Books Read – 2022
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Tag Archives: bibliophiles
Books Read 2021
For the love of sanctuary
In times of upheaval, noise, and fear, like those we’re going through now with the Trump administration’s penchant for dishonesty, disregard for equal rights, and seeming dislike for democracy itself, finding healthy places of refuge are important. I can’t tell you what the healthiest places are for you, I can tell you what they are for me.
Books, music, dance, nature, love, are all sanctuaries for me. In his essay, “Nature”, Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote: “Here is a sanctity which shames our religions, and reality which discredits our heroes. Here we find nature to be the circumstances which dwarfs every other circumstance, and judges like a god all men that come to her.” I agree with Emerson, far beyond the reach of any mastery of words I might have in my possession.
For me, the sanctuary found in nature’s embrace protects the soul while the sanctuary in a loved one’s embrace protects the heart. We are all connected.
And yes, of course, music. Classical, jazz, international, Springsteen, the Beatles, and so on. The right music can take the blues away and allow an already happy day to strut its stuff in the clouds. Nature and music aside, it is safe to say books are my primary refuge. They have been for nearly as long as I have memory.
Of all the gifts my parents gave me, I rank my love of reading at the top. I read thirty to forty-something books a year on average. I am baffled by those who go through life without them. No doubt they are aware of other sanctuaries life offers that are utterly lost on me. I hope so. We all need them, and, more importantly, we all deserve them. From my days of homelessness to now, being connected to a book makes the shifting currents of life easier to manage.
Through good times and bad, if you’ll permit me the use of an all too worn phrase, I’ve been part of the infinite number of worlds found in the pages of books. Along the way I spent time with Dickens and Steinbeck, Edith Wharton, Jon Dos Passos, Whitman, Updike, Anna Quindlen, James Salter, and on and on and on. My mind has traveled the sentences their minds created! And, along the way, I’ve hung out with Pip, and listened to Steinbeck’s Charley bark like crazy at the bears in a canyon out west. I spent time with Lincoln and his cabinet in Doris Kearns Goodwin’s, “Team of Rivals.”
Your refuge can be a rich resource of knowledge. I gobbled up Shelby three-volume, “Civil War: A Narrative,” a collection of work so extraordinary I almost believed I was living in the 1860s and nowhere else.
Taking healthy care of yourself is not an act of disloyalty to anyone else. Moreover, remembering to take care of yourself, a retreat into a loved sanctuary, a conversation with a friend, say, will make you far more effective when you turn your focus to the benefit of others. Something we all need to do in today’s climate.
Books read in 2010 & 2011
I’ve always been curious about the books people read. It fascinates me because, I suppose, what draws the undivided attention of the human mind fascinates me, and because I’ve carried on a love affair with books for as long as I have memory. What people read tends to draw my undivided attention. I even joined a delightful website called Goodreads where book lovers share their reading journeys. Some years ago I took to the habit of keep lists of the books I read, memorializing their completion by noting the day I finished them.
I enjoyed all these books. Long ago I learned from my father that if, after some pages, the book didn’t interest me, put it down and move on.
Desiderius Erasmus, a Dutch humanist and theologian, said, “When I have money, I buy books. If any money is left over, I buy food and clothes.” I’m with you all the way, sir.
Here are the books I read in 2010 and 2011.
2011
1) “Intruder in the Dust” by William Faulkner 1-5-11
2) “The Children” by Edith Wharton 1-11-11
3) “House of Mirth” by Edith Wharton 1-31-11
4) “The Ghost Writer” by Philip Roth 2-10-11
5) “Jean-Jacques Rousseau: Restless Genius” by Leo Damrosch 2-22-11
6) “The Alice Behind Wonderland” by Simon Winchester 3-13-11
7) “The Tenants” by Bernard Malamud 3-25-11
8) “The Assistant” by Bernard Malamud 4-10-11
9) “The Natural” by Bernard Malamud 4-19-11
10) “The Fixer” by Bernard Malamud 4-28-11
11) “Dubin’s Lives” by Bernard Malamud 5-14-11
12) “A New Life” by Bernard Malamud 5-28-11
13) “Angle of Repose” by Wallace Stegner 6-24-11
14) “The Spectator Bird” by Wallace Stegner 6-28-11
15) “All the Little Live Things” by Wallace Stegner 7-3-11
16) “Crossing to Safety” by Wallace Stegner 7-10-11
17) “Shroud” by John Banville 7-23-11
18) “Mark Twain: A Life” by Ron Powers 7-29-11
19) “Troubles” by J.G. Farrell 8-5-11
20) “God’s Grace” by Bernard Malamud 8-8-11
21) “The Siege of Krishnapur” by J.G. Farrell 8-19-11
22) “The Singapore Grip” by J.G. Farrell 8-31-11
23) “The Trees” by Conrad Richter 9-7-11
24) “Girl in the head” by J.G. Farrell 10-4-11
25) “The Rebel Angels” by Robertson Davies 10-17-11
26) “Robert Louis Stevenson” by Frank McLynn 11-12-11
27) “The Edge of Sadness” by Edwin O’Connor 11-13-11
28) “The River King” by Alice Hoffman 11-16-11
29) “Time Will Darken it” by William Maxwell 12-15-11
30) “So Long, See You Tomorrow” by William Maxwell 12-18-11
31) “The Invention of Solitude” by Paul Auster 12-21-11
32) “They Came Like Swallows” by William Maxwell 12-26-11
33) “Washington Square” by Henry James 12-30-11
2010
1) "Arrowsmith" by Sinclair Lewis 1-4-10
2) "It Can’t Happen Here" by Sinclair Lewis 1-18-10
3) "Dodsworth" by Sinclair Lewis 1-31-10
4) "Kingsblood Royal" by Sinclair Lewis 2-10-20
5) "Cass Timberlane" by Sinclair Lewis 2-19-10
6) "Elmer Gantry" by Sinclair Lewis 3-4-10
7) "Winesburg, Ohio" by Sherwood Anderson 3-15-10
8) "True North" by Jim Harrison 3-27-10
9) "The English Major" by Jim Harrison 4-5-10
10) "Blood Brothers" by Richard Price 4-7-10
11) "Wild Pitch" by A.B. Guthrie Jr. 4-10-10
12) "Returning to Earth" by Jim Harrison 4-19-10
13) "The Johnstown Flood" by David McCullough 5-3-10
14) "Widows of Eastwick" by John Updike 5-18-10
15) "The Centaur" by John Updike 5-31-10
16) "Three Soldiers" by John Dos Passos 6-27-10
17) "The 42nd Parallel" by John Dos Passos 7-?-10
18) "Child of God" by Cormac McCarthy 8-23-10
19) "Crack In the Edge of the World," by Simon Winchester 8-29-10
20) "1919" by John Dos Passos 9-6-10
21) "An Irish Country Village" by Patrick Taylor 9-16-10
22) "Big Money" by John Dos Passos 10-4-10
23) "Manhattan Transfer" by John Dos Passos 10-22-10
24) "Death in the Andes" by Mario Vargas Llosa 10-29-10
25) "Nemesis" by Philip Roth 11-4-10
26) "Exit Ghost" by Philip Roth 12-5-10
27) "The Humbling" by Philip Roth 12-9-10
28) "Everyman" by Philip Roth 12-13-10
29) "Indignation" by Philip Roth 12-19-10
30) "Mistler’s Exit" by Louis Begley 12-25-10
31) "The Reserve" by Russell Banks 12-29-10
Without A Book
I love to read and I am, without question, a bibliophile.
The first time I heard I was a bibliophile (a collector of books) it sounded like something that required a hefty dose of antibiotics (do they make pro-biotics? ). Anyway, a world without books would be like a world without sunlight. Nearly as bad is the time between books. If you find an author you love you can gobble up their books one after another. I am, for example, overjoyed to hear Howard Frank Mosher has a new book out, “Walking to Gatlinburg” . I love his writing.
I am pages away from finishing “Elmer Gantry” by Sinclair Lewis, my sixth Lewis book in a row, so I’m up for a change.
Being without a book is to feel a bit rudderless in the world. There is an almost familial comfort to know you have a book to return to as you go through the rest of life. A place to retreat, meet friends, places, experiences to be had that, while you are in the process of having them, belong solely to you.
Anyway, I’d like to talk more but I need to finish Gantry, then find another book to welcome me.
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Peter S. Kahrmann - Est. 1953 