Customer Reviews

On Equilibrium

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

John Ralston Saul's latest book carries on a theme that runs through Voltaire's Bastards and The Unconscious Civilisation: reason, deprived of memory, imagination, common sense and other human qualities, inevitably leads to disaster. Whereas Saul's previous books depicted the disaster (e.g. a chapter on the international arms trade, `The Flowering of Armaments' in Voltaire's Bastards) this book focuses on a remedy to unchecked reason- 6 human qualities, which balance one another. These are: Common Sense, Ethics, Intuition, Imagination, Memory & Reason.
Initially I found this book fluffy reading; it lacks the detailed, fact-filled, and societally oriented argumentation that makes up Voltaire's Bastards. With time and reflection I have come to see wisdom in Saul's approach; the book is encourages us to rethink society through our own lives and with our own qualities. As Donald Rumsfeld lectures about invading Iraq, Reason listens to his arguments while Memory sees Rumsfeld shaking hands with Saddam Hussein in 1983. Witnessing the slow pace of the United Nations, Ethics worries that humanitarian aid is being delayed, but Common sense remains calm, knowing that compromise comes slowly or not at all.
I highly recommend this book.

This is quite possibly the best book Saul has written to date. His writting style is lucid and in a sense, quite remarkable. He examines the central aspects that make us human and examines them in comparison to history. Highly Recommended.

I'm dismayed by the low rating of this book. I enjoyed it immensely, particularly the part about Jean Moulin, the French Resistance leader who was an astonishing individual. I love Saul's books because he offers fascinating and little known examples from history while making angry but spot on points about the decline of our culture. I wish he wrote more.

John Ralston Saul has the ability to identify the core matters that affect how people experience the world. His exploration of the six dimensions of human-kind that underpin our humanity is often provocative, and always stimulates the thinking of the reader. But he uses many words, and doesn't choose them particularly well. It's a difficult read and would have benefited from more careful editing. It is, however, very topical in relation to the impending American onslaught on Iraq. He identifies the fear of uncertainty as a key motivation for the adeherence to ideologies (such as those that guide the Bush Administration). Fear of uncertainty (Saul says) is an obstruction to thought - it's easier to embrace the simple guidance of (especially) conservative (and insular) ideology that America uses to protect it from an uncertain world. And that is what makes the book so topical.
A difficult read, but worth it.