Capturing Thoughts

Oct11

“It is an unhappy thing, but it is the fact with many men, that if you do not seize your fancies when they come to you, and preserve them upon the written page, you lose them altogether. They go away, and never come back.” —A.K.H. Boyd

“A really good book . . . should make you walk into a lamppost. That’s because you can’t stop reading it when you are walking down the street.” —Nick Hornby

I’ve always been forgetful. I’ve lost my keys more times than I can count. I’ve left my purse in the grocery cart in the Kroger parking lot about as many times as I’ve misplaced my keys. (And it always is there when I come back for it, either in the cart where I left it or turned in to the service counter. So far.)

However, I’m getting worse, not better. I do believe I’m slowly losing my mind altogether, and it’s an interesting process. I forget thoughts I want to hang on to. I forget what I read and why I liked it. I forget why I started reading a particular book in the first place. (I also forget my name, but Ihaven’t come to the place that my mothere predicted I’d get to al ong time ago. I haven’t lost my head—because it’s still screwed on.)

So, what works for me is to start a blog post for each book I’m reading and type in the quotations and profound thoughts I want to remember about the book as I read it. If I wait until I finish the book, or heaven forbid, a week or two after I finish reading those thoughts are gone and the quotations are un-find-able. If I have a draft of a post with quotations and observations, I can go back and organize and edit it later —or delete it if there wasn’t really much there to write about.

It works for me. Try Shannon at Rocks in my Dryer for more Works-for-Me Wednesday tips, even a few from people who haven’t yet lost their minds. If you find mine (mind), please email it to me.

Life Lessons from Children’s Books

Oct10

Inspired by Kelly at Big A little a, Jen Robinson blogs about life lessons she learned from children’s books.

Oh, and Kelly was inspired by a couple of articles from the Guardian and its blog, Culture Vulture:

Michelle Pauli on Life lessons: which children’s books have taught you the most?
Lucy Mangan on why she’s still reading children’s books.

So, now I’m inspired. Here are some of the life lessons I learned from children’s books:


Curious George by H.A. Rey: Curiousity is good, but be careful. It’s also good to have a friend (or a dad?) with a yellow hat to rescue you when your curiousity gets you into trouble.

A Bargain for Frances by Russell Hoban: Being careful (suspicious that your friend is out to trick you) isn’t nice. Being friends is better.

Snipp, Snapp, Snurr and the Red Shoes by Maj Lindman: A real gift is something you work hard to get for someone you love.

Frog and Toad by Arnold Lobel: When you run out of will power, go home and bake a cake. Also, a friend loveth at all times, whether you’ve lost your list or your button and especially when you’re embarrased to be seen in your bathing suit.

The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins by Dr. Seuss and Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll: Odd things happen in this world. You just have to go with it, and see what will happen in the end.

Horton Hatches the Egg by Dr. Seuss: “I meant what I said, and I said what I meant, and an elephant’s faithful one hundred percent.” Sometimes faithfulness gets its reward.

Eight Cousins and Little Women by Louisa May Alcott. A big family might be fun.

The Hobbit by JRR Tolkien: Hobbits, and by extension hobbit-like people, are amazing, and they may rise to the occasion with resources you never knew they had. Maybe I have stuff within me I don’t even know about?

I don’t know what I learned from Make Way for Ducklings by Robert McCloskey , but I do remember Captain Kangaroo reading it out loud with the beautiful illustrations, and I remember how comforting the story was. Maybe I learned that stories can bring comfort as well as insight. I know that when I’m depressed or distraught, I go to books.

So what life lessons have you learned from children’s books?

Week 9 of World Geography: Korea

Oct9

Music:
Johannes Brahms

Mission Study:
1. Bold Bearers of His Name: Sohn Family
2. Window on the World: North Korea

Poems:
I’m trying something new for our poetry study this week. I’m copying Cindy at Dominion Family who wrote last week about her poetry colloquy. We’re reading poems from the book, One Hundred and One Famous Poems, published by Barnes and Noble.

Science:
Simple Machines

Nonfiction Read Alouds:
The Pageant of Chinese History–Seeger

Fiction Read Alouds:
Seesaw Girl–Park
Tales of a Korean Grandmother

Picture Books:
A Is for Asia—Chin-Lee
Be-Bim-Bop–Park

Elementary Readers:
The Kite Fighters—Park
A Single Shard–Park
Year of Impossible Goodbyes—Choi
The Girl-Son–Neuberger

Movies:
Korea video: This is a video produced by the International Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention that was in the library of my old church. I’m going to try to go by and see if we can borrow it.
Little Women Dancer Daughter is studying the Transcendentalists this week and next.

Books Shaping Evangelicals

Oct8

Christianity Today published this list of the Top 50 Books That Have Shaped Evangelicals. The rule was that they only included books published since World War II. I’ve put in bold the ones I’ve read. I’ve heard of or know something about almost all of the books listed. I thought it was interesting that they listed Paul Tournier’s The Meaning of Persons. I haven’t heard anyone mention that book, by a Swiss psychiatrist, in years. But it was very popular among a certain group of Christians that influenced me when I was in college.

50.Revivalism and Social Reform by Timothy L. Smith
49.Knowledge of the Holy by A. W. Tozer. Mr. Tozer and I have not had the pleasure although I have heard many people recommend him.
48.The Hiding Place by Corrie ten Boom with John and Elizabeth Sherrill Corrie Ten Boom I do know. Of course, evangelicals have been influenced by the story of Corrie and her sister Betsy. “There is no pit so deep that God’s love is not deeper still.”
47.The New Testament Documents: Are They Reliable? by F. F. Bruce
46.Out of the Saltshaker and into the World by Rebecca Manley Pippert I read this one while I was still in college. I’m not sure I became a better evangelist, but I did realize how insulated I had allowed my self to be.
45.The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind by Mark A. Noll. I was supposed to read this book last year. Eldest Daughter read it at college, and I told her I would read it. However, I didn’t. I suppose I never could get interested because I think I already know what it will say. I’m tired of hearing about how anti-intellectual, “poor, uneducated and easily led” evangelicals are. Sometimes we are, but I’m not sure we’re any less interested in the life of the mind than any other group of people in the United States of America.
44.The Gospel of the Kingdom by George Eldon Ladd. Never heard of it.
43.Operation World by Patrick Johnstone.This one is not a reading book but rather a book of information and statistics about the state of missions and the Christian church in the countries of the world. It’s probably been quite influential in giving evangelicals a worldwide perspective on church growth.
42.The Purpose-Driven Life by Rick Warren Yes, I read it. No, I don’t think it’s the last word on Christianity and how to live the Christian life. Nevertheless, it’s not a bad start. “It’s not about you. The purpose of your life is far greater than your own personal fulfillment, your peace of mind, or even your happiness. . . If you want to know why you were placed on this planet, you must begin with God.”
41.Born Again by Charles W. Colson. Chuck Colson’s spiritual autobiography shaped evengelicals, but even more it told non-evangelicals who we are. After all, I knew what “born again” meant long before Jimmy Carter or Chuck Colson used term. In fact, I remember thinking that journalists back in the mid-seventies were making fun of evangelical Christians by pretending to have never heard the phrase.
40.Darwin on Trial by Phillip E. Johnson Engineer Husband has made a more thorough study of the subject of Darwinism and creationism than I have, but I’ve read enough to be skeptical of the answers we have now from both sides of the debate.
39.Desiring God by John Piper. I haven’t read Piper either although I have one of his books on my TBR list.

38.The Gospel in a Pluralist Society by Leslie Newbigin. The name of the author sounds familiar, but I cna’t say I’ve heard of it.
37.God’s Smuggler by Brother Andrew with John and Elizabeth Sherrill I remember being quite impressed by Brother Andrew’s Bible smuggling operation. Such adventure!
36.Left Behind by Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins. Never read it, but I feel as if I have.
35.The Stork Is Dead by Charlie W. Shedd. I must admit I got my first dose of sex ed from reading All You Ever Wanted to Know . . . , but I did read The Stork Is Dead somewhat later.
34.This Present Darkness by Frank E. Peretti. Read it. Thought it was interesting. Didn’t let it influence my theology or my prayer life.
33.The Late Great Planet Earth by Hal Lindsey with C. C. Carlson. About the time I read this book, back many years ago, I decided that I would most likely remain undecided on matters eschatological.
32.The Cross and the Switchblade by David Wilkerson with John and Elizabeth Sherrill. Oh, yes, what a great story! Nicki Cruz, gangs, the dangers of drugs, the power of Christ to redeem anyone.
31.The Next Christendom by Philip Jenkins. Never heard of it.
30.Roaring Lambs by Robert Briner. I always intended to read this book, but somehow I never got ahold of a copy. Is it still relevant, or have we moved on?
29.Dare to Discipline by James Dobson. I read it and don’t think there’s anything terribly controversial here. Correct, discipline and teach them when they’re young.
28.The Act of Marriage by Tim and Beverly LaHaye. We got a copy of this book and of Intended for Pleasure by Ed Wheat when we got married. Influential? Maybe. Helpful to a couple of virgins who were just starting into this marital relation thing? Definitely.
27.Christy by Catherine Marshall. Christy is a wonderful story, too. Yes, I would say it shaped me, besides being one of the few “Christian romance novels” I would recommend.
26.Know Why You Believe by Paul E. Little This book sets down in easy to understand language just what Christians and why.
25.Boundaries by Henry Cloud and John Townsend. I think I started this book once, and I know it’s about setting boundaries and learning how to say no.

24.The Meaning of Persons by Paul Tournier I said I was surprised to see this book on the list. I thought my friends and I were all reading it as a result of a much more popular book (as I remember it), The Edge of Adventure by Keith Miller and Bruce Larson. Mr. Miller and Mr. Larson refer to Tournier frequently in their book(s), and because of them and the recommendations of a friend I read some Tournier. I wonder how it would sound now if I went back and re-read it.
23.All We’re Meant to Be by Letha Dawson Scanzoni and Nancy A. Hardesty. I’ve heard of this book—frequently and usually negatively. Never read it.
22.The Genesis Flood by Henry M. Morris and John C. Whitcomb. We have this one, but I’ve never read it. Did I ever mention that I’m not a science sort of person?
21.The Master Plan of Evangelism by Robert Emerson Coleman. Never heard of it.
20.A Wrinkle In Time by Madeleine L’Engle I love A Wrinkle in TIme, but I’m not sure how it influenced or shaped evangelicals. I’d say all of Mrs. L’Engle’s books together influenced and shaped me and other evangelical lovers of story to see that Christanity could be discussed in fictional terms as well as nonfictional ones.
19.The Cost of Discipleship by Dietrich Bonhoeffer Of course.
18.The Divine Conspiracy by Dallas Willard. I’ve read something else by Mr. Willard, but I can’t think of the title. I’m left with the impression that the book I read had to do with Christian disciplines and reminded me of Rachard Foster’s book, The Celebration of Discipline.
17.What’s So Amazing About Grace? by Philip Yancey. I’ve read oter books by Yancey, too, but not this famous one.
16.Basic Christianity by John Stott. Good, basic stuff.
15.The Uneasy Conscience of Modern Fundamentalism by F. H. Henry. Why is our conscience uneasy? I’ve read about it, but I don’t recall.
14.Let Justice Roll Down by John M. Perkins.
13.Evidence That Demands a Verdict by Josh McDowell. I was quite impressed with this compilation of evidences for the reliability of Scripture and the historicity of the Resurrection back when I was first introduced to it in high school. I daresay I’d still be impressed.
12.Power Evangelism by John Wimber with Kevin Springer. I heard all about this one —signs and wonders.
11.Celebration of Discipline by Richard J. Foster I read it; now if I could only practice what I read.
10.Evangelism Explosion by D. James Kennedy. One of those books I don’t feel as if I need to read because I already know all about it. I attended the Baptist version of EE, called WIN Institute, and I, too, learned the famous question: “If you were to die tonight, do you know for sure that you would go to heaven?”
9.Through Gates of Splendor by Elisabeth Elliot Inspiring story of martyr Jim Elliot. However, I think some of Elisabeth Elliot’s other books ave been just as mind-shaping as her biography of her husband.
8.Managing Your Time by Ted W. Engstrom
7.Rich Christians in an Age of Hunger by Ronald J. Sider. As a poor college student, this book made me feel really guilty without giving me much idea of what to do about it. Eat less meat? Would that help anyone else?
6.The Living Bible by Kenneth N. Taylor I had a green puffy Bible. Did you have a green puffy Bible? It really was helpful because I could read the Bible and share it with friends and it made sense!
5.Knowing God by J. I. Packer. Never read it, to my shame.

4.The God Who Is There by Francis A. Schaeffer. I did read Francis Schaeffer, but I think the books by his wife Edith (What Is a Family? and The Hidden Art of Homemaking) were much more influential in my life and in that of many other evangelical women. Mr. Schaeffer wrote very dense prose and tended to repeat himself. I got a lot more out of his film series, How Should We Then Live?.
3.Mere Christianity by C. S. Lewis Of course. However, I think Lewis could have taken places 1-6 on the list with his other books, too. What about The Great Divorce and The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe and Till We Have Faces and The Screwtape Letters and ?
2.Understanding Church Growth by Donald Anderson McGavran. Never heard of it, but at #2, it must have shaped someone.
1.Prayer: Conversing With God by Rosalind Rinker. Ah yes, I’m a little surprised to see that CT places this book at #1, but I agree it was revolutionary for its time. In my youth group we began to talk to God in regular words, and I became impatient with those who were older than I and used “thees” and “thous” in their prayers. I’m ashamed of the impatience, but I’m glad I learned to talk to God in colloquial speech and read his word in Ken Taylor’s paraphrased words.

It’s a pretty good list. I’ve read twenty-six out of fifty, and I’m familiar with many of the rest. I haven’t heard of a few of the books on the list, but it’s supposed to be list off the books that have shaped evangelicals as a whole, not just the books that shaped me as an evangelical. There are only four works of fiction on the list, but that’s probably about right. Fiction is not as easy to point to as mind-shaping; the ideas in fiction are more nebulous, encased in story, and therefore more enduring perhaps, but that’s another discussion. Still, I would add the following books to the list (in addition to the C.S. Lewis books I mentioned above):

The Lord of the Rings by JRR Tolkien. Not just the story itself, but the whole idea that you could write a great work of fiction without even mentioning God or Christianity and still have it be infused throughout with a Christian worldview and atmosphere . . . that was mind-bending and exciting. Yes, I know Tolkien was Catholic, not evangelical. He could still shape the evangelical mind.

Joni by Joni Eareckson. I don’t know why this book wasn’t on the list. As much as anyone, Joni helped me and other evangelicals understand that God allows suffering for His own purposes, that God doesn’t always heal, that He is always there even when we don’t understand what He’s doing, that handicapped persons are valuable to God and can glorify Him in their afflictions. What a wonderful gift to the Church of Jesus Christ and to evangelicals Joni’s life and work have been!

The Kingdom of Cults by Walter Martin. I know there are all sorts of controversies about Martin’s life and his writing, but I’m just stating facts when I say that he drew the lines that evangelical Christians still hold to today in differentiating between Christian denominations and cults.

Visit Semicolon’s Amazon Store for more great book recommendations.

Friday’s Center of the Blogosphere

Oct6

These have kind of stacked up. Here’s the Best of the Best I’ve read in the past few weeks:

The Anchoress prays—for all of us. “Prayer is a force and it is real. I came away from Adoration convinced that we will not defeat the enemy (and on the most fundamental level, the enemy – both within and without – is hate) unless we are willing to use the weapon of real and loving prayer – faithfully, humbly, daily…and did I say humbly…we will not win.”

Adrian Warnock and Dan Phillips discuss interpreting proverbs, particularly the book of Proverbs in the Bible. “A proverb communicates a truth. It does not characteristically communicate all truth. It is a sage insight; it isn’t a legal contract.”

Lars Walker, the Bloodthirsty Librarian: “Any reasonable person would recognize that rioting and murdering people are a self-contradictory means of proclaiming one’s peacefulness. And the fact that a large part of the Muslim world fails to get the joke (such as it is) pretty much says it all.
But the Islamic world doesn’t care. Because they’re not involved in a struggle of ideas, but a struggle of honor.”

Patry Francis blogs about grocery store treasures, those healthy and delicious foods that you can find in your local supermarket. I think my favorite “grocery store health food” is the fresh tortillas that are made in-store down here in Texas. I’ll bet they don’t do that in New York.

Mr. De Thinkling on Manhood, particularly Christian manhood. What a great essay on the real problems that Christian men face! I want to send a copy to every Christian man I know, but I’ll content myself with posting a link here and telling you all, men and women and boys and girls, to read it.

Mental Multivitamin does Shakespeare . . . again. You don’t want to miss her guide to resources for enjoying and appreciating Shakespeare for the first time or for the forty-fifth time.

Shannon Rocks-in-my-Dryer really liked Jewel by Brett Lott. I really liked it, too. Here are my thoughts on Jewel. But if like Shannon you don’t care for book reviews, you could just go read the book.

Go here to read the Parable of the Soccer Mom and the Human Embryo. The parable was written in response to this statement by politician Chris Bell: “What would Jesus do? He would not let political objections stand in the way of healing the sick. Stem cell research isn’t just a good idea; it’s a moral imperative.”

Writing Contests for Adults and Children

Oct4

What’s the Story? from SRA/McGraw-Hill is a national writing contest for teachers to win the chance to be published as part of an SRA reading program.
SRA is seeking creative, original, and imaginative stories and poems (fiction and nonfiction) written for students in Grades Pre-K–6—anything you think your own students would enjoy reading.
Story winners will receive a cash prize of $1,000. Poem winners will receive a cash prize of $500. The deadline for entries is December 31, 2006.
I doubt if the term “teacher” includes homeschool teachers, but those who are former public or private school teachers and who enjoy writing should enter.

The Old Schoolhouse, a homeschooling magazine, is sponsoring a short story contest. The deadline is November 1, 2006, and there’s a $7.00 entry fee.

Olive Garden restaurant is asking students in first through twelfth grade: “If you could create a new holiday, what would you name it and how would it be celebrated?” Answers could be worth a trip to New York and a $2,500 savings bond, as part of Olive Garden’s 11th-annual Pasta Tales writing contest.
From Oct. 2 through Dec. 1, Olive Garden will accept essays of 50 to 250 words from students in the U.S. and Canada. Entry forms and complete rules will be available beginning Oct. 2 at local Olive Garden restaurants or by logging on to the Olive Garden website.
The grand prize is a trip to New York, dinner at the Olive Garden in Times Square and a $2,500 savings bond. A winner also will be chosen in each grade category and will receive a $500 savings bond and dinner with their family at their local Olive Garden.

Delacorte Press offers the prize of a book contract for a hardcover and a paperback edition, including an advance and royalties, awarded annually to encourage the writing of a novel of contemporary young adult fiction. Each award consists of $1,500 in cash and a $7,500 advance against royalties.

The Trollope Society has established an annual short story competition. The emphasis is on reading – and writing – for fun.
The worldwide competition is open to students twenty-one and younger. The winner receives a cheque for £1,000 ($1,750 USD) and his or her story is published in the Society’s journal, Trollopiana.

The Center for the Book in the Library of Congress, in partnership with Target Stores and in cooperation with affiliate state centers for the book, invites readers in grades 4 through 12 to enter Letters About Literature, a national reading-writing contest. To enter, readers write a personal letter to an author, living or dead, from any genre– fiction or nonfiction, contemporary or classic, explaining how that author’s work changed the student’s way of thinking about the world or themselves. There are three competition levels: Level I for children in grades 4 through 6; Level II for grades 7 and 8, and Level III, grades 9 – 12. Winners receive cash awards at the national and state levels.

I happen to think contests are a wonderful way to motivate students to write—and even adults can use some motivation sometimes. So write that short story or YA novel, and send it in. Be sure and come to tell me if you (or one of your children) win any of these contests.

I’m adding this post to the Works-for-Me Wednesday list. Mosey on over to Rocks in my Dryer to find out how to make coke roast and to look at a list of links to lots of other nifty ideas.

LOST Between Times

Oct3

I am really excited. Just in time for the new season (which starts tomorrow night for those who do not live in a household full of LOST fanatics), I have deduced the exact location of LOST island. Well, almost, I know the longitude, not the latitude.

Let me back up and tell you where I got the brilliant idea that led me to this knowledge. I’ve been reading In a Sunburned Country by Bill Bryson. I have never read anything by Mr. Bryson, but he makes me laugh so I’ll be reading more of his stuff. Anyway, this book is about Bryson’s travels to and through Australia, and right at the beginning of the book I found it. Here’s the seminal quote:

Each time you fly from North America to Australia, and without anyone asking how you feel about it, a day is taken away from you when you cross the international date line. . . . For me, there was no January 4. None at all. All I know is that for one twenty-four hour period in the history of earth, it appears I had no being.

There is, it must be said, a certain metaphysical comfort in knowing that you can cease to have material form and it doesn’t hurt at all, and to be fair, they do give you the day back on the return journey when you cross the date line in the opposite direction and thereby manage somehow to arrive in Los Angeles before you left Sydney, which in its way, of course, is an even neater trick.

You see it immediately, don’t you? The LOST plane survivors somehow crashed exactly on the international date line, and they’re caught between two days. It’s not purgatory or heaven or hell, or a science lab, or even a real honest-to-goodness island; they’re in limbo. (Limbo: the supposed abode of the souls of unbaptized infants and of the just who died before Christ’s coming.) I just stuck the definition in for fun, although I’ll bet half of those LOSTies were unbaptized infants; I mean the kind of limbo where you’re in between two places, or in this case, two dates.

They’re stuck. They can’t go back to Australia, and they can’t go on to LA because they’re crashed in a time warp on the international date line. And when you get stuck outside of time or in between times, anything can happen. Polar bears survive on a tropical island. Dead men walk. Certain numbers might be holding the world together. Diseases are healed. Your raft gets pulled back to the same island you left. And when they do escape, they’ll arrive in LA on the same day that they left Australia —or the day before.

NOTICE: DO NOT tell me someone else already thought of this theory and posted it on some message board somewhere and it’s already been discredited. It may not be right (or even profound), but it’s mine, and I’m sticking to it. Unless one of you independently discredits my theory. Or I find a better one.

I’ll see you on the other side of the date line tomorrow night after LOST. May the good guys win, whoever they are.

Late-breaking news: The LOSTies may be lost forever. The Pope has abolished limbo. Question: If you get stuck in a time warp, and the time warp sort of limbo place you’re stuck in gets abolished in real time, where are you?
LOST!

The Secret River by Kate Grenville

Oct3

We just finished watching the PBS series, Colonial House, where a group of twenty-first century Americans and Britishers go back in time to the year 1628 and attempt to build a colonial settlement in rural Maine. One of the issues with which they had to grapple was their relationship to the Native Americans upon whose land they were building. I thought the issue was handled with way too much “sensitivity” and political correctness in Colonial House with the erstwhile settlers hanging their heads in shame and guilt over what their ancestors had done to the Native Americans and the native representatives obsessing over their lost heritage and the wrongs their ancestors suffered.

Then I read Kate Grenville’s Booker-prize nominated The Secret River. It’s not about Native Americans at all; it’s set in Australia, New South Wales. But it does show the ruthless subjugation of a native people from the point of view of the invaders, and yet I was brought to see the horror of what was done to the aboriginal people in Australia and, by analogy and implication, of what was done to the native peoples of America. The strength of this novel, however, is that the reader can see the tragedy of what happened when the British settled Australia and engaged in genocidal warfare against the native people, tragedy both for the aborigenes and for the English.

The Secret River is the story of William Thornhill who grows up in the late eighteenth century in the slums of London, has the great good fortune to become an apprentice and marry his master’s daughter, loses his livelihood because of medical bills and bad luck, becomes a thief, and is caught and transported with his family to Australia. That’s just the first part of the book, the lead-in to the real central purpose of the story which is to portray the “depredations and outrages” perpetrated upon and by the native aborgines and by and upon the English ex-convicts who took the aborgines’ land and made it their own. There’s plenty of violence in the book, not gratuituous, but rather uncomfortable. William and his wife, Sal, are fully drawn characters with completely believable motivations. They want security, a dependable living, a place for themselves and their family. The aboriginal people are less clearly portrayed, shown as they most likely were seen by the settlers, to be mysterious and unfathomable in their actions and motivations.

Since Ms. Grenville doesn’t choose to rewrite history, the fate of the aborigines in the book is clear from the beginning, and the fate of Thornhill and his wife is true to history, too. Thornhill gets what he wants, but “he could not understand why it did not feel like triumph.” A narrative picture like the one in this novel is worth a thousand pretend colonials feeling the pain of the native Americans for an hour or so on television. If we’re to avoid further genocidal episodes in our own time, we must understand not only what was done to the victims, but also why and how the perpetrators felt they had no choice but to commit genocide. Perhaps, then, such disasters can be avoided or stopped before they start.

The Secret River is a good, thought-provoking read. I don’t know if it will win the Man Booker Prize or not. Since I’ve not read any of the other nominated books on the short list, I can’t compare them. However, The Secret River at least deserves the recognition of having been nominated.

Visit Semicolon’s Amazon Store for more great book recommendations.

Week 8 of World Geography: Japan

Oct2

Music:
Robert Schumann—Symphonic Etudes
Robert Schumann and Mascot Ziff–Wheeler

Poems:
More haiku

Science:
Physical Science: Force, work, and energy

Nonfiction Read Aloud:
Commodore Perry in the Land of the Shogun–Blumberg

Fiction Read Alouds:
Li Lun, Lad of Courage–Treffinger
Born in the Year of Courage–Crofford

Picture Books:
What Does the Rooster Say, Yoshio?—Battles
How My Parents Learned to Eat—Freidman
Count Your Way Through Japan—Haskins. There is a whole series of these count-your-way-through books, and I think they’re lots of fun for little ones and elementary age children.
Tree of Cranes—Say. Allen Say is an amazing Japanese American picture book author and illustrator.
Tea With Milk—Say
Grandfather’s Journey—Say
Welcome to Japan–Auch
An Illustrated History of Japan–Nishimura
This Place Is Crowded: Japan–Cobb

Elementary Readers:
A Samuraii Castle—Macdonald
The Cat Who Went to Heaven—Coatsworth
The Ghost in the Tokaido Inn—Hoobler
Shipwrecked! The True Adventures of a Japanese Boy–Blumberg

Before There Were Blogs

Sep30

Nowadays for snippets of information, household tips, news analysis, and humorous and autobiographical stories, I go to the internet, usually to blogs. Ten or more years ago I had a subscription to Reader’s Digest. It served much the same purpose, “an article a day of enduring significance.”

Dewitt and Lila Wallace founded the Reader’s Digest Association in 1922.
Their vision for the company was based on a simple notion that people did
not have enough time to read all that was being published, and that people
needed a reading service that selected editorial material to inform, enrich,
entertain and inspire.

The result of the Wallaces’ vision was a pocket-sized magazine, sold at an
annual subscription that would provide an article a day of lasting
interest – and of enduring significance – in condensed form. Today the
magazine offers a mix of engaging original and republished content to appeal
to contemporary tastes. It is the largest-selling magazine in the world,
published in 48 editions and 19 languages, and sold in more than 60
countries.

So how much “enduring significance” did those Reader’s Digest articles contain? Well, it just so happens that I have a lot of those old magazines collecting dust on a top shelf in my bedroom. I thought it would be fun to look at one every now and then and see how significant and enduring it was.

Reader’s Digest, September, 1974.

Current events: a compilation of articles and opinions on the possible eminent impeachment of Richard Nixon (didn’t happen), another on the “rise and fall of the Symbionese Liberation Army” (whatever happened to Patty Hearst?), and still others on busing, Teamsters and the underworld, and the real cost of foreign aid. All of these pieces, while maybe of some historical interest, are dated, not enduring.

“The Colonies Must Be Punished!” by O.K. Armstrong is one of a series of articles, called Great Moments in American History: Bicentennial Feature; this particular article deals with the reaction in Britain and the colonies to the Boston Tea Party. I remember the Bicentennial celebration in 1976. On the Fourth of July, 1976, I was on my way to a youth evangelism conference in Dallas/Fort Worth. For a long time after that, through college, I had the T-shirt with bicentennial colors to prove it. Date yourself; where were you in July 1976?

Back to Reader’s Digest, September, 1974, there are some useful tips on how to make your houseplants behave, how not to get gyped by your auto-repairman, and how to reduce college costs. There’s the obligatory diet article, called “Beware the Diet Saboteur.” “Thousands of people are unable to reduce, obesity specialists find, because their kinfolk knowingly or unknowingly undercut their efforts.” The “psycho-analyze yourself” article is called “What Are You Afraid Of?” and gives us eight suggestions for coping with fear.

Merle Haggard and Sheik Ahmed Zaki al-Yamani get biographical profiles, not in the same articles.

The “special feature” at the end of the magazine is “Solzhenitsyn: Conscience of a Nation.” Enduring significance, yes.

He does not want his country remade in the image of the modern, free-enterprise West. In fact, to some of his admirers, this fierce clinging to everything Russian, including the old concepts of the Russian earth, Russian people, the spiritual values inherent in backward Russia, is one of his limitations as a man and a writer. But it is also one of his greatest sources of strength.

Finally, there’s a kidlit note:

Statement on the copyright page of Toolchest by Jan Adkins: “We have gone to considerable difficulty and expense to assemble a staff of necromancers, sorcerers, shamans, conjurers and lawyers to visit nettlesome and mystifying discomfort on any ninny who endeavors to reproduce or transmit this book in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission from the publisher. Watch yourself!”

By the way, Toolchest is a beautiful, old children’s book. It’s out of print, but available used from Amazon.