I just finished reading my third novel by author, Nevil Shute. I first heard of him in 2007 when Vistage speaker Herbert Meyer (who worked for the CIA) recommended Shute’s book “Kindling” and called it “a book every teacher should read.” The book was published in 1938; it contrasts the power of government fiscal policy with the power of a single person with a cause. It has a lot to say about accountability and taking responsibility for one’s actions. When I recommend this book, I say it’s one that members of the clergy should read. Today, I’d add that it would also be worthwhile reading for members of the US Congress.

After reading Kindling, I became an instant fan of Nevil Shute (who’s best known as the author of “On the Beach”). Since then, I’ve read his 1950 novel “A Town Like Alice” and his last novel, published in 1960, “Trustee from the Tool Room.”

Nevil Shute Norman was born in 1899; he was an engineer, aviator, yachtsman, entrepreneur, race car driver and author of two dozen novels; truly a multitalented man. I admire him as one who believed in private enterprise and the power of the free market. He’s was also a man who put his money where his mouth was; fed up with high taxes and the socialist government of post-WWII Great Britain, he moved to Australia in 1950. His biography traces his free market beliefs back to 1931. As a young engineer, his company was involved in a competition to build competing airplanes. One, the R100 was built privately, and the other, the R101 was built by a government run entity. The competition ended when the R101 failed. He believed this failure symbolized the unsoundness of central planning. One of his biographers said this experience “bred in him an almost pathological distrust of politicians.”

Nevil Shute was a big thinker who was a success on many fronts. I’m not alone in my admiration for him. There’s a Nevil Shute Norway Foundation that celebrates his beliefs and his work. Their web site is http://www.nevilshute.org/

Nevil

This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 3rd, 2009 at 1:33 pm and is filed under Big Thinkers, Big Thoughts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.