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3.38 AVERAGE
3.38 AVERAGE
When I read Tim Fenriss's 'Tools of Titans,' I thought, "These are wonderful vignettes about and interviews with the kind of people Tim Fenriss thinks merit emulation. But where are the people I think merit emulation? Where are the pol-mil professionals? The educators? The writers and thinkers and artists?"
Well, here they are, in the 'The Road to Character.' With this volume, columnist David Brooks explores the lives of figures from literary, political, and philosophical history. In tracing their "roads to character," he searches for commonalities and lessons that we can apply in our own lives. This is a thoughtful and sensitive book, clearly a work of great passion and love. It fascinated me, and I recommend it to all adults.
Well, here they are, in the 'The Road to Character.' With this volume, columnist David Brooks explores the lives of figures from literary, political, and philosophical history. In tracing their "roads to character," he searches for commonalities and lessons that we can apply in our own lives. This is a thoughtful and sensitive book, clearly a work of great passion and love. It fascinated me, and I recommend it to all adults.
Not gaining from this book what i expected. It is just stories about peoples lives.
I enjoyed learning more about some of these great people. I felt like the author was spinning his own web to prove his points. I often felt the people were the opposite of the Character trying to be presented. The whole book seemed rather unclear.
I wanted to like this book so much more than I did. I couldn’t even convince myself to finish reading it. I deeply appreciate his concept of eulogy virtues vs resume virtues, but it turns out the whole book is basically a biography in five parts of different people in history who he believed showed real character. It felt hard to relate to, insofar as his main argument centered loosely around the idea that we’ve morally backslid because people aren’t turning to religion for moral compasses. The examples of people with character were basically people forced to persevere in the face of trauma. None of the stories I read showed someone distinctly choosing between a resume virtue and eulogy virtue. I expected the book to give encouragement for people to find their own core values and follow that as a compass, but it didn’t bring that energy at all. You’re honestly better off skipping the book unless you’re a big history buff. But even then, I question the recommendation.
informative
slow-paced
A slog, some interesting biographical essays, but ultimately quite a preachy tone throughout
The intro and final chapter to this book are powerfully insightful. The middle chapters are well-written and at times fascinating, however, they can stretch on. The description made in the introduction of the book doesn't actually seem to apply to many of the people described; however, the conclusion ties in more with the biographical profiles. Unless you are really into biography, I'd read the intro 2-3 of the middle chapters, and then the final chapter. You'll get just as much out of it.
Updated review: It's been a year since I read this book, and I need to upgrade it from 3 stars to 4. Why? Because there was a lesson that came out of all the stories presented in the book, and that lessons has stayed with me. Character is having something you believe in while doing the work required to support that belief, whatever that work is.
I am currently at home with my young kids and am keeping open to what my next step will be. I see this and that and wonder what work is out there that I would love to do. This book has simplified that question into, "what do I believe in?" and "what can I do to support that belief?" There is no perfect work out there. There will always be tasks and politics and ugly stuff I'll have to deal with no matter what I choose to do next. But having a solid mission that carries me through all the good and bad is what is important.
****
I picked up this book because I enjoy listening to David Brooks' commentary on NPR. He is a conservative commentator worth listening to. I usually fall under the liberal umbrella of thinking, so I appreciate rational and well thought out arguments that make me think. This book is not political, but it sounded interesting.
This book was just okay. It introduced a lot of different people from history, and I appreciated getting a quick glimpse into several different lives. What I didn't enjoy was that I often felt the descriptions of each person were contradictory. "He was a good student... he hated school and fought against the system. She was a faithful daughter... she defied her mother every chance she got." These aren't actually quotes from the book, but this is what I felt the descriptions often sounded like.
The descriptions aside, I did get a good look into the lives of people I was unfamiliar with. I liked how the book ended with a summary comparing all the different qualities of these people to a sort of blanket personality of people living today. I did not find anything super inspiring in this book, but I will bet that I will think about these examples from time to time as I face future moral dilemmas of my own.
I am currently at home with my young kids and am keeping open to what my next step will be. I see this and that and wonder what work is out there that I would love to do. This book has simplified that question into, "what do I believe in?" and "what can I do to support that belief?" There is no perfect work out there. There will always be tasks and politics and ugly stuff I'll have to deal with no matter what I choose to do next. But having a solid mission that carries me through all the good and bad is what is important.
****
I picked up this book because I enjoy listening to David Brooks' commentary on NPR. He is a conservative commentator worth listening to. I usually fall under the liberal umbrella of thinking, so I appreciate rational and well thought out arguments that make me think. This book is not political, but it sounded interesting.
This book was just okay. It introduced a lot of different people from history, and I appreciated getting a quick glimpse into several different lives. What I didn't enjoy was that I often felt the descriptions of each person were contradictory. "He was a good student... he hated school and fought against the system. She was a faithful daughter... she defied her mother every chance she got." These aren't actually quotes from the book, but this is what I felt the descriptions often sounded like.
The descriptions aside, I did get a good look into the lives of people I was unfamiliar with. I liked how the book ended with a summary comparing all the different qualities of these people to a sort of blanket personality of people living today. I did not find anything super inspiring in this book, but I will bet that I will think about these examples from time to time as I face future moral dilemmas of my own.
This was an interesting book. It re-introduced the idea of building character through the "crooked timber" method. Essentially, this involves recognizing that we are each flawed in our own ways and that we need to find ways to overcome our own weaknesses. The author presents this idea through the use of a number of biographical vignettes of people who could be seen as role models and examples of character builders in this style. I found the chapter on Augustine to be particularly interesting.