Chris Via's Blog

Index of My YouTube Videos
http://www.youtube.com/c/leafbyleaf

- Q and A -
Answering Your Questions, Part I
Answering Your Questions, Part II
Answering Your Questions, Part III
Answering Your Questions, Part IV

- BOOKSHELF TOURS -
Bookshelf Tour Teaser
Bookshelf Tour: Literary Studies
Bookshelf Tour: Science
Bookshelf Tour: Poetry

Michael Silverblatt's Library

- ANALYSIS -
Analyzing "In a Tub" by Amy Hempel

COMPILATIONS
Proust 3-Pack: Albaret, Czapski, & Beckett
Theroux, Gass, & Nelson on BLUE

- THE READING LIFE -
On Reading Big Books
Why Read Philosophy? Where to Start? Where to Go?

- LISTS -
10 Big Books I Love: Part II
10 Big Books I Love
10 Books that Keep Defeating Me
10 Favorite Novel Openings
10 Short Books I Love
Non-Fiction Recommendations (November 2019)
10 Books I Will Read in 2020
31 Books on Reading
10 Books for Grazing

- WESTERN CORE SERIES -
WESTERN CORE SERIES: Introduction
ILIAD by Homer (WESTERN CORE SERIES)
ODYSSEY by Homer (WESTERN CORE SERIES)
INFERNO by Dante (WESTERN CORE SERIES)
CANTERBURY TALES by Chaucer (WESTERN CORE SERIES)
HAMLET by William Shakespeare (WESTERN CORE SERIES)
DON QUIXOTE: Part I by Cervantes (WESTERN CORE SERIES)
DON QUIXOTE: Part II by Cervantes

- REFERENCE WORKS -
OXFORD AMERICAN WRITER'S THESAURUS (Third Edition)

- APHORISMS -
The Epigrams of Oscar Wilde
The Maxims of La Rochefoucauld
The Waste Books of Georg Christoph Lichtenberg

- A -

- B -
Slow Days, Fast Company by Eve Babitz (L.A. List 4/7)

Before by Carmen Boullosa

2666 Part I (The Part about the Critics) by Roberto Bolaño
2666 Part II (The Part about Amalfitano) by Roberto Bolaño
2666 Part III (The Part about Fate) by Roberto Bolaño
2666 Part IV (The Part about the Crimes) by Roberto Bolaño
2666 Part V (The Part about Archimboldi) by Roberto Bolaño

THE DESERT AND ITS SEED by Jorge Barón Biza

THE ANXIETY OF INFLUENCE by Harold Bloom
A MAP OF MISREADING by Harold Bloom

- C -
BLINDING by Mircea Cărtărescu

THE INVENTION OF MOREL by Adolfo Bioy Casares
ASLEEP IN THE SUN by Adolfo Bioy Casares

The Albertine Workout by Anne Carson
AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF RED by Anne Carson

THE EYELID by S. D. Chrostowska

- D -
TRAFIK by Rikki Ducornet
BRIGHTFELLOW by Rikki Ducornet

THE FAMILIAR by Mark Z. Danielewski

PROVISIONAL BIOGRAPHY OF MOSE EAKINS by Evan Dara

HOLY THE FIRM by Annie Dillard

THE LOVER by Maguerite Duras

- E -
The Black Dahlia Murder by James Ellroy (L.A. List 3/7)

THE INFINITY OF LISTS by Umberto Eco

Less Than Zero by Bret Easton Ellis (L.A. List 6/7)

- F -
ASK THE DUST by John Fante (L.A. List 1/7)

America and the Cult of the Cactus Boots: A Diagnostic

THE BLUE FLOWER by Penelope Fitzgerald

THE GREAT GATSBY by F. Scott Fitzgerald

- G -
POEMS 1962-2012 by Louise Glück

SEE WHAT I SEE by Greg Gerke

A TEMPLE OF TEXTS by William H. Gass

MELVILLE by Jean Giono

THE RECOGNITIONS by William Gaddis (NEW)
J R by William Gaddis
THE RECOGNITIONS by William Gaddis (OLD)

NOVEL EXPLOSIVES by Jim Gauer
NOVEL EXPLOSIVES by Jim Gauer (OLD)

- H -
TOO LOUD A SOLITUDE by Bohumil Hrabal

THE MANIFOLD DESTINY OF EDDIE VEGAS by Rick Harsch
VOICES AFTER EVELYN by Rick Harsch

LE TON BEAU DE MAROT by Douglas R. Hofstadter

AMERICAN SONNETS FOR MY PAST AND FUTURE ASSASSIN by Terrance Hayes

- I -

- J -

- K -
Anecdotes by Heinrich von Kleist

Sátántangó by László Krasznahorkai

MACHINES IN THE HEAD by Anna Kavan

- L -
POENA DAMNI: THE TRILOGY by Dimitris Lyacos

MEGA-NOVELS AND THE SCIENCE OF PAYING ATTENTION by David Letzler

TWO STORIES by Osvaldo Lamborghini
ON THE SUBLIME by Longinus

THE PASSION ACCORDING TO G. H. by Clarice Lispector

- M -
OUTER DARK by Cormac McCarthy

BIRDS OF AMERICA: STORIES by Lorrie Moore

THE READER AS METAPHOR by Alberto Manguel

Part 1: THE MAN WITHOUT QUALITIES by Robert Musil
Part 2: THE MAN WITHOUT QUALITIES by Robert Musil
Part 3: THE MAN WITHOUT QUALITIES by Robert Musil
Part 4a: THE MAN WITHOUT QUALITIES by Robert Musil
Part 4b: THE MAN WITHOUT QUALITIES by Robert Musil
Part 4c: THE MAN WITHOUT QUALITIES by Robert Musil

ALEXANDER THEROUX: A FAN’S NOTES by Steven Moore

NIGHT SOUL AND OTHER STORIES by Joseph McElroy

THE TWENTY DAYS OF TURIN by Giorgio De Maria

WITTGENSTEIN'S MISTRESS by David Markson

01: HEAR THE WIND SING & PINBALL, 1973 by Haruki Murakami
02: A WILD SHEEP CHASE by Haruki Murakami
03: HARDBOILED WONDERLAND AND THE END OF THE WORLD by Haruki Murakami
04: NORWEGIAN WOOD by Haruki Murakami
05: DANCE DANCE DANCE by Haruki Murakami
06: SOUTH OF THE BORDER, WEST OF THE SUN by Haruki Murakami
07: THE WIND-UP BIRD CHRONICLE by Haruki Murakami
08: SPUTNIK SWEETHEART by Haruki Murakami
09: KAFKA ON THE SHORE by Haruki Murakami

- N -
Valerie and Her Week of Wonders by Vítězslav Nezval

- O -
FORGOTTEN JOURNEY & THE PROMISE by Silvina Ocampo

- P -
THE MYSTERIOUS CORRESPONDENT by Marcel Proust
SWANN'S WAY by Marcel Proust
WITHIN A BUDDING GROVE by Marcel Proust
THE GUERMANTES WAY by Marcel Proust
SODOM AND GOMORRAH by Marcel Proust
THE CAPTIVE by Marcel Proust
THE FUGITIVE by Marcel Proust
TIME REGAINED by Marcel Proust

Inherent Vice by Thomas Pynchon (L.A. List 5/7)
MASON & DIXON by Thomas Pynchon

La Medusa by Vanessa Place (LA List)

THE WAY OF FLORIDA by Russell Persson

- Q -

- R -
PEDRO PÁRAMO by Juan Rulfo
SHAKESPEARE'S DOG by Leon Rooke

- S -
A SWIM IN A POND IN THE RAIN by George Saunders

KOKORO by Natsume Soseki

JOHN THE POSTHUMOUS by Jason Schwartz

SEA ABOVE, SUN BELOW by George Salis

- T -
THREE WOGS by Alexander Theroux
THEROUX METAPHRASTES: AN ESSAY ON LITERATURE by Alexander Theroux
DARCONVILLE’S CAT by Alexander Theroux
AN ADULTERY by Alexander Theroux
LAURA WARHOLIC by Alexander Theroux

- V -
Borges and the Eternal Orangutans by Luis Fernando Verissimo
THE BIRDS by Tarjei Vesaas

William T. Vollmann
YOU BRIGHT AND RISEN ANGELS by William T. Vollmann
THE ICE-SHIRT by William T. Vollmann
FATHERS AND CROWS by William T. Vollmann
RIDING TOWARD EVERYWHERE by William T. Vollmann
POOR PEOPLE by William T. Vollmann
THE ATLAS by William T. Vollmann
RISING UP AND RISING DOWN: Vol. I by William T. Vollmann

- W -
INFINITE JEST by David Foster Wallace
THIS IS WATER by David Foster Wallace

STONER by John Williams

How High? — That High by Diane Williams
COLLECTED STORIES by Diane Williams

MISS LONELYHEARTS by Nathanael West
THE DAY OF THE LOCUST by Nathanael West (L.A. List 2/7)

- X -

- Y -

- Z -

NOTE: I have added Jane Austen and Emily Brontë because, after much consideration, I consider their novels as pillars.

This is the year of The Fourteen (formerly The Twelve). The fourteen select works that represent the pillars of Western literature, from Homer to Woolf. As with anything, to maintain quality, maintenance is required (Robert Pirsig exhausts this proposition in his twin masterpieces Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry Into Values and Lila: An Inquiry Into Morals ). So I find myself once again eager to reinforce the foundation of my literary knowledge.

YouTube supplement
Find more about these works on my YouTube channel: http://www.youtube.com/c/leafbyleaf.

Which fourteen?

Homer (trans. Lattimore), Iliad and Odyssey
Dante (trans. Mark Musa), Inferno
Chaucern(trans. Nevill Coghill), Canterbury Tales
Shakespeare, Hamlet
Cervantes (trans. Rutherford), Don Quixote
Milton, Paradise Lost
Austen, Pride & Prejudice
Goethe (trans. Arndt), Faust
Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights
Melville, Moby-Dick
Whitman, Leaves of Grass
Proust (trans. Davis), Swann's Way
Joyce, Ulysses
Woolf, To the Lighthouse

Preamble
In addition to the core Fourteen, I will supplement with various scholarly texts and biographies, as any good reader would once they have already wrestled with a main text on their own a couple times. For most of these books, this will be the third go for me, though for some (Iliad, Moby-Dick, and Swann's Way) it will be the fourth or fifth. I choose to omit an apologia for my selection, though I do acknowledge that any list is inherently exclusive. This blog post will be a running accumulation of my efforts with each text.

A note on noteworthiness
A lot of these works are notable for their formal or syntactical courage. For example, Homer and the ancient Greek lyricists devised the dactylic hexameter; Dante chose to deny the standard Latin for high poetry in exchange for his Tuscan dialect; Chaucer declined to write in the accepted French of the verses of his day and penned the Tales in Middle English; and John Milton ignored and discredited the then-debased idea of blank verse.

NOTE: Due to character limit on blog posts, I will link to all individual selections.

Iliad
Blog post: http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/...
YT video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zvv2W1...

Odyssey
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
YT video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cppQTa...

Inferno
http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/...
YT video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dl4WjO...

Canterbury Tales
http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/...
YT video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ai3QQ...

Hamlet
http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/...
YT video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=05gwQ...

Don Quixote
http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/...
YT video: ‪https://youtu.be/srn5rb9dvVQ

Milton, Paradise Lost
forthcoming

Austen, Pride & Prejudice
forthcoming

Goethe (trans. Arndt), Faust
forthcoming

Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights
http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/...

Melville, Moby-Dick
http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/...

Whitman, Leaves of Grass

Proust (trans. Davis), Swann's Way
http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/...

Joyce, Ulysses
forthcoming

Woolf, To the Lighthouse
forthcoming

Despite one of the busiest years of my life, I managed to carve out the time to read 116 books. At the end of last year we bought some heavily wooded land, and this year undertook the big project of carving out a driveway and building a house in the woods—a life-long dream come true. And, it is complete with a custom library!



My wife, daughter, and I began the year in a cozy two-bedroom apartment, where I kicked off 2017 with a deep read of The Anatomy of Melancholy in the fat little NYRB paperback edition (read review). Now, I'm bookending the year in my inviting West Elm leather reading chair, surrounded by nearly all of my best books (I keep a fitfully-pruned library), enjoying Jonathan Baumbach's You: Or the Invention of Memory: A Novel , which is like a mix of John Barth and Italo Calvino. Candles with scents like "rugged patchouli" and "sandalwood tobacco" mingle with the throng of spindly trees out my window to complete the tableau. Yes, life is good.

Instead of enumerating the whole of my 2017 reading list, I'll dole out some ad hoc awards.

Best Read of 2017
The Anatomy of Melancholy (Read Review)
I first encountered this text after reading Harold Bloom's The Anatomy of Influence: Literature as a Way of Life , where he cites Burton's tome as the book's inspiration. From the overlong introduction under the guise of Democritus Junior to the concluding organs (remember: the book is an anatomy after all), it is a masterclass in systematic structuring (worthy of a German philosophy book), erudition, and, well, a stockpile of ancient wisdom.

Best Non-Fiction by Female Author
How to Live: A Life of Montaigne in One Question and Twenty Attempts at An Answer
Are you interested in Montaigne the man, his essays, his philosophy, or the historical context of his writing? Doesn't matter; this book covers it all.

Best Fiction by Female Author
Interpreter of Maladies (Read Review)
A beautiful and often shattering testament to the Indian-American experience (predominantly) in America.

Best Non-Fiction by Male Author
Europe Read Review
A one-volume whopper that covers the history of what we call Europe from prehistory to the end of the Cold War. Davies has a deft eye for the right details to include, and, even at roughly 1,200 pages, the text is more than palatable; it's a treat that you will want before and after dinner.

Best Fiction by Male Author
Little, Big (Read Review)
After reading Game of Thrones and complaining that I just don't have a predilection for fantasy, a colleague challenged me with this one. Seeing that Harold Bloom reads it often and supplied a blurb on the Vintage cover, I jumped on it (I didn't think Bloom would comment on anything published after, say, 1930). Sure enough, my opinions were checked and I had to circumscribe my stance.

Non-Fiction Book I Wanted to Abandon the Whole Time
The Space Barons: Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, and the Quest to Colonize the Cosmos Read Review
A bit of a slough but very informative and an important topic.

Fiction Book I Wanted to Abandon the Whole Time
A Game of Thrones
I know this could get me ostracized from some circles, so I will omit any justification or polemic. Suffice it to say: I tried.

Book I Didn’t Want to End
Holy the Firm (Read Review)
Every time I read this it's like eating candy. I've nearly highlighted the entire text and filled the margins.

Best Book I'd Been Putting Off
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry Into Values (Read Review)
For most, the "motorcycle" portion of the title entices them and they abandon what they encounter. For me, I put the book off for years because of the "motorcycle" bit and then ended up enthralled with the greater theme. I followed it with the sequel and plan to re-read it next year.

Best Non-Fiction Re-Read
This Is Water: Some Thoughts, Delivered on a Significant Occasion, about Living a Compassionate Life
Yes, you should buy a hardcover of this short speech that is available for free online. And you should make it mandatory annual reading. DFW was a well of wisdom and a craftsman with language.

Best Fiction Re-Read
Moby-Dick or, The Whale (Read Review)
I consider this one of the top 10 essential texts of all time.

Best Book about Books
My Back Pages: Reviews and Essays
Not sure how I discovered Steven Moore but I'm infinitely thankful. This guy has caused me to spend more money than anyone else. He fights for the large, encyclopedic, difficult books and the independent presses. Jeff Bursey wrote a great review of this book for Numéro Cinq. And there's a fantastic Bookworm podcast here.

Most Startling Book
theMystery.doc (Read Review)
Matthew McIntosh's 10-year effort to find a suitable form for the post-9/11 experience. Trust me—you've read nothing like it.

Best New (To Me) Author
Rikki Ducornet
Yet another gem from My Back Pages: Reviews and Essays . I snatched up the Tetralogy of Elements series right away. So far, I've read The Stain and Entering Fire . There is nothing quite like Ducornet. One feels that she has a whole library and the entirety of the English and French languages at her disposal. Her voice seems nowhere to be found—rather, a spirit diffused into times and characters. I often feel that I cannot place the time in which her books were written, they so effortlessly dip from the evolutions of language and metaphor. A rich, robust vocabulary and knack for juxtaposing the vile and the comedic, Ducornet is a sui generis experience.

Longest Book
theMystery.doc
I didn't think I would end up reading a book longer than The Anatomy of Melancholy but this was it.

Shortest Book
Meno
Part of my re-reading of Plato's oeuvre, courtesy of the Hatchett Publishing production of Complete Works.

Best Philosophy Book
Man's Search for Meaning (Read Review)
I read this on a flight from the US to, well, Germany of all places. Viktor Frankl, a prominent Viennese psychiatrist before enslavement in Auschwitz, emerged with a complete philosophy and methodology for coping with even the worst possible situations: logotheraphy.

Best Science Book
Beyond Biocentrism: Rethinking Time, Space, Consciousness, and the Illusion of Death
I first approached this book with more than a spoonful of skepticism, but after reading through Dr. Lanza's CV my ears pricked up and I engaged. By the fifth chapter I was piqued. And by the eighth I was more than intrigued. Parts of the ideas presented here furnished me with a major theme for a novel I wrote this year. Anyone interested in cutting edge science will find plenty to charge the juices here.

Biggest Let-Down
The Day on Fire
Writer after writer has cited this book as a huge inspiration, and I, too, have been through my Rimbaud phase (still love his poetry, in fact). Unfortunately, the first 200 pages basically match the scope of the movie Total Eclipse, and the remaining 400 are a painstaking cycle of peregrinations.

Book I've Been Reading Forever and Finally Finished
A History of Western Philosophy (Read Review)
I started and stopped this one a few years previously. Not sure what was magical about this year, but I read it through with gusto and relished every page. Russell is a signature wit. And regardless of his personal beliefs, he proves that he can engage in balanced and respectable scholarship. Anyone interested in solidifying their understanding of western philosophy need look no further, especially when this is a single volume.

Book I've Been Reading Forever and Still Didn't Finish
Israelology: the Missing Link in Systematic Theology (Read Review)
I'm keeping a draft review of my distilled reading notes. This is the pinnacle of Messianic Jewish doctrine. Adapted from the author's dissertation, Dr. Fruchtenbaum digs into every major systematic theology and then constructs an exhaustive Israelology that seeks to correct the western omission or denigration of Israel (ironic since most of the Bible concerns Jews). I do look forward to completing it one day, but every paragraph is like a Thanksgiving meal.

Best Literary Criticism
The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages
You've probably realized that I am a Bloom fan. I can't help it; he's bullheaded and cocksure, but learned and passionate about the best of our literary tradition. Even at his worse, I cannot help but love him. This book, above all others, is the one that separates him from most of academia (what he calls the "rabblement of lemmings").

Best Book I Was Pressured into Reading
The Book Thief (Read Review)
Okay, I admit it, I fell for this book. Yes, it is YA (not my usual bag), but it is passionately wrought and provides a chilling narrative perspective à la The Screwtape Letters .

Honorable Mentions
As a Man Thinketh
Metamagical Themas: Questing for the Essence of Mind and Pattern
Lila: An Inquiry Into Morals
In the Heart of the Heart of the Country and Other Stories
Norwegian Wood
Middlesex
Miss Lonelyhearts
Zen in the Art of Writing
Classics for Pleasure

This year I also discovered NetGalley, an online advance-reader program that gets upcoming books into your hands in exchange for a review, and read six books:

The Red Word
Hotel Silence
Thelema: An Introduction to the Life, Work & Philosophy of Aleister Crowley
No Time to Spare: Thinking About What Matters
The Bughouse: The Poetry, Politics and Madness of Ezra Pound
The Space Barons: Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, and the Quest to Colonize the Cosmos

Conclusion
It has been another great year in books, and I look forward to what 2018 brings. At present, I've set a goal of exchanging quantity for quality, but I did this last year and didn't really stick with it. I've selected a baker's dozen books (roughly one book per month) to keep me sated:

The Combinations
A Naked Singularity
The Making of Americans
The Instructions
Novel Explosives
Terra Nostra
JR
2666
Women and Men
Against the Day
Jerusalem
The Tunnel
I Am Radar

Last year I read more books than any other year in my adult life: 124 total books; 105 cover-to-cover. When I look at the spread of page-counts, it is perplexing how I managed such a glut of reading: the average page-count was 384; the shortest book was 68 pages (The Law); the longest was 1,052 pages (Marcel Proust: A Life); only 9 books had fewer than 100 pages. There were many early mornings, late nights, lunch breaks, waiting rooms, and flights spent reading, and my decision to read the whole of Proust's gesamtkunstwerk certainly affected last year's total, but I must take a moment to apply Marx's precept and decide if quantity affected quality negatively or positively.

First, let's separate the wheat from the chaff, so as to tune our focus to books I technically read. My definition of a properly read book is a book the reader read carefully from cover to cover, taking notes, challenging the text, highlighting, consulting outside thoughts, and so on. In other words, properly reading a book is to engage in a sort of dialogue with the book. This leaves out books that I referenced (e.g. anthologies, dictionaries, etc.), skimmed (e.g. to get a feel for a particular subject or author), or abandoned (i.e. just couldn't finish for one reason or another). So, to be fair, let's toss out the books that I didn't technically read last year:

> McDougal Concepts & Skills Geometry: Student Editon Geometry 2005 - used to brush up for GRE.
> William Tyndale: A Biography - got about halfway through and got bogged down.
> Western Philosophy: An Anthology - used for a study on aesthetics.
> The Anatomy of Influence: Literature as a Way of Life - Bloom kept putting me to sleep with this one, but it did lead me to choose The Anatomy of Melancholy for my first read of 2017!
> The Well-Educated Mind: A Guide to the Classical Education You Never Had - I read this up to the sections that are basically annotated reading lists.
> Selected Non-Fictions - one does not simply read through Borges's essays.
> Journey to the Ants: A Story of Scientific Exploration - I love E. O. Wilson, but I just wasn't in the mood for this.
> Value Compact Bible-ESV-Border Design - terrible translation.
> Easy Spanish Step-By-Step: Master High-Frequency Grammar for Spanish Proficiency-FAST! - picked through this one to get a sense of grammar and vocabulary.
> Easy Spanish Reader w/CD-ROM: A Three-Part Text for Beginning Students - see above.
> The Christian in Complete Armour - this is one of those tomes that must be sipped. I got about a fourth of the way through and had to breathe for a while.
> Israelology: the Missing Link in Systematic Theology - this is essentially a dissertation without any regard for readers out side of the candidate's scholarly auditors.
> The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages - having read this one already, I picked through some sections as a refresher.
> The Mind's I: Fantasies and Reflections on Self and Soul - grazed through some essays to prepare for some bigger books on philosophy of mind.
> The Geneva Bible: 1560 Edition - reading this one mostly for the marginalia.
> Barron's Essential Words for the GRE - used to prep for GRE.
> The Complete Works - like Borges, one does not simply read through Montaigne's essays.
> Practical Algebra: A Self-Teaching Guide - more GRE prep material.

Now, this still leaves me with over 100 books. Instead of listing all of them (my 2016 shelf can be perused here), I will point out some highlights.

Of all the books I read last year, there are 5 that stand out. Here they are in order of impact.

1. The Recognitions
Each year, I try to start with a book that is both long and deep. For example, in previous years I've turned to Infinite Jest, The Magic Mountain, Gravity's Rainbow, and Swann's Way. Ever since reading Jonathan Franzen praise it in his essay "How To Be Alone" (in the eponymous book: How to Be Alone), I had Gaddis's debut novel tucked away for the right time, and last year I sensed it was that time. And thankfully the leap of faith paid off. It is one of--if not the--best novels I've ever read. Truly, it has everything. I hung on every word and daydreamed of possibly making it a central text for my dissertation (this fulfillment remains to be seen).

2. Le Ton beau de Marot: In Praise of the Music of Language
If Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid is Hofstadter's Iliad, then this book is his Odyssey. I mean, seriously--how does someone pull off books like these? Hofstadter is the quintessential polymath with a penchant for analogy. Le ton beau is a rumination on the art of translation, using a single French poem that struck him early in his life; and it was the spark that led me to produce my little book of poems, ΑΚΟΥΩ: Incidental Poems. This may well be the best "general" non-fiction book I've ever read.

3. Warranted Christian Belief
Dr. Plantinga offers a satisfying and calculated riposte to the hysterical atheism that seeks to paint anyone with any form of religious inkling as an ignorant, Zenophobic, dullard. Being of the stock of analytical philosophers as Plantinga is, one should brush up on probability calculus (though it isn't necessary) and the arguments offered between Hume (An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding) and Kant (Critique of Pure Reason). In my estimation, Plantinga offers a solid argument for the Christian to retain intellectual integrity. See my review of this one.

4. The Goldfinch
For a long time, I turned away from this novel, knowing I was setup for disappointment after the sensation and experience that is The Secret History. But, finally, I took the plunge. Philip Roth's prose is consistently lauded for its concision and splendor--and rightfully so--but how one can maintain beautiful syntax for 776 pages like Tartt can I'll never know! See my review here.

5. Consciousness Explained
This was a stop on the tour on my self-guided philosophy of mind campaign, and it led me to The Feeling of What Happens: Body and Emotion in the Making of Consciousness (I agreed with Demasio's thesis more than Dennett's, but I enjoyed reading Dennett more) and The Mystery Of Consciousness (haven't read yet). Dennett, in my opinion, has the rare talent of extreme erudition and pedagogical acumen. He makes dry land fertile, dense subjects palatable, and complex "intuition pumps" simple. His writing is concise and voluble. I read this over a series of busy weeks: in mountain cabins, on planes, in a hotel in Poland, and some at home. It was like having a good, learned friend around, to whom you enjoy listening. In the end, I had to reject his argument, but this was an impactful and important text nonetheless. See my review here.

An honorary mention would have to be The Selfish Gene. I have some notes on this one here. Not only is Dawkins's prose on such a complex subject a joy to read; this is a major text in the development of thought on evolutionary biology. It also happens to be the source of the term meme!

In addition to these stand-out books, I re-read some old favorites: The Iliad, Leaves of Grass, The Book of Job. I surveyed a handful of books on reading: Great Books, The New Lifetime Reading Plan: The Classic Guide to World Literature, Revised and Expanded, How to Read Slowly, The Library at Night, and How to Read Literature Like a Professor How to Read Literature Like a Professor . All of these were, of course, a treat. I love reading about something that is my passion. There was also a spate of books I let Goodreads randomly select for me: A Room of One's Own, The Glass Menagerie, Darwin: Portrait of a Genius, Daisy Miller, and The Picture of Dorian Gray.

I attempted to enhance my feeble grasp of mathematics with books such as Geometry, Relativity and the Fourth Dimension, Fermat's Last Theorem: Unlocking the Secret of an Ancient Mathematical Problem, and A Mathematician's Apology, but, according to my GRE quant score this did little to improve my mathematical praxis. Oh, well, they were still delightful books and contributed more to my knowledge of the history of mathematics than anything else.

There were also the few oddball books, with The Morning of the Magicians: Secret Societies, Conspiracies, and Vanished Civilizations being chief among them. This book was a recommendation from a highly trusted source, a friend who also introduced me to The Mystery of the Aleph: Mathematics, the Kabbalah, and the Search for Infinity, one of the best non-fiction books I've read, a few years ago. I look forward to reading Pauwel and Bergier's other work, Impossible Possibilities, in the near future.

Overall, as I think back on a year's worth of reading--not only the material read but the manner in which they were read and the retention of the content--I have come to the conclusion that I want to calibrate my choices for 2017 to be commensurate with those that yielded the highest quality of payoff. Based on the last couple years, it seems that I tend to get more out of longer, denser works than otherwise. Though James Salter's Light Years, for example, which I consumed in a day (nearly in a single sitting), was an aesthetic delight, I don't remember much other than a snazzy line here and there and a thoroughly depressing plot. It seems that books are quite like friends in that one must spend ample time with a book to really get to know it. This, then, has led to my decision to read more "doorstops" in 2017 than in previous years. I agree with Nietzsche's insistence on reading slowly. Therefore, I aim to read the fewest but greatest books this year than previous years.

My tentative list for 2017 includes:
> The Anatomy of Melancholy (currently reading)
> Europe
> The World as Will and Presentation, Vol. 1
> The World as Will and Presentation, Vol. 2
> War and Peace
> Against the Day
> The Brothers Karamazov
> Harlot's Ghost
> Atlas Shrugged
> J R
> The City of God
> Bach: Music in the Castle of Heaven
> Metamagical Themas: Questing for the Essence of Mind and Pattern
> The Life of Samuel Johnson
> Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry into Values
> From Bacteria to Bach and Back: The Evolution of Minds

Here's to a great year of reading behind us and another great year ahead!