What is Friendship? That is one of those questions which I instinctively answer, “It’s obvious,” but whenever I read something about the matter, I think the essay I just read misses the point. Consider Plato’s Lysis, his dialogue on Friendship. Not a very good work if one evaluates a work of philosophy on the criterion of providing an answer which is even worth considering. Nothing here on that front. A decent work if one uses the criterion of whether it has the … [Read more...] about How to be a Good Friend
Great Books
Steppenwolf and You
Herman Hesse, Steppenwolf I read this book a quarter of a century ago, soon after I began serious reading. I think I picked it up at the used book store in Davis, CA, but it may have been at a library book sale. The appeal was obvious: Great Book with the same name as a rock band. So, it must be good, right? I have a vivid memory of being terribly disappointed with the book. There is this guy who is a werewolf, the Steppenwolf, see, and he knows he is a werewolf, and … [Read more...] about Steppenwolf and You
The Church of God the Utterly Indifferent
The Sirens of Titan, Kurt Vonnegut’s second novel, is marvelously fun.Quirky beyond belief—a seemingly wild random ride that ends up all linking together in the end. The basic plot is perfectly circular. It is the type of story that my wife, who hates looping time travel stories, would hate. (By the way, the recent Doctor Who invention of “Wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey” was a hysterical dodge to avoid the inherent problem of maintaining continuity in a 50 year long science fiction series … [Read more...] about The Church of God the Utterly Indifferent
Odysseus: Natural Born Leader
Everyone likes the idea of a role model for leadership. Here is the candidate of the day for that honor: Odysseus. There are thousands of books on How to be a Leader. Thousands. Yet, one of the best of them is also one of the oldest books in the world: Homer, The Odyssey. (As always—if you don’t read Greek, get a good translation. Life is too short to read bad translations. I highly recommend Fagles.) As a leadership text, Homer makes a fantastic starting … [Read more...] about Odysseus: Natural Born Leader
Reading Native Son in the 21st Century
Some books get better with age. Native Son is a book like that. The story, originally published in 1940: Bigger, a young black delinquent, gets a job as a chauffeur to wealthy white family, murders the daughter on his first night on the job, does a terrible job trying to cover up the crime, is discovered, flees, murders another girl, is caught, and is put on trial. The book highlights two great divides in American society. First, the Black-White divide. As a historical … [Read more...] about Reading Native Son in the 21st Century
So, You Want to Pray Like a Jesuit?
What is a book? When is a book not really a book? Before now, I thought I knew; that doesn’t seem like a terribly complicated question after all. War and Peace is a book. So is Thus Spake Zarathustra. So is Go, Dog. Go! But what about a lengthy instruction manual for a Television? It’s bound like a book, and is longer than many things which are obviously books. Is it a book or is the category “Instruction Manual” not contained in the set of things called … [Read more...] about So, You Want to Pray Like a Jesuit?