I know, I know, that third book was missing its title … it’s Chaos: Making a New Science, by James Gleick. And its endpapers and color plates are killer.
Dissertation-related library run: five books I need, one book I just want.
You are for dreams and slumbers, brother priest;
You fur your gloves with reason. Here are your reasons:
You know an enemy intends you harm;
You know a sword employed is perilous,
And reason flies the object of all harm.
Who marvels, then, when Helenus beholds
A Grecian and his sword, if he do set
The very wings of reason to his heels,
And fly like chidden Mercury from Jove,
Or like a star disrobed? Nay, if we talk of reason,
Let’s shut our gates and sleep. Manhood and honour
Should have hare hearts, would they but fat their thoughts
With this crammed reason; reason and respect
Make livers pale and lustihood deject.
Troilus, from Shakespeare’s Troilus and Cressida (II.2.37-50)
I told Chris I was going to work while he watched Ken Burns’s Baseball, but instead I am just drinking a glass of wine and reading this speech over and over and imagining a scenario in which I might get to utter the gloriously contempt-filled phrase “You fur your gloves with reason.”
Dissertation Update
You know shit is getting serious when you spend your morning paging obscure books from the Grand Depository.

