Marcus Aurelius Against The Great Books

The Roman emperor on what to read

Would Marcus Aurelius be against the great books?

Marcus reminds himself again and again to throw away his books:

Throw away your books; no longer distract yourself: it is not allowed; but as if you were now dying, despise the flesh; it is blood and bones and a network, a contexture of nerves, veins, and arteries.

Meditations, 2.2

He has work to do. An empire to run. A life to live.

There’s a movement of sorts behind compiling lists of great books – and seeking to read through them. The lists are full of philosophical and literary masterpieces. See St. John’s reading list and curriculum for an example.

There are obvious arguments for going through lists like these.

A common one: we ought to experience the best literature and philosophy man has created. To fail to be educated in such experiences is to fail to live.

But is this true?

It can’t just be the experience of reading such works. We are not hedonists here.

Another argument: wrestling with these authors and books is intrinsically worthwhile. This may be true enough, but it’s not sufficient. Many things are intrinsically worthwhile.

Perhaps it is the insight or moral improvement offered by the great books?

Yet it’s easy to find champions of the great books decrying their moral value. See Harold Bloom of The Western Canon:

Reading the very best writers—let us say Homer, Dante, Shakespeare, Tolstoy—is not going to make us better citizens. Art is perfectly useless, according to the sublime Oscar Wilde, who was right about everything.

Of course, one could argue that this is posturing. To find moral value, you can’t look for it. It’s better to approach great works with an aesthetic gaze. There’s something to this. But Bloom’s citation of Oscar Wilde, hardly an ethical character, suggests we should take his argument in the straightforward way: art does not improve.

And so Marcus Aurelius writes to himself:

No longer wander at hazard; for neither will you read your own memoirs, nor the acts of the ancient Romans and Hellenes, and the selections from books which you were reserving for your old age.

Mediations, 3.14

I see his posture as throwing down a challenge to the very act of reading. It’s indifferent or worse. A distraction or degradation of life, not necessarily an enhancement.

Life is short. It’s better to read as little as possible and only read for self-improvement. Note that this still means that one ought to read a lot. And we should understand self improvement broadly – not just in terms of so called “self-help.” I see the Stoic view then as having more in common with Plutarch and Emerson, than the many defenders of the great works.

That’s not to say that Great Books programs (personal or institutional) should be abandoned. They are much better than the status quo and certainly make for better reading lists than what can be charitably called the good books of American public school education.

Moreover, some of us will be called to master these works. Just as others are called to curate beautiful architecture, study physics and the works of nature, or sanitize common living areas. The world is a web and we each have our role to play in it. That’s a common Stoic belief. Doing so is the project for some people. Disproportionately readers of this blog perhaps. But not for most.

For most of us: consume conversations of great masters in order to be an excellent person. Developing an aesthetic sense is important, but not enough. If you’re a craftsman, consume the works of the examples that came before you. If you’re a human, read about excellent humans. Of course, you should master some of the basic works of the western canon if you want to be educated (if indeed you are western). But don’t forget that such lists are incomplete and, more importantly, some books are better than others.

But cast away the thirst after books, that you may not die murmuring, but cheerfully, truly, and from your heart thankful to the gods.

2.3