The Pythagorean Theorem by Eli Maor. 2007, ISBN 987-0-691-12526-8. Subtitled: A 4000 Year History. Excellent book. I really enjoyed reading this. The subject is handled correctly and the author doesn't shy away from doing real math, ie, providing theorems and their proofs. However, the book is mostly about the history of this idea and how it has come to be used in various areas of mathematics and science. I will be reading his other books soon. Purchased at Powell's books on 7-27-2007, 24.95.

Book Of Mark. This is from the same copy of the New Testament as the Book Of Matthew. This was shorter than Matthew, I read a couple of chapters a day. Mark contains the ministry and ascension of Jesus, but not the birth story. The print in this tiny copy of Gideons is very tiny. The version of this text is the New King James Version.

Gilgamesh, A New English Version by Stephen Mitchell. 2004 Free Press ISBN 0-7432-6164-X. This book is a re-telling of the Gilgamesh story. There is a 60 page introduction where the author discusses what he did and why. The story itself is around 140 page, but it is in verse form and double spaced, so it really isn't that long. There is also an extensive notes section where the author describe in detail the various choices made in writing this version. I found this version to be easy to read. I think Mitchell has retold the story in a way that makes it easier for the modern reader to understand. Purchased at Looking Glass Bookstore, 11-Oct-04, for 24.00.

Buddha, The Enlightened One by Gabriel Mandel Khan. 2004 Thunder Bay Press, ISBN 1-59223-400-3. This book presents a biography of the founder of Buddhism, Siddhartha Gautama. The text is short, but well written and I think covers the material enough that the reader will gain a good understanding of the Buddha. The book starts with a brief sketch of the Vedic culture that had established itself in India and gave birth to several religions, Hinduism and Jainism, etc. The book describes the life of the Buddha. The last half of the book is about Buddhism and how it spread across Asia. The book contains many color photos of Buddhist art.

Earth (The Book) by the Daily Show with Jon Stewart. 2010, ISBN 978-0-446-57922-3. Subtitled: A Visitor's Guide to the Human Race. The is supposed to be a guide to be used by future aliens who come to earth sometime after the human race has ceased to be. This book explains to these aliens who humans were and what we did, etc. A silly book, but has some good jokes. Purchased on 10-13-2010 at Fred Meyers for 20.99. You can probably get it cheaper if you shop around.

The Survivor and Others by H. P. Lovecraft and August Derleth. 1971, Ballantine Books. 02148-7-095. Book of short stories started or outlined by Lovecraft and completed by Derleth after Lovecraft died. I enjoyed these. They had all of the Lovecraft elements and were easy to read. Purchased from Pandora's Books (via Amazon marketplace) for 12.87 (including s&h) on June 26, 2010. Has another of those amazing covers (front and back) by Gervasio Gallardo.

The Epic Of Gilgamesh, tr. N. K. Sandars. 1972 revised edition. ISBN 0 14 044 100 X. I've owned this book for many years. Probably purchased at Powells. This is the oldest surviving written story. Contains a flood story similar to the one in Genesis. Because of the condition of the clay tablets that this story was written on, there are parts of the text that are missing. The translator in this version has filled in or smoothed over these rough spots, making the story easier to read. This is not a version for experts, but rather a version for the more average reader. I found the introduction very interesting because it explained the context in which this story was written.

The King in Yellow by Robert W. Chambers. 1895. (the edition I read was published in 1902.) This is a collection of short stories. The stories are horror and fantastic in nature. Some take place in an imaginary future (is there any other kind of future?) Some of the stories have the characters reading and under the influence of a play called "The King in Yellow." Portions of this fictional play are quoted in the stories. This author was read by H. P. Lovecraft and some of the elements of the play are mentioned in his stories. The book I read was a PDF scan I downloaded from Google. I read it using the Kindle. This edition had several line drawings illustrating the stories.

Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee by Dee Brown. Bantam Books 1972, 553-07077-195. Subtitled: An Indian History of the American West. Presents the events of the American West from the Indian point of view from 1865 to 1890. A very sad story and a great injustice. The clash of the Indian culture and the European resulted in the destruction of the Indians, mostly because of the greed and ignorance of the Europeans.

One Hundred and One Famous Poems With A prose Supplement, An Anthology Compiled by Roy J. Cook. 1958. The copyright is 1958, however, I think that there were previous editions. How many I do not know. For example, here is a full view edition in books.google.com. First edition maybe 1916. The book is still in print and probably could be found at Powells or Amazon. I have never been a big fan of poetry and many of these poems I could not begin to understand. Some of the authors are Emerson, Whitman, Wordsworth, Shelley, Longfellow. I got this book at Camerons's Books for one dollar probably five to ten years ago.

The Koran translated and with notes by J. M. Rodwell. 1909. ISBN 978-0-486-44569-4. This Dover Thrift Edition is an unabridged republication of the 1909 edition with the notes and the chronological ordering of the Suras. It is amazing how much different translations can vary. See here for example. A PDF of this book can be obtained at books.google.com. I purchased this copy at Borders sometime last winter (2010) for $5.00.

About Time by Paul Davies, 1995, ISBN 0-671-79964-9. The subject of this book is the temporal realm, the dimension of time. The author is a physicist. In technical literature he is listed as P. C. W. Davies. The subtitle is "Einstein's Unfinished Revolution" and much of the book is about general relativity and time dilation. The book starts with a brief history of how people have (and still do) think about time. Everyone experiences time. In some cultures they claim that all times exists together, others only see the Now. In the novel Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut, the character Billy Pilgrim becomes aware of his disjointed time travels. Most of "About Time" is about time as it relates to modern physics. Good book. The book has 285 pages, a Preface, a Prologue, 14 chapters and an Epilogue. Plus Notes describing sources of quotes, etc., a Biblography and an Index.

The Annotated H. P. Lovecraft, edited and with Introduction by S. T. Joshi.
This book contains four stories by H. P. Lovecraft, "The Rats In The Walls", "The Colour Out Of Space", "The Dunwich Horror", and "At The Mountains Of Madness". These were all good stories. The annotated part is mostly footnotes added to explain the more obscure words in the stories. The book also has a number of pictures showing various places where Lovecraft lived. I purchased this book used at Powells, $10.95.

The Spawn of Cthulhu by H. P. Lovecraft and others. 1971. Ballantine Books 02394-3-095 (SBN 345-02394-3-095). Edited by Lin Carter. This is a book of short stories which illustrates the development and growth of the "Cthulhu Mythos" stories. The other authors include Ambrose Bierce, Robert W. Chambers, Vincent Starrett, August Derleth, Lin Carter, Robert E. Howard, Walter C. DeBill Jr., Clark Ashton Smith, Frank Belknap Long, Zealia Bishop and J. Ramsey Campbell. This book was purchased in the early 1970s. I liked these stories for the most part, I might try to read them again sometime. I am also interested in reading more by the other authors (besides Lovecraft.) I have about a quarter of the Ballantine Adult Fantasy series. The cover art is fantastic, like the previous two books (Dream Quest and Doom) by Gervasio Gallardo.

The Doom That Came To Sarnath by H. P. Lovecraft. 1971. Ballentine Books 02146-0-095 (SBN 345-02146-0-095.) Edited by Lin Carter. This collection of short stories is related to the "Dream Quest" collection. Some of these stories are dreams, others are horror and even science fiction. One story was co-authored with Harry Houdini. Like "dream Quest" I purchased and read this first in the early 1970s. The cover art is fantastic, probably the reason I bought the book. The story can be read here or here.

The Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath by H. P. Lovecraft. Ballantine Books 01923-7-095, 1970 (SBN 345-01923-7-095). Edited by Lin Carter (assumed to be no relation to Randolph Carter!) Dream Quest is both the title of this collection of six stories and the title of the longest story. I think these stories are in the public domain, so you can probably find them for free (for example, here.) This book is a paperback that I purchased new in the early 1970s. It is a part of a series of books published by Ballantine Books, Adult Fantasy Series. This book has several of the stories from Lovecraft's Dream Cycle. These stories are related because they have some of the same characters or locations.

The Lottery by Shirley Jackson. Popular Library 445-00300-125. This is a book of short stories. The most famous is "The Lottery." I think I either saw a film version of this story or read it when I was in High School. It is quite shocking the first time you read it. Many of the other stories feature a character named Jim Harris (or something like that.) This is a reference to a popular English ballad "The Daemon Lover." Most of the stories are quite short, with a few being only two or three pages. Most have tricky, surprise endings. This book was purchased at Powell's a few years ago for 95 cents. It is a cheap paper back probably printed in the 1970s. The book "Night in Funland" also had a story by Shirley Jackson.

Fear Of Flying by Erica Jong. Signet 451 J6139. Novel. This the story of Isadora Wing, a young woman trying to determine who she is and what she wants. She is a feminist or at least is searching for what that means. The novel describes many of her sexual adventures and coins the term zipless f*ck. Well written and easy to read, the novel contains many references to literature and psychology.
This book was purchased on February 7, 1978 at the Varsity Book Exchange for one dollar.

Black Cargoes, History of the Atlantic Slave Trade by Daniel P. Mannix in collaboration with Malcolm Cowley. ISBN 0 1400 4253 9. Covers the four hundred year history of Europeans purchasing people in Africa and transporting them to North and South America. Well written and refers in many places to historical documents. Has several pages of drawings depicting conditions on the ships, etc. The sad thing is that in many places in the world slavery is still allowed, e.g., in Haiti (a former French colony that was freed by slave revolt) people still sell their children into slavery. (See Restavec.)

Genesis: A Living Conversation by Bill Moyers. ISBN 0-385-48345-7. This book is a series of transcripts of conversations recorded for a PBS television series of the same name. The series first appeared in the late 1990s. I found this book interesting to read, however sometimes the comments seemed to be a bit silly. The stories of Genesis were written thousands of years ago for a completely different social-economic context. To expect them to represent some modern value system (in other words, to be politically correct) seems to me to be unrealistic. Most of the participants were professional religionists, i.e. people who have made a career out of studying religion.

Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters and Seymour: An Introduction by J. D. Salinger. ISBN 978-0316766944. Two short stories. The stories are about Buddy Glass and his brother Seymour Glass. The first story is about Buddy and some other people on the day that Seymour was to get married, but failed to show up at the altar. The second story appears to be an introduction to a book of poems by Seymour, an introduction written by Buddy.

On Genesis, A New Reading by Bruce Vawter. 1977, ISBN 0-385-06104-8. I really enjoyed reading this book. It uses the New American Bible (NAB) as its English translation. I first purchased this book back when it was new. It has taken me 32 years to get around to reading it. I wish I had read it when I first bought it. The book explains Genesis in terms of the four different sources of text, Priestly (P), Yahwist (J), Elohist (E) and the Redactor (R) and how these contribute to the inconsistencies in the text. It also relates many of the stories and names to information found in other sources and through archeology, etc. In some places it discusses the NAB and how it relates to the Masoretic Text (MT), Septuagint (LXX) and othe sources (Syriac etc.)