What Should a First-Time Visitor to America Read?

National Review ^ | April 7 2018 | Daniel Gerelnter

[iowamark]

A friend recently posed this question: “If you had to recommend one book for a first-time visitor to the U.S. to read, to understand our country, what would it be and why?”...

If the goal is an education, we could recommend Samuel Eliot Morison and Henry Steele Commager’s Growth of the American Republic, a two-volume history that used to be required reading...

Huckleberry Finn may be the greatest American novel... But there is no single novel, no matter how great, that can do the job alone.

Consider instead the great American essayists who invented a new style of writing in the 1920s and founded The New Yorker. E. B. White’s One Man’s Meat is the finest such essay collection... Joseph Mitchell’s Up in the Old Hotel is nearly as great...

Teddy Roosevelt’s short book The Strenuous Life, which opens with his 1899 speech by that name, is an explanation of America’s view of itself — a view that greatly shaped the 20th century. It was the peculiar marriage of power and prosperity together with a sense of moral urgency. Roosevelt demands an active life, a life of struggling for personal and national virtue. He commends a triad of strength in body, intellect, and character — of which character is the most important. America must meet its moral obligations vigorously, he tells us: “It is hard to fail, but it is worse never to have tried to succeed.”...

The origin of that moral urgency was America’s most important spiritual crisis. It is best expressed in a single speech, rich in Biblical imagery and contemporary prophecy: Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address, which is the greatest of all American writing. It is a tone-poem or photograph of the American soul. A complete understanding, in just 697 words.

[Blue Collar Christian]

“I think this country is in a war of what we should be as we go forward.”

No doubt. It is almost unrecognizable even from just 50 years ago (except maybe Philly, I was there in 1971 and it was rough then). The founders would certainly not recognize this place.

[Auntie Mame]

Agree.

[Be Free]

1. 1984
2. Farenheit 451
3. Atlas Shrugged
4. The Fountainhead

[Fiji Hill]

• The American Cause by Russell Kirk (Chicago: Regnery, 1957)

• The Discovery of Freedom by Rose Wilder Lane (New York, Day, 1943)

• The Politically Incorrect Guide to American History by Thomas E. Woods (Washington, DC: Regnery, 2004)--Any of the PIG books is worth reading.

• Witness--Whittaker Chambers (New York: Harper, 1952)

[Fiji Hill]

I have known of Europeans visiting New York who thought they would take two days and make a side trip to see Texas. They really cannot comprehend the size.

I also read an account of an Englishman staying in Chicago who thought he would take a few days off for a quick road trip to Los Angeles.

[foreverfree]

Bump

[publius911]

Bookmark

[DiogenesLamp]

The Southern Democrats in 1860, just like in 2000 and again in 2016, refused to accept the results of the election. No more, no less.

I've learned a lot about this subject in the last three years, and what we think happened isn't exactly correct.

The Southerners were being taxed at a rate 12 times that of the Northerners, (per capita) but because the Northerners had the higher population, they always outvoted the Southerners.

So what could the Southerners have done to get out from under that taxation?

Democracy: "Two wolves and a sheep deciding on dinner."

[Rastus]

If so, her country needs to send more.

[Billthedrill]

A History Of The American People by Paul Johnson. A Brit tells it like it is.

[Rembrandt]

The first thing they should read is the exit date on their visa! Then, comply!

[ProtectOurFreedom]

Excellent suggestions on this thread. I’d suggest he read “Men to Match My Mountains: The Monumental Saga of the Winning of America’s Far West”
by Irving Stone published in 1956, back when all Americans (even Democrats) still believed in America. This book really reveals the character of the men and women who conquered the west.

[SoCal Pubbie]

BS

[Artie]

I hate to come across as ... for an alternative view of the American condition, I would give them a copy of “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas” Hunter S. Thompson. I also agree with Disambiguator on P.J. O’Rourke. I think “Parliament of Whores” sets the tone.

[Joe Boucher]

Steinbeck’s Travels With Charlie.

[Hot Tabasco]

What Should a First-Time Visitor to America Read?

Depending on how long they have been traveling, I would say a restroom sign.......

[Lee'sGhost]

Yeah, they were really dumb to think that they couldn’t quit a union they joined freely. Forcing people at gunpoint to remain in a club is NOT freedom and bears no similarity to the elections in 2000 and 2016 whatsoever.

[T-Bone Texan]

‘Don’t Make the Black Kids Angry’ by Colin Flaherty

“The Talk, Non Black Version”, by Derbyshire:

http://takimag.com/article/the_talk_nonblack_version_john_derbyshire/print#axzz5CBVKKtTt

These could save your life.

[DiogenesLamp]

BS

Your response is a little short on facts. I can show my numbers to prove the South was being taxed at 12 times the rate of the North, can you show me numbers that prove it wasn't?

[SoCal Pubbie]

More like insane to start a war they could not win, especially since they did not exhaust political means to achieve their ends.