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#Post#: 45523--------------------------------------------------
Re: What are you reading?
By: kkt Date: November 25, 2021, 9:45 pm
---------------------------------------------------------
[quote author=Southern Ding-a-ling
link=topic=68.msg45515#msg45515 date=1637893902]
[quote author=kkt link=topic=68.msg45483#msg45483
date=1637872454]
Medici Money: Banking, Metaphysics and Art in Fifteenth-century
Florence,
by Tim Parks
about the Medici Bank in the 1400s and early 1500s. An
international banking house with its home in Florence and
branches in major cities all over Europe. How they got to lend
money and still be considered good Christians at a time when
usury meant lending money at any interest at all. How they
tried (and sometimes failed) to balance payments between
northern Europe and southern Europe. Southern Europe was always
getting excess cash because of the money sent to the Vatican and
because southern Europe made more products northern Europe
needed. How the Medicis dominated Florence politics even though
Florence was supposed to be a republic with all officials
selected by lottery. How Cosimo built the bank, and Lorenzo
squandered it. All the art the Medicis sponsored, and how the
Medicis worked little reminders of who paid the bills into them.
A little about Italian renaissance politics and warfare. Alum
and Volterra.
[/quote]
I bought a copy of this and read it back when I was fascinated
by the Medici. I remember it being illegal to wear buttons or
certain colors. I would think they would find us strange and I
know I would find them to be bizarre. I think I remember that
they called it gifts not interest on the deposits. Instead of a
toaster at the bank you would get a cash "gift" that was a
percent of the deposit. Then you were still compliant with with
the existing laws. Glad to be reminded of it. Was interesting.
[/quote]
Yes, calling the interest a gift was one way. Discretionary
accounts, because they were discretionary in two ways: the
interest paid was at the discretion at the bank (although if
they didn't pay, the depositor could always go to a more
generous bank). And the bank was required to be discreet about
the accounts. It wouldn't do to reveal that cardinals or the
pope had their money in an interest-bearing account, even if the
interest was a gift.
Sumptuary laws, on what types of clothes could be worn by what
class of individual, were in place in many countries. Even
England. During changing times like the Renaissance, when
merchants with not a drop of noble blood in their veins could
afford finery as grand as a duke's, it was a way for the
conservatives to keep them from changing too fast.
#Post#: 45534--------------------------------------------------
Re: What are you reading?
By: Southern Ding-a-ling Date: November 25, 2021, 11:29 pm
---------------------------------------------------------
[quote author=kkt link=topic=68.msg45523#msg45523
date=1637898325]
[quote author=Southern Ding-a-ling
link=topic=68.msg45515#msg45515 date=1637893902]
[quote author=kkt link=topic=68.msg45483#msg45483
date=1637872454]
Medici Money: Banking, Metaphysics and Art in Fifteenth-century
Florence,
by Tim Parks
about the Medici Bank in the 1400s and early 1500s. An
international banking house with its home in Florence and
branches in major cities all over Europe. How they got to lend
money and still be considered good Christians at a time when
usury meant lending money at any interest at all. How they
tried (and sometimes failed) to balance payments between
northern Europe and southern Europe. Southern Europe was always
getting excess cash because of the money sent to the Vatican and
because southern Europe made more products northern Europe
needed. How the Medicis dominated Florence politics even though
Florence was supposed to be a republic with all officials
selected by lottery. How Cosimo built the bank, and Lorenzo
squandered it. All the art the Medicis sponsored, and how the
Medicis worked little reminders of who paid the bills into them.
A little about Italian renaissance politics and warfare. Alum
and Volterra.
[/quote]
I bought a copy of this and read it back when I was fascinated
by the Medici. I remember it being illegal to wear buttons or
certain colors. I would think they would find us strange and I
know I would find them to be bizarre. I think I remember that
they called it gifts not interest on the deposits. Instead of a
toaster at the bank you would get a cash "gift" that was a
percent of the deposit. Then you were still compliant with with
the existing laws. Glad to be reminded of it. Was interesting.
[/quote]
Yes, calling the interest a gift was one way. Discretionary
accounts, because they were discretionary in two ways: the
interest paid was at the discretion at the bank (although if
they didn't pay, the depositor could always go to a more
generous bank). And the bank was required to be discreet about
the accounts. It wouldn't do to reveal that cardinals or the
pope had their money in an interest-bearing account, even if the
interest was a gift.
Sumptuary laws, on what types of clothes could be worn by what
class of individual, were in place in many countries. Even
England. During changing times like the Renaissance, when
merchants with not a drop of noble blood in their veins could
afford finery as grand as a duke's, it was a way for the
conservatives to keep them from changing too fast.
[/quote]
I have other books that I got around the same time. One was
about the Medici women. I don't remember that one as well but
that the women were influential or as influential as a woman
could be at that time. I think it was Maddalena Medici who
married the son of a pope who was much older. I can't help but
be curious how life was for women then.
#Post#: 47308--------------------------------------------------
Re: What are you reading?
By: Southern Ding-a-ling Date: December 1, 2021, 10:52 am
---------------------------------------------------------
The Dark Hours by Michael Connelly.
#Post#: 48749--------------------------------------------------
Re: What are you reading?
By: Lady_Lessa Date: December 5, 2021, 8:21 am
---------------------------------------------------------
I just finished "Bad Blood" by John Carreyrou about the rise and
fall of Theranos.
I found it light reading and enjoyed it. I tend to be
fascinated by those who seek power and are ruthless to get it.
As an industrial chemist, I am amazed that it was mostly
salesmanship because they never had a working product.
Normally, salesmen come to the lab and ask "Can this be done?"
The answers are "yes when do you need it?" "No" (especially
when they want something impossible, like premium performance
for very inexpensive and "Maybe. What's the time frame and
parameters?"
I like their idea, but found the biggest tragedies to be lack of
collaboration between groups, and Elizabeth Holmes' inability to
accept "It can't be done"
#Post#: 48767--------------------------------------------------
Re: What are you reading?
By: animaniactoo Date: December 5, 2021, 9:40 am
---------------------------------------------------------
[quote author=Lady_Lessa link=topic=68.msg48749#msg48749
date=1638714075]
I just finished "Bad Blood" by John Carreyrou about the rise and
fall of Theranos.
I found it light reading and enjoyed it. I tend to be
fascinated by those who seek power and are ruthless to get it.
As an industrial chemist, I am amazed that it was mostly
salesmanship because they never had a working product.
Normally, salesmen come to the lab and ask "Can this be done?"
The answers are "yes when do you need it?" "No" (especially
when they want something impossible, like premium performance
for very inexpensive and "Maybe. What's the time frame and
parameters?"
I like their idea, but found the biggest tragedies to be lack of
collaboration between groups, and Elizabeth Holmes' inability to
accept "It can't be done"
[/quote]
On the other hand this is very like Steve Jobs who she held
herself out to be in his mold.
Memorably, the first preview of one of the early prototypes on
one of the Mac lines… touted as having full functionality in
this tiny machine was later revealed to be 4 systems linked
below the covered table doing all the processing. And that was
at some convention or the other.
#Post#: 48841--------------------------------------------------
Re: What are you reading?
By: Lady_Lessa Date: December 5, 2021, 12:26 pm
---------------------------------------------------------
[quote author=animaniactoo link=topic=68.msg48767#msg48767
date=1638718830]
On the other hand this is very like Steve Jobs who she held
herself out to be in his mold.
Memorably, the first preview of one of the early prototypes on
one of the Mac lines… touted as having full functionality in
this tiny machine was later revealed to be 4 systems linked
below the covered table doing all the processing. And that was
at some convention or the other.
[/quote]
I did not know that, thank you for the insight.
#Post#: 48861--------------------------------------------------
Re: What are you reading?
By: Lurknomore Date: December 5, 2021, 1:16 pm
---------------------------------------------------------
Now reading Oh, William! By Elizabeth Strout. I loved her other
books, and her writing, and this is good but basically plotless.
More her character Lucy Barton’s musings on a previous husband
whom she remains friends with.
I did read about half of Bad Blood too, mentioned below.
Fascinating at first but it was SO detail oriented, albeit well
researched, and Elizabeth is such a damaged, manipulative person
I found it depressing, and it was due back at library.
#Post#: 53783--------------------------------------------------
Re: What are you reading?
By: NoLongerAubergine Date: December 19, 2021, 8:26 pm
---------------------------------------------------------
I just finished The Hour of the Witch by Chris Bohjalian. A
Puritan woman petitions for divorce from her abusive husband. As
one might imagine, it isn't a cut-and-dried legal process in a
patriarchal society.
I really enjoy historical novels, and this was no exception. I
would recommend it to anyone who also enjoys them. It was well
written and researched. OTOH, I would suggest caution to anyone
for whom domestic violence scenes would be especially upsetting.
#Post#: 54500--------------------------------------------------
Re: What are you reading?
By: Lady_Lessa Date: December 21, 2021, 3:08 pm
---------------------------------------------------------
I just finished 2 historical novels, both very good.
"The second Life of Mirielle West" by Amanda Skenandore.
Mirielle is a Hollywood star and wife who comes down with
leprosy and is transported to Carville, which was the only leper
colony in the mainland of the United States. She starts out as
being a not very nice person, but grows and changes in
reasonable fashion. It ends after there is a treatment for the
disease.
"The Indigo Girl" by Natasha Boyd. This is set in South
Carolina before the Civil War, and is the story of Eliza Lucas
who worked with slaves and others to both grow indigo and to
transform the leaves into good quality dye.
#Post#: 55300--------------------------------------------------
Re: What are you reading?
By: muskrat Date: December 23, 2021, 6:09 pm
---------------------------------------------------------
Joan Didion (RIP):
“I’m not telling you to make the world better, because I don’t
think that progress is necessarily part of the package,” she
once wrote. “I’m just telling you to live in it. Not just to
endure it, not just to suffer it, not just to pass through it,
but to live in it. To look at it. To try to get the picture. To
live recklessly. To take chances. To make your own work and take
pride in it.
To seize the moment.
And if you ask me why you should bother to do that, I could tell
you that the grave’s a fine and private place, but none I think
do there embrace. Nor do they sing there, or write, or argue, or
see the tidal bore on the Amazon, or touch their children.
And that’s what there is to do and get it while you can and good
luck at it.”
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