Books that made you change the way you view the world

[Razeus]

....or yourself and others you know. List your books here that had that particular influence and why.

[Anselmus]

Back in high school I read some of the dialogues of Socrates; until then, it never occured to me that obsessive questioning of things was good (it never seems to get to any concrete end). This ignited my desire to learn, anything and everything I could. It was a turning point for me.

[mono]

Many to list:
Most of the dialogues of Plato, Nicomachean Ethics and Metaphysics by Aristotle, The Complete Essays by Ralph Waldo Emerson, various essays by Friedrich Nietzsche, C.S. Lewis, Jean-Jacques Rosseau, Arthur Schopenhauer, Pythagoras, Michel de Montaigne, and Dag Hammarskjöld, The Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri, A Room of One's Own by Virginia Woolf, Being and Nothingness by Jean-Paul Sartre, The Varieties of Religious Experiences by William James, Breakfast at the Victory: The Mysticism in Ordinary Experiences by James Carse, The Celestine Vision by James Redfield, Memories, Dream, Reflections by Carl Jung, The Alphabet Versus the Goddess and Art and Physics by Leonard Shlain, Faust by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, and the poetry of Rumi, Emily Dickinson, and E.E. Cummings.
Whew! ;)

[nadinka]

mono, I see you've been changing your view about the world for quite a few times :)
But, seriosy, I admire this! Must be a really exciting experience when your views get changed. Unfortunaley, I can't think of any book that really changed my views. It's like all of them together shaped my viewes and became a part of what I am right now....Each one a little, but no particular ones really...

[subterranean]

Kieergarrd's books, Satre's, Heller's Eco's..

[mono]

mono, I see you've been changing your view about the world for quite a few times :)
But, seriosy, I admire this! Must be a really exciting experience when your views get changed. Unfortunaley, I can't think of any book that really changed my views. It's like all of them together shaped my viewes and became a part of what I am right now....Each one a little, but no particular ones really...
I have never necessarily changed my view of the world, but, to me a 'good' book, a book that theoretically changes one's view of the world, agrees and, in a way, elucidates a reader's own views, realizing that what he/she reads corresponds to his/her own beliefs.
I think if someone felt yanked around THAT much in beliefs, as many books as I have listed above, he/she never began anywhere with independent theories, but lay merely as a blank slate, waiting for fulfilment from the knowledge of writers, philosophers, and poets. I would like to think that we all begin with not a blank slate, but a slate that we may not have the ability to decipher the writing, that, sometimes, gains more understanding with the knowledge of books; they allow us to discover the wisdom within ourselves.

[transcend]

My chased for universal understanding may have begun as early as the day I realized that the framework of mathematics was arbitrary, yet somehow still that as a whole it could hold absolute truth.

In Siddartha and Narcissus and Goldmund, among others I suspect- Hesse hints at the universality of all seemingly disjointed knowlege. This is manifested in the basis of the glassbead's game where Castalians toss around any and all disciplines using the universal language. Essentially, Hesse has reconcilled one last thing in "The Glass Beads Game" and that thing is everything.

[Helga]

Most books have changed something in me, maybe just realizing emotions I have never known myself.

Lord of the flies is very good and reaches the core of humanity that touched me. The dialoges of Socrates and other philosophers

One book I really love is The Last Flower by James Thurber, it's a poem with pictures and it's just great.

[Bandini]

The 'Cosmic Trigger' series by Robert Anton Wilson. And 'Prometheus Rising' by the same author. Really worth a read - if you get 'em they're great (met a couple of people wjo haven't grasped the irony/ guerilla ontology).

[Sancho]

Gotta agree with mono: every good book I've ever read has changed the way I view the world. And you know what? Life is too short to read crappy books; so as soon as I realize that I'm wading through Ca-Ca, I toss the book onto the dung heap. (How’s that for a scatological metaphor for poor writing?)

Anyhow, good books expand and enrich my understanding of the world, they take me in different directions, make me think of things in different ways, make me question my own assumptions, and all of that necessarily changes me.

Have I mentioned that I like to read?

[Sancho]

Oh yes,
Bandini, dig the siggy.

My favorite bumber sticker: "I'm sorry my Karma ran over your Dogma"

[subterranean]

Can you explain further please?
I don't really get your point..


In Siddartha and Narcissus and Goldmund, among others I suspect- Hesse hints at the universality of all seemingly disjointed knowlege. This is manifested in the basis of the glassbead's game where Castalians toss around any and all disciplines using the universal language. Essentially, Hesse has reconcilled one last thing in "The Glass Beads Game" and that thing is everything.

[Qwinto]

Maugham's "Of Human Bondage"

P.S. subterranian, you have such a magnificent signature... Pleased.

[Rumi_Shams_One]

I believe every single book that talk about knowledge is good, i read many things specially over the internet, but what really got my mind was one paragraph of Rumi's words, i read it and it change me forever, but once again i believe every single book is worth reading

[baddad]

The Sacred Tree. I came across the book in an Aboriginal Anthropology class. It is a blueprint outlining North American aboriginal spiritual beliefs, customs, representations of their icons, drawings and some few rituals. It lays out a foundation for a perspective on the world that encourages enlightenment, peace, free will and volition as the driving forces for a successful life of peace and contentment. Fascinating stuff..........

[lavendar1]

The Interior Castle by St.Teresa of Avila (translated by Mirabai Starr)

This simply worded, simply wonderful account of St. Teresa's spiritual journey to her "Beloved" opened my eyes (and my heart and my soul) to a different way of life -- the contemplative life.

[byquist]

Well, not so much in a philosophical way or "vision of life" way, but
David Mamet's "True and False" is a spunky, little 125-page quick read about the acting profession in relation to higher education. He's very direct, hard-hitting, and accurate. Coupled with wit.

When younger I remember "Gifts From the Sea" by Anne Morrow Lindberg. Ought to read it again to see why I recall it's sincerity and depth.

C.S. Lewis' "The Four Loves" is deep.

Charlotte Joko Beck's two books (she's a realist) - forget the exact titles and she'd be glad I can't recall; would view that as "just fine"

Mary Baker Eddy's "Science and Health" (will stretch your thinking)

Also want to re-read from way back:
The Summing Up by Maugham
The Emply Space (Peter Brooks (?) I think)

Oh, and "An Actor Prepares" by Kostantin Stanislavski
and
"Acting: The First Six Lessons" by Boleslavski (great short book!)

[transcend]

Can you explain further please?
I don't really get your point..

I am so thankful for Hesse because he has sought to reconcile many conflicts I share including: academic life versus political ('real-world') life.

I didn't take the time to get my head straight in my last posting. But, I think i wanted to point out two things:

1) How does Hesse explain concepts?

Hesse's works are filled with moments where he makes u feel the concept that everything is ultimately connected. In otherwords, his writtings are so special because they confer an inuitive understanding of the universe and infinity. Paradoxicaly, it is as if he uses emotions to explain something intellectual. This aspect may be subtle and auxilary to the main themes of his writtings but this aspect really resonates with my own beliefs.

2) How does Hesse reconcile 'everything'?

The way I see it, in "Glass-beads Game", Hesse's view of purely academic versus "real world" life can be thought of as Darwinism. In the book, Castalians emerse themselves in this purely intellectual persuit isolated from the world outside; where as, the outside world of non-Castalians live real lives with real problems, shaping history. Castalians exemplify that which seeks to trancend being shaped by world history and vice-versa. In a sense, that which is immortal. However, non-castalians are the muck of the real world ever struggling to survive and reproduce like any other organism. Mortal life. Through Joseph Knecht's battle with Plino Designori and consultations with the Benedict monk, Hesse develops this conflict between those striving for immortality and those embracing an instinctual mortal life. The concept of universiality is championed by Castalians alone; therefore, a reconcillitation of this conflict between mortals and immortals is also an answer to the question, "How do u reconcile the universial link between all that we know?".

In the novel, 'the game' is a metaphor for pure intellectualism and the fact that the basis of the game is that all disciplines are connected. For example, relationships between philosophy and music can be drawn, "The game began with a rhythmic analysis of a fugal theme and in the center of it was a sentence attributed to Confucius". That is, the basis of the game is unversiality of knowlege. Now, the first attempts at reconcilliation (intellect vs instinct) are abstract. First, the fact that the game was originally played with glass beads suggests the fragility of the innocent and purely intellectual endeavor; second, is the idea that dwelving into the essence of the game is dangerous, when Knecht expresses his fears of being retarded by disillusionment and that ignorance is infact more conducive to ones performance in life,

" I imagine that one can be an excellent player, even a virtuoso...without having any inkling of the real mystery of the Game and its ultimate meaning. It might even be that one who does guess or know the truth might prove a greater danger to the Game, were he to become a specialist or Game leader. For, the dark interior, the esoterics of the Game, points down into the One and All, into those depths where the eternal Atman eternally breaths in and out, [B]sufficient unto itself. One who had experienced the ultimate meaning of the Game within himself would by that fact no longer be a player, he would no longer dwell in the world of the multiplicity, and would no longer be able to delight in invention, construction, and combination."

(Richard and Clara Winston, translated from Das Glasperlenspiel, Hermann Hesse)

The 'truth' about the nature of the crux of the Castalian existence is detrimental to a player's livelihood. In bold is an example of Hesse's hinting at the circular nature of intuitively understanding the universe. From a Darwinian point of view, ignorance and mulitiplicity are virtues for survival.

Knetch actions toward the end of the book are a crossover to the "real-world". Not to spite Castalian life! But to protect it.

Therefore, to cut this short (like the book does), the persuit of a Castalian life isolated from the "real world" is exemplified by the seeking out of the ultimate truth in the universiality of all knowlege. Hesse, maybe suggesting that striving for the 'truth' is not sustainable nor desireable in view of survival in a mortal world.

[Turk]

I believe every single book that talk about knowledge is good, i read many things specially over the internet, but what really got my mind was one paragraph of Rumi's words, i read it and it change me forever, but once again i believe every single book is worth reading

Which word was it?

[Lavender]

hello all...

well, the book that comes to mind when you say "made you change your perspective" was Sophie's World, by Jostein Gaarder. it's LOOOOOONG, and yes, it's about the history of philosophy, but it was amazing. not only did it stretch my mind (it does have philosophy in it, after all) but it was just...amazing. just read it...i don't know how to describe it.

[Eagleheart]

Notes from the underground...All of Dostoevsky's books actually...any defence seems impertinent in the case...
I'll only say that Dostoevsky never leaves any illusions for "outsideness" of the world...you are always inexorably dragged into the shared responsibility...of the society you live in/this is a possible explanation of his often stated "thoughness" in reading/...one has to be a brave person to read Dostoevsky... and of course his writings have changed my worldview

[higley]

The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis is one of the most provoking books that I have ever read. Each page I read made my jaw drop. I don't think that I had ever seen human nature spelled out so clearly as it was in the demon's letters to his nephew.

Lewis's observations really affected me and made me refocus on how I looked at other people, understanding behavior and motivations. A truly amazing book.

[ElenaM]

"The Awakening" by Kate Chopin has completely changed my idea of love and marriage...I experienced the same awakening lived by the main character and now I'm fully aware of the social meaning of being a woman. I think that all women should read it...it could change their life.

[rashikwa]

Metch Albom's writings just make me stop and think. and re-evaluate my whole life. (The Five People You Meet in Heaven) and (Tuesdays with Morrie) are very inspiring.