What am I reading this week, this Summer?

I love to read. I read whenever I'm not swimming, photographing or sleeping. From sun up to way past sundown. Mostly I read fiction. I don't trust anyone who doesn't like to read some sort of fiction. But that's just me. 

I veered off the fiction path a bit lately and here's what I've had on the side table, next to my comfy-est reading chair. 

1. I have been re-reading Robert Adams thin but richly larded book, Beauty in Photography. Essays in Defense of Traditional Values. 

While the book is a relic of the film age most of the philosophy he covers concerning photography is still relevant and his writing style makes it a joy to read. I keep looking for the secret key that will unlock my own appreciation of some of photography's popular 20th century saints. It's still a mystery to me concerning the popularity of some "saints of photography" who started careers in the nadir of the film days but I'm trying hard to understand. Robert Adams essays, when fully digested, get me closer than I have been. 

The book is 108 pages of good writing together with a sprinkling of rudimentary black and white "plates." 

Every photographer would benefit, at least when engaged in pseudo intellectual cocktail party conversations about photograph, by reading this book and another Adams book I always enjoyed, entitled, sneakily enough, Why People Photograph.  You know he's gotta be a good photographer because he was an English Literature major.

2. It's been a tough slog getting through Tim Carpenter's dense and incredibly well researched small book of philosophy tangentially related to photography entitled: 

"To Photograph is to Learn How to Die. An essay with digressions." 

From Nabokov to Kant to Szarkowski to Wallace Stevens and William Carlos Williams, Carpenter drags me through touch points of modern philosophical thoughts about existence, form, awareness and, ultimately the process of thinking in a different way about photography. It's dense and, at times academic but you'll feel so smart once you finish reading it. Even the construction of the essay is novel and new, with three treatise running concurrently, but in different blocks and different typefaces. 

A favorite excerpt from the book:

"Legend has it that --- as a nod to Robert Capa's famous assertion that "if your pictures aren't good, you're not close enough" ___ Tod Papageorge said, "If your pictures aren't good, you're not reading enough."   It sounds like him, but whoever the author is, this gets at the spirit of the thing by placing the locus of achieved meaning in the persistently cultivated mind of the maker of the aesthetic object and, contra Capa, not in the subject matter ( or proximity thereto).

Published by: The Ice Plant

3. While Carpenter's book can be a slog (but a rewarding slog!) Amanda Montell's latest book: 

"The Age of Magical Overthinking: Notes on Modern Irrationality" is a fun to read gem of a book that explains just how irrational we humans of the 21st century can be. In this book she breaks down why our thinking tends to break down. 

Her chapters (which she calls "A note on...") include funny and well written (and researched) essays on The Halo Effect, Proportionality Bias, Sunk Cost Fallacy, Zero Sum Bias, and many, many more psychological land mines that are just waiting to trip us up. I think my favorite chapter was:

#10. Nostalgia Porn: A note on declinism. 

Or maybe #11. The Life-Changing Magic of Becoming a Mediocre Crafter ( A note on the Ikea effect.)

This book is a fun two day read that explains so much of why we end up confused and just flat out wrong about so much in our current, high information lives. I think this one is a must read for just about every adult who wants to make more sense about life.

The writer is funny, witty and an exceptionally fun writer to read. I was going to pass the book along to a friend but I got selfish with this one and decided to keep it for future reference. You need this book. Unless you don't.

4. Sticking with philosophy and psychology I find myself recommending a book by Rick Rubin called, 

"The Creative Act: A Way of Being." 

This book outlines a way of looking at the creative process as being more than a process; in fact, a way of existence. The chapters provide small, digestible three and four page thoughts that brought me a bit of clarity about better ways to enjoy working on stuff that I want to do as opposed to everything else but at the same time he helped me see that all projects can be satisfying and not at odds with a personal vision; if we're clear about doing our work our way. Rick Rubin is a well known music producer but his treatise is written to be relevant to painters, photographers, composers, sculptures and many more. 

To give you an idea of the flavor of the book I'm including the opening thought: 

"The object isn't to make art, it's to be in that wonderful state which makes art inevitable." 

-- Robert Henri

Read this one if you need a kick in the pants to get started. It's like moving from decaf to high octane coffee. In you mind. 

5. Finally, a book which might appeal to only one or two of you but one that's fun to read as you get ready to ignore all the lesser sports in the upcoming Olympics so you can concentrate all your attention on the amazing and transformational swim races!!! You know that's the sport you want to follow. And here's a good book to get you started!!!

It's by the greatest female swimmer of all time. More gold medals that most people have coffee cups or teaspoons. This time around will be Katie Ledecky's fourth Olympic games and she's a favorite in multiple freestyle events. Just WOW!

The book is: "Just Add Water: My Swimming Life." 

Ledecky writes in a very conversational style and this book is a wonderful look into a level of athletic ability that few in the world can come close to replicating. She talks about how her training has progressed over the years. How she trains in the pool. How she trains her brain. Etc. She's Stanford graduate with a degree in psychology. I am a huge fan of her swimming. And her mindset. And her energy. The book is a great airplane read. 

Her secret to being the best? Hard work. Discipline. And more hard work. 

And these are my fave reads from the last few weeks. Just wanted to share.  KT