Two Books by Seth Lerer (Inventing English and Children’s Literature)

When my son was a young infant in the middle of 2008, and I purchased Professor Seth Lerer’s Children’s Literature: A Reader’s History and spent months reading and rereading chapters, hoping to gain a better understanding of where children’s literature fits in the world history. Although I’ve since finished the book, I still plan on rereading portions and finding children’s literature that I can read to fit the eras Lerer discusses about what children read (see my project page; I haven’t done much with this project lately, but it is an ongoing project).

Then I saw Emily’s review of Professor Lerer’s Inventing English last year. Since I love language, I loved the idea of little episodes of the history of the language. I also read this slowly, simply because the subject of the early development of English is new to me. (Yes, despite the fact that I was an English major in college, I don’t recall much of the historical development of early, Old English.)

In the end, both books are ones I can recommend to fans of language and nonfiction.

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Two Neuroscience Books (Proust was a Neuroscientist by Lehrer and Sacks’ Musicophilia)

When I joined the 2009 Science Book Challenge, I didn’t intend to focus on neuroscience, but it turns out that that branch of science is absolutely fascinating to me. These two books I read really have convinced me that science and art are inextricably related each other, for art is perceived and appreciated by the brain.

I think I’d say the Lehrer was my preferred of these two, only because I hadn’t realized the Sacks was abridged. At any rate, I enjoyed both books and would love to revisit either other again in the future. Continue reading »

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows

My sister and I read The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows at the same time this summer. We both enjoyed it, although we both found some aspects of it a bit disappointing. We both answered the same questions for this review. It turns out we thought similar things! Continue reading »

Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte

When I was in eighth grade, I had a reading class in school each day. My teacher often assigned the entire class the same book to read, and we read during each class period. Then we’d discuss it.

One particular time, I think we were reading a children’s novel, like My Brother Sam is Dead (which I reread and reviewed a few months ago). Not surprisingly, I finished before everyone else. I went to the teacher at her desk at the back of the room and told her I was finished and I needed something else to read. She looked at me a moment, then she turned to a bookshelf and fumbled for a book. When she turned back to me, she handed me Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte.

I remember reading it, and I remember a few of the impressions I had. But the impressions I had at 13 were quite different from the impressions I get now that I’m in my late 20s. This time reading Jane Eyre, the straightforward-yet-beautiful prose was a wonderful treat: I enjoyed every single page. Continue reading »

The Discoverers by Daniel Boorstin

Sometimes I read nonfiction to get a general idea about something I don’t know anything about or a person who intrigues me. Other times I read nonfiction to learn something specific in depth; such books may be hard to read cover to cover, but they still merit a careful reading.

The Discoverers by Daniel Boorstin was a combination of both types of nonfiction. In a general way (for such a topic can hardly be comprehensive), Boorstin discusses the discovery of ideas, concepts, places, and facts from the dawn of time until about 1900. But in a very specific way, he teaches about some of the individuals and eras that make such general concepts important. I felt I read mini-biographies of hundreds of notable people, just by reading one book!

I loved the time I spent reading The Discoverers. It contains sections about the discovery (or, more accurately, the development) of concepts of time, the discovery of different lands, the discovery of science from the cosmos to the circulatory system, and the discovery of social development, from the printing press to vernacular languages. I learned a lot, both general and specific. This is a book to reread! Continue reading »