What book has had the most impact on your life?

Wibbs

Fox_In_Socks wrote: »

"The Price of Getting what you Want, is Getting What you once Wanted." -

Damn right. It's why I buy stuff.

Crann na Beatha

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Hellrazer

CinderKone wrote: »

Freakonomics gave me a new perspective on some already assumed presumptions.

The follow up is really good aswell--Superfreakonomics.

For me it has to be any of the early biographies of the people that climbed in the Himalayas.Annapurna by Maurice Herzgog stands out above most though
The things those people went through without the protection that we have today was just amazing and showed huge strength of character.

Climbing Everest is on my bucket list after reading some of those books and I cant even climb a ladder!!!

fits

Me too. I have read nearly any book i can get related to the subject. Its fascinating

Like ACD i too find it difficult to read heavier stuff.. ( im at it all day) so stick mostly to thrillers etc now.

Permabear

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RedJoker

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

Fair point. Maybe because you'd read about Rand's ideas in The Fountainhead, you found Atlas Shrugged a bit less impressive? The thing is 900 pages long so I'm trying to decide if it would be worth reading it or not which might be a bit late considering that I bought the thing.

The political agenda didn't stand out to me that much when I read The Fountainhead (although it's certainly in there), the main thing I got from it was the ethics. Coming from a Christian upbringing and becoming Atheist there was always this gap since Atheism as a philosophy is a dead end. I guess I roughly kept whatever Christian ethics I had without thinking about it too much and just stopped believing in the supernatural. The ethics of The Fountainhead are very different. It sounds like, from what Wibbs and Permabear are saying, Atlas Shrugged focuses more on the political side of Objectivism. Perhaps the user you mentioned earlier agreed with the politics but she had a different view on the ethics, hence her dislike of the The Fountainhead.

saltsun

I found lots of lessons in Animal Farm, which I re-read recently. That had a more profound effect on my view of this country rather than directly on my own life, the ironic smile was pressed into service on reading many passages.

Another which I'm waiting to receive is Tolstoys "How much land does a man need", however the Wikipedia entry gives the game away and I think it runs close to something I read online lately that "The secret to the work/life balance is less work". I had a third in mind but it's unfortunately escaped my powers of recall at this moment.

Any piece of writing which will give you pause to take stock of the direction of your life, and particularly how you deal with what life sends your way is potentially important.

saltsun

Probably seeing as this is a new account I can't seem to edit the above post but I just recalled the third book, which was The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.

Don't quote me on this passage but one part that stuck with me was the piece about building a road through a jungle. Where all the different people were assigned different jobs, engineers, health and safety people, medics and so forth. All the workers were working really hard and making fantastic progress. Until a leader climbed up to the top of one of the tallest trees and said "Oops, wrong jungle".

I don't categorise people because of that, rather look inward and check that personally that I'm in the right jungle.

mynameis905

saltsun wrote: »

I found lots of lessons in Animal Farm, which I re-read recently. That had a more profound effect on my view of this country rather than directly on my own life, the ironic smile was pressed into service on reading many passages.

Another which I'm waiting to receive is Tolstoys "How much land does a man need", however the Wikipedia entry gives the game away and I think it runs close to something I read online lately that "The secret to the work/life balance is less work". I had a third in mind but it's unfortunately escaped my powers of recall at this moment.

Any piece of writing which will give you pause to take stock of the direction of your life, and particularly how you deal with what life sends your way is potentially important.

I love Orwell but I find I much prefer his non-fiction and essays. 'Down and out in Paris & London' and 'The Road to Wigan Pier' are among my favourite books. I like Animal Farm but I can't stand 1984 for some reason.

saltsun

mynameis905 wrote: »

I love Orwell but I find I much prefer his non-fiction and essays. 'Down and out in Paris & London' and 'The Road to Wigan Pier' are among my favourite books. I like Animal Farm but I can't stand 1984 for some reason.

1984 is glaring down at me from the shelf, I have to admit I didn't enjoy reading it either. I'll have to take a look at those other titles.

catbear

I've read 1984 and Animal Farm, the latter packing the greater punch through its simplicity whereas i found the point of 1984 lost in its evocatively bleak distopian setting.

However the George Orwell book that really sank deep in me was Burmese Days which I read whilst traveling through Burma many years ago. I could see so much of the Irish situation in the Burmese. Plus he masterfully distilled into strong characters the nonchalant morally bankrupt exploitive nature of empire matched by the Burmese equivalent of our Gombeen man.

Add to that all his descriptions of food preparations hadn't changed in the half century after it was published. The extremely restrictive military junta had held back the modern world from Burma since after WWII and all the aromas, the customs, and the scene hadn't changed much from Orwell's time.

It was bizarre to see an army of typists crouched at their machines on the sidewalks of Rangoon, typing letters and bills for clients standing over them.

Eugene Norman

Wibbs wrote: »

FWIW I'd be the complete reverse. I found The Fountainhead the better book and Atlas shrugged an awful book. Not the politics, it was just badly written IMH. Granted I don't tend to like any sort of heavy handed political polemic dressed up as literature, so that could be much of it*. BUt my god it is heavy handed. I could never quite fathom its popularity, even among those who dig the politics of it. YMMV.







*that includes fantastic writers like Orwell when he gets obvious. With Animal Farm I'm all "yea yea we get it. bloody hell".

All of her books are written for the sophmoric teenager. Or the kind of person who doesn't lose the teenagerist mind.

Selfheal

The Power of Now, by Eckhart Tolle.

Justin1982

Tarry Flynn by Patrick Kavanagh, Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by Joyce and The Bodhran Makers by John B Keane - Absolutely brilliant books. Tarry Flynn and The Bodhran Makers read beautifully and so gripping the way they drag you into the injustice of Irish society as a young free state. Joyce's book read terribly and I was forced to read it for school but it had a big influence on me all the same.

Hidden Soldier by Padraig O'Keefe - Irish chef leaves his job in Cavan and runs off to join the French Foreign Legion in the early nineties before coming home after a few years and becoming a security mercenary during the Iraq war. Such an amazing story from start to finish. I couldn't put it down. Best book I ever read.

VBA Power Progamming for Excel by John Walkenbach - Well it did have a big impact on my career at least.

Sleepy

Douglas Coupland's "Girlfriend in a Coma" lead me to the rest of his body of work and he remains my favourite writer, the man's prose is better than most other writers poetry. Truly a master of the English language.

JB Strunk's "The Elements of Style", prescribed by our Junior Cert English teacher and the book that made me a grammar nazi.

A Game of Thrones - the book that finally converted me to a Fantasy nerd in my late twenties. I'd only ever tried to read the Lord of the Rings as a teenager and found it turgid, a friend pretty much forced me to try A Song of Ice and Fire and I've been devouring fantasy novels ever since.

Another vote for "Freakonomics" here too.

joeprivate

The China Study is a book by T. Colin Campbell, Jacob Gould Schurman Professor Emeritus of Nutritional Biochemistry at Cornell University, and his son Thomas M. Campbell II, a physician. It was first published in the United States in January 2005 and had sold allmost two million copies as of Jan 2016, making it one of America's best-selling books about nutrition

topmanamillion

The Evolution of God by Robert Wright - a superb Pulitzer prize nominated book.The Evolution of God is a 2009 book by Robert Wright that explores the history of the concept of God in the three Abrahamic religions through a variety of means, including archeology, history, theology, and evolutionary psychology. The patterns which link Judaism, Christianity, and Islam and the ways in which they have changed their concepts over time are explored as one of the central themes.

catbear

The most influential book I've read in recent year was "Why the West Rules, for now" by Ian Morris. It's a big book but using the latest archeaological information he shows how and why civilisations both east and west have risen and fallen over time.
It really changed my thinking on the way the world is progressing and how brief the western European dominance has been and how the Chinese modernization it just a return to their longterm global importance.

Wibbs

I read that book too CB. Very interesting alright, though I would seriously debate his conclusions. For example the only period in the last couple of thousand years when China was wealthier than Europe was in the Tang dynasty, right smack dab in the middle of the European "Dark Ages"(a term that gets me twitchy too). Though as you say China's recent resurgence is more of a reset after the daftness of the 20th century*

The Evolution of God sounds like a very interesting book. Might check that one out. There certainly was an evolution(the role and character of the devil changed hugely from early on). It's the little hints that still remain that always fascinated me. We think of the Abrahamic faiths as monotheistic and they are, but way back when not in the sense that there was just one god. EG the 2nd commandment, it doesn't say there are no other gods, just don't worship them.




*not unusual for the place mind you. On a very regular basis it has gone from periods of growth and innovation followed by periods of introspection and decline, communism was just another one.

catbear

@Wibbs, I think the most telling indicator that Morris used was life expectancy which when examined through archeaological remains tells us that life expectancy in europe peaked in 100CE and only passed that peak again in the industrial revolution, nearly two millennia later! The period in between could be viewed as somewhat regressive.

The Chinese expansions and contractions are incredible and made me want to know more about them. The way each new dynasty would build a new capital and simply move the buildings of the last dynasty was fascinating.

Wibbs

catbear wrote: »

@Wibbs, I think the most telling indicator that Morris used was life expectancy which when examined through archeaological remains tells us that life expectancy in europe peaked in 100CE and only passed that peak again in the industrial revolution, nearly two millennia later! The period in between could be viewed as somewhat regressive.

Still that "regressive" period contained a few renaissances, the enlightenment, massive exploration, rapid technological advances and indeed the industrial revolution itself. Look at what Europe did with gunpowder and printing, even though China had them for much longer.

The Chinese expansions and contractions are incredible and made me want to know more about them. The way each new dynasty would build a new capital and simply move the buildings of the last dynasty was fascinating.

It is an incredible culture alright. One that has lasted as a pretty cohesive unit for far longer than Europe was able to muster(though that can be a problem too). How their philosophies moulded their worldview is an interesting area too and quite different to the European philosophies. It's a fascinating compare and contrast exercise and how seemingly mundane things can make a huge difference. EG the Chinese had porcelain so never really pursued glass making, whereas the opposite happened in Europe and the Middle east and that was a big advantage later on. I love reading of their culture and history too.

Which reminds me, I'm OK with European and a fair chunk of Asian history(particularly Chinese), but beyond the very early days of the rise of Islam, with a smattering of Moorish Spain my later Middle Eastern knowledge is sorely lacking. I'd know way more about Mesoamerican cultures and pre Islamic Persia and such. Must try harder.

j80ezgvc3p92xu

coolemon wrote: »

The Communist Manifesto. It introduced me to a structural and critical way of thinking about history and society.

Have a go at Animal Farm, any of Solzhenitsyn's works or perhaps The Black Book of Communism to get a more rounded picture .

For me, it had to be the Bible. Wow. Since I picked it up a few years ago my life has just changed by a total 180. You would not believe how much one book can alter a person until you spend some time alone with Scripture. Do not deny God the chance to heal and transform your heart

On a similar note, the Imitation of Christ is also brilliant. Witold Pilecki, the man who broke in and out of Auschwitz during World War II, lived by it. If you want insane courage, there is the place to aquire it.

enda1

The Irish Statute Book probably :P

Hagar7

Probably the Irvine Welsh book called Glue.
I enjoyed it so much I had trouble putting it down.

catbear

Hagar7 wrote: »

I enjoyed it so much I had trouble putting it down.

You're thinking of that book about "anti gravity".

MudSkipper

Slaughterhouse five by Kurt Vonnegut.. Best Anti-war novel, based on authors own experiences during bombing of Dresden.

Man in the high castle by Philip k Dick, great altermate history story by favorite sci-fi author.. Book is much better than the Amazon series, but at same time glad it got so much exposure.

HalloweenJack

I've posted on countless threads like this before and I always give the same answer: Cancer Ward by Solzhenitsyn.

An inspiration. It made me realise that I needed to keep fighting while going through a rough time because if I didn't, I was going to get pulled under.