Barbarian Days

by William Finnegan

Book Reviews

  • More: + The Sciences of the Artificial + Paradigms of Artificial Intelligence Programming (the first Norvig book, not the second) + Edward Abbey + The Sermon on the Mount + "The Starship and the Canoe" + Freeman DysonLink to Tweet
  • Many of these books had a transformative effect on me. I'll read something like Deschooling Society, be transformed; and then I meet someone else decades later who loved it, and we're both instantly in a club!Link to Tweet
  • @bingfish You win some prize for having three books I have never read before but which all look great. This is a left field recommendation, but based on reading the summary of all three I recommend Barbarian Days.Link to Tweet
  • Since it's World Book Day, here are some of the best books I've read recently: I Want to be a Mathematician, by Paul Halmos Barbarian Days, by William Finnegan From Galileo to Newton, by Rupert Hall The British Industrial Revolution in Global Perspective, by Robert AllenLink to Tweet
  • Mavericks just before 2pm today. Good spot to finish reading William Finnegan's superb "Barbarian Days: A Surfing Life". https://t.co/rSHvxV3rrELink to Tweet
  • If you read books, read William Finnegan's Barbarian Days. It's one of those rare books that divide your life into two parts: before you read it, and after. https://t.co/BTODaei5hrLink to Tweet
  • William Finnegan's _Barbarian Days_ is so good that I find myself looking forward to getting home so I can read more of it. https://t.co/BTODaei5hrLink to Tweet

About Book

Surfing only looks like a sport. To initiates, it is something else entirely: a beautiful addiction, a demanding course of study, a morally dangerous pastime, a way of life. Raised in California and Hawaii, Finnegan started surfing as a child. He has chased waves all over the world, wandering for years through the South Pacific, Australia, Asia, Africa. A bookish boy, and then an excessively adventurous young man, he went on to become a writer and war reporter. Barbarian Days takes us deep into unfamiliar worlds, some of them right under our noses -- off the coasts of New York and San Francisco. It immerses the reader in the edgy camaraderie of close male friendships annealed in challenging waves.