Breaking Bread with the Dead

This book explores how engaging with past writings can help us live less anxiously in the present and increase our “personal density.” In our information-overloaded society, algorithms shape our thoughts, and history seems like an obstacle. Jacobs’s solution is to challenge ourselves with the perspectives of the past. Homer’s teachings on force, Frederick Douglass’s confrontations with America’s Founding Fathers, and modern authors’ passionate engagement with the past offer valuable insights. Ursula K. Le Guin’s revelations about Virgil’s female characters exemplify this. By hearing the past’s voices, we expand our consciousness, sympathies, and wisdom beyond the present.

(This book may contain a sharpie mark on the top or bottom edge and may show mild signs of shelfwear.)