About 4 years ago, I decided that I'd embark upon reading the Harvard Classics, a 51 volume set of books compiled in the early 1900's designed to give the reader a "liberal education." Also called the Five Foot Shelf of Books, Dr. Eliot put serious work in putting together this compendium and deserves a vast amount of credit in developing this and allowing dissemination of knowledge to anyone who would could afford it. As I close in on finishing the massive series of books, I decided that I'd blog about it.
I'm almost finished reading every single page of the Harvard Classics, including the 20 volume set of the Harvard Classics Shelf of Fiction. There are reading guides out there that allow you to read 15 minutes a day and in retrospect, perhaps I would have done better if I read that instead. And after reading a few of the volumes, I've been left scratching my head and indulging in late night research sessions wondering "What the hell did I just read?"
Certainly I'm richer for having read these books, and I don't regret it for a bit, but a lot of questions have come up. Does this collection of books still hold value for those pursing a liberal education? If there was an updated version of the Five Foot Shelf of Books, what would be added or removed? Are the texts enough, or do they need explanations as well?
I'm not an academic, but I figured that I should at least write notes down regarding each volume of the collection and see where it leads.
A few thing as I get started: I read these books over the course of four years. For me to recall everything is impossible, therefore any errors in my recollection are entirely my fault. As I write this blog, I'll go back and look up what I read and try to summarize it with attributions as I go along. For any misattributions, I wholeheartedly apologize. They are inadvertent. I also apologize for any accidental swearing in any blog post. And if there's any question about the accuracy of what I wrote, I'm probably wrong.
I'm almost finished reading every single page of the Harvard Classics, including the 20 volume set of the Harvard Classics Shelf of Fiction. There are reading guides out there that allow you to read 15 minutes a day and in retrospect, perhaps I would have done better if I read that instead. And after reading a few of the volumes, I've been left scratching my head and indulging in late night research sessions wondering "What the hell did I just read?"
Certainly I'm richer for having read these books, and I don't regret it for a bit, but a lot of questions have come up. Does this collection of books still hold value for those pursing a liberal education? If there was an updated version of the Five Foot Shelf of Books, what would be added or removed? Are the texts enough, or do they need explanations as well?
I'm not an academic, but I figured that I should at least write notes down regarding each volume of the collection and see where it leads.
A few thing as I get started: I read these books over the course of four years. For me to recall everything is impossible, therefore any errors in my recollection are entirely my fault. As I write this blog, I'll go back and look up what I read and try to summarize it with attributions as I go along. For any misattributions, I wholeheartedly apologize. They are inadvertent. I also apologize for any accidental swearing in any blog post. And if there's any question about the accuracy of what I wrote, I'm probably wrong.
No comments:
Post a Comment