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/lit/ - Literature

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3827821 No.3827821 [Reply] [Original]

I was interested to hear if anyone on /lit/ has a had a sort of life-changing experience from just reading a certain book/books, or if you know others who you've seen or claim that their life changed direction or on a deeper level after reading something.

If you'd liked to post the book and your story.

I don't really have any experiences like that, but I do have a few friends who have become completely different people after "waking up" by reading something.

First friend was a kind of boring, straight-edge and against any drugs or alcohol out of principle up until he was 24, when someone recommended him to read Huxley's Doors of Perception/Heaven and Hell, and after that he has become a huge drug experimentalist, traveller and pseudo-"philosopher" and he still attests that it was that book what drew the change in him.

Other girl's story is a bit boring and maybe common, raised up as Lutheran, never doubted anything about God or religion, then read The God Delusion and now she's anti-religion and turned against everything she used to believing in.

Sorry for long OP.

>> No.3827835

Consecutively reading Fight Club, Less Than Zero, and Blood Meridian in about a month and a half had a big part in me becoming a nihilist.

>> No.3827843

>>3827821

No, I had a life changing event from getting and surviving cancer.

Fucking teens.

A book? A BOOK?!?! Give me a fucking break.

>> No.3827848

Freddy & St. Max

>> No.3827851

>>3827843
>event

That's just the picture, experience is what I asked.

And good to hear that you are still with us. This has nothing to do with age, and especially not teens. I hope getting cancer didn't make you feel more "privileged" to live and angry at people who might complain about smaller problems, that's not too good.

>> No.3827852

>>3827843
little bump in your testicle? LITTLE bump IN YOUR TESTICLE?

give me a fucking break, get over yourself you fucking loser

>> No.3827853

>>3827843
>implying books can't be life changing
>getting mad and condescending about it

I hope you relapse.

>> No.3827854

>>3827843
As everyone knows, a threat to your health is the only way your life can change. All hail the voice of reason.

>> No.3827857

ITT spoiled Western teens

>> No.3827860

>>3827854

It is called the conscience of mortality, son. It is the ONLY complete opposite of life, and at the same time its complement, which, as a consequence, has the most powerful effect on it.

>> No.3827861

>>3827843
This isn't about Vietnam, Walter.

>> No.3827863

>>3827853
>>I hope you relapse.

You are a fine human being.

>> No.3827868

>>3827863
Most people get better at taking it easy, being kind, appreciating what they have and not fretting the little things after they survive something like that. He obviously didn't get the message.

>> No.3827865

>>3827843
>>3827857

These are different people.

I viewed religion differently not from specific book, but from multiple readings from both sides. I made the switch from stark atheism to Christianity through multiple sources.

>> No.3827866
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3827866

The Corrections : We're all lame ass humans with lots of worries. Also its exciting to make a lot of money.

>> No.3827872

>>3827851
>>I hope getting cancer didn't make you feel more "privileged" to live

It is not possible to feel privileged with PTSD, anon, I am afraid.

Anyway, while I was getting chemo I read Neruda's poetry. It changed my life.

Give it a try.

>> No.3827876

>>3827857
ITT: Ass-ravaged cancer "victim"

>> No.3827880
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3827880

>>3827876

I am not the cancer guy, wise ass. I am just an adult who laughs at kids being kids.

>> No.3827879

>>3827872
>actually having books change your life
my grandpa died YOU FUCKING TEENAGER

>> No.3827881

>>3827880
OP here, I'm 28, if that's still too young for you.

>> No.3827883
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3827883

>>3827879

Why didn't he finish The Pale King at least decently? Was the rope too good to hold on for another month?

>> No.3827884

>>3827881

You're being trolled, anon, stay on topic.

>> No.3827886

>this thread

Seems like cancer can be contagious.

>> No.3827887

>>3827886

Yup, just as /b/ and /pol/ scum are contagious to this formerly fine forum.

>> No.3827890

>>3827884
Okay.

I've never been on /lit/ so I kind of assumed there was maybe less trolling around here, but maybe not.

Yes, please let's continue past this cancer and age subject.

>>3827848
Could you be more specific, and I can't find any book by that name.

>> No.3828000

>>3827890
>Could you be more specific, and I can't find any book by that name.
Friedrich Nietzsche and Max Stirner

>> No.3828771

Kropotkin's The Conquest of Bread, Satre's Being and Nothingness, and Salinger's Catcher in the Rye all had a pretty profound impact on me.

>> No.3828927

After i had a couple of hypomanic episodes i changed forever. Due to the heightening of emotions and perception i had, it made me experience another layer of the world that most people never experience in their lives, every day is full of unconcious emotions and events that go unnoticed most of the time, every facial expression, every color, ever word carries with it an intense emotion.

I also had a realization, that the modern, automatized, isolated world is an unnatural habitat that spawns isolated and unsatisfied individuals.

>> No.3828943

Schopenhauer's aphorisms are probably the reason I was such a terrible teenager.

>> No.3828961

>>3828943
They were probably more of a symptom of your inherent terribleness.

>> No.3828971

>>3828961
I'm not sure how I was supposed to have a causative effect on Schopenhauer's writing, perhaps you meant my reading of them, rather than they themselves.
But if not, I'm glad to have had such an effect on German thought. Here I thought I'd done little of consequence.

>> No.3829017

>>3828971
I meant that as a teen with everything that comes with it you would gravitate towards Schopenhauer who expressed the already present angst and pessimism for you.

>> No.3829043

>>3829017
So, yes, you meant my reading of them.
How quaint; I recommend modesty, it will serve you as a virtue.

>> No.3829642

The Hitchhicker's guide to galaxy kinda opened my awareness to the Universe signs.

Currently I am reading the Illuminatus! Trilogy which is opening my eyes to the political spectrum. I was more inclined to the right-wing, but now I can see that any wing is a broken wing really :)

My next move is going to be the Principia Discordia. I have read some parts of it and being an atheist I've felt more inclined to the discordianism as a "religion" after reading just a few passages. I guess you can say that's some minor change in someone's point of view

>> No.3829668

No book has ever changed my life. I met someone who had a mental breakdown and attributed their developing schizophrenia to their reading Animal Farm when they were 13, though.

My key life-changing event was spending 9 months locked in a psychiatric institution against my will with a whole lot of fucking crazy assholes, being told I was off my rocker every day. Then having the psychiatrists turn around and tell me I was never mentally ill in the first place and that it was all actually a neurological/seizure disorder and being released back into society after I'd been institutionalised. Complete headfuck.