Villainous Company

Boy, this is going to get me in trouble...

Chronologically...

1. Whoever wrote the early 1950's Air Force manual on basic radar. (My Mom was a radar tech in the Air Force when she met my Dad. That manual kindled my interest in electronics that ended up getting me where I am today.)

2. The Bible - Catholic version and King James version. A comparative read that got me to realize that an awful lot of conflict is based on some really trival differences.

3. Edward Clinton Ezell - (Small Arms of the World) I knew more about modern weapons systems in the 6th grade than was probably healthy. :-)

4. Robert Heinlein - I read a lot of science fiction, but Mr Heinlein's moral positions are fascinating to me.

5. Jeff Cooper - As a young adult I read a lot of his articles, kind of a practical aplication of the Robert Heinlein stuff.

Honorable Mention - HW McBride - (A Rifleman Went to War) A book the Canadian press should read.

I was an Air Force brat as a kid who used to love to read any military manuals I could get my hands on. I still consider Field Manuals as having entertainment value as well as practical application.

I think if anyone asks me that question in an interview I'd better have some alternate answers, huh? :-)

I think I may have actually answered some variant of this question when you interviewed me. Still:

1. J. R. R. Tolkien, most important because he influenced me earliest.

2. G. K. Chesterton, for his Ballad of the White Horse.

3. Aristotle, Nichomachean Ethics.

4. Plato, the early Socratic Dialogues

5. Tie: Homer, the Iliad; or the unknown author of the Beowulf; or the unknown authors of some of the Norse sagas.

Now for the troublesome part: the earlier question. Honestly, if you disallow people I've actually known, I can't think of a single woman who's impacted my life in an important way. There are some I admire (Joan of Arc, St. Theresa, Eleanor of Aquitaine, Marie de France), but I wouldn't go so far as to say of any of them that "she is a very large part of the reason that you are who you are."

Now, women I've known personally have influenced me greatly. In terms of authors or political figures, thinkers or even characters in poetry or literature -- sorry, but no one comes to mind. I think it's right to say that strong-minded women have been a big influence in my life, but it's all been personal. They haven't influenced me by writing great works, or by being characters in novels or poems. It's just the ones I've really known who have impressed me.

Well, you've got at least one of mine. These are in no particular order of importance:

To start off with:

1. Ayn Rand (Atlas Shrugged, The Fountainhead). I wouldn't say I subscribe wholeheartedly to Objectivism, but she definitely changed the direction of my thought as a young woman and had what I can only describe as a titanic effect on my view of the world.

2. Adam Smith: my first understanding of economics again turned my view of the world upside down, I think because I wasn't really exposed to it until I was older, and then I saw so many connections to human psychology and the way we make choices.

3. JS Mill

4. Robert Heinlein (Time Enough for Love) What a great book. Again, I read it as a child, and over and over again through the years. His "specialization is for insects" quote really resonated with me over the years, and several of the pithier quotes from the Notebooks of Lazarus Long have stayed with me. I always rather thought I'd include a copy of that in my will, just for kicks.

5. John Locke Theory of limited government, social contract, natural rights, empiricism.

6. The New Testament of Jesus Christ pretty much the foundation of my entire moral code, growing up.

7. Jane Austen

To be continued...

Actually Grim, I thought that too at first (that there were no women who had impacted my life in a significant way.

Then I realized that Elizabeth I had been my heroine growing up. I wouldn't expect that to be true for a man, however :)

When I started to think of female authors, at first I couldn't think of a one! Then Ayn Rand popped into my head and to my surprise, if I had to think of an author (or a thinker, for that matter) who had a bigger effect on my thinking than any other, regardless of whether I agreed with everything they said, it would have to be her.

I've never read Rand, actually. I have had her philosophy introduced to me, which is far from the same thing; but for whatever reason, it never got on my list.

I've been meaning to give her another read to see what I think now that I'm older. I'd be interested to see what you think, actually. Most people have the most problems with her ideas on altruism, though personally I just think they take her waaaayyyyy too seriously.

My son told me something funny. At his school they "had" to take all her books off the library shelves (what a farce, for a school where people literally feast on ideas) because kids just became obsessed with her ideas and formed Objectivist Clubs. The faculty apparently thought it was "unhealthy".

Every year the kids do a senior prank. I was trying to get them to buy up about 200 copies of Atlas Shrugged and plant them in the campus library, and drive around in golf carts dressed up like Ayn, reading out loud from John Galt's famous speech.

Can you imagine? It would send them right around the bend :) I'd have paid real money just to see it.

These are in chronological order:

1. The American Heritage Junior History series. These (still) excellent books kindled my lifelong love of history.

2. Robert Heinlein (Starship Troopers). I devoured SF (especially the Big Three) as a youngster. Heinlein combined traditional SF themes with adventure and a marvelous writing style. His philosophy was provocative (although I found his anti-religious bias tiresome in the end).

3. J.R.R. Tolkien (The Lord of the Rings). I read this for the first time when I was 14. I had no idea that literature could be so powerful. His description of Middle Earth and its denizens shaped a lot of my worldview, especially concerning duty and sacrifice.

4. C.S. Lewis (Mere Christianity). Lewis explained what I had accepted on faith, that Christianity was not only the true faith, but a natural one at that. There is a reason that he is the premier apolegetic of the modern era. He was, in the end, a superb teacher of hard-earned spiritual truths.

5. Walter Lord (Incredible Victory: the Battle of Midway). The first writer of narrative history that I discovered, he combined accuracy with personal interviews to give the impression of sitting down with the participants of history yourself.

6. Stephen Ambrose (Band of Brothers). A premier talent. He made me realize why I had always been proud to be an American. His histories are unabashedly pro-American and exhaustive.

Hmmmm.

Russel Davis. (Marine at War.) I ceased having an interest in being a fireman, warrior was the life for me. I was in third grade. I *still* like the book.

Robert Heinlein. (Rocket Ship Galileo.) Discovered science fiction while Dad was in Vietnam.

Leon Uris. (Battle Cry!) The whole brotherhood of war thing.

J.R.R. Tolkien (Lord of the Rings) Completed the Science Fiction/Fantasy link.

Heinz Hoehne (Order of the Death's Head) Evil is real. And terribly mundane.

John Pullen (The 20th Maine) Introduction to Joshua Chamberlain, my warrior/scholar beau ideal.

Guy Sajer (The Forgotten Soldier) Little is as simple as it seems.

Heh. I'm pretty one-dimensional. No wonder I'm humorless and boring at parties.

I find it interesting that two of the biggest influences in my life were the Bible and Heinlein/Rand, considering that the latter both had such a big anti-religious bent, Chris. But they were, I think, important to me for that reason. They made me question some things I had never questioned before, and that was an important process for me to go through. I also think I had to go beyond that.

I still have a few more books but I'm busy right now. Sorry.

Boyo, you are anything but boring :) Remember, I talk to your lovely bride, who is also anything but boring. Smart lady, that. I like her enormously.

Now me, I'm pretty much shallow. I used to read all kinds of deep stuff and now I'm lucky if I don't fall asleep reading anything harder than a newspaper article. I'm just too exhausted all the time.

Funny, the other thing I got from Heinlein (don't make fun of me Pile, you already checked that block big time) was my big dream of colonizing a new planet. Of course I was a mad sci-fi reader as a child anyway, so it wasn't just Heinlein. I also loved Frank Herbert and almost any of the apocalyse-genre novels: Earth Abides, Lucifer's Hammer, etc. Maybe it is a female thing, I don't know.

It seems everyone I talk to who loves Heinlein got something different from reading him. Odd.

Robert Heinlein, for obvious reasons.

R.M.Persig -- for delineating what I was thinking about 12 years before I was thinking about it.

Lawrence Van Cott Niven, for amusing the hell out of me and making me think of things in ways I would otherwise not have.

Frank Abagnale, for making me aware that "De l’audace, encore de l’audace, et toujours de l’audace" is more than just a great quote.

Matthew, for repeating "The Sermon on the Mount" so effectively.

G.B. Shaw, for doing something as beautiful as "Pygmalion", then writing the screenplay of it.

Peter Valk, for Cancelling Doomsday.

Petr Beckman, for teaching me not to trust neoluddites to ever tell the truth.

Yeah - this *Cotillion* thing is dangerous...

Don't worry, it's not really like that. We don't gossip about guys we're married to. If your ears were ever burning, it would only be in a good way :)

Mostly we dish about Pile.

Yeah, Pile (because all the ladies talk about Pile) and bloggers who get on our nerves. Trust me you do not ever want to get on that list.

Heh. Cassie's lying through her keyboard. Sheesh, woman, I'm lying in bed next to SWWBO when the hens gather to peck and pic{gack!@3$*%#}

Well, she wasn't lying about that Pile thing.

Well I think maybe she does that weekend chat thing I think, which I don't get involved with.

Geez Louise! After reading some of these, I feel like little Sir Echo voicing my opinions.
I started reading Heinlein's 'juveniles' when I was 8 or 9 (a juvenile!), coincident with the dawn of the Space Age (early 1960's). I also read Arthur Clarke (my sister actually met him once, dang!)and Isaac Asimov, and a host of others that I really don't remember too well.

But Heinlein stayed with me, and stays with me still. I read "Citizen of the Galaxy" when I was 10 years old, and liked it. I picked it up at a friend's house a couple of years ago (he got it for his teen-age son) and re-read it. It's still a good yarn, and well written too. It stands up, and the writing isn't dated, like so much of SF written in the '50's and '60's now. And I appreciate more of the subtleties of Heinlein's writings, now. Heh.
So yeah, I still like most of what old Bob had to say and write. Heinlein wasn't so much anti-God or anti-faith, but he ceaslessly mocked the religious hypocrites, who said one thing and practiced something else (sharpest examples: J.O.B.: A Comedy of Justice and Stranger in a Strange Land). So many of his books are actually subtle satires (based on reading some of his autobiographical writings) on the personal and professional problems he faced as a writer, naval officer, etc.
Duh. Favorites/influential:

R.A. Heinlein: Starship Troopers; Orphans of the Sky; Tunnel in the Sky; Have Space Suit, Will Travel, and on, and on.

Ayn Rand: The Fountainhead/Atlas Shrugged. Influenced me later in life, and I read her as I was changing and growing dissatisfied with many things, so I was impressionable way back then (at 27?).

They Were Expendable (forget the author, look it up later)
Guadalcanal Diary; Richard Tregaskis
Once an Eagle: Anton Meyer
(hey, what's up with all this military stuff!)

Islandia: Austin Tappan Wright (a lost classic, IMHO)
Heart of Darkness: Joseph Conrad

The military stuff, interestingly enough, those stories re-inforced my ideas (ideals?) of the correct nature or attitude of a man, as the men of my father's generation (all WWII vets) were LIVING examples of that, and I though ALL men were like that, as a boy (and boy, was I wrong about that).

Well, I wonder if we read as young people with what we're going to have to do in the back of our minds?

I guess this may sound silly or trite, but I always saw primary "job" in life as a wife and mother or teacher of children, so I think that's why books about civilization and the glue that holds societies together were so vitally important to me. I have a post working in the back of my mind about this, but I'm too busy at work right now to concentrate at it - have been working in the early am and late so I can't really write.

Maybe also that's at the bottom of my fascination with 'doomsday' books. I wanted to give my boys everything they would need to survive in the world? I know that's something that was on my mind all the time: did I teach them everything they needed to survive and to be strong, moral men? Sounds dumb, I know. But it was my job and I took it very seriously. I got so scared right before it was time to let them go - you run out of time and you think, "Did I forget anything?" And you know they're not really listening to you anymore anyway :)

Kids...

Someone needs to send Cassie Farnham's Freehold so she can have some Heinlein Doomsday.

Virginia Lee Burton: Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel (Mary Ann!)- work ethic
Claire Huchet Bishop: The Five Chinese Brothers - justice
Herman Melville: Moby Dick - spirituality
Robert Louis Steveson: Treasure Island - courage
Steven Hawkins - A Brief History of Time - humility
Joseph Heller: Catch-22 - cynicism
Franz Kafka: The Trial - alienation
Albert Camus: The Plague - terror, and hope
The Yellow Pages - phone numbers

No particular order:

1. Ayn Rand, Cassandra said it perfectly. Nobody mentioned We the Living.

2. Robert Heinlein, although I must say I was unable to finish To Sail Beyond the Sunset. Lazarus Long going back in time to do his mother was a little much. I've always wondered why Hollywood has never picked up on Glory Road. It seems tailor made for an adventure movie.

3. Francis Shaeffer. Despite being an evangelical Christian teacher and writer, much of his book How Should We Then Live, could have been written by Rand.

4. Leon Uris. Early favorite was Battle Cry but Mila 18, Exodus and The Haj were early influences on my views of the Israel-Palestine issue.

5. C.S. Lewis. I've never read the Narnia books but I have read much of his non-fiction. He and Francis Shaeffer both were excellent at "making sense" out of Christianity.

6. Herman Wouk. I'm a sucker for large books. I think the main reason I picked up Rand's The Fountainhead way back when was because it was the biggest paperback in the store. That was so long ago I probably paid something like 95 cents for it.

7. A.B. Guthrie's The Big Sky. I was always fascinated with the mountain men and The Big Sky gave a little more sobering account of them than the overly romanticized stuff I had read before. The ending of that book is particularly haunting.

8. J.R.R. Tolkien. I resisted reading LOTR when I first became aware of it (mid to late 60's) because at the time I was totally enthralled by Rand and was only reading "serious" stuff and everyone I knew at the time that was reading it was a off into weird music and "hippie" type activities.

9. Kenneth Roberts. Arundel and Rabble in Arms fueled my interestin American history.

10. Emily Bronte. Wuthering Heights may not have been particularly influential in my life, but it has haunted me forever.

Robb White (Up Periscope) WW2 submarine story.

Alexandre Dumas (The Count of Monte Cristo)

JRR Tolkein (LOTR)

CS Lewis not just the chronicles , but his spiritual writings as well

Francis Schaeffer (The God Who is there, Tue Spirituality) as wellas others.

JI Packer (Knowing God)

Robert Heinlein - as mentioned above. I especially was intrigued by his ideas on gov't in Starshi Troopers and The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress

Well...I'm just glad the ladies have something to talk about. I fear what might happen if they didn't.

There has really only been one author who has had an effect on me, personally, emotionally, spiritually or intellectually.

That would be.....

Sean Hannity--Deliver Us From Evil.

I mean to say, who doesn't want to be delivered from that?

"Deliver Me A Pizza"

Ken Follet's "Modigliani Scandal" and his "On Wings of Eagles"
James Clavell's whole Asia series and his "Children's Story" Loved his screenplays.
Tolkien's "Lord of The Rings"
The Bible and other scripture
Margaret Mitchell's "Gone With The Wind". That book was intense in so many ways. She took this superficial silly girl, turned her into a twisted, bitter herione through war and hell only to have her find out what really mattered in the end. And now that we live near Jonesboro, and a lot of the battlegrounds, reading it again is like reading it for the first time. I wonder if Ayn Rand ever read it?

Well, I will try this again. Maybe it will make more sense today.

8. Pearl Buck: (The Good Earth) Hard work matters: we only really savor bread we have earned ourselves. Families and societies require adversity to ward off complacency and moral decay. I read this book so many times when my kids were growing up: it ought to be right up there with Aesop's Fables. It taught me more about human nature than I could have learned in ten years of watching people.

9. William Golding: (Lord of the Flies) human nature is *not* intrinsically good.

This book and Ayn Rand, I would say, changed me from a liberal to a conservative. Though I very much wanted to, I could not deny the essential truth of it. I am by nature an optimist: I tend to give people the benefit of the doubt until they screw up. Before reading Golding, I thought people were essentially good and rules were annoying obstacles set up by petty, interfering, rigid control freaks bent on harshing my mellow. My husband, OTOH, is a complete cynic about human nature, so as you might imagine, in our 20's were always arguing about the value of rules :)

I still believe there is more good in people than he does because I see it all the time, but I am far more aware of the bad now. This book had a profound effect on me because it made me see the need for a barrier between people and the dark side of human nature. Rules form one part of that barrier: that part is erected by society. Your conscience forms the other part, and that barrier is reinforced or eroded by even the smallest acts you perform each day, whether or not anyone sees them. That idea has been central to my life and to what I tried to teach my sons. Not sure I always live up to the ideal, though.

10. Guy Gavriel Kay The Lions of Al-Rassan: I won't express this well, I know. It's not a thing easily put into words: more a feeling. In some ways a more frivolous book but one with some really big ideas and one I've ultimately found unforgettable. Duality and conflict. Being torn between two things. The idea that life often catches you up and takes you in strange directions. So many of the characters in this novel have conflicting loyalties or desires. What I loved about this book was the idea that in an insane world it is possible to love totally contradictory things and yet find peace in your heart, if only at odd moments.

I liked the fact that it did not end well, because in real life that so often happens, yet the characters still manage to snatch moments of piercing sweetness from each day.

11. Well, I suppose I have to cave and admit I loved LOTR too :) Like many of the other commenters, I was captured by the ideas of being faithful to a promise even when all hope seems gone, trusting in old friends, and protecting good things so they do not pass from the world.

Don, I'm trying to remember when I first read Ayn Rand.

It must have been when I was about 21, because I can't imagine plowing through it when I had a newborn, and as I recall I was immersed in re-reading James Clavell's whole series front to back right about then (much easier reading for someone who was getting up every 2 hours to nurse an infant!).

And I know I had read her by the time I had my second baby because I remember reading them for the second time when I was 23 or 24 when my husband was in the field. Boy was that a long time ago!

Comrades,

The first book that hit me right in the brain stem was IVANHOE, by Sir Walter Scott. I was only 10 years old, but I devoured that tale. Excellent examination of morality and courage.

That was followed by "The White Company" by Arthur Conan Doyle. Illustrated, no less, by Wyeth. Few know he was a gifted student of Heraldry and medieval warfare and society. Again, a story of courage and morality... I'm begining to detect a theme here...

Robert Heinlein: Starship Troopers. More and more i think his views on citizenship are correct.

Guy Sajer: The Forgotten Soldier. Amazing reading.

Plus anything by the following: Jerry Pournelle, David Drake, Larry Niven, Bill Forstchen. Drake, in particular, was an officer in Vietnam, and much of the detail in his SF work rings so very true.

Homer: His works, read by a young man with a mind full of dreams, sparked a lifelong pursuit of adventure. He taught me both the nobility and futility of becoming a warrior, the path I chose for my life, and one I do not regret.

Respects to all,

Gwedd

Cass (and anybody else that's interested in my numbskull thoughts):
The books I listed I read by the time I was 12 or so (except Ayn Rand's novels), so I read them when I was very impresionable. My mushy little brain.
A close friend got me to start reading Rand, and we discussed the books alot while we were both reading them (and still do, sometimes). I've read quite a bit by her, and quite a bit about her, and thought she was quite a flawed person, many of her ideas stand the test of time, IMHO.

I still read the White Pages and the Yellow Pages though, and I find quite a bit of enlightenment there, too. :)

De cahds nevah lie! I forsee a trip to the bookstore (again) on Mother's Day or very close to it.

I have a copy of "The Lady of the Lake."

I read "Ivanhoe" when I was 12. It spurred me on to study the Diaspora, as I didn't think that there were Jews in England! At least not at that time. It also taught me about integrity, doing that which is right, no matter what.

"The Song Of Roland" Iffen y'all want a romping good read, Roland's defense of the pass at Roncesvalles covering Charlemagne's back is great. This was the stuff of heroes and legend.
Pride too as he was urged to blow his horn for assistance and refused. Charlemagne returns and finds him...I cried because Roland was gallant, brave and foolish. I was 11 when I read that one.

"Canterbury Tales" The road trip from hell. Pilgrims going to a cathedral to do homage to a man who opposed a king, and telling each other stories. These are people who, were it not for their common goal would never have met otherwise.
I would love to see a modern day adaptation set on a bus. Wouldn't that be a hoot?

"Robin Hood" written and illustrated by Howard Pyle.

"The Legends of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table" Need I say more?

Mary Stewart's series about Merlin..."The Crystal Cave," I think. Not bad.

One More Thought: The Chanson of Roland is not to be missed. The foreshadowing of it especially today, 1200+ years later is telling.

Theodore Seuss Guisell, AKA Dr. Seuss and Maurice Sendak, Beverly Cleary and E B White. (To learn to read, to love to read)
George Orwell, Ayn Rand (Animal Farm, 1984, Anthem)
Cyril Parkinson, Lawrence Peter, Scott Adams, W Edward Demming (Parkinson's Law, Peter's Principle, Dilbert Principle, Out of the Crisis)
Bernard Lewis, Fareed Zacharias. (What Went Wrong, The Rise of Illiberal Democracy)
All of them, but Dr Seuss most.

Heh. Notice the preponderance of Heinlein in the above. I wonder if appreciation of RAH ties directly to having any sort of common sense?

> 9. William Golding: (Lord of the Flies) human nature is *not* intrinsically good.

I disagree with this utterly. I think the development of civilization itself requires that it be intrinsically good, and the uneeded advancedments of it (equal rights for all creeds, as well as the sexes) certainly demonstrate it.

Think about that -- if men were not basically good, why would they yield so much power to women, without any real cause to do so? Because, at heart, we want to be loved more than feared. Yes, there are plenty of exceptions, enough to make all men (and women) cautious -- but it's still tremendously obvious that the majority must be essentially decent, or else there would still be slaves and women with no rights other than maid, whore, and broodmare, in all human societies.