Reading catch-up

I've been busy wrapping up my winter reading list.

How the Irish Saved Civilization started slowly. Very slowly. And the beginning had almost nothing to do with Ireland. I got the impression that the author didn't have quite enough material for a book and so was padding it with information that only tangentially applied to his thesis. But once he got to the Irish part, it was interesting. A lot of it was information I had read before but hadn't made its way into my long-term memory. For example, illuminated manuscripts really did come from Ireland. The illuminated manuscripts from continental monasteries are from monasteries founded by Irish monks. The monks sometimes wrote asides as they were transcribing the material, commenting on the material or how they felt at the moment. When Christian missionaries from Rome arrived in England, the church they established differed in some ways from the Christianity spread by Irish missionaries in Scotland and northern England. Things eventually came to a head and the Roman church won.

I really enjoyed The Last Week. It definitely gave me a deeper understanding of Holy Week. Like all of Marcus Borg's books, it reminded me that Jesus's message was centered on justice for people in this life and that if I want to follow him, I should be working to bring the kingdom of heaven here to earth.

Beginning Twelfth Night was a bit of a shock. It's been a very long time since I've read Shakespeare, and now that the King James Version is my secondary Bible translation, my Elizabethan English is more rusty than ever. Once I got back into the rhythm of the language, the play was a quick and enjoyable read, although not a good choice when I was tired. Of course, the plot is preposterous. A woman pretending to be a man. Boy/girl twins that look so much like they are mistaken for each other. And characters who switch from being passionately in love with one person to being passionately in love with another in the space of one very short scene. But hey, I watched Alias, so clearly preposterous plots don't phase me.

I picked up 21: Bringing Down the House because I work with some former MIT blackjack players and I was curious about the blackjack experience. The book is a quick and interesting read, and I look forward to seeing the movie this spring.