Early Spring Reading List

by tristero

(Note: Links are to Powells Books, a fine independent bookseller.)

Mark Danner on the Downing Street Memos and then some. Danner is one of the greats of the American press. Not to be missed.

The Enemy of My Enemy: The Alarming Convergence of Militant Islam and the Extreme Right. And now you know why Horowitz has been so swift to insist that it's liberals who are in bed with Osama. But seriously, this could be a terrific book. The thing is that the author, George Michael, is going to have to define the "extreme right", because obviously many rightwing conservatives - eg Flemming Rose, Franklin Graham, the Dobson scum, etc. - clearly loathe islamism, if not Islam itself. But it sure is mighty curious how close islamist values mirror christianist ones.

Since both these books won't be out until April, that gives me plenty of time to finish off Jonathan Israel's masterpiece, Radical Enlightenment: Philosophy and the Making of Modernity 1650-1750, all 834 pages of it. And it's wonderful, wonderful, wonderful. In related reading, I'll also have time to complete my first serious pass through Spinoza's writings since college. Folks, you ain't read nuttin' 'til you've read his Tractatus Theologico-Politicus. The word on the street (grin) is that Spinoza is dry, cold, and difficult. Not true. I find him deeply moving and, well, not exactly easy on occasion, but clear as a bell most of the time and worth every second. I've been gobbling up excerpts from this set of selections from Spinoza's work. It includes the complete Ethics, which I've just started and don't expect to grok for many, many years. There are the usual disputes in academe about translations, but the ones here, by Curley, seem more than adequate.

If you need some hand-holding getting into Spinoza - as I did - Israel's book has some superb, concise chapters on Spinoza's works that can help as a guide. I would skip The Courtier and the Heretic by Matthew Stewart, about Spinoza and Leibniz, which got some good reviews recently. I read it, and yes, it's a very fast read, but that's because most of the book is taken up with biographical stuff and very little detail of their philosophies. But I suppose if all of this is brand new to you, Stewart's book is a good way to get a toe wet. But definitely go on over to Spinoza himself. Beautiful. And if you already know him, you might want to read him again, just to remind yourself that there once was a time when people thought a reality-based government was a pretty good idea.