The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet by John Greene
Date read: 5/7/23. Recommendation: 8/10.
Huge fan of John Greene’s writing—he’s hilarious, witty, and I wish I could write half as well as he’s able to. In The Anthropocene Reviewed, he reviews different aspects of contemporary humanity, from Halley’s Comet and Diet Dr. Pepper to the Indianapolis 500 and the Internet, on a five-star scale. Each chapter is insightful and entertaining, I loved his perspective on purpose, excess, belonging, and perception.
Check out my notes below or Amazon for details and reviews.
My Notes:
Finding meaning:
“Pay attention to what you pay attention to. That’s pretty much all the info you need.” Amy Krouse Rosenthal
Excess:
“Gatsby is a critique of the American Dream. The only people who end up rich or successful in the novel are the ones who start out that way. Almost everyone else ends up dead or destitute. And it’s a critique of the kind of vapid capitalism that can’t find anything more interesting to do with money than try to make more of it. The book lays bare the carelessness of the entitled rich—the kind of people who buy puppies but won’t take care of dogs, or who purchase vast libraries of books but never read any of them.” John Greene
“Like ice on a hot stove, we must ride on a melting Earth, all the while knowing who is melting it. A species that has only ever found its way to more must now find its way to less.” John Greene
Belonging:
Home is not a place, but a moment: “Home wasn't a set house, or a single town on a map. It was wherever the people who loved you were, whenever you were together. Not a place, but a moment, and then another, building on each other like bricks to create a solid shelter that you take with you for your entire life, wherever you may go.” Sarah Dessen
Evolving: “One of the strange things about adulthood is that you are your current self, but you are also all the selves you used to be, the ones you grew out of but can’t ever quite get rid of.” John Greene
Perception:
“I honestly believe it is better to know nothing than to know what ain’t so.” Josh Billings
“We do not see things as they are, we see them as we are.” Anais Nin
Focus on your work:
Embrace the quiet: “Being busy is a way of being loud.” John Greene
“I’ve often wished—especially when I was younger—that my work was better, that it rose to the level of genius, that I could write well enough to make something worth remembering. But I think that way of imagining art might make individuals too important. Maybe in the end art and life are more like the world’s largest ball of paint. You carefully choose your colors, and then you add your layer as best you can. In time, it gets painted over. The ball gets painted and painted again until there is no visible remnant of your paint. And eventually, maybe nobody knows about it except for you. But that doesn’t mean your layer of paint is irrelevant or a failure. You have permanently, if slightly, changed the larger sphere. You’ve made it more beautiful and more interesting.” John Greene