15 Books in 15 Minutes

From a Facebook Friend:

15 Books, 15 Minutes

Don’t take too long to think about it. Fifteen books you’ve read that will always stick with you. First fifteen you can recall in no more than 15 minutes. Tag 15 friends, including me because I’m interested in seeing what books my friends choose.

My Reply, for fg:

01. Bertrand Russell’s and Alfred North Whitehead’s Principia Mathematica
02. Betrand Russell’s Logic and Knowledge
03. Bertrand Russell’s Human Knowledge: Its Scope and Limits
04. Bertrand Russell’s In Praise of Idleness
05. Bertrand Russell’s Basic Writings
06. Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz’ Philosophical Essays
07. Soren Kierkegaard’s Fear and Trembling and Sickness Unto Death
08. T.S. Eliot’s Murder in the Cathedral
09. James Joyce’s Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
10. James Joyce’s Ulysses
11. James Joyce’s Finnegan’s Wake
12. Arthur Schopenhauer’s The World as Will and Representation
13. Carl Jung’s The Collective Unconscious
14. John Dewey’s Experience and Nature
15. Lionel Trilling’s The Liberal Imagination

[This listing of 15 books in 15 minutes’ time, which was sent to me by JJ Henson gave me an idea: to list the books fg had, or had read, when I first knew him in 1961.  At the time, as he was 24 years old to my 16, I thought he was ‘old’, and sort of took it for granted that he had read all these books, and more.  In retrospect, it was only his mind and intellect that were ‘old’, and had been, for quite a while.  In fact, when he spoke of his childhood, I got the impression that he was happy and childlike only for a brief time; his father’s death when he was only 13 and in grade school thrust ‘adult’ responsibilities upon him, esp. as his only brother was married and had a daughter by then.

Strangely, his experiences embittered him, if they did, only slightly.  His sense of humor remained with him up to the end, and he was one of the most generous persons I knew.]

Reactions from my Facebook friends:

Written 21 hours ago · Comment · LikeUnlike

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JJ Henson at 12:38pm July 15

Grabe ‘tong list ni Uncle Fred. Kumbaga sa workout, this requires pretty heavy lifting. I think I’ll start with his choices for James Joyce

 

Ethel P David at 12:41pm July 15

‘portrait of the artist as a young man’ would be a good start, i think.

and yes, you said it–pretty heavy. just listing it exhausted me.

 

Ethel P David at 4:23pm July 15

btw, this was his list in ‘61. over the years, his list would change according to his current status. for instance, when he was taking his master’s, his books began to include physiology books, medical books like netter’s, and the like, and less of literature. but philosophy would always remain in the list.