What I've been reading recently...

Henry Pirenne, Mohammed and Charlemagne. I’ve already praised this book in another post, so I’ll keep it short here. I really enjoyed reading the book. As we move along in the European Literature seminar I’m in, we continue to see the influence of Pirenne on later historians.

Tyler Cowen, Big Business: A Love Letter to an American Anti-Hero. With this book, I’ve now read three of Cowen’s many, many books. Cowen is a great writer and I take a lot of inspiration from him. He writes books that are scholarly but in a way that normal people can read them. This book was no exception! What’s incredible about this book is that page after page, Cowen lays out a well thought out and almost too obviously true argument for why we undervalue big business when we should be valuing it higher. And yet, I know lots of people who would disagree with everything. In many ways the arguments in the book are simple. Sure, people say they hate billionaires, but when you need to buy something, where do you go? (you may notice all my links are to Amazon—thanks Jeff) But then Cowen goes deeper, as towards the end when he really gets at why people hate big business. “We are rather less well constructed for thinking about abstract systems, the import of rules, and how the secondary and tertiary consequences of those rules may improve (or harm) human well-being in nonobvious ways” (186). Engaging and timely throughout!

Photo by Henry Be on Unsplash

R. W. Southern, The Making of the Middle Ages. This book, though dense and confusing at times, was good. This was a major work in the historiography of the Middle Ages. How did the middle ages come about, and what were the foundational features? Southern attempts to answer those questions. The book is hard to access if you don’t know anything about that time period in Europe (I didn’t). So, having a discussion over the book was helpful. I found particularly interesting the discussion of how liberty came to be associated with an increase in laws and a decrease in arbitrariness. Negative liberty in the early Middle Ages? Southern is allusive in his writing, however. For instance, towards the end when he is concluding about some of the changes during his period of study, he says “These changes are hard to define and their connection can more readily be felt than explained. Indeed, in a strict sense, these changes defy definition, and the connection between them cannot be explained—it can only be exemplified in the lives of individuals” (219). Even if such a statement can make sense, why do we let historians get away with writing such obscure things?

Tana French, In the Woods. I picked this book up on a whim in a thrift store in Texas a few years ago. It looked like a scary/horror novel, but it was much more of a true crime type book. That’s not my favorite type of fiction, but I enjoyed this one. I imagine people would be divided over the ending. I kind of like it, but I imagine a lot of people hated it. Overall, French’s writing is captivating throughout. The narration is very realistic.

Roland Bainton, Here I Stand: A Life of Martin Luther. The seminar class I’m in tore this book to shreds. It’s a biography of Martin Luther, but the historian was writing the book in a less academic and more religious or theological way. He mentions at a few points that Luther’s struggle for faith was our struggle for faith (keep in mind the book came out in 1950, right after WWII and Hitler—a protestant German nationalist). So, it made it hard to take Bainton’s word given how unobjective he set out to be. He has very little criticism, and a lot of praise for Luther. However, I do think there was some merit to the book. Something I would have liked to discuss was whether the consequences of Luther’s actions mattered in our evaluation of him. A deontologist might say no, Luther was doing what he saw as right (revolting against the church and following his conscience), and the consequences weren’t his fault. A consequentialist on the other hand would say, no Luther deserves ample criticism—his actions led to death and destruction (not to mention his antisemitism). It was an interesting book overall, just keep in mind the subtitle says A life of Martin Luther, not the.

Carlo Ginzburg, The Cheese and the Worms. This was a fun book to read. It’s very highly acclaimed, often considered a seminal work in European History and Microhistory. Ginzburg writes about the life of Menocchio, a miller in sixteenth century Europe. Menocchio had some interesting ideas and ultimately died because of his heresy. The scary thing about books like this where the historian is attempting to write about the history of someone who we know just very little about, is that it could just all be wrong. It likely is wrong, since we can’t actually go back and see what things were like, in actuality. But what if Ginzburg is way off? What if Menocchio wasn’t some sort of representation of figures caught between the peasant oral culture of times past and the new written culture? What if he was just an alcoholic or what if he was schizophrenic? At the end of the day, if we want to try to reconstruct the life of Menocchio, Ginzburg likely did it pretty well, but it’s hard to say much about someone when all we have are a few trial court documents and fragments of documentation. It makes for a fun read though! Who wouldn’t want to read about some guy who said, "All was chaos, that is earth, air, water, and fire were mixed together; and of that bulk a mass formed―just as cheese is made out of milk―and worms appeared in it, and these were the angels." We actually talked a bit in class about why Ginzburg structured the book the way he did (no chapters really) and someone mentioned readability, and I would add money—Ginzburg sold a lot of books.

Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking. As an introvert, I was excited to read this book. The book was a best seller, but I was let down. I actually only made it about halfway through before giving up. It just felt like another self-help book. It is interesting that when the book came out introverts were, I guess, looked down upon in some way. Cain makes the case that the world was set up for extroverts (and that’s 2013—not that long ago). It seems like a weird argument now. As far as I can tell, being an introvert is super in vogue. I usually don’t tell people that I’m an introvert unless they ask because it’s become such a trope/almost annoying thing to say. There’s got to be some reason it was a best seller, but I couldn’t tell you.

Kyle Harper, Slavery in the Late Roman World AD 275-425. Harper deserves a lot of praise for this book. It is really long, dense, and well researched. I definitely learned a lot. I didn’t care so much about the actual history, but I was intrigued by Harper’s methods. In a lot of ways, Harper is thinking in an economic way. He does a lot of modeling and trying to understand slavery using tools such as supply and demand. I like when historians understand basic economic concepts and can use them affectively. I’d like to read more about Rome in general. What comes through as a large theme throughout the book was the degree of complexity in the Roman World. Also, kind of interesting that Harper makes numerous comparisons to American slavery—I guess for obvious reasons.

Dave Marsh, The Heart of Rock and Soul: The 1001 Greatest Singles Ever Made. This has to be one of the coolest books I’ve ever gotten. Marsh just goes through what he considers the 1001 greatest rock and soul singles ever made. The way I’m reading it is to just read through a song (he just gives you a short back story and some thoughts on why the single is so good) and then I listen to it. It makes for a slow process, but it is really enjoyable. I’ve only made it through seven songs so far, but I’ll keep chipping away at the list. My favorite so far probably has to be Bob Dylan’s, Like a Rolling Stone. Check out this live performance from 1965—here. I still can’t believe that Bob Dylan got booed off stage so often when he toured with The Band.  

Bonus: What I’ve been listening to…

I went to two concerts this week! Gov’t Mule played on the Strip in Tuscaloosa, and I caught Blackberry Smoke, and their opener North Mississippi Allstars in Birmingham. Both concerts were great. I’ve been trying to learn more about/get into more new music—specifically that connection/transition between blues/soul and rock and roll. Warren Haynes was great. Every song was perfect, but the highlight for me had to have been when they played the Beatles’ She Said, She Said. I can’t decide if I like their cover, or the Black Key’s cover more. Here’s a video of Gov’t Mule playing it live. Blackberry Smoke was also great. Here’s one of their more popular songs. However, North Mississippi Allstars kind of stole the show for me. Their bass player was really impressive, as was Luther Dickinson (lead guitar). Here’s one of my favorites. Both bands had a lot of energy. The concert started on time (at 6pm) and didn’t end until a little after 9pm! Maybe the best overall concert I’ve ever been to!