Useful reading

[storeynicholas]

On similar lines: Bertrand Russell's In Praise of Idleness; The Conquest of Happiness and Authority and the Individual.
NJS

[marcelo]

It is certainly not how I keep my own books. Still, I love this picture.

[storeynicholas]

Ha! Yes, I see what you mean but not good for the books! There have been times when I have stacked them on the floor.
NJS

[Jordan Marc]

Tatty old books improperly shelved and long neglected are the end of civilization!

JMB

[marcelo]

I have perused this volume in a bookshop today and was glad to see a vast collection of sartorially very interesting old pictures - and not only of the writer himself. A good title for the end of civilization staple.


Gore Vidal: Snapshots in History's Glare

[rjman]

I have perused this volume in a bookshop today and was glad to see a vast collection of sartorially very interesting old pictures - and not only of the writer himself. A good title for the end of civilization staple.


Gore Vidal: Snapshots in History's Glare

+1, best accompanied with the author's memoir Palimpsest.

It is too bad that he has lately descended into some sort of cantankerous crackpottery.

[pvpatty]

To this list I would like to add Theodore Roosevelt's speech, The Strenuous Life. When friends of mine have found themselves in various types of strife in the past, I have directed them to this text. It is available online: http://www.bartleby.com/58/1.html

[Azdak]

To this list I would like to add Theodore Roosevelt's speech, The Strenuous Life. When friends of mine have found themselves in various types of strife in the past, I have directed them to this text. It is available online: http://www.bartleby.com/58/1.html

As imperialistic pep talks go, not bad...

[pvpatty]

To this list I would like to add Theodore Roosevelt's speech, The Strenuous Life. When friends of mine have found themselves in various types of strife in the past, I have directed them to this text. It is available online: http://www.bartleby.com/58/1.html

As imperialistic pep talks go, not bad...

Surely that's the best kind of pep talk!

[boxcar]

Good gosh! Lighten up!

Try some escapist fiction.

[NJS]

I found this wonderful reference to an incident during the London Blitz, near the beginning of Chapter 10 (War and Worse) of Richard Walker's seminal book Savile Row An Illustrated History (Rizzoli, 1989), and suggest that anyone seeking the spirit of Savile Row will glimpse it here:

''Sandon was bombed out of 8 Savile Row in the early hours of 16 September 1940; the offices and workshop were completely demolished and four battered fitting rooms were left standing. Miss Selleck, the secretary, placed her typewriter on some debris and tapped out orders on her knees in the street.''

NJS

[hectorm]

I found this wonderful reference to an incident during the London Blitz, near the beginning of Chapter 10 (War and Worse) of Richard Walker's seminal book Savile Row An Illustrated History (Rizzoli, 1989), and suggest that anyone seeking the spirit of Savile Row will glimpse it here

Mercifully Walker´s magnificent chronicle stops at around the mid 80s. These last 30 years have not been specially kind on that Row´s old stoic spirit.
By the way, is your Rizzoli edition covered with pin striped flannel? My copy is from the Prion editorial house and comes only with a paper dust jacket faking the flannel.

[NJS]

Hector - My copy appears to be a first edition, which a LL member in Brazil kindly gave me last year (he had two copies!) and features a Tom & Jerry cartoon on the cover.
NJS

[Berwick]

I would suggest "Zorba the Greek" for an interesting discourse about whether it is better to live every day as if it were your last, or to live every day as if you would live forever.

Churchill's "My Early Life" is a rip-roaring read, and helps the reader to understand his great strengths and particular weaknesses. he certainly lived in exciting times. Iit deals with his life from his birth in 1874 to about1904.

[hectorm]

...features a Tom & Jerry cartoon on the cover

Now I understand why the book is an "illustrated" history.