Books read January through December 1964
| Author | Piersall, Jim |
|---|---|
| Author | Hirshberg, Al |
| Publication | |
| Copyright Date | 1955 |
| Number of Pages | 224 |
| Genres | Non-fiction; Autobiography |
| Keywords | Sports |
| When Read | January 1964 |
Jim Piersall was an outfielder for the Boston Red Sox when, at age 22 in 1952, he suffered a severe mental breakdown that left him without any memory of seven months of his life. With professional psychiatric help he recovered from his debility and was able to return to a normal life with his wife and his career.
I seem to recall that I found a paperback copy of this book somewhere and decided to read it. I don't think it was a library book. Perhaps someone left it at our house who was finished with it. I read it and found it quite absorbing. I knew very little about mental illness before reading this. It may have been the first thing I ever read about mental illness and very likely the first autobiographical account. I believe the book became a best seller as the first, or one of the first, to address mental illness as a potentially curable illness to be acknowledged and treated rather than hushed up.
| Author | Kantor, MacKinley |
|---|---|
| Publication | Cleveland: World Publishing |
| Copyright Date | 1961 |
| Number of Pages | 957 pages |
| Extras | map |
| Genres | Fiction; Historical fiction |
| Keywords | American frontier |
| When Read | January 1964 |
In the 1850's a settlement was established near Spirit Lake in Iowa, populated by a variety of different people from further east. The settlement was raided by a band of Sioux Indians in 1857. According to the Wikipedia entry on the "Spirit Lake Massacre", they killed 35-40 people and abducted four young women.
The novel attempts to reconstruct the lives of the settlers and, to a lesser extent, the Indians. I remember the shock of reading page after page after page of the development of various characters and then having them suddenly killed. I would continue reading with a sense of dread, knowing that other characters with whom I had invested time and sympathy were also likely to be killed. I remember the sense of relief with the ones who escaped.
I read the novel because I was impressed with Kantor's Andersonville. I wanted more. This book had the same writing skill and power of the other book but never achieved anything like the popularity of the Civil War novel.
| Author | White, T.H. |
|---|---|
| Publication | New York: Putnam |
| Copyright Date | 1958 |
| Number of Pages | 677 |
| Genres | Fiction; Historical fiction; Fantasy |
| When Read | February 1964 |
White recounts and amplifies the story of Arthur Pendragon from his childhood to his rise to be King Arthur, leader of the Knights of the Round Table and Lord of Camelot, and to his final demise in the tragedy of Sir Lancelot and Queen Guinevere and the battle with Mordred.
White's tale, although ultimately tragic, had many delightful moments, often involving Merlin and the young Arthur. I remember (I think) being delighted by his turning Arthur into an ant, and into other animals to give him a different perspective on life. In spite of the fantastic character of the story, I really enjoyed it.
| Author | Huxley, Aldous |
|---|---|
| Publication | |
| Copyright Date | 1932 |
| Number of Pages | 311 |
| Genres | Fiction; Science fiction |
| Keywords | Dystopia |
| When Read | February 1964 |
Huxley's most famous novel is set in a future state in which all children are born via in vitro fertilization and are the products of genetic engineering that modifies them to fit the mold of a particular caste, from alpha plus intellectuals to epsilon minus working drones. They all take the drug "soma" to make them happy. One individual, an imperfectly engineered alpha plus, comes to reject the society. He has brought a young man back to England who knows nothing of this society and ultimately commits suicide. The alpha is exiled.
I remember that the story made a big impression on me, as it did on millions of other readers. There were aspects of the society that attracted me such as the sexual freedom, not something that was available to my teenage self. As with all of Huxley's books, it was complex. It forced the reader to think and to ask questions.
| Author | White, Edward Lucas |
|---|---|
| Publication | New York: E.P. Dutton |
| Copyright Date | 1916 |
| Number of Pages | x + 700 |
| Genres | Fiction; Historical fiction |
| When Read | February 1964 |
The subject of the novel was José Gaspar Rodríguez de Francia, one of the only educated men in Paraguay in the early 19th century. He called for a revolution against Spain and achieved supreme power in the country, advocating for Enlightenment policies that benefited common people rather than the small agrarian elite.
I remember nothing at all of this quite large book (I seem to have been reading a lot of big ones in those days.) The most I can say about my reading of it is that my historical interests kept expanding. I had learned about Simón Bolívar and José de San Martín in the sixth grade and had begun to think about the independence of the Latin American countries in the same light as that of the United States. I knew that democracy was not as well established in Latin America as in North America and may have been looking for more information about Latin American history from a more progressive point of view. I still do that, looking for good in developments in countries whose progress is in doubt.
| Author | Blacker, Irwin R. |
|---|---|
| Publication | Cleveland: World Publishing |
| Copyright Date | 1959 |
| Number of Pages | 478 |
| Extras | illustrations |
| Genres | Fiction; Historical fiction |
| Keywords | Mexico; American Indians |
| When Read | March 1964 |
This was a historical adventure novel about the Spanish conquest and oppression of the Indians of what is now New Mexico, and the Indian "Pueblo Revolt" beginning in 1680.
I found a copy of a paperback edition on the Internet Archive and will quote from the back cover:
"Tumultuous human drama unfolds across a province as vast as old Spain itself - a land rich with the heritage of two civilizations and drenched in the blood of both - as a fiercely courageous man leads his people against those who destroy their gods and their lives, and as an unforgettable woman with a dream of her own wields the very forces of history to make her dream come true."
I'm quoting that to remind myself not to get too intellectual and high minded in my review of past reading. I loved the rollicking adventure and romance as much as the next guy.
I recollect a scene from this book, or perhaps another novel on the same subject. Indians, presumably Apaches or Comanches, had fought on foot and won some small battles against Spaniards on their horses. Then, a few decades later I think, the Indians had bred a large number of horses from captured stock and had mastered the art of living and fighting on horseback to a degree that was unknown and frightening to the Spanish. The Indian mastery of horsemanship turned back the Spanish attempts to conquer the American Southwest.
| Author | London, Jack |
|---|---|
| Publication | |
| Copyright Date | 1904 |
| Number of Pages | 366 |
| Genres | Fiction; |
| When Read | March 1964 |
Intelligent, educated, Humphrey van Widen is thrown into San Francisco Bay when a ferry he is on collides with another boat in night and fog. The young man survives and is picked up by a seal hunting schooner heading out to sea. The commander of that schooner is the powerful, driven, domineering, dangerous man named Wolf Larsen, known as "the Sea Wolf". He refuses to change course to set the young man ashore and instead just forces him into his crew.
I read this book again in 1976. See 1976-02.04 for more notes about it.
This was the first of London's books that I read. The last one I read was in year 2000. Maybe it's time for me to read another.
| Author | Huxley, Aldous |
|---|---|
| Publication | Harper and Brothers |
| Copyright Date | 1948 |
| Number of Pages | 205 |
| Genres | Fiction; Science fiction |
| Keywords | Satire |
| When Read | April 1964 |
There is a story of an author named "Tallis", followed by a book within the book, the story that Tallis wrote. The story within the story is about a nuclear and poison gas war that severely damages human civilization for many years after it occurs.
I don't remember this book and all I have about it comes today from the Internet. I think this may have ended my great interest in Aldous Huxley, though I did read another of Huxley's book 30 years later - 24 years ago.
| Author | Shaw, Irwin |
|---|---|
| Publication | Random House |
| Copyright Date | 1948 |
| Number of Pages | 689 |
| Genres | Fiction |
| Keywords | World War II |
| When Read | April 1964 |
I first encountered this story via the movies and liked it so much that I read the book. I read it again 40 years later in 2004. See my book notes for 2004-08.04.
See my book notes for 2004-08.04.
| Author | France, Anatole |
|---|---|
| Original Language | French |
| Translators | Evans, A.W. |
| Publication | 1909 |
| Copyright Date | 1908 |
| Number of Pages | xx + 345 |
| Genres | Fiction; Satire |
| When Read | May 1964 |
An almost blind abbot shipwrecked on an antarctic island mistakes the penguins around him for people and baptizes them. This initiates a slow transformation of the birds into people who act out a satiric history of France.
I'm pretty sure that I read this book after encountering Anatole France as a character introduced in the first volume, World's End, of the Lanny Budd series. Sinclair writes: "He was an old gentleman, tall and thin, with a large head and a long face, like a horse’s. His name was Thibault, but he went by his pen name of Anatole France."
Thibault/France plays no significant role in the novel. There are a couple pages at the introduction above, and a single reference later in the novel when Lanny's intellectual uncle in Connecticut asks his 17 year old nephew what books he has read and Lanny names Anatole France as one of the authors. The uncle questions him about the books and was satisfied that Lanny was a smart kid. At the time I read this I was also a near 17 year old, wanna be smart kid named "Lanny" (my family's nickname for me) and I decided to read Anatole France too.
I don't think Anatole France appears as a character in the rest of the series, but there are nostalgic references to him when Lanny recalls people he met at this or that soiree. Now if only I had properly learned to speak French.
| Author | Dos Passos, John |
|---|---|
| Publication | |
| Copyright Date | 1921 |
| Number of Pages | 433 |
| Genres | Fiction |
| Keywords | World War I |
| When Read | May 1964 |
Dos Passos, himself a veteran of the first world war, writes a story of three very different men, a farm boy, a store clerk, and a Harvard graduate, who served in the American army in World War I.
Although there was fighting in this novel my recollection is that it was more about the nature of life in the army than it was about the horrors of the trenches. The men are basically civilians, not used to or accepting of military discipline, and in turn not well tolerated by the military command. One of them tries to advance in the army and get to command other men. The other two resist and rebel against the dehumanization to the extent that one of them, the Harvard man, deserts. All three are damaged by their experience.
Dos Passos was one of the "naturalist" American writers. I think I was already made aware in high school of that characterization of the literary style of some of the key American writers of the early 20th century - bald descriptions of reality, short sentences, seeing people and hard situations as they were rather than as we like to think of them - at least that's the way I thought about it. I had already read lots of John Steinbeck and bits of Jack London, Ernest Hemingway, Upton Sinclair, Sinclair Lewis, a number of European writers, and now John Dos Passos. I wanted to know the truth about the world beyond my protected, middle class teenager's life. By now, reading was long established as an integral part of my life.
| Author | Orwell, George |
|---|---|
| Publication | |
| Copyright Date | 1949 |
| Number of Pages | 328 |
| Genres | Fiction; Science fiction |
| Keywords | Dystopia |
| When Read | June 1964 |
In a world where the ministry of propaganda is called the ministry of truth, the ministry of war is called the ministry of peace, history is rewritten to suit current government policy, people engage in "doublethink" and "doublespeak", and "Big Brother" is watching everyone, a lost bureaucrat attempts to find his way.
I'm sure that I was fully in line with Orwell's criticism of Stalinism in this book, as I was with his previous book Animal Farm. At the time my attitude was given to me by my upbringing in 1950's America, which only began to waver in the late 60s and early 70s in the long shadow of the Vietnam War. However, whatever criticism I voiced against American support for kleptocratic regimes around the world or for billionaire rule in the U.S., I don't think I ever endorsed any kind of Orwellian future.
I don't remember if this was assigned reading in high school or not.
| Author | Conrad, Joseph |
|---|---|
| Publication | |
| Copyright Date | 1899 |
| Number of Pages | 107 |
| Genres | Fiction |
| Keywords | Africa |
| When Read | June 1964 |
River steamer captain Charles Marlow tells the story of taking a boat upstream to his company's furthest outpost to meet ivory trader Kurtz in deepest Africa. What he finds along the way and at Kurtz' post are horrifying examples of savage behavior both from the primitive Africans and the even more savage Kurtz and the essentially savage colonialism he represents.
I read the book again for a book group in 1994. See my abstract, comments and notes for 1994-03.04.
Our views of colonialism and primitive peoples evolved dramatically over the years. I no longer remember what my opinion of the book was when I read it. I don't remember whether I considered it to be a racist book, an anti-racist book, or a book that drew no conclusions about racism and just tried to tell a story.
Today, taught in part by all the discussion I've read about historical men accused of racism by some and celebrated as anti-racists by others - I'm thinking for example of the American presidents Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, and both Roosevelts - I'm inclined to restrain my judgments. E.H. Carr analyzed this problem as well as any historian I've read. He argues that we cannot understand the events of any time, place, or person unless we can put ourselves in that time and place and look at the person and the events within that context. Furthermore, and surprisingly to many of us I think, Carr also argued that a historian must try to imagine the future and put himself in that imagined context if he wants the opinions he writes to be of value to the future. It's a view, I think, that mixes ethics and objectivity, offering an improvement to each of them.
So, in light of that, what do I think of Conrad? I can't answer that question without spending some time studying the period, the views of the people of that period, the views of the people of our current period (some African intellectuals are very anti-Conrad), and thinking about what an objective view might appear to be in the future. So I'll defer that question.
| Author | Faulkner, William |
|---|---|
| Publication | |
| Copyright Date | 1929 |
| Number of Pages | 326 |
| Genres | Fiction; Experimental fiction |
| When Read | July 1964 |
This is a novel about three brothers - Benjy, Quentin, and Jason - each relating to Caddy, their sister. It's in four parts, the first three being a stream of consciousness from each of the three brothers. Three parts take place in 1928. The other one, Quentin's story, is earlier in 1910 when he and Caddy are just reaching adulthood.
Benjy is a mentally defective man. Perhaps like a small child, his thoughts are mainly sense perceptions, ranging about without understanding. Quentin is an intellectual. His mind is filled with obsessive thoughts of protecting and loving Caddy, neither of which is possible. He commits suicide. Jason, the third brother is selfish and nasty but his stream of consciousness is the clearest and easiest to understand. The fourth part is from outside the boys.
I don't know if I read this before or during my first semester of college. It was not assigned reading but I may have read it to prepare myself for Light in August, which was assigned.
The book is very difficult. Stream of consciousness, only recently introduced by James Joyce in a full novel in 1922, is difficult to follow and understand even in ideal conditions. When the consciousness is a mentally retarded person like Benjy or a highly intelligent but very disturbed person like Quentin, it is a real challenge. When those two sections of the book constitute the first half, with no introduction to them and no clearer view until after they are complete, the challenge can be overwhelming.
At the age of 18, I didn't know what to think about all of this. I don't really know now. Clearly, the book was a work of literary genius, but it wasn't something that I could understand, assimilate and use as a stepping stone to a higher level of understanding. I spent a lot of time thinking about the characters and the story, attempting to relate the points of view of the three brothers and of the sister, a woman with significant problems of her own. I'm sure that my young mind was able to make more of it than I can looking back over 55 years today.
| Author | Parry, J.H. |
|---|---|
| Publication | New York: Mentor Books, New American Library, 1964 |
| Copyright Date | 1963 |
| Number of Pages | 383 |
| Extras | maps, photos, notes, index |
| Genres | Non-fiction; History |
| When Read | September 1964 |
Professor Parry tells the story of European exploration and expansion into the rest of the world in the period from 1450 to 1650. He covers the technical developments in shipbuilding, navigation, seamanship, commerce and finance; the story of the great discoveries in Africa, Asia, and the Americas; and the "fruits of discovery", i.e., the consequences in conquest and colonization and the building of new overseas empires.
Most of the books I read were borrowed from libraries but this is one that I bought at home and took with me to college. I still have it in my personal library and can see the price, 95 cents, marked on the cover. I remember picking it up in my dormitory room at the University of Pittsburgh and thinking to myself, Dammit, I've been assigned all of these things to read by my professors, but I refuse to give up personal reading just because I've got to read other things too. So I read through this book and liked it quite a lot. The subject was one I was very interested in and had read about in other sources.
The book is apparently still in print and has garnered nine reviews, averaging 4.5 stars, on Amazon. The last review is dated 2016. A number of the positive reviews appear to be from sophisticated readers of this period in history.
| Author | Dostoevsky, Fyodor |
|---|---|
| Publication | |
| Copyright Date | 1860 |
| Number of Pages | 335 |
| Genres | Fiction |
| Keywords | Russia |
| When Read | September 1964 |
In 1849, Dostoevsky suffered a mock execution by the Russian state, followed by four years labor (out of an original sentence of eight years) in a prison camp in Siberia for being part of a progressive study group in St. Petersburg. This book was based on his time in prison where he encountered brutality and murder as an expected and generally accepted behavior in both prisoners and guards.
This was the first book I read by Dostoevsky, a writer who became one of my very favorites. I had heard about him but wanted to first get a sense of his writing before diving into one of his long books. I remember being depressed by the book - not an uncommon experience reading D, but I was also taken with his insights and humanity.
I see many editions on Amazon with many variant English titles and wildly varying page counts ranging from 168 to 400 pages. The count above comes from a Kindle edition that includes an introduction.
| Author | MacLeish, Archibald |
|---|---|
| Publication | Cambridge, MA: Houghton Mifflin |
| Copyright Date | 1958 |
| Number of Pages | 153 |
| Genres | Theater play |
| Keywords | Religion |
| When Read | October 1964 |
"And the LORD said unto Satan, Hast thou considered my servant Job, that there is none like him in the earth, a perfect and an upright man, one that feareth God, and escheweth evil?" (KJV Job 1:8).
In MacLeish's 1958 play, Mr. Zuss and Mr. Nickles, acting we might say on behalf of God and Satan, discuss J.B., a well to do businessman with a fine and healthy family and everything to be thankful for in the world. They cause a replay of the story of Job. J.B. loses his children and his business and his wife leaves him for his continuing worship of God, but unlike Job's wife, she returns to him and offers him love.
And by the way, there is a parody sort of nuclear war that occurs.
I don't remember my reaction to the play. I became an atheist at age 16 and when I read this at 18 I would have already seen it as being irrelevant to my own conception of the world. I probably read it as part of an English 101 assignment.
| Author | Wolfe, Thomas |
|---|---|
| Publication | |
| Copyright Date | 1929 |
| Number of Pages | 544 |
| Genres | Fiction |
| When Read | October 1964 |
A young boy grows up and goes to college at the University of North Carolina. It is the story of Wolfe's own escape from a confining childhood in a difficult family and his awakening to a wider world.
I don't remember any of the specifics of this novel but do remember being swept away by it. The writing was magnificent.
It was probably assigned to me in an English class but I know I went on to read other books by Wolfe. I'm thinking of The Web and the Rock. I read it a year or two later.
Zachary Littrell, in his review on Amazon, writes:
"It is a bonafide thicket of adjectives and metaphors. Wolfe comes from the Walt Whitman school of 'why say it in one word when five will do?' This is further accentuated by his stand-in Eugene Gant, who any college graduate can uncomfortably recognize themselves in: an over-dramatic intellectual who can make a mountain out of a mole-hill and certain the world is either to pat him on the back or out to get him."
If other critics are to be believed, the novel was not as well regarded in the second half of the 20th century as it was in the first. It was considered too romantic, too "sprawling", perhaps "Southern Gothic". However, at age 18 that would have been just the thing for me. On my own for the first time, studying philosophy, literature, and art history, rebelling against engineering and calculus, smoking cigarettes. I was ready for my own romantic coming of age.
| Author | Fleming, Ian |
|---|---|
| Publication | New American Library, 1964 |
| Copyright Date | 1963 |
| Number of Pages | 240 |
| Genres | Fiction; Spy |
| When Read | November 1964 |
Ernst Stavro Blofeld is still alive after the Thunderball volume and Bond goes after him in Switzerland.
Mr. Shapiro, I don't remember his first name, was the graduate assistant at the University of Pittsburgh who taught the two classes each week associated with the once weekly English 101 lecture by a more forgettable professor whose name I don't remember. English 101 was a required subject in the freshman year and there were many graduate assistants assigned to help the lecturer. I really liked Shapiro and made sure to be assigned to his classes for the second semester.
I've told this story twice already, once in my notes for Casino Royale (2007-01.03) and again for Moonraker (2019-10.02). I'll forgo telling it again except to say that this book was the origin of the events of my story.
| Author | Miller, Arthur |
|---|---|
| Publication | |
| Copyright Date | 1949 |
| Number of Pages | 139 |
| Genres | Theater play |
| When Read | November 1964 |
This was the classic American play about Willy Loman, a salesman who tried but never succeeded in making a lot of money or becoming a respected person, admired by his wife and son.
Read, I think, for English 101.
I had gone to the University of Pittsburgh because of their program offering a dual Bachelor's Degree combining Liberal Arts and Engineering. I was soon very disillusioned by the Engineering School that seemed to talk more to students about making money than about creating great engineering achievements, but enchanted by the Philosophy Department and by other Liberal Arts that I pursued. Looking back, perhaps this play, and Mr. Shapiro's exposition of it in English 101, were, I won't say instrumental, but still significant in my deciding that I wasn't going to spend my life pursuing money.
I won't say more about money, studies, or career here. It's a subject for my diary rather than my book notes.
| Author | Updike, John |
|---|---|
| Publication | New York: Alfred A. Knopf |
| Copyright Date | 1960 |
| Number of Pages | 265 |
| Genres | Fiction |
| When Read | December 1964 |
26 year old Harry "Rabbit" Angstrom has a job as a kitchen gadget salesman, a two year old son, and a pregnant wife. He's a young man. He was a great high school basketball player and can still play pretty well, but now he's bored and alienated from his life. On an impulse he runs away and takes a new woman.
Probably read for English 101 with Mr. Shapiro.
I now surmise that the themes of this book were a little beyond my ken as an 18 year old. My family of origin had its problems, but nothing like this. My mom and dad fought a lot and had many disappointments in their marriage, but they had made commitments to each other and, as far as I knew, kept them. This was not the first book that included infidelity that I read but I think it did make me think about these issues more seriously than before. I don't remember much about the book but do remember being highly impressed by it.
After writing up these notes I decided to read some more Updike. I've only read three of his books. Now I'm reading My Father's Tears. It will be in my 2020 book notes.
| Author | Joyce, James |
|---|---|
| Publication | |
| Copyright Date | 1912 |
| Number of Pages | 384 |
| Genres | Fiction |
| When Read | December 1964 |
I read this book again in 1997. See notes ID 1997-12.01.
My real recollections of the book are from my 1997 reading. See the comments there.