On Reading Well
Reason Book was Chosen:
The subtitle of this book is Finding the Great Life through the Great Books. I'm planning to begin reading through The Great Books beginning this year, so I thought this would be a good book to start off the year. Dr. Karen Prior has also put out guide books of sorts for some of the books on my list - The Scarlet Letter, Sense & Sensibility, Jane Eyre, Heart of Darkness, and Frankenstein. I plan to read her versions for my Great Books project. This book here will be my first introduction to her.My Thoughts
I’m pretty sure Karen Swallow Prior has been wiretapping my wireless because this book addressed major questions I’ve been pondering for the past year. It’s as though I’ve charted a new course in thinking. Dr. Prior uses each of the 12 chapters to tie a virtue to a work of literature. She also writes about the role of virtues in the Christian life in terms of which ones are practices developed by us and which derive from God (the cardinal vs theological virtues). Having just read some books on moral philosophy, this book tied together a number of the questions I had after reading the philosophers. It’s rare that I read a book so perfectly timed to where I am in life. In fact, had I read this book just 3 months ago, it would not have packed the punch it did reading it at this exact moment.
