I read Catcher In The Rye every year. Each time I read it, the book seems new and different to me. I always learn something new about the characters.
—Scott Crawford, Director of Career Services
The book I re-read for pleasure is Moby Dick. Like the whale and the whale hunt itself, there is no limit to what this book can deliver on re-reading. The Stubb’s supper chapter makes me laugh every time, even as the mate’s racism makes my skin crawl. And when Ahab drops that one tear into the Pacific, I tear-up myself and want to stop this man from killing himself and everyone else on board—but of course, I never can.
—Warren Rosenberg, Professor of English
Willa Cather’s A Lost Lady, and F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby. I re-read them for the elegance and precision of their style, for the complexity and ambiguity of their characters, and just because I like the stories.
—Tom Bambrey ’68, Director of Athletics
As a former high school English teacher, this is easy for me. One of my favorite books to teach was To Kill A Mockingbird, and now that two of my own kids are in high school, I have enjoyed re-reading the book with them. It has all the qualities of classic American literature with rich characters and meaty themes that spark wonderful conversation and make people of all ages think deeply. And it has the number one thing I cherish in all good books—it makes me laugh and cry!
—Michele Pittard, Associate Professor of Teacher Education
The books of the Bible. Why? See Hebrews 4:12 “For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart.” and 2 Timothy 3:16-17.
—Jon Baer, Associate Professor of Religion
The Dragonlance Chronicles trilogy by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman was my initiation into the realm of fantasy literature, which created a yearning for enchanted worlds and showed me the power of our imagination. Although the writing is simplistic, re-reading this compilation of books feels like coming home and reminds me of where my love of J. R. R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings began.
—Will Oprisko, Associate Dean of Students
When I was a child, my mother read The Little Engine That Could by Watty Piper to me. I read it to my daughter, and I hope (someday maybe) to read it to a grandchild. I still pull it off the shelf occasionally for a quick pick-me-up.
—John Culley ’69, Comptroller
I know you were looking for a book, but I hope this is useful anyway: I screen the The Searchers every year. Even on my sabbaticals when I haven’t shown the film to my Theater 104 students, I’ve watched it again on my own. It’s a complex and epic film that never fails to engage me, and I think it endures because it’s such an eloquent statement of the Western’s two defining values: sacrifice and redemption.
—Michael Abbott ’85, Associate Professor of Theater
The Road Less Traveled by M. Scott Peck, M.D. I re-read sections of this book during moments when the understanding of human behavior requires clarification.
—Lana Burnau, Bookstore Clothing and Gift Buyer
A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson. I like Bryson’s sense of humor. And for some reason this book especially seems to appeal to me when I have a cold and want something I can curl up with and read but don’t have to work hard to understand it.
—Karen Gunther, Assistant Professor of Psychology
I have read The Grapes of Wrath many times. The power of the human spirit over adversity, poverty, despair, and hopelessness is a timeless lesson for us all.
—Mary Towell, Campus Visit Coordinator
I keep coming back to Toni Morrison’s Jazz. It’s a formally difficult book, but the characters are so layered with stories and Morrison’s language is so exquisite that I can’t help but entangle myself in its pages again and again.
—Eric Freeze, Assistant Professor of English
A book that I find myself going back to at least once a year is Lucky Man by Michael J. Fox. I find it inspiring, funny, engaging, and definitely uplifting.
—Roberto Giannini, Head Soccer Coach
My most-read book is a sports novel called Semi Tough by Dan Jenkins. It’s about the time leading up to the Super Bowl between the New York Giants and New York Jets, and is, in my opinion, the funniest football book ever written.
—Tom Perkins, Equipment Manager/Athletic Assistant
My all-time, no contest most re-read book is The Worm Ouroboros, a classic piece of epic fantasy by E.R. Eddison, and it definitely qualifies as a kind of comfort read. I return to it because it was written (in 1922) in a kind of faux 17th century style that works so beautifully that I periodically drop into it at a randomly chosen point just to savor the prose for a few pages. In the same key but a lower register, Robert E. Howard’s Conan stories are like an irresistible junky snack food.
—Stephen Morillo, Professor of History