A former Hindu goddess of knowledge, Saraswati was the daughter of Shiva and Durga. She is credited with the invention of language and knowledge for mortals, and the divine inspiration of their holy Scriptures. Mortals pray to her for moksha, or true wisdom that will deliver them from their mortal shells.

Saraswati’s fealty to fixed ideas causes her to bend all gods and mortals to high standards. Since she desires change in others into becoming better people, she is relentlessly critical and judgmental. Sometimes Saraswati is surprised when others do not appreciate her judgments, although she is quick to praise whoever meets her standards. (more…)

I bought this book on September 8th and finished it last night. As a fan of Robert Greene, the modern-day Machiavelli, I was eager to snatch his latest book that’s a collaboration with 50 cents, the rapper.

The 50th Law is a decent book that spins 10 variations on the single theme of fearlessness into 10 chapters. Each chapter is further broken down into sections: the eye of the huster, the key, the strategies, and the reversal, which is similar to the original structure of the 48 laws of Power. 50 cents contributes the material of his biography and the key to fearlessness as pithy quotes. Several new individuals are also included here, from Richard Wright to Malcom X to Amelia Earhart to John Ford, along with returning favorites like Napoleon and Scipio. However, 50 cents’ biography is stretched thin across 200 plus pages, and there seems to be a great deal of overlap that borders on repetition. Robert Greene should be applauded for moving into new territory, into the world of the hustlers and the rappers to supplement his previous works on the great leaders, seducers, artists, thinkers, and generals.

One thing that bugs me: there’s no mention of the 49th law. Perhaps in the next book?

Despite the scathing title above, this is not ammunition for the Oralist nor the Signing Exactly English (SEE) user, nor an excuse for American Sign Language (ASL) purist to burn an effigy of yours truly, but a serious discourse on whether ASL, as a concrete language, has been shortchanging a certain segment of our population of our nation known as the D/deaf people. (more…)

Today, literary criticism is an exceedingly complicated discipline – one so complex that most people are unable to put forth a serious critique of a book without falling back on their own subjective tastes that lack rigor and reflective thought.

However, I have discovered a technique that may aid us in our attempt to judiciously critique a work of literature, be it a novel or film. Simply put, this technique is a careful analysis of the characters, how they are deployed in the story: do they represent the classic protagonist/antagonist that’s based on a black and white picture of reality? Or are they representative of a morally ambiguous reality in which the audience is trusted to be able to judge them? Merely a placeholder for an overarching ideology the author is foisting upon the reader? (more…)