Ex Libris Contratimes

I've read six books since Christmas, four of which were Christmas gifts and five of which I would like to recommend.

For readers interested in the atheism/theism debate, there is hardly a better book than There Is A God: How the World's Most Notorious Atheist Changed his Mind, by Antony Flew and Roy Abraham Varghese. Flew is the aforementioned notorious atheist, and I'll dare say his arguments will have atheists in a bind. I'll further state that his book -- even if ultimately wrong -- sets atheism back at least a decade ... once the full impact of what his book represents is realized.

Also, the appendices in the book are outstanding, particularly Church of England bishop N. T. Wright's wonderful defense of the resurrection of Christ. While the book is a great read, Wright's addition is a must-read.

Theodore Dalrymple's amazing little book, In Praise of Prejudice: The Necessity of Preconceived Ideas, is refreshing in its common sense and invigorating in its brisk walk through the pitfalls of prejudice, and the foolishness of most attempts to purge prejudice from the human mind. The quick pace of this finely-wrought work explores the silly ideal that the highest good of any man is to dwell on the land without prejudice. Dalrymple argues that even biology equips humans for survival's sake with the habit of prejudice; and while he notes that racial prejudice is a gross mistake, the far greater mistake is to think that the absence of prejudice of any kind is a sign of moral authenticity, health and superiority. It simply isn't it, and the absurdities around this allegedly noble goal lead us to all sorts of moral confusion, including excusing a man for being a crook or lout because he is free of prejudice.

Connected to Dalrymple's beautifully written work is Shelby Steele's White Guilt: How Blacks and Whites Together Destroyed the Promise of the Civil Rights Era. For me, this is the only book I've read in a long time that I would describe as transformative. I can hardly tell you what was good about it since the book has left me nearly speechless. If anything, let me say that it made me realize that I -- raised in the public school system in the 1960s in northern New Jersey and in the '70s in southwestern New Hampshire -- was sold a whole boat of load junk about the white and wise solution regarding racism. My "white guilt" is both misbegotten and misplaced; Shelby Steele -- a "conservative" black man born of a white mother -- has shattered something in me I did not know even existed. My eyes have been opened: They have been lying to us. And I've been lying to myself -- unwittingly!

Steele's book is not perfect; and although I think he creates a dilemma -- especially for white Americans -- that he does not see, his work is so brilliant, so beautifully and powerfully brilliant, I believe it deserves a place in the great books list. You will see things about yourself and American politics and education you did not see before. I promise.

What higher praise can I give a work than to say it transformed me? Perhaps I can say that it stopped me in my tracks. (My wife, who passed this book along to me, considers Steele one of the bravest men in America. I think she's right.)

Falling in perfect harmony with White Guilt is Michael Gerson's lucid and well-written Heroic Conservatism: Why Republicans Need to Embrace America's Ideals (And Why They Deserve To Fail if They Don't). Gerson, as some of you know, is the Wheaton College-educated former speechwriter for President George W. Bush. (If you are not aware, Wheaton [Ill.] College is arguably America's premier evangelical college, and is a great school.)

I liked most of this book, if for no other reason than it revealed to me the presidential power that a speechwriter possesses. Gerson is indeed a great speechwriter; but his influence on the presidency was nothing short of astounding. He, not Bush, is responsible for many of the most memorable phrases from the formative years of the Bush presidency: Bush, ultimately, may own these phrases, but Gerson (and his team) is the brain inside the teleprompter. And what an interesting, lucid brain it is! While I found myself disagreeing with Gerson in the book's opening chapters, I also found myself mostly swayed by him by book's end. In fact, by the time I finished his book, I was thinking of changing careers, of finding a noble cause for which to fight. It is an inspiring book, and is a trenchant analysis of conservatism's heart. Gerson convinces me that that heart is getting better in most of the right ways.

Also, Gerson's back room view of the Bush presidency (Gerson was witness to a lot of really inside stuff) is revelatory. His description of President Bush is not one-whit idolatrous. He is critical in all the right areas. It's just that he manages not only to humanize the president, he manages to show a man who is strikingly heroic in many ways and will never be noted for it among the media or ruling classes. After all, Bush policies -- at least his foreign efforts -- are some of the most noble and boldest in decades. The War on Terror -- which is really the institution of democracy and liberty everywhere neither is known -- is the most obvious of Bush's efforts; but his generous help in addressing poverty, malaria, and AIDS in Africa largely goes unnoticed. Gerson shows not only why these smaller things were necessary, but how good they are for our world.

Lastly, I very much liked Frederick Buechner's tiny little volume, Speak What We Feel (And Not What We Ought To Say). Buechner examines the key work of four writers -- poet and priest Gerard Manley Hopkins, William Shakespeare, Mark Twain, G.K. Chesterton -- exploring what it means for these men to have written their greatest works "in blood." Buechner delves into the darkest hours of these men, their great intellectual and spiritual struggles with demons past and present, and how they, in effect, wrote themselves free of all that threatened to bind them. The Twain chapter was very touching to me, as was the chapter on Chesterton. Great stuff about some of my very favorite writers.

In closing, all these books have one thing in common. I will read them again.

(The other book I read, if you are wondering, was G. K. Chesterton's glorious The Man Who Was Thursday. I have read it many times before.)

Peace this day.

©Bill Gnade 2008/Contratimes. All Rights Reserved.