Books, Books, and More Books!

I have a bad habit of reading several books at the same time. I'm not sure why I do this. I think maybe it's because I'm always eager to go on to the next book and so I start a new one before I finish the last one. I used to have the bad habit of not finishing books, but I've broken that one--for the most part.

Anyway, since I just finished Edersheim's Sketches of Jewish Social Life I am down to just one book. Truth be told, I haven't picked this one up in six months. In fact, I'm not sure where I last left it. But I am determined to go find it and finish it before . . . at least by July 4.

I'm talking about Samuel Adams: A Life by Ira Stoll. I was doing well in it, but somehow got sidetracked. The last I read he was instigating the Boston Tea Party.

There is another one I put down a long time ago intending to pick back up, just never have. That one was Richard Dawkins's The God Delusion. Dawkins comes across as such a raving fundamentalist that I found myself alternately entertained and appalled. I do want to get back to this one, mostly because Dawkins is so popular in atheist circles. For those of you unfamiliar with leading atheists, Dawkins isn't necessarily their best spokesman, nor most tutored, but he is certainly the most vocal and he is a skilled rhetorician. I posted some things on him ages ago on another blog and I may dredge one or two of those back up and do some more debunking if I get back to this one--which I will--but maybe not right now.

I also have my commentaries coming. I'll be reading all of the introductory and background notes in the first volume when it arrives, this so as to commence my series of devotional posts from Isaiah's prophetical writings.

But what shall I read for enjoyment, for pure pleasure? I have had it in my mind for some time now that I should actually read all the classics, or at least all those books I look at in the book store or in a library and say, "You know, one day I need to read that book." These always turn out to be better than I think when I'm first opening them up and in this way I have read some really cool stuff that no one really, actually reads any more.

For example, I have Moby Dick on my book shelf and have been intending to read it for some time. The very thickness of it seems daunting enough, but couple that with the fact that it was written a hundred and fifty years ago and it can be quite intimidating. On the other hand, Ray Bradbury loved this book and I love Ray Bradbury.  I know I am going to love the language and the story once I get into it. This may be next.

But I have also been thinking of reading all of the dystopias. I recently re-read two of Orwell's classics, Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four. A year or so ago I read Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged. That was a marathon. I may grab a hardback copy of Brave New World and re-read that one. It's been ten years or more since I read it before and it isn't that long a read. Another one I am going to re-read (and use as an excuse to buy and own in hardback) is Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451. Along those lines I also want to get and read (for the first time) Machiavelli's The Prince, Catch-22 by Joseph Heller, and there's another one I have on a wish list somewhere but can't remember the name of it.

Three or four years ago I read The Odyssey and since I bought it and The Illiad at the same time I have been thinking about reading the latter ever since. Maybe I will get to it this year. Hmmm. So many books . . .

Addendum:

The preceding was written and published last night, after which I settled on and began reading two new books, both relatively short. The first is Captains Courageous by Rudyard Kipling. I am three chapters in and so far it is a pretty good yarn. The other is an introduction to the discipline of logic by Graham Priest called, aptly enough, Logic. One chapter into that one and I can tell it will be something to take in and think about one chapter at a time. -- James, Friday morning.