Books and Ideas (17)

I read for ideas. Here are some of the ideas I have found in books.

Silas Marner. George Eliot.
Novel. Why read it? To read Silas Marner is to experience a time in England when people knew only their villages and the surrounding countryside. No one living today can appreciate how provincial and limited was their outlook on life. Silas Marner is a wholesome novel that was characterized by a writer in the 1960’s craze for “relevance” as “that Silas Marner crap.” I never read the novel until after I had completed graduate school, expecting something in the nature of “Goody Two-Shoes,” and I was surprised by the delightful scenes of English village life. I should have known from having previously read Middlemarch that George Eliot would never write “crap.”

Some Good in the World: A Life of Purpose. Edward J. Piszek with Jake Morgan.
Why read it? This book, little known, perhaps outside of the Philadelphia, PA, area and possibly in Poland, is an American success story. James Michener: “This is a story that imparts exactly what makes America unique among nations, where any man or woman may start life with few advantages and then—through courage, brilliance, endurance, and hard work—achieve not only great material wealth but also turn that life into the greatest treasure of them all: a life willed with purpose.” Piszek made his wealth from selling frozen fish.

The Spectator, Volume One. Addison , Steele and Others. Ed. Gregory Smith.
Why read it? The Spectator essays were not sermons. They amused. They were short. They made fun of anything that was not common sense. They recommended good manners by making fun of awkward and clumsy manners. Everyone recognized the targets of their humor. The essays also commented thoughtfully on life.

The Spectator, Volume 2. Addison, Steele and Others. Ed. Gregory Smith.
Why read it? In a way, the Spectator papers/essays fulfilled the need for a “Dear Abby” of the 18th century. Unlike Abby’s plain statements, short sentences and familiar vocabulary, the sentences in the Spectator papers are sometimes convoluted and lengthy, and the vocabulary stretches the reader, but the purpose of the Spectator is similar to Abby’s, to resolve problems using common sense. The Spectator papers do a remarkable job of presenting that consistent point of view although Addison and Steele and several other authors originated the papers individually. Take away the name of the author, and the reader will be hard pressed to discern a different style. Addison is more intellectual and Steele is more humorous and the others more prosaic and less imaginative, but the point of view—common sense—remains consistent.

The Star Thrower. Loren Eiseley.
Why read it? Loren Eiseley is a remarkable essayist. A professional scientist, he was an artist with words. Unlike scientists who analyze and dissect to kill, Eiseley retained his understanding of the mystery of life. His essays usually begin with a brief anecdote and he then extends its implications to science and humanity. He is of the school that sees people as a part of nature and nature as one with people, not as people who dominate nature. And he sees evolution as promising that human beings will one day improve themselves through evolution, that human personality will improve to match the wonders of scientific findings. This book collects some of Eiseley’s thought-provoking, memorable essays. When you finish an essay by Loren Eiseley, you will not be finished because you cannot stop thinking about what he has said.

Books and Ideas (16)

I read for ideas. Here are some of the ideas I have found in books.

The Scarlet Letter: A Romance. Nathaniel Hawthorne.
Why read it? A story of life in Puritan New England. Hester Prynne must wear the scarlet letter A on her breast to advertise her guilt as an adulteress, but she will not reveal the name of the father. It is Arthur Dimmesdale, a respected, godly, influential young preacher who has condemned publicly the very sin he has committed. Pursuing knowledge of the identity of the father is Roger Chillingworth, Hester’s husband, an older man, a physician, who had remained in Europe when Hester had come to America. He continually baits Dimmesdale while gathering evidence that he is the father. The book represents Hawthorne’s favorite themes: secret sin and the unpardonable sin of using others for one’s own purposes.

The Schweitzer Album: A Portrait in Words and Pictures. Erica Anderson.
Why read it? The essence of Dr. Schweitzer’s life and thought is respect and reverence for all life. He believed that the idea of reverence for life is spread from person to person, not through the mass media. All life is one. The good preserves and supports life; evil destroys or injures life. Everything that lives is related to humanity. The fly knows anxiety, hope and fear of not existing any more. Has any man been able to create a fly? Schweitzer earned degrees in philosophy, theology and medicine. He dedicated the first 30 years of his life to scholarship and music; the rest of his life would be dedicated to the service of men, modeling his life on Jesus Christ.

Seabiscuit: An American Legend. Laura Hillenbrand.
Why read it? You will have a hard time putting this book down. My first impression is that the people who know horses treat them as individuals. Treating horses as individuals was important to the success of Seabiscuit, who would have resisted working for anyone who did not recognize his personal traits, his toughness, his heart, his rebelliousness, his determination and the absolute need never to use the whip. Tom Smith was a horse training genius who studied his horses, notably Seabiscuit, to learn what he could about them as individuals.

Selling Sickness: How the World’s Biggest Pharmaceutical Companies Are Turning Us All into Patients. Ray Monihan and Alan Cassels.
Why read it? Ordinary people with common complaints are being turned into patients by pharmaceutical companies who market drugs through doctors and directly to consumers. “Awareness campaigns” make people concerned abut conditions that are part of the fluctuations of normal living. Little known conditions are emphasized; old diseases are redefined and renamed; new dysfunctions are created. Drug companies market fear in order to sell medications.

Sense and Sensibility. Jane Austen
Novel. Why read it? Two sisters have dramatically different personalities. Elinor is cool in crisis, objective, keeps emotion in check, sees and accepts the world as it is. Marianne is emotional, uncontrolled, blows apart in crisis. The two are jilted. How do they handle this disappointing turn in their lives?

Sketches by Boz [Rhymes with ‘nose”]. Charles Dickens.
Why read it? Dickens paints pictures with words. A collection of brief scenes of English life that are wonderfully entertaining and moving.

Solitude: A Return to Self. Anthony Storr.
Why read it? An in-depth analysis of the nature and uses of solitude. Interesting anecdotes. However, the author concludes that happiness comes from both personal interrelationships and solitude. Took a whole book to arrive at what appears to be plain common sense. Except that in today’s world, solitude is hard to come by. If you have never tried solitude, this book could cause you to try enjoying its advantages.

Books and Ideas (15)

I read for ideas. Here are some of the ideas I have found in books.

Robert Kennedy and His Times. Vol. 1. Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr.
Why read it? To realize the opportunities the world has lost because of Robert Kennedy’s assassination. Schlesinger divides the topics in the book among RFK’s growing up; his shyness and feelings of inferiority to his brothers; his physical exertions; his mixed achievement in school; his work in Congressional investigations, including those concerned with corrupt unions; his work in organizing his brother’s Senatorial and Presidential campaigns; his work as Attorney General and his battle with institutional inertia, particularly the FBI and J. Edgar Hoover; his work with his brother on Civil Rights; his trips to foreign, unfriendly countries in which he confronted aggressive criticism of the United States, especially from the young; and his work with his brother during the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Robert Kennedy and His Times, Vol. 2. Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr.
Why read it? Robert Kennedy was a “profile in courage.” The second volume of this biography of RFK covers the period of the assassination of his brother, his stormy relationship with LBJ, becoming the Junior Senator from New York, considering the vice-presidency under LBJ and, finally, when the he realizes that Vietnam is tearing American society apart, the run for the presidency that is halted by his own assassination.

Roughing It. Mark Twain.
Why read it? Mark Twain’s impressions of the “wild West” are sometimes hilarious, sometimes vivid and always interesting. Twain describes pioneering in the West, riding in a stage coach; the Pony Express; the Mormon Bible (“chloroform in print”); the “scholarly” Indians in The Last of the Mohicans; a landslide; a character who knows everyone he meets or a relative; the colorful idiomatic language of the West; lawyers—“First and last aim…was to defeat justice”; the belief that everything that happens is good if we wait long enough to find out—“Prov’dence don’t fire no blank ca’tridges, boy”; the missionaries who converted the natives of Hawaii to Christianity and made them permanently miserable; and Brigham Young and polygamy.

The Roots of Heaven. Romain Gary.
Novel. Why read it? The slaughter of the elephants will lead to man’s slaughter of mankind. Morel, the idealistic defender of elephants, is the moral of this story. Opposed to the slaughter of the elephants in Africa, and laughingstock to most of the people around him, he mounts a campaign to gather signatures to stop the slaughter of the elephants. However, he is not just defending the elephants, who are a symbol of freedom, man’s freedom. He is trying to show men that they can be the sensitive, moral, compassionate creatures that they are in potential. His selfless obsession for saving the elephants attracts a number of people who have other agendas—but their agendas fade as Morel’s quest to save the elephants takes on a higher purpose—to save men from their own self-destruction. For what they do to the elephants, they will do to themselves. Morel is confident that he will achieve his goal, so confident, so sure, that he fears not for his safety. He is the exemplar of what he wants men to become.

Saints and Strangers. George F. Willison.
Why read it? The author set out to separate the myths and the truth about the Pilgrims. The author found that much of what he thought he knew about the Pilgrims was wrong and learned that he did not really know much about them. The Pilgrims, “Separatists” from the Church of England, had emigrated to Leyden, the Netherlands, and then sailed on the Mayflower to found Plymouth Colony in 1620. While the Leyden group held the power and were the motivating force behind the voyage, the majority of the group consisted of “strangers,” non-Pilgrims. This story is as much about the “strangers” as the “Saints.”

Books and Ideas (14)

I read for ideas. Here are some of the ideas I have found in books.

Poland. James A. Michener.
Why read it? To learn why the Polish people are far more courageous than the Polish jokes that are their stereotype. It’s a novel, of course, but most of Michener’s “novels” are really loaded with information about his topics, almost an encyclopedia, but told in story form. Michener is Polish and he wrote this novel to help people in the rest of the world understand the peculiar circumstances that makes Poland what it is—a country beset by large powers that have torn it apart, brutalized it, yet produced people of courage who never give up trying to live productive lives.

Portrait of a Lady. Henry James.
Novel. Why read it? Henry James studies the relationships between the American character and the staid, aristocratic Europeans. In this novel, Isabel Archer visits American relatives who have lived for a long time in Britain and who have adopted the British view of belief in a stratified society with special emphasis on proper manners. Isabel’s American/British relatives enjoy observing her in action, watching to see how she deals with certain situations. Isabel is manipulated by the sophisticated and socially polished Madame Merle into marrying an aristocratic, impoverished aesthete who tries to control her after they are married. At first, Isabel rebels and leaves him, but then returns because of the marriage bonds.

Pensées. Blaise Pascal.
Why read it? The first half of Pascal’s Pensées is profound. At one point, I considered Pascal’s Pensées to be the Christian counterpoint to Islam’s Koran, “the only book needed in the world.” The second half of the book, arguing that the Catholic Church is the answer to the conundrums and dilemmas of humanity, is interesting, but less profound.

Pride and Prejudice. Jane Austen.
Novel. Why read it? Quite a few people say that Pride and Prejudice is their favorite novel. Austen’s view of marriage is both satirical and reverent. She makes fun of most veteran wedded couples who are, as is true in most marriages that I have observed, misfits, but the realities of marriage do not stop Elizabeth and Jane, her sister, from seeing marriage as their ultimate goal for achieving happiness in life. Elizabeth represents prejudice; Darcy represents pride. Elizabeth thinks Darcy is an arrogant aristocratic snob. Darcy thinks Elizabeth’s family—but not Elizabeth—is beneath his social standing as an aristocrat. Will they get together?

Profiles in Courage. John F. Kennedy.
Why read it? It is not easy to vote according to conscience if you are a politician. This book puts political courage into the context of the forces with which politicians must concern themselves, including loss of their careers if they act courageously. This book is as much about the abuse that politicians suffered in public as it is the tenacity with which they voted according to conscience.

Ragtime. E.L. Doctorow.
Novel. Why read it? In this novel, Doctorow presents an impression of the ragtime era, the period before WWI. These were the “good old days.” With vivid prose and facts, Doctorow paints a picture of a raw American society divided into a few very rich and many poor. It was the era of immigrants, slavery in the coal mines, women without equal rights and child labor. In this novel, you will gain a realistic view of just how “good” the “old days” were.

Essays and Lectures. Ralph Waldo Emerson.
Why read it? Because Emerson will make you think. He writes in sentences, each sentence suggestive, freighted with ideas. His sentences are like a stone skipping across the pond—each idea leading to other ideas in never-ending concentric circles He writes in prose but his images create poetry. When you read Emerson, be ready to think and to reflect for surprisingly long periods.

Books and Ideas (13)

I read for ideas. Here are some of the ideas I have found in books.

On Writing Well: An Informal Guide to Writing Nonfiction. Second Edition. William Zinsser.
Why read it? A helpful book on all aspects of writing nonfiction, including articles and business communications. Zinsser is especially critical of “clutter” in American writing. He discusses audience, the size of paragraphs and usage. Everyone can learn something about how to write better from reading this book. I guarantee it.

Civilization: A Personal View. Kenneth Clark.
Why read it? History of Western civilization. A personal study of the nature of civilization, which needs confidence to construct and is easily destroyed.

Deephaven. Sarah Orne Jewett.
Novel. Why read it? Two young women spend an idyllic summer vacation in Deephaven, once a thriving Maine seaport town. Will remind readers of their own idyllic summer vacations.

Fox at the Wood’s Edge. Loren Eiseley. Gale Christianson.
Why read it? Biography of a scientist, a paleontologist and poet who wrote essays on nature and the meaning of evolution. Some of his essays are unforgettable. He conveys a melancholy, yet joyous, view of life. The miracles he discovers are found in everyday existence.

The Immense Journey. Loren Eiseley.
Why read it? Series of essays concerned with the meaning of evolution. Eiseley views evolution as a continuing process, changing to become—who knows what? Men and women as they are now will not be the men and women of the far future. We are working out what we are going to be.

Medea. Euripides.
Why read it? The ultimate revenge. This play is the story of a woman scorned, who took vicious revenge on her lover, Jason.

A Random Walk in Science: An Anthology. Compiled by RL Weber. Ed. E Mendoza. Foreword by William Cooper.
Why read it? Before you take science too seriously, you need to read this anthology. Parts of it are very, very funny. 133 selections record anecdotes about noted scientists, items of historical interest and articles showing the often bizarre ways in which scientific theories and achievements are brought into existence.

The Red Badge of Courage. Stephen Crane.
Novel. Why read it? A realistic, impressionistic description of confusion and fear and death in the American Civil War, written by an author who had never seen a real battle, but describes the scenes so vividly that “you are there.” War is all about irony. The irony of Henry Fleming’s illusion that he will be a hero when engaging in combat, but when faced with the reality of the conflict, he turns and runs. And justifies his cowardice to himself. The irony of being struck accidentally on the head by a fellow soldier’s rifle, giving Henry his “red badge of courage,” the sign to others that he had actually fought and been wounded during the battle. In turn, he feels courageous because of his “red badge.” In the end, Henry Fleming forgets himself, forgets his doubts, joins in the shooting, becomes one with the other men on the lines.

The Road Ahead. William H. Gates, III.
Why read it? Bill Gates, founder of Microsoft, predicts the changes in the world that will happen because of the computer and the Internet. He is not far off. “There will be a day, not far distant, when you will be able to conduct business, study, explore the world and its cultures, call up any great entertainment, make friends, attend neighborhood markets and show pictures to distant relatives—without leaving your desk or armchair.”

Books and Ideas (12)

I read for ideas. Here are some of the ideas I have found in books.

The Once and Future King. T.H. White.
Why read it? A delightful story of the education for leadership of King Arthur by Merlyn. Part of his training was in learning to live with the animals and gain their perspective. His purpose in founding the Round Table was to channel the natural aggressiveness of men into fighting for good causes.

The Outermost House: A Year of Life on the Great Beach of Cape Cod. Henry Beston.
Why read it? Like Thoreau at Walden, Beston took up a solitary residence in a cottage on the beach where he could observe the life of the sand and the dunes and the moods of the ocean.

Oxford Book of Aphorisms. John Gross, Ed.
Why read it? There’s much wisdom in this collection of aphorisms listed by topic. Perhaps the best advice for reading books of aphorisms is the aphorism on page 2: “The only way to read a book of aphorisms without being bored is to open it at random and having found something that interests you, close the book and meditate.” Prince DeLigne, 1796.

The Ordeal of Mark Twain. Van Wyck Brooks.
Why read it? To understand why Mark Twain did not become America’s Shakespeare. According to the author, Twain was a writer who could have made a significant contribution to the world’s literature, but became sidetracked by his success and popularity as a humorist. Possibly explains his extreme bitterness in the latter part of his life. He never fulfilled his destiny. Desired wealth and prestige as well as fulfillment of his creative instinct. He couldn’t have both.

Out of Chaos. Louis J. Halle.
Why read it? To understand the apparent contradiction between accident in the foundations of matter and order in its developed form, between molecules bouncing by chance from one to another like pinballs and a fully grown, fully developed human being. The closer our perspective, the more chaotic things appear to be; the wider and broader our perspective, the more ordered things appear to be.

The Passions of the Mind: A Novel of Sigmund Freud. Irving Stone.
Why read it? To understand Freud’s ideas in relatively plain English. All right. It’s a fictionalized biography of Freud, and not one of Stone’s best, either. [His best fictionalized novel was Lust for Life on Vincent Van Gogh.] Freud’s original writing reads like a textbook and so does Stone’s fictionalized biography. But the novel does explain Freud’s thought in readable prose so that ordinary people like me can understand his ideas. Freud suggested that childhood experiences significantly affected adult lives. Freud was viciously insulted for his work in describing the reality of human nature. Inhibitions are caused by repressed instinctual drives. Freud showed us how much of our rational lives is influenced by the unconscious.

Persuasion. Jane Austen.
Novel. Why read it?. To appreciate Jane Austen’s humorous observation of the people in her social circle and her keen sense of the place of women in her society. The heroine, Anne Elliot, and her lover, Captain Wentworth, were engaged for eight years before the story begins but Anne broke the engagement in deference to family and friends—they didn’t like him. Reunited, they fall in love again. Austen’s impressions of the people around her are delightful.

The Pickwick Papers. Charles Dickens.
Why read it? Novel. One of the funniest books ever written. The history of the Nimrod Club, the members of which go out shooting, fishing, etc., and get themselves into difficulty because of their lack of dexterity. In short, a club of klutzes. A mixture of wit and wisdom; the introduction of Sam Weller (pronounced, “Veller”) and his widow-hating father. The sheer joy in using language. Simply hilarious.

Books and Ideas (11)

I read for ideas. Here are some of the ideas I have found in books.

Northanger Abbey. Jane Austen.
Novel. Why read it? Satirizes the genre of Gothic mansions with mysterious goings on and horror. I think this novel illustrates Austen’s versatility within the limited experiences she was able to describe. Of course, for another point of view on the Gothic, read Edgar Allen Poe.

Notes from Turtle Creek. Ted Browning.
Essays. Why read it? Makes a convincing argument for man’s learning to live with nature, not exterminate it. A local (Chester County, PA) naturalist helps us to see the world of nature with a fresh view. You’ll never look at nature again in the same way after reading these essays. Ted Browning is right there with Loren Eiseley and Joseph Wood Krutch, though not so well known. They all believe that people should be partners with nature, not dominate it.

Not So Wild a Dream. Eric Sevareid.
Autobiography. Why read it? Most of this book describes Sevareid’s experiences in WWII as a reporter and commentator. To those who heard and watched him on TV or read his newspaper columns, Eric Sevareid expressed himself concisely and memorably. He never wasted a word. One of his prominent traits was irony. This book helps people who are not familiar with Eric Sevareid to learn from him again.

Notre Dame of Paris. Allan Temko.
Nonfiction. Why read it? This book re-creates for the reader the world in which Paris's Notre Dame Cathedral was built. Construction of the cathedral occurred because of the extraordinary faith of the people of its time—the world which Henry Adams describes as a unified society built around the Catholic religion and the universal love for the Virgin Mary. To read this book is to engage actively in the construction of one of the world’s great monuments to faith.

On Aggression. Konrad Lorenz.
Nonfiction. Why read it? To understand something about the causes and cures of human aggression. The author claims to have studied aggressive behavior in animals and to have drawn conclusions from their behavior that might help humans to control the aggressive instinct. Suggests that the aggressive instinct in humans be redirected toward the goals of art, science and medicine—beauty, truth and the alleviation of suffering.

Only Yesterday. Frederick Lewis Allen.
Why read it? Remember the 1920s? You will while reading this book, even though you did not live in the 1920s. Allen vividly re-creates the time that I think marks the beginning of modern society in the United States. You will recognize many of the practices that originated in the 1920s today in the 21st century. The era of the 1920s, from the end of World War I to the collapse of the stock market in 1929, is one of the most colorful decades in U.S. history.

On the Road. Jack Kerouac.
Novel. Why read it? To understand the spirit of the 1950’s that led to the spirit of the 1960’s. In On the Road, the mood is one of “Go!” Stay for any period of time and you will feel the urge to “Go!” Travel back and forth across the U.S. See the different social classes in action. Gather impressions of America in the 1950s. This novel is a “beat” classic, and the tempo of the book carries the reader frenetically through changing moods and experiences in different parts of the country.