Recent Reads, Volume XIII

A brief summary of what I’m currently reading or have recently finished, why I read it, and whether I’d recommend it. Although really, it’d have to be truly terrible for me to bother writing about a book I wouldn’t recommend……

What to Read and Why (Francine Prose) – Bestselling author Francine Prose recommends more than two dozen books and/or authors that everyone should read, and more importantly explains why these are important. I’ve not actually read any on her list, and most of them are not “my” type of book. Some of these recommendations – Dickens, Alcott, maybe even Austen, to specify a few – I do plan to eventually read, at least in part due to her recommendation. Some of the others, such as Lolita, Karl Ove Knausgaard’s My Struggle, and Stanley Elkin, have not been added to my to-be-read list. I don’t mean to imply that those books aren’t worthy of the time; I’ve not read them, and I may very well be selling myself short in not considering them. I simply choose to invest my limited reading time in other directions; it’s ok, and even good, to have different priorities and choose differently.

The Adventures of John Carson in Several Quarters of the World (Brian Doyle) – Based upon a novel planned by Robert Louis Stevenson but never written, and written from Stevenson’s point of view. This is probably most accurately called historical fiction; Carson and several other of the characters that play however small a part in the novel do appear to have existed, but I would hesitate to pick out any part of it and call it absolutely true. Noteworthy quotes – Mrs. Carson, Stevenson’s landlady, to Stevenson: “We think of a life as something composed of years, Mr Stevenson, but this is not so – not so at all. Our lives are made of moments, and not the vaulting ones that we think: the moment you are married, the moment you are a father, the moment you sell your book to the publisher, the moment you are sworn into office, the moment you unlock a new house. No – it’s the sidelong moment that matters most, I think – the one no one would notice but you, because you felt the turn of the tide, the subtle depth, the shiver of wonder. I think the moments we remember best are the smallest ones……..a small moment by the measure of the world, but a mountainous one for me.”(p125) And also “Stevenson’s” musings on friends: “We do not acknowledge enough, I think, the clan and tribe of our friends, who are not assigned to us by blood, or given to us to love by a merciful Creator, but come to us by grace and gift from the mass of men, stepping forth unannounced from the passing multitudes, and into our lives; and so very often stepping right into the inner chambers of our hearts. In so many ways we celebrate those we love as wife or husband, father and mother, brother and sister, daughter and son; but it is our friends whom we choose, and who choose us; it is our friends we turn to abashed, when we are bruised and broken by love and pain; it is our friends whose affection and kindness are food and drink to our spirits, and sustain and invigorate us when we are worn and weary.”(p203). Doyle could have benefited, I think, from reading Francine Prose’s essay “On Clarity”, but one grows accustomed to the paragraph-long sentences.

The Greatest Generation (Tom Brokaw) – A collection of vignettes of the lives of WWII vets and their experiences both abroad and at home. Most of those featured would probably argue that they didn’t do anything especially noteworthy or courage. I, for one, appreciate the ability to read about the parts they played in writing history, without intruding on the privacy of their civilian lives.

First Ladies (Betty Boyd Caroli) – Caroli provides a history of the office of First Lady by writing about each of the women who played that role and how they changed it. Many of these I had barely heard of, if that; even their names were largely unfamiliar, and their backgrounds and ideas even more so. Every biographer writes through their own lens of perspective and opinion, of course, and that colors their work. My opinion is hindered by limited prior knowledge, but it seems as though Caroli did a good job of tempering that. I already have an extensive to-be-read list, but I added to that list more comprehensive biographies of Sarah Childress Polk, Grace Coolidge, and Claudia “Lady Bird” Johnson. 

So there you have it: 4 books I’m reading right now or have recently finished. If you’ve read any of these (or decide to after reading this post), drop me a note and let me know what you thought of them! And let me know what you’re reading right now too.