That thing nobody understands about you. That book that explains it. Match me up.
Martin Buber: I and Thou
It’s a masterpiece of philosophy, and honestly accounts for maybe 3/4ths of my worldview.
The Stranger - Albert Camus
Gustave Doré- Illustrations for the Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri
Read the Divine Comedy at like 12, and loved it. What I liked the most were the illustrations, they made a profound impact in me; and are probably the first artistic work I came to by myself that truly shaped me as a person.
https://archive.org/details/the-dore-illustrations-for-dantes-divine-comedy-pdfdrive
These are beautiful. They’re what I want to draw when I grow up.
Same, still a work in progress
The Historical Illuminatus Chronicles, Volume 1: The Earth Will Shake.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Historical_Illuminatus_Chronicles
Anything else by Wilson would probably be a more productive starting place.
All of Wilson is fantastic, but this is probably the most accessible of his fiction.
His non-fiction though, man, throw a dart. 😉
I compulsively buy copies of Prometheus Rising so I have them on hand to distribute to interesting people.
Yeah, that’s a good one. I like the Illuminati Papers and Right Where You Are Sitting Now as well!
The only book I’ve ever reread was The Illuminatus Trilogy, and I’ve reread it twice. I give out copies of that one too.
Maybe these don’t explain me, but they hit hard at forming my views of my fellow apes:
American politics
How Half Of America Lost Its F**king Mind
Which is also explained, among a shitload of other behavior, in
So MUCH of what we see around us is explained in those two articles. I’ve had responses that neither is a complete view, not all behavior, bla, bla, bla. Yeah, I know. But if you want to understand humans, especially why so many seem bugfuck evil, there’s a lot of bang for the buck in there. (Be patient with the Monkeysphere article, old and the formatting is hosed, but I trust you’ll get it.)
DSM-V
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Codex Seraphinianus.
Some pages may take two-three reads before understanding fully.
Incy wincy spider
It’s the Myth of Sisyphus for the under-fives.
One must imagine incy, not wincy
To scrap the surface: Babel.
The description of what it means to be an expat, away from your culture, cut much deeper than it had reasons to. And it’s a great action/fantasy book
Blackshirts and Reds by Michael Parenti will go a long way towards understanding my politics.
The Critique of Pure Reason.
The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy series and the John Dies at the End series
both 10/10s mixing gut wrenching existentialism and laugh out loud comedy
tbh I probably wouldn’t say I’m into comedy writing in general but those two and Terry Pratchett are the only writers to ever make me bust out laughing in response to words on a page
I’ve lost count of the number of times and number of formats in which i’ve consumed The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy and i’ve loved it every time.
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Anna Karenina and Promise at Dawn
