2024 Books I Read, and other stuff

Shakespeare once again dominated my reading schedule, and not just because I can read a play in an afternoon. For the record, this year’s plays were Macbeth, Merry Wives of Windsor, Comedy of Errors, and Much Ado About Nothing. There is also some Shake-related nonfiction in the 2024 list, a little on the academic side but worthwhile reading nonetheless.

Notably, this year’s list is shorter than in past years, though I did dip into some short story and poetry collections. I blame my fractured vision (cataracts) and attention span (Olympics, college reunion, comedy improv with Clay Aiken). Here’s my year, in roughly chronological order:

1. The Razor’s Edge, W. Somerset Maugham (fiction; re-read). Not the only first-person autobiographical tale on the list, but not by design. I’d read this many years ago and remembered liking it, but couldn’t remember why. Philosophy, I guess: A nonmaterialistic hero wants everyone to be happy. I like that.

2. The Brothers Karamazov, F. Dostoevsky (fiction; re-read). More psycho-philosophical fiction. Handy to have class notes in the margins of my college-days paperbacks so I could continue underlining themes and significant passages. I seem to have a fondness for the nonmaterialistic hero who wants everyone to be happy type. Note: this list only takes me through March. Slow reader with distractions.

3. Sense and Sensibility, Jane Austen (fiction; re-read). Hm. Curiously unambitious choices so far. I usually like to mix things up. Jane’s first story probably could have used some paring of extraneous characters, as I much prefer the Emma Thompson script. But it’s far more sophisticated and engaging than …

4. Mount Vernon Love Story, Mary Higgins Clark (fiction). George and Martha Washington as Hallmark Channel love interests, a bit too “she gazed into his soft gray eyes” for my taste. Blech. Still, it seemed sufficiently well-researched to merit becoming a nice giveaway to new donors to the Mount Vernon Ladies Association, a very worthy cause.

5. Modern Ethics in 77 Arguments, Peter Catapano and Simon Critchley, eds. (philosophy). Apparently a collection of New York Times columns, though I suspect the readership and the authorship were the same demographic. I skimmed through the topics that interested me—morality, religion, race, women, the future. There was something in the discussions about women that annoyed me when I read it back in April, but I’m too lazy to re-read that stuff. Much, much more interesting is …

6. An Unfinished Love Story, Doris Kearns Goodwin (history, memoir). Doris specializes in writing about the great men of American history, but here she truly makes a case for the historic greatness of her own husband, Dick Goodwin (Kennedy speechwriter best known to some of us as the guy who went after the Quiz Shows back in the day). And like Doris’s stories of other American heroes, she does not forget their ladies—in this case, herself. So you say you want a love story? This is it! Now I wish she’d write that George and Martha thingy.

7. Ocean Breathing, Barbara Mathias Riegel (fiction). I admit I bought the book because a dear friend’s mother wrote it. I like to be supportive, and the story takes place in our familiar neighborhood. The first-person narrator is dealing with severe anxiety, which she only begins to overcome when other people’s problems supersede her own. A less-than-gentle therapist (or reader) might say “Get over yourself.” She does.

8. Shakespeare’s Language, Frank Kermode (literary studies). Survey of how Shakespeare’s command of language (metaphors, motifs, and stuff like that) matured from play to play and advanced the English language along the way. Maybe a little academic, but like Shadowplay (a survey of the plays through the lens of religious and political conflict), an interesting way to review the plays and Shakespeare’s greatness.

9. The Code of the Woosters, P. G. Wodehouse (fiction; re-read). Speaking of a master of language! Not that Wodehouse advanced the English language itself, but he sure had fun with it.

10. Philippe Halsman: A Retrospective (photography). One of the great portraitists of the 20th century, showcasing some of the greatest personalities of the time. Yes, we like looking at celebrities. Halsman made them jump for him. Literally.

11. David Copperfield, Charles Dickens (fiction, though likely autobiographical). A first-person narrator reflects on his life, and it’s a ripping yarn. There are people! Things happen! It’s how I can get through an 800 page book gladly, whereas with some remembrances-type fiction I can’t get through four pages (I’m looking at you, Proust and Joyce).

12. Shakespeare’s Sisters, Ramie Targoff (literary history). Okay, it got a good review in The New Yorker and it had Shakespeare in the title, so I bought it. Targoff covers the work of four key women who wrote at the same time as William but were not in fact related to him. Well worth reading, but I’d quibble about the book’s title.

13. Headlong, Michael Frayn (fiction). Art history in a comic mystery! What a fun book.

14. The Bully Pulpit, Doris Kearns Goodwin (presidential history, biography). While Teddy Roosevelt made the cut for Doris’s top four presidential leaders (with Lincoln, FDR, and LBJ), the well-liked and judicious William Howard Taft had a lot going for him. Another one of my heroes who wants everyone to be happy? Despite their epic rift, Doris gives William and Teddy a happy enough ending to make me cry. (Also sobs-inducing, the Titanic death of Archie Butt, their mutual friend and security man.)

15. Circe, Madeline Miller (fiction). A “Wicked”-type retelling of familiar myths from the witch’s point of view. Richly rendered language thick with metaphors and similes, if you like that. I did.

16. A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens (ghost story). Rereading this every year might become a tradition for me, along with watching as many different versions as possible (from Magoo’s to Patton’s, er, George C. Scott’s). There is no perfect rendering of the story, however, other than Dickens’s. They all leave something necessary out or put something unnecessary in. And I think Scrooge was really more indifferent than angry or hostile. Scott’s rendering of the character wins on that point.

Confession: I broke my rule this year about finishing everything I started to read. As mentioned above, I couldn’t make it into Proust’s Swann’s Way, for its lack of characters and actions. This is also the reason I couldn’t make much headway into 2025 from the old Coates & Jarratt futurists shop. I spent a career making futurists’ writing accessible to nonfuturists. The book’s many scenarios of new technologies and future problems were devoid of any human beings doing anything. I just couldn’t take it.

The real 2025 looks promising, bookwise: I spy James by Percival Everett at the top of the pile!

Love, hosaa

Happy New Reading