Modern Renaissance Man

 Many, many years ago I dreamed up an idea of a magazine (then webzine) for the modern renaissance man (in the Old English sense of "human being, person [male or female]"). I was trying to come to grips with my many interests (fickle, you say?) and wanted an explanation (later resolved after reading Refuse to Choose). 

By David Martin - The White House Historical Association, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=9390044

Depending where you look, you'll get varied definitions of renaissance man. One I like defined it as a man who "sought to develop skills in all areas of knowledge, in physical development, in social accomplishments and in the arts." Armed with that, I looked at my various interests and decided these are the areas in which I want to be learned:

• Science: ornithology (specifically birds of prey/raptors; corvus [ravens & crows]); fermentation
• Arts: classical guitar (not playing, but knowing); Bruegel, John Currin; Shakespeare; oriental rugs
• Language: English in all historical phases; Esperanto and interlinguistics; general linguistics
• Physical development: Swimming; orienteering; walking; lifting; misogi
• History: Ancient Egypt; medieval, esp. technology, war, languages; politics of language, esp. linguistic discrimination.
• Literature: Mid 20c British writers; English Catholic writers; literature about war.

Thus, here on out, I'll be tagging posts on books that are in the above subjects, with the goal of reading at least one book in each of those bolded areas once per year.