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A Reader's Journal — Journeys into Understanding Volume 1
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A Reader's Treasury:
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'87 Reviews: Various Chapters


Discover Freedom on the Half Shell
ARJ vol 1, Table of Contents by Chapters
Chapter 1: Evolution of Consciousness
Chapter 2: Quantum Reality
Chapter 3: Psychotherapy
Chapter 4: Spiritual Science
Chapter 5: Reading for Enjoyment
Chapter 6: Writing

The Italian National Monument pictured at the top of this page reminds me that if one would understand Roman history, one must take a journey to Rome at some point. Likewise, if one would understand Carl Jung, Owen Barfield, C. S. Lewis, Milan Kundera, Rudolf Steiner or any of the authors in A Reader's Journal, Vol. 1, one must open their books and read them.

It is not always practical to acquire books of every author that one is interested in, so I offer these reviews to you, dear Reader, for the first time on the Internet. Through reading these reviews you will be able to accompany me on my journey into understanding — only know this: that your journey will be different than mine because it will be your unique journey into understanding.

Readers in countries around the world have acquired bound copies of ARJ 1. The reviews that followed the publication of ARJ 1 were posted immediately to the Internet and are still available there, and new reviews are added every month. In addition, reviews are being written and posted to A Reader's Treasury, which when completed will contain over 860 reviews of books that I have previously read some 15 to 30 years ago. This was a time before I began writing reviews of books as soon as I completed them as I do now.

To Keep Up-to-date on Latest ARJ and ART Reviews, Subscribe to our Montly Digest now CLICK HERE!. Not sure you want to subscribe without reading it first? No problem — we've accommodated you by placing the archived Digests on-line. Click Here to read the most recent Digest and access the Archived Digests.

A Reader's Journal — Journeys into Understanding Preface

IN MORTIMER ADLER’S How To Read A Book book I first encountered the concept of syntopical reading. It is the reading of one book on the same subject as another book you’ve already read. This concept opened doors to ways of thinking about books for me. I began to seek and acquire books based on their similarity to previous books I’d read. . . Click Here for rest of Preface.

Introduction

ONCE, MANY PARADIGM HOPS AGO, I wished to become a writer and did not know how to go about it. As I usually do when confounded, I found the answer at my elbow, in a book. This time it was Peter Elbow, and he became my writing teacher. He did so by instructing me, as I read his classic book, Writing Without Teachers. All the other courses had teachers to teach you how they write, but Peter taught me how to write by teaching me to begin, not by studying literature, not by taking grammar lessons, not by building my vocabulary, but by writing, purely and freely, on a blank piece of paper, to make that blank piece of paper my companion, my best friend, my friendie who accompanies me everywhere I go, and to whom I confide my inner-most secrets. . . Click Here for rest of Introduction.

Readers Comments

RE: YOUR REVIEW of Thucydides — Speeches of Pericles by H. G. Edinger: I do believe that history repeats itself, as you said, but the way you have taken ancient Greek history and have related to today is amazing. I can see it only when it is pointed out to me, as you have so masterfully done. I think it will make great reading in the Digest and will spark a lot of controversy with members of the Steiner98 list.
Renee Lattimore on November 5, 2002.

DAMN, YOU'RE A GOOD WRITER. Back when I first started reading "self-help" books, I came across the idea that praising someone for an individual accomplishment is much better than just flattering them. So I apologize for the flattery and want to instead mention that it's really incredible that you got yourself to sit down and write all those reviews.
Jon of Instead Laugh Website on August 20, 2002.

I WANT TO MENTION YOUR NEW STEINER REVIEW, "Anthroposophical Leading Thoughts." I'm in awe. I marvel at the genius that permits you to observe and comment as you do with such a wide variety of material, picking up on the thread that is tendered with a show of interest, perceptiveness and genuine participation that is extremely rare---and I might say a precious discovery! Why did I in ignorance and lack of exposure ever think that Cajuns were strictly backwoods and backward? If that were true, then a brilliant jewel has sparkled in their midst. Edward Reaugh Smith on April 24, 2002

Note that at the end of each Chapter, Reviews with Authors Names in Blue are Excavated 1987 and 1988 Reviews, i.e., those reviews that did not make it to Bound ARJ, Volume 1. They appear here for the first time. Note that after reading these Blue Reviews, you should click BACK on your Browser to return to where you came from.

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ARJ, Vol. 1, TABLE OF CONTENTS

~^~^~^ Evolution of Consciousness ^~^~^~

Author ( First Name Last Name) Full Title of Book Reviewed
James H. Austin Chase, Chance and Creativity
Gaston Bachelard The New Scientific Spirit
Owen Barfield History, Guilt, and Habit
Owen Barfield Owen Barfield on C. S. Lewis
Owen Barfield Saving the Appearances
Owen Barfield Romanticism Comes of Age
Owen Barfield Speaker's Meaning
Owen Barfield Unancestral Voice
Owen Barfield Worlds Apart
Frederic Bastiat The Law
Brian Bates The Way of the Actor
Gregory Bateson Mind and Nature
Gregory Bateson Steps To An Ecology of Mind
Gregory and Mary Catherine Bateson Angels Fear - Towards an Epistemology of the Sacred
Mary Catherine Bateson Peripheral Visions
Edmund Blair Bolles A Second Way of Knowing
Jerome Bruner Acts of Meaning
Jerome Bruner Actual Minds, Possible Worlds
Jerome Bruner In Search of Mind
Fritjof Capra Uncommon Wisdom
Gilbert Keith Chesterton The Innocence of Father Brown
R. G. Collingwood The Idea of History
R. G. Collingwood The Idea of Nature
R. G. Collingwood The Principles of Art
Rush W. Dozier Codes of Evolution
Bruce H. Dobkin Brain Matters
Benjamin Farrington The Philosophy of Francis Bacon
Reshad Feild Here to Heal
Michael Gazzaniga Mind Matters
James Gleick Chaos
Daniel Goleman Emotional Intelligence
Temple Grandin Emergence: Labeled Autistic
Temple Grandin Thinking in Pictures
F. Gonzalez-Crussi The Five Senses
Edward T. Hall An Anthropology of Everyday Life
Michael Heim The Metaphysics of Virtual Reality
Richard Heinberg Memories and Visions of Paradise
Doyle P. Henderson PANACEA! The Ultimate Alternative?
Doyle P. Henderson French translation (traduction française): PANACEA! L'Ultime Alternative?
Stephan A. Hoeller Freedom - Alchemy for a Voluntary Society
Patrick Hughes and George Brecht Vicious Circles and Infinity
Sergei Kahili King Urban Shaman
Winston L. King Zen and the Way of the Sword
Ellen J. Langer Mindfulness
Jung Young Lee Patterns of Inner Process
Stuart Kauffman At Home In The Universe
John C. Lilly, M.D. Lilly on Dolphins
S.E. Luria A Slot Machine, A Broken Test Tube
Dudley Lynch and Paul L. Kordis Strategy of the Dolphin
David Macaulay Motel of the Mysteries
Gary Brent Madison Understanding
Bobby Matherne Flowers of Shanidar
Humberto Maturana and Francisco Varela The Tree of Knowledge
Marlo Morgan Mutant Message Down Under
C. A. Meier et al A Testament to the Wilderness
Dan Millman The Way of the Peaceful Warrior
Thomas Nagel What Does It All Mean?
Jim Nollman Dolphin Dreamtime
Carol O'Biso First Light - A Magical Journey
John Passmore Serious Art
Edited by Karl Pribham et al On the Biology of Learning
Jane Roberts The Magical Approach
Ayn Rand Atlas Shrugged
Oliver Sacks An Anthropologist on Mars
Giorgio de Santillana and Hertha von Dechend Hamlet's Mill
Lynn Segal The Dream of Reality
Rupert Sheldrake The Presence of the Past
Luella Sibbald Footprints of God
Curtis G.Smith Ancestral Voices
Warren D. Thomas and Daniel Kaufman Dolphin Conferences
Rudolf Steiner The Course of My Life
Rudolf Steiner Deeper Secrets of Human History
Rudolf Steiner The Evolution of Consciousness
Rudolf Steiner The Philosophy of Freedom
Helmut Tributsch How Life Learned to Live
Frederick Turner Tempest, Flute, and Oz
Ludwig von Mises The Anti-Capitalistic Mentality
Ludwig von Mises Human Action
B. Alan Wallace Choosing Reality
James Boyd White Legal Imagination
Edgar Wind Art and Anarchy
Timothy Wyllie Dolphins Telepathy and Underwater Birthing
Yatri Unknown Man
James Carse Finite and Infinite Games
Mircea Eliade The Myth of the Eternal Return
Tom T. Hall The Songwriter's Handbook
James Boyd White When Words Lose Their Meaning


~^~^~^ Quantum Reality ^~^~^~

Author ( First Name Last Name) Full Title of Book Reviewed
Itzhak Bentov A Cosmic Book — On the Mechanics of Creation
Jeremy Bernstein The Life It Brings — One Physicist's Beginnings
Richard Feynmann QED - Quantum Electrodynamics
N. Katherine Hayles The Cosmic Web
Nick Herbert Quantum Reality
Michael Talbot The Holographic Universe
Victor Weisskopf The Joy of Insight
Fred Alan Wolf The Body Quantum
Danah Zohar The Quantum Self
Danah Zohar and Ian Marshall The Quantum Society
Gary Zukav The Seat of the Soul


~^~^~^ Psychotherapy ^~^~^~

Author ( First Name Last Name) Full Title of Book Reviewed
Jean Shinoda Bolen Gods in Everyman — A New Psychology of Men’s Lives & Loves
Robert Bosnak A Little Course in Dreams — A Basic Handbook of Jungian Dreamwork
Hilde Bruch Golden Cage — The Enigma of Anorexia Nervosa
The Troops for Truddi Chase When Rabbit Howls — The Ninety-two Personalities Who Share the Body of the Woman Known as Truddi Chase Tell their Astonishing Autobiography
Adam Crabtree Multiple Man — Explorations in Possession & Multiple Personality
Jay S. Efran, Michael D. and Robert J. Lukens Language, Structure, and Change — Frameworks of Meaning in Psychotherapy
Josef Goldbrunner Individuation — A Study of the Depth Psychology of Carl Gustav Jung
David Gordon And Maribeth Meyers-Anderson Phoenix — Therapeutic Patterns of Milton H. Erickson
Aneila Jaffe From the Life and Work of C. G. Jung — Jung’s Last Years and Other Essays
Dora Kalff Sand Play — A Psychotherapeutic Approach to the Psyche
Richard S. Lazarus and Bernice N. Lazarus Passion & Reason — Making Sense of Our Emotions
Robert Mayer Through Divided Minds — Probing the Mysteries of Multiple Personalities – A Doctor’s Story
C. A. Meier Consciousness, Vol III of Psychology of C. G. Jung
Barbara O'Brien Operators and Things — The Inner Life of a Schizophrenic
Peter Schellenbaum How To Say No To The One You Love
Miguel Serrano Jung & Hesse - A Record of Two Friendships
Daryl Sharp Dear Gladys — The Survival Papers Book 2
Daryl Sharp Personality Types — Jung’s Model of Typology
Mara Sidoli The Unfolding Self — Separation and Individuation
Marie L Von Franz and James Hillman Jung's Typology — Lectures by Franz: The Inferior Function; Hillman: The Feeling Function
Paul Watzlawick How Real is Real? --Communication, Disinformation, Confusion
Paul Watzlawick Muenchhausen's Pigtail — Psychotherapy & “Reality”
Paul Watzlawick The Situation Is Hopeless, But Not Serious
Paul Watzlawick Ultrasolutions — How to Fail Most Successfully
Gerhard Wehr Jung: A Biography
George Weinberg and Dianne Rowe The Projection Principle — The Breakthrough Technique for Getting Others to See You as You Really Are
Estelle Weinrib Images of Self — The Sandplay Therapy Process
Stephen R. Lankton Elements of an Ericksonian Approach
Paul Bohannen All the Happy Families




~^~^~^ Spiritual Science ^~^~^~

Author ( First Name Last Name) Full Title of Book Reviewed
Tom Brown The Vision
Joseph Campbell Myths to Live By
Carlos Castaneda The Art of Dreaming
Achaan Chah A Still Forest Pool
Noel Cobb Prospero's Island
Eugen Herrigel Zen in the Art of ArcheryZen
Gustie L. Herrigel Zen in the Art of Flower Arranging
Eugen Herrigel The Method of Zen
Herman Hesse Siddhartha
Jean Houston Godseed
Alice O. Howell The Dove in the Stone
Alice O. Howell Jungian Symbolism in Astrology
Alice O. Howell Jungian Synchronicity in Astrological Signs and Ages
Alice O. Howell The Web in the Sea
Carl Gustav Jung Alchemical Studies
Carl Gustav Jung The Archetypes in the Collective Unconsciousness
Carl Gustav Jung Modern Man in Search of a Soul
Carl Gustav Jung On the Nature of the Psyche
Carl Gustav Jung Psychological Types
Carl Gustav Jung Two Essays on Analytical Psychology
C. G. JunG The Undiscovered Self
Carl Gustav Jung and C. Kerenyi Essays on a Science of Mythology
Hazrat Inayat Khan The Art of Being Human Volume 8 of the Sufi Message
Stephan A. Hoeller Jung and the Lost Gospels
Gertrud Mueller Nelson To Dance With God
Robert Powell The Great Awakening
James Redfield The Celestine Prophecy
James Redfield The Tenth Insight
Ronald Siegel Fire In The Brain
Brad Steiger Kahuna Magic
Rudolf Steiner From Buddha to Christ
Rudolf Steiner Ancient Myths
Rudolf Steiner Anthroposophy and Christianity
Rudolf Steiner Ancient Myths
Rudolf Steiner At the Gates of Spiritual Science
Rudolf Steiner An Outline of Occult Science
Rudolf Steiner Occult Signs and Symbols
Rudolf Steiner Egyptian Myths and Mysteries
Rudolf Steiner The Inner Nature of Music and the Experience of Tone
Rudolf Steiner Philosophy, Cosmology, and Religion
Rudolf Steiner The Stages of Higher Knowledge
Rudolf Steiner Supersensible Knowledge
Rudolf Steiner Ten Commandments
Rudolf Steiner Sermon on the Mount
Rudolf Steiner The Arts and their Mission
Rudolf Steiner Theosophy
Rudolf Steiner The Soul's Awakening
Rudolf Steiner Aspects of Human Evolution
Rudolf Steiner The Cycle of the Year
Rudolf Steiner Inner Impulses of Evolution
Rudolf Steiner Knowledge of Higher Worlds and Its Attainment
Rudolf Steiner The Occult Significance of the Bhagavad Gita
Rudolf Steiner Reading the Pictures of the Apocalypse
Rudolf Steiner Reincarnation and Karma
Rudolf Steiner Rosicrucian Esotericism
Rudolf Steiner The Karma of Materialism
Rudolf Steiner The World of the Senses and The World of the Spirit
Richard Stern The Invention of The Real
Carl G. Vaught The Sermon on the Mount
Ken Carey The Star Seed Transmissions
Mircea Eliade No Souvenirs
Mircea Eliade The Forge and the Crucible
Brian Swimme The Universe is a Green Dragon


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~^~^~^ Reading for Enjoyment ^~^~^~

Author ( First Name Last Name) Full Title of Book Reviewed
Douglas Adams Mostly Harmless
Harvey Arden Dreamkeepers — A Spirit-Journey into Aboriginal Australia
Jean Auel Plains of Passage
Jane Austen Pride and Prejudice
Richard Bach Running From Safety
Nicholson Baker Room Temperature
Barbara Branden The Passion of Ayn Rand
Samuel Butler The Way of All Flesh
Joseph Conrad Lord Jim
Joseph Conrad Heart of Darkness
Photographs by Philip Gould Les Cadiens d'Asteur (Cajuns of Today)
Joseph Conrad A Personal Record
Ian Dallas The Book of Strangers
Robyn Davidson Tracks - The exhilarating tale of a willful woman’s solo trek across 1,700 miles of Australian outback.
Philip J. Davis Thomas Gray Philosopher Cat
Philip J. Davis The Thread
Florindo Donner The Witch's Dream
Lawrence Durrell Caesar's Vast Ghost, Aspects of Provence
Umberto Eco Travels in Hyperreality, Essays
Umberto Eco Foucault's Pendulum, A Novel by the Author of The Name of the Rose
Michael Fedo The Man From Lake Wobegon
Robert Fulghum It Was On Fire When I Lay Down On It
Robert Fulghum All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten
Richard Feynman What Do You Care What Other People Think?
Lawrence C. Gibbs Simple Living and High Thinking
Jean Giono The Man Who Planted Trees
James Gleick Genius — The Life and Science of Richard Feynman
Kenneth Good Into the Heart
Robert Heinlein Tramp Royale
Eric Hoffer Truth Imagined
Kasumi The Way of the Urban Samurai as revealed by Kasumi
Nikos Katzanzakis The Last Temptation of Christ
Daniel Keyes Flowers for Algernon
John Durant and Jonathan Miller (Eds) Laughing Matters - A Serious Look at Humour
Peter Lourie Sweat of the Sun, Tears of the Moon
Peter Mayle A Year in Provence
Roy Meyers Dolphin Boy
Geoffrey Moorhouse The Fearful Void
Farley Mowat Woman in the Mist
John F. Nau The German People of New Orleans 1850-1900
Gloria Norris Looking For Bobby
Boris Pasternak Doctor Zhivago
James Penner Goliath - The Life of Robert Schuller
John Cowper Powys A Glastonbury Romance
Mary Summer Rain Spirit Song
Robert Ramsay and Randall Toye The Goodbye Book
Rainer Maria Rilke Letters to a Young Poet
William Shatner (with Chris Kreski) Star Trek Memories
William Shatner (with Chris Kreski) Star Trek Movie Memories
William Irwin Thompson Islands Out of Time
Leo Tolstoy War & Peace
Sheldon Vanauken A Severe Mercy
Ivan Turgenev Fathers and Sons
Joana McIntyre Varawa Changes in Latitude
George Lee Walker Chronicles of Doodah
Robert James Waller The Bridges of Madison County
Colin Wilson C. G. Jung - Lord of the Underworld
Colin Wilson The Personality Surgeon
Robert Anton Wilson Cosmic Trigger II
Robert Anton Wilson Prometheus Rising
Tad Wise Tesla - A Novel
Jane Austen Emma
Roy Blount, Jr. One Fell Soup
Frances Hodgson Burnett The Secret Garden
Pat Conroy The Prince of Tides
Natsume Soseki The Three-Cornered World
Mary Stewart The Crystal Cave
Whitley Scrieber Communion — A True Story


~^~^~^ Writing ^~^~^~

Author ( First Name Last Name) Full Title of Book Reviewed
Maria Nemcová Banerjee Terminal Paradox
Owen Barfield Poetic Diction
Owen Barfield Rediscovery of Meaning
Ray Bradbury Zen in the Art of Writing
Dorothea Brande Becoming A Writer
Avis Burnett Gertrude Stein
Sidney Cox Indirections for Those Who Want to Write
Guy Davenport A Balthus Notebook
Guy Davenport Every Force Evolves a Form
Humberto Eco Six Walks in Fictional Woods
Leon Edel Stuff of Sleep and Dreams
Robert Eisner The Road to Daulis
Ralph Waldo Emerson Representative Men
Joseph Epstein The Middle of My Tether
Noah Jonathan Jacobs The Toils of Language
Christi Killien and Sheila Binder Writing in a Convertible With the Top Down
Larry L. King None But A Blockhead - On Being A Writer
Milan Kundera Testaments Betrayed
Milan Kundera The Art of the Novel
Milan Kundera The Book of Laughter and Forgetting
Milan Kundera The Unbearable Lightness of Being
C. S. Lewis Studies in Words
James A. Michener The Novel
Gary Provost Beyond Style — Mastering the Finer Points of Writing
Brenda Ueland If You Want To Write — A Book About Art, Independence and Spirit
Julia Cameron with Mark Bryan The Artist's Way — A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity
G. A. Wells The Origin of Language — Aspects of the Discussion From Condillac to Wundt
Ellen Winner The Point of Words — Children's U nderstanding of Metaphor and Irony
Eudora Welty One Writer's Beginnings




National Monument Figure, Rome, Copyright 2000 by Bobby Matherne National Monument Figure, Rome, Copyright 2000 by Bobby Matherne

These books are all about going on. All the way. To our common destination. To which none of us wants to go ignorant and alone. Hence, into the dark, we write. ---Nancy Mairs in Voice Lessons


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