My most Recent Book Purchases

On my Thursday out this week, I purchased two books of interest to some of you. One is a big volume of 819 pages of text in fine print and 90 pages of notes, prelude [sic], acknowledgements, and index, a total of 909 pages. It must weigh about ten pounds. It is Washington, A Life, by Ron Chernow.

Who is your favorite of our country’s presidents? I hope you all said “Washington.” Lincoln was a politician; Washington was a statesman. Recently I’ve been searching for the source of a quotation attributed to Washington but to no avail. It appeared in a speech or letter by Washington in the America Literature text used the first year I taught school. I haven’t seen that quotation since that time. According to the way the political times have gone, these words of this great man would have been removed from all textbooks, whether literature, history, government, whatever. College majors in political science might have run across this, but many of them would surely delete it themselves if they could. As I remember the words, they went exactly like this: “In order to plan for peace, we must be prepared for war.” You can’t read those words and not know they are the bare truth.

If you disagree with this man of wisdom, I beg you to read the small volume I recommended earlier, in my blog for October 10. Be sure and not miss the author’s conclusion in the last chapter, but the other chapters must lead the way.

It may take me five years to get through this tome, but just think of all that I shall learn. I forgot to mention, as you leaf through this work, you notice it’s all long, hard-packed paragraphs, with no dialogue. Think of that in fine print that looks like font size 8. If I go blind with this reading, know that it was in a search for truth.

The other book purchased is Our Kind of Traitor by that excellent espionage master John le Carré, only 306 pages of legibly sized font. I hope you keep reading too, a book for every outing you have, at least!

♥