Since it's topical right now

Last year I read Campus Confidential: 100 Startling Things You Don't Know About Canadian Universities by Ken S. Coates and Bill Morrison (Lorimer, 2011). Whether you're a student (or a prospective student), a parent, a faculty member, an administrator, or simply an interested Canadian, this provocative book will get you thinking about the purpose, efficiency, value, and sustainability of university education in Canada.

I can't truthfully say that I liked this book. I fundamentally disagree with many of its basic positions and attitudes. Still, there are many passages that I believe, from my subjective experiences as both a recent graduate student and a faculty member, are spot on. This book should inspire conversation about what the real purpose of a university education should be — or could be. There's certainly value in that discussion, particularly right now in Alberta, as the minister of Advanced Education tries to reframe what a university education is and means.

My Five-Star Bookshelf: A Coda

I would never have guessed when I started this exercise that it would take me the better part of a year to work through my twenty-nine five-star texts. Interestingly, in the course of writing those book talks, I identified a few books that should likely be added to the list, but I haven't added them, nor have I discovered any other books that deserve my five-star rating. Here are a few of my close contenders (4.5 stars), though, just for the sake of interest:

Sherman Alexie, The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian

Tony Bennett et al., New Keywords: A Revised Vocabulary of Culture and Society

Joseph Boyden, Three Day Road

Lorna Crozier, The Book of Marvels: A Compendium of Everyday Things

JonArno Lawson, A Voweller's Bestiary

Martine Leavitt, My Book of Life by Angel

Toni Morrison, A Mercy

Bryan Talbot, One Bad Rat

Jo Walton, Among Others

I wish some of my favourite authors could write more books. I'd love a new Tom Robbins novel. I just checked and Jaclyn Moriarty has a new novel coming out this spring! And of course I have an unread John Irving sitting on my to-read pile upstairs. And an unread Atwood waiting for me to finish some major project or other — I bought it as a reward–incentive. And a couple of memoirs. And another few hundred books I mean to get to, sooner or later...

You will notice that several of the books on the 4.5-star list are for children or young adults. As I mentioned earlier, my professional interests — and perhaps my academic interests as well — are moving toward a deeper exploration and appreciation of YA texts.

When we finally build my longed-for library in the basement, I intend to recatalogue my books on LibraryThing. Perhaps there will be some shaking up of my five-star list at that time. In the meantime, I'm glad to have embarked on the writing exercise — despite that something intended to take a few weeks stretched on to months and months. Oh, poor players, we.

 

My Five-Star Bookshelf, Part Twenty-Seven

 
Ronald Wright, The Illustrated Short History of Progress

I missed my chance to hear Ronald Wright speak at the University of Alberta (in my own doctoral department!) in late 2012 and so regret that.

I received this book as a publisher's sampler. (What a joy it is to be an academic: free books!) This book, however, is one I should have read regardless. It's an important book, accessibly written and bearing a profound message: a society cannot advance past its natural carrying capacity, and our current global society is quickly encroaching on this critical boundary. This is highly effective environmental communication, entwined in history, cultural criticism, anthropology, and sociology.

This book, which was a Massey Lecture about a decade ago and subsequently a Canadian bestseller, is particularly enhanced by illustrations. (I must confess here that I also read an illustrated version of The Da Vinci Code, which I think made that book a much more compelling text — but nowhere near a five-star book.) I challenge you to read The Illustrated Short History of Progress and not feel moved to change the way you live. In small ways — and maybe in larger ways, too — I have, and thus this book is another that has changed my life.

And so endeth the list.

What not to do in the first week of April

So you have a doctorate and a pile of marking eight feet tall. You could be marking, or writing a paper, or reading an insightful book. Or you could do this.

"Bear"

(to the tune of "Hair" as performed by The Cowsills)

She asks me why

Why I'm a hairy guy

I'm hairy noon and night

Hey, I'm a fright

I'm hairy high and low

Don't ask me why

'Cos I don't know

It's just the way I'm bred,

Like Charles Darwin said,

Darling...

Give me a den with bears

Tall, beautiful bears

Biting, frightening,

Rending, mauling, tearing

Look at that one there: bear!

Shoulder height or taller: bear!

Here's the baby, there's the mama,

Look out for the daddy, daddy...

Bears! (bears bears bears bears bears bears oh)

Fear them, revere them

Just don't try feed them

They're bears.

They don't mind a stiff breeze

And they love to climb trees

A hole in a hill's a good lair

A coat full of fleas

A hive full of honey bees

Or roots and berries

There ain't no words

For the beauty, the splendor, the wonder

Of the...

Bears! (bears bears bears bears bears bears oh)

Fear them, revere them

Just don't try feed them

They're bears.

Their fur is long, straight, curly, fuzzy

Snaggy, shaggy, ratsy, matsy

Oily, greasy, fleecy, shining

Gleaming, steaming, flaxen, waxen

Brown or black or golden

Bears, they are so hairy

If you try to poke one you'll be

Mangled, wrangled, tangled

Like spaghetti

Oh say can you see

My claws?

If you can,

Then you're much too close.

O'er the mount—
O'er the mount—
The bear goes

over the mountain
where he sleeps for eight months

No, never has to diet

And he can sleep for eight months

Oh, give me a den with bears
Tall, beautiful bears

Biting, frightening,

Rending, mauling, tearing

Now won't you give a care for bears?

Black or Kodiak bears?

Here's the baby, there's the mama,

Look out for the daddy, daddy...

Bears! (bears bears bears bears bears bears oh)

Fear them, revere them

Just don't try feed them

They're bears! (bears bears bears bears bears bears oh)

Fear them, revere them

Just don't try feed them

They're bears!

Bears bears bears bears bears bears bears bears

Bears bears bears bears bears bears bears bears

Bears!