The Top Ten

[Jolly]

With the exception of STEM texts, what 10 books should every American read before the age of 25?

Would everyone reading those 10 books create a new common ground among citizens?

[Mik]

For starters, Tempest At Dawn by James Best about the crafting of the Constitution. It was an amazing, albeit messy, process.

[Jolly]

1. The Bible...Pick your version, KJV, NAS, CSB, NIV
2. The Civil War: A Narrative
3. Plutarch's Lives
4. Pilgrim's Progress
5. The Collected Works of Shakespeare
6. The Federalist Papers
7. The Anti-Federalist Papers
8. The Guns of August
9. Band of Brothers
10. One general, encompassing history of the U.S., such as the Smithsonian edition.

[Doctor Phibes]

Read a book about jazz.

It's the greatest American art form, some might say the only one, although that's open to debate.

I've only read one of those listed above in it's entirety, although I've dipped in to a few of them.

And nobody reads all of the collected works of Shakespeare. Apart from anything else, they're plays, not novels.

[Jolly]

@Doctor-Phibes said in The Top Ten:

And nobody reads all of the collected works of Shakespeare. Apart from anything else, they're plays, not novels.

Granted, but you ought to at least read the sonnets and wade through some of the better known plays, such as Hamlet, King Lear, The Taming of the Shrew and Romeo and Juliet.

[Doctor Phibes]

@Jolly said in The Top Ten:

Granted, but you ought to at least read the sonnets and wade through some of the better known plays, such as Hamlet, King Lear, The Taming of the Shrew and Romeo and Juliet.

I think watching them can be enjoyable. I found reading them to be very painful, although I appreciate there's much to be gained.

[Mik]

The words were meant to be spoken, so much is in the delivery. You miss an awful lot just in reading.

[Aqua Letifer]

I don't think it works like this. You can't read 10 books and then call it good. Gotta learn how to know what to read at the time the book is right for you, and then keep reading.

I guess "Mindset" by Carol Dweck would get them started.

[Jolly]

@Aqua-Letifer said in The Top Ten:

I don't think it works like this. You can't read 10 books and then call it good. Gotta learn how to know what to read at the time the book is right for you, and then keep reading.

I guess "Mindset" by Carol Dweck would get them started.

Consider the target sector:

1. American
2. 25 and under.

We used to have more of a shared identity. Much of that was a grounding in some of the things which made America, America. So many young people today have no understanding of who or what we are.

[Aqua Letifer]

@Jolly said in The Top Ten:

@Aqua-Letifer said in The Top Ten:

I don't think it works like this. You can't read 10 books and then call it good. Gotta learn how to know what to read at the time the book is right for you, and then keep reading.

I guess "Mindset" by Carol Dweck would get them started.

Consider the target sector:

1. American
2. 25 and under.

We used to have more of a shared identity. Much of that was a grounding in some of the things which made America, America. So many young people today have no understanding of who or what we are.

I don't know why that's your stopping point. So many young people today have no grounding in religion, and so they fumble their way into making up their own by way of enviroradicalism and other nonsense on the left or what Father Schmitz calls moralist therapeutic deism on the right.

You have to start with understanding yourself, which they certainly do not, and from there understand other people. Only after that can you talk about the idea of America.