On Becoming a Man

 By Bruce Shawkey

Found this interesting book in the online archives. A sort of modern-day version of Ralph Waldo Emerson's essays on self-reliance. Here's a brief description of the book's contents:

This book explores the life of men in various contexts: work, play, prayer, war, home, and friendship. Using essays and stories, myths and history, to bring life to the subject, Bennett defines what a man should be, how he should live, and to what he should aspire.

Published in 2011, at 608 pages, it contains essays by such varied authors as Chuck Yaeger, Leo Tolstoy, Colin Powell, and Theodore Roosevelt. Each chapter contains a lesson, or "moral of the story," if you will.

I have to believe that Bennett wrote this book in response to his belief that men were becoming "soft," or all Alan Alda. His first chapter on "Man at War" seems to bear this out.

William J. Bennett is an American conservative politician and political commentator who served as secretary of education from 1985 to 1988 under President Ronald Reagan.

Might explore this book further, maybe not. Too many projects going on.

Here is a link to the book:

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