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	<title>Curious Book Fans &#187; Essays</title>
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	<link>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk</link>
	<description>This is a site for curious book fans who like to read and write about books they read...</description>
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		<title>Is That a Fish in Your Ear?</title>
		<link>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2012/essays/8956/is-that-a-fish-in-your-ear</link>
		<comments>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2012/essays/8956/is-that-a-fish-in-your-ear#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sat, 21 Jan 2012 17:02:15 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>eilidhcatriona</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Essays]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Languages]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[David Bellos]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/?p=8956</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Is That a Fish in Your Ear? by David Bellos, with the subtitle Translation and the Meaning of Everything, is a study of the world of translation. What is translation, what does it mean to translate, the history of translation, the pitfalls and different types of translation...these are all areas which Bellos looks at. From www.curiousbookfans.co.uk]]></description>
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		<title>Amazing Tales For Making Men Out of Boys</title>
		<link>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2012/history/8857/amazing-tales-for-making-men-out-of-boys</link>
		<comments>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2012/history/8857/amazing-tales-for-making-men-out-of-boys#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 05 Jan 2012 12:23:38 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>collingwood21</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Essays]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[History]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Neil Oliver]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/?p=8857</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[“There was a time not so very long ago when boys were taught to be men” writes author, archaeologist and broadcaster Neil Oliver, and “part of the education of boys came from reading tales of brave and selfless deeds”. Not so any more. “It’s rubbish being a British man at the moment…nowadays the rest of the world sees British men as the performing seals of George W Bush’s Wild West Show. We’re the sick men of Europe too with our lazy fat guts and our binge-drinking.” from www.curiousbookfans.co.uk]]></description>
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		<title>The Art of Camping</title>
		<link>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2011/essays/8647/the-art-of-camping-matthew-de-abaitua</link>
		<comments>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2011/essays/8647/the-art-of-camping-matthew-de-abaitua#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 30 Nov 2011 23:05:43 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Mary Bor</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Essays]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Travel books]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Matthew de Abaitua]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/?p=8647</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[When Father Ted presented her with a machine that would ‘take the misery out of tea-making’ TV’s most aesthetically challenged housekeeper Mrs. Doyle lamented ‘some people enjoy the misery’. It’s more or less the way I feel about camping; I certainly don’t camp for any pleasure I derive from it, rather a belief that it’s somehow character building and morally robust. I’m certainly not the first to think so and in The Art of Camping Matthew de Abaitua takes us on a trip back in (fairly recent) history to look at those people for whom camping was a means to rehabilitation or a way of instilling certain values, using socialist in principle. From www.curiousbookfans.co.uk]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
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		<title>Golden Treasury</title>
		<link>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2011/essays/8447/the-best-of-quest</link>
		<comments>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2011/essays/8447/the-best-of-quest#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 07 Nov 2011 12:56:50 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Anjana Basu</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Essays]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Poetry]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Achal Prabhala]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Arshia Sattar]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Laeeq Futehally]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/?p=8447</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[I started with an article by Professor P Lal, a rejoinder to Jyotirmoy Datta, on why he wrote in English, ‘We do not write in English because it is a pan-Indian language of the educated; we write because we cannot write as well in any other language’,  revisiting the incisive words of the man who was the doyen of Indian Writing in English, or Indo Anglian literature. Then I went onto Khushwant Singh at his vigorous best writing about Delhi, in a collating of some of his columns. There was a piece about the notorious Sashtibrata, writing letters in English for Delhi’s shoeshine boys and turning up in rags at tatters at the Delhi offices of The Statesman. from www.curiousbookfans.co.uk]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>How To Be a Woman</title>
		<link>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2011/essays/8411/how-to-be-a-woman-by-caitlin-moran</link>
		<comments>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2011/essays/8411/how-to-be-a-woman-by-caitlin-moran#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 31 Oct 2011 07:32:26 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>collingwood21</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Essays]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Society]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Caitlin Moran]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/?p=8411</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[How To Be a Woman may seem an oddly titled book for a 33 year old woman to be reading – surely with 33 years of practice I must have figured it out by now? Yet despite this ample experience, being a woman is something I feel I’m a bit rubbish at. I only own one dress (the one I got married in, never to be worn again). I only own one pair of heels that I can’t walk in (putting me apparently way below average on this count). I never wear, and never have worn, make-up (not even on my wedding day – I drew the line at having to wear a frock). I don’t have a handbag, either (why would I need one when I have a perfectly serviceable rucksack and pockets in my clothes?). And the biggest failing of all – I don’t want babies. From www.curiousbookfans.co.uk]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>1</slash:comments>
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		<item>
		<title>Faulks on Fiction</title>
		<link>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2011/art/5899/faulks-on-fiction-sebastian-faulks</link>
		<comments>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2011/art/5899/faulks-on-fiction-sebastian-faulks#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 04 Feb 2011 23:20:56 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>koshkha</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Art]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Essays]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Sebastian Faulks]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/?p=5899</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Faulks on Fiction is a companion book for the BBC 2 series of the same name which starts on Saturday 5th February. I'm writing my review before seeing the show since I think any book needs to be able to stand on its own two feet especially one by a man who is first and foremost a writer. However I suspect that the TV programme probably introduces some artificial constraints that inevitably impact on the choices Faulks has had to make in selecting the books and the characters he's analysed. When you need to make the characters fit a set of four hour-long programmes, each of which must race through seven different literary giants, it's likely to reduce the creative freedom of the writer. I'd have preferred Faulks to have been given the freedom to pick the 28 most interesting characters regardless of having to make them fit – seven of each – into the four topics of Heroes, Lovers, Snobs and Villains.
]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2011/art/5899/faulks-on-fiction-sebastian-faulks/feed</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Obliquity</title>
		<link>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2011/essays/5682/obliquity-john-kay</link>
		<comments>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2011/essays/5682/obliquity-john-kay#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sat, 22 Jan 2011 22:54:27 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>collingwood21</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Essays]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Science and nature]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Society]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[John Kay]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/?p=5682</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[When I was presented with a copy of John Kay’s book Obliquity, my heart sank just a little at seeing the words “goals” and “achieved” used in the same sentence on the front cover. Books that use these sorts of words are usually dull, prescriptive and....well, the sort of books that Kay goes to considerable length to tell you are not in slightest bit helpful. Why? Because they are too direct to work in an uncertain world such as ours.
From www.curiousbookfans.co.uk]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Help</title>
		<link>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2011/essays/5387/help-how-to-become-slightly-happier-and-get-a-bit-more-done-by-oliver-burkeman</link>
		<comments>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2011/essays/5387/help-how-to-become-slightly-happier-and-get-a-bit-more-done-by-oliver-burkeman#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 10 Jan 2011 16:50:06 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>koshkha</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Essays]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Society]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Oliver Burkeman]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/?p=5387</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[I’m not much of a fan of the self-help genre and I believe that most self-help books do little for their readers other than inducing a greater sense of self-loathing and diminished self-worth when those readers fail to convert themselves into better people overnight.  How many copies of ‘How to Win Friends and Influence People’ are sitting on the shelves of friendless and uninfluential people who can’t quite remember how they ever thought something they paid a few quid for was going to change their personality overnight? I try to avoid getting sucked in – well obviously when you’re perfect already there’s not much need – but even I am prone to the odd purchase. I have more shelf-space than I care to measure devoted to various tomes on mind mapping and ‘de-junking’ my life whilst my mind remains largely terra incognita and my life is absolutely full of junk.
From www.curiousbookfans.co.uk]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2011/essays/5387/help-how-to-become-slightly-happier-and-get-a-bit-more-done-by-oliver-burkeman/feed</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Food and Philosophy: Eat, Think and be Merry</title>
		<link>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2010/essays/4728/food-and-philosophy-eat-think-and-be-merry</link>
		<comments>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2010/essays/4728/food-and-philosophy-eat-think-and-be-merry#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 08 Nov 2010 11:03:14 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>koshkha</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Essays]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Health, mind and body]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Philosophy books]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Dave Monroe]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Fritz Allhoff]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/?p=4728</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[It’s not that I don’t read non-fiction; I do. But most of my non-fiction tends towards historical biography or accounts of big historical events. Reading Food and Philosophy felt a bit too much like being at work. Some of the essays grabbed and held my attention but these were the exceptions rather than the rule. In the Appetizers section I gobbled up the essays on Vegetarianism and Eating Disorders but rejected the section on Epicurus. And let’s go back to that word ‘Appetizer’ - why the irritating Z? Further examination of the profiles of the authors soon set me straight that despite being a Blackwell Publishing book the authors are almost all American academics.
From www.curiousbookfans.co.uk]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2010/essays/4728/food-and-philosophy-eat-think-and-be-merry/feed</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>1</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>The Philosophy of Serial Killers</title>
		<link>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2010/essays/4713/the-philosophy-of-serial-killers</link>
		<comments>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2010/essays/4713/the-philosophy-of-serial-killers#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 05 Nov 2010 12:59:54 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>sunmeilan</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Essays]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Philosophy books]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Society]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[S. Waller]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/?p=4713</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Serial Killers: Being and Killing is part of a series published by Wiley-Blackwell that concentrates on providing a general view of philosophy for those (including this author) who are not experts in the area. Other books in the series concentrate on everyday life issues, including beer, cannabis, porn, cycling and Christmas, amongst others. Serial Killers is probably the most serious subject out of all of them, but it is nevertheless not as hard a read as some people may expect - it really will be quite comprehensible to most people, with only a few complicated terms, such as phenomenology, thrown in every now and again.
From www.curiousbookfans.co.uk]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2010/essays/4713/the-philosophy-of-serial-killers/feed</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Reasons to be Cheerful</title>
		<link>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2010/essays/2473/the-optimist</link>
		<comments>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2010/essays/2473/the-optimist#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sun, 11 Apr 2010 15:11:43 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>koshkha</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Essays]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Society]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Laurence Shorter]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/?p=2473</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Given the choice, would you rather hang out with optimists or pessimists? It seems like a simple choice doesn&#8217;t it? Wouldn&#8217;t we all choose a life uplifted by rubbing shoulders with perpetually sunny cheery glass-half-full types over one dragged down and depressed by those who always expect to lose a fiver and find a shirt [...]]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2010/essays/2473/the-optimist/feed</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>I Will Survive</title>
		<link>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2010/biography/2233/emergency-by-neil-strauss</link>
		<comments>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2010/biography/2233/emergency-by-neil-strauss#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sun, 28 Mar 2010 16:04:20 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>collingwood21</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Biography]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Essays]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Neil Strauss]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/?p=2233</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[If you had asked me a week ago what one thing I would most want if I was about to live through the collapse of Western civilisation, my answer would almost certainly have been “Ray Mears”. As a life-long urban dweller who has only once been camping, my only means of survival should we lose [...]]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2010/biography/2233/emergency-by-neil-strauss/feed</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Negotiating with the Dead</title>
		<link>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2010/art/1623/negotiating-with-the-dead</link>
		<comments>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2010/art/1623/negotiating-with-the-dead#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 26 Feb 2010 14:56:10 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>frangliz</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Art]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Creative]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Essays]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Margaret Atwood]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/?p=1623</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Having read and been so impressed by several of Margaret Atwoods works of fiction, I imagined that a book written by her about the art or activity of writing would prove to be an interesting read. As explained in the introduction and prologue to the book, the chapters here are based on the Empson Lectures [...]]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2010/art/1623/negotiating-with-the-dead/feed</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Ferret Smuggling and Partying with Warhol</title>
		<link>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2010/essays/1143/area-code-212</link>
		<comments>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2010/essays/1143/area-code-212#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 19 Jan 2010 22:38:08 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>koshkha</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Essays]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[212]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[New York]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Tama Janowitz]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/?p=1143</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Tama Janowitz is a favourite of mine and I love her fiction, the titles in particular &#8211; &#8220;The Male Cross-dresser Support Group&#8221; and &#8220;A Cannibal in Manhattan&#8221; are just two of her greats. So even though I don&#8217;t really like books of essays, the strength of the Janowitz &#8216;brand&#8217; was enough to draw me to [...]]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2010/essays/1143/area-code-212/feed</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Sidney Kugelmass, his love affair with Emma Bovery and other funny stories</title>
		<link>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2009/fiction-books/comic-fiction/58/sidney-kugelmass-his-love-affair-with-emma-bovery-and-other-funny-stories</link>
		<comments>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2009/fiction-books/comic-fiction/58/sidney-kugelmass-his-love-affair-with-emma-bovery-and-other-funny-stories#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 01 Dec 2009 13:06:27 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>James</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Comic fiction]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Essays]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[comic]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Woody Allen]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://curiousbookfans.co.uk/?p=58</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[The Complete Prose of Woody Allen is a bumper collection of comic fiction and essays and consists of the three Woody Allen books of humorous prose &#8211; Getting Even (1971), Without Feathers (1975), and Side Effects (1980). There are over fifty pieces of comic writing here which makes the book both great value for money [...]]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://www.curiousbookfans.co.uk/2009/fiction-books/comic-fiction/58/sidney-kugelmass-his-love-affair-with-emma-bovery-and-other-funny-stories/feed</wfw:commentRss>
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