The Book-lover: A Guide to the Best Reading

The Book-Lover opens as both a celebration of reading and a practical manual for choosing books wisely. Drawing on James Baldwin's long experience guiding readers, it offers tested reading courses, study plans, and a rich harvest of quotations that praise books as companions, counselors, and gateways to wisdom, comfort, and moral elevation. Across voices from Richard de Bury, Petrarch, Milton, Carlyle, Emerson, and others, books emerge as living forces that preserve great minds, outlast empires, and open the reader to truth, beauty, and intellectual freedom. Yet the book is not content with praise alone. It warns students, teachers, and parents that not all "good" books are truly good, and that harmful reading can weaken judgment, dull taste, and corrupt imagination. It urges purposeful, selective reading built around a true intellectual calling, with discipline, depth, and a few master works rather than desultory variety. Special attention is given to children: their reading should progress carefully from simple stories and fairy tales to myths, romance, and history, avoiding the flood of trivial fiction. The closing sections argue that school libraries should be small, carefully chosen, and supported by teachers who are readers themselves. This edition has been fully restored with modern typesetting, custom cover design.