The first books of my massive pile that drew my attention were Barthes’ “Mythologies”, Bakewell’s “A Life of Montaigne”, and de Botton’s “The Consolations of Philosophy”. Today, I wanted to do an exploratory swim through some of the books to whet my appetite for what’s to come. By the end of the day, I won’t have finished reading these yet but wanted to capture my first thoughts and interactions with them.
First, the Mythologies title caught me as that was a topic I enjoyed reading about in K-12. It could have been because of the books my mom (ex. The Odyssey – from a children’s book collection) would read to me, or the stories I would gravitate towards on Greek and Roman myths. I was intrigued by these exotic characters and the etymology of words, like echo, narcissism, and tantalizing, in addition to myth stories from other cultures. From a first glance at the table of contents, the Mythologies approaches everyday items and ideas like ‘novels and children’, ‘toys’, ‘steak-frites’ and what the mythology might be behind them – what do they represent, how might they be interpreted, what narratives do they contain, which are novel ideas. I typically think of myths as something that existed in the past. This book sounds like it will challenge my preconceptions of mythology.
Next, I wanted to find a way into Montaigne’s scary looking tome of “The Complete Essays” by starting with Bakewell’s book. The title enticed me with its invitation to learn about this writer’s life and an attempt to answer one question (‘How to live?’) in twenty tries. The introduction caught my attention by reminding me of the French verb ‘essayer’ and that Montaigne describes his writing as tries. Bakewell suggests that each reader sees themselves in his writing. This led me to think about the podcast project I want to launch in 2018 with my Langara students. I predominantly work with international students, who have previously completed their post-secondary studies back home, and have come to Canada to try to build a different life for themselves and their families. Through this podcast project, I want them to be able to see themselves reflected back through the stories & interviews with alumni from the program and current employers/hiring managers; to learn from others’ struggles and successes, and lessons to be gleaned from those experiences. I have a feeling my exposure to Montaigne might influence the direction I might take with this project.
Lastly, I had first heard of De Botton from a Tim Ferriss podcast. Tim likes to collect thought-provoking questions and he mentioned this philosopher in one of his episodes and the “School of Life” he co-founded. While exploring a shop called Walrus on Cambie this past summer, I happened to stumble on a number of these question prompting card decks promoted on the show. As I can claim these as ‘teaching aids’ in my class, I bought these (‘What Should I Do With My Life’ and ‘100 Questions’), though haven’t yet figured out exactly how I’ll use them –
De Botton’s Consolations of Philosophy seems to be a response or entry to Boethius’s “The Consolation of Philosophy”, which is also part of our reading list this term. But that is as far as I’ve gotten in this first exploration.
That was my first ‘try’ at these books. More tomorrow!
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