The Marginalian
The Marginalian

Reads from 2012

The Machine That Made Us: Stephen Fry and the BBC Explore Gutenberg’s Legacy
The Machine That Made Us: Stephen Fry and the BBC Explore Gutenberg’s Legacy

A hands-on history of the most important milestone of technology since the invention of the wheel.

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Henry Miller on Art, War, and the Future of Humanity
Henry Miller on Art, War, and the Future of Humanity

“It is almost banal to say so yet it needs to be stressed continually: all is creation, all is change, all is flux, all is metamorphosis.”

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The Half-Life of Facts: Dissecting the Predictable Patterns of How Knowledge Grows
The Half-Life of Facts: Dissecting the Predictable Patterns of How Knowledge Grows

“No one learns something new and then holds it entirely independent of what they already know. We incorporate it into the little edifice of personal knowledge that we have been creating in our minds our entire lives.”

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Scientists and Philosophers Answer Kids’ Most Pressing Questions About How the World Works
Scientists and Philosophers Answer Kids’ Most Pressing Questions About How the World Works

Why we fall in love, what we’re all made of, how dreams work, and more deceptively simple mysteries of living.

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Kurt Vonnegut’s Daily Routine
Kurt Vonnegut’s Daily Routine

“In an unmoored life like mine, sleep and hunger and work arrange themselves to suit themselves, without consulting me.”

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The Big New Yorker Book of Dogs
The Big New Yorker Book of Dogs

“Dogs are not about something else. Dogs are about dogs.”

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The Nature of the Fun: David Foster Wallace on Why Writers Write
The Nature of the Fun: David Foster Wallace on Why Writers Write

“Fiction becomes a weird way to countenance yourself and to tell the truth instead of being a way to escape yourself or present yourself in a way you figure you will be maximally likable.”

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The Beatles Perform Shakespeare in Color, 1964
The Beatles Perform Shakespeare in Color, 1964

The Fab Four take on “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.”

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Building Stories: Cartoonist Chris Ware Explores the Architecture of Being Human
Building Stories: Cartoonist Chris Ware Explores the Architecture of Being Human

What the inner life of a brownstone reveals about empathy, gender, and the human condition.

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How the Gutenberg Press Embodies Combinatorial Creativity
How the Gutenberg Press Embodies Combinatorial Creativity

From metallurgy to the division of labor, or why Gutenberg was a typesetting despot.

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