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RE: Which books most shaped how you see things? - 4/30/2009 4:09:37 PM   
BKSir


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From: Salt Lake City, UT
Status: offline 		Chronicles of Narnia, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland/Through the Looking Glass.  A Christmas Carol.  The collective writings of Poe and Yeats.  Also, the Tao Te Ching.

The first two (sets) taught me the value of imagination and that no matter how old one might get, to hold onto it, keep that spark alive in yourself, keep all those possibilities alive. Life is there for living, and all the wonders that we see all the time but ignore are special and beautiful.

A Christmas Carol taught me about generosity and caring.  It taught me about how things in our lives DO shape who we are and what we become, and that it's up to us to let them shape us properly.  It taught me about compassion for our fellow man, and how even the slightest bit of generosity, of giving of something that wouldn't even be missed can significantly change the lives of others.

Poe and Yeats, they taught me about flow and beauty.  About the most minute of details in writing and in life making all the difference in the world and should never be overlooked.

The Tao Te Ching...  While being technically a religious text, sort of, to me it was more of a book on personal philosophy.  I grew up baptist, oddly enough with jewish grandparents on that side of the family (it's a mess), and my mom was very... ecclectic.  I had access, thanks to her, to all sorts of different views.  This one just seemed to strike a chord and made sense.  Not something I can exactly explain, but, yeah...

EDIT:  Totally spaced "Everything You Ever Wanted To Know About Sex.*   But were afraid to ask."
For its time it was very powerful and out there, but still quite blunt, informative, well written, historically accurate and scientifically correct (again, for what was known at the time.  god how things change).
It taught me that sexuality was NOT an evil thing.  It's NOT something to be afraid of, to run from, to shun.  It's something in everybody (well most everybody).  It's something to embrace and enjoy.  That no matter what aspect(s) your own sexuality may take, that's part of you, of who you are, and that you're not the only one out there who feels that way, and that it's been around for a DAMN long time.


< Message edited by BKSir -- 4/30/2009 4:16:18 PM >

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RE: Which books most shaped how you see things? - 4/30/2009 6:21:52 PM   
JohnSteed1967


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Status: offline 		Oh there are many, many more than I can tell but here's a good number of them
  1. The Bible
  2. Dune
  3. The Hobbit
  4. The Lord of the Rings
  5. Most anything By Robert E Howard
  6. the works of Stan Lee and Jack Kirby
Movies or actors that have influenced me
  1. Sean Connery
  2. Patrick Macnee
  3. Star Wars
  4. The Matrix (yes there is something to think about there)
  5. V for Vendetta
  6. Highlander



< Message edited by JohnSteed1967 -- 4/30/2009 6:22:42 PM >

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RE: Which books most shaped how you see things? - 4/30/2009 7:28:20 PM   
Apocalypso


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Status: offline 		Principia Discordia- Macalypse the Younger and Omar Khayyam Ravenhurst
The Illuminatus Trilogy- Robert Shea & Robert Anton Wilson
Homage to Catalonia- George Orwell
The Invisibles- Grant Morrison
The Hunting of the Snark- Lewis Carroll
Fantastic Mr Fox- Roald Dahl
Watchmen- Alan Moore
Small Gods- Terry Pratchett
Don Quixote- Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
Condensed Chaos- Phil Hine
The Situationist Manifesto- Guy Debord
Archers Goon- Diana Wynne Jones
What is Anarchism- Alexander Berkman
Decade of Disorder- Ian Bone
The Robin Hood Legends- Various

That's off the top of my head without even getting into music...






< Message edited by Apocalypso -- 4/30/2009 7:29:45 PM >

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RE: Which books most shaped how you see things? - 4/30/2009 8:42:28 PM   
LookieNoNookie


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quote:

ORIGINAL: amoryblane

I know that many will immediately answer something like "None, only experience shapes how you see the world."  That's one view.  But for some of us nerdy nerd nerds, there are books (or maybe movies or even records) that really have changed or shaped how we see things.

For me, I think the short list is:

Cat's Cradle by Vonnegut
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Adams
This Side of Paradise by Fitzgerald
Beyond Good and Evil by Nietzsche
Coldness and Cruelty by Deleuze.

I guess I'd probably throw in the one volume version of The Golden Bough and/or Burroughs's Naked Lunch, both of which sort of drove home a similar point in my head, though only one of which (the latter) also got me insanely aroused with some of its grotesque, violent, surrealist imagery.



Every book I've ever read.

Books are wonderful.

Books are fabulous.

<----- Book whore.

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RE: Which books most shaped how you see things? - 4/30/2009 10:12:50 PM   
FirmhandKY


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Some notable influences:

Looking Out For Number One by Robert J. Ringer.

Winning Through Intimidation by Robert J. Ringer.

Evidence That Demands a Verdict by Josh McDowell

Animal Farm by George Orwell ("Some Animals are More Equal Than Others" kinda like on this board. )

Starship Trooper by Robert Heinlein

The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress by Robert Heinlein

Wireless Communications: Principles & Practice by Theodore S. Rapport

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RE: Which books most shaped how you see things? - 5/1/2009 5:22:32 AM   
MarsBonfire


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Status: offline 		Yeah... that explains a lot, Firm. (You left out Mein Kampf, BTW...)

Mine would be:

The Tao of Pooh/Te of Piglet by Ben Hoff

Your Rugged Constitution by Bruce and Ester Findlay

Tales of Mystery and Imagination by E.A. Poe

The Harlan Ellison Hornbook/An Edge in my Voice/The Glass Teat and other Essays by Harlan Ellison (taught me the worth of being a dissenter, a pain in the ass to assholes, and what really makes someone great... not just the materialistic BS)

The collected science essays of Issac Asimov.

Those were the most influential... althought he character from the Marvel universe I most related to was probably Ben Grimm.


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RE: Which books most shaped how you see things? - 5/1/2009 6:20:02 AM   
Thunderbird56


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Status: offline 		Not a book, but the U.S. Constitution with the Bill of Rights! Arguably the most important thing ever written by man.

Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand. It's been said that Thomas Jefferson was the father of the Libertarian philosophy, if so, then Ayn Rand was it's mother.

The Big Bang by Simon Singh then, The Elegant Universe by Brian Greene. If you don't have at least a basic understanding of modern physics you might as well believe the Earth is flat and that the sun revolves around it.

Tolkien's Trilogy, if for nothing else than my sometimes signature line:

"... all we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us"  Gandalf the Grey




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RE: Which books most shaped how you see things? - 5/1/2009 6:26:21 AM   
tiinkerbell


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Status: offline 		LOL looking at everyone else's reading list's, I have come to the conclusion that I am a total geek-nerd.
 
Allison

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RE: Which books most shaped how you see things? - 5/1/2009 7:09:28 AM   
samboct


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Status: offline 		I'm another one who was a voracious reader and thus it's hard to pick out what shaped my so called "formative years".  It's funny, but I find that reading some plays that were eye opening- and I did like going to Broadway and seeing them live.  Still do actually-

In the 7th grade I tangled with August Strindberg's Miss Julie,  (depression) while in high school, it was Arthur Miller's All My Sons.  I was/am an airplane nut, and to realize that aviation had a seamy side was very much an eye opener.  I liked Shakespeare, but I must admit, I liked Poe more.  I'm just not sure how much either of the two shaped my thought process though. Also in that category- Herman Hesse- read a lot, but didn't really penetrate all that far.

On slavery, my introduction was Huck Finn-
On the Holocaust, The Diary of Anne Frank.
On Nuclear War- On the Beach- Nevil Shute.  (I've discovered I like a lot of his stuff.)
On Pretentiousness- The Old Man and the Sea.  I discovered I didn't like Hemingway- wasn't crazy about Steinbeck either and I had to deal with all the people that looked at me like I was crazy.  I liked Cannery Row- but my favorite was Travels with Charlie.  My pop's favorite was The Red Pony, and that's when I discovered I had very different taste than him.
On aviation- We- Charles Lindberg.  Some of the short stories by St. Exupery.  I liked Richard Bach's stuff too- way before Jonathon Livingston Seagull (Stranger to the Ground.)  Biographies on Amelia Earhart- "The Search for Amelia Earhart" by Fred Goerner- one of the first conspiracy books I read.  Took me a long time to figure out why people tend to reject such stories.  Later read the stuff by Erich Von Daniken.
On human nature- Les Miserables by Victor Hugo.  I tangled with this in middle school, and the concept that you could have no good choices in your life was a powerful one.
On friendship- Alexandre Dumas- the Three Musketeers, and the Four Musketeers, and 10 years After, and 20 Years After.  Not only that- but the idea of nostalgia being a common thread for humans.

Not mentioned yet- TV shows. One of the strongest influences in my life was a cartoon called "Jonny Quest".  It's not until I saw the cartoons as an adult that I realized what an influence they'd had on me.  The original version of Jonny Quest was about a scientist- his son Jonny, friend/pilot Race Bannon, Haji (Jonny's buddy) and dog Bandit.  The show had scientists, airplanes, villains, lasers, all that fun stuff.  (There's the modern version which sucked- they replaced the science in the original show with magic-phtui....)  The show put the idea in my head that scientists could have an adventurous life- (boy was that wrong....) but it clearly steered me on the path of my later academic career. 


Sam 

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RE: Which books most shaped how you see things? - 5/1/2009 7:16:35 AM   
DomMeinCT


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quote:

ORIGINAL: tiinkerbell

LOL looking at everyone else's reading list's, I have come to the conclusion that I am a total geek-nerd.
 
Allison


You're not alone!  :)

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RE: Which books most shaped how you see things? - 5/1/2009 8:09:37 AM   
samboct


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Status: offline 		Mars

I'm not sure I'd pick on Firm for his reading list- it looks pretty similar to a lot of folks.  And although I often find myself on the other side of a debate with the guy- I've read a bunch of those books too.

What's notably omitted from my list- and I suspect some others-

Justine by the Marquis de Sade.  I read a bowdlerized version in high school- read some more of his stuff in college.  Very unsettling.


Sam

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RE: Which books most shaped how you see things? - 5/2/2009 4:42:44 AM   
NorthernGent


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quote:

ORIGINAL: amoryblane

Beyond Good and Evil by Nietzsche



I'm not particularly widely read; I tend to lose interest unless it's a book that has me gripped; nor do I think books particularly shape me, because there's no substitute for experience (a cat can't live by the laws of a lion just because you tell it it's a good idea, ditto your average man on the street and an enlightened mind).

The best books for me are factual and history based, because I think you understand human behaviour by looking at their actions. I've read collections of poems and letters from soldiers fighting in the trenches during WW1 and found them fascinating and enlightening, the same with accounts from survivors of the holocaust about their experiences in the death camps. I think you learn far more from reading about the way people have actually acted in extreme circumstances, than you could ever do from the likes of Neitzsche (and I picked this out to illustrate the point); who was ultimately one man with a view of the world that was as much shaped by the circumstances of his childhood as anything, and certainly lacked a thorough understanding of human behaviour.

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RE: Which books most shaped how you see things? - 5/2/2009 5:33:42 AM   
Sunnyfey


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Status: offline 		Stranger in a Strangeland -Robert A. Heinlein
Eat chocolate naked (and 142 other ways to be romantic) - Cam Jhonson

TThe last one sounds silly, but it really gave me a new way to look at romance, and how I am responsible for the romance in my life also, not just my lover.


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RE: Which books most shaped how you see things? - 5/2/2009 5:52:35 AM   
stella41b


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Status: offline 		The Dhammapada

The Pali Canon

The Holy Bible

The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner by Alan Sillitoe

The Empty Space by Peter Brook

The Story of my Life by Rudolf Steiner

Stanislavsky's System Pathways for the Actor edited by Alison Hodge

Shah of Shahs by Ryszard Kapuscinski

Brave New World by Aldous Huxley

War of the Worlds by H. G. Wells

Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll

numerous books by Dickens

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RE: Which books most shaped how you see things? - 5/2/2009 6:47:48 AM   
samboct


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"I think you learn far more from reading about the way people have actually acted in extreme circumstances, than you could ever do from the likes of Neitzsche (and I picked this out to illustrate the point); who was ultimately one man with a view of the world that was as much shaped by the circumstances of his childhood as anything, and certainly lacked a thorough understanding of human behaviour."

If your view of literature was correct, we'd make little progress.  The point of literature is to share enlightenment and to pass along the inspiration to others.  As Newton said- If I have seen further than others, it's because I've stood on the shoulders of giants.

Nietzche had some very interesting views on the world and how it was made up.  His writing style was certainly a bit more accessible than  Kant who outlined how our brains must think and the nature of the world merely by inspection in his Critique of Pure Reason, but it's very hard going.  Note that Kant's ideas of how our brain must be organized have predated the tools necessary to do the experiments by over 200 years, but his theories are holding up quite well.

Sam

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RE: Which books most shaped how you see things? - 5/2/2009 7:20:32 AM   
mdr080480


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Status: offline 		In all honesty, the Satanic Bible. From a philosophical standpoint, I became a better person having read an unpopular viewpoint.

Shakespeare's stuff too, I have read many, enjoyed many, would love to read the rest of what I haven't, and reread many of those that I have forgotten.

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RE: Which books most shaped how you see things? - 5/2/2009 8:22:44 AM   
CarrieO


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Status: offline 		There are too many to count, but to name a few:


Early youth...
*Grimm's Fairy Tales
* D'Aulaire's Book of Greek Myths
*The Hobbit
*The Wind in the Willows

Later...
*The Mists of Avalon by Mairon Zimmr Bradley
*The Great Cosmic Mother by Monica Sjoo & Barbara Mor
*The Miracle of Mindfulness and Living Buddha Living Christ both by Thich Nhat Hanh
*The Good Life by Helen and Scott Nearing
*The Second Sex by Simone De Beauvoir
*Peterson's Guide to Eastern/Central Medicinal Plants and Herbs

Just to name a few.

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RE: Which books most shaped how you see things? - 5/2/2009 8:37:10 AM   
MarsBonfire


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Status: offline 		Oh yeah, I remember "The Satanic Bible"... that's the one by Anton Levey... total mish mash of whatever interested him... As I recall, it was his attempt to create a church of his own, so he'd have a steady income stream as he went on into his retirement years.

Pretty much trash, IMO. But then, I find scientology and Gor and other psuedo philosophy and religion to be the same way.

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RE: Which books most shaped how you see things? - 5/2/2009 10:36:37 AM   
susie


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Status: offline 		The one that probably had the biggest influence was Chariots of the Gods by Erich von Daniken.

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RE: Which books most shaped how you see things? - 5/2/2009 2:54:36 PM   
LyraLaLaurie


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A Clockwork Orange :)

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