Very strange... seeing a new book by Alessandro Baricco, The Barbarians: An Essay on the Mutation of Culture at the checkout counter at Eataly, Chicago. Yes one could read a tabloid, but... Two previous reads by Baricco were excellent: Silk, and The Ocean Sea. And yet this new book, presented in tabloid manner, and with a title that sounded ugly and uninteresting, caught my eye.
I bought it.
Yes Baricco is onto something! Challenging many of our deepest cultural thoughts, the book reminds me of my first trip to the Santa Fe Institute in 1993, for a Cultural Evolution Workshop. In the most lighthearted manner Baricco examines the mutations occurring in our global society, heavily influenced by American inertia.
Highly recommended and willing to share more thoughts!
cheers ~