:rolleyes: I think the most influential book to me is Fairy Tales Of Anderson.
I read this book when I was very young, and I still think it's great now.
:) wish you all like it too.
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:rolleyes: I think the most influential book to me is Fairy Tales Of Anderson.
I read this book when I was very young, and I still think it's great now.
:) wish you all like it too.
W. Faulkner, 'The Sound and the Fury'
L.P. Boon, 'De paradijsvogel', 'Mijn kleine oorlog', 'Het Geuzenboek' (I don't know about English translations, but these are litteral translations of those titles: 'The Bird of Paradise', 'My Little War', 'The Book of Gueux' - I don't know how to translate this last one: it's about the protestant uprising in Flanders in the 2nd half of the 16th Century)
H. Claus, 'De verwondering' (the wonder, or the amazement, something like that)
Paul de Wispelaere, 'Het verkoolde alfabet' (the charred alphabet, a journal)
W. Shakespeare, 'Hamlet'
and so much more
i think that the book thay influanced me
pride and prejudice by jane Austen ;)
There have been so many over the years that I'll probably have to come back and edit this later because I'll have left one or two out, but for starters...
"The Outsiders" by S.E. Hinton, read way back when I was about 11 or 12. Cried my eyes out, but it opened my mind to the idea of writing. I've been keeping a journal ever since and, though I did write the Great American Novel, I do make a living through writing (technical stuff, not very creative).
"Absalom, Absalom" by William Faulkner. Faulkner is one of my favorites, and race relations is the great shame of our country. Faulkner shows how our fate will forever be tied to our inability to eradicate racism.
"Ulysses" by James Joyce. This was like turning a fire hose on my ego and all my aspirations of being a writer. It was so beyond anything I had read to that point. It was writing beyond storytelling, writing beyond the beauty of language, or the revelation of truth. Joyce kicked my butt!
A Remarkable Book I will have to come back and name later (please no comments about my age!) Anyway, it's an oral history of the civil rights movement in American from the death of Emmett Til up to what was then the present day (1980s). True stories of people putting their lives on the line.
"Tropic of Cancer" by Henry Miller. Words that leap from the page, pulsing with life, while writing about the breakdown of civilization in depression-era Paris. Not all of Miller's work is that vivid, some of it downright awful, but ToC is an ode to life -- flawed, tragic, comic, imperfect life.
I'm leaving far too many out, but I'm out of time.
ihrocks
There have been so many over the years that I'll probably have to come back and edit this later because I'll have left one or two out, but for starters...
"The Outsiders" by S.E. Hinton, read way back when I was about 11 or 12. Cried my eyes out, but it opened my mind to the idea of writing. I've been keeping a journal ever since and, though I did write the Great American Novel, I do make a living through writing (technical stuff, not very creative).
"Absalom, Absalom" by William Faulkner. Faulkner is one of my favorites, and race relations is the great shame of our country. Faulkner shows how our fate will forever be tied to our inability to eradicate racism.
"Ulysses" by James Joyce. This was like turning a fire hose on my ego and all my aspirations of being a writer. It was so beyond anything I had read to that point. It was writing beyond storytelling, writing beyond the beauty of language, or the revelation of truth. Joyce kicked my butt!
"Voices of Freedom," an oral history of the civil rights movement in American from the death of Emmett Til up to what was then the present day (1980s). True stories of people putting their lives on the line.
"Tropic of Cancer" by Henry Miller. Words that leap from the page, pulsing with life, while writing about the breakdown of civilization in depression-era Paris. Not all of Miller's work is that vivid, some of it downright awful, but ToC is an ode to life -- flawed, tragic, comic, imperfect life.
I'm leaving far too many out, but I'm out of time.
ihrocks
You do have good taste in literature, though. The Outsiders wasn't anything extraordinary, but Hinton did write it when she was in high school (which I thought was very impressive).
You can't go wrong with James Joyce, either. Each page of Ulysses was a captivating little view of the human spirit (sometimes overwhelming). I don't like to break it down too much, though. It is enjoyable even at face value (the rhythm and the diction, for example).
I think I'm too young for Faulkner, though, because I'm still not mature enough to understand what 'true' suffering is. But I'll give it a couple more years and then see what has transpired in my life (but, then, why am I wishing that on myself?).
It's good to have you here, if I didn't say it before.
Thanks for the welcome!
I'm sure if I went back now and re-read "The Outsiders" I'd cringe, but I have to say that 30 years of journaling, a degree in communications, five years writing for a newspaper, and even my present humble situation all started with that little book.
Also, I didn't give props to Dylan Thomas or D.H. Lawrence because neither wrote a specific book that influenced me, but their collective writings are among my favorites.
Yes, that was what was so awe-inspiring about "Ulysses." It works at every level, and the more you dig into it, the more you find, and the more satisfying you find it. There is a theory that all literature either leads up to, or away from, that one book. I'm not sure I buy into it, but it is an amazing piece work.
Oh, and did I mention, "As I Lay Dying"? Another fantastic bit from Mr. Faulkner.
ihrocks
Interesting. Are there any other particular writers that you plan to keep for later in life? I've never thought of authors like that, but it makes a lot of sense.Quote:
Originally Posted by AbdoRinbo
Well, for different reasons. By the time I was a junior in high school, I'd read almost every Kurt Vonnegut novel ever written, so I forced myself to stop that way I would have something new to look forward to later on in life (as opposed to just re-reading all of his novels, which wouldn't be as nostalgic, I think).
On the contrary, I probably started reading Arthur Rimbaud too soon (I couldn't write a line of poetry after reading him, he was so pure). He abandoned poetry at the age of 19 to pursue different interests (ultimately he would wind up in Africa to partake in the 19th-century colonial trading circuit after wandering back and forth between his home in France and parts of Sothern and Eastern Europe). He died very young, too. Personally, I don't know of many artists who lived as tragic and mythic a life as Rimbaud did. I was simply overwhelmed by him, if anything else, and I may never fully recover. It's strange to think that literature can have that sort of power over you.
"dream of the red chamber " by Cao Xueqin
which offers me a soul journey to Chinese culture and human's destiny
And builds up my sensitivity .
"Illiad" and "Odyssey"Show me a totally new magical world
"Les Miserables"teaches me to love people.
Hans Andersen ,Borther Grimm and Oscar Wilde's Fairy tales provide for me a land to dream,to smile and to reserve truth,kindness and beauty.
Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
I found a majesty in his language that got me into literature.
#1 has already been mentioned--Night by Elie Wiesel--it set me on my course of study of literature of victims of genocidal oppression.
#2 is not actually a book but a novella--"The Bear" by William Faulkner--it was my first exposure to Faulkner and it has continued to carry me through my dissertation and inspire my publishing career.
#3--Tracks by Louise Erdrich--it furthered me on my course of study and led me to my first academic conference paper and my first professional publication.
I couldnt agree more. It was if some new dimension opened into my brain. I was completely a different person from that point on.Quote:
Originally Posted by jamesting
I must give credit to the pre-LOTR, the Hobbit. Its simplicity of depth is rivaled only by The Old Man And The Sea, which is my second favourite book. Both gave me goosebumps and after finishing these, i started right over from the beginning, and continued.
"The man who mistook his wife for a hat" by Oliver Sacks.
Essays about people Sacks has met during his work as a neurologist. His thoughts about body and mind, brain and soul and the way he writes about his patients was a true inspiration when I started to study.
My fathers says that I´m also shaped by the Pippi Longstocking books he read to me when I was a child.
why shocked??? I loved the book so much. lolQuote:
Originally Posted by Helena_of_verona
Its one of my favorite. I watched the movie (the new version) several times. It is great as well
Be back soon with my favorite books.
have a nice day everyone :D