h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Remember the Penguin Cafe, that online book club? At A2819937

I'd just like to announce that I would like to resurrect the Cafe. The reason it failed beforehand is that too few people ended up reading the book of choice, with the result that there was not a lot left to talk about at the end of the day.

So, here are two modifications to the house rules that I'd like to propose:
* All books must be in the public domain. This means that they will be downloadable FREE OF CHARGE from an Internet site. A good place to start is Project Gutenberg: http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Main_Page
* Secondly, anybody can propose a book of the month. The ay to do this is to start a thread here with the title "Propose: for ", then all and sundry get to vote for it. Multiple proposal threads may be started for any month, but not by the same person.

Er, that's it.

Propose: The Abolition of Man for Dec 2006

Author: C.S. Lewis
Title: The Abolition of Man - or Reflections on education with special reference to the teaching of English in the upper forms of schools

The Online text is downloadable free of charge at :

http://www.columbia.edu/cu/augustine/arch/lewis/abolition1.htm

I have a short precis of the book at A16019318

As I'm supposed to be writing not reading I can't guarantee to join in regularly, but where its a book I already hold, or have an interest in I'll be happy to join in.

I think FM:PT suggestion as a rule for picking is that the proposal should be one that is free access on the web.

Eg., sites like;

http://www.americanliterature.com/
http://www.litrix.com/readroom.htm
http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Main_Page

And you can find other books donwnloadable elsewhere as for my suggestion of The ‘Abolition Of Man’


So we have a lot of choice . Better than spending hard earned money on some of these classics, even though I am old fashoned enough to still like a physical book in my hands!

Right, well, in the absence of any other recommendations, the Abolition of Man it is.

Now, I suggest we move any discussions around to the Cafe's original space.

I would have finished this by now were it not for the fact that my ISP has totally trashed my internet access. TalkTalk decided to 'upgrade' my connection in much the same sense of the word as the way the USA 'upgraded' the Iraqi form of government to democracy. they are utterly, utterly useless in everything they have done so far.

>they are utterly, utterly useless in everything they have done so far.<

Bob, FM, I *love* the frequently clever ambiguity of your pronouns! Brightens our day.

2nd-line technical support got around to calling me today, only two weeks after I reported the original issue and told them that there was a fault on the line. I asked for an evening callback. They called me back at 8:30 am just as I was going out the door to work.
'Oh sorry, but you did specify a morning callback'.
'No I bloody well didn't: I specified an evening callback.'
I then spent another 5 minutes convincing them that no, I didn't need to run any diagnostics because (a) I hadn't buggered around with the router and (b) I knew a dead connection when I saw one, being someone who has actually written a TCP/IP networking application. TalkTalk have obviously outsourced their customer services department to Planet Vogon.
It's reassuring to know that I'm not being singled out for special treatment:
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/cash/story/0,,1951488,00.html