To me, there's nothing like holding a book and turning the pages, do you enjoy reading books on the internet? Do you listen to Books on "Tape"?
Z
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66 comments:
I love to read! My eyes don't let me read as much as I used to.
I should read my Bible more!
Jody Piccoult - My Sister's Keeper
W.E.B. Griffin - By Order Of The President, series
Clive Cussler
Patrick Robinson - U.S.S. Seawolf
Harlan Cobin
I don't know about the Kindle. I like the feel of the pages in my hands!
T.J. Stiles --- "The First Tycoon: The Epic Life of Cornelius Vanderbilt"
Watch out, it will curl your hair.
I do listen to books on tape occasionally.
Generally something like Chaucer where the rhythm is so important and a trained ear brings it out.
The Virtue of Selfishness - Ayn Rand
The Creature from Jeckyll Island - G. Edward Griffin
Easy reading:
Any Stuart Woods book featuring the character Stone Barrington.
"Morgan American Financier" by Jean Strousse. I'm always interested in the days before the world changed before WW I and the onset of the powerful interventions of the "progressive" thinkers.
The book is long but does describe the spirit of the times and show that it was Morgan and his father who were responsible for the importing of the European money to invest in the great industrial expansion of the 19th Century.
Waylon
Faust, by Goethe? :P Just kidding... (inside joke)
Linda, I've been contemplating a Kindle, but I like holding the book, too. Plus, from what I understand, it's ten bucks each time you download! I can get used books for 2-6 bucks and re-sell them or donate them. So I think I'll wait on that. However, you can download books free from your local library, straight to your computer! :-)
Here's what I'm into lately:
Martin Heidegger - Poetry, Language, Thought
Sheldon Vanauken - A Severe Mercy
The Diary of Soren Kierkegaard
WM. Paul Young - The Shack
Robert Johnson- Femininity Lost and Regained
Audiobooks are a lifesaver for me, considering my work commute three times a week.
That, and every time I pick up a 'real' book, my little Genna cannot help herself from going into a 20 questions session, and I wind up reading the same paragraph over and over and over.
Right now, I'm into Sherlock Holmes.
Ooh, Chaucer. It's been a while since I've read that; I should probably revisit it.
Defoe, Dante and Tolkien are old faves, too.
And just for little-redeeming-quality-fun, a Star Trek monthly isn't a bad thing, either.
Mr Z and I gave up heavier reading as we became entrenched in worrying about politics and the terrible place our country's sliding into.......
I suggested mysteries and he loved them....we read all of Josephine Tey and then, my personal favorite, Martha Grimes. For 'get your mind off life' reading, try any of hers, though there is a kind of 'order', you can read them out of order, too.
I miss the characters so very much as I've read them all. I'd finish one, then pass it to him, etc....
Anybody got a mystery writer they adore? Preferably set in England, as Grimes' books are? (She's American and I can't tell you how well she gets every aspect of the British Aisles...fantastic)
"Anybody got a mystery writer they adore? Preferably set in England"
An instance of the fingerpost, by Iain Pears. Brilliant.
I've not held a book in my hand in forever, doing most of my reading online.
I recently listened to Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged" and Stephen Hawking's "A Brief History of Time" on my Ipod.
I think the last paper-paged book I read was one of Terry Pratchett's Discwold novels.
Jen, stay away from Heidegger or we may have to put you on a suicide watch.
"I recently listened to Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged"
Given the philosophical magnitude of her masterwork, it has always amazed me how listening to it on audiotape can effectively result in processing the material.
Can one essentially pause the audio for contemplation and then resume without issue??
I mean a book I get...read a chapter or a handful of pages...set it down to let is simmer on the mind and then pick up sometime later.
Even an audio book of a short fiction novel I get. But Atlas Shrugged is a novel set around an intricate philosophical premise. Having read it 3 times I'm still amazed how someone digesting it for the first time would do so on audio.
I've read Rand's "Atlas Shrugged" before. I think I liked it better when I was younger and more immature.
Ducky,
I'd have thought Heidigger's zeal for burning books and praising national socialism as a fully devoted Nazi under Hitler would put him on your favorites list.
Yes, you probably would think that, Beamish, because you're a low functional.
Go back to head banging.
To each his own I guess. I enjoyed it much more the second and even third time. Of course that was after I'd spent two summers' worth of studies through the institute in Irvine.
"The most thought-provoking thing in our thought-provoking time is that we are still not thinking." - Heidegger
Deep enough for you to grasp with a spoon, Ducky, even without a guitar solo your Fuhrer can't play.
Given the philosophical magnitude of her masterwork ...
------------------------------
Always a favorite
Soapboxgod,
You devoted yourself to Rand a bit more strenuously than I did or could.
To me, Atlas Shrugged reads like bad science fiction rather that a developed philosophical treatise.
Ducky,
I find his poetry beautiful and even life-affirming. But I do get lost at times...
Brooke, thanks for bringing up Tolkien! I've never read him. :P
I have a hard time reading any fiction right now, but that would be a good place to start, with the kids!
Heidegger's one of my proofs that philosophers stopped walking the Earth around the mid 19th Century and haven't come back. He's a lightweight with good PR.
Once you reach the rather imbecilic "Vienna Circle" and the pedantics of logical positivism and post-modernism of the eartly 20th Century, it's no longer the love of knowledge but rather the love of multisyllabic fart noises driving the genre of philosophy.
Ducky, that whoever penned that comic obviously has never read Atlas or simply forgot all about Hugh Akston who, after leaving the head of the Department of Philosophy at Patrick Henry University, where he taught Francisco d'Anconia, John Galt, and Ragnar Danneskjöld, ends up working as a cook in a roadside diner.
"To me, Atlas Shrugged reads like bad science fiction rather that a developed philosophical treatise."
You're not alone in thinking that. Fact is most, not all, people who feel that way have either A) studied or read many books on philosophy; and B) have never read any of Mrs. Rand's other works which deal specifically with the pillars of philosophy (i.e., Metaphysics, Epistemology, Ethics, etc.). Thus, when they get to reading Atlas Shrugged, they have a very limited understanding (if any at all) of those matters for which Mrs. Rand bases her premises upon.
Oooops. Typo
"A) studied or read many books on philosophy"
Should read NEVER studied or read many books on philosophy.
Soapboxgod,
I have studied philosophy.
There's a reason why you have to sign up outside academic philosophy settings to study Ayn Rand's "Objectivism" the main one being that it isn't philosophy in any objective sense. ;)
Boy, Z,
You must have a lot of 'intellectual' readers here. I thought we'd get some ideas for some new books to read. Ayn Rand...I read her/him in HS. I didn't understand it then, and I'm surely not going to read it now. I think people who study 'philosophy' need to get a life. It is like people who graduate from college with a 'liberal arts' degree. Their jobs will contain the words, "Do you want fries with that?"
That's one plausible explanation Beamish. The other is that everything that the philosophy of Objectivism preaches and stands for is the complete and total antithesis of an altruistic society that is preached in the halls of acedemia as well as the churches of today. Thus anything that challenges the traditional orthodoxy becomes quite easily dismissable by those very persons.
Sheldon Vanauken - A Severe Mercy
Jen, isn't that great!? xxx
HEIDEGGER?
I'm talking LIGHT READING HERE, like I said...stuff that takes our minds off heavier things like politics, folks!! :-)
The Duck probably also has the the Communist manifesto narrated by Harry Belacommie.
"I'm talking LIGHT READING HERE, like I said...stuff that takes our minds off heavier things like politics, folks!! :-)"
Youth in Revolt!!!
Z, I read A Severe Mercy for a couple of hours one night and was struck by his description of beauty, and the pain he felt upon observing it. Just frozen still. Pain upon observing beauty. Imagine! Can you relate?! :-)
Then...THEN!!!....I switched to Heidegger right before bedtime and he wrote about the same thing. :-)
I just love it when that happens.
Maybe it was me, in that mindset, but it's what I read.
I'll post it later.
Right now I'm reading - Life After Death - by Dinesh D'Souza.
Like what seems like everyone else here, I also read Atlas Shrugged many years ago. I found it to be decidedly philosophical.
For fun and escape, I read Stephen King. I'm a horror and suspense fan. I know it doesn't sound like fun, but King is a good storyteller and he draws you in.
Pris
I never read Atlas Shrugged, labor theory of value, gold standard, strict philospophic materialism ... the funny thing is she's a Marxist who became a Stalinist, just changed the configuration of the politburo.
Randoids are a gas.
R.E. Neighbour, "If They Shall Fall Away" is absolutely the best exposition on the Book of Hebrews I have ever seen. It opened this Epistle up for me like none other commentary has. It's hard to find, having been published originally around 1940, but worth the trouble!
Soapboxgod,
Everything you can find in Rand you can find in Nietzsche. But Nietzsche was refuted by Kierkegaard before Nietzsche ever picked up a pen, and Solomon gave Kierkegaard everything he needed to know in the book of Ecclesiastes.
And the full circle goes round and round...
Light reading?
If Lord of the Rings / Tolkien / fantasy epics are your thing, Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series will keep you busy for a good long while (the day those are made into films will keep Hollywood in gold for a while)
Pass on the vampire romance "Twilight" craze. In fact, if your bookstore has a wall dedicated to it, run find a bookstore.
It's hard for me to answer a "light reading" question. I'm just as comfortable reading about historical Aztec military tactics as I am a book on reconfiguring Windows XP. I'm a "how to" hard science / history kind of guy, and that unavoidably trickles into politics and philosophy at times.
I've been eyeballing VD Hanson's book on the Peloponnesian Wars, but haven't committed. Summer reading?
Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer(1997)
about the 1996 Mt. Everest disaster. Beautiful, descriptive writing. He also wrote Into the Wild.
For a page turner, but easy reading, Douglas Preston's Impact(2009). It is science fiction, but not the real kind.
Young's The Shack
Andre Bocelli's autobiography until I misplaced it
La Santa Biblia
nerdy engineering stuff
Looking for mysteries? I was talking to someone at work today about Encylopedia Brown. Check it out.
tio
Don't get excited Ducky, everyone who read Atlas Shrugged isn't a Randoid.
Is everyone who's read Alinsky an Alinskyite? You know, leftist rules to live by! Just asking.
Pris
Jen, that is SO cool!
tio......THE SHACK? You're kidding me, right?? YOU?
Linda forgot about Vince Flynn (I have no idea how she could have, as she has given several book reviews at our library on his books). I agree that reading should be fun and most books on "real" stuff is pretty boring. However, I am reading Going Rogue right now and am enjoying it. Most of the time fiction is what turns me on...blood, murder, espionage, navy seals, CIA etc. I'm glad that we don't all have to agree on what is good vs bad books.
I'll post it later.
------
It's up at my place.
:-)
I've just started reading "50 Years in the Church of Rome" by Charles Chiniquy, a man who spent many years of his life in the Catholic Church, left it and lived to tell about what he has witnessed from early in the 19th Century.
Pretty hair-raising stuff about confessionals and how this is used to manipulate those who reveal inner secrets to the priests. Seems this depravity of priests and young boys and girls is not something new but is an innate part of the Church and is carried on today as the current news shows.
Waylon
Lana, good points! Thanks for stopping by.
Jen, I'll check this afternoon...off to a busy day! Thanks..xx
Waylon, what's sad is people draw conclusions about Christianity based on this type of thing. I'm PRETTY SURE that the Bible's against priests sleeping with young boys :-)
Odd, too, that beheadings and preaching death to the West seemingly aren't quite as provoking to our media, isn't it?
Z, perhaps somebody enlightened about the inner working of Catholicism can confirm this ... but my understanding is that the Church of Rome does hold Mary in higher regard than Jesus Christ, upon whose life, teaching and character Christianity is based. So there is a fundamental difference between what most consider Christianity and the real teaching of Catholicism.
The Pope is upheld as God's embodiment on Earth so it is not difficult to see the depravity in the thinking of those who understand the upper echelons in the Church.
Where is that quack when you need him?
Waylon
Waylon, i have to run but wanted to give my take on your comments, which aren't unfounded, of course.
If Mary is the MOTHER of someone and we revere her (solely) (or SOULY?!!:-) for that, how can that person she gave birth to be LESSER than she? Still, she's far more exalted in Catholicism than in Protestantism.
I remember, however, running into a bible study Protestant friend at THE PASSION film, and she said "Yes, I liked it, but Mary was a little too in our face!" I thought "But, she's the MOTHER OF CHRIST!"...I think she deserves some credit, and that God PICKED HER...holy cow! AND that she obeyed and lived the life we think she led.
One big difference in the Catholic church vs Protestantism and Orthodoxy is intercessory prayer, where they go through saints to get to the 'big guys'!
And, yes, the Pope is apparently regarded as you say, but I can't imagine meeting one Catholic who'd put him BEFORE GOD...I don't believe HE would consider himself the 'embodiment', either...but the head of the church?
I hope some Catholics chime in here....I'd like to hear.
My eyes don't permit me to read novels anymore -- and haven't for ten years -- but here are a few I've enjoyed in the past: Treasure your eyesight, and don't waste it reading junk. I thank God I can still read on the computer, but only because I can change the gfont size at will.
Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
Silas Marner - George Eliot
The Mill on the Floss - George Eliot
Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
The Tenant of Wildfell Hall - Ann Bronte
A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
The Old Curiosity Shop - Charles Dickens
Little Dorritt - Charles Dickens
Bleak House - Charles Dickens
The Aspern Papers - Henry James
The Spoils of Poynton - Henry James
The Portrait of a Lady - Henry James
The Turn of the Screw - Henry James
The House of Mirth - Edith Wharton
The Age of Innocence - Edith Wharton
Ethan Frome - Edith Wharton
Afterward - Edith Wharton
Kerfol - Edith Wharton
The Forsyte Saga - John Galsworthy
The Magnificent Ambersons - Booth Tarkington
The Good Earth - Pearl. S, Buck
Peony - Pearl S. Buck
Jamaica Inn - Daphne DuMaurier
Rebecca - Daphne DuMaurier
My Cousin Rachel - Daphne Du Maurier
Droll Tales by Guy de Maupassant
Gigi - Collette
Madame Bovary - Gustav Flaubert
Tales of Mystery and the Imagination - Edgar Allen Poe
The Complete Poems of Edgar Allen Poe
The Collected Works of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (creator of Sherlock Holmes)
The works of P.G. Wodehouse (creator of Jeeves and Bertie Wooster)
The Short Stories of Katharine Mansfield
The complete works of Rex Stout (creator of Nero Wolfe and Archie Goodwin)
The complete works of Agatha Christie (creator of Hercule Poirot, Miss Marple, Tommy and Tuppence, and Mr. Parker-Pyne)
The Poetry of Dorothy Parker
The Complete Poems of Ogden Nash
The Egg and I - Betty Macdonald
The complete works of Mary Laswell (creator of Mrs. Feeley, Miss Tinkham and Mrs. Rasmussen)
The works of Thorne Smith (creator of Topper)
The Wake of the Red Witch - Garland Roark
February Hill - Victoria Lincoln
I Capture the Castle - Dodie Smith
Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House - Eric Hodgins
Mr. and Mrs. Cugat - Isabel Scott Rorick
The Claudia Novels - Rose Franken
Mapp & Lucia - E.F. Benson
Auntie Mame - Patrick Dennis
The complete works of James Herriott (All Creatures Great and Small, etc.)
The Travis McGee novels of John D. McDonald
The Spenser novels of Robert B. Parker (especially Early Autumn)
~ FreeThinke
One more to add to my list:
Bless This House - Norah Lofts
____________________________
I don't read anti-Capitalist screeds ginned up to promote the Marxian View of History, nor do I bother with faked-up "exposés" like the rancid offerings of Kittey Smelley.
The only possibly- defamatory book that caught my attention and held it was Thomas di Lorenzo's unbridled attack on Abraham Lincoln -- something long overdue when you consider the enormity and illegality of Lincoln's actions and the legacy of grief, poverty and desperation he left in his wake.
I was unable to read di Lorenzo's book, because of the eye problems cited earlier, but I have read and heard enough about it to persuade me to believe it has merit. And besides Michael Medved doesn't like it.
~ FreeThinke
Z,
We are reading the Shack in my Bible study small group--where I was suddenly very conscious of how many times "just" was used in prayer.
Have you read it/have an opinion of it?
tio
Ah! A casual remark by Beamish reminded me:
Interview With The Vampire by Anne Rice. Encountered that at Kennedy airport in 1976 waiting to board a flight for London. Bought it on a whim without knowing anything about it, and found it spellbinding -- so much so that it upstaged my first views of London -- well Heathrow Airport.
Never read any of Rice's other stuff. I think she became a sort of Vampire Cottage Industry after her initial success.
So many books -- so little time!
As for "talking books" it's definitely something I ought to investigate, since I can't really read anymore. Don't know why I resist.
The Love/Hate relationship with technology, I suppose?
~ FreeThinke
I don't think any Catholic would describe Mary as superior to Jesus. I think Catholics teach that the mother of the king in ancient times had a special position in being able to intercede with the king. From what I've seen, Catholics don't pray to the saints; they ask the saints to pray on their behalf. This is not in place of praying to God but rather is akin to asking your friends to pray for you.
Catholics believe that Jesus appointed the Pope to act as head of the church following his ascenion. The idea of Jesus ordaining humans to act on his behalf should not be too foreign to Protestants. How often has the Lutheran heard "In the stead and by the command of our Lord Jesus Christ, I forgive you all your sins"?
There are differences between Catholicism and Protestantism, but I think the secular humanists are happy to play a divide and conquer strategy. Let the Protestants portray the Catholics as Mary-worshipping pedophiles. Let the Catholics portray the Protestants as shysters pushing a message of health and wealth. Meanwhile, secular humanism attacks both.
tio
FT,
Anne Bronte? I didn't realize there were more Brontes still coming out of the woodwork.
tio
tio, did you read my comment..? I agree with you...Catholics don't pray TO the Saints, it's intercessory prayer "Saint Anthony, pray for me..."
It drives me nuts when people slam Catholicism as if it's the Anti Christ... many people I know even say "She's Catholic but she IS CHRISTIAN" !!!
It's the BUSINESS of the church I find troubling, like indulgences, etc., but mostly, I think you're right; We don't need anything destroying Christianity even more than the media is!
Of course, the Lutheran blessing is from Pastors only...I say that just in case someone reads that and incorrectly runs with it...
Tio,
There were four Bronte children. Emily and Charlotte were the best known and the most gifted, but their sister Ann wrote very well too. I remember reading The Tenant of Wildfell Hall long ago, just because I was curious about Ann and surprised to learn of her existence. It was a good read.
The sisters had a brother called Branwell. From the little I know he was supposed to be enormously gifted too, but he became enamored of alcohol and possibly drugs early on. As far as I know his life was wasted.
None of them lived very long. They were the children of an Anglican priest. The rectory or vicarage was located on the edge of a moor.
The immense passion, and fantastic quasi-erotic images these girls conjured up in what-is-supposed-to-have-been a stern, repressive, rather dank atmosphere are unique in the annals of English literature, though they've been widely imitated since their first publication.
~ FreeThinke
PS: I don't know how well acquainted the Brontes were with Jane Austen, but Jane preceded them, and they may have been influenced by her. Austen's Northanger Abbey is considered by many to be the first "Gothic Romance."
I hess everything is derivative to some degree or other? The collected Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm must certainly have provided much fodder for literary cannons.
~ FreeThinke
FT, you have the Branwell story right..
I have a male friend who's an author and, when he was about 22, he traveled to Haworth, where they lived, in the moors, and I remember being so touched by his comment that he was with a tour through the house and when they all left the room which had the sofa roped off on which either Charlotte or Emily had languished on before her death, he reached over the rope and drew his hand lightly across the fabric. I'll never forget that.
Sorry, I've not be about for awhile. Couldn't resist this one. Yes to audio books - it's most of my reading. I'm a member of Audible.com. Exceptions abound, and I've gotten a hard copy of more than one book to mark as I listen.
Current recommendations:
> The Lemon Tree - a very personal perspective on the arab/Israeli conflict. A fair author on a biased subject.
> Gandhi and Churchill (Arthur Herman)
> FDR's Folly (Jim Powell)- another excellent work on a topic that's getting more light these days (Amity Shlaes' The Forgotten Man also a best)
> Mao - the Untold Story [of a total, self-centered narcissist]
> Empires of the Sea (Roger Crowley)- gritty account of how the lines drawn at Malta and Lepanto scotched grandiose Ottoman ideas of taking Rome
Freethinke,
You are right, Anne Rice is the vampire queen... accept no substitute, LOL. She also has a series of books on witches, and has melded her vampire and witch stories in crossovers, so that all of her stories are "in the same world."
She also writes erotic takes on childrens stories like Sleeping Beauty that will either turn you on or turn your stomach depending on how you swing, and she's also the author of Exit to Eden, which was made into a movie that saw Rosie O'Donnell shoehorned into lingerie... ugh.
Overall, I'd say stick with her early vampire chronicles and steer away from the smut.
----
Z,
I'm going to hold my typing tongue on spelling out the differences between Christianity and Catholicism so as to not spoil decor without free reign, but you know how I feel. They're nothing like each other.
Tio,
I've read the book, but I wouldn't recommend it to anyone who wasn't a strong Christian in their belief. If you wanted to use it as a way for someone to become a Christian, it could cause lots of problems with their beliefs. 'Just' sayin'.
tio, to be honest, I have not read THE SHACK but I have several Christian friends who have and they say it misrepresents plenty. Sorry I can't discuss it with any real knowledge...I should read it, just to make my own decision, but it's apparently not quite on scripture?
Z,
I did read your comments on the Catholic church. I think we're of a similar mind.
A Catholic friend told me they hear nothing of indulgences in Sunday services. I think indulgences are a part of official Catholic doctrine, but I object to the characterization of the Catholic church's primary purpose being indulgences.
I looked up a couple online criticisms of the Shack. The book is fiction, so it's hard to determine what to attribute to the author's portrayal of God and what to attribute to his story-telling convention.
One of the things that I'd notice and then saw mentioned by minds such as Chuck Colson is the portrayal of God's holiness. The Shack portrays God as having more a buddy buddy relationship with the main character. Not the awe-inspiring images of Isaiah or Moses seeing God.
tio
tio you said "A Catholic friend told me they hear nothing of indulgences in Sunday services. I think indulgences are a part of official Catholic doctrine, but I object to the characterization of the Catholic church's primary purpose being indulgences."
I believe your friend and it's not a huge part of the faith anymore, but it was. And, a Catholic friend of mine said they now display the redeemed cross in many churches instead of the crucifix, neither of which I object to, obviously (I wear one or the other, too), but it's an interesting phenomenon.
I'm not as adverse to Catholicism as most Protestants are and I know MANY very solid Christian Catholics are at my Bible Study.....
I couldn't BE a Catholic, but I have a lot of respect for the members of my family and some long time friends who truly "keep the faith."
However imperfectly it may have represented the Word we owe so much to the Church and the culture it engendered it's impossible to describe. Suffice it to say there would BE no "Western Civilization" without it's influence.
I have respect for anyone who is true to his beliefs, unless those beliefs tell him it's "holy" to go out and murder, rape, rob or otherwise distress those not of his faith.
Even though much of our history is based on it, I detest "competitiveness" among Christian sects.
We all have a right to our beliefs. God will decide soon enough who among us has and has not been true to Him. Some of us may be in for a pleasant surprise and others a rude awakening.
"There's a wideness in God's mercy like the wideness of the sea. There's a kindness in His Justice that transfigures you and me..."
~ FreeThinke
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