(Part 2) Reddit mentions: The best essays & correspondence books

You might consider checking out some books about books, to start with. There have been a lot of books published in the last few years that are basically lists of other books as introduced and recommended by various people, and some of them can be quite useful for the beginner. Michael Dirda's Classics for Pleasure would be a good place to start. He has written a number of other books along the same sort of lines, too (this one might also be of interest), but Classics for Pleasure has been very well-received.

Paradoxically, I'd recommend against tackling the classics themselves from the very start. One of the reasons they're classics in the first place is because they're advanced examples of the craft of writing, and for someone not used to reading for the pleasure of that craft rather than for other reasons (which I'll mention in a moment), they can be quite daunting. Your whole project would probably collapse at the outset if you just picked up some Dostoevsky or Flaubert and hoped for the best.

That said, love of the craft isn't the only reason people read, and your understanding of that craft will mature and grow like any other faculty. Some people read to pass the time or to escape from a more mundane life. Some read for a love of incident; that is, they like to read about things happening, and favour books that have strong narratives (sometimes at the cost of description) and exciting things going on in them. I guess the most reductive example of this would be something like a Dan Brown novel, of which type of book it is so often said that "it really moves along." I use this as a familiar example, but you shouldn't take it to mean that enjoying incident in your books is a bad thing. It's not the same as enjoying the craft, but it's not necessarily worse; it just means that people who love a Danielle Steele novel and people who love Tolstoy are loving these works in different ways.

Anyway, here's a list of ten enjoyable, non-threatening, small- to mid-length books that combine craft and incident under one cover:

1. George Orwell - Animal Farm: An interesting refiguration of totalitarian thinking in terms of farm animals. Short and sweet, and certainly quite sad.
   
   
2. Alexander Solzhenitsyn - One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich: A short novel recounting a day in the life of a prisoner in a Soviet Gulag. It's a brutal and intriguing work, but quite easy to get through.
   
   
3. J.R.R. Tolkien - The Hobbit: A reasonably straightforward story of fantasy and adventure. It's very good, and if you find you really like it you can then graduate to the much more elaborate endeavour that is the Lord of the Rings trilogy.
   
   
4. Max Brooks - World War Z: A series of fictional interviews with survivors of the great zombie war. If you don't like zombies it won't really be your thing, I'm afraid, but if you do like zombies there is pretty much literally no better book to read. It is by turns hilarious and heartbreaking, and contains some interesting meditations on questions of societal structure and military theory. It's a bestseller for a reason.
   
   
5. C.S. Forester - The African Queen: In which a gin-soaked tugboat pilot takes a very prim missionary woman down an African river while trying to avoid - and then attack - the German forces that surround them (it's set during the First World War). It's a funny and exciting book, and was made into an equally great movie starring Humphrey Bogart and Katherine Hepburn.
   
   
6. John Steinbeck - The Moon is Down: A novella in which an unnamed European town is occupied by unnamed totalitarian forces. The book chronicles what happens to the townspeople as a result, how they resist, how they compromise, and so on. Written in 1942, this would become Steinbeck's most notable contribution to the war effort. It became a runaway success in occupied Europe, and was widely distributed there in underground translations. It's very good.
   
   
7. Orson Scott Card - Ender's Game: A classic of modern science fiction about (among other things) a child genius in training to conduct a war against an alien race. There are numerous subplots and many interesting ideas under consideration, and for sci-fi it is thankfully not especially predicated on the technology involved (though there is a lot of neat stuff). It's more about characters and concepts than spaceships.
   
   
8. William Golding - The Lord of the Flies: A monstrous little tale of societal breakdown. A tropical island full of stranded schoolchildren degenerates into a savage tribal bloodbath.
   
   
9. G.K. Chesterton - The Napoleon of Notting Hill: A delightful and utterly bizarre little novel in which the King of England in the then-distant future (1984; the book was written in 1904) re-establishes the medieval boroughs and heraldry and clothing as a joke. But one man does not see that it is a joke, and when some developers want to tear down his home to build a new road, his furious resistance ignites a civil war that consumes all of London. It's a very funny book, but it's also full of epic grandeur and street battles and whatnot.
   
   
10. Edwin A. Abbott - Flatland: A strange novella in which Mr. A. Square, a resident of Flatland (a plane existing in only two dimensions), describes the astonishing consequences of being introduced to the world of the third dimension. It also has a lot of fun side notes about the socio-political makeup of Flatland, and it makes for a quick read once you get used to the slightly antiquated style.
    
    You might also consider the works of Douglas Adams and Terry Pratchett, two English writers who deliver a lot of fun ideas under the guise of satire and adventure. Adams is best if you like sci-fi, while Pratchett is more in the fantasy section, but they're both quite good and accessible.
    
    I hope some of this will prove useful to you. Reading can be a most enjoyable pleasure, and a profitable one besides. Good luck with your beginning.

If you want to just know buzzwords to throw around, spend a bunch of time clicking around on Wikipedia, and watch stuff like Crash Course on YouTube. It's easy to absorb, and you'll learn stuff, even if it's biased, but at least you'll be learning.

If you want to become SMARTER, one of my biggest pieces of advice is to either carry a notebook with you, or find a good note taking app you like on your phone. When someone makes a statement you don't understand, write it down and parse it up.

So for instance, write down "Social Democracy", and write down "The New Deal", and go look them up on simple.wikipedia.com (Put's all of it in simplest language possible), it's a great starting point for learning about any topic, and provides you a jumping board to look more deeply into it.

If you are really curious about starting an education, and you absolutely aren't a reader, some good books to start on are probably:

"Thing Explainer: Complicated Stuff in Simple Words" by Randall Munroe

"A Short History of Nearly Everything" by Bill Bryson

"Philosophy 101" by Paul Kleinman, in fact the ____ 101 books are all pretty good "starter" books for people that want an overview of a topic they are unfamiliar with.

"The World's Religions" by Huston Smith

"An Incomplete Education" by Judy Jones and Will Wilson

Those are all good jumping off points, but great books that I think everyone should read... "A History of Western Philosophy" by Bertrand Russell, "Western Canon" by Harold Bloom, "Education For Freedom" by Robert Hutchins, The Norton Anthology of English Literature; The Major Authors, The Bible.

Read anything you find critically, don't just swallow what someone else says, read into it and find out what their sources were, otherwise you'll find yourself quoting from Howard Zinn verbatim and thinking you're clever and original when you're just an asshole.

People of the Book is almost pornography for bibliophiles. This book had me seriously considering going back to school to learn about document preservation.

I went through a period of wanting to read a lot of books about books about a year ago. I think I even have an old submission in r/books on the same subject. Here are a bunch of books I still have on my amazon wishlist that date to around that time. This will be a shotgun blast of suggestions, and some may be only tangentially related, but I figure more is better. If I can think of even more than this, I'll edit later:

The Man who Loved Books Too Much

Books that Changed the World

The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages

How to Read and Why

The New Lifetime Reading Plan

Classics for Pleasure

An Alphabetical Life: Living It Up in the World of Books

The Library at Night

The Yellow-Lighted Bookshop

Time Was Soft There

I have even more around here somewhere...

Edit: Ok, found a couple more....

Among the Gently Mad: Strategies and Perspectives for the Book-Hunter in the 21st Century

At Home with Books: How Booklovers Live with and Care for Their Libraries

Candida Hofer

Libraries in the Ancient World

The Business of Books: How the International Conglomerates Took Over Publishing and Changed the Way We Read

A Short History of the Printed Word

Reluctant Capitalists: Bookselling and the Culture of Consumption

Medieval Illuminators and Their Methods of Work

The Book on the Bookshelf

A History of Illuminated Manuscripts

Bookmaking: Editing, Design, Production

Library: An Unquiet History

Understanding Illuminated Manuscripts: A Guide to Technical Terms

A Passion for Books: A Book Lover's Treasury of Stories, Essays, Humor, Lore, and Lists on Collecting, Reading, Borrowing, Lending, Caring for, and Appreciating Books

A Gentle Madness: Bibliophiles, Bibliomanes, and the Eternal Passion for Books

And yet I still can't find the one I'm thinking of. Will get back to you...

Fuck yeah, I found it!

That last is more about the woman who own the store than about books, but it's awash in anecdotes about writers and stories we all know and love. Check it out.

If you're wanting to learn more about feminism, I highly recommend reading bell hooks, especially Feminism Is for Everybody: Passionate Politics. It's short and a super accessible view on various topics related to feminism. She's a very prolific writer, and she's written on lots of different topics related to teaching, race, and gender.

Audre Lorde is one of my favorite writers, and her book Sister Outsider is a collection of essays and speeches she's written about race, gender, sexuality, and so much more. She described herself as a "black, lesbian, mother, warrior, poet," and I find her work to be powerful and beautiful.

Gloria Anzaldua is another of my favorite writers, and her The Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza is a collection of autobiographical essays and poems. She plays with language, and she wants to make people a bit uncomfortable and to question history. She edited an anthology of essays, poems, and other work by women of color called This Bridge Called My Back: Writings By Radical Women of Color.

I found this list that someone created, and I really like this list. It includes tons of films and books that I've watched or read. They included tv shows and music in the list as well.

Uma Narayan is one of my favorite feminist scholars. In her book, Dislocating Cultures: Identities, Traditions, and Third World Women, she challenges how Western feminists look at issues in other countries. This text is definitely more theory heavy than the others I've suggested.

Dean Spade is a legal scholar, and most people familiar with him are familiar with his work around trans* legal issues. He tries to make this essays accessible, and he tries to focus on finding real world solutions to real world problem. One of my favorite essays is "Mutilating Gender" which is about his experiences attempting to get counseling and chest reconstruction surgery and the patterns he saw socially that made that difficult to accomplish. This text is also a bit theory heavy.

I'm a Women's Studies graduate student, and I teach an intro level Women's Studies course. My research is about representations of Third World women (primarily Indian women), and I look at book, films, and other products of pop culture. For my thesis, I'm examining cultural hybridity in a film, Sita Sings the Blues, and a graphic novel, Sita's Ramayana. If you have a more specific idea of what you want to learn more about, and if you're willing to read some dense, theoretical stuff, I could give you more suggestions for texts or scholars to check out.

I guess you can probably tell from the answers you've already received, but the most important part about writing about New York is not what New York is actually like. It's that it's the kind of city where objective fact is really tinged by individual experience. Is your protagonist a local or a tourist? Or a transplant? This matters a lot and influences their experience.

Generally a local will be a lot less fazed by things. Things might still be weird (and often gross)-they just have grown so accustomed to it that it's become background noise. For instance, New York is quite disgusting as far as cities go -mountains of trash on the sidewalks, litter, the subway is disgusting compared to almost every other subway system I've been on, etc. You really do get used to those things and start developing tunnel vision after a while. If you were born here, you might never have noticed it to begin with or thought it was all perfectly reasonable. That's the biggest way to tell locals apart from tourists -locals won't even look if someone is screaming at the top of their lungs on the subway. They also don't look up at the skyline almost at all. A transplant usually comes with expectations and stereotypes and that colors things a lot too (a book that comes to mind is Goodbye To All That, which is a book about writers that moved here, lived here and left and all that entails.)

Apart from that, there's also different New York types. I'm a woman, so that's what I notice: women that work in midtown and wall street wear classic business attire and convey competence, models basically have an all-black uniform (black booties, jeans and leather jackets usually), creative Brooklyn types often wear red lipstick and funkier but fashionable stuff (various hipster aesthetics), old Upper West Side ladies have classy grey bobs (no dye, ever), the people that man the galleries wear understated black, etc. Obviously this varies person to person, but you get the idea: New York is big and there are different subgroups whose clothing is somewhat affected by their employment choice.

Finally - something that lends credibility to a text is the monetary aspect of things: life is expensive in New York, so look at sites like Streeteasy to get a feel for where your characters could realistically live. Once you zero in on a neighborhood, I recommend you go to /r/nyc and ask specific questions there about what it's like to live there.

Good luck on your novel!

This is a laudable effort but (un)fortunately really has little to do with architecture. What you've drawn are some made up elevations, each representing a different house. While as a general ambition commendable, this way of thinking is very unarchitectural. It would be far better if you tried to draw four elevations of a single house - then you'd encounter what architecture really deals with and what it's all about - interconnectedness and various relationships. That single exercise would force you to think about what's happening behind corners and behind walls, it'd force you to think in terms of space, not surface. Elevations especially in modern architecture are the consequence of the inner disposition and plan, so thinking about modern architecture (as in contemporary, not necessarily modernist) from the outside is the wrong approach. Classicist architecture could perhaps justify this approach.


I realize that you're still very young and that I'm seemingly demanding too much, but my intention is not to chastise you but to dispel misapprehensions about architecture as such, among those the notion that one can get away with casual dabbling with it. Architectural manifestations are a response it's content, function, to it's inner and outer processes and relationships. One of my professors used to say 'don't draw a dining room, draw lunch', because it's all about the 'why' and 'what for'. So if you're genuinely interested in pursuing architecture I'd recommend this fun and delightful book and wish you all the best.

I had a really dark time in my life as well where I turned to music as a main comfort to stay sane. I listened to MOTM 2 by Kid Cudi nearly every day for a year. While there were times I felt like maybe things were better because of this album, I found that nothing had really changed after the year had passed. Music can be therapeutic, but think of it as a very short term fix (like a drug high vs "high off life").

It's been years since that really tough time, and being someone that has dealt with depression for a long time, I've found that while the music was sort of comforting, it doesn't compare to the therapeutic effects of taking action. Instead of stewing in the room with the music on, distracting you from reality, do any action that you feel is productive- it could be something physical like a sport or going to the gym, talking to that one girl you've always liked, beginning to learn that new skill you always wished you had, starting a new business venture----anything that means something to you that you have to work at consistently in order to achieve success in. The point is that while I know you want to be distracted right now, the truth is that music, games and drugs are fun but ultimately aren't lasting solutions to any problem.

If you really insist on just the music, MOTM2 is the way to go from my experience, but just know that it doesn't actually make anything better, only you can do that through your actions. I hope you make it through to the other side of whatever is happening- stay strong!

Here are some links that might help you get pumped up to do the thing you want to do:

www.reddit.com/r/GetMotivated

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IYGaXzJGVAQ (David Foster Wallace - This is water commencement speech)

http://www.amazon.com/Essential-Writings-Emerson-Library-Classics/dp/0679783229/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1381754376&sr=8-1&keywords=the+essential+writings+of+ralph+waldo+emerson (The essential writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3JBu47vDa9Y (Inspiring words from Nas)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yJbpHBeVWkA (Motivation from Pharrell)

If you need someone to speak with, PM me.

Scott McCloud is one of the standards, definitely start there! Here's a list of some of the more granular/weird ones that are on my shelves:

• Panel Discussions (lots of great topics like page breakdown, pacing, using your gutters, etc)
  
• The Will Eisner Books (Comics & Sequential Art, Graphic Narrative and Storytelling, Expressive Anatomy. I've only read the 1st two, but they're fascinating looks at the older-style black and white layouts, with lots of good tips)
  
  • ***these use examples from Eisner's life, so 1930s-2005. The older ones are less-than-politically-correct, and the publisher addresses it in the forward, but still, CW.
    
• Wonderbook (this is just FUN fiction writing theory, written by the guy who did Annihilation)
  
• The Comics Journal (you can subscribe to this at your local comic book store through Diamond. Full of industry talk!)

Starting out in philosophy, I think, requires a historical approach. In order to fully understand some work (say, Marx's Das Kapital) means you need the background literature that led up to that work (say, Hegel's Phenomenology). The important thing to remember when reading through the history of western philosophy, is that all of these writers are in dialogue with one another, and that none of their views makes perfect sense in a vacuum. So, I suggest we start at the beginning.

Plato. Folks will tell you to read the pre-socratics, but if you aren't a professional or a student, it's not entirely necessary. Plato is the ground floor in terms of western philosophy and the upshot is that the dialogues are fairly easy and light reading (in the context of western philosophy, which can often get very dense). I'd suggest the Meno which covers a bunch of intro epistemology, the Republic, which covers a lot of P's political and moral thought. The trial and death of socrates is also really great. It's a collection of dialogues.

Then I'd suggest Aristotle's Nichomachean Ethics which is a direct response to Plato.

Then I'd move on to the early modern guys. Some will tell you to dig into the Romans and the medieval stuff, but again, if you just want a beginners list, I'd skip em for now.

In terms of early modern stuff, the period runs roughly from Francis Bacon or Galileo, to Kant. All of these guys are debating with each other so its important to move through it chronologically, in order to understand the context of the writings.

I always suggest that my students pick up this book: http://www.amazon.com/Modern-Philosophy-Anthology-Primary-Sources/dp/0872209784/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1375192962&sr=1-1&keywords=early+modern+philosophy+reader
Get an old edition, and a dirty used cheap one if you are buying the book. No point in going nuts when there's no difference between editions.

It is an anthology (with good translations) of Descartes' Meditations, Spinoza's Ethics, Leibniz's Monadology, Locke's Essay, Berkeley's Three Dialogues, Hume's Enquiry, and Kant's Prolegomena. Plus more- checkout the table of contents.
This book will give you the whole history of early modern, without you having to buy a ton of different books. But these are the books a beginner would read, in this order.

Once my beginner had finished these texts, he'd have a good idea of what the history of philosophy looks like, and would be in a really good position to start tackling more contemporary stuff. It will also give you an idea of what issues in philosophy (metaphysics, epistemology, logic, ethics, political philosophy, etc.) you are interested in so you can dial in what else you want to read.

Remember!: All of these books are in the public domain and you can find free copies online. The only downside is that the translations can be a little rough.

I also suggest (as you can no doubt tell by now), that a beginner tackle primary sources. People will tell you to read some secondary book that "breaks it down for you," but the only way to build up the ability to read the history of philosophy is by actually digging in and getting messy. Philosophy can be really hard to read, but you get the hang of it. But this only happens if you struggle with the text's themselves. The payoff is worth it.

Edit: /u/realy provided an absolutely badass reading list from St. John's undergraduate great books program. Check it out!!

For criticism of HPL's works i would highly recommend:

Dissecting Cthulhu

A Subtler Magick: The Writings and Philosophy of H.P. Lovecraft

Lovecraft: Disturbing the Universe
or any volume in the Lovecraft Annual




For Biography on Lovecraft:

H.P. Lovecraft: A Life

...or the expanded version of the above I Am Providence




And Lovecraft's letters (edited and compiled by Joshi) are really the best way to get deep into Lovecraft, although I'll warn you, you really are reading HPL's conversations with his friends, so there is a tremendous amount of biographical detail, but not a terrible amount in the way of talk about his own work. Some of the best:

Letters to James F. Morton

A Means to Freedom: The Letters of H.P. Lovecraft and Robert E. Howard

O Fortunate Floridian: H.P. Lovecraft's Letters to R.H. Barlow

Hey, I think this is a great idea and not dumb at all in light of what is going on.

I’ve been to Hong Kong once for a week about 7 years ago. It definitely is a city with a personality.

I haven’t read this yet but it’s been recommended to me a few times. It’s about writers that loved but eventually left New York City. Like HK, NYC is a financial powerhouse with sprawling geographics (if you count all 5 boroughs), huge income gaps, lots of migration in and out, a mix of cultures, etc.

In your other comment you suggested both a love and a critical look at HK, so that might fit a bit with the theme of loving but leaving (not that you will leave, but the idea that this city is also hugely flawed despite your love for it).

The difference might be that I don’t think most of the writers featured are NY natives while you are an HK native, etc.

It's great that you're interested! However, you're asking for two different things.

This should be a nice book of the [Anglo-Saxon Chronicles] (https://www.amazon.co.uk/Anglo-Saxon-Chronicles-Michael-Swanton/dp/1842120034/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1521744983&sr=1-1&keywords=anglo+saxon+chronicle) in translation, for a non-academic reader.

As for the language, that's a bit more tricky. As Old English is basically only taught at universities and the ubelievable greed of academic publishers, the prices are more than 20 pounds or dollars for a paperback copy. And these are textbooks for learning the language, mind you. They will explain the pronunciation, the case system, the nouns and adjectives, the grammatical gender, the declension of verbs, the poetic metre, etc etc. They also have some shorter texts in Old English, both poetry and prose, with a glossary at the end.

From those, I'd recommend [Peter S. Baker - Introduction to Old English] (https://www.amazon.co.uk/Introduction-Old-English-Peter-Baker/dp/047065984X/ref=sr_1_8?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1521744924&sr=1-8&keywords=old+english) (my favourite), [Richard Marsden - The Cambridge Old English Reader] (https://www.amazon.co.uk/Cambridge-Old-English-Reader/dp/1107641314/ref=sr_1_5?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1521744918&sr=1-5&keywords=old+english) (which is more of a collection of texts and not a textbook for learning the language, though does provide some very limited help), or [Mitchell and Robinson - A Guide to Old English] (https://www.amazon.co.uk/Guide-Old-English-Bruce-Mitchell/dp/0470671076/ref=sr_1_12?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1521744828&sr=1-12&keywords=old+english)

For a non-academic book to learn the language, I don't have any experience with it, but people seem to like it on Amazon, so it's [Matt Love - Learn Old English with Leofwin] (https://www.amazon.co.uk/Learn-English-Leofwin-Matt-Love/dp/189828167X/ref=sr_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1521744828&sr=1-4&keywords=old+english). There is also a book+CD set by [Mark Atherton - Complete Old English: Teach Yourself] (https://www.amazon.co.uk/Complete-Old-English-Teach-Yourself/dp/1444104195/ref=sr_1_14?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1521744446&sr=1-14&keywords=old+english)

He actually wrote about his perspective on religion in his book Ideas and Opinions. I haven't read it myself, but a friend told me he had some interesting insights on Judaism. Amazon also has a collection of his writings on Cosmic Religion and Other Opinions and Aphorisms. Seems like the information is there if people are interested in his religious views.

On Writing Well by William Zissner and Elements of Style by Strunk and White will help you write with clarity and succinctness. King's On Writing and Lamott's Bird by Bird will give you good general advice (and the reading list at the end of King's is great), but yeah, they don't get into the nitty gritty details too often (which is why some people like them and why some people don't).

Thrill Me by Benjamin Percy is a great collection of essays on fiction. It's somewhere between On Writing's and Bird by Bird's generalness and the specificity of On Writing Well and Elements of Style. You might even disagree with some of Percy's essays but he tackles topics that are important to think about regardless.

And I can't recommend Writing Fiction: A Guide to Narrative Craft by Janet Barroway and Elizabeth and Ned Stuckey-French enough. It's a little pricey—look for it at your local library before you buy—but it's basically a undergraduate class on writing, complete with readings and exercises.

Nothing really, you can go right to it. But it's not light reading and might not resolve your concerns, especially if Man's Search for Meaning didn't immediately help. What Frankl offers in that book is basically a patronus. Not that Harry Potter isn't a way of life but it's not a rigorous framework either. It's a charm in your pocket, if you can find one that's strong enough to withstand scrutiny and repeated use.

Because of your other questions The Myth of Sisyphus by Albert Camus. It gets to the heart of the question.

r/existentialsupport

I am a few years older than you and I have been going hard with books lately. It's not amazing, but I am on track to finishing about ~400 books by the time I am 30. I am also going for quality more than quantity. As in, if I feel like I didn't digest a particular book, I will keep at it and put other books on hold.

In any case, here are my top 3 recommendations:

1.) The Essential Writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson

2.) The 48 Laws of Power

3.) The Autobiography of Malcolm X

Also, Influence by Robert Cialdini is excellent. One of my favorites.

A little cautionary warning about asking people for recommendations though: Be careful about following other people's lists because those book won't vibe with you the same way. Each of us had our own unique life experiences, so you should be ideally choosing your own books. Lists are good for clues/inspiration though. Frequently, books choose me, not the other way around.

Also, try to keep track of the books (and knowledge) you read. I keep a single page HTML page with all the books I read along with a short note in reverse chronological order. I also have the option of putting this list online in the future if I need to.

I use this one and it has a good 60 odd pages of introduction and context to both.

A good ASC is Ingram/Giles which isn't modern but is still very good and is a sort of default ASC. If you can afford the upgrade, then Dorothy Whitelock's version is very good but very expensive. Michael Swanton has a new version with new translation which I thought I had ordered but apparently not, so I can't comment on that yet (but read the Amazon comments- the formatting might be not to your taste).

Physics major here! I loved my writing seminar (Alienation and the Modern Identity), and I found it extremely beneficial. If you have time, read some Nietzsche; I especially liked ON THE GENEALOGY OF MORALS. The Walter Kaufmann translations are good: https://smile.amazon.com/Writings-Nietzsche-Modern-Library-Classics-ebook/dp/B004KABEBU/ and https://smile.amazon.com/Portable-Nietzsche-Library-ebook/dp/B001R9DI3Y/

I read This Bridge Called My Back recently. It was pretty interesting to me. Some of it was pretty far out there, and some of it is pretty outdated, but I felt like it gave an interesting overall view of what women of color are dealing with in America and how Feminist theory was developing and being treated at that time.

Honestly, I'm far more into sociology and philosophy than economics so most of my suggestions will be based on those!

I couldn't recommend Camus' The Rebel or
The Myth Of Sisyphous

Ooooh or Jean-Paul Sartre's (or as you may know him: one of the leftists who tried to abolish the age of consent) The Wall or
Existenialism Is A Humanism

These are the kinds of works that inform my worldview more than any other, and I believe them to be great jumping off points into abusrdism and existentialism respectively (though Existenialism Is A Humanism could also be replaced by a much stronger work of his, Being and Nothingness )

No specific feedback on that poem (I honestly don't think it would help you at this point, if you're just starting out), just some general advice:

It takes a long time and a lot of work to become a good poet. Just try to write regularly and read poetry regularly - every day, or at least 4-5 days a week, if you can. Most of what you write will be pretty bad, and some of what you read you won't fully understand. But that's okay. You'll improve as you write your first few (dozen, hundred) pieces.

>I've never taken a poetry class

There are lots of resources you can use on your own. There are many resources online, and if you want a book to get your feet a little wetter check out one of the following:

http://www.amazon.com/How-Write-Poem-John-Redmond/dp/1405124806

http://www.amazon.com/Wingbeats-Exercises-Practice-Scott-Wiggerman/dp/0976005190/ref=pd_bxgy_14_2?ie=UTF8&refRID=1444QQJWP5YABHPKME64

http://www.amazon.com/Crafty-Poet-Portable-Workshop/dp/193613862X/ref=pd_bxgy_14_3?ie=UTF8&refRID=1444QQJWP5YABHPKME64

Absolutely. If you're interested in the friendship between them, the collected letters between them have been published in a two-volume set by Hippocampus Press. They're 55 bucks together, but you can sometimes get them for less on eBay, etc.

http://www.amazon.com/Means-Freedom-Letters-Lovecraft-Robert/dp/0984480293
http://www.hippocampuspress.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=1_5&products_id=7&zenid=1cd889d3e25ff2304aff7d03300ab221

Some of Howard's best stories are set in the Lovecraft Mythos. Check out stories like "Worms of the Earth" and "The Black Stone." I'd suggest The Horror Stories of Robert E. Howard if you're like to read more, though most are available-ish in the public domain:

http://www.amazon.com/Horror-Stories-Robert-E-Howard/dp/0345490207

Recently picked up his Guide to Creating Imaginative Fiction

Its a pretty interesting read for anyone interested.

Here are all the local Amazon links I could find:


amazon.com

amazon.co.uk

amazon.ca

amazon.com.au

amazon.in

amazon.com.mx

amazon.de

amazon.it

amazon.es

amazon.com.br

amazon.nl

amazon.co.jp

amazon.fr

Beep bloop. I'm a bot to convert Amazon ebook links to local Amazon sites.
I currently look here: amazon.com, amazon.co.uk, amazon.ca, amazon.com.au, amazon.in, amazon.com.mx, amazon.de, amazon.it, amazon.es, amazon.com.br, amazon.nl, amazon.co.jp, amazon.fr, if you would like your local version of Amazon adding please contact my creator.

Well back in the day they had a much larger following which included blacks, yep the KKK was not always violent towards blacks.

Hard Times by Studs Terkel (1970, New York). The book is about the conditions in this country during the Great Depression. On page 239 we read:

"The Ku Klux was formed on behalf of people that wanted a decent living, both black and white. Half the coal camp was colored. It wasn't anti-colored. The black people had the same responsibilities as the white. Their lawn was just as green as the white man's. They got the same rate of pay. There was two colored who belonged to it. I remember those two coming around my father and asking questions about it. They joined. The pastor of our community church was a colored man. He was Ku Klux. It was the only protection the working man had. ....... One time a Negro slapped a white boy. They didn't give him any warning. They whipped him and ran him out of town. If a white man slapped a colored kid, they'd have dome the same thing. They didn't go in for beating up Negroes because they were Negroes. What they did was keep the community decent to live in. What they did object to was obscenity and drinking.".
"The Ku Klux Spirit", by J.A. Rogers, noted Negro historian of the 1920's. The Ku Klux Spirit was first published in 1923, by Messenger Publishing Co. It was republished in 1980, by Black Classic Press. On page 34 of his book we find the amazing passage: "A fact not generally known is that there were thousands of Negro Klansmen. These were used as spies on other Negroes and on Northern Whites."
https://www.amazon.com/Hard-Times-History-Great-Depression/dp/1565846567

Very interesting. In the 1920's, there were plenty of original Klansmen still living as well as many other people of both races who lived during the Reconstruction Era. J.A. Rogers would have been able to interview many. Why would a Black historian make such a thing up? And if he did make it up there would have been plenty of people who would have objected. His book would not have survived to this day. Yet, it did.

Thank you for replying and answering my questions. As a non-childbearing woman myself, let me recommend you some books I've read to help me with understanding our place in this world.

Motherhood: A Novel, by Shelia Heti

Selfish, Shallow, and Self Absorbed: Sixteen Writers on the Decision Not to Have Kids by Meghan Daum

The M Word: Conversations About Motherhood by Kerry Clare

To honor National Mental Health day, I have a free ebook promotion going on from now until 10/12. I have struggled and continue to struggle with depression and anxiety. I wrote my book as a way to cope with my struggles. It was a cathartic experience that helped me grow as a person.  I hope we can all reflect on this day and make sure to raise awareness to reduce the stigma surrounding mental illnesses. Keep fighting and growing.

Please help support me as an artist by downloading and reading my book, Hail:

https://www.amazon.com/HAIL-When-I-Reign-Hurts-ebook/dp/B07C95C4LH/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1566499295&sr=8-3

You can also support by reviewing and following my socials:

• Facebook page:https://www.facebook.com/Brandon-Haist-214420729313174/
  
• Instagram page: https://www.instagram.com/where.is.b/
  
  Thanks,
  
  Brandon Haist

I happen to have two different translations of this very book right next to me.

On this amazon listing for the book, it lists the translator right next to the author near the top of the page "Thomas Common (Translator) "

I found Walter Kauffman on amazon, and you can get his translation of "TSZ" through The Portable Nietzsche right there on Amazon in paperback, kindle or library binding formats.

Enjoy! As I have.

Georges Perec's species of spaces helped me when i went through a similar thing, he has a different way of looking at the world and its full of fabulously inspiring references.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Species-Spaces-Pieces-Penguin-Classics/dp/0141442247/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1288993123&sr=8-1

my tutor was the reason i lost interest and stopped believing in my ability to design, sometime you just have to get on with it and turn it into something you passionate about again.

Thanks for the kind words! :-)

I read Daum's book "Selfish, Shallow, and Self-Absorbed: Sixteen Writers on the Decision Not to Have Kids". Don't judge the book by it's cover or the title. It's actually a very thoughtful and thought-provoking read. I found it to be an accessible book, full of personal testimonies. It goes beyond the myopic views about starting a family.

Really helped me to put things in perspective.

This is the standard translation. You might also try Robin Waterfield's translation, but it's less in favour.

If you have more questions I'd take this to /r/AskPhilosophy, or alternatively you can PM me. We try to keep /r/philosophy for discussion rather than questions like these.

I don't either. I've started reading http://www.amazon.com/Wingbeats-Exercises-Practice-Scott-Wiggerman/dp/0976005190 and one of the first things the author says is to write everyday. Even if it doesn't feel like it's your best.

I think this practice sharpens you for when you get those moments of inspiration. I also think we are not the best judge of our work. Several people will see it and they will determine if it speaks to them.

Now I should follow that book's advice and write a poem today!

edit: grammar fix.

If you are going to tackle Terkel (and i recommend you do) I cannot give high enough praise for "Hard Times" which is an oral history of the Great Depression. It is simply mindblowing.

most people did not lose their jobs during the great depression (75% employment rate). many people weren't affected much at all.

i'm no expert on the great depression, but i did read this book and found it quite fascinating how disparate the hundreds of personal stories and experiences were.

The structure of the list comes from Harold Bloom's book The Western Canon, in which he separates the history of literature into four ages: theological, aristocratic, democratic, and chaotic.

This website helpfully explains Bloom's inspiration:

> Vico was an eighteenth-century scholar who argued that the history of the nations of Europe follows a three-fold pattern of development from barbarism, to heroism, to reason. This hopeful dynamic is tempered in Vico by the notion that it is an ever-recurring pattern whick breaks down into chaos and starts all over again. Bloom, a contemporary literary critic, uses Vico’s idea to divide the history of Western Literature into three phases in his landmark survey The Western Canon.

> Thoughts & Ideas By Albert Einstein

I believe you mean "Ideas and Opinions" by Einstein :)

Link for anybody interested!

+ladybro:

> Thoughts & Ideas By Albert Einstein

I believe you mean "Ideas and Opinions" by Einstein :)

Link for anybody interested!

Did you know Amazon will donate a portion of every purchase if you shop by going to smile.amazon.com instead? Over $50,000,000 has been raised for charity - all you need to do is change the URL!

Here are your smile-ified links:

On Writing Well

Elements of Style

Thrill Me

Writing Fiction: A Guide to Narrative Craft

---

^^i'm ^^a ^^friendly bot

Emerson's Self Reliance and On Intelligence (for starters)

Joseph Campbell's Power of Myth

John Bridges' How To Be A Gentleman

If you're going into business: Sun Tzu's The Art of War

Jean Jacque Rousseau's The Social Contract

These are all non-fiction reads that are meant to build character. Most fiction is meant to engender culture in their readers or inspire philosophical reflection. Non-Fiction is typically more instructional.

i took a 4-month trip from SF to Osaka...only flew once from NY to London...it was a great trip...plus moths here and there in about 45 countries...highly recommended...
some other good books

It's something like a travelogue, but Pecked to Death by Ducks is witty and educational. I can definitely recommend it to someone looking for engaging nonfiction.

I definitely recommend buying it in paperback "Ideas and Opinions
Book by Albert Einstein" http://www.amazon.com/Ideas-Opinions-Albert-Einstein/dp/0517884402?ie=UTF8&keywords=ideas%20and%20opinions&qid=1464431639&ref_=sr_1_1&s=books&sr=1-1

http://www.amazon.com/Pecked-Death-Ducks-Tim-Cahill/dp/0679749292

That is a great travel book, as are many of his other ones.

• Minsky, Marvin - The Society of Mind
  
• Minsky, Marvin - The Emotion Machine
  
• Coetzee, John Maxwell - Summertime
  
• Hawking, Stephen & Mlodinow, Leonard - The Grand Design
  
• Camus, Albert - The Rebel

Hard Times by Studs Terkel. It's an oral history of the Great Depression by the editor/interviewer of my favorite non-fiction book, Working.

Existentialism and Human Emotions, by Sartre, is only 96 pages and quite an easy read. {ISBN-13: 978-0806509020} Existentialism and the Philosophical Tradition, [Raymond], gives a broad selection of thinkers throughout history, but it is pricey. {ISBN-13: 978-0132957755} Another approach would be texts that are not strictly philosophical yet present some existential points such as: The Plague, The Stranger, and The Rebel, all by Camus, Nausea by Sartre, Notes From Underground, by Dostoevsky, or Waiting For Godot by Beckett

Kaufmann's translation of TSZ is contained in full in his 'The Portable Nietzsche' Kindle edition here:

https://www.amazon.com/Portable-Nietzsche-Library-ebook/dp/B001R9DI3Y/ref=sr_1_6_twi_kin_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1543604107&sr=8-6&keywords=walter+kaufmann

The book also contains several other Nietzsche works, well worth owning in my opinion.

I highly suggest Einstein's collected Ideas and Opinions. This particular passage comes from his essay 'Good and Evil'.

The OP specifically mentioned the hardback edition, which is going for $400-$450 on Amazon.

I agree that $36.38 isn't bad for the two-volume paperback edition, but even that might be beyond some people's means.

Aha, yes, "The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages" does indeed sound opposed to political readings, to say the least, and he's been criticized for being hopelessly old fashioned, which is doubtless what I'm looking for; thanks!

Never justified on a moral scale. It is rather hard to explain in forum context without going into lengthy philosophical discussions. I would just recommend reading 'The Rebel' by Albert Camus.

Or just go for Amazon; it might not be exactly cheap but it's not hugely expensive either.

Hard Times by Studs Terkel. Many books by him, actually.

https://www.amazon.com/Hard-Times-History-Great-Depression/dp/1565846567

There's a book...

https://www.amazon.com/Pecked-Death-Ducks-Tim-Cahill/dp/0679749292

Harold Bloom wrote about this 20 years ago and it had brewing a long time before then

no , just open-minded, what about you ?



EDIT:

here's a quick selection of some of the books from my library list. have you seen/read at least 1 of those?? ;-)

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Margins-Reality-Consciousness-Physical-World/dp/1936033003/

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Holographic-Universe-Michael-Talbot/dp/0586091718/

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Synchronicity-Coincidence-Change-Unlocking-Your/dp/1601631839/

https://www.amazon.co.uk/WILLIAM-WALKER-ATKINSON-Ultimate-Collection-ebook/dp/B01CKHEABK/

https://www.amazon.co.uk/What-Reality-Consciousness-Existence-Paradigm/dp/1590793919/

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Course-Miracles-Foundation-Inner-Peace/dp/1883360269/

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Brief-History-Everything-20th-Anniversary/dp/1611804523/

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Biology-Belief-Unleashing-Consciousness-Miracles/dp/1781805474/

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Selfish-Gene-Anniversary-Landmark-Science/dp/0198788606/

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Bhagavad-Easwarans-Classics-Indian-Spirituality/dp/1586380192/

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Perceptual-Intelligence-Illusion-Misperception-Self-Deception/dp/160868475X/

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Brain-Story-You-David-Eagleman/dp/1782116613/

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Seeing-Myself-Out-body-Experiences/dp/1472137361/

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Seat-Soul-Gary-Zukav/dp/147675540X/

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Brain-That-Changes-Itself-Frontiers/dp/014103887X/

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Breaking-Habit-Being-Yourself-Create/dp/1848508565/

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Complete-Works-Swami-Vivekananda-ebook/dp/B073GYW7W2/

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Eye-Which-Nothing-Hidden/dp/178180768X/

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Consciously-Creating-Circumstances-Winslow-Plummer-ebook/dp/B005NWJKDI/

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Essential-Writings-Emerson-Library-Classics/dp/0679783229/

How knowledgeable are you ?

Oops, sorry about that!

Despite being rather comprehensive, 1001 List is problematic, and I suspect you might not find it as useful as the Time 100. Its selection seems to be based on what would make you a literary conversationalist at a cocktail party; the selection is heavily skewed to recently published works and a lot of the non-English books seem to be sort of token selections.

In addition it has inexplicable Coetzee obsession which I found maddening because I'm not his biggest fan.

Another literary list I'd recommend is the one compiled by Harold Bloom. http://www.amazon.com/Western-Canon-Books-School-Ages/dp/1573225142

Are you a fucking idiot?

The Daily Show (The Book): An Oral History as Told by Jon Stewart, the Correspondents, Staff and Guests https://www.amazon.com/dp/1455565369/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_yNIIAbMD7CKCF

Hard Times: An Oral History of the Great Depression https://www.amazon.com/dp/1565846567/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_nOIIAb8EVQSB7

Please Kill Me: The Uncensored Oral History of Punk https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00F21WW6W/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_9OIIAbCN96QAJ

Albert Einstein was very left wing. If you want to read more of his non-physics opinions, I recommend a book I once knew as "The Ideas and Opinions of Albert Einstein," but which now seems to have been shortened to "Ideas and Opinions."

He made quite number of memorable statements. He had no use for the military:

> This topic brings me to that worst outcrop of herd life, the military system, which I abhor. That a man can take pleasure in marching in fours to the strains of a band is enough to make me despise him. He has only been given his big brain by mistake; unprotected spinal marrow was all he needed. This plague-spot of civilization ought to be abolished with all possible speed. Heroism on command, senseless violence, and all the loathsome nonsense that goes by the name of patriotism -- how passionately I hate them! How vile and despicable seems war to me! I would rather be hacked in pieces than take part in such an abominable business. My opinion of the human race is high enough that I believe this bogey would have disappeared long ago, had the sound sense of the peoples not been systematically corrupted by commercial and political interests acting through the schools and the Press.

source

Unprotected spinal marrow! Hacked to pieces! Colorful words, for sure.

Sometimes he sounded like a gnostic:

> A human being is a part of the whole, called by us "Universe," a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings as something separated from the rest, a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty. Nobody is able to achieve this completely, but the striving for such achievement is in itself a part of the liberation and a foundation for inner security.

source

He's interesting reading, if nothing else. A side of Einstein we rarely hear about today.