Joel Bowman with today’s Note From the End of the World: San Martín de los Andes, Argentina…
We’re mid detox, dear reader… digital detox, that is.
No mainstream media… no (anti)social media… no endless newsfeeds or online wormholes or attention attenuating antics of any kind.
Just mountain air, glacial lakes and time with our family. And books. Always books. We’ve got a stash of half a dozen or so between us, including Black Beauty and Wind in the Willows for dear daughter (9yrs), Thomas Mann’s The Beloved Returns and Stefan Zweig’s The Post-Office Girl for dad and Victor Hugo’s highly travel-unfriendly, 1,400-page doorstop Les Misérables for dear wifey.
With such a haul, and for not even a week “offline,” the conversation came up over a copita of Patagonian malbec a couple of days ago:
If you had to take just one book… to the mountains, a remote seaside, or the proverbial desert island, presumably for an undetermined amount of time, what would it be?
There were many worthy contenders put forward, including favorites from the literary canon, various religious texts and, naturally, instruction manuals for how to survive on that bloody desert island!
“What about the Essential Classics?” wifey piped up. If you don’t already know about the “book 100-years in the making,” check it out here.
Whether you’re marooned on some sandy shore or sipping a snifter by a cozy fireplace, there’s enough wit and wisdom in that singular text to keep you and your progeny going for another hundred years.
Indeed, our friend Bill Bonner says it “may be the most important book you will ever read.” Learn all about the Essential Classics, here.
We’ll be back in the “real world” next week, with all your regular Notes. In the meantime, please enjoy a few pictures from springtime down at the End of the World…
And that’s all from the End of the World this week. We’ll write to you again from Buenos Aires. Until then…
Cheers,
Joel Bowman
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