#14: Julius Caesar by William Shakespeare

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100 books, book review, books, drama, Shakespeare

Over the next six weeks, my students will be reading and studying my favorite of Shakespeare‘s plays, Julius Caesar.  I decided to read it again yesterday to refresh my memory before making my lesson plans.  If you have not read Julius Caesar, you should be ashamed!  It is the classic version of the assassination of Caesar by Marcus Junius Brutus and his co-conspirators.  The play features some of Shakespeare’s most memorable lines and has influenced countless later works of literature.  Antony’s funeral oration is a study in the use of propaganda (and will make for some great lessons).  The examination of what makes power legitimate and how far men are entitled to go in defense of their liberties is as relevant today as it was in Caesar’s Rome or Shakespeare’s England.  I am extremely excited about teaching this play for the next few weeks!

The Current Count:

14 Read, 86 To Go

#13: The Spy Who Came in from the Cold by John le Carre

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100 books, book review, books, le Carre

Every so often, a book comes out of nowhere to completely blow you away.  The Spy Who Came in from the Cold by John le Carre was one of those books for me.  Based on the recommendation of my friend Luke Walker, I picked up book number thirteen from Half Price Books earlier this week.  I expected an action book with a good plot.  What I got was much more.   The Spy Who Came in from the Cold tells the story of Cold War spy Alec Leamas, who agrees to a final mission for British covert intelligence in an effort to stave off his inevitable retirement from field work.  The mission is incredibly dangerous, but Leamas is willing to take the risk in order to eliminate his East German rival, Hans-Dieter Mundt.  Leamas pretends to defect in an effort to make the East Germans believe Mundt is a British double agent.  I won’t say what the outcome is, because I do not want to spoil this book.  If you like espionage books, read it.  If you like mystery books, read it.  If you like crisp, intelligent prose, read it.  Le Carre’s book transcends the espionage genre.  It is a reflection on the nature of Cold War foreign policy and a scathing indictment of utilitarian political theory (the good of the many outweighs the good of the few).  It is a touching look at the impact of love on even the most hardened individuals.  Most significantly, it is a wonderfully perceptive examination of human nature and the modern world’s total indifference to it.

The Current Count:

13 Read, 87 To Go

#12: Human, All Too Human by Friedrich Nietzsche

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100 books, book review, books, classics, literature, Nietzsche, philosophy

Nietzsche is a philosopher with the heart of a poet (and a mustache that makes Tom Selleck look like a 13 year old working towards his first shave).  Human, All Too Human contains 638 aphorisms on a variety of subjects, including religion, philosophy, aesthetics, science, ethics, and more.  The book falls in the middle part of Nietzsche’s career, when his philosophy is tempered by a subtle sympathy for the common man and contemporary culture.  This is Nietzsche looking ahead to what will come, but not ordering the reader to force its coming.  Nietzsche’s wit is sharp and his prescience is remarkable.  Many of his cultural prophecies have come true in the century since his death.

You cannot argue with a mustache like that.

Let me be clear– this is not a fun book to read.  It is, however, a brilliant book.  Nietzsche has an uncanny ability to point out exactly those things that shame us most about our natures.  It is subtitled A Book For Free Spirits, and the free spirit is what Nietzsche believes we all should be but lack the courage to become.  This concept is a clear precursor to the Ubermensch of Thus Spoke Zarathustra.  Many other ideas that are central to Nietzsche’s later philosophy make their first appearance in Human, All Too Human.  The structure of this book makes it easier to digest than some of his other works.  He does not attempt to offer a complete philosophical system.  Instead, we are presented with his observations about the state of everything he sees.  If you are new to Nietzsche, Human, All Too Human is a good place to start.

The Current Count:

12 Read, 88 To Go

#11: A Moveable Feast by Ernest Hemingway

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100 books, book review, books, classics, Hemingway, literature, Nobel Prize, Paris, travel

Papa Hemingway provides my eleventh book of the year.  A Moveable Feast is a collection of memoirs from Hemingway’s time in Paris during the early 1920’s.  The story behind the book is an interesting one.  In 1956 a trunk was discovered in the basement of the Ritz Hotel in Paris containing notebooks Hemingway had filled during his time in the city.  He had them transcribed and worked on editing them into book form during the last few years of his life.  His fourth wife edited the manuscript following his death.  The end result was controversial, with many experts later questioning the validity of Mary Hemingway’s edits.  Another (equally controversial) edition has since been published, edited by a Hemingway grandson. 

Hemingway in Paris

 

A Moveable Feast is an enjoyable read but is not my favorite Hemingway work.  It contains many fine examples of the classic Hemingway style, but has a somewhat artificial feeling.  Whether it is the result of posthumous edits or Hemingway trying to recapture a youth that lived up to his tremendous reputation, the book doesn’t have the same depth of emotion as his short stories, novels, or other non-fiction works such as Death in the Afternoon.  The book does paint a romantic and irresistible picture of a time and place that no longer exist.  Hemingway makes 1920’s Paris sound like a Bogart movie put on paper.  His descriptions of meals, locations, and people are charming and evocative.  Read it for the glimpse of a bygone era and for the glimpse of Hemingway before he was the legend.  Just don’t read it expecting another For Whom the Bell Tolls.

The Current Count:

11 Read, 89 To Go

#10: The Elements of Style by Strunk and White

Tags

100 books, books, classics, education, writing

After a very funkadelic week, I completed my tenth book of the year on Thursday.  The Elements of Style by William Strunk and E.B. White is a rare thing– an enjoyable grammar book.  The book was created by college professor Strunk as a guide for his writing students.  E.B. White (of Charlotte’s Web fame) was one of those students.  He later added to the book, contributing a guide to style.  Throughout the book, both Strunk and White are charming and amusing.  The guidelines are presented in a way that makes sense and are not overly academic.  The section on commonly misused words and phrases should be required reading for college freshmen.  The entire book should be required reading for high school freshmen (I teach sophomores and they could use a grammatical refresher before they get to me).  I have used the book in a patchwork manner for several years, and am now teaching writing skills tutorials based on it.  After reading it in its entirety for the first time, I have no doubt that this is the ideal grammar and style guide.  If you write at all, you need to read this book.

The Current Count:

10 Read, 90 To Go

Bring in the funk…

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100 books, books, literature, reading

George Clinton- Knows a thing or two about the funk.

I apologize for the lack of promised posts over the past week, but I have been deep in a reading funk.  Despite being partway through several different books a week ago, I have only managed to complete one since then.  Instead of finishing my eleventh and twelfth books of the year, I have been staring blankly at pages, dozing with a book on my chest, or trying to force my way through a book only to land on “How I Met Your Mother” instead.  I wanted to read.  I tried to read.  For some reason, I just couldn’t read more than two painful pages before giving up.  The funk only ended yesterday, when I finally finished one book and made good progress on another.  I don’t know why yesterday was different, but it all finally clicked.  The funk now defeated, I should have multiple reviews soon.  If I am going to get to 100 before the end of the year, I need to avoid returning to the funk.  Have you ever gone through a similar funk?  Couldn’t find your reading groove?  What can be done to get over it?  Suggestions would be greatly appreciated!

#9: The Comedy of Errors by William Shakespeare

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100 books, book review, books, classics, drama, literature, Shakespeare

After trudging part of the way through both Homer’s Iliad and Nietzsche’s Human, All Too Human, I decided to take a break and read something a bit more lighthearted.  Shakespeare is the obvious choice, right?  I am an English teacher, and as you might suspect, I love Shakespeare.  He and Milton are the two authors that make the English language sound the best it possibly can.  One of my eventual goals is to read every one of Shakespeare’s plays.  Before yesterday, I had read 14 out of roughly 38 (a few are disputed).  Most of those 14 are either tragedies or histories.  Yesterday I decided to kill two birds with one stone.  I would read another Shakespeare play, but I would read a comedy to lighten things up after several days with Homer and Nietzsche.

I settled on The Comedy of Errors.  This is definitely one of Shakespeare’s lighter plays.  It features two sets of twin brothers separated at birth.  One set of twins are wealthy, and the other set are poor.  The parents of the wealthy twins purchase the poor twins shortly after birth to be lifelong servants for their two sons.  A shipwreck on the way home separates the family.  The father is rescued by one boat with a twin from each set, and the mother is rescued by another boat with the other two twins.  Twenty years later, the two sets of twins wind up in the same city and an amusing sequence of events follows.  Each twin has the same name as his brother, though none of them know it.  Repeatedly mistaken identities, marital strife exacerbated by the mix-ups, beatings, arrests, and accusations of demonic possession make this play an extremely enjoyable farce. 

Many critics have dismissed The Comedy of Errors as simple comedic fluff.  I strongly disagree.  Beyond his linguistic skill, I believe that one of Shakespeare’s greatest gifts is his perception of relationship dynamics.  All of his plays read as studies in interpersonal relations.  The Comedy of Errors showcases a multitude of relationships in a very insightful way.  I also thought that the confusion regarding the identity of the twins can offer an interesting perspective on the world we currently inhabit, with identity theft such an enormous problem.  I would recommend The Comedy of Errors to any Shakespeare fan looking for a change of pace from the histories and tragedies.  I should have another post or two in the next few days, so please check back soon!

The Current Count:

9 Read, 91 To Go

Month in Review: January

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100 books, books

Despite the flu’s best efforts to take me out, I made it to February!  I thought a post reviewing my progress thus far would be in order.  Without any further ado, here is my Month in Review for January 2011.

I got through seven books in January, which gives me an average of one book every 4.4 days.  That is behind the average of 1/3.65 needed to get 100 in the year.  In other words, I need to step it up in February.

On the bright side, last year I only read five books in January.  That means I am ahead of last year’s pace (that ended with 63 read).

Here is the breakdown:

3 Novels: Cancer Ward, The Sirens of Titan, and Rosshalde

1 Collection of Short Stories: Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned

1 Poetry Collection: A Boy’s Will

1 History Book: The River War

1 Philosophical Book: Of the Conduct of the Understanding

Best Book of January: Cancer Ward by Alexander Solzhenitsyn

I enjoyed all seven books that I read over the past month, but Cancer Ward was my favorite.  If you haven’t already, find a copy and read it.

My February target is eight books.  Stay tuned for my progress!

#8: Churchill: An Unruly Life by Norman Rose

Tags

100 books, book review, books, Churchill, history

One month and eight books down!  As noted previously, I am obsessed with Winston Churchill.  The man was fascinating.  No single 20th century figure looms larger over the Western world than Churchill.  The story of his life ensures that any biography will be an entertaining read.  This particular volume is relatively short, with 346 pages of text and roughly another 100 of Notes and References.  Compare that to the excellent single volume biography by Roy Jenkins (1000 pages), William Manchester’s two-volume (so far) The Last Lion (roughly 900 pages each), or the massive official biography by Randolph Churchill and Martin Gilbert (8 volumes and a dozen companions).  If you want a biography that gives you every detail of Churchill’s life, Rose’s book is not for you.  It does include several interesting anecdotes that I had not read in other sources.  The difficulty in writing a shorter biography of Churchill is deciding how many pages to spend on the different periods of his life.  Rose’s book gives roughly equal space to all phases of Churchill’s life and career.  The result is that some chapters give far less detail than desired (specifically the WW2 and post-war chapters).  Ultimately, I would only recommend Rose’s book to people who have read numerous other Churchill biographies.  Rose’s goal from beginning to end is to show the ‘other side’ of Churchill, the unpredictable and unreliable genius whose one paramount triumph overshadows his numerous failures.  I do not think that Churchill is perfect.  He made many, many mistakes.  My complaint with Rose is that in his effort to avoid hagiography he has produced a negatively skewed book.  It is a good book for Churchill fanatics that need to be reminded that Winston is human, but is not a fair portrait of one of history’s great individuals.

The Current Count:

8 Read, 92 To Go