My wife once told me a story from A Tale of Two Cities. It took place in a small village outside of Paris in the late 18th century. The French Revolution had not yet begun, and the townspeople were living under oppressive poverty. One day a large cask of wine was being unloaded from a …
Category Archives: Literature
Flash Review: Into the Wild
I first read Into the Wild as a teenager. I was working at a Christian bookstore at the time, selling copies of Left Behind and The Prayer of Jabez in a shopping center off the highway. On breaks I would walk across parking lots and past chain restaurants to the Barnes & Noble to read John Krakauer’s account of …
What Happened to Lewis and Chesterton?
In his autobiography, G.K. Chesterton, the great 19th century British author, describes a formative early experience. “The very first thing I can ever remember seeing with my own eyes was a young man walking across a bridge. He had a curly moustache and an attitude of confidence verging on swagger.” The man, we’re told, was …
Death Is My Life Coach
A reader of this blog (oh, you read that right) recently asked me an unfair question. He requested a reading list on the good life. What can we read and consider that will make us more capable of facing down the next 50 or so years? His question was unfair because, really, that is the …
How To Impress a Teenager
I recently read Paper Towns by John Green. The novel, which focuses on two high school students, was entirely inappropriate, demographically speaking. It departed significantly from the sorts of things that a family man in his late 30s is supposed to read. But I was inspired nonetheless. It challenged me to think about the art …