My Ten Books for February
In January, I started my year of reading more, and more systematically. After a successful first month, here’s my bet on February’s reading.
One — DONE: Uwe Wesel: Juristische Weltkunde: Eine Einführung in das Recht. (“Judicial World Knowledge: An Introduction to Law”) — As the title says. An interesting journey through legal history and theory. Starts from indigenious tribes, passing by ancient Greek, Roman and medieval traditions and culminating with the abuse of Law in Germany by the Nazis. Eye-opening.
Two — DONE: Doris Kearns Goodwin: Leadership in Turbulent Times — A huge volume that demonstrates the “ingredients” of leadership with the examples of four US-presidents: Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin D. Roosevelt and Lyndon B. Johnson. An exciting lesson in leadership, and quite a ride through US history since the mid-1800s. The most revealing, for me, was how different the characters of these four men were, and how they succeeded with them in their respective times.
Three: Betty Sue Flowers et al.: Presence: Exploring Profound Change in People, Organizations and Society.
Four — DONE: Baltasar Gracián: Handorakel und Kunst der Weltklugheit (“The Art of Worldly Wisdom”) — A collection of advice that seems to have originally been addressed to aristocrats. Easy to understand (if not fitted to my world view) but hard to read. The German version is by famous philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche.
Five — DONE: Michael Pollan: How to Change Your Mind — The history of psychedelics from the Ancients til today. The author himself tried severela psychedelics during the writing of this book. A good explanationof why psychedelics could do magic, as in healing addiction and depression. Yet a balanced description of the state of research today and a glimpse into why microdosing might be coming at us from the Valley.
Six — DONE: Carl Gustav Jung: Archetypen (“Archetypes”) — A part of the famous psychiatrist’s collected works (Vol. 5) and possibly one of the central parts of his theory of the human psyche. That theory turns out to not be limited to the individual, but shared by all of humanity. A fascinating glimpse into the history of ideas of the 20th century.
Seven: Iain McGilchrist: The Master and His Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World. — One of those books that were actually hard to get. Now I have the 2nd, extended edition!
Eight: Peter Watson: The Modern Mind: An Intellectual History of the 20th Century.
Nine: Christian Berkel: Der Apfelbaum (“The Apple Tree”) — An autobiographical work by a German actor. Wonder how he describes the uneathing of his family history in Berlin(?) in the 20th century.
Ten — DONE: Viktor E. Frankl: Der Mensch vor der Frage nach dem Sinn. Eine Auswahl aus dem Gesamtwerk. — Thought this was the (original) German version of the famous “Man’s Search for Meaning”. Turns out it was a collection, selected from several works and speeches. I guess I got the gist of Frankl’s thinking, including one shocking report from the non-life he had to suffer in the Auschwitz concentration camp. The last half, which actually compresses some of Frankl’s books into short paragraphs was pretty hard to read. Still a great read.
Eleven (January catch-up) — READING: Philip F. Stahel: Becoming a Better Surgeon. Seems to be a rather down-to-earth description of one man’s journey to professional excellence and human maturity in the medical field. I don’t like the way the book presents itself: more like a picture book than a narrative. But maybe he has something interesting to say.
So all in all, I became a little messier, and also saw the limits of my way of organizing books in “goodreads”. Especially the “Order by ranking” seems to change quite a bit for the less-read works I am interested in. Still: reading more (and systematically) is an idea I like sticking to.
