Month: August 2023 (Page 2 of 2)

Here is a selection of titles recently added to the collection .

 The book of negroes /Lawrence Hill.   Hill is a master at transforming the neglected corners of history into brilliant imaginings, as engaging and revealing as only the best historical fiction can be. A sweeping story that transports the reader from a tribal African village to a plantation in the southern United States, from the teeming Halifax docks to the manor houses of London, The Book of Negroes introduces one of the strongest female characters in recent Canadian fiction, one who cuts a swath through a world hostile to her colour and her sex.

 The Chapleau Game Preserve: history, murder, and other tales /William E. McLeod. A history of the fur trade in Northeastern Ontario in the first half of the 20th century. It moves on to accounts of six murders and a disappearance in the Chapleau area. The author recounts a number of anecdotes about his family connection with Grey Owl, a fur bootlegging trial, the forest fires of 1948, the opening of Highway 129 in 1949 and the Budd Car excursion between Sudbury and White River.

 The Christian commitment; essays in pastoral theology. / Karl Rahner. Translated by Cecily Hastings.

 The Christian life in the Middle Ages and other essays /by Sir Maurice Powicke.The essays cover a variety of topics including church and state, the Crusades, monasticism, and the spiritual life. The essays are written with clarity and insight and are ideal for students of medieval history

 The coming revolution in church economics: why tithes and offerings are no longer enough, and what you can do about it /Mark DeYmaz with Harry Li. For churches to not only survive but thrive in the future, leaders must learn to leverage assets, bless the community, empower entrepreneurs, and create multiple streams of income to effectively fund mission. You’ll learn why you should and how to do so in The Coming Revolution in Church Economics.

 The divine comedy /Dante Alighieri ; translated by Allen Mandelbaum ; with an introduction by Eugenio Montale ; and notes by Peter Armour. The Divine Comedy begins in a shadowed forest on Good Friday in the year 1300. It proceeds on a journey that, in its intense recreation of the depths and the heights of human experience, has become the key with which Western civilization has sought to unlock the mystery of its own identity. Mandelbaum’s astonishingly Dantean translation, which captures so much of the life of the original, renders whole for us the masterpiece that genius whom our greatest poets have recognized as a central model for all poets. This Everyman’s edition — containing in one volume all three cantos, ‘Inferno, ‘ ‘Purgatorio, ‘ and ‘Paradiso’ — includes an introduction by Nobel Prize-winning poet Eugenio Montale, a chronology, notes, and a bibliography. Also included are forty-two drawings selected from Botticelli’s marvelous late-fifteenth century series of illustrations.

 The heart of a boy: celebrating the strength and spirit of boyhood /Kate T. Parker. Against the backdrop of a growing national conversation about how to raise sons to become good people, Parker is leading the way by turning her lens on boys. She shows the true heart of a boy in 200 compelling photographs.

 The mapmaker’s eye: David Thompson on the Columbia Plateau /Jack Nisbet. Nisbet utilizes fresh research to convey how Thompson experienced the full sweep of human and natural history etched across the Columbia drainage. He places Thompson’s movements within the larger contexts of the European Enlightenment, the British fur trade economy, and American expansion as represented by the Lewis and Clark Expedition. Nisbet courses through journal notebooks to assemble and comment on the explorer’s bird and mammal lists, his surprisingly detailed Salish vocabulary, the barrel organ music he and his crew listened to, and the woodworking techniques they used to keep themselves under shelter or on the move. Visual elements bring Thompson’s written daybooks to life. Watercolor landscapes and tribal portraits drawn by the first artists to travel along his trade routes illuminate what the explorer actually saw. Tribal and fur trade artifacts reveal intimate details of two cultures at the moment of contact. The Mapmaker’s Eye also depicts the surveying instruments that Thompson utilized, and displays the series of remarkable maps that grew out of his patient, persistent years of work. In addition, Nisbet taps into oral memories kept by the Kootenai and Salish bands who guided the agent and his party along their way.

 The origins of the liturgical year /Thomas J. Talley. Talley draws on all the resources of historical scholarship to examine and unravel the complications brought to liturgical time by the blending of local traditions. His findings illustrate for the reader that every festival the Church celebrates – every Sunday – is centered primarily and finally in the Eucharist, which from the beginning and always proclaims the Lord’s death until he comes.

 The Oxford handbook of interdisciplinarity /editor in chief, Robert Frodeman ; associate editors, Julie Thompson Klein and Roberto C.S. Pacheco. This title provides a synoptic overview of the current state of interdisciplinary research, education, administration and management, and problem solving – knowledge that spans the disciplines and interdisciplinary fields and crosses the space between the academic community and society at large.

 The philosophy of the good life, being the Gifford lectures delivered in the University of St. Andrews, 1929-30. /   Charles Gore In The Philosophy of the Good Life, Gore examines the concept of the good life as it is entertained by the famous moral leaders of humankind—Zarathustra, the Buddha, Confucius, Muhammad, Socrates, Plato and the Stoics, the Jewish prophets and, finally, Jesus Christ.

 The Septuagint with Apocrypha: Greek and English /Sir Lancelot C.L. Brenton. This edition of the Septuagint, including Apocrypha, gives the complete Greek text along with a parallel English translation. The name derives from the tradition that it was made by seventy Jewish scholars at Alexandria, Egypt during the reign of Ptolemy Philadelphus. The Apocryphal writings, although rejected by Protestants as non-canonical, provide important background material for a better understanding of the New Testament.

 The spiritual history of the Dead Sea sect /David Flusser ; [English translation by Carol Glucker]. Based on a series of radio lectures, the book retains much of its original conversational tone and structure, but has been expanded to present a more detailed overview. Flusser opens with a general introduction to the Essenes and their origins, then describes their relationship to the Pharisees and Sadducees, the organization of the sect and aspects of its daily life. Only after this groundwork is laid are the various doctrines, beliefs and ideologies explored. He draws from a broad reservoir of ancient texts and recent scholarship, much of it his own, as he surveys the sect’s beliefs of predestination, the “true Israel,” the conflict between light and darkness, spirit and flesh, the Messiah and the Apocalypse.

 The works of Gerard Manley Hopkins: with an introduction and bibliography. Selected poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins.

Theology of the Lutheran confessions /by Edmund Schlink ; translated by Paul F. Koehneke and Herbert J. A. Bouman. Schlink points the reader to Scripture as the basis of the Lutheran Confessions. They are neither “just” historical documents nor merely expressions of a philosophy. They remain the church’s summary exposition of Scripture, upon which members must take a stand. This volume helps the informed reader of Scripture and the Confessions take that stand.

Oppenheimer, the movie, is this summer’s blockbuster  ( that and Barbie.)

A selection of print books on Robert Oppenheimer is on display and ready to borrow and explore the issues. As well our online holding list over 140 eBooks on Robert Oppenheimer “the father of the atomic bomb,”   The Manhattan Project that created and tested the first atomic bomb  as well as related issues.

(For the record,  there are some 640 ebooks on Barbie.)

 Conscience, science and security : the case of Dr. J. Robert Oppenheimer / edited by Cushing Strout. To some, the Oppenheimer security hearing was an ugly manifestation of fear, hysteria, and anti-itellectualism; to others, a sober exercise in responsible statesmanship. The material presented here is designed to enable the reader to understand and evaluate the proceedings in this case and includes testimony drawn from official documents.

 In the matter of J. Robert Oppenheimer : a play freely adapted on the basis of the documents / by Heinar Kipphardt ; translated by Ruth Speirs. Kipphardt uses the facts taken from the published transcript to present some fundamental issues which face the world today–the conflict between the responsibility of the individual to his country and to humanity as a whole, the right of the patriot to express views at odds with those of his government without his loyalty being called into question. Kipphardt used thousands of pages  from primary sources- mainly the proceedings published by the US AEC. But he shortened the long proceedings for the stage in a way that the truth would not be distorted.

 In the shadow of the bomb : Bethe, Oppenheimer, and the moral responsibility of the scientist / S.S.Schweber. In the Shadow of the Bomb narrates how two charismatic, exceptionally talented physicists–J. Robert Oppenheimer and Hans A. Bethe–came to terms with the nuclear weapons they helped to create. When the Cold War followed, they were confronted with political demands for their loyalty and McCarthyism’s threats to academic freedom. By examining how Bethe and Oppenheimer–two men with similar backgrounds but divergent aspirations and characters–struggled with these moral dilemmas, Schweber tells the story of modern physics, the development of atomic weapons, and the Cold War. Schweber draws on his vast knowledge of science and its history–in addition to his unique access to the personalities involved–to tell a tale of two men that will enthrall readers interested in science, history, and the lives and minds of great thinkers.

 Lawrence and Oppenheimer / Davis, Nuel Pharr The fateful story of Ernest Lawrence and Robert Oppenheimer, the two giants of twentieth-century American physics whose association began in productive harmony, climaxed in world shattering achievement, and ended in rancor that split the nation’s scientific community and swayed the entire course of United States atomic policy.

 Leading minds : an anatomy of leadership / Howard Gardner ; in collaboration with Emma Laskin.  Gardner and Laskin take a novel approach to the study of leadership, exploring it from a cognitive perspective to glean powerful lessons for decision makers of all sorts. They show how effective leaders both create new stories and tap into the power of existing narratives. Their view of Oppenheimer: “… reserved and contained, could not slap backs or wade into audiences or participate convincingly in what he called the ‘common discourse.’…A troubled and poetic spirit, eloquently expressed the dilemma of communication in our time…”

 Men and decisions / Lewis L. Strauss. Strauss was the driving force in the hearings that resulted in Oppenheimer’s security clearance being revoked. This book is a free-swinging autobiography of the most controversial figure ever to head the Atomic Energy Commission. Even when immersed in the best of his material — the history of nuclear science, Strauss succumbs to a compulsion to plead his own cause as a humble, public-spirited servant of good causes right up to his last hour of government service. Strauss’ diary notations are apparently voluminous, and he has combed them to establish all possible points in his favor.

 Oppenheimer : the story of a friendship / by Haakon Chevalier. Impressions, based on a friendship of seventeen years, of the life and personality of the atomic scientist, including his later involvement in security investigations by U. S. Government authorities.

 Robert Oppenheimer : the man and his theories / Michel Rouzé ; translated by Patrick Evans. When Oppenheimer was appointed scientific director of the Manhattan Project, history thrust a sensitive and deeply civilized man into a dilemma which cruelly shaped his life. It is for this reason that the biography of J. Robert Oppenheimer is more than just a life story and ideas of a great and original thinker. It is also a challenging study of moral problems of a scientist’s responsibility to government and their fellow humans. Here is an important piece of contemporary history, illuminating a controversial scientific figure and much of the nature of modern physics itself.

 Robert Oppenheimer, letters and recollections / edited by Alice Kimball Smith, Charles Weiner. A beautifully organized collection of letters and reminiscences. The editors have interviewed those who knew and worked with him, stirred in the necessary explanatory background, and produced an account, both scholarly and highly readable, which throws fresh light on a man who will probably always remain something of an enigma.

 Science and the common understanding / by J. Robert Oppenheimer. The pages are packed with ideas. Oppenheimer uses the same clarity which characterized his teaching to the layman, albeit an educate and interested one, the most important developments in atomic and nuclear physics. His discussion of the very abstract ideas of the uncertainty principle and complementarity is particularly excellent. One cannot fail to be impressed with his erudition and with the sincerity and depth of his thinking.

 The ash garden : a novel / Dennis Bock. The Ash Garden follows the stories of three characters affected by World War II: Hiroshima bombing victim Emiko, Los Alamos nuclear physicist Anton Böll, and Austrian-Jewish refugee Sophie Böll.  It is a controlled explosion of a story, hugely energetic, powerful, and complex. It talks about surviving both world-shattering events and life’s mundane struggles, about what is lost and what grows up in its place, and, most importantly, it speaks about humanity.

 The great weapons heresy / Thomas W. Wilson, Jr. The Great Weapons Heresy, views Oppenheimer as a totally consistent and prescient humanist, for whom it was “as inevitable … [to] be drawn to Washington in the postdawn of the nuclear age, as it was for him to be drawn to Gottingen [a great and free scientific center] in its predawn.” Wilson looks favorably upon Oppenheimer — “perhaps alone among all the scientists” — having been willing to weigh the option of preventive nuclear war against the Soviet Union.” Wilson’s summing up of Oppenheimer as a man whose “only dogma was faith in the open society” tries to capture this haunted, magnetic, philosopher‐king. Could there have lived a man with a more complex and contradictory inner struggle over guilt‐laden issues of loyalty and betrayal?

 The pleasure of finding things out : the best short works of Richard P. Feynman / by Richard P. Feynman Feynman worked at on the Manhattan Project at Los Alamos“When they make a moving picture about this [the Manhattan Project], they’ll have a guy telling the Princeton men all about the bomb, and he’ll be dressed in a suit and carry a briefcase and so on – but [I’m] in dirty shirtsleeves telling about it.”

Here is a selection of print books recently added to the collection

 Pastoral politics: why ministers resign /John Gilmore.  Pastoral Politics addresses the many issues related to why pastor move from one church to another. Gilmore deals with thorny subjects concerning when ministers should leave and when”principled-protest resignations” are necessary. A key feature of Pastoral Politics is its ability to see good and genuine humor in grueling experiences. The book provides the church board and the pastor valuable insights-theologically, psychologically and procedurally-enabling  pastors and members to be more flexible and charitable. The book is necessary reading for church board members, seminary students and every pastor who has and could face the prospects of moving on.

 Patterns of evidence, Exodus: a filmmaker’s journey /Timothy P. Mahoney ; with Steven Law. Mahoney went to Egypt looking for an answer to one fundamental question: did the Exodus story as written in the Bible really happen? During the course of his 12-year project he reviews accepted archaeological viewpoints, compares biblical references to evidence and presents alternative theories that support the validity of the event called The Exodus. This book tells the story about the creation of his feature documentary film, also titled Patterns of evidence: Exodus.

 Phenomenology of spirit /by G.W.F. Hegel ; translated by A.V. Miller ; with analysis of the text and foreword by J.N. Findlay. Hegel’s Phenomenology was written, so the story goes, on the eve of Napoleon’s destruction of the Holy Roman Empire and at the beginning of the German ‘Wars of Liberation. It is Hegel’s grandest experiment, changing our vision of the world and the very nature of the philosophical enterprise. Hegel puts into harmony ethics and autonomy, ancient philosophy and tragedy, Byronic Romanticism, German poetry, the Enlightenment, the French Revolution, the concept of virtue, the history of religion (including an ambiguous defense and critique of modern Christianity), the beginnings of a new philosophy of science and Kant’s moral philosophy. All are tied together with the dazzling if sometimes bewildering leaps in logic that have come to be known as ‘Hegel’s dialectic.’

 Pre-Christian Ireland: from the first settlers to the early Celts /Peter Harbison ; drawings by Edelgard Soergel-Harbison. Harbison has written the first full-scale survey of Irish prehistory for a general audience to have appeared for a decade. Pre-Christian Ireland gives the story of human settlement from the beginnings 10,000 years ago to St Patrick’s Christianizing mission in the fifth century AD. It combines the solid groundwork of earlier generations of archaeologists with the great advances made in research during the last twenty years.  The latest thinking on the astronomical significance of megalithic tombs and the social implications of the great Bronze Age hoards is interwoven with an up-to-date account of the recent major excavations. The author also looks afresh at the controversial question of when the Celts first arrived in Ireland.

 Promiseland, a century of life in a Negro community /Elizabeth Rauh Bethel.  Promiseland chronicles the intergenerational story of fifty African American families living in the rural community of Promised Land, South Carolina. From the newly emancipated slaves who established the settlement in 1870 to the third- and fourth-generation descendants who remain a part of the community, Bethel describes the personal strength, cooperative spirit, family integrity, and gender equality that have united residents in the face of unyielding racial abuse.

 Prostitutes and polygamists: a look at love, Old Testament style /David T. Lamb. Prostitutes and Polygamists is  an exposé of sexual issues the Bible doesn’t avoid that are as real and destructive today as in ancient times. Lamb sheds light on these important issues, for probing these taboo texts, and for calling Christians to engage on behalf of the vulnerable and wounded.

 Reframed: self-reg for a just society /Stuart Shanker. For Shanker, the possibility of a truly just and free society begins with how we see and nurture our children. Shanker explores self-regulation in social terms. Whereas his two previous books, Calm, Alert, and Learning and Self-Reg, were written for educators and parents, Reframed, unpacks the unique science and conceptual practices that are the very lifeblood of Self-Reg, making it an accessible read for new Self-Reggers.

 Religion, culture, and society in the early Middle Ages: studies in honor of Richard E. Sullivan /edited by Thomas F.X. Noble and John J. Contreni. Essays in this volume explore wide-ranging topics: Constantinople, Cloistered Women, Popes and Holy Images, Kingship, Pastoral Care, and Pilgrimages to the works or lives of Sidonius Apollinaris, Gregory of Tours, John Damascene, and Anselm of Havelberg. Like the scholarship of the man who inspired the essays (Sullivan) the essays are broad and incisive.

 Revised lists of the texts from the Judaean desert /by Emanuel Tov. Many details in the inventory list of the texts found in the Judaean Desert have altered since their initial publication by Tov in2002. Such changes were inserted in some twenty-five percent of the lines of the database, and this information is now presented to the public at the end of the publication procedure of the DJD series. The updating reflects corrections made to imprecisely recorded details, the data published in the last DJD volumes, inscribed archeological evidence not recorded previously, new fragments, changed names, new identifications and arrangements of fragments, updated bibliography, etc. The volume also contains an updated version of the categorized list of biblical texts from the various sites in the Judaean Desert.

 Sweet mystery: a book of remembering /Judith Hillman Paterson. Sweet Mystery is Paterson’s harrowing account of the memories of her mother, told with eloquence and understanding. Set largely in Montgomery, Alabama, the story plays out against a backdrop of relatives troubled almost as much by southern conflicts over race and class as by the fallout from a long family history of drinking, denial, and mental illness.
While rich in the details and flavor of small-town life in the South during the 1940s, Sweet Mystery transcends time and regionalism to evoke universal American themes. Ultimately, it confirms the damaging effects of early trauma on children as well as the innate and familial strengths that enable some children to survive, grow up, and heal.

 Swift, Lord, you are not /Kilian McDonnell. McDonnell, O.S.B. after decades of writing as a professional theologian and now 82  gives us Swift, Lord, You Are Not, poems of the struggle to find God – waiting for the silence of God to break. He does not write pious verse, or inspirational poetry, but of wrestling with the illusive God. His themes are mostly biblical and monastic. He closes with an essay Poet: Can You Start at Seventy-Five?  in which he describes the literary decisions he makes within the monastic context – decisions he needs to make with some dispatch.

 Teachers these days: stories and strategies for reconnection /: Jody Carrington, Laurie McIntosh. Carrington and McIntosh bring together theory and practice, weaving the science of human development with real-life stories and tangible strategies told by those most qualified to share them—our teachers. This book is for those who need a place to land when they want to be reminded that, simply by the choice of their profession, they are a powerful force in shaping our world.

 Textual editing and criticism: an introduction /Erick Kelemen ; foreword by Donald H. Reiman.  This book introduces undergraduate and beginning graduate students to the field and provides them with a broad range of examples and materials for hands-on practice. Textual Editing and Criticism  is concerned with both the history of the text and the aesthetic and political choices made in textual transmission. It is intended for courses concerned with questions of literary interpretation and value.

 The action Bible: God’s redemptive story /[retold and illustrated by] Sergio Cariello. Retells the stories of the Bible in graphic novel format, including the stories of Noah, Abraham, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, Jonah, and the life and death of Jesus Christ.

 The American heritage new history of the Civil War /narrated by Bruce Catton ; edited and with a new introduction by James McPherson. An attractively formatted and extensively illustrated story of the Civil War.  Catton’s narrative and 800-plus images ranging from photographs, sketches by soldiers at the front, to famous paintings by Winslow Homer, reveal the scope and drama of the war. The volume also contains three-dimensional maps of battles and campaigns, the words of men and women who actually witnessed the events, and documents written by Abraham Lincoln.