- Title: Reader’s Digest Great Lives Great Deeds
- Author: Various
- Year Published: 1964 (The Reader’s Digest Association, Inc.)
- Year Purchased: 1966, by my Grandma
- Source: Reader’s Digest
- About: When my mom was growing up in the 1950s and 1960s, a normal American family with kids owned a car, a television, a full set of encyclopedias, and at least a few Reader’s Digest books. My grandparents had double the amount of encyclopedias and several shelves full of RD volumes, a circumstance that I took full advantage of as a child. I spent many weekends, large chunks of summer, and all of spring and winter breaks happily bonding with my grandparents. The books I brought with me never lasted long, so I read theirs rather than go through withdrawal. By the time I exited elementary school for the bright lights of the sixth grade, I had read each of those volumes too many times to count. This book was my youthful introduction to many of history’s most interesting men, and 9 of the most interesting women. Yep, as a product of the mid-1960s it is pretty sexist. How did they choose the 9 women represented? Why is Queen Elizabeth I not included? These were questions I started asking before too long. However, for what it is, and for who I was as a 7 or 8-year-old, it is fine.
- Motivation: See above.
- Times Read: A few
- Random Excerpt/Page 157: “Every great people has its poet. Shakespeare, Goethe, Pushkin, Dante, Hugo, Li Po-these names float over their countries almost like the national flag. There are many who believe that, in America, it is Walt Whitman who occupies this unique place.”
Queen Elizabeth I (1533–1603). (Photo credit: Wikipedia). What, no Good Queen Bess? For shame, Great Lives Great Deeds. For shame.
- Happiness Scale: 7, because it was really helpful when I was a child.
A Small Press Life: Books. Art. Writing. Life. Tea.
Not just a blog, a philosophy
A Small Press Life: Books. Art. Writing. Life. Tea. 
I love how this is phrased: “these names float over their countries almost like the national flag…”
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That really caught my fancy, too.
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