'The Mystery of Things', a collection of essays, or more tellingly, vignettes by A.C. Grayling is an important little book, to say the least. In an age of texting, gaming and CGI, what is Real is rapidly becoming cliche' as the synthetic moves in to become the order of the day. Grayling, however, is one of the last voices of the human, a mind able to unflinchingly tackle such diverse subjects as the City of Ur and the heroin addiction of William S. Burroughs. Thankfully not a specialist, Mr. A.C. Grayling divides the pages of this powerful little nugget of a book into the Arts, the Sciences, and History. A Purist you may ask? Perhaps. But no snobbery is to be found here, where the author assumes one is interested in, and has therefore heard of the various subject matters contained within these pages.
In the Arts section, one of the fascinating topics is collecting, and Grayling has certainly turned a master's eye to the collection of these writings. Standing alongside the somewhat luddite-ish complaint of modern architecture in 'The Cities of Modern Culture', one finds a nice retelling and critique of 'A Winter's Tale' by Shakespeare (within a stone's throw at least) and without feeling seasick from the sea change. As made manifest in the essay on Art and Nature, Grayling betrays a soul as sensitive and keen as a John Ruskin when extolling the golden age of European voyagers and their exploits where Captain Cooks were teamed with Naturalists and Artists who documented the New Worlds of the West Indies.
Do you, like me, feel we are missing something in our postmodern culture? A.C. Grayling expertly goes back and picks up the pieces, fitting them together in perhaps surprising ways, to form one Great Culture. Highly recommended...
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