, so, she looked brave and rich with life, but as if she had been done out of her rights. It hurt the boy keely, this feeling about her, that she had never had her life's fulfillment: and his own incapablility to make up to her hurt him with a sense of impotence..." (90-91)

other:

"There was warmth of fury in his last phrases. He meant she loved him more than he her. Perhaps he could not love her. Perhaps she had not in herself that which he wanted. It was the deepest motive of her soul, this self-mistrust. It was so deep she dared neither realise nor acknowledge it. Perhaps she was deficient. Like an infinitely subtle shame, it kept her always back. If it were so, she would do without him. She would never let herself want him. She would merely see." (260)


(1913. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1992)