Knight's Reading List I: January 2007

I read quite a lot, and quite a variety, as well. Some of the books I read are well-known - some are even regarded as classics. On the other hand, some are pretty obscure, and many of those deserve their obscurity. Still, I get something out of almost every work I read, and I'd be happy to share my impressions of any book with others who find the title of interest. In these reading lists, I provide basic information on books which I finished in the month in question.

In January, 2007, I finished reading the following works:

Nevins, Allan. The Emergence of Lincoln, Volume II: Prologue to Civil War 1859-1861. 1950. viii + 524 pages, including Appendices, Bibliography, and Index.

Melville, Herman. Billy Budd and the Piazza Tales. 2006. xliv + 338 pages.

O'Brian, Patrick. Post Captain. 1972. 496 pages

Appleyard, Dennis R. and Alfred J. Field, Jr. International Economics. xxvi + 822 pages, including Index.

Not my most productive month, January, though I could note that I was also reading four other books, which, however, I did not finish. (In fact, I have yet to finish The Magic Mountain by Thomas Mann.) I read a total of 1272 pages in eight books during the month.

Now, which would I recommend? On the fictional side of the ledger, Post Captain is an expertly composed and very entertaining, as well as thoroughly-researched, novel of the British Navy during the Napoleonic Wars. Melville's style, on the other hand, is not likely to be to everyone's taste, and some of the stories miss the mark. "Bartleby the Scrivener" makes very little sense, but "Benito Cereno" is pretty good. Unfortunately, Melville uses the denseness of his viewpoint characters to build suspense (but Conan Doyle has the same fault.)

International Economics is a textbook, and I would only recommend it to someone who really wants to gain a technical understanding of that field. Economics is a subject matter which relies on recent examples to demonstrate its currency (no pun intended.) I would buy something newer if I wanted to begin study of this subject.

Allan Nevins is, I think, one of the great historians of the 20th century, who wrote a long, multi-volume history of the origins of the Civil War and the war itself. (I have four of the volumes and have read three; I need to read the volume that comes before this one.) He tends to stress the economic side of the conflict and, with regard to the war, the North's advantage in material factors. This book provides really wonderful background to two others I'll mention later: Doris Kearns Goodwin's Team of Rivals and Gore Vidal's Lincoln.