Reading list for March 2005

Just sneaking under the wire (well it would have done, had Blogger not bombarded me with EOF error messages), this month's reading list. A mixed bag indeed, with much to recommend.

Alfred Döblin ranks very highly in German literature of the early 20C, much admired but seldom read; he will be known to some of you as the author of Berlin Alexanderplatz, which has been filmed several times including a TV version by the BBC in the 80's. Wallenstein is allegedly the story of the financier, general and power-behind-the-throne of that name, one of the actors of the Thirty Years' War, but I'm already 60 pages in and he hasn't yet been mentioned.

Leopold von Ranke is related in some way to the British war poet Robert Graves, who appears in German bookshops as "Robert von Ranke Graves". The book presents itself as a history of the development of civilization in the Middle East, from ancient Egypt to the death of Agathokles on the eve of the Roman republic. It's hard to tell what von Ranke's purpose is, at present (we're up to the sack of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar) he seems to be establishing the historical truth of the Old Testament. The book is (so far) a partisan and generally approving history of the people of Israel. It was published in 1938. Von Ranke probably had a very "interesting" time in the years immediately thereafter.

Currently reading
Denkanstöße 2005, a local publisher's annual sampler, from Richard Feynman to Michael Moore via Gidon Kremer.
Alfred Döblin, Wallenstein in German
Leopold von Ranke, Geschichte des Altertums in German

Previously read
Annie van Gemert, Een zomer aan zee in Dutch (photography)
Fred Hoyle, On Stonehenge
Hanspeter Rings, Einen Erdwurf weit: Aphorismen in German
Arnold Robbins, vi Editor Pocket Reference
David Taylor and Brian Jepson, Learning Unix for Mac OS X Panther
Neale Donald Walsch, Conversations with God: an uncommon dialogue described in a comment

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