Point Books Supposing Sum: Forty Tales from the Afterlives
| Original Title: | Sum: Forty Tales from the Afterlives |
| ISBN: | 0307377342 (ISBN13: 9780307377340) |
| Edition Language: | English |
David Eagleman
Hardcover | Pages: 110 pages Rating: 4.14 | 14326 Users | 1969 Reviews
Specify About Books Sum: Forty Tales from the Afterlives
| Title | : | Sum: Forty Tales from the Afterlives |
| Author | : | David Eagleman |
| Book Format | : | Hardcover |
| Book Edition | : | Anniversary Edition |
| Pages | : | Pages: 110 pages |
| Published | : | February 10th 2009 by Pantheon |
| Categories | : | Short Stories. Fiction. Philosophy. Fantasy. Religion. Adult. Death |
Interpretation In Favor Of Books Sum: Forty Tales from the Afterlives
At once funny, wistful and unsettling, Sum is a dazzling exploration of unexpected afterlives—each presented as a vignette that offers a stunning lens through which to see ourselves in the here and now. In one afterlife, you may find that God is the size of a microbe and unaware of your existence. In another version, you work as a background character in other people’s dreams. Or you may find that God is a married couple, or that the universe is running backward, or that you are forced to live out your afterlife with annoying versions of who you could have been. With a probing imagination and deep understanding of the human condition, acclaimed neuroscientist David Eagleman offers wonderfully imagined tales that shine a brilliant light on the here and now.Rating About Books Sum: Forty Tales from the Afterlives
Ratings: 4.14 From 14326 Users | 1969 ReviewsCrit About Books Sum: Forty Tales from the Afterlives
***NO SPOILERS***An enjoyable set of inventive "what if?" vignettes, Sum is Eagleman's envisionings of various versions of the afterlife. All are impressively unique, and some really stretch the mind. Be sure to open this book while fully alert. Eagleman's background as a neuroscientist is, at times, on full display in these pages as some of his ideas veer into the complex and obscure with talk of quarks and atoms. Readers not inclined toward the scientific may find these boring. Fortunately,probably 3.5 actually. A fascinating book of short tales about possible afterlives, including one where all possible versions of you exist (quantum physics I think), another where God is so small he works on a microbal (?) level, and is simply unaware of us, a bi-product of bacteria. Or where the afterlife conforms to capitalist principles and for a reasoable price you can download your version of heaven. Or When you arrive in the afterlife, you find that Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley sits on a
Now putting the finishing touches to the Bulgarian translation.Caveat: Sum will bring no insight to those who seek visions of the afterworld--and no consolation either. ;) Instead, it may make us re-examine our very own lives, here and now. Perhaps avoid some of the blunders. Definitely laugh. At ourselves, most of the time.I laughed in "Quantum":In the afterlife you can enjoy all possibilities at once, living multiple lives in parallel. You find yourself simultaneously eating and not eating.
You do not have to be a subscriber to any of the more common religions in this world to harbor some notion, some hope, that there might be a form of personal existence beyond death. Eagelman has come up with forty possible post-mortem futures and offers them up in bite-size stories in this slim volume. The tales range from tedious to inspired. There is an O-Henry-esque tale in which a mans greatest desire is to become a horse. A vision of God as being fascinated with Mary Shelleys masterpiece
Some of these stories were indeed imaginative scenarios of what the afterlife is like or what God might be like. But because his Heaven or God is always imagined as some inversion of a human hierarchy or scale...it gets repetitive very fast. God always lacks some human quality that intrinsically keeps him as God and us as humans, or...he's just like us, but just a smaller or larger scale. Because his Heaven is always some rearranged variation of the human life, all the stories start to sound the
Work. Of. Genius.
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