Random Number Lit

This is probably the most research I have put into a Small Works List entry. It often happens that I have no idea who the author is and what they have written that is most significant. I am thinking here of Ki No Tsurayuki and trying to track down what he wrote inside of the Kokin Wakashu. Then I think about Guaman Poma whose name couldn’t have been more obscure from me, but it was clear what the document he would be known for. Isaac Newton also presented some problems for me to get a document that I could actually understand.    Christopher Columbus is probably one of the most famous, or infamous, people who ever lived. Towns, Countries, parks, statues, a national holiday that has recently been renamed (and for good reason), and there isn’t a clear book or text that he wrote? How odd is that? I did a bit of Googling and I found that Penguin Classics has a collection of documents that they package together and call it the 4 voyages. I ordered this book to find out th

 I saac Newton (Small Works List) Let me tell you something from the jump here, I am not a scientist. I pulled the name Isaac Newton from the Small Works List because, you know, whatever and I called an astronomer that I know, Stephen Case, and asked him what do I have to read to get to know Isaac Newton. Newton wrote prolifically in his life, but the main thing he wrote was the Principia which is a 400 page ancient math text book. I thought I might read this. He said no. He gave me an abridged version that breaks it down into his physics stuff which was 70 pages. I read 20 pages of this and stopped. I am not a physics person. I then found a copy of the Principia whose whole edition is 900 pages long with 400 of which the manuscript itself. I looked at every page of this text for longer bits of prose in between the math stuff. This was still impenetrable. I found two sections worth reading, one the Scholium in between Book 2 Section 6 and 7. Here he talks about how he se