might have to break my spending freeze to buy this
― Know how Roo feel (LocalGarda), Friday, 19 October 2012 09:03 (eleven years ago) link
have any of you guys read the whole thing? i just have that modern library edit, and it's still like 1200 pages.
― (The Other) J.D. (J.D.), Friday, 19 October 2012 18:43 (eleven years ago) link
i have this disgustingly gorgeous three-volume unabridged hardcover with giant two-page reproductions of the "original etchings" but nah i have not read anywhere close to the whole thing, partly cuz i can't take it anywhere. i think i said on some other thread that it can only be read on a plinth. but the kindle editions i got were pale, pale, pale imitations.
― difficult listening hour, Friday, 19 October 2012 18:46 (eleven years ago) link
Iirc, I petered out in Byzantium around 900 or 1000 AD.
― Aimless, Friday, 19 October 2012 18:46 (eleven years ago) link
(it's from one of my annual holiday-season raids on the bookshelves in my parents' basement, lest anyone think i am not buying ramen w pennies)
― difficult listening hour, Friday, 19 October 2012 18:47 (eleven years ago) link
(also i don't mean to be snotty about the kindle editions, being able to pull any version of gibbon out of the fucking AIR for NOTHING is literally the main thing our civilization has going for it)
― difficult listening hour, Friday, 19 October 2012 18:49 (eleven years ago) link
โ Aimless, Friday, October 19, 2012 1:46 PM (12 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
so did byzantium iirc
― goole, Friday, 19 October 2012 18:59 (eleven years ago) link
I've Storified my (plentiful) tweets on what I found noteworthy in Gibbon: wisdom, humour, elegance, prejudice https://t.co/SODaFPUfZ1— Josh Spero (@joshspero) April 27, 2017
― ๐ ๐๐ข๐จ (caek), Saturday, 20 May 2017 18:33 (seven years ago) link
this is the way gibbons intended it to be read
― flopson, Saturday, 20 May 2017 18:52 (seven years ago) link
this is probably the best book ever
― The Remoans of the May (Noodle Vague), Saturday, 20 May 2017 19:17 (seven years ago) link
Yearly reminder to read Gibbon
― xyzzzz__, Monday, 4 September 2017 20:52 (six years ago) link
it's actually not that great as an intro to Roman history - it starts after all the famous imperial stuff (Caesar Augustus, Claudius, Nero) is over (and assumes its audience knows its way around that iirc); but the title hides the fact that you do get Attila, Genghis Khan, Charlemagne, rise of Islam, Crusades etc etc.
โ you don't exist in the database (woof), Monday, 5 September 2011 bookmarkflaglink
Is it worth reading Suetonius before starting on this btw?
― xyzzzz__, Monday, 25 May 2020 13:56 (four years ago) link
neither of them are the most accurate things to read as history in 2020, both of them are the best things to read as entertainment, you certainly *could* read Suetonius first but then there's 600-odd years of Roman history before the Caesars so it's still not the whole empire. i think the Decline makes sense on its own, Gibbon sets out his terms at the beginning and in the title.
― Children of Bo-Dom (Noodle Vague), Monday, 25 May 2020 14:02 (four years ago) link
Got it, Ty.
― xyzzzz__, Monday, 25 May 2020 14:03 (four years ago) link
Iggy Pop on Gibbonโs Decline and Fall is the most poignant thing Iโve read all week. https://t.co/jksAqwnpAQ pic.twitter.com/sG5aW5gN9h— Mary Harrington (@moveincircles) January 3, 2021
― xyzzzz__, Monday, 4 January 2021 11:28 (three years ago) link
I've seen that before but it is great
― Uptown Top Scamping (Noodle Vague), Monday, 4 January 2021 13:18 (three years ago) link
"I feel less tyrannized by the present day"
― xyzzzz__, Monday, 4 January 2021 17:43 (three years ago) link
Iggy's frequenting the bookstore at which I worked in the early '90s was a delight.
― Patriotic Goiter (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 4 January 2021 17:45 (three years ago) link
Ha, was wondering when that was going to get mentioned.
― Dog Heavy Manners (James Redd and the Blecchs), Monday, 4 January 2021 17:47 (three years ago) link
did he ever come into the bookstore shirtless?
― nobody like my rap (One Eye Open), Monday, 4 January 2021 21:20 (three years ago) link
Barefoot.
― meticulously crafted, socially responsible, morally upsta (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 5 January 2021 03:19 (three years ago) link