Chacham's Journal: What is the strangest/significant book that you own or saw?

What is the strangest book that you own or have seen? Strange means odd to you, since it is a relative term. significant, means personal, or in general.

Of one my favorites is "Oneirocritica: The Interpretation of Dreams" by Artemidorus Daldiani, of second century Greece. I consider it strange, because then people believed that dreams meant something. Now, a great deal don't. My second is probably both, "Mark Twain's Aquarium; The Samuel Clemens Angelfish Correspondence, 1905-1910" which documents his letters to about twelve girls ages 10-16 (what he called "schoolage") and "Enchantment: A Little Girl's Friendship with Mark Twain" which was renamed to "Mark Twain and Me" after the Disney movie of that name came out. I find those strange because he is a well respected author, and a documented pedophile (unpublished personal diary mentioned in the Aquarium he says that he "worships" little girls) (very much like Charles Dogdeson "Lewis Carrol"), which is so against recent culture.

As for significant, those are mostly religious books on Jewish outlook. I consider them significant, because I changed my outlook after reading them.

Good discussion starter

[mekkab]

"Be Here Now" by Baba Ram Das. Its a really groovy book. Great pictures.

"Stranger in a Strange Land" by Heinlen (sp?)

the one-two punch combo of "On the Road" by Kerouac and then "Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test" by Wolf- you get character continuity with Neal Cassady. Heck, even Kerouac shows up. You gotta read 'em back to back.

That's all for now...

Re:Good discussion starter

[Liora]

Yeah... I would have to say

• The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test

is both the strangest book I own, and the one that influenced me the most... funny enough though, it did all that influencing in high school... no more of that these days.

Books that changed me--

[ParticleGirl]

The Goldbug Variations by Richard Powers is about the most beautifully written piece I've ever had the pleasure to read-- metaphor heaped upon metaphor; The Glass Bead Game by Herman Hesse is incredible and won him a Nobel prize; A Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood is a brilliant book and a sharp illustration of the concept of "slippery slope," and The Source by James Mitchner got me deeper into Jewish history and archaeology both. Has anyone read any of these? Does anyone think that TGBV or TGBG are as phenomenal as I think they are? Why has no one heard of TGBV?! Powers won a McArthur "Genuis Award" for it, and it's more complex than Cryptonomicon; just as funny and brilliantly written, and with a broader subject matter. Music, cryptology, genetics... I find it so sad that no one knows it exists.