The Well-Educated Mind

Title: The Well-Educated Mind

Author: Susan Wise Bauer

Pages: 480

Genre: Non-Fiction

Grade: B

Synopsis: The subtitle for this book is "A Guide to the Classical Education You Never Had." I thought it would be a primer on a bunch of different subjects, but instead, it is just a glorified reading list of novels, autobiographies, histories, dramas, poetry and science texts. Bauer gives strategies for making it through difficult subjects and advocates for time spent reading each day, keeping a reading journal, asking questions and reading books at the same time as a friend in order to stimulate discussion.

My Review: I do love reading lists.  I've got a good number of them and I rarely read books that are not on one list or another. However, I'm posting this review after only reading about 90 pages of the book as the remainder of the book is dedicated to the reading list along with little tidbits about the books suggested. While I can see the benefit of the strategies suggested for deep learning while reading, I also am of the mindset that life is short and that I'm not going to spend too much time re-reading and studying these texts.  Instead, I'll just read them for enjoyment with sparknotes open to help provide clarity to the difficult passages.  Next up (from Bauer's list): Don Quixote.