Darkness at Noon

Aargh, Formatting! Try 2 : For the value of ‘best’ that includes (a) had a deep and long lasting impact on how I think about the world and (b) I consider beautiful pieces of writing in their own right, here are some in no particular order: The Selfish Gene, Richard Dawkins Thinking Fast and Slow, Daniel Kahneman Naming and Necessity, Saul Kripke Tractatus LogicoPhilosophicus, Ludwig Wittgenstein (These you might want to approach via a gentle introduction if you did not study Philosophy to degree level) The Rediscovery of the Mind, John R Searle Darkness at Noon, Arthur Koestler The Glass Bead Game, Hermann Hesse A Handful of Dust, Evelyn Waugh Diaries, Samuel Pepys Falling Off the Map, Pico Iyer A Time of Gifts, Patrick Leigh Fermor The Lonely Sea and the Sky, Francis Chichester The Way We Live Now, Anthony Trollope Bevis, Richard Jeffries The Diary of a Nobody, George and Weedon GrossSmith The Inimitable Jeeves, PG Wodehouse Hitch-22, essays, Christopher Hitchens Collected Essays, William Hazlitt Venice, Martin Gayford The Ascent of Man, Jacob Bronowski The Fabric of Reality, David Deutsch Too obvious a list, perhaps, but some gems for all that! Happy reading.

For the value of ‘best’ that includes (a) had a deep and long lasting impact on how I think about the world and (b) I consider beautiful pieces of writing in their own right, here are some in no particular order: The Selfish Gene, Richard Dawkins Thinking Fast and Slow, Daniel Kahneman Naming and Necessity, Saul Kripke Tractatus LogicoPhilosophicus, Ludwig Wittgenstein (These you might want to approach via a gentle introduction if you did not study Philosophy to degree level) The Rediscovery of the Mind, John R Searle Darkness at Noon, Arthur Koestler The Glass Bead Game, Hermann Hesse A Handful of Dust, Evelyn Waugh Diaries, Samuel Pepys Falling Off the Map, Pico Iyer A Time of Gifts, Patrick Leigh Fermor The Lonely Sea and the Sky, Francis Chichester The Way We Live Now, Anthony Trollope Bevis, Richard Jeffries The Diary of a Nobody, George and Weedon GrossSmith The Inimitable Jeeves, PG Wodehouse Hitch-22, essaysChristopher Hitchens Collected Essays, William Hazlitt Venice, Martin Gayford The Ascent of Man, Jacob Bronowski The Fabric of Reality, David Deutsch Too obvious a list, perhaps, but some gems for all that! Happy reading.

Great great book. I need to re-read it.

Don't know about changing my life, but these books changed the way i look at things: The Tao of Pooh: Benjamin Hoff Slaughterhouse-Five, or The Children's Crusade by Kurt Vonnegut TI 99/4a basic reference manual Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs, by Abelson, Sussman Object Oriented Analysis and Design by Grady Booch Darkness at Noon by Arthur Koestler Thieves in the Night by Arthur Koestler All the King's Men by Robert Penn Warren The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck The Little Prince, Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. War and Peace by L.N.Tolstoy Chapaev and the void by Pelevin

Melville "Bartlby the Scrivener" & Ramsey "When We Are No More: how Digital Memory Is Shaping Our Future" Down "Brilliant Beacons: a History of the American Lighthouse" Koestler "Darkness Before Noon" & "The Invisible Writing" & "The Ghost in the Machine" John Gardner - anything really but October light and the sunlight dialogs in particular.