Having finished the Book of Tobit, I have started my bible study of the Book of Job. The bible study group at St. Mark's is planning to do this in the Fall; so I want to get a head start. I am using the New American Bible (NAB), an old issue of God's Word Today (now out of print), the Jewish Study Bible, and the (free) NET Bible. The NET bible has extensive notes that are a useful supplement. I started to use the Anchor Bible version by Marvin Pope but it proved to be too pedantic (and distractingly difficult for a neophyte like me).Treasure Island (by Robert Louis Stevenson)
Readers of this blog will be aware of my recently acquired affinity for Treasure Island. The Walt Disney version version awakened my interest. The Victor Fleming movie furthered my curiosity. The terrible Muppets movie version thankfully did not distract me. While the movies sparked my desire to read the book, unfortunately my local library did not have a good copy. Fortunately, I found a nice version at the West Hartford Library book sale: a Junior Deluxe Editions version (see picture at left).Instead of buying the Sparks notes or Cliff Notes, I put together my own supplementary material, primarily derived from the Wikipedia entry (see link above). It includes notes from two different editions (very helpful for some of the archaic language and nautical terms), the preface from the biographical edition by RLS's wife, and an essay by RLS on how he wrote the book.
I learned that, like Uncle Tom's Cabin, Treasure Island was originally published in serial form in a children's magazine (see above or here). I don't think someone Richard's age would enjoy reading TI although the story is great. As I mentioned above, the book is filled with rather language, but it is not as hard as Shakespeare and much more thrilling. I'm looking forward to more reading of the works of the Scotsman, RLS.
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