When I was younger I could remember anything,
Mark twain
whether it had happened or not;
but my faculties are decaying now and soon
I shall be able to remember only the things
that never happened.
“The mind is not a vessel to be filled,
Plutarch [paraphrased]
but a fire to be kindled.”
Judge a man by his questions
Voltaire
rather than his answers.
Resist much, obey little.
Walt whitman; “To the states“
People don’t take trips —
John steinbeck
trips take people.
孙子兵法, i.e. “The Art of War” by Sunzi (孙子) is one that I can and have read more than twice.
I’m not a huge re-reader, but others include “Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras,” “Hamlet,” “Leaves of Grass,” and Miyamoto Musashi’s “Book of Five Rings.” Translated literature is often good for more than one read because translations vary so much.
If babel fish existed or I could have access to a fluid translator, then perhaps Drukpa Kunley, (or, alternatively, Hanshan or Ikkyu,) because I would like to know how that level of freedom is achieved (and whether it’s all it’s cracked up to be.)
If I was on my own for language, maybe Thoreau or Whitman. (For largely the same reason.)
1.) love; 2.) a glorious turn of phrase; 3.) discovery; 4.) walking; 5.) swimming; 6.) stumbling upon an interesting and / or novel idea; 7.) movement; 8.) travel; 9.) street food; 10.) quiet; 11.) health; 12.) recognition that when things are at their very worst, they must get better — because everything is impermanent; 13.) an intense stretch; 14.) Whitman’s “Leaves of Grass;” 15.) undiscovered country; 16.) the hanging moment; 17.) a mystery-laden world; 18.) a moment of flow; 19.) a mountain path; 20.) a clear stream; 21.) the way of non-adversariality; 22.) a thing stripped to its simplest form; 23.) the moment breath turns the tide; 24.) animals being animals; 25.) a brief instant of free fall; 26.) the recognition that something that used to cause me angst or fear no longer does; 27.) when body, movement, and the world fall into alignment; 28.) first contact with someplace / something new; 29.) connection; 30.) the first sign that the struggle is paying off.
Centre of equal daughters, equal sons,
All, all alike endear’d, grown, ungrown, young or old,
Strong, ample, fair, enduring, capable, rich,
Perennial with the Earth, with Freedom, Law and Love,
A grand, sane, towering, seated Mother,
Chair’d in the adamant of Time.
List three books that have had an impact on you. Why?
Steven Kotler’s The Rise of Superman changed the way I looked at mind-body development.
Water Margin [a.k.a. Outlaws of the Marsh] convinced me a sprawling epic could be worth reading if it was done well, it kicked my love of Chinese Literature into high gear, and it started me on the path of learning Chinese.
Self-Reliance and Other Essays by Ralph Waldo Emerson had a major influence on my early philosophical development — especially the titular essay.
Now, I’m thinking I should’ve pushed one of these out for Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman, but perhaps another time.
If plays count as books, then most of Shakespeare’s plays. I’ve already reread a number of them (e.g. Hamlet, Macbeth, Merchant of Venice, and A Midsummer Night’s Dream.)
I’ve read Whitman’s Leaves of Grass, a couple times in full (and segments of it many times over) and expect to get to it again. I’ve read Voltaire’s Candide a couple times.
I could definitely see rereading Journey to the West, Water Margin, and Romance of the Three Kingdoms, but at this point I’m hoping my Mandarin will get good enough to read them in Simplified Chinese.
I’ve read a number of nonfiction texts multiple times — e.g. Sunzi’s Art of War, Miyamoto Musashi’s Book of Five Rings, Laozi’s Dao De Jing, and Emerson’s Selected Essays.
I’m generally not a fan of rereading books because there is so much awesome stuff out there to be read a first time. For all the reading I’ve done, there is still a massive number of classics that I have yet to touch. Usually there has to be a good reason for a reread, e.g. a new translation that promises to be improved / simplified, the book is just so potent as to still have lessons packed in after the first read, it’s a challenging read and the first go leaves a lot on the table, or — like The Little Prince — its enjoyment-to-time investment ratio is high.
Sometimes with one I love I fill myself with
rage for fear I effuse unreturn'd love,
But now I think there is no unreturn'd love,
the pay is certain one way or another
(I loved a certain person ardently and my
love was not return'd,
Yet out of that I have written these songs).
Allons! the road is before us!
It is safe -- I have tried it -- my own feet have
tried it well -- be not detain'd!
Let the paper remain on the desk unwritten,
and the book on the shelf unopen'd!
Let the tools remain in the workshop! let
the money remain unearn'd!
Let the school stand! mind not the cry of
the teacher!
Let the preacher preach in his pulpit! let the
lawyer plead in the court, and the judge
expound the law.
Camerado, I give you my hand!
I give you my love more precious than
money,
I give you myself before preaching or law;
Will you give me yourself? will you come
travel with me?
Shall we stick by each other as long as we
live?
Allons! through struggles and wars!
The goal that was named cannot be
countermanded.
Have the past struggles succeeded?
What has succeeded? yourself? your nation?
Nature?
Now understand me well -- it is provided in
the essence of things that from any
fruition of success, no matter what, shall
come forth something to make a greater
struggle necessary.
My call is the call of battle, I nourish active
rebellion,
He going with me must go well arm'd,
He going with me goes often with spare
diet, poverty, angry enemies, desertions.
Tiger Riding for Beginners 