Book Meme

Henry at Webicosm has passed me the foloowing book meme:

Number of books I own: somewhere around 2300. I have them all neatly listed in several databases (by subject) and I haven't actually added them all up lately.

Last book I bought: Gould's The Structure of Evolutionary Theory. I had meant to but it a while back when I bought Ridley's Evolution but I somehow ended up buying Lloyds The Structure and Confirmation of Evolutionary Theory. Which, actually turned out to be an interesting book on the philosophy of biology.

Last boo I read for the first time: The Lloyd book mentioned above.

Five books that mean a lot to me:

City by Clifford Simak - excellent robot science fiction
Lucy: The Beginnings of Humankind by Johanson and Edey - obviously
The Antecedents of Man vy Le Gros Clark - I'm a fan of Le Gros Clark and this one caused me to go into physical anthropology.
The Peloponnesian War by Thucydides - an excellant account of the effects of war on a democracy. Thucydides was a keen observer, his descriptions of Athens during the plague and of the decline of the political process (democracy taken over by demagogues - sound familiar)are masterpieces. I actually took two years of ancient greek so I could read it in its' original language.
The Plague by Albert Camus - much the same as for Thucydides, except I did not learn french.

Bonus book that means a lot to me: One of my favorite baseball players is Willie Mays. When I was 8 or 9 I read a biography (or it may have been an autobiography) of him that really affected me. From his treatment in the segregated south to the fact that after a promising start to his career he left the joints to join the army and go to Korea. Touched a cord I guess. I can't, now, remember the name of it - but I think what I took away from the book was more important than its' name.

Five Bloggers to send this to: Unfortunately, most of the blog I frequent either have already done it or don't participate in these memes. But any who read this can feel free to do it.