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Powell's Staff:
Five Book Friday: In Memoriam
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Every year, the booksellers at Powell’s submit their Top Fives: their five favorite books that were released in 2023. It’s a list that, when put together, shows just how varied and interesting the book tastes of Powell’s booksellers are. I highly recommend digging into the recommendations — we would never lead you astray — but today...
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Brontez Purnell:
Powell’s Q&A: Brontez Purnell, author of ‘Ten Bridges I’ve Burnt’
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Rachael P.:
Starter Pack: Where to Begin with Ursula K. Le Guin
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Customer Comments
Andrew has commented on (2) products
State of Exception
by
Giorgio Agamben
Andrew
, February 28, 2007
A difficult book, Giorgio Agamben's "State of Exception" is nonetheless a book that every American should read. In clear and precise prose, Agamben dissects the current "state of exception (or emergency)" that holds sway over not only the United States, but every Western "democracy." Exploring both the juridical status of the emergency clause in the constitutions of the Western nations, and outlining the history of its use since the 1930's, Agamben argues that the state of exception is now, in fact, the norm in law and government. While couched in some difficult philosophical concepts - he presumes the reader has some knowledge of Michel Foucault, Martin Heidegger, and Walter Benjamin, among others - this is Agamben's most lucid and accessible book. He applies some of the themes raised in previous volumes - "Homo Sacer", for example - to our current situation. The portrait he paints of the normalization of emergency rule should give every citizen pause. For if we accept Agamben's judgments, the situation at Guantanamo Bay, and the promulgation of statutes like the USA PATRIOT Act, and the British Anti-Terror legislation, begin to look not like anomalies or temporary emergency measures, but the next logical development in state power, a power which is increasingly pushing past democracy and into a generalized bureaucratic tyranny. Absolutely vital.
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Here Is Where We Meet A Fiction
by
John Berger
Andrew
, February 21, 2007
It would be a shame if, as rumored, this is to be Berger's last novel, for "Here is Where We Meet" finds Berger in top form. Sliding sideways through the ambiances and experiences of a post-historical Europe, moving from Portugal to Poland, Geneva to his longtime home in the French Haute-Savoie, Berger maps the personal atop the public, the political atop the quotidian. His silvery prose glistens, beautiful yet severe in its spareness and precision. Not a word is wasted. With the death of Sebald, Berger stands alone.
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