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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
A lot of the content of these lists seems to assume that the readers are already at college level. Seems like a mistake.
Yes. Sadly too many college students today are not at “the college level”. This includes students who entered at the college level but who have been dumbed down by miseducation.
The dilemma as alluded to in one of my earlier comments is finding authors that write without footnotes but whose grounding in original sources is sound and reliable.
I’m not sure I even know how to read a book that doesn’t have footnotes or endnotes. It isn’t just academic authors who use them, either.
Like, what do you do when you want to know where the author got his information? Write a letter and ask?
C. S. Lewis.
N. T. Wright.
I’m not sure who exactly this reading list is intended. I thought we were listing for a well educated adult.
If CS Lewis were to have ever used a footnote, it would be ironically.
I followed this thread when it started so that I could make myself a list of what was suggested after the replies died down. Ricochet being what it is, I was not disappointed. Just in case no one else has done it, I compiled a list of the suggestions and tried to break them down into individual books (as some were multi book sets, etc…). There were some suggested links to previously compiled lists at colleges, etc… and I didn’t include those, but saved the links for future browsing. The only books I added to the list myself were the three volumes of the Gulag Archipelago, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, and an unspecified book that chronicles the Chinese cultural revolution (I haven’t found one yet). The grand total is 158 books. Twenty four of them are Thomas Sowell alone (another 18 could be added if all of Walter Williams books were included).
Considering we’re starting to see cancellation of “problematic” books in digital form as well as even the ceasing of printing of others (in this case some of the Dr Seuss books), starting one’s own library of non-“woke” material might be a good idea.
If anyone would like the rough-cut excel file of the compiled list just hit me up via private message.
Saving the woke stuff is going to be a big deal. Hunt down all of Kipling and Secret Garden and Little Princess are classic kids books that will get the axe.
Amazon will be able to make some extra money for Bezos by selling multi-volume “The Complete Dr Seuss” which is all blank pages.
Castalia House is working on preserving some of the classics of western literature. They are their own publisher and distributor. If you want to support such projects, check them out.