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The Classics Corner: Key Books on Joseph Smith for Your Home Library
by Richard H. Cracroft

Editors' Note: We are surrounded by thousands of books, overwhelmed by choices. Instead of having enough information in our lives; we have too much. How do we find the diamonds in the sand and surround ourselves with books of the most value? Furnishing our minds needs to be more meticulously and carefully designed than furnishing our house.

In fact, in creating a Zion home in a Babylonian world, the book shelf plays a vital role.

Beginning with this column, Dr. Richard H. Cracroft, former dean of the College of Humanities at Brigham Young University and director of the Center for the Study of Christian Values in Literature, tells us how to build a home library, category by category. He has had a lifelong love affair with the written word, so his discriminating taste makes him a natural to point us toward the best books.

In this first column he lists the enduring works on Joseph Smith.

I invite you to become an active Browser in a new on-line column aimed at fellow Bibliophiles (book-lovers) who, in addition to possessing well-worn library cards, like to own (and use) a shelf of books on subjects dear to them-or which they wish to make dear to them. At the behest of editors Maurine and Scot Proctor, I will undertake, every month (until the Second Coming or my Translation, whichever comes first), to list a few core books on a variety of subjects which you may wish to find and add to your personal library.

Making such suggestions is, of course, sticking my bookish neck out, highly subjective and dangerous to my (or your) blood pressure. Certainly no one will agree with all of my suggestions or omissions. Remember, the titles are merely the informed suggestions of a bookish professor; you are the judge and jury and chief selector. Let's make this another part of the Great Conversation: if I seem to overlook some choices which seem important, or if I suggest some books which you feel are downright wrong, kindly let me know via e-mail, and I'll try to include your suggestions in next month's column.

Although I may venture my personal opinion about some of the books, I won't be reviewing them; instead, I'll be listing the books which seem to have emerged as classics in a variety of fields. For example, in November I am going to present a selection of what I (and others) deem to be the core books on LDS Church history. In December, I'll suggest important, "classic" works by and about the other LDS Church prophet/presidents and notable General Authorities. But in January and thereafter I propose to veer away from church-related books to list classical works from other fields-the great English novels; great American novels, and, later, if you wish, great French, Russian, and Latin American novels. Another month we might discuss classic biographies; or the classics of LDS fiction; or the best collections of verse/poetry. And how about classic Mormon humor? Or classic books for teenagers? For children? For senior citizens? Or classic religious fiction (such as Ben Hur, The Robe, The Chronicles of Narnia)? I hope each month to include suggestions from you about classic books on subjects to be announced in advance. Feel free to suggest subjects of particular interest to you.

The subject for November, due by October 9 is "The Best of LDS History." The criteria are always: Is this book more than a good book? Is it a classic on this subject? Is it an essential "must" for anyone's library?

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A Selection: Vital Books by and about the Prophet Joseph Smith, Jr.

A number of these books are still in print; others can be found in used book stores or from on-line sources:

Writings of Joseph Smith:

-Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith (1938), Joseph Fielding Smith, ed.; an invaluable and exhaustively indexed chronological compilation of doctrinal statements excerpted from sermons, letters, and other of Joseph Smith's writings. Does not treat historical matters or other documents readily available.

-Discourses of the Prophet Joseph Smith (1956), compiled by Alma P. Burton, is a now dated but still useful compilation of the Prophet's sermons; better still is Joseph Smith: Selected Sermons and Writings, edited by Robert L. Millet (1989). For study of the King Follett Discourse of April 7, 1844, see articles in BYU Studies, 18 (Winter 1978: 179-225); incidentally, a subscription to BYU Studies is a wonderful addition to any LDS library.

-The Words of Joseph Smith, compiled and edited by Andrew F. Ehat and Lyndon W. Cook (Provo: BYU Religious Studies Center, 1980), is a full collection of the Prophet Joseph's Nauvoo discourses, 1839-1844); depends upon written reports by clerks and witnesses, as no written drafts or verbatim reports of the speeches exist.

-The Personal Writings of Joseph Smith, compiled and edited by Dean C. Jessee (Deseret Book, 1984);attempts to publish everything written in Joseph Smith's own hand and other material which Joseph is known to have dictated. Contains two of his twelve journals, four autobiographical pieces, and eighty-eight letters. Includes photos of all of Joseph's holographic materials. Unfortunately includes six of the Mark Hofmann forgeries.

-Lyndon W. Cook's The Revelations of the Prophet Joseph Smith (Provo: Seventy's Mission Bookstore, 1981) is a historical and biographical commentary on all Doctrine and Covenants revelations, including substantial biographical summaries of each person mentioned in the D&C.

-Encyclopedia of Joseph Smith's Teachings, edited by Larry E. Dahl and Donald Q. Cannon (Deseret Book, 1997), is a valuable compilation, presented alphabetically and chronologically within each topic, of Joseph Smith's statements. An excellent index helps readers find quotations either by subject or key word.

Primary Accounts:

-The History of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Period 1. History of Joseph Smith the Prophet, by Himself. Introduction and Notes by B.H. Roberts; ed. by James Mulholland, Robert B. Thompson, William W. Phelps, Willard Richards, George A. Smith, Wilford Woodruff, and later, B.H. Roberts. 6 vols. (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1912). Written in the form of a first-person journal, this personal history is still the most extensive publication of the Prophet Joseph's personal papers and is an invaluable resource for any library. The official history of the founding generation of the church and of the revelations contained in the Doctrine and Covenants, it was written by Joseph Smith and some two dozen scribes and could be called "The History of Joseph Smith." Brought up to 1843 by the time of his death in 1854, by Willard Richards, Joseph Smith's "private Sect. & Historian," and continued into August 1844 by

Richards's successor as church historian, George A. Smith, the six volumes cover less than two decades of church history-it is here that Joseph recounts his First Vision and other important events of the Restoration;

-Lucy Mack Smith, History of Joseph Smith by His Mother, with Notes and Comments by Preston Nibley (1853;1958); this first published biography in LDS history was by the Prophet's mother; this book, originally entitled Biographical Sketches of the Prophet Joseph Smith, and His Progenitors for Many Generations, has been recently republished by Scot and Maurine Procter as

Revised and Enhanced History of Joseph Smith by His Mother. For this recent edition, the Proctors went back to Lucy's original manuscript and did a new edit of the book to make it closer to Lucy's original words, added 600 footnotes and 100 photographs.

-John Taylor, Witness to the Martyrdom: John Taylor's Personal Account of the Last Days of the Prophet Joseph Smith (1999), edited by Mark R. Taylor, makes available eyewitness Taylor's account of the assassination of the Prophet.

Selected Biographies:

Each of these biographies is a thorough and sympathetic study of the Prophet's life. Most of them are out of print and difficult to find; if you find a copy in a used book store, buy it!

-George Q. Cannon, Life of Joseph Smith the Prophet (1888;1964); B.H. Roberts, Joseph Smith, the Prophet Teacher (1908;1967);John Henry Evans, Joseph Smith, An American Prophet (1933; 1966); John A. Widtsoe, Joseph Smith: Seeker After Truth, Prophet of God (1957).

More recent biographies are the important study by Donna Hill, Joseph Smith, The First Mormon

(Doubleday, 1977); Richard L. Bushman's prize-winning study, Joseph Smith and the Beginnings of Mormonism (1984); Francis M. Gibbons, Joseph Smith: Martyr, Prophet of God (1982); and Truman G. Madsen's Joseph Smith the Prophet (1989).

Related Biographical Studies:

-Hyrum L. Andrus, Joseph Smith, the Man and the Seer (1960) is a non-scholarly compilation of little-known stories about the Prophet Joseph, written for a popular audience; as is Hyrum L. Andrus, and Helen Mae Andrus's They Knew the Prophet (1974).

-Dallin H. Oaks and Marvin S. Hill's Carthage Conspiracy: The Trial of the Accused Assassins of Joseph Smith (University of Illinois, 1975), this scholarly study finally replaced and eclipsed the sensational collection of dubious accounts about the perpetrators of the martyrdom compiled by N.B. Lundwall in The Fate of the Persecutors of the Prophet Joseph Smith.

Karl Ricks Anderson, in Joseph Smith's Kirtland: Eyewitness Accounts (1989), collects reminiscences by LDS and Gentile witnesses of Joseph Smith and the Kirtland era.

-Leonard J. Arrington, et al., eds., The Presidents of the Church (Deseret Book, 1986). This multi-authored collection of essays on each of the Presidents of the Church is a solid place to- begin with study of Joseph Smith and his successors.

-Scot Facer Proctor and Maurine Jensen Proctor's Witness of the Light, A Photographic Journey in the Footsteps of the American Prophet Joseph Smith (Deseret Book, 1991) is a photographic and written essay capturing the places and events in the prophet's life.

-Three useful collections of essays are The Prophet and His Work: Essays From General Authorities on Joseph Smith and the Restoration (Deseret Book,1996); and Larry C. Porter and Susan Easton Black, eds. The Prophet Joseph: Essays on the Life and Mission of Joseph Smith (Deseret Book, 1988); and Susan Easton Black and Charles DF. Tate, Jr., eds., Joseph Smith: the Prophet, the Man (Provo: Religious Studies Center, BYU, 1993).

-Encyclopedia of Mormonism, 5 Vols. (1992), edited by Daniel H. Ludlow. This is essential resource for all home libraries; most studies of LDS subjects begin with these invaluable volumes.

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