/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.6220832]

So I'm going to live alone in a secluded log cabin in the middle of nowhere with no technology for the next several years of my life, doing nothing but reading, writing, meditating and hiking. Here is my current (very incomplete) list of books I'll be taking, mostly just off the top of my head. Question marks mean I specifically want to include something by that author/subject, but I don't know what. Some areas are clearly severely lacking because I don't know jack about them. Some I've already read, but I really want to take them with me. Please suggest more, but only ones you think have serious value, because I do have a physical limit to how many I can take.

http://pastebin.com/9SuJ9vj3

I would really appreciate your suggestions, /lit/. This is going to be an interesting chapter of my life, and I don't want to leave out anything important.

[Anonymous No.6220843]

>>6220832
>no technology

What you going to write with, you tool? Your own shit on the cabin walls?

Take your My Side of the Mountain roleplay to >>>/k/ or anywhere but here.

[Anonymous No.6220849]

>>6220832
You've forgotten the best book of all time. The Count of Monte Cristo

[Anonymous No.6220872]

This is the plot line of the Unabomber

[Anonymous No.6220876]

>>6220843
No electrical appliances, I meant, but I'm sure you knew.
Also, I already own the cabin and have a fishing license.

>>6220849
Good rec, definitely going to include this.

[Anonymous No.6220879]

You're not gonna eat or sleep?

[Anonymous No.6220889]

>>6220879
Didn't feel the need to list necessities of survival, I thought they were a given.

[Anonymous No.6220891]

You're going to read Nietzsche and Schopenhauer and Hegel and you're seriously not going to read Kant??

[Anonymous No.6220916]

>>6220891
I got about a third of the way through CoPR before giving up. Is it an absolutely necessary prerequisite for those three?

[Anonymous No.6220932]

>>6220916
>Is it an absolutely necessary prerequisite for those three?

I suppose you could read an account of the critique that distills the concepts, but yes it's necessary.

[Anonymous No.6220942]

Northern Exposure reading lists! You are living my dream anonkun ;_;

[Anonymous No.6220946]

>>6220876
>Also, I already own the cabin and have a fishing license.

[Anonymous No.6220961]

>>6220946
Nice meme :)

[Anonymous No.6220965]

>living in the woods and reading babby lit for years

I can't stand tween edgelords

[Anonymous No.6220983]

>>6220961

Nice Walden RP, faggot.

You might want to spend some of your time On Imaginary Pond trying to work out what memes are.

[Anonymous No.6220984]

>>6220932
I'll do it then, but begrudgingly.

>>6220965
What should I read then? The literal children's novels (Alice, Gulliver's Travels) are just for cultural perspective.

[Anonymous No.6220997]

>>6220983
I don't know what to tell you. I've been planning this for a long while; it's not just a whim. You don't have to believe me though.

[Anonymous No.6221008]

>>6220832
Zuang Zi & Tao Te Ching, but mainly the Zuang Zi. There is no book that has affected my way of living so supremely.

[Anonymous No.6221020]

>>6221008
Already have Tao Te Ching listed. I'll get Zuang Zi though; thanks for the rec.

[Anonymous No.6221030]

>>6220832
Also, Mein Kampf is a stupid waste of time (including for "historical reasons") and your history section is supremely lacking. I'd give you specific recommendations, but you don't seem to have particular interests, so just read the Greeks and Romans. Herodotus, Thucydides, Xenophon (maybe not, he's pretty dull & relatively unimportant) and Polybius.

Then Caesar, Sallust, Livy, Plutarch, Suetonius, and Tacitus. Ammianus Marcelinus if you still care.

Don't consider these books history; they are literature. You are cheating yourself if you don't at least read Hero/Thucy/Sall/Livy/Tacy

[Anonymous No.6221035]

>>6220832
I'm not even being ironic when I say you should start with the Greeks. Check the nonficiton section in the wiki, there's some pretty good image macros on philosophy that you should build up on.

[Anonymous No.6221039]

>>6221008
>>6221030
And one more thing.

It'd be stupid to try and do this without a bunch of reference books. Consider the lack of Wikipedia without technology. Bring Britanica & references for every subject that you really want to learn about.

[Anonymous No.6221060]

>>6221030
I can skip Mein Kampf if it really is a waste of time; I just thought it was historically significant. And yes, the section IS lacking, which is why I made the thread. Can you give specific books by the historians you mentioned?

>>6221035
I've read (almost) all of Plato and Aristotle, but I'll check the wiki.

>>6221039
I don't use Wikipedia that often (only for the short biographies), but bringing Britanica is a good idea.

[Anonymous No.6221095]

>>6220832

Get the Norton Anthologies of English, American, World, and Religious literature. In addition to containing the primary texts, or large selections, they contain critical apparatus that will help you situate the texts in history and that will help you understand them in all their obscurities.

In addition to this, I strongly recommend you get the following, and bring two translations of the following when they're in translation:

1. The Illiad and the Odyssey (Pope and Lattimore/Lombardo)
2. The Aneid.
3. The Metamorphosis (Arthur Goldsmith as one of the translators.)
4. The Bible (+ 2nd volume of the Norton anthology of religious literature)
5. The Divine Comedy
6. Paradise Lost and Paradise Regained
7. The Complete Works of William Shakespeare

Read these seven at least twice.

[Anonymous No.6221106]

>no KJV

[Anonymous No.6221428]

Hey OP just wanted to say that I think this is a really great idea. If I had more courage I would quit my job and do this for a year.

I'm actually thinking about doing something similar on a smaller scale. I'm hoping that in the next 6 months I'll find a way to do this type of thing on the weekends, however I have no idea where to find a cabin and how I could pay for it.

My recommendation would be to take along Ralph Waldo Emerson's Selected Essays. Try and find the penguin classics edition that was printed around 1985.

Will also recommend Burmese Days by Orwell, Great Expectations, Dune, Shogun by James Clavell, The Stand and The Shining by Stephen King, Storm of Steel by Ernst Junger and finally the three best works by Robert Graves... I, Claudius, Goodbye To All That and The Long Weekend.

Don't forget to bring some history as well. Eric Foner has a great reference guide to American history which you can bring with you. I would recommend you read James G. Randal's books on Lincoln from the 40s and 50s. Master of the Senate and the Power Broker are also must reads. I also just finished a book called "Bloodlands" which is about the atrocities committed by the Soviet Union in the 1930s. Probably the best book to ever combat marxism.

[Anonymous No.6221560]

Huxley: BNW, Island, Doors of Perception

I think BNW has some themes related to your travel, Island is just a good read (especially so when read right after BNW as a comparison of 'right' and 'wrong' utilitarianism), and Doors of Perceptions is a good read on consciousness and human perception (admittedly a better read if you've used psychedelic drugs before, but quality nevertheless)

[Anonymous No.6221587]

>>6220984

>reading for cultural perspective
>alone in a cabin in the woods

or you could just go outside and talk to people (i.e. engage in actual culture)

[Anonymous No.6222153]

>>6220832
that's the best edit of the train dilemma i've ever seen

[Anonymous No.6222157]

>>6221587
You dumb.

[Anonymous No.6222167]

>>6220832
Your log cabin is a product of technology. The books you want to read are a product of technology.
>>6220876
You're obviously not autistic enough for /lit/, I recommend that you get the fuck >>>/put/

[Anonymous No.6222169]

>>6222167
>>>/out/

[Anonymous No.6222188]

you better bring some Playboys or somethin, m8

[Anonymous No.6222748]

add some classical stuff in, at present you only have some philosophy and Homer + the Aeneid, shovel on some: Thucydides, Herodotus, Aeschylus, Sophocles, Cicero, Tacitus, Pliny, Xenophon … etc …

[Anonymous No.6222756]

>>6220832

Ender's Game is pretty damn good if you haven't read it already.
Check out some Manly P. Hall as well, when it comes to philosophy and shit.

[Anonymous No.6222773]

>>6222748
This especially Arschylos and Sophocles. Euripides too. As a fellow human being I wouldn't want OP doing this without the tragedies.

[Anonymous No.6222778]

>>6222773
Aeschylos*

[Anonymous No.6222807]

>>6220832
Describing Morphosyntax

Chaucer (in the original spelling, the metre gets fucked up otherwise)

The Shijing (for christ's sake avoid that dead bloated fish of a victorian by name of Arthur Waley)

300 Tang Poems

The Consolation of Philosophy (Boethius. Chaucer did a translation, I think.)

Loeb Classical Library - Greek Lyric

Gavin (Gawin) Douglas's translation of the Aeneid

Arthur Golding's translation of the Metamorphoses

John Donne or an anthology of the Metaphysical Poets

Elizabethan Lyric Poetry (get an anthology)

European Literature and the Latin Middle Ages by Ernst Robert Curtius

[Anonymous No.6222809]

Copleston and Durant, bro

All dat history and philosophy. All dem pages.

[Anonymous No.6222847]

>>6220832
Art of War
Alexander the Great
Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
Chariots of the Gods?
Crimea: The Great Crimean War, 1854-1856
Don Quixote
Dracula
Ender’s Game
Interpreting Dreams
20,000 Leagues Under the Sea
Gods, Demigods & Demons
Gulliver’s Travels
Histories: Herodotus
History of the Peloponnesian War
Holy Grail
Iliad, the
Interpreting Dreams
Journey to the Centre of the Earth
Les Miserables
Man in the Iron Mask
Moby Dick
Moses and Monotheism
Myths from Mesopotamia
Napoleon’s Russian Campaign
Passage to India, A
Oliver Twist
On to Berlin
Republic, the
Red, Blue & Green Mars
Robinson Crusoe
Rob Roy
Romeo & Juliet
SEAL Team Seven: Frontal Assault
Starship Troopers
Stranger in the Valley of the Kings
Vietnam: A History
Waterloo: The History of Four Days, Three Armies and Three Battles
War & Peace
Wonderful Wizard of Oz

[Anonymous No.6222911]

Good call on Tao Te Ching and Zuang Zi, I'd recommend the I Ching on top of that.

[Anonymous No.6222921]

>>6220832

How secluded will you be? Literally no contact with anyone for years? This may be harder (and unhealthier) than you imagine.

Remember Thoreau had people walking in on him all the time and he was hanging around the village regularly.

[Anonymous No.6223312]

>>6222809
this

[Anonymous No.6223321]

>>6222847
>Robinson Crusoe
This

[Anonymous No.6223325]

>>6220843
>>6222167

Ow the autism. You know what he meant.

[Anonymous No.6224223]

>>6221428
It started as a weekend thing for me, but I'm ready to take it to the next level after realizing that my weekdays basically became secondary in priority. Whatever you end up doing, good luck, and thanks for the recommendations.

>>6221587
Except
1) People on the streets don't offer an accurate cross section of any culture
2) Nobody does that. I would get probably maced.

>>6222188
Jacking off is for the weak :^)

>>6222748
Only thing I've read from any of those authors is Oedipus the King. What are some other good classical Greek writings by those authors?

>>6222809
>>6222911
Added.

>>6222847
A lot of those are already on my list. Definitely adding DQ and Moby Dick though.

>>6222921
I honestly thrive on loneliness. I'm sure I'll encounter some campers and rangers along the way (but really, this cabin is in the middle of fucking NOWHERE), and if they want to talk to me I'll oblige. But I can truthfully say I have no problem with long periods of isolation. This will be the longest stretch by far, though.

[Anonymous No.6224240]

>>6224223
Also, I really appreciate all the literature and history recs, but can you guys suggest specific books by the philosophers I mentioned?

[Anonymous No.6224555]

Just a piece of advice get an e-reader and solar panel to charge it to save on space

[Anonymous No.6224804]

>>6224555
There isn't gonna be much sun where I'm going.

[Anonymous No.6224862]

>>6224804
Solar panels still work under cloud coverage.

At the very least, you should have an emergency phone/radio

[Anonymous No.6225679]

>>6224862
What about and week long storms and blizzards? I really would consider it; it's clearly MUCH more space efficient, but I don't want to worry about the battery dying and being shut out from literature for weeks. They're also fairly fragile; if I ruin one book then I still have hundreds of others, but if I ruin an ebook reader then I lose everything.

[Anonymous No.6225804]

>>6220832
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance

and the Tao of Pooh

[Anonymous No.6225853]

>>6220832
thats a nice list but its not a hermit in the woods list. Just pick up Heideggers work and spend the entire time on that.

[Anonymous No.6226097]

>>6220832
You may find "Mistakes Were Made (but not by me)" interesting. Considering the cognitive dissonance you'll have after wasting your time in a log cabin, it will be helpful to understand what's going on.

Just kidding. MWM is worth reading though. Good luck, man.

[Anonymous No.6226632]

Get Voltaires Philosophical Dictionary for sure. And his stories (Candide, Zadig, etc)
Get Francis Bacon essays and New Atlantis
Get complete
Get all Kafka. The stories, The Trial, The Castle
Get all Camus
Get all Tolstoy
Get all Dosteovsky
Get all Joyce
Plutarch's Lives
A History of the Mediterranean in the time of Phillip II
Arabian Nights
Koran
KJV with Apocrypha
Get all Thomas Pynchon
Get all Nabakov
Get all Gene Wolfe

Just go to a fucking used book store and buy everything that catches your eye

[Anonymous No.6226635]

Get all these just to start
Get every book written by each of the authors on this list
Get more books

[Anonymous No.6226654]

>>6220832
My daily schedule doesn't really exist. I can work work here or there for 3-5 hours a day, then I usually play pool with a friend or go out socialize, or read, shitpost, photo ect. Then at 3pm I typically go home to eat, lurk, read do things alone. Go to the gym at some time 5-9pm. After gym home to do the same alone or go socialize. My weekends are this minus work. So more social or alone things to be done.

[Anonymous No.6226695]

I would recommend at least some books on religion

[Anonymous No.6226702]

>>6221560
>Doors of Perception
Second that, but will also strongly suggest you also obtain his companion essay "Heaven and Hell". My edition came with both but I've no idea how common/uncommon that is.

If you get BNW I'll also throw it out there that he wrote a follow-up essay "BNW Revisited" some years later that you should read immediately after.

[Anonymous No.6226890]

>>6225804
F-full disclosure, both those books and Lila are on the list too, I just didn't want to look like a pleb

[Anonymous No.6226907]

>>6226890
That's some good shit anon

You're about to live my dream life, I'm jealous of your bravery

Take care and do well

[Anonymous No.6227007]

>>6225679
Either take two ereaders with an interchangeable memory card or take an ereader and lots of books. Also solar panels are not the only way to make electricity easily

[Anonymous No.6227136]

I will trim it down for you:
Aristotle - Metaphysics
Plato - Republic, Apology, Theaetetus, Phaedo
Lao Tzu - Tao De Ching
Confucius - Annals
Epictetus - Golden Sayings of Epictetus
The Holy Bible
St. Augustine - Confessions
St. John of the Cross - Ascent of Mt. Carmel, Dark Night of the Soul
The Philokalia
ONE epic poem of your choice (Iliad, Odyssey, Aeneid, Beowulf, Divine Comedy, Paradise Lost, etc.) - the point of reading these is to memorize the lines and be able to speak them out loud (so don't read prose translations).

[Anonymous No.6227144]

a lot of these books are meant for pampered literati, not men living in the woods

[Anonymous No.6227151]

>>6227136
>(so don't read prose translations).

because it's hard to memorize prose as compared to poetry
one of the main uses of poetry (with metre) is memorization

[Anonymous No.6227156]

>>6227136
Also, it's better to read 5 books 10 times each than to read 50 books once (especially if we are talking about good books).

[Anonymous No.6227160]

You're going to get depressed and bored reading nothing but difficult literature. I'd definitely take a lot of much lighter stuff. I'd kill myself if I had to read the complete works of Shakespeare and live alone in Alaska.

How are you going to take all of these books?

[Anonymous No.6227162]

>>6227160

Also can you tell me where you are going so I can pick them all up when you are dead from exposure or malnutrition?

[Anonymous No.6227196]

>I went to the mountains to become a man, I came back a literary fop

[Anonymous No.6227519]

Maybe bring a few how-to books (like how to make hooch) and some technical stuff as well? Also, can I come with? ;_;

[Anonymous No.6228441]

>>6227519
Yeah I wanna come and visit you too, OP.

I will bring Pizza.

[Anonymous No.6229018]

>>6220832
Sidney, Spenser (DEFINITELY get The Faerie Queene) and Marlowe are good for Elizabethan poetry outside Shakespeare. You can get their selected works and also the Penguin anthology of renaissance verse which has a lot of cool stuff by other poets.

If you're going to be in the woods, get as much of Wordsworth as you can. The Prelude. Also Keats, also Coleridge, also Shelley and Byron and Blake.

Age of Reason poetry, I assume you mean Pope. He's very good, an aphoristic machine. Milton as well.