Two Jewels of books and others

Om Gam Ganapathaye Namah!: (from Ganapathi Atharva Sirsha Upanishad.)

Two Jewels: (1) Translation of Shankara's Self-Knowledge (Atmabodha) by Swami Nikhilananda. It also has a beautiful introduction to Vedanta philosophy with an appendix that includes English translations of many of Shankara's works. (2) Ramakrishna and His Disciples by Christopher Isherwood about Shri. Ramakrishna, the phenomenon.

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Some belated obituaries: The great indian novelist Raja Rao, the great musician Bismillah Khan (interview and anecdotes [Hat tip: Uma]) and a great entertainer Steve Irwing.

Other books: Zen mind, Beginners mind, Our Kind by Marvin Harris, [Hat tip: Atanu] and Devil's Chaplain by Richard Dawkins [Hat tip: SMS].

Other stuff: In his introduction to Bhagavad-Gita, Prof. Deutsch considers Chapters 12 and 13 to be the pinnacle of Bhagavad-Gita.

Hope everyone is doing fine. More later.

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Amar