I’ve just about finished The Bounty. Alexander definitely decided in the course of her research that Captain Bligh could do no wrong. Fletcher Christian and another officer, Peter Heywood, are the villains of the piece–although the author seems to have a soft spot for Heywood in his old age. It all sounds right the way she tells it, but then again others have told the story from a completely different point of view. History is not as easy as it seems. Two (or more) people see the same event and draw totally different conclusions. Even in the case of current events we sometimes have trouble agreeing on the facts. Look at the OJ Simpson trial. “Just the facts, m’am, just the facts.” said Joe Friday. Easier said than done.

There’s a great article in WORLD magazine this week by Gene Edward Veith about reading and why it is vital to us as Christians and as witnesses to our culture–which is becoming increasingly a-literate. One of his points is that “many people can read but never do.” Veith has some of my favorite quotes about reading included in his article. For instance, this from C.S. Lewis: We must “keep the clean sea breeze of the centuries blowing through our minds, and this can only be done by reading old books.” (I just finished reading the Odyssey for the first time for a class I’m teaching in our homeschool co-op, so I feel properly virtuous in this regard.)

Veith also quotes Milton recommending “the benefit which may be had of books promiscuously read.” I never heard this quotation before, but I certainly believe in following it. Lately, I’ve read Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton, Under the Banner of Heaven by Krakauer, Financial Peace by Dave Ramsey and the afore-mentioned Patrick, Odyssey and WORLD magazine. This list seems fairly eclectic–even though Lewis recommends reading one “old book” for every three “new books.” I wonder if Age of Innocence counts as an “old book”?

Wow! I have my own blog! I hope to fill it with scintillating prose that will provoke the few who read it to think and examine and perhaps even come to new and exciting conclusions. Who am I? I am the wife of one husband and the mother of eight children. I am a Christian (in spite of my faults), a Republican (in spite of their faults) and a reader of books. Right now I am reading Patrick, Son of Ireland by Stephen R. Lawhead. The book is a fictionalized biography of St. Patrick set in about the fourth century AD. I have read several of Lawhead’s other novels, and although he teeters on the edge of paganism, a Christian worldview seems to win out most of the time. His books are all set in the early centuries of the Christian era, and most have something to do with Celtic history. The Patrick book, so far, is absorbing and thought-provoking. How would a spoiled young nobleman react to being taken into slavery by Irish barbarians?