037. The Sparrow (1996).

The Sparrow by Mary Doria Russell (1996).

One of the weirdest books I’ve ever read.

It’s part fantasy, part religion and all together some sort of strange adventure/mystery novel with possibly most complicated characters with most twisted relasioship I’ve ever read.  

Could be a masterpiece but I’m not quite sure…

  

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layers. –All the major players in this book have either traumas or deep self-doubts and wear masks to hide their true nature. Creepy but great for the storyline.

Father Emilio Sandoz. A really hard working Jesuit who is also intelligent, funny, passionate, street-tough and extremely good looking (sexy, too).

A genius in linguistic, he learns to speak/understand French, Spanish, English, Puerto Rican, Portuguese, Polish, Arabic, and many more. And this communication skill is the reason why he becomes the part of the team travelling to foreign planet.

The only survival from the human being’s first extraterrestrial exploration. So naturally, he is the one who carries this book to the shocking end.

Sofia Mendes.  A child prostitute turned a computer expert. She is as precise as computer and as cool too. Mirror opposite of Father Emilio.

She moves jobs to jobs depending on the contract and learning everything required to do the jobs in between. A genius. 

She is also as beautiful as it gets. A perfect example of beauty with brain.

Jimmy Quinn.  An astronomer who first finds (de-codes) the songs from Alpha Centauri.  Also, a specialist in navigation and communications.

A good friend of Emilio and George and Ann.

George and Ann Edwards.  A computer expert and a physician couple. They are both old (64) and wise and adventurous. Just great people to be around. 

The rest are either another astronauts or priests from the churches or all sorts of weird creatures from Alpha Centauri.

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lace. – Rome. More precisely, a huge church of Rome where Father Emilio takes a refuge after coming back from the space all damaged and crushed.

And Puerto Rico where Jimmy and Sofia work at Arecibo telescope, Emilio at the street and George and Ann in free street clinic.

And then, galaxy far far away at Alpha Centauri, the world of Rakhat and all other creatures.

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lot. – Like a lot of interesting books with complicated storyline, this book also adapts the same two part formula that recycles by hundreds of writers out there: the first, developing story, part and the second, drastic and exciting climax, part. However here is the problem with this book. This book does divide into two parts like all others, but the two sides are so wide apart, even after finishing the book, I still can’t figure out exact storyline and what happen. Or more likely, why. 

The first half is really well written stories with quite a few fascinating characters interacting with each other developing relationship and inevitably revealing their past and personalities. Now, this part is really good. The other half, I’m not sure. 

Out of everything, the second half becomes, get this, an outer space exploration SF adventure!! In alien planet full of weird (kind of)human like creature with bizarre customs and crazy attitudes!! Not to mention insane sexual activities with insane creatures!! You have to read it to believe it. It’s so strange.

Ok. Here is the actual story.

After a long night of party with dance, songs and broken heart, Jimmy retreats into his cubicle and in there surrounded by bitter solitude, he stumbles upon a beautiful song from outer space.

The church, CHURCH! not government, assembles the crew of eight and send them to Alpha Centauri to explore the new world. And of course, everything goes wrong and Father Emilio is the only survivor coming back barely alive. How and Why?  

The story jumps around between before the mission (2019~39) and after (2059~).

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erdict. –There is not much to say about this book just because I still can’t figure out what kind of book this is. This is one of those books that you really have to read it to understand it. Do not believe what other people say about it especially the book reviews on its back. They’ve got it all so wrong or just print out cliché after cliché so that they don’t scare away any potential readers, I think.

This book is like “A Planet of Apes” with really great, deep and extremely disturbed characters and even crazier apes. Well, at least second half of it.

For all I know, " The Sparrow" could be a blown away masterpiece or just one crazy book written by weird gipsy or something.

036. The Professor and the Mad man (1999).

The Professor and the Mad man by Simon Winchester (1999).

The story of two men who essentially give the world the first ever complete English dictionary,

“Oxford English Dictionary”!!

Just think about the magnitude of it.

This is a truly extraordinary story.

  

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layers. –Dr. W. C. Minor aka MAD MAN.

 A gifted surgeon and a war hero. He was a great student and a brilliant doctor until he joined the Union Army during the civil war in America. It was in this war, more specifically, during “The Battle of the Wildness” which is arguably the most brutal campaign of entire civil war, he lost his sanity. 

 From there, everything slowly goes downhill. Then, on final night of Feb, 17, 1872, he finally puts himself away forever from reality (mental asylum, that is) by shooting an innocent man three times with revolver.

After spending 10 yrs doing nothing significant in quite comfortable jail room in mental asylum, he starts collecting/amassing vast amount of words for OED as a way of redemption for his crime.

James Murray aka The Professor.  Another exceptionally smart gentleman (Scotsman) and a professor who is directly responsible for OED.

When the society which starts OED project needs someone to carry on the entire project on his shoulder, Murray is the only man in the vast British Empire who can take over the impossible task.

He is a self-taught genius who made his name with number of famous English language studies and being an excellent English teacher in private school.

Their first meeting which took place at Jan, 1891 becomes a modern myth with scholars and English historians.

Oxford English Dictionary aka OED.  It is essentially the main character in this book.

It took more than seventy years to assemble over half million words and millions of characters and here’s why. Instead of just gathering words, OED goes out with ultimate total package: it includes not just a meaning but quotations and references of every single words it contains so that by showing examples, it can show the full meaning/history/origin of every spoken/written English word.

By the time the first edition comes out at 1927, it consists of

1.    12 huge volumes.

2.    414,825 words.

3.    1,827,306 quotations.

4.    Over 220 million letters and numbers.

One of a true triumph of human history.

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lace. – Mainly England because it all started in London. There are brief scene in America for Minor’s war experience. But other than that, it all happens in London, the center of English world at that time.

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lot. – The concept is very simple. How, when and by whom the OED is created. However what makes it complex , therefore providing great materials for Simon Winchester, is the persons behind of it.

I honestly thinks the main characters, the professor and the mad man, are chosen not just by their enormous contribution to the OED, but by their extraordinary life stories. Especially, Dr. Minor who went through at least 3 films worth of life before age 35!!

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erdict. –One thing is very clear. Every single person who made difference in Great Britain, hence changing the world ‘cause they used to own half the continent, is pure psychopath!

None of them are normal! They are compulsive, obsessive, either outrageously arrogant or just plain crazy!! But of course, brilliant, too.

If you have either class(=money) or talent, you could got away with almost everything possible. Only because 1. they(=Britain) used to own half the continent and 2. more importantly, it seems to me that they held higher tolerance toward those privileged people (with either money or mind).

Anyway, enough with crazy people. Let’s get back to the book. This book is probably one of the most entertaining non-fiction, history book I’ve ever read. The author, veteran journalist Simon Winchester, obliviously has a good idea what people want to read about and delivers exactly that: a few big historic events surrounding OED with bunch of non-important but fascinating trivia in between them. 

He mixes facts and imaginations so masterfully, even if this book is actually a biography of OED which is just a thick, really boring, almost incomprehensible dictionary, it starts building the tension from the beginning!! Imagine that! 

Other than Johnny Cash’s Man in Black and Bruce Campbell’s If Chin’s Could Kill, this could be the most entertaining biography I’ve ever read.