One heretical thought on Halberstam and The Best and the Brightest. It was the first "big" book I ever read, and like so many people I was in awe of it. There can't be too many reporters who had their reputation so completely and impressively made by a book. The scope was monumental...he interviewed everyone who had anything to do with American policy in Vietnam in the 60s, and plenty of people who didn't, and it seems like it all made it into those 1000+ pages.
Here's the thing: Bill James, another author you rightly like, absolutely shredded Halberstam's baseball book, Summer of '49. He found one mistake after another. Lots of little ones, but big ones too.
No one, not even Lyndon Johnson or Robert McNamara or McGeorge Bundy, could have had personal knowledge about more than a fraction of the stuff in The Best and The Brightest. If it had been as sloppy as Summer of '49, very few people would have been able to tell...and no one would have wanted to listen to architects of the Vietnam War in 1971 anyway.
The thing about baseball (and this obviously disgusted James the most about Halberstam's errors) is that, even pre-internet, there is so much information available. James mentioned a couple of reference works that Halberstam could have consulted. But there was no Vietnam War handbook.
James assumed that Halberstam made mistakes in Summer of '49 because he didn't care enough about the subject matter. But maybe his baseball mistakes were just easy to find?
I’ve reread Remains of the Day at least ten time and rewatched the movie at least that many times. My wife and I have a long-running joke that I, the Native American, need to write my Remains of the Day about rich white Americans and the people who work for them.
I love your Barbarians at the Gate and American Heritage history of World War I picks. I revisit that world war I book every few years. Also if you like that one you may also like the American Heritage History of The Civil War. Comes with great maps!
Very similar to my list overall in terms of authors, but the individual titles are likely to be the ones I didn't reread: e.g., I read the first volume of Manchester's Churchill biography two or three times, but the second volume only once. I have reread just about all Tom Wolfe books, except "Electric Kool-Aid."
I'm a generation younger and have not read most of these, and only reread the one you have no comment on. I started watching the tv adaptation from 7 or 8 years ago, but stopped when it hit the scene where Major Major is promoted on the basketball court. Went back and read it. I don't think I'll actually ever read that book again, but I it was nice to know the High schooler and 20 something who read it 3 it 4 times had pretty good taste.
I found you choices very interesting; but primarily your reference to the 1934 film version of The Count of Monte Cristo. I have spent years trying to convince my friends that a Monte Cristo is something other than a sandwich, so getting them to read the book or watch the film (especially the black and white film) was quite beyond my powers of persuasion. But I totally agree with you that it’s such a perfect version of that story!
Would you, could you, be so bold as to take a stab at why and the “how” our social structure has changed in the past two generations? Wondering if it was inevitable. Would not “hold you to it” as answers to these questions, given the nature of the question and the answer inherently elude definitive explanations.
Sometimes it seems that even after a lifetime of being an avid reader there are so many more books to read that rereading one is irresponsible. Standard Ebooks (https://standardebooks.org/ )
sends out a monthly newsletter with the new titles of public domain works that it is making available for free and there are rarely less than a half dozen intriguing titles some of which I actually get around to reading. Yet, if rereading something else gives one pleasure, why not?
When I was young in my 40s and 50s rereading familiar books was a great way to turn off my brain at night to get to sleep or to deal with insomnia. And so an hour or so rereading something like The Lord of the Rings, or the Aubrey-Maturin, or Flashman series was a pleasant bit of escapism that helped with sleeping and shutting out all the work-related turmoil that would otherwise have plagued me. In my dotage and no longer needing escapism, I find myself reading relatively less fiction and rereading even less of it.
However, some exceptions are favorite world literature titles out in new translation. For example, I’ve read three translations of Tolstoy’s Hadji Murad (1912 - https://grokipedia.com/page/Hadji_Murad#tolstoys-novella ) but am eager to get my hands on the 2023 annotated version by Kirsten Lodge. Sometimes this goes in reverse. I read the first book of the Fire and Sword trilogy by Henryk Sienkiewicz (1905 Nobel Prize for Literature) in a modern translation, but started the second in the older Jeremiah Curtin translation which was so much better that I set it aside and reread the first book in his translation.
Another good excuse to reread classic books is if you can remember your initial reaction to reading them as a teenager. Some books produce a different reaction with a few decades under your belt. I thought of this yesterday as I had reread Edith Wharton’s House of Mirth (1905 - https://grokipedia.com/page/The_House_of_Mirth ) not too long ago and it struck me that my teenage self could not possibly have appreciated it fully.
But my most common reason for rereading a classic of fiction is that I am just not smart enough to really absorb and appreciate many classic novels with just one go. There are some that repay multiple readings handsomely and your browser will return hundreds of lists of such books (here for example is a list that concurs with Dr. Kling on Dumas: https://teaandinksociety.com/rereading-books/ ). My approach which probably only would appeal to a small number of readers is to take one of the classic reading lists (my choice was the Norwegian Book Club’s: https://www.librarything.com/list/889/all/The-100-Best-Books-of-All-Time-by-Norwegian-Book-Club-World-Library ) and work through it until it feels like time for taking a break. Then reread the book that made the biggest impression on you. This led me to stick with the list and not get distracted and reminded me that the list probably held a lot more books that would really rock me. And it did.
I have read a few of those but none of them more than once- "Alone", "The Three Musketeers", "The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test", "The Wind in the Willows", "Liar's Poker", and "Catch-22".
I am a big Tom Wolfe fan, though, and have read several of his books twice and one three times (Bonfire of the Vanities).
Thanks for the book recommendations. I started the F Black bio the other day-- am really enjoying it.
I recommend to you and your readers the following bios, which are absolutely great:
1. Frank Ramsey: A Sheer Excess of Powers by Cheryl Misak
2. The Man from the Future: The Visionary Ideas of John von Neumann
by Ananyo Bhattacharya
One heretical thought on Halberstam and The Best and the Brightest. It was the first "big" book I ever read, and like so many people I was in awe of it. There can't be too many reporters who had their reputation so completely and impressively made by a book. The scope was monumental...he interviewed everyone who had anything to do with American policy in Vietnam in the 60s, and plenty of people who didn't, and it seems like it all made it into those 1000+ pages.
Here's the thing: Bill James, another author you rightly like, absolutely shredded Halberstam's baseball book, Summer of '49. He found one mistake after another. Lots of little ones, but big ones too.
No one, not even Lyndon Johnson or Robert McNamara or McGeorge Bundy, could have had personal knowledge about more than a fraction of the stuff in The Best and The Brightest. If it had been as sloppy as Summer of '49, very few people would have been able to tell...and no one would have wanted to listen to architects of the Vietnam War in 1971 anyway.
The thing about baseball (and this obviously disgusted James the most about Halberstam's errors) is that, even pre-internet, there is so much information available. James mentioned a couple of reference works that Halberstam could have consulted. But there was no Vietnam War handbook.
James assumed that Halberstam made mistakes in Summer of '49 because he didn't care enough about the subject matter. But maybe his baseball mistakes were just easy to find?
I’ve reread Remains of the Day at least ten time and rewatched the movie at least that many times. My wife and I have a long-running joke that I, the Native American, need to write my Remains of the Day about rich white Americans and the people who work for them.
"The Eighth Day of Creation', Horace Freeland Judson
I love your Barbarians at the Gate and American Heritage history of World War I picks. I revisit that world war I book every few years. Also if you like that one you may also like the American Heritage History of The Civil War. Comes with great maps!
Very similar to my list overall in terms of authors, but the individual titles are likely to be the ones I didn't reread: e.g., I read the first volume of Manchester's Churchill biography two or three times, but the second volume only once. I have reread just about all Tom Wolfe books, except "Electric Kool-Aid."
"These showed up in my life at Freddie Mac around 1990, when a consulting firm came in with training programs based on such, er, stuff."
Was this Landmark, which was an offshoot of Werner Erhard's est?
At the company where I worked around then, the top bosses went off to a Landmark weekend and came back raving about how everybody had to go to it.
A month later I asked about it, and was told: "Never mention that name again."
So I never got the full story.
No, this firm was called "Human Factors"
I rarely read a book twice but that one got better every time I did (started at brilliant)
Arnold
Very interesting . . .
Made me review my rereading (I’m 75).
From youth I’ve reread Robert Heinlein multiple times , his early works especially. ‘Citizen of the Galaxy’ and ‘moon is a harsh mistress’.
Also, Rex stout and his Nero Wolfe stories. Still rereading.
From twenties, all of dick Francis. Still rereading.
Non-fiction.
Morris Kline - “The Loss of Certainty’’. Reread many times. Huge impact.
Pascal “penees”. Profound.
And “psalms “ from Hebrew Bible.
Most of all “Proverbs” from Hebrew Bible.
Thanks
Clay
I'm a generation younger and have not read most of these, and only reread the one you have no comment on. I started watching the tv adaptation from 7 or 8 years ago, but stopped when it hit the scene where Major Major is promoted on the basketball court. Went back and read it. I don't think I'll actually ever read that book again, but I it was nice to know the High schooler and 20 something who read it 3 it 4 times had pretty good taste.
I was hoping to see Frankl's "Man's Search for Meaning," or something similar like Gulag Archipelago.
I found you choices very interesting; but primarily your reference to the 1934 film version of The Count of Monte Cristo. I have spent years trying to convince my friends that a Monte Cristo is something other than a sandwich, so getting them to read the book or watch the film (especially the black and white film) was quite beyond my powers of persuasion. But I totally agree with you that it’s such a perfect version of that story!
Arnold -
Would you, could you, be so bold as to take a stab at why and the “how” our social structure has changed in the past two generations? Wondering if it was inevitable. Would not “hold you to it” as answers to these questions, given the nature of the question and the answer inherently elude definitive explanations.
Sometimes it seems that even after a lifetime of being an avid reader there are so many more books to read that rereading one is irresponsible. Standard Ebooks (https://standardebooks.org/ )
sends out a monthly newsletter with the new titles of public domain works that it is making available for free and there are rarely less than a half dozen intriguing titles some of which I actually get around to reading. Yet, if rereading something else gives one pleasure, why not?
When I was young in my 40s and 50s rereading familiar books was a great way to turn off my brain at night to get to sleep or to deal with insomnia. And so an hour or so rereading something like The Lord of the Rings, or the Aubrey-Maturin, or Flashman series was a pleasant bit of escapism that helped with sleeping and shutting out all the work-related turmoil that would otherwise have plagued me. In my dotage and no longer needing escapism, I find myself reading relatively less fiction and rereading even less of it.
However, some exceptions are favorite world literature titles out in new translation. For example, I’ve read three translations of Tolstoy’s Hadji Murad (1912 - https://grokipedia.com/page/Hadji_Murad#tolstoys-novella ) but am eager to get my hands on the 2023 annotated version by Kirsten Lodge. Sometimes this goes in reverse. I read the first book of the Fire and Sword trilogy by Henryk Sienkiewicz (1905 Nobel Prize for Literature) in a modern translation, but started the second in the older Jeremiah Curtin translation which was so much better that I set it aside and reread the first book in his translation.
Another good excuse to reread classic books is if you can remember your initial reaction to reading them as a teenager. Some books produce a different reaction with a few decades under your belt. I thought of this yesterday as I had reread Edith Wharton’s House of Mirth (1905 - https://grokipedia.com/page/The_House_of_Mirth ) not too long ago and it struck me that my teenage self could not possibly have appreciated it fully.
But my most common reason for rereading a classic of fiction is that I am just not smart enough to really absorb and appreciate many classic novels with just one go. There are some that repay multiple readings handsomely and your browser will return hundreds of lists of such books (here for example is a list that concurs with Dr. Kling on Dumas: https://teaandinksociety.com/rereading-books/ ). My approach which probably only would appeal to a small number of readers is to take one of the classic reading lists (my choice was the Norwegian Book Club’s: https://www.librarything.com/list/889/all/The-100-Best-Books-of-All-Time-by-Norwegian-Book-Club-World-Library ) and work through it until it feels like time for taking a break. Then reread the book that made the biggest impression on you. This led me to stick with the list and not get distracted and reminded me that the list probably held a lot more books that would really rock me. And it did.
I have read a few of those but none of them more than once- "Alone", "The Three Musketeers", "The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test", "The Wind in the Willows", "Liar's Poker", and "Catch-22".
I am a big Tom Wolfe fan, though, and have read several of his books twice and one three times (Bonfire of the Vanities).
Bonfire...yes, a few times.
I have re-read Kim by Kipling several times.
All of William Manchester's works were excellent - one of the most touching was "Good-Bye Darkness."
And who has not re-read Old Man and the Sea?