Same Thing, But Different

Thursday, August 24, 2006

All the cool kids are doing it.

I swiped this from BabBab & Gina who, in turn, took it from Suse.

1. A book that changed your life.
The Road To Serfdom by Friedrich von Hayek. One of those eye-opening sorts of things that makes you see stuff you've seen all along in a very different (and not altogether pleasing) light. Those who like their bitter truths less bitter (but no less truthful) and rather funny ought look up anything by Frédéric Bastiat.

2. A book you've read more than once.
ANY of PG Wodehouse's Bertie & Jeeves novels. The Harry Potter ouvre. Oh, and also Don Quijote. Books I reread are "comfort books," things to which I return to cleanse my palate when I have been reading too much of one type of book and need to start afresh. Whenever reading begins to look like drudgery, I return to them.

3. A book you'd want on a deserted island.
A boatmaking manual and Rand McNally's World Atlas.

4. A book that made you giddy.
I originally put down From Bauhaus To Our House by Tom Wolfe, but upon colder reflection Night Of The Avenging Blowfish by John Welter is the clear winner. EVERYONE must run out and read this book. (How can you NOT love a book with the subtitle of "A novel about covert operations, love and luncheon meat"? )

5. A book that you wish had been written.
My unauthorized autobiography. I'd just worry about my kids reading it one day and thinking me at best a lout, cad and bounder or, at worst, a raving Macchiavellian hypocrite. Absent that, I vote for Jeeves at Blandings.

6. A book that wracked you with sobs.
[blinks dumbly at screen] Sobs? The best I can do is a book that wracked me with a 2 day headache. Let me know if that one will do.

7. A book you wish had never been written.
3-way tie. Das Kapital, The Communist Manifesto & Mein Kampf. That little red Chairman Mao thing is right up there, too. (Notice the dearth of links; damned if I enable you to shower ducats at these bastards.)

8. A book you are currently reading.
Leave It To Psmith by PG Wodehouse.

9. A book you've been meaning to read.
Gentlemen & Players, because Gina suggested it and it because it seems something that would be right up my alley.

Posted by Joke at 8:06 AM

4 Comments

Badger posted at 1:08 PM, August 24, 2006
I keep meaning to do this one but I can't, for the life of me, think of a single book that changed my life in any measurable way whatsoever.

Joke posted at 3:21 PM, August 24, 2006
You can just answer the question with

[blinks dumbly at screen]

-J.

Poppy Buxom posted at 12:01 AM, August 25, 2006
There is Jeeves. There is Lord Emsworth. There is Mr. Mulliner.
There is Ukridge. There are various Drones.

But Psmith? Stands alone.

Joke posted at 8:03 AM, August 25, 2006
I'd put Uncle Fred at the head of that class, but then again, I'm weird.

-J.