Today there is more to read than ever. Traditional and social news sites are filled with the latest buzz stories repeated ad nauseam. One is pressed to keep up. Amid the endless competition to make headlines and build traffic there is no enduring value.
When I read exclusively new material for an extended period I lose confidence. Each story seems to blend together into meaningless jargon. I feel empty and depressed. Nothing matters because whatever I learn today will be old news tomorrow. If you are someone searching for meaning in life, I am sure you have felt this way as well.
Whenever this happens, I have learned to turn back to the classics, the old enduring books that have stood the test of time and retain their luster. The common perception of old books is that they are antiquated and useless. Nothing could be farther from the truth. We believe, with our technology, that we have reinvented life. But this is not the case. The gadgets that surround us are minor details, the essence of life remains unchanged. It feels the same to be alive today as it did a thousand years ago. Look into yourself and you will know this is true. We are still lone souls confined to our thoughts, facing the same challenges.
Everything has its particular place. Old books cannot give you the weather forecast or teach you to write a javascript. But what they will teach you is how to live. They will teach you what it means to be human. They will give you a firm place to stand against the assault of constant change. The wisdom of the greatest human minds passed down through centuries is our most reliable asset.
I am not alone in this opinion. I leave you with this passage from the immortal Albert Einstein.
Somebody who reads only newspapers and at best the books of contemporary authors looks to me like an extremely nearsighted person who scorns eyeglasses. He is completely dependent on the prejudices and fashions of his times, since he never gets to see or hear anything else. And what a person thinks on his own without being stimulated by the thoughts and experiences of other people is even in the best case rather paltry and monotonous.
There are only a few enlightened people with a lucid mind and style and with good taste with a century. What has been preserved of their work belongs among the most precious possessions of mankind.
Nothing is more needed than to overcome the modernist’s snobbishness.
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John,
Any suggestions for great classics? I love to read but find myself all too often surrounded by modern thought and theory. Any advice would be much appreciated.
Great question. The place I would start is “Self-Reliance” by Ralf Waldo Emerson. It is an incredibly inspiring essay. The English is dense, you should read it more than once, but it is well worth it. I keep going back to it and love it every time.
Of course there is also Shakespeare. He isn’t universally accepted as the greatest English writer for no reason. I need to read more of him.
I could recommend a thousand things but those are a good place to start. The best part is you can read all of this stuff for free at www.bartleby.com .
I’ve been reading some of the classics that have been on my shelves unread for too long lately, for this reason.
Here goes:
The Gambler, Great Gatsby, Agamemnon, and now Animal Farm.
I’d recommend any/all of these, they’re all good.
These kind of books are dirt cheap in charity/2nd hand shops, so I get *books* because its good to get away from the tft, and cos books are nice objects, and also its good for my kids to see me reading books for pleasure.
If you wnt to read shakespeare but end up procrastinating, try readng the revengers tragedy, its the bawdy trashy equiv from that era or thereabouts!
Howard,
I completely agree about books being a great hobby, especially for the money. My only problem is not having enough time to read most of the used books I buy.
I’ve been discovering Orwell recently and have read a few of his essays. The more I read the more I like him, so I’m sure I’ll end up reading Animal Farm.
Anything written by Epictitus, Marcus A.,
or Seneca.
Buddha’s Lotus Sutra
The Uppanishads
Anything written by Voltaire
Anything written by William James
Plato’s Dialogs
Faust by Goethe and also ” The Sorrows of Young Werther”
“The Anatomy of Melancholy” by Richard Burton
The Federalist Papers
The Social Contract
The Autobiography of B. Cellini
Anything written by Tom Paine
Mimesis
The Way by Lao Tzu
William Blake: The Marriage of Heaven and Hell
Critique of Pure Reason by Kant
Anything by Charles Darwin
Anything by Franz Kafka
Rhetoric by Isocrates
That Aside, I would have been saved lots of pain ( gifted kid stuff) if I had been exposed to Theophilus North by Thornton
Wilder!
Dear John,
If you are reading Orwell, also check out
Aldous Huxley–whose essays are brillant. Also, his book “Brave New World” which is similar to 1984 in many ways.
Penny
Great stuff. There is a new book out about how to home-school your child in the classical tradition, The Well -Trained Mind. (My toolbar has disappered.) The book contains an extensive reading list, which might come in handy for those of us who have gaps in our reading-repertoire.
Gita,
That’s an interesting concept. I actually flipped through something similar at B&N a few months ago. It was called “A Curriculum for Life Long Reading”.
After I realized how little great literature I was exposed to in school I felt a bit deprived. At least I have a lifetime of great reading to look forward to.
I would like to make some recommendations as well: anything written by Alexander Dumas (but The Count of Monte Cristo in particular), and The Portrait of Dorian Grey and The Young King by Oscar Wilde (not to mention just about anything else he wrote).
I’m cheating a bit with a “modern classic” but “Godel, Escher and Bach by Douglas Hofstader” (1978) blows away anyone who reads it.
I’ve heard a lot about Hofstader, but never read any of his work. I’ll have to check that out.
[…] I first learn about the importance of old books from John Wesley. He often uses old books as his source of ideas and inspiration. I agree with him. Old books are good source of knowledge and inspiration, often better than new books. […]
I recommend “Man With A Maid”.
Thanks for the recommendation, Froedrick. I just Googled it. Definitely looks interesting.
I’ve got to jump in here. There’s a neo-classic on *how to approach the classics* called ‘How to Read a Book’ by Mortimer J. Adler. He was involved in the Great Books project as well, and both sprang from his work on one of the finest encyclopedias ever produced. Dip your toes in and TRULY get a feel for how elegant and effective these books can be by reading :
‘The Republic’ - Plato
‘Ethics’ - Plato
“Experience” (a single essay, not a book title) - R W Emerson
‘The Law’ - Frederic Bastiat
‘The Prince’ - Machiavelli.
I assigned these to my high school sophomore son (age 14) and he *devoured* them, going on independently to snag my copy of ‘The Clouds,’ by Aristophanes, and then the little blighter read my copy of ‘Oedipus Rex’ *before* I got to it! So much for the ‘Family Book Discussion’ plans! (G)
The thing that helped spur his interest in the classics might help adults a little leery of the idea of ‘wading through’ books they may only know by title or vague description– I paired something classic with something modern. EG, for his reading of Machiavelli, he wrote a pro/con comparison of the Ferengi Rules of Acquisition from the Star Trek “mythos”. I offered a trio of fun fiction with Mary W. Shelley’s ‘Frankenstein’ along with Asimov’s ‘Bicentennial Man’ and a Cyberpunk manga a friend lent him.
The local library may have a copy of “The Lifetime Reading Plan”, which includes about two hundred of the most notable books, mostly fiction, along with a very brief summary meant to incite interest. Use that to pair off your reading, or simply make a ‘wish list’ for Bartleby.com, or E-Gutenberg, or the University of Virginia’s e-text library (which has a drool-worthy collection for any American History buff).
Look for tips on speed reading and retention - Several univeristy sites offer very good advice and even .pdf printouts for study tips. I practice my speed reading on the daily paper and my electronic news, thus saving enough time to spend an hour after dinner *reading* for pleasure. Believe you me, the speed reading *does* create a marked increase in the casual reading rate!
Thanks for the recommendations, RabidBiblioPhile. I’ve been meaning to get back to reading Plato. Have you ever heard of Mark Edmundson’s book “Why Read?”
You’re a true friend, bringing the perfect gift– the title of a new BOOK! (G)
It’s now on my list of things to acquire for the next month’s reading!
If you read Polybius, you will understand everything about modern politics and war, especially what is happening with China. Caesar’s Gallic Commentaries are a great read, but read it with the understanding that it is propaganda by the man who would demolish the underpinnings of the Roman republic. Machiavelli is important for politics and modern advertising, and understanding big business and the military-industrial complex.
Livy’s Lives of the Ancient Greeks and Romans is a big bag of potato chips, and an understanding of post modernist reading adds another layer to it’s wisdom.
These are all on line, in multiple translations.
John,
I love that your first suggestion was Emerson. I read alot of classics. In fact that is almost all I read, and I recommend” The Essential Writings” by Emerson to anyone that asks. In fact that book rarely goes back on the shelf, it is sitting two feet from me. I do some long endurance race’s on my bike and sometimes it’s hard to keep motivated for the many hours of training. When someone ask how I train for a 24 hour solo race I tell them Emerson is my motivational coach. Because endurance is very mental as well as physical. I need somthing to accupy my mind as I ride.
Nathan,
I couldn’t agree more about Emerson. If I could have the abilities of any writer it would be him. His power to motivate and inspire is amazing and I always pick up something new when I reread one his essays.
[…] I first learn about the importance of old books from John Wesley. He often uses old books as his source of ideas and inspiration. I agree with him. Old books are good source of knowledge and inspiration, often better than new books. […]
Not too old, not too modern, but take a look at the short, pithy books of Eric Hoffer, a longshoreman/social critic. Particularly, The True Believer will give you insight into the U.S. Christian conservative movement as well as the Muslim fundamentalists.
Pride & Prejudice - Jane Austen
Sense & Sensibility - Jane Austen
The Warden - Anthony Trollope
Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
The Chronicles of Narnia - C.S. Lewis
The Lord of the Rings - Tolkien
Moby Dick - Herman Melville (Yes, it is long, but as it encompasses the vastness of the sea, and the depths of evil, the length is important - sort of along the lines of MacLuhan’s “the medium is the message”)
Anyway… hope someone enjoys these.
Have a look at http://thegreatbookslist.com
Plenty of inspiration there..
if you don’t have time to read why not listen to audio books , a great site is librivox.org it has most of the necessary classical writing whether drama or philosophical treatise and even Einstein’s book on relativity and did i also mentioned that they have a almost of of Emerson’s writing on tape, and for the Thomas Paine, Jules Verne, Daniel Defoe and Jane Austen fans out there they have what you are looking for, and for true classicist like my self There is Aesop, Plato and his illustrious pupil whose name i do not need to mention (Aristotle, it slip ) and several others form the Greek and Roman period , No Adam Smith for all the economics lovers out there, the book is 1275 pages long that would take a day to record,I hope have being of help
did i forget to mention all of Leo Tolstoy works which is a must read for any one who considers him self an intellectual, for those whose love Kant Nietzsche and Schopenhauers (just studies on pessimism is available in English) will be right at home, they also have few non english recordings , oh yes and and I am not an old man, I have yet to see my second decade on this earth
Robert,
Those are some my favorites too. It’s great to see someone else from my generation who enjoys the classics.
Robert,
thanks for the website recommendation. I have been looking for a good website for audio books I will check it latter today. nate
anyways,reading is important because we can know all thnings happen in the world,it is a lso one-way of getting knowledge and information.
if you don’t have time to read why not listen to audio books , a great site is librivox.org it has most of the necessary classical writing whether drama or philosophical treatise and even Einstein’s book on relativity and did i also mentioned that they have a almost of of Emerson’s writing on tape, and for the Thomas Paine, Jules Verne, Daniel Defoe and Jane Austen fans out there they have what you are looking for, and for true classicist like my self There is Aesop, Plato and his illustrious pupil whose name i do not need to mention (Aristotle, it slip ) and several others form the Greek and Roman period , No Adam Smith for all the economics lovers out there, the book is 1275 pages long that would take a day to record,I hope have being of help
I would recommend Don Quixote as an excellent read. Also anything by James Joyce or Jerome K. Jerome would be well worth reading.
I may also recommend a couple of books from Peter Watson: “Ideas” and “The Modern Mind”, they are both compilations of Human Mind achievements. “Ideas” starts from the development of writing…
Since I am a native Spanish speaker, I’ll recommend the following authors:
- Gabriel Garcia Marquez
- Mario Vargas Llosa
- Jorge Luis Borges
- Ernesto Sabato
- Julio Cortazar