http://www.spellingbee.com/

the last Minnesotan in the bee fell out in round 9 (of 19) by misspelling cancrizans*, a hopelessly useless word which would prolly only be of interest to someone who collects hopelessly useless words. not even Douglas Hofstadter would use this word in writing of crab canons (as he was wont to do).

*she spelled it cancrazanz, greatly overthinking the Latin roots.

someone who collects hopelessly useless words And gee, we don't know anybody like that, do we?
Douglas Hofstadter: whodat? Ah, yes: Works by Douglas R. Hofstadter (b. 1945)
1979 Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid. The professor of computer science at Indiana University explores human consciousness and the connections among mathematician Kurt Gödel's Incomplete Theorem, the art of M. C. Escher, and the music of Johann Sebastian Bach. Despite its complex subject, it wins the Pulitzer Prize and sells more than 100,000 copies in the year following its publication. (from Answers.com)
I didn't know he was at IU--that's right up the road from me. One of these years I ought to get around to trying to read that book, y'all mention it so often. Am I going to be able to understand it?

RE: Am I going to be able to understand it?

sentences and paragraphs made sense... but pages and chapters didn't!

i think the book would be a great one as a group read along. (not that i am suggesting it!)

i think it would be more understandable with discussion, and with a group (like us) who have some artists (who could show other examples of how art works), and muscians, who could play the music and walk us throught the subtles that we tone deaf miss, (and who could play the music for those of us, who are unable to read music and "hear" it in our heads) and mathmaticians (even if only amature mathmaticians) who could help those who are mathphobic.

for me, understanding of the ideas was elusive.. i would read and understand, but not so well that i could ever explain it to others. -i never 'grokked' the ideas, the connections, the overallness of the book.

it was like one of those random dot astiagrams. (magic pictures) that i could never quite make come into focus.. but could at fleeting times 'see'.

(i can do RDA's in seconds. and i can also 'find' the same optical effect with many other objects. fences, grills (on radiator covers), wicker, screens and other 'regular' interference patterns can be used to create the same 3D effect. --i can pop in and out of focus with these patterns/ on other patterns.)

for me, I think I grokked the ideas, just couldn't make sense of the book...

understand it

Maybe if you try, say, Finnegan's Wake first it might seem comprehensible by comparison. I'm with the consensus here. As long as you don't try to read more than one sentence at a time you'll do just fine.

DH introduces each chapter(?) with a 'conversation' amongst Tortoise, Crab, Achilles, et al. these are quite readable (and clever), and purportedly relate to the gravitas of the chapter.

I like the pictures, too.

it also introduced to me one of my favorite words: bifurcation. and boustrophedonic. cool.