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Recommended Reading
Catch 22 - Joseph Heller. An excellently written, dark, sometimes disturbing story of an Air Force Captain in WWII. If all art is representative of an artist's view of life, one wonders what events were taking place in Heller's life as he wrote this.
"Sure there's a catch," Doc Daneeka replied. "Catch-22. Anyone who wants to get out of combat duty isn't really crazy. There was only one catch and that was Catch-22, which specified that a concern for one's own safety in the face of dangers that were real and immediate was the process of a rational mind. Orr was crazy and could be grounded. All he had to do was ask; and as soon as he did, he would no longer be crazy and would have to fly more missions."
The Catcher in the Rye - J.D. Salinger The 16 year old narrator of this book is full of both brilliant observations and adolescent contradictions. He is at once idealistic and cynical; despising pretence yet continually fabricating stories; sincere and deluded.
"New York's terrible when somebody laughs on the street very late at night. You can hear it for miles. It makes you feel so lonesome and depressed."
"It was lousy in the park. It wasn't too cold, but the sun still wasn't out, and there didn't look like there was anything in the park except dog crap and globs of spit and cigar butts from old men, and the benches all looked like they'd be wet if you sat down on them. [. . .] It didn't seem at all like Christmas was coming soon. It didn't seem like anything was coming."
East of Edan - John Steinbeck. It always seemed to me that Hemingway overshadowed Steinbeck in literature classes. Personally, I prefer the depth of Steinbecks characters to the terse sentences of Hemmingway. To each his (or her) own I guess.
"A man who tells secrets or stories must think of who is hearing or reading, for a story has as may versions as it has readers. Everyone takes what he wants or can learn from it and thus changes it to his measure . . . A story must have some points of contact with the reader to make him feel at home in it. Only then can he accept wonders." --Steinbeck
Elective Affinities - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe A story of the separations and connections between people. It is, however, much more than that. Goethe procures the human spirit on paper by associating human quirks to various occurrences in nature, and in doing so, raises a myriad of questions about human nature itself. Free-will, cause & effect, and how sometimes we are able to see a situation present in society as a whole without seeing the exact same situation in the smaller circle of our own lives. To twist the old saying a bit - Sometimes we can't see the tree for the forest.
"People reveal their character by nothing more clearly than by what they find laughable."
"Familiar experiences recur more often than we think, since our own nature is the main cause of them. Character, individuality, inclination, disposition, place, surroundings, and habits- all form a whole where every individual floats, as it were, in an element or atmosphere comfortable for him alone." - Goethe, Elective Affinities
Faust Part I & II - Goethe Germany's Shakespeare and one of the last true renaissance men.
Faust: Which of us dares to call things by their names?
Those few who had some knowledge of the truth,
Whose full heart's rashness drove them to disclose
Their passion and their vision to the mob, all those
Died nailed to crosses or consigned to flames.
Mephistopheles: Besides, civilization, which now licks
Us all so smooth, has taught even the Devil tricks
The Fountainhead - Ayn Rand An inspiring book about a man who refuses to sacrifice himself or his ideals. It is a tribute to the spirit of those who have accomplished their goals without sponging off of others. This book is probably more indicative of our society today than it was when it was written.
". . . misfortune is not a mortgage on achievement - failure is not a mortgage on success - suffering is not a claim check, and its relief is not the goal of existence - man is not a sacrificial animal on anyone's altar nor for anyone's cause - life is not one huge hospital." -- Ayn Rand, "Apollo 11," The Objectivist
Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad. At 73 pages this is one of the shortest, yet heaviest books I have read. It is easy to see why Coppola was intent on completing Apacolypse Now.
"But the wilderness had found him out early, and had taken on him a terrible vengeance for the fantastic invasion. I think it had whispered to him things about himself which he did not know, things of which he had no conception till he took counsel with this great solitude-and the whisper had proved irresistibly fascinating. It echoed loudly within him because he was hollow at the core . . ."
House
of Leaves - Mark
Danielewski A
hilarious, horrifying, labor of love. This book is not light reading,
instead it is the epitome of style serving the story. It is a puzzle, a
riddle, a labyrinth.
"This is not for you."
I think now if someone had said be careful, we would have. I know a moment came when I felt certain its resolute blackness was capable of anything, maybe even of slashing out, tearing up the floor, murdering Zampanò, murdering us, maybe even murdering you."
Johnny Truant - Introduction to House of Leaves
One From None - Henry Rollins: Probably better known for his roles in Black Flag and Rollins Band. This book is full of Henry's observations, written in a non-prose style. If you have any sense of introspection this book will throw a light on all those thoughts you thought you had swept under the rug.
"I am sitting in this room losing it slowly.
You know how it is
When nothing comes quick enough
And when it finally does, it's not what you needed." --Rollins
Self Reliance - Ralph Waldo Emerson: A short essay that is often quoted (sometimes out of context) and that I continually return to. I believe there is a lot of truth in this work.
"It is easy in the world to live after the worlds opinion; it is easy in solitude to live after our own; but the great man is he who, in the midst of the crowd, keeps with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude." --Emerson
Walden - Henry David Thoreau: Similar to Emerson in a variety of ways - This work is often taken out of context - usually as an argument against material things. What one should realize though, is that it is, in actuality, emphasizing that one live within a state of perpetual awareness. That is, it is not necessarily wrong to want material things - but one should know why one desires them: Is it to impress others or because they provide pleasure in and of themselves?
"I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately"
"Public opinion is a weak tyrant compared with our own private opinion. What a man thinks of himself, that it is which determines, or rather indicates, his fate."
"There are nowadays professors of philosophy, but not philosophers.?"
"The millions are awake enough for physical labor; but only one in a million is awake enough for effective intellectual exertion, only one in a hundred millions to a poetic or divine life. To be awake is to be alive"
The Winter of Our Discontent - John Steinbeck: Steinbeck again. Steinbeck's somewhat odd sense of humor makes this one of my favorites.
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance - Robert Pirsig Although I don't agree with all of his reasoning, this book forced me to question some of the notions I believed. This one wouldn't let go of me until I had worked the ideas out for myself.
Book List
Currently Reading:
The Picture of Dorian Grey - Oscar Wilde
Other Recommendations
Atlas Shrugged - Ayn Rand
Cider House Rules - John Irving
The Crucible - Arthur Miller
Landscape for a Good Woman - Carolyn Kay Steedman
Mephisto - Klaus Mann
On The Road - Jack Kerouac
To Kill A Mockingbird - Harper Lee
The Trial and Death of Socrates - Plato