Comments on: Best introductions to … http://crookedtimber.org/2006/04/04/best-introductions-to/ Out of the crooked timber of humanity, no straight thing was ever made Sun, 27 May 2012 00:15:07 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.2 By: Hogan http://crookedtimber.org/2006/04/04/best-introductions-to/comment-page-1/#comment-150629 Hogan Tue, 04 Apr 2006 20:33:19 +0000 http://crookedtimber.org/?p=4512#comment-150629 I was gonna say . . . Anyone who calls American Renaissance an introduction to 19th-century American literature is using the word "introduction" in some sense with which I'm not familiar. But I can see calling it the one book to read if you're going to read only one book. And as someone who regularly asks the one-book question (about the French Revolution, the Ottoman Empire, scholasticism, Romanticism . . . ) I see tremendous value in compiling the list. I will watch your future progress with considerable interest. I was gonna say . . .

Anyone who calls American Renaissance an introduction to 19th-century American literature is using the word “introduction” in some sense with which I’m not familiar. But I can see calling it the one book to read if you’re going to read only one book.

And as someone who regularly asks the one-book question (about the French Revolution, the Ottoman Empire, scholasticism, Romanticism . . . ) I see tremendous value in compiling the list. I will watch your future progress with considerable interest.

]]> By: Scott Eric Kaufman http://crookedtimber.org/2006/04/04/best-introductions-to/comment-page-1/#comment-150624 Scott Eric Kaufman Tue, 04 Apr 2006 19:05:55 +0000 http://crookedtimber.org/?p=4512#comment-150624 I should have done this differently: held up Book X as <i>the</i> book to read if one was only going to read one book on a given subject. Then, over the course of many years, I'd collect all the answers to my various provocations and posted them as a completed list . . . which people could then take issue with. But thanks for the link. Hopefully it'll drum up more interest in my pet project. (One which, for reasons explained elsewhere, I think can be a really important one. What if I know the medievalist at the institution considering me for a position specializes in the C12th renaissance? Wouldn't it be nice to be able to pick up a book which'll 1) inform me as to what that is and 2) which has a scholarly stamp-of-approval as something generally respected by the field? I should have done this differently: held up Book X as the book to read if one was only going to read one book on a given subject. Then, over the course of many years, I’d collect all the answers to my various provocations and posted them as a completed list . . . which people could then take issue with. But thanks for the link. Hopefully it’ll drum up more interest in my pet project. (One which, for reasons explained elsewhere, I think can be a really important one. What if I know the medievalist at the institution considering me for a position specializes in the C12th renaissance? Wouldn’t it be nice to be able to pick up a book which’ll 1) inform me as to what that is and 2) which has a scholarly stamp-of-approval as something generally respected by the field?

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