Be a Man

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I really wanted to like this book; I think it's a very interesting and relevant topic and I was curious to view it through the perspective of a man who is a "self-proclaimed former 'lad'". However, despite the thought provoking discussions Hemmings dives into I cannot overlook the glaring issues that are present throughout the entire read. In 1981 he won his first literary prize — an all-expenses paid trip for two to Hawaii — for his story of a particularly perilous Indonesian adventure he’d had 8 years earlier. This spurred him to immerse himself more fully in his writing. He also deepened his psychospiritual work, which spread worldwide in the late 1980s. He studied chemistry at the University of Turin, graduating summa cum laude in 1942, notwithstanding the restrictions imposed by Mussolini's racial laws. In 1942 he found a position with a Swiss drug company in Milan. [1] With the German occupation of northern and central Italy in 1942, Levi joined a partisan group in Aosta Valley in the Alps. [2] Kimmel’s definitely a liberal feminist (he graduated from Vasser College), and he doesn’t like traditional notions of manliness. He’s often criticized for villainizing men and glorifying women.

Benchouiha, Lucie (2006). Primo Levi: Rewriting the Holocaust. Troubador Publishing Ltd. ISBN 1-905237-23-5 In "October 1944" the prisoners anticipate a 'selection': the Germans will send a proportion of the prisoners to the gas chambers to make room for new arrivals. No one knows the exact day on which it will take place; the prisoners reassure each other that surely it will not be they who will be selected. When it comes, the process is so perfunctory that it is almost a matter of chance who is chosen.The book is a really interesting read, but honestly, the article he wrote that became the book sums up his main points much more succinctly. Some things to highlight from this book is that to be a man is to be a man of prayer and a follower of Jesus Christ. Father Larry would then specify how and what aspect of being a man can we grow into in Christ. True masculine power happens when courage, integrity, vulnerability, compassion, awareness, and the capacity to take strong action are all functioning together. Such power is potent but not aggressive, challenging but not shaming, grounded but not rigid, forceful but not pushy. Again, it requires head, heart, and belly in full-blooded alignment.

What I love most about this book is how absolutely fun it is to read. Ardrey’s talent as a playwright and screenwriter shine through in his work and he’s able to take complex ideas like paleoanthropology and make them accessible to the layman. In January 1947, the manuscript was initially rejected by Einaudi, with the writers Cesare Pavese and Natalia Ginzburg thinking it too early after the war for such an account. [3] However Levi managed to find a smaller publisher, De Silva, [7] who printed 2,500 copies of the book, 1,500 of which were sold, mostly in Levi's hometown of Turin. In 1955, Levi signed a contract with Einaudi for a new edition, which was published in 1958. The initial printing of 2000 copies was followed by a second of the same size. [8] The shaming effect of telling a man (or boy) to “be a man” is rarely seen for what it is, being commonly viewed as a kind of tough-love support (psychologically akin to “spare the rod and spoil the child”), especially in authoritarian or militaristic contexts. Bottom line, read this book for the history and the awesome resources Kimmel has uncovered; skim over the pontificating. If This Is a Man ( Italian: Se questo è un uomo [se kˈkwesto ˌɛ un ˈwɔːmo]; United States title: Survival in Auschwitz) is a memoir by Jewish Italian writer Primo Levi, first published in 1947. It describes his arrest as a member of the Italian anti-fascist resistance during the Second World War, and his incarceration in the Auschwitz concentration camp ( Monowitz) from February 1944 until the camp was liberated on 27 January 1945.Nicole Krauss’s Holocaust short story in a refugee camp got to me more than it might have if I wasn’t already tender myself. And such shaming usually becomes internalized as yet another aspect of the inner critic (a heartlessly negative self-appraisal originating in childhood), the shaming finger of which gets waved in our face so often that it gets normalized. This internal drill sergeant, this love-barren relentless inner overseer, simply wears us down even as it pushes us to be better, to be more successful, to be more of a man, etcetera after self-castigating etcetera. And if the delivery of this is sufficiently harsh, we may lose much or all of our drive to better ourselves, sinking into depression, apathy, and self-loathing — so long as we leave our inner critic unquestioned and in charge. The calm sobriety of Levi's prose style is all the more striking given the horrific nature of the events he describes. Levi explained in his 1976 Appendix to the work: "I thought that my word would be more credible and useful the more objective it appeared and the less impassioned it sounded; only in that way does the witness in court fulfil his function, which is to prepare the ground for the judge. It is you who are the judges." [12]

In one of her strongest works of fiction yet, Nicole Krauss plunges fearlessly into the struggle to understand what it is to be a man and what it is to be a woman, and the arising tensions that have existed from the very beginning of time. Set in our contemporary moment, and moving across the globe from Switzerland, Japan, and New York City to Tel Aviv, Los Angeles, and South America, the stories in To Be a Man feature male characters as fathers, lovers, friends, children, seducers, and even a lost husband who may never have been a husband at all. Vanessa D. Fisher, co-editor and author of Integral Voices on Sex, Gender & Sexuality: Critical Inquiries Levi began to write in February 1946, with a draft of what would become the final chapter recording his most recent memories of Auschwitz. According to Ian Thomson, Levi worked over the next ten months with concentrated energy and extreme facility. Levi told him that the words poured out of him "like a flood which has been dammed and suddenly rushes forth". [4] In the daytime Levi was working at a paint factory north-east of Turin. Mostly he wrote in the evenings and late into the night, although Levi said that the chapter The Canto of Ulysses was written almost entirely in a single, half-hour lunch break. [5] The first manuscript was completed in December 1946 and required considerable editorial work. His future wife, Lucia Morpurgo, helped him to shape the book, giving it a clear sense of direction. [6] Publication [ edit ] Primo Levi The books shows how so many men cannot sustain intimate relationships because of what he calls the "unholy triumvirate" of "unhealthy forms of shame, power and sex." Masters covers the need for men to deal with the disowned parts of themselves by facing their shadow. He also recommends shifting from aggression to anger and dealing with violence.Sex is the engine of God’s dominion: the means by which He designed man to establish heaven on earth. That might seem like a controversial thesis to some, but Baumeister lays it out in a very sensible, straightforward, non-inflammatory, and ultimately hard-to-argue-with way. Heuses studies from the growing fields of evolutionary psychology and sociobiology to explain why cultures have exploited men the way they have. And he explainshow and why certain aspectsof male and female behavior are hardwired and that these differences should be used to complement each other rather than asfodder in the gender wars. This is a favorite book among AoM readers. I can’t count the number of times readers have recommended this book to me. Overall, I thought it was a decent book that offered solid food for thought, but it doesn’t top my personal list of favorites. If you’re a Christian man who feels like there is a “wound” in your soul, this book will likely really resonate with you (although some Christians criticize the book because Eldredge’s theology does not align with their own). If you’re looking for practical advice and/or are not a theist, it won’t likely hit the sweet spot.

This very important book covers the whole spectrum of men’s experience and challenges in these times. Dr. Masters explains the development of men’s many strengths as well as their compensations, the downsides that so many adopt to “be a man,” including burying some parts of themselves so deeply that they forget that such parts are even there! Dr. Masters is courageous in disclosing his own personal challenges throughout his life and the discoveries he found valuable both for himself and the many men he has counseled on their way forward to a bigger and more complete sense of self-respect and wholeness. This is both a book for men who want to embrace their inner life as well as well as for women who want to understand them. I follow him at a distance down the street. He passes under a mulberry tree, so I pass. He crosses to the other side, so I cross. He stops to look up at a tall building they are raising, and I too stop to look up, and it seems to me that I could go on doing this for a very long time, shadowing a life”.Last year I started a men's group and since I have been reading lots of the classic texts in the men's work oeuvre (No More Mr. Nice Guy, Way of the Superior Man). "To Be a Man," filled in gaps left by those other fantastic works, especially in the domains of sexuality. I found the portion on "Sex" (part IV) alone to be worth reading the whole book.