Being a Prince, Impersonating a Man, and Mistaking Your Own Wife for a Hat

I'm already slacking on this thing, and it's only the third day of the year. I'm three books behind! To update:
The Prince by Niccolo Machiavelli on 1-1-2010
Twelfth Night by William Shakespeare on 1-2-2010
The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat and Other Clinical Tales by Oliver Sacks on 1-3-2010.

So at least I haven't been slacking on actually reading.
The Prince was good, though different that I expected. Apparently, it has been severely misquoted and misconstrued over the years. It is not a book about being cruel, or evil, or ruthless. It is a book about ruling as a prince, and ruling well. Machiavelli does not advocate cruelty. In fact, he explicitly makes an argument against useless cruelty and harshness. That being said, he advocates that it is better to be feared than loved, because fear is more stable. However, whenever both emotional responses are possible, he advise one to obtain them. Also, his most oft repeated advice is to avoid being hated.
Overall, I thought the book was really interesting. I'm certainly glad I read it, as I had a completely incorrect preconceived notion about it. That being said, i felt I couldn't follow some of Machiavelli's points because I did not have the historical knowledge. In each chapter, Machiavelli would first argue his opinion, giving advice, and then give both a "present day" and ancient example. I really enjoyed reading the arguments, but sometimes became lost with the examples due to the fact that i have studied very little world history. Overall, I'd rate the book a 6. Machiavelli's ideas were solid, well organized, and well supported. At times, things were mildly monotonous (though they couldn't get too monotonous over only 154 pages), but for the most part, I was not bored.

Next, I read (or rather listened to) Twelfth Night by William Shakespeare. Try as I may, I am not a hardcore Shakespeare fan. I appreciated most of his plays, but I've never been able to love them. That being said, Twelfth Night is one of my favorite Shakespeare plays to date, falling slightly behind Merchant of Venice. It is funny, clever, and well organized. I was never confused (which is saying something, as audio books are often hard to follow in play form if you don't get the voices memorized quickly), and I really enjoyed it. I think that I prefer Shakespeare's comedies over his tragedies. His characters are less dramatic and vapid, and the entire thing reads less like a soap opera and more like a sitcom (I've never been a soap opera kind of girl). Also, I loved that there was a strong female character in this play. I know that Shakespeare often has strong females in his plays (like Lady Macbeth and Ophelia, obviously), but I felt that Viola and Olivia were more relatable that the typical Shakespeare female. Overall, 6 out of 10.

Finally, I read The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat and Other Clinical Tales by Oliver Sacks. I must say, it was excellent. It is probably my favorite nonfiction book of all time, and beats out many of my favorite fiction books as well. As the title suggest, TMwMhWfaHaOCT (how's that for an initialism?) is a compilation of clinical tales related to neurology. I have been interested in neuroscience for some time, and this got me even more excited about the subject. The book is split into four sections: deficits/losses, excesses, reminiscence/transports, and mental retardation. All sections were equally captivating. Sacks, a practicing neurologist, told stories of patients with various neurological disorders while simply explaining the science behind them. The book was humorous, clever, and well-executed.
I apparently have insomnia once again. I tried to go to sleep at 10, as I'm trying to prepare for having o get up at 5 am again once school starts tomorrow, but couldn't sleep at all. At around one, I pulled out this book and finished in by about 2:30. I laughed aloud on a few occasions, and was brought nearly to tears on another. While some of the neurological problems described are quite funny, they are, in reality, quite tragic.
In addition to the wonderful information that Sacks presents from his own studies, he also references the work of other neurologists and great thinkers who have done research. I am looking forward to going through the bibliography of his book and reading many of the books mentioned.
Granted, I only got 2 hours of sleep, possibly because of this book, but it was worth it. Before writing this blog, i spent an hour looking up colleges that offer neuroscience majors. I had been considering psychiatry, but neurology now seems so much more endearing. 9.5/10.

Total Book Count for 2010: 4
Nonfiction Count: 2 (50%)