I was talking with a friend a few days ago, and he asked me what I thought about a particular news story. He was surprised when I responded that I knew a good bit less than he did about this story, and he seemed even more surprised as I was describing it with what he [...]
Robert Hutchins Studying and leading conversations on the Great Books for more than twenty years still produces that sense of awe and wonder, especially when I discover a new tool to aide in the exploration of wisdom. Unfortunately, this excitement is often curtailed when I engage many of those within the academy. Once, [...]
The adages of Erasmus often provide philosophical and religious insight with social and political commentary. It is stunning how relevant many of the adages are to our own time. The Adages of Erasmus, compiled by William Barker (University of Toronto Press, 2001, 384 pages) Reading wisdom literature in any age is wise. Reading wise sayings [...]
Andrew Klavan has started writing young adult fiction and for a Christian publishing house. While this may be a bad move for some writers, Klavan has navigated the move very well. In truth, Klavan is a fine popular contemporary novelist. The extra benefit of this enjoyable read is that it may indeed have an additional application in light [...]
My students regularly ask me about books and authors and also frequently ask, “what do you read when you are not reading Great Books?” It surprises them when I mention certain science-fiction and fantasy authors and I am always open for recommendations. Not long ago I was reading a blog, and novelist Andrew Klavan was mentioned. I was aware [...]
Over the years I’ve seen countless book lists and there are two books on “must read lists” that speak to the modern world insightfully, but in differing manners. As dystopian works, people have tended to see them both as “prophetic” and yet, of the two, most think that the one literary vision was closer to [...]
There is a popular series of books entitled, “Eat This, Not That.” The premise of the series is that of all the foods out there, some are healthier for you than others or some are not as unhealthy as others. We can classify this essay as a “Read This, Not That.” With the growing number [...]
Incarnational Humanism, by Jens Zimerman This work is thoroughly grounded in Christian theology and biblical reflection. At the very heart of Zimmerman's case is the incarnation of Christ. Possibly the most explicit assertion defended throughout the book is “True humanity is the heart of the Gospel and the goal of Christ's redemptive work…” This is [...]
On the Unseriousness of Human Affairs: Teaching, Writing, Playing, Believing, Lecturing, Philosophizing, Singing, Dancing by James V. Schall Ever since God commanded His creation to rest, humans have managed to busy themselves to near oblivion. James Schall has long been recognized as one of the great masters of the essay. In his most recent collection of [...]
A colleague in our Great Books program shared an article with me over the Christmas break, and as I was buried in reading some of the Great Books and a few seasonal works, I was hard pressed to read this article. The article, by Patrick Deneen, was published in First Things and entitled, Against Great Books Questioning [...]
Featured Book: The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore. For all bibliovores, regardless of age, this book is for you. It is beautiful in form and content, it is good in form and content, and it is true in form and content. Rarely does one find a children’s picture book that so throughly celebrates a bookish life, [...]
As with Erasmus, I affirm that The Imitation of Christ by Thomas A’Kempis is the grandest of devotional reads. The devotional books that litter the bookstores, especially the local Christian bookstore are more shaped by the lowest common denominator of trivial therapeutic drivel, the “cutting edge” madness of the management class, or silly self-help books that know [...]
On numerous occasions, Mortimer Adler wrote about the criteria that were used to determine which books of all the books written in the West would be placed within The Great Books of the Western World. Contrary to confusion and many misstatements I've read over the years, Adler says it was essentially three criteria and they [...]
Humanism and Religion: A Call for the Renewal of Western Culture, by Jens Zimmermann, Oxford University Press, 2012. As a number of books from important thinkers (Etienne Gilson, Jeffrey Burton Russell) have sought to educate open-minded readers to a most enlightened Middle Ages, Zimmermann seeks, in part, to challenge some misinterpretations and terrible damage done to [...]