Quote:
Originally Posted by CazMar
One thing I notice about all these lists of "Great Classics" is the lack of any non-fiction works. I know some scholarship can become dated, but back in the days (seemingly when they had servants to do all that domestic stuff!) people would spend years writing works running into many volumes. A more recent (20th cent.) example would be Copleston's "History of Philosophy" - no purple prose here but if you want to know the history of Western thought this is it. And all in a lightweight 10 volumes or so!
Also am I "well read" because I have studied Homer in its original Greek, or not well read because I loathed quite a few of the books on the list of authors? Homer was much more fun - lots of action and strange monsters!
|
That is such a good point! A lot of people just don't like reading fiction. My husband will not read fiction at all. He's read non-fiction that might be considered "classic" (at least in the sense that I heard of them in college) but those works don't seem to make the lists of what we should read to be well read. There's never classic works from philosophy, religion, sociology, etc.