A Sideways Look at Time

I **loved** this book.
She played with language, while playing with the varying ideas and concepts of time around the world.
It was funny, provocative, and interesting.
I might not always agree, but she collected interesting observations and shared them with creative aplomb.

Although I have had many lucky wins from the remainders section of book shops, every now and then you come across a book that explains why there IS a remainder section. This book has a simple and interesting core thought - that we live our "time" too fast. But after that thought is described, in the first chapter (or was it the introduction?) there is sadly no development of the idea. What should we do about it? How could we live our times differently - these and many other questions remain unanswered. In trying to get a one paragraph concept stretched to book-length, the author does test some boundaries. I thought that the lament at language loss (fewer languages in the world) was the best. How is this related to living time too fast? show more And what can we do about it? More unanswered questions. This is a clunker. (Read December 2010) show less

Mostly amusing diatribe against the modern artificial division of time by clocks and Christians. At its best describing different cultural views of time; at its worst as a general argument against 'progress'.

A cross-cultural and scientific look at notions of time.