This week I am listening to Unbroken and A Moveable Feast. I am in Paris. I am in the Pacific. The Seine is beautiful while the Pacific is dangerous. Hemingway experienced the trenches in World War I and is called part of the "Lost Generation" by Gertrude Stein. He resents being pigeon-holed into a category since all generations are lost then found and, if they are lucky, lost again. For Zamperini, his life would be altered by World War II. He truly was lost and could not be found by the many search planes sent out over the Pacific.
Listening to the these two stories on the tail of 10% Happier and Yes, Please demonstrates the lack of struggle in our life. Well, now that I think of it, as an embedded reporter Harris truly had to deal with numerous physical and mental hardships that were probably similar to those confronted by Hemingway. Perhaps it is the easy life of Paris that healed Hemingway. For Harris, in the fast paced ever connected post modern world, there was never a moment to unwind. The turning point for Harris comes when he reluctantly takes an assignment to report on religion in America. Confronting various spiritual leaders while working with a therapist Harris is opened up to a dimension of life that had withered away. Investigating and learning about various worldviews that might replace his drug addiction leads to an elevated existence. It is no longer about his mug on the screeen-although that is very important.
Post moderns are narcissus on steroids. We want it all. We want it now. We want perfection. And perfection is wholeness even if it comes by way of drugs, plastic surgery, and gurus. Hemingway looked outside of himself. Harris looked at himself. It is only when Harris begins to look inside that healing can begin. Poehler didn't have much to add to the conversation. I found myself in several stories. I liked her little mottos. Way too long. I did not finish the book. However the fact that people are excited about this book tells a bigger story. People are searching for something. Is it meaning? Is it pleasure? Is it that they are so accustomed to reading about other people on social media that books seem to be written in the same fashion? Do people really think they are reading something meaningful? Of course, if it is meaningful to them don't shatter their illusions.
The best book in my stash this week is Why Teach? by Mark Edmundson. I usually order books from the library as I encounter references to the author or book in my reading. It is great. I don't even need to rummage through the stacks. But...Wait! I like to rummage through the stacks. After listening to the first and last chapters of The Organized Mind I realized I was not following my interest but another's steps. I wanted to lay down fresh prints. Our library is very small and getting smaller. Over the past two years the library has changed. It is not bibliocentric. Spaces have been carved out for technology centers. There are now computers in the Children's section and a huge sitting area in the back for lounging with one of the library's Kindles. The stacks looked lonely. Who goes there anymore? I pretended to be Hemingway who could not afford to own books. Who would come home with me tonight? The Durants? Too heavy. Shakespeare? Pearl Buck? Suze Ormond or one of the other economic wizards? Wait. What's this bright yellow book in the education section? A Harold Bloom quote on the front? Well, I must read it.
Why Teach? expands on the ideas put forth by David Hicks in Norms and Nobility. While Hicks focuses on developing the Ideal and helping younger students chisel their image, Edmundson describes the current state of college education. He mentions many of the same issues we have discussed in the Atrium. Of all the books I have read this week, this one has made an immediate impression. Truths came flying at me. The room lit up from all the light being shed. I may even have to buy a copy so I can mark it up! Edmundson confirmed that I want my life to be bibliocentric.
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