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It’s Time to Make a List
Powerline has publicized Amazon de-listing a book from its retail site, effectively “disappearing” it. Amazon may yet reverse its action and claim some form of “error” in the de-listing. But it has happened before and may become a regular occurrence in the future.
In response it is appropriate to ask the following question: If it was your responsibility to preserve the ability for society to “rediscover” the ideas necessary to reformulate Western Civilization, readily accessible by the folk of the future (not solely scholars) with the smallest library of physical books, what would your list be?
One may say this is wholly unnecessary. But who would have thought they would be coming after Washington and Lincoln? It’s time to consider the unthinkable, and plan the strategy for reformulating society.
Published in General
http://walterewilliams.com/Libertas.pdf
pages 16-18
Excellent!
I sent it to all my ‘ignorant’ friends
I mean ‘ignorant’ in the nicest way possible
If you’re going to include Machiavelli’s “ The Prince” you should also include his “ The Discourses “
Interesting website: https://libertylibrary.org. Good resource but vulnerable to Big Tech.
The thought also occurred that the Will and Ariel Durant’s Story of Civilization series is a good balance of scholarship-popularization of concepts.
We should start with “Fun With Dick and Jane” and work our way up to the books on the list . . .
Passing Time in the Loo – Volume One (not kidding – it has everything you could imagine, presidential history, baseball scores, famous quotes, reviews of the great Classics, attitudes at work, how to stay healthy, great artists and painters, they crammed a lot in here – wonder what the other volumes have?
How to Build a Fire and Other Handy Things Your Grandfather Knew by Erin Bried – everything from how to wax a mustache, to breaking in a baseball mitt, to how to ask for help………….
“Guilt, Blame, and Politics” by Allan Levite
“Why Government Doesn’t Work” by Harry Browne
“On Liberty” by John Stuart Mill
I got myself confused a little bit. It’s Kindle that’s trying to go to the rental system. However, I see worrisome signs that Audible wants something like that, too. Judging by the way they make their app harder to use, they seem to be tired of the book business and wanting to get into something more like podcasting.
Think I would want to add Adam Smith, Wealth of Nations
A likely starting place is Fahrenheit 451, just to help them understand the nature of the problem they are dealing with.
Good point, but I think you start with describing Atlantis and then talk about how it was lost. They have to be made to want an outcome before talking about the path.
When I did a search for “When Harry Became Sally” on Amazon, I got quite a few conservative looking titles along the same line of thinking. I’m not sure why they have delisted that particular book. If it’s because of censorship, the keeping other books don’t make sense.
Wikipedia has an entry on The Great Books of the Western World. It’s very extensive, so much so it can’t be copied and pasted here. Go here.
Maybe the other books aren’t popular enough to have gotten the attention/complaints?
Shouldn’t Aesop’s Fables and Orwell’s Animal Farm be on the list ? I’d put them on a shelf together. I’m pretty sure kids somewhere between ages 11 and 14 should read (or re-read) some of Aesop’s Fables and then read Animal Farm.
What 5 of Shakespeare’s plays ? Shouldn’t it be more like 7 to 10 ?
What’s LOTR ?
It should be at least 20 of Shakespeare. But it was supposed to be a short list. Me, I’d prefer Hamlet and Macbeth to be preserved. And Merchant of Venice.
Aesop and Orwell need to be preserved. But in a short list I’d probably prefer those other books. It’s not unreasonable to drop something from my list for Aesop and Orwell.
But don’t drop Lord of the Rings! It’s the best.
That crossed my mind too. But it was several books. I don’t know. Amazon has been pretty good. I don’t have the same perception of them as Facebook and Twitter.
King Lear is in my book not just Shakespeare’s best but the greatest play ever written. If I had several months to live, King Lear would be one of the last reads I would do before I go.
You need something aimed at children. Lewis satisfies that. You can’t preserve western civ without keeping your children engaged in it.
A small publisher has revived the Junior Classics for such a reason – a curated collection of poetry, short stories, mythology, bible, and history suitable for educating the young mind.
If we’re trying to reformulate Western Civilization, my recommendation will be Herman L. Masin’s little book published in 1958, “Sports Laughs.” I probably bought it through the “Scholastic Book Club” or some such thing, maybe when I was in 8th grade. I read it many times when I was a kid. I dug it out a few years ago and saw that my old copy was falling apart, had a missing cover and missing pages, etc., so bought a replacement. Some of the jokes may need interpretation for the younger generation, but despite it being clean, shallow and light-hearted, the anecdotes contain a lot of important illustrations of human nature.
Here’s one under the heading, “Clipping Penalty.”
I think we have some of the Foxfire books lying about here somewhere.
Amazon is not the only source for books. When Harry Became Sally is readily available at Barnes and Noble. Since I do not use Amazon, I would not have known about their delisting the book if it weren’t for all the publicity.
We could get them for the articles. 😀
Decision in Philadelphia because if we’re going to have to rebuild let’s not go over the same ground twice. This book tells you how the Constitution was written nearly word by word.
Carnage and Culture to remind us that western exceptionalism is not western chauvinism. It’s a set of best practices born and wrought from blood and sweat.
The Complete Works of Shakespeare so that we understand that not all wisdom was discovered this morning, it’s been around for a while.
Math books from kindergarten to differential equations, if we have to rebuild let’s at least get a leg up and take math with us into the dark age.
Stranger in a Strange Land to point out how heartless and cruel crowds can be when faced with some thing or someone that is unique and different. Don’t be the crowd.
Liberal Fascism to remind us that the only real dichotomy is between freedom of expression and suppression.
Ernest Hemingway Complete Short Stories, The Finca Vigia Edition because if you read them all somewhere in there you’ll find your story. And it will comfort you to know that what you are thinking and feeling is not something new.
The Law by Bastiat to remind us that the government that manages the least manages the best.
The Torah and the Bible so that we remember that there is a Judeo Christian value system that drove most of western thought through the last millennia.
The Oxford English dictionary so that we can remember that the word “woke” used to be the opposite of “sleep” and not the opposite politically incorrectness.
Meditations by Marcus Aurelius because it is a good guide to developing a stable emotional IQ.
And to remind us when Jonah Goldberg made sense.
A Conflict of Visions by Thomas Sowell perfectly describes the difference between Leftism and conservatism.
There’s the St. John’s College reading list/curriculum.
For a more concise version, there’s the Graduate Institute reading list. The undergrads used to refer to it as the Readers Digest Condensed Version of their program. Snotty kids, even there!
When I graduated, our Commencement speaker (an ambassador whose name escapes me) told us that we were the keepers of the flame of Western Civilization and that someday society would come looking for us to help them rebuild. Or maybe, the thugs will hunt us down is what he really meant…
Looks like the GI list and program have changed a bit since I was there, but it’s pretty close.
Thanks for the links, @caryn. Even autodidacts benefit from reference suggestions. I wonder how St John’s is handling woke culture?
Not enough Augustine and Aquinas or other theological philosophers that helped shape the foundational truths of western civilization.