I think it is safe to say in an age of ‘un-literacy’ as our own, a single book cannot become something that is read or known by virtually everyone. That is, it cannot acheive everlasting greatness and influence.
I would like to know what u guys think are some of the most influential books/texts ever written. The most obvious examples are the Bible and the communist Manifesto. These were not merely relics understood or known by just the learned few, but seminal pieces which influenced millions of people throughout history.
Heh, your attitude sounds a lot like that of the people who advocated closing the patent office around the turn of the century because “everything that can possibly be invented already has been.”
I agree that the Bible (and just consider that the old testament encompases the Torah) is up there, in the same vein I would add the Quran.
Not really a book, but perhaps the US Constitution deserves a place in the list. The Magna Carta for the same reason.
Well right now I’m on page 800 of Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand. I started reading it due to its reputation as being an “influential book.” Not sure if it truly qualifies or not…
I think Lord of the Rings is definitely influential - it’s still the #2 most read book in the world behind the bible, not to mention it single-handedly created a universe for the fantasy genre which almost everyone uses.
As for this century, I think Harry Potter deserves note. It has changed children’s books. There have always been children’s novels, but the length with which she maintains a child’s interest has changed the way children’s literature focuses.
While it is still up and coming, the book which is touted as the beginning of the blogging craze, The Cluetrain Manifesto seems to be gaining in its influence.
I’d second most (if not all) of the aforementioned. Just a couple to add:
The Iliad (by Homer – one of the pillars of Western Literature, and which both glorified and signaled the death knell of the Greek heroic code) Martin Luther’s 95 Theses (signaled the begining of the Reformation) The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (as Hemingway said, “All modern American literature comes from one book by Mark Twain called Huckleberry Finn”) A Vindication of the Rights of Women (by Mary Wollstonecraft – a precursor to the feminist movement) The Interpretation of Dreams (by Ziggy Freud) Beyond Freedom and Dignity (by B.F. Skinner – the seminal work of the behavioralist movement) The Jungle (Upton Sinclair’s muckracking book that brought about a public demand for clean food practices, as well as establishing a benchmark for investigative journalism) The Upanishads (Hindu religious philosophy) The I Ching (perhaps apocryphal, but I’ve read that Liebniz once wrote that the yin-yang philosophy of the I Ching inspired him to invent the binary mathematical system that now forms the basis for our computer systems) the Republic (Plato’s work on government and society) Relativity (by Albert Einstein) The First and Second Discourse (by Jean Jacque Rousseau – critiques of the Enlightenment and an essay on the foundations of inequality) General Theory of Employment, Interest, and Money (by John Maynard Keynes – the foundation for the Federal Reserve System in America, and the basis for much modern economic thought)
Sorry. That’s definitely more than “a couple.” I’ll stop now before it gets too ridiculous.
Following one trend of noting early works above, I believe **The Epic of Gilgamesh[b/] may predate Beowulf, although (in school) i didn’t recognize the merit to Gilgamesh as apparent as that of Beowulf.
In addition, I’m not sure the world-altering works are as noteworthy in this day and age as those universal works listed above i.e. PHILOSOPHY, SCIENCE, HISTORY.
Just a note, jesseboy: next time you should post this in Cafe Society. Although you are asking opinions (which normally go in IMHO), it’s about books, the domain of Cafe Society. Of course, the mods may disagree and just keep it in this forum
I think that Aristotle’s Politics and Nicomachean Ethics should be there.
If I was to pick a novel, it would be Dostoyevsky’s Crime and Punishment. It is considered by many to be a classic, a great psychological novel (a genre many cite Dostoyevsky as creating), plus I really really like it
Although they are more collections than works by a single author, I’d have to include the Tales of the Brothers Grimm, and Mother Goose on this list, since they are the first collections of childrens stories which still survive to this day. I suppose Hans Christien Anderson (sp?) goes along in there as well, with The Little Mermaid. And what about A.A. Milne and Winne the Pooh? I suppose they are much more influential on children than on society as a whole, but I think they’re important.
Although it probably doesn’t count, I really kind of WISH that Antoine de St. Exupery’s Le Petit Prince would make that list, since it’s such a wonderful book, and it SHOULD influence more people than it does! I read somewhere once that it has been translated into 80 or 90 languages, including Latin!
Dr. Spock’s Baby and Child Care. For the first time children were accorded rights, and Spock gave parents permission to love their kids and to throw away the ‘rule-books’.
"The Female Eunuch" by Germaine Greer and “The Feminine Mystique” by Betty Friedan both radically changed the course of human interactions, socially, politically and economically.
As a member of one of the world’s many Lewis Carroll Societies, I need to put in a word for Carroll’s <i>Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland</i> and <i>Through the Looking-Glass</i>.
Dismiss them as nonsense if you like, but they’re still the third most quoted books in English when viewed as a package (behind the Bible and the complete works of Shakespeare). Everyone’s heard of them, most have seen one movie version or another, and many have read them. They’re everywhere.
Carroll changes worldviews, informs political discussion, and pops up in logic and math textbooks all the time. And the books were revolutionary in literature as being among the first children’s books that really were written for kids, and appealed to kids.
John Stuart Mill’s “On Liberty” is often overlooked. His work was central in the development of democratic thought in the late 19th century, particularly in recognizing the rights of the individual and the limits of “majority rule.”
Hey…don’t diss Dick and Jane, (or John and Betty as it was known down here). Seeing Scottie and Fluff run (and being able to understand the words that described their antics) was a profound moment in my 4 yr old life.
