2009 Suggestions – “What was the common man’s experience…?

This year had a great question: “What was the common man’s experience in Great Britain from 1066 to the 1776?”

Since I gan this blog as I was just finishing up this them, here is the first entry I wrote which best summed up my the best reads:

Right now I am on the cusp…finishing up exploring the question: What was life like in England from 1066 through 1850? As you can see from the list below, I ended up over in the colonies.

The wild read included all kinds of texts – the top ten being: Pillars of the Earth, The Lady Elizabeth, The Life of Elizabeth I, John Adams, 1776, John Locke in 90 Minutes, Thomas’ Paine’s Rights of Man, Emerson’s essay Self Reliance, A Breath of Snow and Ashes. Still to finish are Portrait of a Lady and An Echo in the Bone.  Not yet started is the final piece, A Midwife’s Tale.

So far the most compelling reads were Blindspot – Best Novel and The Invention of Air, best non-fiction!