The Reading List – The W’s, Y’s and Z’s

Well, this is the last of the "book" list postings.  I hope you've taken something from it and I want to continue to encourage readers to recommend anything missing. 

Happy reading!

Ross

All the King’s Men, Robert Penn Warren

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, Max Weber

Night, Elie Weisel

The Eye of the Story, Eudora Welty

Collected Stories, Eudora Welty

Leaves of Grass, Walt Whitman
Collected Poems, Richard Wilbur
Letters, Oscar Wilde
The Picture of Dorian Gray, Oscar Wilde
The Complete Poetical Works, William Wordsworth
Fides et Ratio, Karol Wojtyła
The Jeweler’s Shop, Karol Wojtyła
Person and Community, Karol Wojtyła
Veritatis Splendor, Karol Wojtyła
Mrs. Dalloway, Virginia Woolf
The Waves, Virginia Woolf

Collected Poems, William Butler Yeats

Germinal, Emile Zola

The Reading List – The T’s and V’s

We are coming to the end of this list but would still appreciate any additions you think would be needed.

Ross

The Talmud,

Collected Poems, Allen Tate

Essays of Four Decades, Allen Tate

On Disinterest, John Tauler

Vanity Fair, William M. Thackeray

Collected Poems, Dylan Thomas

The Imitation of Christ, Thomas a Kempis

Walden, Henry David Thoreau

Essays, Henry David Thoreau

History of the Peloponnesian War, Thucydides

Democracy in America, Alexis de Tocqueville

Anna Karenina, Leo Tolstoy

The Cossacks, Leo Tolstoy

War and Peace, Leo Tolstoy

The Barchester Chronicles, Anthony Trollope

Fathers and Sons, Ivan Turgenev

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain

The Gospel of Truth, Valentinus

A Commonitory, Vincent of Lerins

The Aeneid, Virgil

Candide, Voltaire

Slaughterhouse-Five, Kurt Vonnegut

The Reading List – The S’s

This is a big swath of books but there are some shatteringly important ones as well.  Enjoy and again, let me know if you have a suggestion.

Ross 

No Exit, Jean-Paul Sartre

Don Quixote, Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

On Religion: Speeches to its Cultured Despisers, Friedrich Schleiermacher

Medea, Seneca

Cymbeline, William Shakespeare

Hamlet, William Shakespeare

King Lear, William Shakespeare

Macbeth, William Shakespeare

A Midsummer’s Night Dream, William Shakespeare

Much Ado About Nothing, William Shakespeare

Othello, William Shakespeare

Selected Sonnets, William Shakespeare

Major Critical Essays, George Bernard Shaw

Man and Superman, George Bernard Shaw

Frankenstein, Mary W. Shelley

The Wealth of Nations, Adam Smith

One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

Oedipus the King, Sophocles

Oedipus at Antigone, Sophocles

Oedipus at Colonus, Sophocles

The Ballad of Peckham Rye, Muriel Spark

Pia Desideria, Phillip Jakob Spener

Grapes of Wrath, John Steinbeck

Of Mice and Men, John Steinbeck

The Red and the Black, Stendhal

Collected Poems, Wallace Stevens

Essays, Robert Louis Stevenson

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Robert Louis Stevenson

Life of Jesus, David F. Strauss

Dracula, Bram Stroker

The Little Book of Eternal Wisdom, Henry Suso

Gulliver’s Travels, Jonathan Swift

The Reading List – The R’s

Please add to the list with a comment and explanation if you something that should be added.

Ross

Gargantua and Pantagruel, François Rabelais
Atlas Shrugged, Ayn Rand
Selected Poems, John Crowe Ransom
The World’s Body, John Crowe Ransom
The Social Gospel, Walter Rauschenbusch
The Confessions, Jean-Jacques Rousseau
On the Origin of Inequality, Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Social Contract, Jean-Jacques Rousseau
A History of the Crusades, Steven Runciman

The Reading List – The O’s and P’s

Another installment of great books. I wanted to do a post entitled the P's and Q's but I don't have any books under the latter. Perhaps, you know one? Or any other book for that matter that should be on the list. Send a comment.

Ross

Quodlibetal Questions, William of Ockham
The Complete Stories, Flannery O’Connor
Everything that Rises Must Converge, Flannery O’Connor
Mystery and Manners, Flannery O’Connor
The Violent Bear it Away, Flannery O’Connor
War Blood, Flannery O’Connor
One Thousand and One Nights,
On First Principles, Origen
On Prayer, Origen
1984, George Orwell
Animal Farm, George Orwell

Pensées, Blaise Pascal
The Essential Writings, Charles S. Peirce
Oration of the Dignity of Man, Pico della Mirandola
Leisure: the Basis of Culture, Josef Pieper
The Philosophical Act, Josef Pieper
Apology, Plato
Crito, Plato
Laws, Plato
Meno, Plato
Parmenides, Plato
Phaedrus, Plato
Republic, Plato
Symposium, Plato
Enneads, Plotinus
Poetry and Tales, Edgar Allan Poe
Remembrance of Things Past, Marcel Proust
Contrasts, Augustus Pugin

The Reading List – The N’s and O’s

This is part of an ongoing series representing the books on my must read list. I encourage readers, if they see a book that needs to be added, to comment and do so, complete with your assessment of the book.

Thank you very much

Ross

Lolita, Vladimir Nabokov
The Unfortunate Traveler, Thomas Nashe
Selected Poems, Pablo Neruda
The Idea of a University, John Newman
Lectures on Justification, John Newman
On Consulting the Faithful, John Newman
University Sermons, John Newman
A Grain of Wheat, Wa Thiong’o Ngugi
Beyond Good and Evil, Friedrich Nietzsche

Quodlibetal Questions, William of Ockham
The Complete Stories, Flannery O’Connor
Everything that Rises Must Converge, Flannery O’Connor
Mystery and Manners, Flannery O’Connor
The Violent Bear it Away, Flannery O’Connor
War Blood, Flannery O’Connor
One Thousand and One Nights,
On First Principles, Origen
On Prayer, Origen
1984, George Orwell
Animal Farm, George Orwell

The Reading List - The M's

The Prince, Niccolo Machiavelli
A Guide for the Perplexed, Maimonides
Buddenbrook, Thomas Mann
Death in Venice, Thomas Mann
The Magic Mountain, Thomas Mann
Homo Viator, Gabriel Marcel
The Mystery of Being, Gabriel Marcel
The Philosophy of Existentialism, Gabriel Marcel
Mediations, Marcus Aurelius
Art and Scholasticism, Jacques Maritain
Creative Intuition in Art and Poetry, Jacques Maritain
Introduction of Philosophy, Jacques Maritain
A Preface to Metaphysics, Jacques Maritain
Three Reformers, Jacques Maritain
Dr. Faustus, Christopher Marlowe
One Hundred Years of Solitude, Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Communist Manifesto, Karl Marx
Chapters on Knowledge, St. Maximus the Confessor
On Charity, St. Maximus the Confessor
Moby Dick, Herman Melville
New Seeds of Contemplation, Thomas Merton
Utilitarianism, John Stuart Mill
Paradise Lost, John Milton
The Misanthrope, Jean-Baptiste Molière
Don Juan, Jean-Baptiste Molière
The Imaginary Invalid, Jean-Baptiste Molière
Spirit of the Laws, Baron de Montesquieu
Principia Ethica, G.E. Moore
Dialogue of Comfort Against Tribulation, St. Thomas More
Letters, St. Thomas More
Utopia, St. Thomas More
The Wind Up Bird Chronicle, Haruki Murakami
The Tale of the Genji, Lady Murasaki

The Reading List – The L’s

Piers Plowman, William Langland
Tao Te Ching, Lao Zi
Complete Poems, D. H. Lawrence
If This is a Man, Primo Levi
Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis
The Screwtape Letters, C.S. Lewis
The Weight of Glory, C.S. Lewis
Essay Concerning Human Understanding, John Locke
Second Treatise on Civil Government, John Locke
Call of the Wild, Jack London
Appeal to the German Nobility, Martin Luther
Babylonian Captivity of the Church, Martin Luther
On the Bondage of the Will, Martin Luther
Christ and Apollo, William Lynch

The Reading List – The K’s

Please feel free to comment with a suggestion of an addition with a little explanation. Thank you.

The Castle, Franz Kafka
The Metamorphosis, Franz Kafka
The Trial, Franz Kafka
Critique of Judgment, Immanuel Kant
Critique of Practical Reason, Immanuel Kant
Critique of Pure Reason, Immanuel Kant
Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals, Immanuel Kant
Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics, Immanuel Kant
Religion Within the Limits of Reason Alone, Immanuel Kant
The Letters of John Keats, John Keats
The Poems of John Keats, John Keats
The Dharma Bums, Jack Kerouac
Fear and Trembling, Søren Kierkegaard
Sickness Unto Death, Søren Kierkegaard
Kim, Rudyard Kipling
Enthusiasm, Ronald Knox
Darkness at Noon, Arthur Koestler

The Reading List - The I's and J's

Brand, Henrik Ibsen
The Seven Letters, St. Ignatius of Antioch
The Refutation and Overthrow of Knowledge Falsely So-Called, St. Irenaeus

On the Orthodox Faith, St. John of Damascus
The Jewish War, Josephus
Dubliners, James Joyce
A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, James Joyce
Guide for the Perplexed, Joseph ben Judah
Revelations of Divine Love, Juliana of Norwich
Dialogue with Trypho the Jew, St. Justin Martyr
First Apology, St. Justin Martyr
Satires, Juvenal

Reading List - The H's

Please examine the list and if you have an addition that should be made, please comment.

The Federalist Papers, Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, James Madison
Largo Desolato, Vaclav Havel
The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne
Philosophy of History, Georg Hegel
Being and Time, Martin Heidegger
Catch-22, Joseph Heller
For Whom the Bell Tolls, Ernest Hemingway
The Sun Also Rises, Ernest Hemingway
De Religione Gentilium, Edward Herbert
The Temple, George Herbert
The Histories, Herodotus
Selected Poems, Robert Herrick
Theogony, Hesiod
Narcissus and Goldmund, Hermann Hesse
Siddhartha, Hermann Hesse
Steppenwolf, Hermann Hesse
Commentaries, Hillel
The Ladder of Perfection, Walter Hilton
Leviathan, Thomas Hobbes
The Iliad, Homer
The Odyssey, Homer
Complete Poems, Gerard Hopkins
Selected Poems, A.E. Housman
Selected Poems, Langston Hughes
The Distance, the Shadows: Selected Poems, Victor Hugo
The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Victor Hugo
Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion, David Hume
Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, David Hume
Brave New World, Aldous Huxley

The Reading List – the G’s

Please comment with an addition that should be included along with your thoughts on it.

Gilgamesh,
The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Edward Gibbon
The Arts of the Beautiful, Etienne Gilson
The Unity of Philosophical Experience, Etienne Gilson
Faust, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
The Sorrows of Young Worthers, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Dead Souls, Nikolai Gogol
Collected Stories, Caroline Gordon
The Women on the Porch, Caroline Gordon
Brighton Rock, Graham Greene
Fairy Tales, Jakob and Wilhelm Grimm
The Spirit of Liturgy, Romano Guardini

Reading List – The E’s and F’s

Please comment on any addition that should be included.

Life of Charlemagne, Einhard of Fulda
Murder in the Cathedral, T.S. Eliot
The Waste Land, T.S. Eliot
Complete Poems and Plays, T.S. Eliot
Selected Essays, T.S. Eliot
Essays, Ralph Waldo Emerson
Enchiridion, Epictetus
In Praise of Folly, Desiderius Erasmus
On Pilgrimages, Desiderius Erasmus
De Divisione Naturae, Johannes Scotus Erigena
The Elements, Euclid
Church History, Eusebius
Life of Constantine, Eusebius

Absalom, Absalom, William Faulkner
Light in August, William Faulkner
The Sound and the Fury, William Faulkner
Selected Essays, Robert Fergusson
The Essence of Religion, Ludwig Feuerbach
The Old Faith and the New, Ludwig Feuerbach
Madame Bovary, Gustav Flaubert
Introduction to the Devout Life, St. Francis de Sales
Man’s Search for Meaning, Viktor Frankl
Collected Poems, Robert Frost

Reading List – The D’s

If you have a suggestion that should be added to the D's, please post the title and an explanation. Thank you

Divine Comedy, Dante
La Vita Nuova, Dante
Poems, Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz
Discourse on the Method, Rene Descartes
Meditations, Rene Descartes
Principles of Philosophy, Rene Descartes
Logic: The Theory of Inquiry, John Dewey
David Copperfield, Charles Dickens
Complete Poems, Emily Dickinson
On the Divine Names, Dionysius the Areopagite
On the Mystical Theology, Dionysius the Areopagite
Complete Poems, John Donne
The Brothers Karamazov, Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Crime and Punishment, Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, Frederick Douglass
The Three Musketeers, Alexandre Dumas
An American Tragedy, Theodore Dreiser

Reading List - The C's

Here is the next installment of my “classical” reading list. Please feel free to suggest and explain an addition to the C’s.

Institutes of the Christian Religion, John Calvin
The Myth of Sisyphus, Albert Camus
The Plague, Albert Camus
The Stranger, Albert Camus
The Horse’s Mouth, Joyce Cary
The Genius of Christianity, Francois-Rene de Chateaubriand
Canterbury Tales, Geoffrey Chaucer
The Tales, Anton Chekhov
A History of the English-Speaking Peoples, Winston Churchill
On Duties, Cicero
On the Commonwealth, Cicero
On War, Carl von Clausewitz
Miscellanies, St. Clement of Alexandria
The Code of Justinian,
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, Samuel Taylor Coleridge
Biographia Literaria, Samuel Taylor Coleridge
Autobiography, R.G. Collingwood
The Idea of Nature, R.G. Collingwood
Principles of Art, R.G. Collingwood
Heart of Darkness, Joseph Conrad
Lord Jim, Joseph Conrad
The Deerslayers, James Fenimore Cooper
The Epic Cosmos, Louise Cowan
The Terrain of Comedy, Louise Cowan
The Tragic Abyss, Louise Cowan

Reading List – The B’s

Here are the books on my classical list under the B's. As last time, please feel free to suggest and explain another book that should be listed. Thank you.

Essays, Francis Bacon
The Girl with the Golden Eyes, Honoré de Balzac
The Second Sex, Simone de Beauvoir
Waiting for Godot, Samuel Beckett
The Rule of St. Benedict, St. Benedict
The Rationale of Punishment, Jeremy Bentham
Beowulf,
The Steps of Humility, St. Bernard of Clairvaux
Bhagavad Gita,
The Bible,
Collected Writings, Ambrose Bierce
The Consolation of Philosophy, Boethius
The Journey of the Mind to God, St. Bonaventure
Retracing the Arts of Theology, St. Bonaventure
Poems, Emily Brontë
Modern Poetry and the Tradition, Cleanth Brooks
The Well Wrought Urn, Cleanth Brooks
Between Man and Man, Martin Buber
I and Thou, Martin Buber
The Knowledge of Man, Martin Buber
The Master and Margarita, Mikhail Bulgakov
A Philosophical Enquiry…, Edmund Burke
Don Juan, Lord Byron
Poems, Lord Byron

Reading List - The A's

Last year, I decided that, as a well-read individual, I should endeavor to read the classics. Periodically, I'd like to share on this blog the books that I placed on a "classical" list. The list is not meant to be complete and while there are many books of a classical nature dealing with Christianity, I've tried to add many other ideas as well. I will post them alphabetically, starting with the "A's." Please feel free to add a title and a thought about the title if you see something that should be added to my list. I'm always looking for good books to read.

Cheers

Ross

The Oresteia, Aeschylus
Prometheus Bound, Aeschylus
Tevye the Dairyman, Sholem Aleichem
Al-Qur’an,
Malmad, Jacob Anatoli
The Bridge on the Drina, Ivo Andric
Proslogion, St. Anselm
Why God Became Man, St. Anselm
On Being and Essence, St. Thomas Aquinas
On Kingship, St. Thomas Aquinas
On the Principles of Nature, St. Thomas Aquinas
On the Teacher, St. Thomas Aquinas
Summa Contra Gentiles, St. Thomas Aquinas
Summa Theologica, St. Thomas Aquinas
Acharnians, Aristophanes
Frogs, Aristophanes
Peace, Aristophanes
Complete Works, Vol. I and II, Aristotle
On the Incarnation, St. Athanasius
Collected Poems, W.H. Auden
Against the Academicians, St. Augustine
City of God, St. Augustine
Confessions, St. Augustine
On Christian Doctrine, St. Augustine
On Free Choice of the Will, St. Augustine
On the Teacher, St. Augustine
On the Trinity, St. Augustine
The Rule of St. Augustine, St. Augustine

Books, R.I.P.

For whom does the bell toll? Today, it was Borders. The book seller behemoth fell to the online acumen of its major competitor, Barnes and Noble. Now, over 400 stores will be shut and some 11,000 people will lose their jobs, according to a recent article in The Baltimore Sun. From a brick-and-mortar stand point, Barnes and Noble must also read the writing on the wall. The sad part is, the industry is doing it to themselves.

This past year, I had a student who bought himself one of those electronic readers. He tried to sell me on the idea of buying one. It should be known that I’m a committed bibliophile. I love the feel and the texture of a book. I love the smell and the sensation of turning pages. It is such a tactile and intellectual experience. It was fostered as a small child when my parents displayed the joys of reading. Being a bit of a loner as a kid, I loved and depended upon books. Now, I see my students, those who like to read, curling up to an e-reader? It is a sad and typical sign of today’s generation.

So, my student looks at me and says he can hold thousands of books on this thing. First of all, no one reads thousands of books at one time so what is the point of that feature? At most, you might be one of those people who can read two books at the same time. What energy does it take to carry two books? I can see if they were encyclopedias but other than that, this feature of the e-reader does not hold water. The commercials say you can even read the e-reader in bright sun light. You know what else you can read in bright sunlight…books. Some books on the e-reader, particularly older or classic ones, are free. Such things exist in the real world as well. They are called libraries. Would all of you e-readers be sad if you could not annotate your own personal copy of Plato’s Republic upon checking them out from the library? There are only about five people in the entire country who have any business writing suggestions on the margins of their copy of Plato’s most famous work. My student is not one of them, neither am I and no offense, I believe that might go for anyone else reading this blog. It also has a feature that can allow you to identify the definition of a word. You know what else does that? A dictionary.

The more I see the commercials and talk to those who have it, the less benefit I see with the e-reader. However, when I walk into Barnes and Noble, there is a grand display to entice the modern reader to abandon the printed word. A bookstore promoting an e-reader seems, ultimately, counter-intuitive and self-destructive. It is quite likely bookstores will die out and I realize that I might come across as an old guy wishing for simpler days, but why must they provide the instrument of their own death?