On Reading

I tend to read quite a bit, and even once had a full-page ad written up in World Magazine with my photo, about my love for books. I’ve occasionally been accused of reading too much. I recently encountered the blog page of M.N. (http://www.allthingsexpounded.com/) who I find also has a tremendous fascination with books. There are friends of mine who are quite fascinated with books, one person, in particular, D.D., who probably owns about 10 x as many books as me, is quite familiar with the content of the books he owns and the public sentiments toward the book, can recommend just about any book on any topic and be correct, but has rarely ever read a whole book. It reminded me of brother Lewis, who had a library full of books, all with bookmarks about 30 pages into the book. M.N. seems to be more like me, with a long list of books, and a book doesn’t get filed until it is either read, or I realize that it is not worth reading. I read a modest amount on the internet, mostly for news. Facebook annoys me, especially for its triviality, yet it remains a good way of staying in touch with many people without fear of going deeper than superficiality.
My old list of every-morning internet news pages has changed. I rarely ever read World Net Daily anymore. The only columnists that I read regularly are Pat Buchanan, Judge Napolitano, and occasionally George Will. My favorite internet sites for news are…
1. http://www.drudgereport.com/
2. http://patriot-newswire.com/
3. http://www.infowars.com/
4. http://townhall.com/
5. http://www.newsmax.com/
6. http://www.spiegel.de/
7. http://www.bild.de/
I skim through World Magazine every other week, and Bicycle Magazine once monthly. A friend subscribed me for a year last year to National Review, which I enjoyed reading, though I had some problems with its Neo-Con and Papist orientation. My current reads, of which you will be seeing reviews, include God & Time – Four Views, and Dostoevsky by Peter Leithart (Kindle edition).
My reading list this year is….
Kindle – wise
The Gambler – Dostoevsky
The House of the Dead – Dostoevsky
The Idiot – Dostoevsky
Gulag Archipelago –  Solzhenitzyn
In the First Circle – Solzhenitzyn
The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich – Shirer
The Prince – Machiavelli
Babbitt – Sinclair Lewis
Affirming the Apostles Creed – JI Packer
History of the Christian Church – Schaff (read once already)
Devotional Treasures from the Holy Land – Delaney
Systematic Theology – Charles Hodge
Durch die Wüste – Karl May
Kinder und Hausmarchen – Grimm und Hauff (read once already)
Hard Books
The God of Miracles – Jack Collins
Enjoy every Sandwich – Lipsenthal
The Emperor of all Maladies
Cutting for Stone
Life Together – Bonhoeffer
The Revelation of God – Jensen
The Person of Christ – MacLeod
Collected Writings on Scripture – Carson
Christ of the Covenants – OP Robertson (read once already)
Mein Kampf – Hitler
Die Deutschen – Guido Knopf
Redemption Accomplished and Applied – Murray
The Reformed Doctrine of Predestination – Boettner
Historical Theology – Cunningham
Several Photography How-To Books
The Systematic Theologies of
Horton
Turretin
Bavinck
Shedd
Dabney
Reymond
Erickson (maybe???)
There are other books on the shelves, but, that’s enough for now. I think it will take me about 3 years to get through all these texts, but then I’ll probably add on another dozen or more in the next year.