"'Tis the good reader that makes the good book; in every book he finds passages which seem to be confidences of sides hidden from all else and unmistakably meant for his ear; the profit of books is according to the sensibility of the reader; the profound thought or passion sleeps as in a mine, until it is discovered by an equal mind and heart." - Ralph Waldo Emerson
I've never thought much about blogging, partly because of all the terrible Xanga posts I made in middle school (please don't try to find them) and partly because I don't have much to blog about (relevant xkcd). Then this past summer, after graduating from college, I began my massive reading list, a chronological survey of every important book (with a focus on literature and philosophy) that various internet compendia instructed me to read, and that friends, classmates, and professors had suggested to me. (“You’ve never read any Sumerian literature? Were the cuneiforms too much to handle?”) But without the constant threat of discussion sessions and final papers, I found that I was speeding through books without giving them proper thought and consideration. Sure, I had finally read all of Plato’s important dialogues, but I hadn’t absorbed them like I should have. Hopefully this blog will keep me honest and keep my reading conscientious.
Why embark on such a laborious and masochistic project? When people ask, I usually say that it’s to make myself a more intelligent person, and that’s more or less true. I think it’s important to know what smart people have said about important questions, and with any luck the chronological aspect will provide me with a sense of the genesis and history of different ideas.
There’s a less academic purpose behind this reading list, and especially behind this blog, as well. My favorite books have always been those that challenge me, tell me something new, present to me a new way of looking at the world; in short, those that provide me with the materials for living. (I’m paraphrasing Kenneth Burke’s comment that literature provides us with the equipment for living. Unfortunately, someone beat me to “equipmentforliving.blogspot” as a blog name. No, actually; look it up.) This, to me, is the true profit of my reading list. There will undoubtedly be a TON of material in every book that goes over my head (at least until SparkNotes come out with that No Fear Pre-Socratic Philosophers I’ve been emailing them out), and I’m not guaranteeing that I’ll always end up with a solid, faithful reading of every book. I’ll do my best to not royally screw up my interpretations or say bland, unintelligent things, but my overarching goal will be to find enlightening passages, ones that Emerson would say were unmistakably meant for my ear alone.
So please stay tuned for my next post, which will be on Cicero's "On Moral Ends" and the first part of my 3rd (or 4th, or nth -- who knows) attempt at reading Dostoevsky's "The Brothers Karamazov."
