Good Reads

[stephen_speicher]

Free Capitalist, if you meant "approved" in some other way than I take it, then fine; all I wanted to do is clarify the fact that Ayn Rand did not approve that book (in the normal meaning of "approve") and it therefore should not be considered to be a part of her philosophy of Objectivism.

As to your mention of a "strictness policy," I view ideas as being right or wrong essentially by their correspondence to reality, not by the standard of the person who said them.

[Harald]

A classic not mentioned is Henrik Ibsen, a novelist Ayn Rand herself enjoyed. I especially recommend his "The Lady from the Sea" and "An Enemy of the People".

[AshRyan]

A classic not mentioned is Henrik Ibsen, a novelist Ayn Rand herself enjoyed. I especially recommend his "The Lady from the Sea" and "An Enemy of the People".

I know Ibsen primarily as a playwright (and both of his works that you recommended are plays). Was he also a novelist, or was that just written in error?

But anyway, I'll second the recommendation. I've loved Ibsen since high school, largely due to the two plays you mentioned here.

[AMERICONORMAN]

It's funny. Last night I was at a bar with a pint of guiness. I had an abridged version of Les Miserables on the table. There was a couple to my right, and a man behind who it seemed had too much to drink. Eventually, after a discussion about heated patios, the lady of the couple, noticed that book and suggested that I sit with the drunken poetry enthusiast behind me. She soon realized that I wanted to be alone. The guy with her asked who was my favorite Latin American writer. I said that I hadn't read any and that Ayn Rand was my favorite.

They knew of The Fountainhead and the lady related that her battered copy was stolen from her bookshelf at one of her parties. The man said that he had started reading The Fountainhead and could not finish due to its lenght. I answered with an air that suggested he was missing out on something wonderful.

The lady asked me what it was about Ayn Rand that attracted me. I said that it was the ideas in the novel, ideas that became the words for a feeling about life that I had already felt all my life; many of her fans have had this reaction. But then when you read the story over and over, you realize that the story is told superbly; and the conflicts by the onslaught of obstacles that hit Roark, cannot fail to keep one's attention.

I recommended plays since the length of Rand's writings seemed to be a factor. I recommended Schiller, Hugo, Rostand.

Finally I commented with a smile that if he wanted to read The Fountainhead without reading The Fountainhead, then he might want to read Ibsen's Enemy of The People. The themes of both are similar.

So I definately recommend Ibsen. Also I recommend Tore Boeckman's course The Principle of Drama which gets into the structure of several of the stories of the above Authors and more.

The man, it seemed, was planning on actually reading The Fountainhead.

Americo.

[Harald]

I know Ibsen primarily as a playwright (and both of his works that you recommended are plays).  Was he also a novelist, or was that just written in error?

But anyway, I'll second the recommendation.  I've loved Ibsen since high school, largely due to the two plays you mentioned here.

You are absolutely right, the works recommended are plays, not novels. I do not think he wrote any novels at all, none that I know of.

[Harald]

Also I recommend Tore Boeckman's course The Principle of Drama which gets into the structure of several of the stories of the above Authors and more.

I second that recommendation. Tore' Boeckmann's course is great and made me appreciate litterature and Ibsen even more than before. By the way, Tore will give a lecture in London this weekend on "Romanticism and Individual Values"; Scott McConnel will lecture on The Greatness of Terrence Rattigan: I soo look forward to their lectures! Other speakers will be Robert Tracinski on "To the Empire! A Vindication of British Colonialism"! John Lewis on, among other things, Ancient history and the lessons we can draw from it in our current war between Faith and Reason (see detailed lecture desription on conference website below) and the Dane Christian Beenfeldt on Alan Turing and the philosophy of AI.

The one and only Professor John Ridpath will lecture on the Founding Fathers (I heard his Nietzsche talk last year, in Oslo; it was awesome, I really got inside N's twisted mind and I saw concretely why and how N. influenced modern philosophy. John Ridpathh is a truly outstanding and moving lecturer!).

So if any of you on the East Coast or elsewere have the opportunity, come to London this weekend, for details see (and please forward to anyone who might be interested):

http://www.icognition.biz/iCon2004/index.html

Thanks,

Harald

[Jay P]

I'd like to recommend a military history book:

The Soul of Battle, by Victor Davis Hanson, 1999

The book's subtitle is From Ancient Times to the Present Day, How Three Great Liberators Vanquished Tyranny, and that is an accurate summary of the book's content. The book is in three sections that deal with:

1. The general Epaminondas of Thebes who in 370-369 BC led

an army of soldiers from Thebes and other Boeotian city states

in a campaign to destroy the slave society of Sparta and liberate

hundreds of thousands of people who had been slaves to the

Spartans.

2. General Sherman and his campaign of 1864 against the heart of

the Confederacy. Hanson argues that Sherman's caimpaign was

responsible for ending the Civil War, and with far fewer casualties

than would otherwise have been the case.

3. General Patton and his 1944-45 campaign against the Nazi armies.

Hanson argues that Patton's military genius and the resulting rapid

progress of his Third Army resulted in a much earlier defeat of Germany

than would have otherwise been the case. He also describes how Patton

was repeatedly held back by superiors.

The book emphasizes generalship, and the fighting spirit of free men - who fight for a moral cause. Hanson emphasizes how much the successes are due to these particular generals; in his opinion, there was nobody else at the time who could or would have done what they did. To me it's quite inspiring. These generals fought brilliant and ruthless campaigns with audacity, and in spite of opposition from other leadership on their own side. In addition, Epaminondas, Sherman and Patton were good at inspiring men in a great moral crusade. They didn't just see themselves as fighting a war: they saw themselves as smashing tyranny, and they did their best to instill this idea in the men they led.

Frustrating is that apparently much of the information that existed about Epaminondas is lost, so Hanson's description of this campaign left out lots of details. But also in the case of Sherman and Patton, Hanson does not provide a detailed description of the campaign. So if you are looking for a complete description of these campaigns, you won't get it from this book. I don't regard this as a problem, because there are plenty of other books (quite a few of which are listed in Hanson's bibliography) that do provide these details. But, you'll probably get more out of the book if you are somewhat familiar with the course of the Civil War and the European theatre of World War II. (Though even that's not a prerequisite: I previously knew very little about Greece at the time of Epaminondas, yet was able to follow that section of the book easily.)

A minor flaw is that he identifies "democracy" as being what these men were fighting for. Which in a narrow sense, it is, since the systems they instituted were ones in which leaders were democratically elected by the populace, but it should be distinguished from the kind of mob rule of an unlimited democracy, which is not at all what they were fighting for. (Though perhaps in ancient Greece the ideas were not fully enough developed so that the distinction was clear.)

This book is particularly relevant today: our fine armies are held back by men who do not have the moral courage to wage a ruthless war, so it is inspiring and instructive to read about men who had that courage, "went for the jugular", and decisively won, at far less overall cost in lives, than if the armies had been led by lesser men. I also like the connection Hanson makes between the ancient Greeks and America.

There is nothing so powerful as an army of free men, led by a military genius, fighting to obliterate a tyrannical state.

......

In reading this book, I also discovered that its author has written some good essays on current events that are available on his web site. And I strongly recommend that too.

Hanson is a professor of classics at Cal State Fresno. His web site is http://victorhanson.com. It contains a list of fairly current essays, mostly on topics related to the war, and also has some archived essays. I've by no means read all of them, and I have read none of the ones on his site that were written by other people.

The best thing I like about his essays on the present war and the greater political situation today is that he does not hesitate to name the issues. Morally, and with force. He speaks as a man who does not consider situations such as the 9/11 terrorism or the recent murders of the Russian schoolchildren morally ambiguous at all. This is a man who sees things in black and white. (In these respects, his essays are reminiscent of his book. Forcefully written, with moral clarity.) Not being an Objectivist, he doesn't go all the way back to the philosophical roots of the problem, so you won't find something as clear, for example, as Peter Schwartz's outlining of the fact that a proper foreign policy rests on self interest. And though he identifies the Islamic fundamentalists as evil and names the concretes that justify this, he doesn't quite get to the root of the evil. But - the way I look at it is that an Objectivist reader can fill this in. I also don't know whether he'd actually recommend quite as ruthless of a fight as Peikoff would (and I concur with Peikoff).

Another refreshing aspect of his writing is that he makes no attempt to be politically correct. Interestingly, he's apparently a Democrat (and some of his writing does use fairly liberal justifications for his positions), but doesn't seem to have much use at all for people like Dean or Kerry and holds Michael Moore in complete contempt.

Whatever he is politically, he's a man who loves Western Civilization and understands that it needs to be unhesitatilgly defended. From his book and from his essays, he clearly understands that there is such a thing as a just war. His essays are some of the best analysis of the present war that I've found anywhere.

[sczarj]

the curious incident of the dead dog in the night time, by mark hadden

count of monte cristo by dumas

[thefigure]

I have read these so I recommend them (none of them are Objectivist)

(They are not all great literature, but have good heroes or good plots, in the case of Follett and Clancy the bad characters are better drawn than the good ones)

Barometer Rising, by Hugh MacLennon

Monna Vanna, by Maurice Maeterlinck

Ian Fleming (James Bond series)

Eye of the Needle, Ken Follet (none of his other books)

The Hunt for Red October, Tom Clancy (none of his other books, although I have read them all)

Harry Potter, JK Rowling

The Mind Thing, Brown, Fredric, , also his mystery and other sci-fi books

McWilliams Special, Spearman, Frank

Cold Equations, Goodwin, Tom

Cappy Ricks, Kyne, Peter

Edited June 15, 2006 by thefigure

[Blinky]

My favourite books other than AR are those written by Andrzej Sapkowski. They will be finally published in english so you will be able to enjoy them too. He wrote great fantasy pentalogy which is about the Witcher. If you see it, I highly recommend to buy it.

From fantasy I liked some books by David Gemmell - especially those about Wayfarer.

I recommend books by Milan Kundera too. I haven´t read much of fiction recently but books by him are worth mentioning.

I read a lot of nonfiction, I especially like Richard Dawkin´s books from the field of biology (evolution) and William Glasser´s books in psychology.

[~Sophia~]

Has anyone here read East of Eden by John Steinbeck? I am wondering if it is worth my time.

[musenji]

I actually read it about half a year ago!

I'm not a voracious reader of fiction, so my standards of comparison are probably somewhat limited, but I thought his description and setting development were quite rich. I found the plot to be engaging, and the characters very well-developed, consistent, and often fascinating. There were several points in the book when I couldn't wait to see what happened when character X met character Y, to see how their "natures" would interact.

As for philosophy, there is mention of Christian writings, and some use of Christian metaphor (though to tell you exactly what would spoil some of the plot). But, I remember a passage that was particularly individualistic, about the sanctity of the individual mind. I read a rumor somewhere that Steinbeck had met Rand, quite possibly in-between the publishing of Grapes of Wrath (1939) and East of Eden (1952). I can't seem to find the reference now...ah! Here.

****

Objectivist Shoshana Milgram (professor of English at Virgina Tech) said in an interview with the Ayn Rand Institute:

"Last December I spoke at a session entitled "Problems in Literary Research," about my detective work on the parallels between a passage in John Steinbeck's East of Eden and Roark's courtroom speech. I'd noticed the similarity many years ago, when I taught the Steinbeck novel, and I've been trying to discover how and when Steinbeck might have encountered Ayn Rand or The Fountainhead. A highlight of my investigation-in-progress was a phone call from Thomas Steinbeck, whom I'd contacted: he told me that his father had indeed known Ayn Rand."

[intellectualammo]

I'm not a voracious reader of fiction, so my standards of comparison are probably somewhat limited,

I know my comparisons are limited, and will continue to be, since I write way more than I read now.

But, I remember a passage that was particularly individualistic, about the sanctity of the individual mind.

I do to. It's got to be the one in chapter 13 no doubt. But I have discovered many quotes that are of value in this novel. There are also characers that I particularily liked, Lee for example. Also one the most witchy characters in all of fiction is in the novel as well, Cathy. There is only one other character that I have read that is even comparable to her in that way and that is Zenia from Margaret Atwood's "The Robber Bride."

Sophia, I have no idea whether you have read Grapes or not, but EoE was certainly worth the read for me.

I read a rumor somewhere that Steinbeck had met Rand, quite possibly in-between the publishing of Grapes of Wrath (1939) and East of Eden (1952). I can't seem to find the reference now...ah! Here.

Very interesting. I've been wondering for a while now, how the hell he went from writing Grapes to some of the passages in EoE... I know someone else on the board that may be interested in knowing about that reference...

Edited September 19, 2007 by intellectualammo

[Myself]

If you're in the mood for fun literature, I'd try Twain's A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court. It's about an industrialist/inventor who winds up in the middle ages and tries to transform the period through reason and technology (with mixed results). Alternately humorous and thrilling it's one of my personal favorites.

[Erik Christensen]

Anything by Frank H. Spearman, esp. "Nan of Music Mountain" and "Daughter of a Magnate"

[Erik Christensen]

My all time favorite fantasy novel is "The King of Elfland's Daughter" by Lord Dunsany written in 1924

http://www.amazon.com/King-Elflands-Daught...7534&sr=8-1

[Space Patroller]

My all time favorite fantasy novel is "The King of Elfland's Daughter" by Lord Dunsany written in 1924

http://www.amazon.com/King-Elflands-Daught...7534&sr=8-1

Aside from, and preceding Rand I'm basically science fictions:

For fantasy adventure. It's Tolkien

For hardcore science fiction it's Heinlein, Asmiov, Niven and some Clarke and Aldiss

For sci-fi adventure it's Anderson and E.E. Smith; especially the Skylark serids

For sci-fi exotica. Algis Budrys and Cordwainer Smith

Throw in Marion Zimmer Bradley

Add in IF magazine from 1961 to 1973 and the early TV space shows and I'm there

[Axiomatic]

Just started reading this hilarious book.

The Butt - Will Self.