1. Read Widely; Read a Lot

I’m back after a rather unpleasant dance with the devil—COVID. “It’s not if you’ll get COVID but when,” the experts say, and evidently, I had a date with the disease, which was a rather mild date as it turns out and one I’d rather not endure again.

During my time in quarantine, I took the advice of Dr. Ruth J. Simmons to heart: “I’m much less convinced than many others that there is a prescriptive list of books that you must read. I’m more convinced that it is the reading widely that matters more than anything else.” So, I holed up with three books (2 non-fiction, 1 fiction) and read. And read. And read. I finished two of those books, and I should finish the third—100 Years of Solitude—this week.

Each of the books spoke something different to me, helped me refine some thoughts. For instance, The Gospel in Gerard Manley Hopkins (Ellsberg) reminded me that the writing life is often solitary and without much payoff, but the work is reward enough. On Living Well (Peterson) showed me that great writing can be simple. 100 Years of Solitude (Marquez) served as a reminder that wisdom comes by solitude and solitude comes by age and age comes for all of us.

Are you reading widely? If you aren’t, consider a few of my January selections.

(All links are affiliate links, meaning a portion of any book you purchase will help fuel my reading habit.)

2. The Most Amazing Video for Book Lovers

This might be my favorite mini-documentary on YouTube, and it’s the video containing the above quote by Simmons. Enjoy.