Crime, violence, infamy are not tragedy. Tragedy occurs when a human soul awakes and seeks, in suffering and pain, to free itself from crime, violence, infamy, even at the cost of life. The struggle is the tragedy—not defeat or death. That is why the spectacle of tragedy has always filled men, not with despair, but with a sense of hope and exaltation. That is why this terrible book is also a book of hope. For it is about the struggle of the human soul —of more than one human soul. It is in this sense that the Hiss Case is a tragedy. This is its meaning beyond the headlines, the revelations, the shame and suffering of the people involved. But this tragedy will have been for nothing unless men understand it rightly, and from it the world takes hope and heart to begin its own tragic struggle with the evil that besets it from within and from without, unless it faces the fact that the world, the whole world, is sick unto death and that, among other things, this Case has turned a finger of fierce light into the suddenly opened and reeking body of our time.
– Whittaker Chambers, Witness
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New Year’s Resolution #5, over the course of 2013 read these books:
** Main Currents of Marxism by Leszek Kolakowski
** Red Horizons by PJ Media’s great columnist Lt. Gen Ion Mihai Pacepa
** Witness by Whittaker Chambers
** Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand
** A History of the American People by Paul Johnson
Click to submit book suggestions for for the new daily feature at PJ Lifestyle. You can also send photographs of your favorite excerpts.
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Related at PJ Lifestyle today:
A book recommendation often with excerpt(s), usually attempting to fit the daily theme. Family and Relationships on Monday, Practical and Technology on Tuesday, Laughter on Wednesday, Culture on Thursday, Intellect on Friday, Health and Fitness on Saturday, and Religion and Ethics on Sunday. Image courtesy shutterstock / robert_s
Outstanding selection? Main Currents of Marxism will teach you the result of letting pond slime
rule men.
Whitaker Chambers is one who would not have been fooled by our supposed victory in the Cold War. Yes, the Berlin Wall is down and the Soviet Union is gone, but the “reeking body” lives on.
Link to History of the American People is bad.
Corrected. Thanks for the heads up.
The fascination with evil is a losing game. As #1 mentions, these are excellent training for tyrants. I would look for something more positive to study – dare I say my uplifting. Maybe your attitude will change and the anxiety may lessen.