Favorite Book(s)

[paladinoflunaria]

Hard to rank them, but some of my favorites include 1984, Brave New World, Catch-22, and The Catcher in the Rye. I could list tons of books, and there are people who could list many more than I, so keep it fairly short (if you want ;) ).

[paladinoflunaria]

Almost forgot- Flowers for Algernon and Flatland and Stranger in a Strange Land and Huckleberry Finn.

And... and... and...

[Claverhouse]

This is like asking an alcoholic to list his favourite drinks

So just one for now: the stupendous, the incredible, the unsurpassible: 'JURGEN' by the great James Branch Cabell.

It explains the world to a 15-yr-old.

Even now I can think of other books and authors, but that should stand alone in a post. Will revisit to list others.


Claverhouse :ph34r:

[Johnny]

Current Faves:
Blood Music - Greg Bear
From Rationalism to Existentialism - Robert Solomon

[sme_bro]

'This is like asking an alcoholic to list his favourite drinks '

-so true
'House of Leaves' - have read that once every year for the last 4 years-about to again
'the tommyknockers' - i love almost any Stephen King but this one stands out in my mind
'Jennifer Government' - portrays a libertarian world almost completely run by corporations which for alliences with other companies based on what reward card system they subscribe to, Loved it!!!

so many more but this is all i can recall at the mo

[paladinoflunaria]

What is "House of Leaves" about?

[Melody]

David Brin's Uplift novels.

[Pati]

I'll stick to a few fiction works....
A Wrinkle in Time
The E. Nesbit Books
Most of Sheri Tepper's Books

[HairlessBluetick]

'Jennifer Government' - portrays a libertarian world almost completely run by corporations which for alliences with other companies based on what reward card system they subscribe to, Loved it!!!

Have you seen the webpage of this? It's made by the author. You get to design your own country and then everyday you get "issues" to resolve, which determine how your country develops. Its pretty neat. I think the address is www.nationstates.com .

[BritainOphira]

'Jennifer Government' - portrays a libertarian world almost completely run by corporations which for alliences with other companies based on what reward card system they subscribe to, Loved it!!!

Have you seen the webpage of this? It's made by the author. You get to design your own country and then everyday you get "issues" to resolve, which determine how your country develops. Its pretty neat. I think the address is www.nationstates.com .

Sorry, the website's http://www.nationstates.net

To be more on topic, some of my favorite books at this moment are just about anything by F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Catcher in the Rye, and well, too many others to name...

[Avengardh]

1. The Neverending Story by Michael Ende.
2. Momo by Michael Ende.
3. The Foundation Trilogy by Isaac Asimov.

These aren't books, but plays:

4. The Importance of Being Ernest by Oscar Wilde
5. A Midsummer Night's Dream, Shakespeare.

Graphic Novels:

6. Nausicaa of the Valley of Wind, Hayao Miyazaki.

~*Aven*~

[int]

Fiction:

"The Disposessed" - Ursula K LeGuin
Anything written by Vonnegut

There's lots more but I'm not awake yet.

[Johnny]

Graphic Novels:

6. Nausicaa of the Valley of Wind, Hayao Miyazaki.

This takes me way back. I'd offer The Watchmen and Miracleman by Alan Moore, and Electra by Frank Miller to accompany the list.

[cloakable]

Hmm... think, think
Ah... I'm not going to decide, I have about 150 - 200 books in my flat, and I like all of them (and yes, they are all MY books :D)

[Division56]

I have so many books, and I love them all (just not equally). I have so many that I'm having to remodel my library to fit them, they were taking up too much of the rest of the house.

[allendobkin]

Books! Love em!

[HackerX]

Hard to rank them, but some of my favorites include 1984, Brave New World, Catch-22, and The Catcher in the Rye. I could list tons of books, and there are people who could list many more than I, so keep it fairly short (if you want ;) ).

I'm suprised with a list like that you don't have 1985 and A Clockwork Orange. They're all great books too :)

[Melody]

My favorite are the Uplift novels by David Brin.

Sundiver
Startide Rising
The Uplift War
Brightness Reef
Infinity's Shore
Heaven's Reach

[sme_bro]

What is "House of Leaves" about?

Woah- you cant explain House of Leaves! you have to read it....I highly recomend you read it, most people find it confusing the first time(i didnt) and it is written unlike any other book...worth reading a few times at least.






'Jennifer Government' - portrays a libertarian world almost completely run by corporations which for alliences with other companies based on what reward card system they subscribe to, Loved it!!!

Have you seen the webpage of this? It's made by the author. You get to design your own country and then everyday you get "issues" to resolve, which determine how your country develops. Its pretty neat. I think the address is www.nationstates.com .

Sorry, the website's http://www.nationstates.net


Yeah i saw the site and participated in it for awhile, was fun but restricting...when i left they were getting ready for a new version that you would need to pay to participate in...i figured once they introduced this there would be less people on the origonal so i left.

[jimkopelli]

I'm gonna cheat.
Almost anything by Heinlein, everything by Terry Pratchett, David Eddings many series, and Ayn Rand. Holy crap. Read "Atlas Shrugged", by Rand, and you'll never look at Monopoly the same way again.

[file cabinet]

When I was Five I Killed Myself is good

[Hunter]

The Original Hitchhiker's Trilogy. (The last two...not so good)
The Original Dragonlance Trilogy
Star Wars books...
Brave New World was cool

[libertarianjim]

Parliament of Whores by P.J. O'Rourke.

[Poison Okra]

I love the Abhorsen/Old Kingdom Trilogy by Garth Nix. The books in the series are Sabriel, Lirael, and Abhorsen. The genre is fantasy/science-fiction.

[Avengardh]

I have been wondering, did anyone read The Giver by Lois Lowry, when they were kids?

I still love that book...

~*Aven*~

[Birnam]

The Giver was a great book :)

... how could I list a favorite?!

The best book that I've read recently is 'The Anubis Gates' by Tim Powers

but I'll cheat too:
anything by-
Tolkien
almost anything by-
Diana Jones, LeGuin, O S Card, Jules Verne, Mark Twain...

[howiec]

There are too many. Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf would probably be the novel which I love the most. A few of my favorite poems are The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock by T.S. Elliot; America and Howl by Allen Ginsberg; Ariel, Totem, Poppies in October, Words, Monologue at 3 a.m., and Mad Girl's Love Song by Sylvia Plath; and Wanting to Die, 45 Mercy Street, The Death Baby, and Letters to Dr. Y. by Anne Sexton.

[Laeskis]

Awwww. Why threads like this hurt me. I've several hundred books already; I will not be able to read the ones I have. Here we go introducing more books which sound entirely too interesting.
The pain; the agony of it all...
Anyhoo, Hyperspace, by Michio Kaku is a really really good one...though I've lost my copy.
Genesis Revisited is cool one too, though absolutely absurd and completely insubstantial.
Any Tokein book.
All Wheel of Time books.
Piers Anthony's Incarnations of Immortality series is amusing.
moremoremoreblabbityblah; I think I will shut up now.
No wait.... Lewis Carroll rocks too! (despite the pedophilic obsession...thing)

[Dengarm]

Ooooh! Where to begin?

Where am I Now - When I Need Me by George Axelrod
Don't Stop the Carneval by Herman Wouk
The Illuminatus Trilogy by . . . someone
Schott's Origanal Miscalleny
The Long Dark Teatime of the Soul by Douglass Adams

[Claverhouse]

The Illuminatus Trilogy by . . . someone

Robert Anton Wilson ?


See this link to the grand old forum:

R. Anton Wilson Homepage & the late James Martin (http://intp.1.forumer.com/index.php?showtopic=353)


Claverhouse :ph34r:

[Dengarm]

yeah thats it. I always remember the initials (RAW is easy to remember) but forget the actual name.

Principa Discordia is great too. It's the only book I've been able to read on a computer screen. http://www.principiadiscordia.com/book/9.php

[nobarcode]

The Illuminatus Trilogy by . . . someone

Robert Anton Wilson ?


See this link to the grand old forum:

R. Anton Wilson Homepage & the late James Martin (http://intp.1.forumer.com/index.php?showtopic=353)


Claverhouse :ph34r:

Yes, he co-authored it. It was actually a meant to be a parody when they first wrote it.


yeah thats it. I always remember the initials (RAW is easy to remember) but forget the actual name.

Principa Discordia is great too. It's the only book I've been able to read on a computer screen. http://www.principiadiscordia.com/book/9.php

Robert Anton Wilson contributed to the book and the whole discordian movement (lol). He is one of my favorites (*edit*-Actually I would consider him more influential to me than any other writer), therefore my sig.
http://www.rawilson.com/main.shtml

[jimkopelli]

Schott's Origanal Miscalleny

Yes! Someone else has discovered the goodness that is the Miscellany! What was your favorite bit? I like the "Curious Deaths of Burmese Kings" and all the sections on commonplace languages.

[s]

Hard to rank them, but some of my favorites include 1984, Brave New World, Catch-22, and The Catcher in the Rye. I could list tons of books, and there are people who could list many more than I, so keep it fairly short (if you want ;) ).

Nice list, looks a lot like mine. Catcher is my number one and I would like to add Ender's Game, On the Road, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest... a few more fictions, plus Webster's Dicitionary and any encyclopedia.

[jimkopelli]

I told him to read a lot of those. Have you read Ayn Rand? You need to read Ayn Rand.

[waxwing]

Breakfast of Champions - Kurt Vonnegut
Steppenwolf - Hermann Hesse
The Bluest Eye - Toni Morrison
Naked - David Sedaris
The Unbearable Lightness of Being - Milan Kundera
Black Lamb and Grey Falcon - Rebecca West
What We Talk About When We Talk About Love - stories by Raymond Carver
Questions about Angels - poems by Billy Collins

[giftedmadness@hotmail.com]

Crime and Punishment.
The Idiot.


Okay, so I don't read that much or give authors a chance or know anyone else who actually likes to read. ;- /

[Horger]

Well right now I'm reading a book called Plainsong for my English composition class. I really like it.

The Chronicles of Narnia ( well, 7 book series)
The Giver (7th grade english hahaha)

For a period I was a total dork, and I read fantasy novels by Piers Anthony. It was pretty amusing when I was like 12.

[crule81]

Non-fiction: "The Stuggle for Mastery in Europe" - A.J.P. Taylor
"Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire" - Edward Gibbon (first volume)

Fiction - Harry Turtledove - alternate history novels: "Agent of Byzantium," "Great War" series.
- Asimov - whole Foundation series from "Caves of Steel" except the end of "Foundation and Earth" which was a terrible conclusion to the story.
- Rand - "Fountainhead"

Plays - anything by Shakespeare except the first half of "Pericles" (which he probably and hopefully didn't write)

Biography - William Manchester - two volume Churchill biography

[EternalCynic]

Demian by Hermann Hesse
Steppenwolf by Hermann Hesse
Siddartha by Hermann Hesse (do we see a pattern?)

Most things by Neil Gaiman, though I've never read the Sandman series

Currently reading Crime and Punishment (I like it so far)

Hmmm.. oh, duh! A Wrinkle in Time (and the sequels up until 'Many Waters'.. though that one was okay)

[gypseymothlee]

anything by Chuck Palahniuk or Neil Gaiman
Stargirl by spinelli
The Life of Insects by victor pelvin
White Oleander by janet fitch
Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi
The World According to Garp by John Irving

I also liked House of Leaves, especially the minotaur footnotes.
Best when read while listening to Poe's Haunted cd, so you can point out refernces to the book and feel clever.

[Arcael]

i would have to say:

Siddhartha
House of Leaves (*favorite)
1984
Fear and Loathing in Los Vegas
Lamb: The Gospel as told by Biff, Jesus's Childhood friend (may not be exact)
and The Illiad and the Odyssey

[lauriep]

Picking favorite books is like asking a mother to pick her favorite child, it's cruel.

I'll cheat and pick authors, still hard but a little easier. Tolstoy, Kim Stanley Robinston, Tennyson, Sagan, Tolkein, Bronte, Frank Herbert, & Brian Jacques (he writes kid books - good for a light read when you're under the weather), etc.....

[officebum1978]

Has anyone read Kafka The Castle?

[Slider]

The Picture of Dorian Gray
The Rum Diaries, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
Treasure Island, The Strange Case of Dr. Jeckyll and Mr. Hyde
Cat's Cradle
Nine Stories, Catcher in the Rye

ugh, too difficult to choose. how bout authors:

wilde
hunter thompson
robert louis stevenson
vonnegut
salinger
mark twain
graham greene
william burroughs
bukowski
harry crews
brautigan (just getting into him)
dee rimbaud (same here, he's not well known though)
faulkner

looks like I discriminate on gender, lol. ahh but I do like madeline l'engle and jk rowling . . .

[Durroch]

The Blue Sword (some kids had blankies, I had a book), Phantom of the Opera, Ummmm...

Authors!
Austen
Tolkein
Lewis
McKinley
McKillip
Hugo

Bah... I'm going to go to bed.

[Chill]

vonnegut


Ah yes Vonnegut. One of the funnest papers I've written was my Highschool senior paper on Vonnegut's Timequake

[mgb]

Such A Long Journey - Mistry
On the Road - Kerouac
All of Oscar Wilde's short stories.

[Dman]

Whoa. You guys rock, I've seen about every book on my top ten listed here already - 1984, chronicles of Narnia, tommyknockers, neverending story, ender's game, etc. etc.

Clan of the cave bear was good, never read the sequels though. Same with Dune.

The Stand, and the gunslinger series (especially number 3) are more of Stephen King's classic epics.

Never read any Ayn Rand though, I've heard she's very good. Which one would be best to start with?

[mgb]

My favorite Stephen King book (and I did like the Stand) was Eyes of the Dragon. I used to read his books a lot and it was the only one of his books that was more of a fantasy...that may have changed since the never-ending factory of Stephen King just keeps going. Also I really enjoyed David Eddings Bulgariad and Mallorean series. But I haven't read fantasy in years.

[Dman]

Oh yeah, has anyone ever read the short story "The Long Afternoon of Earth" by Brian Aldiss? Really cool story, I remember reading it in high school & wanting more. I think there is actually a novel, "Hothouse", that is the full version, but I've never seen it.

[tragula]

I can highly recommend anything by P.G. Wodehouse. I think it is very INTP type of dry witty humor. People who like Douglas Adams should plug right in! It may seem a bit high brow, being about Brittish aristocrats mainly, but they are very "light" and fun actually.

Some are a bit "romancey" also, if that is a turn on or off for anyone.

He wrote A LOT, I would suggest starting with his Jeeves series.

[Chill]

Never read any Ayn Rand though, I've heard she's very good. Which one would be best to start with?

There is a thread about her here: http://forums.intpcentral.com/showthread.php?t=1154

[alex]

An excellent book I finished last week:
Lolita by Vladmir Nabokov
Subject matter is somewhat controversial (underage love); written and told insanely well.

[Zero Angel]

The Art Of War (Denma Translation)
This book is the Art of War, which translates Sun Tzu's teachings as well as interpretations and essays on the nature of 'The Sage Commander' and taking the enemy whole without destroying him for the greater benefit of all involved, and also how to influence others by bringing them to see which is the greater and ultimate good, it helps you understand things such as deception, spies, advantage and the best time to strike. I never read the other versions/translations however this book has helped me a lot to develop my strategic and diplomatic intelligences because the concepts can be integrated into intuition. Worth reading through several times because it is a contemplative book and although the knowledge is broken up into easily-digestable chunks, as a whole it is highly compressed so you may have to read the book several times to absorb the knowledge fully.

[cjs55]

Lolita is a huge book, and very important in my life, especially in tempering rhetorical passions after Whitman.

[Claverhouse]

I can highly recommend anything by P.G. Wodehouse. I think it is very INTP type of dry witty humor. People who like Douglas Adams should plug right in! It may seem a bit high brow, being about Brittish aristocrats mainly, but they are very "light" and fun actually.

Some are a bit "romancey" also, if that is a turn on or off for anyone.

He wrote A LOT, I would suggest starting with his Jeeves series.

I grew up collecting all Wodehouse stuff from the age of 12 onwards & literally can't imagine this world without him. But... whilst Big Money is my very favourite, the Ukridge stories ( on the brilliant personality of Stanley Featherstonehaugh Ukridge and his shifty penniless life ) are excellent beyond words.

After getting being given a drive in someone's car, a girl gets mildly hit by the car ( her fault ); he pretends to be the owner to impress her, then introduces himself to her lower-class family: over the next month or so he goes around constantly impressing them with his assumed/real status in order to join them at meals and shopping. Just before they select him as a future son-in-law, he has to look after her siblings whilst they go shopping and he complains about this to his friend.


'You see, I dislike subterfuge'
Since there was no chance of him topping this, I withdrew.
But then there are the Blandings stories. And anything with the impulsive and adorable Roberta Wickham ( in the Mulliner stories and Jeeves stories )...

It's mainly his 1910 - 1920s occasionally more serious novels that display a weakness of sentimentality. But this twin striving for seriousness and sentimental depth could afflict almost any good writer of that period periodically. Edgar Wallace was a fine writer with a nice line in cynical irony; yet the same author who could put things succinctly on the slum-dwellers then ( he had grown up as a child amongst them ):

Hearing sounds and laughter,

'I wonder what they do there ?'
'I should hate to know'
was fairly unsuccessful in his more solemn books and the depraved feminism implicit in many of his writings was so explicit in his final book as to make it practically unreadable. ( However, like Dickson Carr/Carter Dickson, he was brilliant at producing marvellous and believable young heroines*: nothing to do with that vice mentioned. )

*Usually with clear grey eyes and a simple beauty.


Back to PGW: on a newspaper tycoon like Lord Northcliffe from Service with a Smile:


Lord Tilbury had wealth and power and the comforting knowledge that, catering as he did for readers who had all been mentally arrested at the age of twelve, he would continue to enjoy these indefinitely.


Claverhouse :ph34r:

[tragula]

Nice to see there is another Wodehouse fan around! I suppose I shouldn't be surprised, as people here seem to have things in common to an almost bizarre extent!
I've read like maybe 20+ of his books so far. They are quite addictive...
The sentimentality doesn't actually bother me, I'm a bit of a sucker for a sappy romance. Which is perhaps why, curiously the Ukridge stories are my least favorite ones. They may be well crafted but the oiliness of Ukridge, always hitting people up for a "touch" doesn't work for me.
Now the Golf stories really strike a chord, so much so that they make me want to take up the game someday, and I never thought I'd be a golfer in a million years. :-)

[Edmond Zedo]

Robot Dreams by Asimov, then Jurassic Park by Chrichton, now Master & Commander by O'Brian.

[melancholeric]

1984, Brave New world, Crime and Punishment, all of those have been mentioned though. I need to read more. Animal Farm by Orwell was quite good, and Homage to Catalonia.

[MjrMarshmellows]

1984, Brave New World, Crime and Punishment, Catcher in the Rye, The Great Gatsby, Slaughter-house five, Cats Cradle, Catch 22, The Hobbit, Enders Game, The hitchhikers guide, The things they carried, and SOO many more!

[Wilde Mutton]

- anything by Vonnegut
- anything by Kafka
- anything by Orwell, but particularly the book about being poor (can´t remeber its name though)
- anything by Wilde, but his only novel ("The Picture of Dorian Gray) has a special place in my heart
- anything by Chehov
- anything by Gogol
- anything by Dostoyevski
- anything by Gaarder
- anything by Christie
- anything by (Samuel) Beckett, but "Waiting for Godot" in particular
- (almost) anything by Poe
- a bit by Doyle
- a bit by (John) Irving
- "Catch-22" by Heller
- "The Crying of Lot 49" by Pynchon
- "Also sprach Zarathustra" by Nietzsche

and the list goes on...

[melancholeric]

- anything by Orwell, but particularly the book about being poor (can´t remeber its name though)
Down and out in Paris and London? Just read it some time ago. Good book. Not my favorite Orwell book though. Homage to Catalonia was better.

[Wilde Mutton]

Down and out in Paris and London? Just read it some time ago. Good book. Not my favorite Orwell book though. Homage to Catalonia was better.

Objectively, yes. However, I will always connect this particular book with another, brilliant piece by a completely different author, Robert McLiam Wilson´s "Ripley Bogle"...the style has been mimicked and the humorous, misanthropic, humane voice built to an eversoaring crescendo...

[kuranes]

I saw someone recommending "1985' in distinction to "1984" early on in the thread, and I must admit I never heard of it. I will additionally be on the lookout for Dee Rimbaud. Any relation to Arthur? "Ripley Bogle" is also a new one on me. And Gaarder.

P.G. Wodehouse! Great! The first one I read is still my favorite, perhaps because of that. But I can't remember the title. "Pigs have Wings"? It had an old man in it with an obsession that people were trying to steal his pig. I enjoyed the Psmith book I read too. Then I heard there was a whole SERIES on Psmith, like there is a Jeeves series. Not sure which Psmith it was I read. "Psmith to the Rescue" comes to mind, but I could be wrong. Wodehouse's humor and plotting style is so distinctive that many other authors have adopted the basics of it, even though their stories are less romantic comedy and more something else. John Dickson Carr is a good example of this. Even Jack Vance admitted to it. I was struck by a resemblance to Wodehouse while reading Kingsley Amis' "Lucky Jim", too.

Certainly Kafka is in a class by himself.

Brautigan's best was "In Watermelon Sugar" IMHO. I still like him better than Tom Robbins, but I saw a resemblance between the two at one point.

I enjoy a lot of genre writing too. Sci-Fi, Mystery, Suspense, and Fantasy.

Also travel books and similar non-fiction such as John McPhee, Paul Theroux, and Bill Bryson. I got to meet Bryson once, as I did Colin Wilson too. ( Colin was a bit tight, as they say in England, but he still spelled his name correctly. )

K

[tragula]

P.G. Wodehouse! Great! The first one I read is still my favorite, perhaps because of that. But I can't remember the title. "Pigs have Wings"? It had an old man in it with an obsession that people were trying to steal his pig. I enjoyed the Psmith book I read too. Then I heard there was a whole SERIES on Psmith, like there is a Jeeves series. Not sure which Psmith it was I read. "Psmith to the Rescue" comes to mind, but I could be wrong. Wodehouse's humor and ploitting style is so distinctive that many other authors have adopted the basics of it, even though their stories are less romantic comedy and more something else. John Dickson Carr is a good example of this. Even Jack Vance admitted to it. I was struck by a resemblance to Wodehouse while reading Kingsley Amis' "Lucky Jim", too.


K

There are at least a couple other big Wodehouse fans around here! Me and Claverhouse. 8O

My favorite is always the last one I've read. I particularly liked the golf stories though. There are so many of them that after a while it's hard to keep track and remember which ones you've read already!

[Fingers]

1984 - Orwell
Carl Von Clauswitz - On War
Nietzsche - Thus Spake Zarathustra
Hagakure - Yamamoto Tsunetomo
Omerta - Mario Puzo
anything by Roald Dahl

[Claverhouse]

Down and out in Paris and London? Just read it some time ago. Good book. Not my favorite Orwell book though. Homage to Catalonia was better.
My favourite is 'Coming Up For Air', about a fattish middle-aged lower middle class man taking a sudden break from his tedious life to revisit where he grew up before WWI, and finding out how it has been spoilt; since the time is just before WWII, it's full of angst.

Apparently, Americans never took much to the book: much as the British never really got Thomas Wolfe ( 'Look Homeward, Angel', not the present Tom Wolfe ).



Claverhouse :ph34r:

[Claverhouse]

P.G. Wodehouse! Great! The first one I read is still my favorite, perhaps because of that. But I can't remember the title. "Pigs have Wings"? It had an old man in it with an obsession that people were trying to steal his pig. From memory... 'Uncle Fred in the Springtime' ? or 'Service with a Smile' perhaps. Uncle Fred is the Earl of Twickenham ( Twickenham is a long the Thames towards Windsor: real place, Pope lived there, but not a romantic place for an earldom ) star of PGW's best short story: 'Uncle Fred Flits By', pure suave brutality...



I enjoyed the Psmith book I read too. Then I heard there was a whole SERIES on Psmith, like there is a Jeeves series. Not sure which Psmith it was I read. "Psmith to the Rescue" comes to mind, but I could be wrong. About 3 or 4... 'Psmith in the City' ( Wodehouse started off as a bank-clerk ), 'Psmith Journalist' set in old New York, and 'Leave it to Psmith'. I can't say I've read every Wodehouse book so there may be more.

Here's some of his early stuff online at Arthur's Classic Novels - Wodehouse (http://arthursclassicnovels.com/arthurs/wodehouse.html)

It's difficult to explain, but it's far easier to read his works in the original 1930s editions by his publisher Herbert Jenkins ( himself an author of the WWI period, mostly comic novels about a removal man called Bindle, rather sentimental, class-conscious and predictibly anti-german: but useful ); by the 1960s this had become Barrie & Jenkins and were often very small print and ugly; since then like most modern books the font is OK, but the paper is rubbish. Those 1930s books I read at school and cost about 50p - £2 each; in the last decade they've shot up to an average of £25 and for first editions up to about £300... This means kids in the future will be disbarred from reading books as they were when they came out. [ Should they grow up in homes with any books in them at all... ]


Colin Wilson too. ( Colin was a bit tight, as they say in England, but he still spelled his name correctly. ) Interesting; he's regarded as a bit of a odd bird here. Outside say, the ghost-hunting fraternity and astrology, the paranormal is rather frowned upon.


Also I may point out that reading online is a poor substitute at best for holding a book. Since due to the scarcity of older books for reasons above, I decided it was no use ever expecting to find the old cheap early 20th copies of Robert Barr and Joseph C. Lincoln ever again I downloaded the extant Project Gutenberg texts etc. Reading stuff like that in Notepad+ or via a browser is not at all fun...



Claverhouse :ph34r:


PS Note Arthur's cute favicon. Black & Gold.

[Claverhouse]

Hm, a hat-trick...

Just to mention that on Arthur's site there is also a section devoted to Bret Harte (http://arthursclassicnovels.com/arthurs/harte.html), and this includes his excellent parodies which I never thought to see again ( I had a copy, dated about 1900, but the paper was made of some sort of china-clay and kept crumbling: never seen anything like it elsewhere, thankfully )

New Burlesques (http://www.arthursclassicnovels.com/arthurs/harte/nbrlq10.html)

Condensed Novels (http://www.arthursclassicnovels.com/arthurs/harte/cndns10.html)

I'm not as well read as this may imply, since though I read voraciously until I discovered the internet nothing would induce me to read either the Brontes ( any of them ) nor certain long-dead authors like Hall Caine; yet the grounding enables me mysteriously enough to recognise that his take-offs are pretty brilliant...

Charlotte Bronte

He had never once looked at me. He stood with his back to the fire, which set off the herculean breadth of his shoulders. His face was dark and expressive; his under jaw squarely formed, and remarkably heavy. I was struck with his remarkable likeness to a Gorilla.As he absently tied the poker into hard knots with his nervous fingers, I watched him with some interest. Suddenly he turned toward me:--
"Do you think I'm handsome, young woman?"
"Not classically beautiful," I returned calmly; "but you have, if I may so express myself, an abstract manliness,--a sincere and wholesome barbarity which, involving as it does the naturalness--" But I stopped, for he yawned at that moment,--an action which singularly developed the immense breadth of his lower jaw,--and I saw he had forgotten me. Presently he turned to the housekeeper:--
"Leave us."
The old woman withdrew with a courtesy.
Mr. Rawjester deliberately turned his back upon me and remained silent for twenty minutes. I drew my shawl the more closely around my shoulders and closed my eyes.
"You are the governess?" at length he said.
"I am, sir."
"A creature who teaches geography, arithmetic, and the use of the globes--ha!--a wretched remnant of femininity,--a skimp pattern of girlhood with a premature flavor of tea-leaves and morality. Ugh!"
I bowed my head silently.
"Listen to me, girl!" he said sternly; "this child you have come to teach--my ward--is not legitimate. She is the offspring of my mistress,--a common harlot. Ah! Miss Mix, what do you think of me now?"
"I admire," I replied calmly, "your sincerity. A mawkish regard for delicacy might have kept this disclosure to yourself. I only recognize in your frankness that perfect community of thought and sentiment which should exist between original natures."
Victor Hugo

When a man commits a crime, society claps him in prison. A prison is one of the worst hotels imaginable. The people there are low and vulgar. The butter is bad, the coffee is green. Ah, it is horrible!
In prison, as in a bad hotel, a man soon loses, not only his morals, but what is much worse to a Frenchman, his sense of refinement and delicacy.
Jean Valjean came from prison with confused notions of society. He forgot the modern peculiarities of hospitality. So he walked off with the Bishop's candlesticks.
Let us consider: candlesticks were stolen; that was evident. Society put Jean Valjean in prison; that was evident, too. In prison, Society took away his refinement; that is evident, likewise.
Who is Society?
You and I are Society.
My friend, you and I stole those candlesticks!

Charles Dickens

Don't tell me that it wasn't a knocker. I had seen it often enough, and I ought to know. So ought the three-o'clock beer, in dirty high-lows, swinging himself over the railing, or executing a demoniacal jig upon the doorstep; so ought the butcher, although butchers as a general thing are scornful of such trifles; so ought the postman, to whom knockers of the most extravagant description were merely human weaknesses, that were to be pitied and used. And so ought, for the matter of that, etc., etc., etc.

But then it was SUCH a knocker. A wild, extravagant, and utterly incomprehensible knocker. A knocker so mysterious and suspicious that Policeman X 37, first coming upon it, felt inclined to take it instantly in custody, but compromised with his professional instincts by sharply and sternly noting it with an eye that admitted of no nonsense, but confidently expected to detect its secret yet. An ugly knocker; a knocker with a hard, human face, that was a type of the harder human face within. A human face that held between its teeth a brazen rod. So hereafter, in the mysterious future should be held, etc., etc.

But if the knocker had a fierce human aspect in the glare of day, you should have seen it at night, when it peered out of the gathering shadows and suggested an ambushed figure; when the light of the street lamps fell upon it, and wrought a play of sinister expression in its hard outlines; when it seemed to wink meaningly at a shrouded figure who, as the night fell darkly, crept up the steps and passed into the mysterious house; when the swinging door disclosed a black passage into which the figure seemed to lose itself and become a part of the mysterious gloom; when the night grew boisterous and the fierce wind made furious charges at the knocker, as if to wrench it off and carry it away in triumph. Such a night as this.


Geez, Dickens. Sometimes it's difficult to forgive him.





Claverhouse :ph34r:

[kuranes]

I like Dickens. There was a great pastiche of his style written by a man called Charles Palliser, who has an advanced degree specializing in Victorian lit. It's called "The Quincunx". Soon I will read "Hard Times" and "David Copperfield" for the first time. I started as a young man with "Oliver Twist", and of course read "A Christmas Carol" too, back then. After seeing the original movie. I wonder what I would think of them nowadays? Of course all the surprises are gone now, but I might still get something out of it. I am not one for re-reading books much, except for my absolute favorite authors. These may be books that were part of my life when it was changing, even if they're not considered great literature. So that I not only remember the book's world, but the times in my own life it reminds me of.

[trendal]

It's so hard to pick only a handful from so many good books which I have read...

That being said, some of my favorites are:

Fiction:
1984
Brave New World
The Hitch Hiker's Guide series
The Foundation series
The Wheel of Time series
Alice in Wonderland & Through the Looking Glass

Non-fiction:
The Elegant Universe
The Fabric of the Cosmos
Sync

[tragula]

Here's some of his early stuff online at Arthur's Classic Novels - Wodehouse (http://arthursclassicnovels.com/arthurs/wodehouse.html)

It's difficult to explain, but it's far easier to read his works in the original 1930s editions by his publisher Herbert Jenkins ( himself an author of the WWI period, mostly comic novels about a removal man called Bindle, rather sentimental, class-conscious and predictibly anti-german: but useful ); by the 1960s this had become Barrie & Jenkins and were often very small print and ugly; since then like most modern books the font is OK, but the paper is rubbish.


Claverhouse :ph34r:


PS Note Arthur's cute favicon. Black & Gold.


Fun Link. Thanks!

I've read Piccadilly Jim. Rather liked that one.
:)

Over here Wodehouse (I can't bring myself to call him Plum) is being re-introduced in very classy hardcovers, on nice paper with eminently readable type.
Of course they are quite pricey... but if you think of them as investments it's a lot easier to justify. :whistle:

[Partial Observer]

One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez

I really don't read very much though, not fiction anyway.

[Sackanaka]

I'm wondering if anyone has read "The Know-It-All" by AJ Jacobs. I've read about 20 pages at B&N; not only did it make me laugh inappropriately loud, but I have a feeling that the author has an INTP tone.
Recommended to buy?

[Madrigal]

All Men Are Mortal

(By Simone de Beauvoir)

[kendoiwan]

If I had to recomend one author, my hands down favorite is R.A. Salvatore, I've read everything he's ever written for Forgotten Realms, and the Demon Wars Saga. His written for other companies but I never got into them.

Whose idea was this? Asking a junkie which pipe is his favorite?

[attila_the_hunny]

I, Claudius by Robert Graves
The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera
Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov
The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand.

[Pan]

I'll restrict myself to a handful of stuff that hasn't been mentioned already

fantasy/sci-fi
Douglas Adams: Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency
Steven Brust: Cowboy Feng's Space Bar and Grill, Jhereg (and some of the sequels)
Roger Zelazny: Lord of Light, Doorways in the Sand, (the Amber books are fun, too)
William Gibson: Neuromancer
John Brunner: Stand on Zanzibar
Phillip K Dick: A Scanner Darkly, Ubik

children's
AA Milne: The House at Pooh Corner
Grahame: The Wind in the Willows (esp. "The Piper at the Gates of Dawn" and "Wayfarers All" - the more poetic chapters)

other
Steinbeck: Grapes of Wrath
Milton: Paradise Lost (I HIGHLY recommend this if you enjoy and are comfortable reading Shakespeare - but you'll still need all the footnotes the first time through)
Rushdie: The Ground Beneath Her Feet
Naipaul: The Enigma of Arrival

[sowega]

I have read so many books I can think of them all, but a fewof my favorites that I can pull from a hat are:

Faust (Goethe's version), Brothers Karamozov, Hamlet, King Lear, Gordon Pyme (Poe), The Mysterious Island, Huck Finn, Lord of the Rings, and so on.

Many of you mentioned interestingly, Cather and the Rye. I found it to be a good book, but to dramatic and personal (too much angst) for my liking.

INTP, 5w6 sx

[Master O]

i hate to jump on a band wagon, but I just read "A Million Little Pieces" and it is as good as the hype says it is. I recommend it to everyone regardless of whether or not you've dealt with addiction.

The author is truly one of the strongest people on the planet. Sounds like a strange description of an addict, but if you read the book, you'll get it.

the style is so enjoyable that it is a very fast and (ironically) addicting read.

[Trystorp]

There are so many....

Guns, Germs and Steel by Jared Diamond
Masters of Rome Series by Colleen McCullough
Asimov's Foundation and Robot Series
The Ender Series by Orson Scott Card
I, Claudius and Claudius the God by Robert Graves
King Jesus by Robert Graves
Red Mars, Blue Mars, Green Mars by Kim Stanley Robinson
Edward Rutherfurd's books - Sarum, London, Russka, The Forest, etc..
Herman Hesse - Magister Ludi, Steppenwolf, Siddartha
There are two errors in the the title of this book by Robert M. Martin
Juvenal's Satires
Sun Tzu's Art of War
Clausewitz's On War
Lord of the Rings - Tolkien
Herodotus' Histories
A World Lit Only by Fire by William Manchester
Suetonius - The Twelve Caesars
A Canticle for Leibowitz by Walter M. Miller, Jr.
Steven Saylor's Rome Mysteries

And many, many others.

[mjolinar]

Wow, a lot to pick from.....

for lighter reading I would say

-R.A. Salvatore: all the Drizzt books
-Douglass Adams: The Hitchhikers Guide
-Neil Gaiman (SP?): American Gods and Neverwhere.

For Deeper or Darker reading
-Ayn Rand: Atlass Shrugged (started it the other day, i'm about half way through)
-Dante: Inferno
-Pato's Socratic Diologues
Anything Lovecraft
Anything Poe

[expired]

i hate to jump on a band wagon, but I just read "A Million Little Pieces" and it is as good as the hype says it is. I recommend it to everyone regardless of whether or not you've dealt with addiction.

The author is truly one of the strongest people on the planet. Sounds like a strange description of an addict, but if you read the book, you'll get it.

the style is so enjoyable that it is a very fast and (ironically) addicting read.


I just read that. I loved the author... and the way he thought. Did you get that too?

I'll admit it. I was concerned to find that it was Oprah's book club read, but I read it anyway. I'm happy that I did.

I didn't like the way that Oprah interpreted it though. That was annoying.

[nonsequitur]

Too many to list, honestly. But top of my list (always):

Harper Lee's "To Kill a Mockingbird" - probably my no. 1 favourite book, and the only one out of my compulsory reading list for lit. in school that I loved.
Madeleine L'Engle's books - there are far too many to list, but the Time Quartet is probably her most famous work. Also liked "A Ring of Endless Light".
Jostein Gaarder's "Sophie's World" - the first book on philosophy that I read. But I also loved "The Solitaire Mystery", "The Christmas Mystery", "Through a Glass, Darkly", "Maya" and "Vita Brevis". I like most of his work.
Terry Pratchett - again, far too many to list.
Antoine de Saint Exupery - "The Little Prince"
Louis de Benieres - "Captain Corelli's Mandolin"
I have a crush on Jane Austen too.
There must be more, but this is all that I can list offhand..

*edited to take out most of the "love"s..* :ph34r:

[nihilist]

I am going to refrain from listing the obvious classics about alienated intellectuals. Off the top of my head...

Michael Chabon-The Mysteries of Pittsburgh, Wonder Boys(also a decent movie)
Joseph Heller-Something Happened, Catch-22
Charles Bukowski-Post Office, Tales of Ordinary Madness, You get So Alone at Times That It Just Makes Sense(an anthology of poems in free verse)
Bret Easton Ellis-Less Than Zero, American Psycho
Chuck Palahniuk-Choke
Richard Perez-The Loser's Club
Don DeLillo-Mao II, White Noise
Phillip K. Dick, an underrated and probably my favorite sf author--Ubik, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, Time Out of Joint, A Scanner Darkly
Pat Cadigan-Synners

[Dunearhp]

Most of my favourites have already been listed, so I'll just add:
The Jungle Book - Rudyard Kipling.
The Known Space (i.e. Ringworld universe) books - Larry Niven.
Some of Theodore Sturgeon's stuff.
Anything by Neil Gaiman.

[TPol]

When I get time to start reading again, this is where I'll come for suggestions. Meanwhile, without reading the lists above me, I'll list mine and hope there aren't too many repeats that simply make the list boring:

Ellen G. White's "Desire of Ages" (Christian Biography of Jesus)
Orson Scott Card's "Enders" series (Science Fiction)
Kathleen O'Neal Gear/W. Michael Gear's "People of..." series (anthropological/archeological Fiction)
Wilbur Smith's "Seventh Scroll" and "River God" (somewhat anthropological fiction)
Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged" and "Fountainhead" (Fiction)
Lois Lowry's "The Giver," "Gathering Blue," "Number the Stars," "A Summer to Die," and "The Silent Boy" (philosophical/historical/futuristic)
James Gurney's "Dinotopia" books (YA/fantasy)
Sheri S. Tepper's "A Plague of Angels" (SciFi/Fantasy)
Josephine Cunnington Edwards' "Swift Arrow" (YA western)
Dr. Temple Grandin's "Thinking in Pictures" (Autobiography)
Mira Rothenberg's "Children with Emerald Eyes" (Non-Fiction science/psychology)
C.S. Lewis' "Chronicles of Narnia" series (YA Fiction)
Henry David Thoreau's "Walden" (Fiction/philosophical)
George Orwell's "1984" (Fiction/futuristic/philosophical)
Aldous Huxley's "Brave New World" (Fiction/futuristic/philosophical)
John Steinbeck's "The Pearl" and "Grapes of Wrath" (Fiction/historical)
Walt Morey's books (YA/animal)
Jean M. Auel's "Earth Children" series (Fiction/anthropological)
Gary Paulsen's "Hatchet" (Fiction/YA survival)
Jean Craighead George's "Julie of the Wolves," "My Side of the Mountain," "On the Far Side of the Mountain" (Fiction/YA survival)
Gavin Maxwell's "Ring of Bright Water" (Autobiography/wilderness/animal)
Ardath Mayhar's "Medicine Walk" (Fiction/YA survival)
Madeleine L'Engle "A Wrinkle in Time," several others (Fiction/YA fantasy/scifi)
Mary Summer Rain's "Seventh Mesa," "Spirit Song" (Fiction/new age)
Frank Herbert's "Dune" series (SciFi Fiction)
Douglas Adams' "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" (Humor Fiction)
John Jakes' "Homeland" (Historical Fiction)
Marguerite Henry's "Misty of Chincoteague" series (YA fiction/horses)
Yann Martel's "Life of Pi" (Fiction? Yes...or is it?)
etc.

Edit: suddenly wonders if a certain INTPc member got his username from a Walt Morey book about a dog.

[ingenting]

A few:
Jens Bjørneboe - History of bestiality (trilogy)
Fyodor Dostoevsky - The possessed, Crime and punishment
Orwell - 1984

[Master O]

I just read that. I loved the author... and the way he thought. Did you get that too?

I'll admit it. I was concerned to find that it was Oprah's book club read, but I read it anyway. I'm happy that I did.

I didn't like the way that Oprah interpreted it though. That was annoying.
yeah, I take Oprah with a grain of salt quite often. She likes to turn things around to demonstrate how special she is. She'll often get excited just to be cute. Still, with so many of her staff also raving about this book and the fact that they brought it to her and not vice versa, I had pretty high hopes; especially after I saw him interviewed.

I'm considering buying his second book so I can learn more about Leonard.

[PenguinHunter]

There's a bunch but a very interesting book I read recently is The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro. Partly about the decline of Britain and the Empire, partly about getting old and the nature of "serving." It's got that kind of perfect understatement that leaves you feeling melancholy but you can't quite figure out why.

[Trystorp]

Ellen G. White's "Desire of Ages" (Christian Biography of Jesus)


My mother was a Seventh-Day Adventist and after I dropped out of university for 18 months she offered to help pay my tuition if I would attend an SDA university. I found the level of education at the school to be quite good and completed my degree there. I was required to take some religion courses, most of which I didn't mind as I, despite being agnostic, have an interest in the concept. I haven't read "Desire of Ages" but "The Great Controversy" was required reading in a History of Christianity course. I didn't come out of it with any great respect for Ellen White, who apparently plagiarized a good deal of her writings, including "Desire of Ages".

[Marble Wry]

A few:
Jens Bjørneboe - History of bestiality (trilogy)
Fyodor Dostoevsky - The possessed, Crime and punishment
Orwell - 1984

The Possessed- loved this book. Possibly Dostoyevsky's finest work.

[djeikyb]

Never read any Ayn Rand though, I've heard she's very good. Which one would be best to start with?
_The Fountainhead_. _Atlas Shrugged_ is cooler, but the former is more palatable. She did a short story or novella or something. Be forewarned: it sucked.

It is like Ms. Rand gets so excited about her ideas that she forgets she is writing a story, or hurries through the story portion so she can unadulteratedly convey her ideas.


What is "House of Leaves" about?
Semiotics. Go read it. Quite interesting. It was predictable, but extraordinarily interesting none the less.

[Hustler]

This is like asking an alcoholic to list his favourite drinks

Gin and Tonic.

[Hustler]

I am currently engrossed in the works of Charles Bukowski.

If you ask me (and you didn't), 'Hot, Water, Music' is his best work. 'Run With The Hunted' is good, too. This is not to say the rest of his work isn't top-drawer as well, just that those two have lingered in my mind the longest (years now).

[Slider]

The Picture of Dorian Gray by Wilde, and Salinger's Glass series.

[TPol]

My mother was a Seventh-Day Adventist and after I dropped out of university for 18 months she offered to help pay my tuition if I would attend an SDA university. I found the level of education at the school to be quite good and completed my degree there. I was required to take some religion courses, most of which I didn't mind as I, despite being agnostic, have an interest in the concept. I haven't read "Desire of Ages" but "The Great Controversy" was required reading in a History of Christianity course. I didn't come out of it with any great respect for Ellen White, who apparently plagiarized a good deal of her writings, including "Desire of Ages".

Interesting. I don't know much about Ellen White yet, so what you mention will be an intriguing line of research for me. Plagiarized from whom, by the way? I haven't read "The Great Controversy," but have it on my "to read" list. Thanks for the information. I've never been in an Adventist school, but have also heard the overall quality is exceptional.

[kuranes]

The Possessed- loved this book. Possibly Dostoyevsky's finest work.

It was my favorite Dostoevsky so far.

[Sally]

It was my favorite Dostoevsky so far.

Ooh I'll have to read it!

I never did finish Brothers Karamazov......

[kuranes]

NK{0]Ooh I'll have to read it!

I never did finish Brothers Karamazov......[/QUOTE]

You may like it. It doesn't have the pace that many readers of contemporary books have come to expect, but there are some nice elements to it if you have patience. There is one part where a lot of intellectuals and poseurs are discussing politics and art disputatiously that may amuse you.

[Sally]

You may like it. It doesn't have the pace that many readers of contemporay books have come to expect, but there are some nice elements to it if you have patience. There is one part where a lot of intellectuals and poseurs are discussing politics and art disputatiously that may amuse you.

Maybe I'll skip to that part, then. :)

I think the thing about Brothers Karamazov was that the novel as a novel just couldn't live up to The Grand Inquisitor as an exerpt.

[kuranes]

Speaking of a psychological story ( fantasy? ) where Jesus himself makes an appearance, did you read Anne Rice's "Memnoch the Devil"? Some of her books are fun. Others not so. Either that or I am tiring of the lush style which is sometimes short on plot.

A book I really liked was a fantasy called "Perdido Street Station" by China Mieville. Not that it was terribly profound. Just fun.

[Sally]

Speaking of a psychological story ( fantasy? ) where Jesus himself makes an appearance, did you read Anne Rice's "Memnoch the Devil"? Some of her books are fun. Others not so. Either that or I am tiring of the lush style which is sometimes short on plot.

A book I really liked was a fantasy called "Perdido Street Station" by China Mieville. Not that it was terribly profound. Just fun.

I read some Anne Rice, mostly in order. I tended to laugh hysterically at things she probably didn't intend to be that funny, and then I just got bored with them. Never made it to Memnoch.

Never read any China Mieville, either, but I did just reread Tanith Lee's Biting the Sun (Or Don't Bite the Sun, which is the first book in the composition, and also the better one). I'd remembered it as sci-fi fantasy fluff, but what struck me the second time around was that it was both more entertaining and also more interesting than I'd remembered.

Not that it's particularly profound. ...But that's sort of the point of it. It knows that you don't have to have a point to have a point. :)

[Trystorp]

Interesting. I don't know much about Ellen White yet, so what you mention will be an intriguing line of research for me. Plagiarized from whom, by the way? I haven't read "The Great Controversy," but have it on my "to read" list. Thanks for the information. I've never been in an Adventist school, but have also heard the overall quality is exceptional.

I have a great deal of respect for many Adventists but have never understood the fascination with Ellen White. All of her writings have been found to have been plagiarized in whole or in part from a wide variety of sources. "Desire of Ages" in particular was taken from 23 different books - none of them cited. This site (http://www.ellenwhite.org/egw4.htm), though a little flashy and antagonistic for my taste, has some good information.

[sparrowsfall]

The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature
How the Mind Works
The Language Instinct

Killer knowledgeable, and laugh-out-loud funny on every other page.

In TLI, he's talking about how we deal with irregular verbs, often trying to regularize them or extrapolate their usages into regular use. Tells the old one about the women who flies into Logan airport (Boston) goes out to get a cab.

Asks the cabbie, "can you take me somewhere where I can get scrod?"

"Gee," says the cabbie, "I've never heard it in the pluperfect subjunctive before."

If liked boys I'd marry this guy.

[RottenApple]

The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature
How the Mind Works
The Language Instinct

Killer knowledgeable, and laugh-out-loud funny on every other page.

In TLI, he's talking about how we deal with irregular verbs, often trying to regularize them or extrapolate their usages into regular use. Tells the old one about the women who flies into Logan airport (Boston) goes out to get a cab.

Asks the cabbie, "can you take me somewhere where I can get scrod?"

"Gee," says the cabbie, "I've never heard it in the pluperfect subjunctive before."

If liked boys I'd marry this guy.

Just the titles of those books sound intriguing. Tell us a bit more about them.
'The Modern Denial of Human Nature' ... sounds like he planted a listening device in my brain.

[zhang_bob]

The Man in the High Castle---- Philip K. Dick
fatherland---- Robert Harris
The Catcher in the Rye ~J.D. Salinger
The Outsider----Albert Camus,

[sparrowsfall]

>The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature
>How the Mind Works
>The Language Instinct


Just the titles of those books sound intriguing. Tell us a bit more about them.
'The Modern Denial of Human Nature' ... sounds like he planted a listening device in my brain. Yeah, Blank Slate especially is one of those books that makes you say "yeah, that's what I was thinking but never could have expressed so well." Plus a lot of new thinking to add to the matrix. Pinker's a neurolinguist at Harvard, formerly MIT. Argues for a major genetic contribution to human nature, character, personality, predilictions, etc. And demonstrates it.

Amazon:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/search-handle-url/index=books&field-author-exact=Steven%20Pinker&rank=-relevance%2C%2Bavailability%2C-daterank/

You can see him being interviewed by Robert Wright, author of The Moral Animal (great exploration of how natural selection, bloody in tooth and claw, could have created moral emotions), here:

http://meaningoflife.tv/video.php?speaker=pinker&topic=complete

And of course the classic in that field is Richard Dawkins' The Selfish Gene:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0192860925/103-6763756-1383868?v=glance&n=283155&n=507846&s=books&v=glance

[Purple-Silver Fox]

A book I really liked was a fantasy called "Perdido Street Station" by China Mieville. Not that it was terribly profound. Just fun.

Have you read the second one, "The Scar"? It follows up the first chronologically, but with different characters and in a different part of the world. From the first pages it reminded me of Mervyn Peake's Gormenghast trilogy.

[Chimera]

A Song of Fire and Ice, by George R.R. Martin - best fantasy I've ever read. Keeps the feel of the genre but disregards many of it's conventions. First book is called A Game of Thrones.

The Origins of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind, by Julian Jaynes. Makes the claim that modern consciousness did not exist as recently as 2000BC, and it's emergence paralleled the development of language, especially of the written variety.

Makes the further claim that what existed before in the minds of human beings was a type of almost schizophrenic existence, whereby audio hallucinations (produced by the right hemisphere) was interpeted as the voice of the Gods or dead ancestors. Really bizarre but also compelling theory with a large amount of evidence in support. Great writer too, highly recommended.

All the others I can think of have already been mentioned (and if the 2 above have been mentioned and I missed it, mea culpa).

[Shimpei]

Madame Bovary by Flaubert
The Young Lions by Irwin Shaw
One Minute Stories by Istvan Orkeny
Short stories by Slawomir Mrozek
Marie Antoinette by Antona Fraser (a biography)
Schindler's Ark by Thomas Keneally
A Woman Rides the Beast by Dave Hunt (the story of the Catholic Church)

[raptor_red]

Hmm...seems I'm something of an odd duck here:

Favorite authors:

1)Pearl S. Buck
2)Toni Morrison (esp. "Beloved")
3)Sandra Cisneros
4)Neil Gaiman (mentioned several times before)

All-Time Fav Books:

Fiction:
The Once and Future King, The Killer Angels, Andersonville, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, A Canticle For Leibowitz


Non-Fiction:
Confederates in the Attic, The Civil War: A Narrative History, Waiting for my Cats To Die, Into the Wild

[TelecomClone]

Favorite Book(s)Top five (alpha): Atlas Shrugged (Ayn Rand)
Foundation (Isaac Asimov)
Lenin in Zurich (Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn)
Starship Troopers (Robert A. Heinlein)
The Universe in a Nutshell (Stephen W. Hawking)

[Justin05]

This is like asking an alcoholic to list his favourite drinks

So just one for now: the stupendous, the incredible, the unsurpassible: 'JURGEN' by the great James Branch Cabell.

It explains the world to a 15-yr-old.

Even now I can think of other books and authors, but that should stand alone in a post. Will revisit to list others.


Claverhouse :ph34r:

Was he also a librarian? VCU has a library called James Cabell library in Richmond, Va.

[Justin05]

No. 44. The Mysterious Stranger by Mark Twain

[Monica]

A short list:

1. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas - Hunter S. Thompson
2. 1984 - Orwell
3. Brave New World - Huxley
4. Fahrenheit 451 - Bradbury
5. Stranger in a Strange Land - Heinlein

I love anything by HST. The combinations of words he uses and the crazy things he describes just really appeal to me. I also like Vonnegut, Clive Barker, Stephen King, Margaret Atwood, Anne Rice, William S. Burroughs, and Samuel Beckett.

[songbird36]

A short list:

1. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas - Hunter S. Thompson
2. 1984 - Orwell
3. Brave New World - Huxley
4. Fahrenheit 451 - Bradbury
5. Stranger in a Strange Land - Heinlein

I love anything by HST. The combinations of words he uses and the crazy things he describes just really appeal to me. I also like Vonnegut, Clive Barker, Stephen King, Margaret Atwood, Anne Rice, William S. Burroughs, and Samuel Beckett.

That's an excellent list; if perhaps a little genre-specific. #5 is one of my all time favourites, even though I generally eschew sci-fi as a genre. Deeply interesting and influential book..

[TPol]

raptor_red, looks like you like books about the Civil War. I haven't read "Killer Angels" yet, but I read in "How to Write and Sell Historical Fiction" by Persia Woolley that it is a "must read" for those wanting an example of some of the best historical fiction.

[Mr.Miagi]

FRANNY AND ZOEY!!!!!!!!

[QQQ]

"War and Peace"

[blacksharrds]

lol my favorite book is "To Kill A Mockingbird". i dunno it just seems so deep to me. and i like "Freakonomics" too. i love the way the book's authors look at the world and take everyday situation and analyze them through skills used in economics.

[macr0]

The Dragonlance Chronicles Trilogy

[puzzled-observer]

"Catcher in the rye", "Great expectations", "Animal farm", and maybe "Hamlet" too.

[BoH]

Hmmm. "Catcher in the rye" was okay, I liked "Franny and Zooey" more (by Salinger) I really loved "Catch-22". Umm "Crime and punishment" "Hitchhiker's guide to the universe"

Some books just caused me the shivers and so I loved them for their effect "Fathers and Sons" by Turgenev "The Trial" kafka.

That's all that comes to mind at this moment

[Ferrus]

Currently enjoying Robinson Crusoe.

[Ellis]

The Flounder by Gunther Grass, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Salman Rushdie's Midnight's Children, Robot Visions, and this collection of plays by Jean-Paul Sartre. I also like The Glass Menagerie and A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams. I can't say I really have favorites, though.

[Tayshaun]

Letters To A Young Poet - R.M. Rilke

[Faust06]

Robert Rankin - The Hollow Chocolate Bunnies of the Apocalypse. I'm not kidding.

[sorabji_66]

recently??

William Gaddis "The Recognitions" (hands down the greatest mind-$$crew ever, a bargain at 956 pages)

Thomas Bernhard "Correction" (the perfect INTP project!!!)

Emile Zola's Rougon-Macquart 20 novels.

[glassmoon]

'The Real Frank Zappa Book' - Frank Zappa


The Real Frank Zappa Book is written by Frank Zappa with Peter Occhiogrosso and is, essentially, Franks autobiography in his words. He talks about growing up, his introduction to music, his first band, and his struggles with getting his music played by orchestras. Here’s the way Frank describes the book in the introduction:

I don’t want to write a book, but I’m going to do it anyway, because Peter Occhiogrosso is going to help me. He is a writer. He likes books — he even reads them. I think it is good that books still exist, but they make me sleepy.

The way we’re going to do it is, Peter will come to California and spend a few weeks recording answers to ‘facinating questions‘, then the tapes will be transcribed. Peter will edit them, put them on floppy discs, send them back to me, I will edit them again and that result will be sent to Ann Patty at Poseidon Press and she will make it come out to be a ‘A BOOK.‘


Government is the Entertainment Division of the military-industrial complex.

The manner in which Americans "consume" music has a lot to do with leaving
it on their coffee tables, or using it as wallpaper for their lifestyles,
like the score of a movie -- it's consumed that way without any regard for
how and why it was made.

If you wind up with a boring, miserable life because you listened to your
mom, your dad, your teacher, your priest or some guy on TV telling you how to
do your shit, then YOU DESERVE IT.

The book can be found in the eMule.

[2hype]

Winter's Tale by Mark Helprin

[ZHASH]

The greatest book of all time:

The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky

[sorabji_66]

The greatest book of all time:

The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky


great book.

it's becoming a bit of a cliche though. unless you are reading it in FD's language...

then, like Snoopy, you have to go back to Herman Hesse.

[IdiotPrayer]

Hmm, a Favourite Book.

This is quite the difficult.

I cant go past Eriksons Tale of the Malazan Book of the Fallen Series; Deadhouse Gates, Memories of Ice, Midnight Tides.

Also Gene Wolfe's Book of the New Sun series is definately Up there.

[Geoff]

Hmm.

Lord of the Rings.

-Geoff

[Arcturus]

'The Real Frank Zappa Book' - Frank Zappa

I read that back in the summer. It was somewhat entertaining when he stuck to music, but he had some completely unsupportable, off-the-wall political ideas that I found to be pretty annoying to read. I can't even specifically remember what they were now, I just recall thinking, "Here's yet another case of a musician who should stick to what they know best." I don't know what gives people the idea that, if they can pick up an instrument, they can proselytize about politics as if he/she is the only one who knows about it.


Hmm.

Lord of the Rings.

Mine as well.

[Steve]

Dune
Catcher in the Rye
Valis

[Eileen]

FRANNY AND ZOEY!!!!!!!!

Zooey! ZOOEY!

[Eileen]

I thought I'd responded to this, but apparently not (or I missed it while going back through the thread).

Anyway, some jewels:

Franny and Zooey - JD Salinger
Revelations of Divine Love - Julian of Norwich
the His Dark Materials trilogy - Philip Pullman
Of Mice & Men - John Steinbeck
A Prayer for Owen Meany - John Irving
The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
The Little Prince - Antoine de St. Exupery
Sights Unseen - Kaye Gibbons
A Wrinkle in Time - Madeliene L'Engle
Walking on Water: Reflections on Faith and Art - Madeliene L'Engle
The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood
Collected Stories - Flannery O'Connor
The Poisonwood Bible - Barbara Kingsolver

[bagikleche]

The Fountainhead
Fahenheit 451
1984

[Sojourner]

Absolute favorites
Night Watch (Terry Pratchett) - Fantasy/humor, but perhaps more thoughtful than humorous.
Flowers for Algernon (Daniel Keyes) - er... science fiction, maybe?
Enchantress from the Stars (Sylvia Louise Engdahl) - Fantasy/sci-fi


Well-beloved
The Zombie Survival Guide (Max Brooks) - Humor
Xenocide (Orson Scott Card) - Science fiction
Darwin's Children/Darwin's Radio (Greg Bear) - Science fiction

[cut the grass]

ender's game, ender's shadow, rebecca, complicity, pet sematary, brain droppings, tao te ching, junky, last exit to brooklyn

[Eileen]

A new favorite is Geek Love by Katherine Dunn. It's about a circus sideshow family. It's pretty damn fantastic.

[Ivy]

A new favorite is Geek Love by Katherine Dunn. It's about a circus sideshow family. It's pretty damn fantastic.

Whoa, so they mean geek in the original sense, huh? I have heard many good things about that one.

[Eldanen]

The Wheel of Time series, by Robert Jordan. All the sub-series of Shannara, by Terry Brooks. Polgara the Sorceress, by David & Leigh Eddings.

[Rice-Tactics]

Dorian Grey

[MagicGermanGypsie]

Glad to see Orwell & Huxley on quite a few of the lists.
-1984
-Animal Farm
-Brave New World
-Island
-Doors of Perception [actually an essay]
-A Scanner Darkly
Although It is Hitler, Mein Kampf.

[naruto littles helpers.jpeg]

just several books i like a lot; but i like a lot of books.

imitation of christ - thomas a kempis
orthodoxy - g.k. chesterton
tender buttons - gertrud stein
technological bluff - jacques ellul
the life of johnson - james boswell
mansfield park - jane austen
winesburg, ohio - sherwood anderson
the ambassadors - henry james
cat's cradle - kurt vonnegut

[paulwhy]

"Hitch hiker's Guide to the Galaxy" by Douglas Adams
Sherlock Holmes books by Arthur Conan Doyle
"Homicide: A Year on the Killing Streets" by David Simon

[Eileen]

Whoa, so they mean geek in the original sense, huh? I have heard many good things about that one.



Yes! Check it out! It's so, so fantastic.

[Jean Valjean]

Oh wow! I have so many it's hard to pin them down.

I loved the Dune Chronicles by Frank Herbert. I just read Flannery O'Connor's "The Life You Save May Be Your Own". It was hilarious! I read both the Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew books religiously when I was younger. In fact, I probably have an original copy lying around of the Hardy Boys. Oh, and I enjoyed Ray Bradbury's "There Will Come Soft Rains". I probably could mention dozens. Oh, anything by Poe too, I like.

[ohtarie_aranel]

Lord of the Rings (Tolkien)
The Release of the Spirit (Nee)
The Final Quest (Joyner)
Watership Down (Adams)
Persuasion (Austen)
The Abolition of Man (Lewis)
In Touch with the Throne (Murray)

Etc. Etc...

[Reflection]

Crime and Punishment
Notes from Underground
The Trial
The Outsider
The Catcher in the rye
Suttree
The Road
The Grapes of wrath
Anna Karenia
David Copperfield
Steppenwolf
Death in Venice
We
Ulysses
Intensive care
To the lighthouse
Catch 22

[hereandnow]

The Meaning of Relativity by Einstein

The Magus by John Fowles

No End Save Victory by Ambrose, et al.

Six Easy Pieces by Feynman

[Dansker]

Six Easy Pieces by Feynman
I was given Six Easy Pieces and Six Not So Easy Peices as a gift last year. They are in my pile of books to read before this year is out.

Because they are both so small and light, they are ideal aeroplane reading. I might take them away with me later on this year and hopefully I will get to them.

[MacGuffin]

Suttree
The Road

McCarthy fan! You read Blood Meridian? I have The Road due up soon in my list.

[Reflection]

McCarthy fan! You read Blood Meridian? I have The Road due up soon in my list.

Its next on my list after my current batch, along with some Faulkner.
Have you read any Faulkner, if so what would you recommend?

[MacGuffin]

Its next on my list after my current batch, along with some Faulkner.
Have you read any Faulkner, if so what would you recommend?

I just finished Absalom! Absalom! which was excellent but at times the most difficult Faulkner I've read. I'd start with the Portable Faulkner if I was a noob, and then move onto the three Oprah-recommended books. Then take it from there (find the short story Barn Burning online somewhere too - a real oversight left out of Portable).

[venerationOFrabbits]

Mysterium Coniunctiois by C.G. Jung of the collected works of his. I was under the impression I would wait until I finished his earlier material before starting this endeaver. I decided to just dive in and am working my way around his other essays as I go along. I have two companion books to MC. The Mysterium Lectures by Edward F. Edinger and Aurora Consurgens: A document attributed to Thomas Aquinas on the problem of opposites in alchemy Edited with a commentary by Marie-Louise Von Franz.

I read in another of Von Franz's book on Alchemy, an incident of Thomas Aquinas and he made me laugh out loud. Who would have thought.

Also, I read (more like devoured) Anatomy of the Psyche: Alchemical Symbolism in Psychotherapy, by Edward F. Edinger, which I highly recommend to anyone interested in attempting anything about Alchemy written by CG Jung.

I've only gotten through the first twelve paragraphs of MC before I decided to go back and read two of Jung's previous essays: The Spirit Mecurius and the other being The Psychology of the Transference, which is almost a book in itself.

Yeah I know I must be crazy. Eh! Something to do on a Saturday night.

[Ceilinh]

A warning before you get in to this. I am a book nerd and I work in a bookstore. (The discount will do me in. I will die in an avalanche of books!) Threads like this make me lose control. Completely.

Authors (by category*)

Mystery
-Elizabeth Peters
-Dorothy Gilman
-Peter Watson

SF & F
-Robert J Sawyer
-Orson Scott Card
-Connie Willis
-Elizabeth Moon
-Cecelia Dart-Thornton
-Douglass Adams
-Rob Grant
-Neil Gaiman
-Tom Holt
-Philip K Dick

Kid Lit (I admit it! I love Kids books!)
-Roald Dahl
-Lewis Sachar
-Lewis Carroll
-C.S. Lewis
-Madeline L’Engle
-Lemony Snicket
-Gordon Korman (Mostly his older stuff)
-Susan Cooper
-Garth Nix
-Shannon Hale
-Gail Carson Levine
Philip Pullman

-Edward Gorey (defies classification)

Non-fiction
I don’t tend to follow specific authors when reading non-fiction (don’t know why, but whatever…)

*Some authors should by rights, be listed in multiple categories, but this list is already too long (and therefore, has been cut off) and I am leaving off too many names… sigh.

Books (by authors not previously listed)

One for the Morning Glory- John Barnes
Macroscope- Piers Anthony
The Book Thief- Markus Zusak
Le Petit Prince- Antoine de Saint Exupery
Cat’s Cradle- Kurt Vonnegut
...

[nagrom]

The Diamond Age by Neil Stephenson
A Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
Dune by Frank Herbert

[EL84]

As said, too many, too many to list. I like many things previously mentioned.

Other stuff that might be appealing:
Anything by Haruki Murakami
Anything by Yukio Mishima
Ghostwritten - David Mitchell
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance / Lila: An Enquiry Into Morals - Robert Pirsig
Factory Service Manual for my car
Moomintroll series - Tove Jansson
Carrying the Fire: An Astronaut's Journeys - Michael Collins (I read everything I can find written by/about Apollo astronauts/missions.)
Timothy Zahn Star Wars novels
Noddy series - Enid Blyton
Billy & Blaze series - Clarence William Anderson

[san-cervaza]

the first book i ever properly read was the Godfather - most other things since do not compare: but you have to sift through the shit to get to the work-a-day mediocre, and very occasionally the true gems. i dust off roughly 20 books or less a year, usually from the sunday times, nyt recommends, classics or amazon(ian) happenstance (this is when im not glued to broadsheet or periodical comment) im now broadly cynical of all recommendations, so any quality "choosings" are now typically a case of pure luck

i can name some major duds however

catch 22, wtf. as in - you feel dutybound to read a supposedly laterday modern classic, only to find youve wasted 3 weeks of your life carefully digesting a heavy paperweight of drivvel- catch 22. Or was that alanis morrisette?? who knows

darkly scanner - they say all great books are books that the reader feels they could have written themselves. todays 3yr olds must have a-ot of potential.

the book of dave. like catch 22 only worse.

do not follow the fashions

[meanlittlechimp]

Before driver's license:
Ender's Game
Watership Down
The Outsiders
Rumble Fish
Rats of Nimh
Elric series
The Great Brain Series
D'Aulaires Book of Greek Myths
D'Aulaires Book of Norse Myths
Catcher in the Rye
Battlefield Earth
Lord of the Flies
Call of the Wild

After driver's license:
Ham on Rye
The Brothers Karamazov
Siddhartha
The Tin Drum
Guns, Germs and Steel
Consciousness Explained
Me Talk Pretty One Day
Presentation of Self in Everyday Life
Butterfly Stories
People's History of the United States
Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee
Among the Thugs

[Fingers]

Just finished a book called Spares by Michael Marshall Smith, it's definitely up there with the best of them.

[Raxr]

I need to read more. My favorite author is Paul Auster and my favorite book is Moon Palace. Based on this would someone like to make some recommendations?

[Ferrus]

Siddhartha

You read this and not Steppenwolf?

[djm]

Tricky keeping this short, but here goes:

Knut Hamsun - Complete works

Alexsandr Solzhenitsyn - Cancer Ward.

Fyodor Dostoyevsky - Brothers Karamazov, and Crime and Punishment.

Thomas Mann - The Magic Mountain.

John Steinbeck - Complete works.

Yukio Mishima - Sea of Fertility tetralogy.

Mikhail Bulgakov - The Master and Margarita.

Gabriel Garcia Marquez - One Hundred Years of Solitude.

Dimity Grigorovich - The Fisherman.

JRR Tolkein - Lord of the Rings

Friedrich Nietzsche - complete works

That leaves a lot out, but if my house was burning down I'd save them first.

Edit - should have put Kafka on the list (The Trial, and The Castle).

[Theodoret]

There are a few books that I really like:

The Prince (Machiavelli)
Discourses on the First Ten Books of Livy (Machiavelli)
The Politics (Aristotle)
The AntiChrist/Twilight of the Idols (Nietzche)
I Claudius (Robert Graves)
Maurice (E.M. Forster)
A Passage to India (E.M. Forster)
Julian (Gore Vidal)
A Scanner Darkly (P. K. Dick)
The World Jones Made (P. K. Dick)
Six Easy Pieces (Richard Feynman)
Chimpanzee Politics (Franz de Waal)
The Selfish Gene (Richard Dawkins)
The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (Gibbons)
Goodbye to Berlin (Christopher Isherwood)
Twelve Caesars (Suetonius)
The Satanic Verses (Salman Rushdie)
Diaries (Alan Clark)
Diaries (Samuel Pepys)
The Histories (Herodotus)

[Sokkorobo]

Nearly all lectures by Thomas Woods

The moon is a harsh mistress- Heinlein
Stranger in a Strange Land-Heinlein
Dune- Herbert
The stone Canal-Ken Macleod
The Ego and His Own-Max Stirner
Atheism the Case Against God- George H. Smith
The Cat Who Walks Through Walls- Heinlein
Elric of Melnibone- Michael Moorcock
Silmarillion- Tolkien
The Art of War- Machiavelli
At the Mountains of Madness- Lovecraft
The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy-Adams
All Quiet on the Western Front-Erich Maria Remarque.
Have Spacesuit Will Fly- Heinlein
Angela's Ashes- McCourt


among others

[MacGuffin]

Stranger in a Strange Land-Heinlein
That one sucks ass.

[Sokkorobo]

Are you telling me you didn't like Jubal Harshaw?

[Kathara]

James Joyce - Ulysses. I think he was an INTP.

[halah]

My Sister's Keeper by Jodi Picoult
The Diary of Anne Frank

[demagogic_schizoid]

the first book i ever properly read was the Godfather

wow same here. I loved it, I didn't even enjoy the film much compared to the book, because you notice how they can't develop sideline stories like the cop who beats up his step-son (Tommy?).

[booyalab]

that i can think of at the moment......

Down and Out in Paris and London- George Orwell
Fingersmith- Sarah Waters
Basic Economics- Thomas Sowell
A Conflict of Visions- Thomas Sowell
Intuition- David G. Myers
Wicked- Gregory Maguire

[songbird36]

Have recently been re-reading a few old favourites:
Love in the time of cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter - Mario Vargas Llosa
Foucault's Pendulum - Umberto Eco
Birdsong - Sebastian Faulkes

Another great recent read was Amy Knight's biography of Lavrenty Beria

and I quite like the unexpurgated diaries of Anais Nin :)

[oxyjen]

So many classics, and decidedly intellectual books.

With a couple of exceptions, I generally hate the classics.

Some random favorites:
A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius--Dave Eggers
Choke,
Survivor,
Invisible Monster--all three by Chuck Palahniuk
Dry--Augusten Burroughs
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas--Hunter S. Thompson
Naked Lunch--William Burroughs
Naked,
Me Talk Pretty One Day,
Barrel Fever--all three by David Sedaris
Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs--Chuck Klosterman

My favorite book is The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test by Tom Wolfe.

[Screaming Ferret]

A Devil's Chaplain - Richard Dawkins
Underworld - Graham Hancock
At The Mountains of Madness and Other Tales - H.P. Lovecraft
Guards! Guards! - Terry Pratchett
The Silence of the Lambs/Hannibal - Thomas Harris
The Seven-Year Hitch - David R. Grant
The Silmarillion - Tolkein
Great Expectations - Dickens
Dracula - Stoker
His Dark Materials trilogy - Phillip Pullman
The Illiad/The Odyssey - Homer
The Epic of Gilgamesh
The Aenied - Virgil

Short stories/random stuff:

The Theban plays - Sophocles
Electra - Sophocles

The Tale of Sinuhe - anon, ancient Egyptian
The Eloquent Peasant - anon, ancient Egyptian

The Watchmen - Alan Moore
The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen - Alan Moore
Astonishing X-Men - Joss Whedon

[King Rat]

This is like asking an alcoholic to list his favourite drinks


idk. though anything will do, but the few alkie i know usually stay pretty loyal to one type of drink. how many different types of drinks do james bond order?

as for favorite books, i get a kick out of the "...for Dummies" books. quite practical

[xNTP]

The Wisdom of Insecurity - Alan Watts
Be What You Are - Alan Watts
Peoplewatching - Desmond Morris
The Naked Ape - Desmond Morris
Brief History of Time - Stephen Hawking
Wanting Enlightenment is a Big Mistake - Zen Master Seung Sahn
Naked - David Sedaris
Far Side - Gary Larson

[aussiegirl]

Ok, keeping it short:

- The Bible
- 1984 by George Orwell
- Pride & Prejudice & Jane Eyre & The Diary of Anne Frank (gotta love the schoolgirl's faves! Still cry everytime!)
- The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka
- High Fidelity by Nick Hornby
- Anything by Bill Bryson (especially "Downunder" of course!)
- The Turn of the Screw by Henry James
- Collected Short Stories of Anton Chekhov, Katherine Mansfield, & Vladimir Nabokov
- The Hobbit by Tolkien
- Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis
- The Diary of a Nobody by George & Weedon (!) Grossmith (!!)

This is my absolute favourite topic in the whole wide world. :grin:

[Acala1]

Veronika Decides to Die - Paulo Coelho
The Demon And Mrs. Prym - Paulo Coelho
The Metamorphosis - Franz Kafka
Age of Reason - Paul Sartre
Jonathan Livingston Seagull - Richard Bach

and all Kafka stories...

[Thevenin]

In addition to all the great books mentioned, one book that should interest INTPs is:

"How to Solve it," by George Polya

It's the only book I know that helps one learn how to do mathematical proofs, in addition to solving problems in general.

It is mentioned in the following post: http://forums.intpcentral.com/archive/index.php/t-468.html

[Wolfmaster]

I'm rather surprised no one mentioned Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

[consolata]

By The Light of My Father's Smile-Alice Walker
The Color Purple-Alice Walker
A Widow For One Year-John Irving
All of John Irving really
Still Life With Woodpecker-Tom Robbins
Jitterbug Perfume-Tom Robbins
It-Stephen King
Paradise-Toni Morrison
White Teeth-Zadie Smith

[vanamonde]

My favorite books are:-
Almost everything from Arthur C clarke but particularly,Against the fall of night & The lion of commare.
Cosmos and Shadows of the forgotten ancestors.(carl sagan)
Manifold series(Stephen baxter)
I robot,The caves of steel,Naked sun,The robots of dawn,Robots & empire and all the foundation series(Issiac Asimov)
Parallel worlds and hyperspace(Michio kaku)
Robinson's crusoe(Daniel Defoe)
illiad and odyssey(Homer)
The valley of fear(Conan doyle)
The bourne series(robert ludlum).



-----------------------------------------
Introverted (I) 89.66% Extroverted (E) 10.34%
Intuitive (N) 64.86% Sensing (S) 35.14%
Thinking (T) 53.33% Feeling (F) 46.67%
Perceiving (P) 78.13% Judging (J) 21.88%

[zhandao]

I'm rather surprised no one mentioned Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.That's because I had to read that in a class structure for high school, in a "philosophy" class where the teacher basically told us how to think.

[Mr.Miagi]

Ivan's Turgenev's Desperate !

[karenk]

Milan Kundera "The Unbearable Lightness of Being"

[Uberfuhrer]

Does Cinefex (http://www.cinefex.com/) qualify as a book?

[somnium]

I'm rather surprised no one mentioned Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

Someone did here (http://forums.intpcentral.com/showpost.php?p=649625&postcount=163).

I'm surprised no-one mentioned Sandman (except to say they hadn't read it). Seems like quintessential INTP fare to me. Or don't comics count?

[Heretic]

1984(wow), star maker, anything by Asimov, Frank Herbert and Peter Hamilton

[somnium]

If comics are allowed, here are a few that I particularly like:

Sandman by Neil Gaiman, despite its flaws, for its incredible inventiveness and whimsicality, and the diversity of the artwork.

Quartier Lointain and Le Journal de mon P?re by Jiro Taniguchi; these don't seem to have been translated into English which is a shame as they are wonderfully thoughtful, nostalgic tales about revisiting childhood.

Bone by Jeff Smith, especially the hilarious earlier volumes before it degenerates into high-fantasy. Smiley as the Mystery Cow is a comic moment to rank up there with such greats as Captain Haddock with rose petals on his nose.

Tintin, except for the early volumes where it's just a sequence of escapades stitched together.

Maus by Art Spiegelman.


...I'll have to do regular books some other time. Most of my favourites have already been cited.

[psychocandy]

Milan Kundera "The Unbearable Lightness of Being"

I fucking love this book -probably as it is written in non linear form

[somnium]

Milan Kundera "The Unbearable Lightness of Being"
I fucking love this book -probably as it is written in non linear form

I must read it again... I can't remember what was non linear about it, all I can remember is liking it. I also recall enjoying "The Book of Laughter and Forgetting", partly because of its unexpected link with one of my favourite pieces of music.

If you like non linear writing, you might enjoy "Dhalgren" by Samuel R. Delany. Or you might not. It's hard to say.

[Fataliztik]

I *love* complex mysteries - Agatha Christie is my favourite author. I mean, I'm an experienced reader of mysteries and with most you can pretty much guess who did it and how. With her you're genuinely surprised. Brilliant.

I also love 'The Phantom of the Opera' by Gaston Leroux. It's a complex, gothic, romantic novel - not like the cheese pedalled by Andrew Lloyd Webber (though I admit I enjoyed the musical).

[sriv]

The Art Of War (Denma Translation)
This book is the Art of War, which translates Sun Tzu's teachings as well as interpretations and essays on the nature of 'The Sage Commander' and taking the enemy whole without destroying him for the greater benefit of all involved, and also how to influence others by bringing them to see which is the greater and ultimate good, it helps you understand things such as deception, spies, advantage and the best time to strike. I never read the other versions/translations however this book has helped me a lot to develop my strategic and diplomatic intelligences because the concepts can be integrated into intuition. Worth reading through several times because it is a contemplative book and although the knowledge is broken up into easily-digestable chunks, as a whole it is highly compressed so you may have to read the book several times to absorb the knowledge fully.

YES.
Also recommended is The Prince by Niccolo Machiavelli. I read each several times a month.

Other than those two keepers -

1984
Ender's Game and the rest of the series
Ender's Shadow and the rest of that series
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, The Antichrist, and other works of Nietzsche
The Kite Runner and A Thousand Splendid Suns are rare pop culture books that actually appeal to me
Lord of the Rings all of them and The Silmarillion
The Dark Tower series

[Katzchen]

I just finished Winter's Tales by Isak Dinesen (who is really Karen Blixen) for a class and it was a really excellent collection of short stories. It's weird she isn't talked about too much considering so many well-known writers admire her.

[Western Star]

Magician (Feist)
Mistress of the Empire Trilogy (Feist & Wurts)
Wheel of Time (Jordan)

Read them all a few times over the years.

[kuranes]

Have you read the second one, "The Scar"? It follows up the first chronologically, but with different characters and in a different part of the world. From the first pages it reminded me of Mervyn Peake's Gormenghast trilogy.

Yeah. It was pretty good, but I still like "Perdito Street Station" best of his books.

BTW - where ya been ?

[Nighthawk]

I still love Asimov's Foundation series ...

... and Alan Dean Foster's Weave Trilogy, just for the commentary on human nature.

[Black Cat]

Party of One (Rufus) Nonfiction - About loners.

Strong Motion (Franzen) Fiction - Couple of outsiders (INTPish) and their version of falling in love.

Wake up, Sir! (Ames) Satire, fiction - Delusional, alcoholic writer and his manservant.

Haunted - (Palahniuk) Satire, fiction - um, a special writer's retreat.

Straight Man (Russo) Fiction - Pee your pants hilarious. - About a man's mid-life crisis.

Currently reading: Atlas Shrugged (Rand) - Suggested by a friend who wants to engage me in a pseudo-intellectual philosophical debate in order to prove his superiority. I'm humoring him.

[cozmonite61]

The Giver, The Metamorphosis, The Most Dangerous Game, Flowers for Algernon

[s0978]

Hm, an opportunity for $5 in casino cash.

Some of my faves were/ are: Name of the Rose, The World as I Found It, 100 Years of Solitude. I recently read Ishmael by Daniel Quinn, and was quite impressed, but too soon to know if I can call it a favorite.

[Teonanacatl]

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Bhagavad Gita, The Design of Everyday Things, Thoughts on Interaction Design, Popol Vuh, Be Here Now, The Tibetan Book of the Dead, The Psychedelic Experience, The Way of the Boddhisatva, The Invisible Landscape, Brave New World, 1984, Fahrenheit 451... and the list goes on...

[Ill eagle]

Johnny Got His Gun
1984
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
Amazonia

[MiniCarl]

The Alchemist

My Friend Leonard

Ender's Game Series

[Millie_(A)TCK]

The Alchemist

why oh why?


My favorite books are:

Wizard of the Crow - Ngugi wa Thiong'o

and

Accidental Death of an Anarchist - Dario Fo

[syzygy]

I have WAY too many to list but I'll try listing authors:

Neil Gaiman, Douglas Adams, Richard Feynman, J.K. Rowling before she started getting preachy, Agatha Christie, E. Nesbit, Jhumpa Lahiri, Susanna Clarke, Phillip Pullman, Jonathan Safran Foer, Jonathan Stroud, Harper Lee, Richard Dawkins, Roald Dahl, George Orwell, Jane Austen

Other books:

The Catcher in the Rye (J.D. Salinger), Ender's Game (Orson Scott Card), Yes Minister and Yes Prime Minister (Jonathan Lynn & Antony Jay) A Short History of Nearly Everything (Bill Bryson), A Brief History of Time (Stephen Hawking), Good Omens (Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett), Artemis Fowl (Eoin Colfer, before he started getting preachy), Skipping Christmas (John Grisham)

Okay, that's enough for now.

[kble]

The Secret Agent and Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad.

I'll think about he others.

[notjeffgoldblum]

I think you guys would like Predictably Irrational

[g_vartan]

I think you guys would like Predictably Irrational

Reading that right now. Very interesting :reading:

You might also enjoy Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth, and Happiness. I heart behavioral economics :wub:

[Nunki]

His Dark Materials trilogy
Harry Potter series
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland & Through the Looking-glass
It (Stephen King)
Neverwhere
The Vampire Lestat, Interview with the Vampire, The Vampire Armand
Wuthering Heights
The Fountainhead (No, I'm not an Objectivist)

[Chunes]

Critical Path by Buckminster Fuller.
also Walden by Thoreau.

Others are inferior.

[Harumph]

A Confederacy of Dunces
Ulysses & A Portrat of the Artist (I'm a closet pretentious douchebag)
A Clockwork Orange
Angels in America
Catch 22

off the top of my head.

Read Moth Smoke recently and thought it was lovely. Reading this book called Q&A now, but it pissed me off because it spews out that myth about Einstein being a highschool dropout in the first fucking chapter. Can't really enjoy it now.

[somnium]

A Confederacy of Dunces
Ulysses & A Portrat of the Artist (I'm a closet pretentious douchebag)
A Clockwork Orange
Angels in America
Catch 22



Ah yes, A Confederacy of Dunces was a great read. Lent to me by an ENTP friend who has a nose for such things. He also lent me Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas which I think appeals to the same kind of person.

[Harumph]

I think it appealed to me because it sort of de-romanticized the intellectual outcast. The Holden Caulfield, Stephen Dedalus types. Plus it just made me giggle a whole bunch.

I only saw the movie version of Fear and Loathing, but I remember thinking as I was watching it that it would probably make a much better book.

[ApeTheDog]

The Ants trilogy by Bernard Werber. Has anyone here read it?

Recently I've also read "Ender's Game" and found it gripping me and forcing me to read on, yet at the same time I dislike it for not making enough internal sense and not exploring deeply enough the concepts that interested me. I don't feel like the author explored his concepts enough. It was matrix-like (but, certainly, better) in it's implementation. "Suddently Ender gets it and he's a brilliant military leader" <-> "Suddenly Neo gets what the matrix is all about and he can dodge bullets and fly".

[TPol]

You might read further into the Enders series, since you liked "Enders Game" well enough. There's a book later in the series I liked even better; "Speaker for the Dead," I think it was. Which concepts would you have liked the author to explore more?

[Nunki]

Ender's Game was amateurish, I thought. Speaker for the Dead was a more mature effort. . .and also a somewhat duller one. Xenocide was, I must admit, quite good. Children of the Mind was excellent, as well.

However, Card is madman, to put it bluntly. I think most any INTP would agree with me. So if you must read his books, check them out from the library or even download them. The alternative is giving him money, which is like handing a serial killer bullets.

[Millie_(A)TCK]

Party of One (Rufus) Nonfiction - About loners.

Strong Motion (Franzen) Fiction - Couple of outsiders (INTPish) and their version of falling in love.

Wake up, Sir! (Ames) Satire, fiction - Delusional, alcoholic writer and his manservant.

Haunted - (Palahniuk) Satire, fiction - um, a special writer's retreat.

Straight Man (Russo) Fiction - Pee your pants hilarious. - About a man's mid-life crisis.

Currently reading: Atlas Shrugged (Rand) - Suggested by a friend who wants to engage me in a pseudo-intellectual philosophical debate in order to prove his superiority. I'm humoring him.

I really like your taste in books. On your recommendation I tried Wake up Sir! and I love it.


Arundathi Roy- The God of Small Things is now also part of my favorite literature.

[Ghost-Girl]

However, Card is madman, to put it bluntly. I think most any INTP would agree with me. So if you must read his books, check them out from the library or even download them. The alternative is giving him money, which is like handing a serial killer bullets.

Huh? How is he a madman?

[Nunki]

I don't want to derail the discussion but . . . He literally suggested that the government should be overthrown if same-sex marriage is legalized in California. Literally. He has also said a number of other things typical of the most extreme kind of Christian fundamentalist.

More on topic, a new favorite: Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke. It gets off to a slow start, but after that it's a joy to read, chock full of wit and imagination.

[Ferrus]

I am currently reading Le Morte D'Arthur... I was interested in Malory's life and here's what emerged on Wikipedia:


All facts are certain in Malory's history. He was born in 1405 . He died in March of 1471, less than two years after completing his lengthy book. Twice elected to a seat in Parliament, he also accrued a long list of criminal charges during the 1450s, including burglary, rape, sheep stealing, and attempting to ambush the Duke of Buckingham. He escaped from jail on two occasions, once by fighting his way out with a variety of weapons and by swimming a moat. Malory was imprisoned at several locations in London, but he was occasionally out on bail. He was never brought to trial for the charges that had been levelled against him. In the 1460s he was at least once pardoned by King Henry VI, but more often, he was specifically excluded from pardon by both Henry VI and his rival and successor, Edward IV. It can be construed from comments Malory makes at the ends of sections of his narrative that he composed at least part of his work while in prison.

More information here: http://www.malory.net/bio_&#37;20frame.htm

Typical MP I suppose.

[C.J.Woolf]

Typical MP I suppose.
I was thinking more like, "They don't make MPs like they used to."

[Edit: Malory kinda reminds me of Zaphod Beeblebrox (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zaphod_Beeblebrox).]

[Mercurial]

More on topic, a new favorite: Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke. It gets off to a slow start, but after that it's a joy to read, chock full of wit and imagination.

Been meaning to get around to that one...

[adds to book queue list]

edit a couple days later: I'm faulting you for the book being nearly too large for my backpack. It was so large as to be easily missed on the shelf. >.<

[kuranes]

The Ants trilogy by Bernard Werber. Has anyone here read it? No, but I looked it up and found out a little bit more. What did you like about it ?


"Suddently Ender gets it and he's a brilliant military leader" <-> "Suddenly Neo gets what the matrix is all about and he can dodge bullets and fly". Hmmm. I read the book ( admittedly not recently ) and don't know what you're referring to. The big scene at the end is filtered by him operating under an assumption, of course, about risk.

[bleh]

Unquiet Mind

[QuotidianFevers]

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly - Jean-Dominique Bauby
The Fountainhead - Ayn Rand
The Idiot - Fyodor Dostoevsky
The Catcher in the Rye - J.D. Salinger
I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell - Tucker Max
My Point ... And I Do Have One - Ellen Degeneres
The Carpetbaggers - Harold Robbins

[EastofEden]

East of Eden - John Steinbeck

If you read Grapes of Wrath and hated it, don't be thrown off. I have read this novel so many times and I can relate so much to Cal, one of the main characters who has to deal with being the less favoured son. And at 600+ pages, I wouldn't ask anyone to read this if it wasn't amazing. Lots of ideas to chew on.

Oh and in case you can't tell by my name, I'm a wee bit obsessed.

[Nunki]

New addition to my list: Gormenghast by Mervyn Peake.

[Stryfe]

Dune, Frank Herbert (and the rest of the original series of course)
Time Enough for Love, Robert A. Heinlein
1984, George Orwell
Alice in Wonderland, Lewis Carroll

[Randall]

For fiction, my personal favourite would have to be "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" by Ken Kesey.

[The Question]

Let me see...

The Dresden Files by Jim Butcher
Dracula by Bram Stoker
Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes
The Picture of Dorian Grey by Oscar Wilde
American Gods and Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman

and a whole bunch of others I can't remember right now.

[judges]

The Trial by Franz Kafka
The Idiot by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

[applevenus]

My favourite books are:

Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen
Atonement by Ian McEwan
Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris

That's what my facebook profile says, anyway. Mostly I tend to be drawn towards humanist writers like E.M. Forster, McEwan, Julian Barnes, and Philip Pullman. I like a man who expresses himself articulately and rationally. ;)

[Curtis24]

Let's see:

Shogun, James Clavell - he just has one of the most soothing and enthralling writing styles I've ever encountered.

1984, George Orwell - its sheer intellectual content is amazing.

Brave New World - see above

[LuridLemur]

Best books I've read this year:

Franny & Zooey
The Basketball Diaries
I Am Alive and You Are Dead (Philip K. Dick bio)
Dracula

edit: Raise High the Roofbeam, Carpenters/ Seymour: An Introduction should be up there with Franny & Zooey.

[*Strictly_The_Facts*]

:reading: 1984 by George Orwell. Premonition of the scary future which lays ahead... Definitely my favorite.

[Ptah]

Saberhagen's Swords books.

I don't read much fiction, however. What of it I have read is crap for the most part.

edit: I'd have a much longer list (most of what else I've read, fiction-wise) for un-favorite/craptastic books.

[Lethal Sage]

Hey Ptah, did you ever end up reading that book I recommended: Programming the Universe by Seth Lloyd.

I think you'd really enjoy it.

[DennisThePenetrator]

I have a common answer but I love the book The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time, probably because it's "written by" an austistic INTP.

[TPol]

I have a common answer but I love the book The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time, probably because it's "written by" an austistic INTP.

Read this at the recommendation of a friend. Liked it much better than I thought I would.

[Promethean]

So many favorites!

The Fountainhead

Atlas Shrugged

Stranger in a Stange Land

The Moon is a Harsh Mistress

1984

East of Eaden

Of Mice and Men

The Grapes of Wrath

Old Man in the Sea

Steppenwolf

A Tale of Two Cities

The Hunchback of Notredamn

Wheel of Time series

Sword of Truth series

Forgotten Realms series

Dragonlance series

Anna Karenina

Jane Eyre

All Quiet on the Western Front

White Fang

Footfall

Dune Series

Ideas and Opinions

Rommel

Infantry Aces

The Ellegant Universe

Guns Germs and Steal

The Scarlet Pimpernel

The Name of the Rose

The Portrait of Dorian Gray

The list goes on but I love all of these.

[MoneyJungle]

Upon the passing of John Updike, one of my favorite writers, I suggest picking up a copy of Rabbit, Run. I love this book, avoidant prick that I am. I'll miss John.

[Randall]

Here are some I reread recently:

Not really a favorite, but Daniel Quinn's Ishmael was thought provoking, although something about the writing style irked me.

A definite favorite: A Confederacy of Dunces by Jonathan Kennedy Toole. If you haven't read this yet, I highly recommend it.

[Nunki]

A definite favorite: A Confederacy of Dunces by Jonathan Kennedy Toole. If you haven't read this yet, I highly recommend it.By on odd coincidence, I'm in the middle of reading this right now. So far I like it, although I don't expect it to be a favorite.

[Eyjwalker]

My Favorite Books

The Legend of Drizzit

The Hunter's Blade Trilogy

Autumn Bridge

Lord of the Rings

The Hobbit

That's certainly not all but that's all I can think of right now.