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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 October 2012
22 July 1996, “Noodles of Nothing”
How's your academic life? Have you been reading any? Do you still subscribe to Texas Monthly? Or was it The Smithsonian, I forget which? Right now, in my spare time, I'm reading Robert Oppenheimer: Letters and Recollections. Mostly it's a collection of letters from when he was in college and graduate school. The fellow was an amazing writer: it would be hard to tell he was a scientist if you didn't know otherwise. Of course, my real interest is in peering into his thoughts as he was learning quantum mechanics; that's why I'm putting time into the book. But it is always good to absorb something of someone else's style.
Have you ever read anything by William James (the psychologist and philosopher – not to be confused with Henry James)? For some reason I'm just fascinated with his writing style; I would love to be able to pull the same tricks, and have it acceptable to do so. If you get a chance, take a look at the first few pages of his essay “The Dilemma of Determinism” just for the style. (You'll be able to find it in the library in any collection of his essays, probably with titles like The Will to Believe; the one I have at home is a Dover edition.)
There's a new phenomenon going on in my field: we've apparently reached the level where it's time for some books on the subject.
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