Quantum Library

[Cain]

The premise is simple:  list books that are so rich in content that each time you re-read them, they elicit new insights.

[Assaf]

illuminatus, who started the whole thing for me.
though i haven't read them in some time, quantum psychology and prometheus' rising, for continuing illuminatus' work with my mind.
yoga vasishta - this book is amazing, not many things like it, def a must read.
nisargadatta maharaj's "i am that" - also amazing, you should google for it, it's available online.
the bhagavad gita.
ashtavakra gita.

[East Coast Hustle]

One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish

[Cainad (dec.)]

The Prince of Nothing Trilogy by R. Scott Bakker (imagine the first Crusade, but with a single supergenius psyop warrior who takes over the whole thing)

[Requia ☣]

Gospel of Thomas.

[Honey]

One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish

Ditto.

Gospel of Thomas.

Ditto.

Tao Te Ching, especially the translation by Stephen Mitchell
Siddhartha by Herman Hesse
Zen Flesh, Zen Bones, A Collection of Zen & Pre-Zen Writings, compiled by Paul Reps

off the top o' my head but many more, often re-read stuff, often sends me off to new places

[Iason Ouabache]

Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy "Trilogy"

[Honey]

Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy "Trilogy"

Ditto those too!

[LMNO]

This is a really tough question.

I used to read "Steppenwolf" once a year, to see the different ways I reacted to it as I greww older.  But I stopped doing that.  Maybe I should start again.

I suppose any text that can hold multiple meanings might have to be intentionally vague, like the Tao Te Ching -- you'd hope that something like a physics textbook would convey the same message regardless of when or how you read it.

Ultimately though, I think that it's not so much the book as much as it is the reader.  Just like you can't step into the same river twice, you can't read a book twice with the same frame of mind.

For example, it had been 10 years between my two readings of "Godel, Escher, Bach" and the different ways I experienced the book was profound.  But even more frivolous works, like The Sandman series, changed when I re-read them, because I had some idea of how everything would end up.

But for the greatest amount of multiple information storage, I suppose poetry would have to rank pretty high -- TS Eliot, Ginsburg, Ezra Pound.

[Honey]

For Madmen Only 

Have read Steppenwolf several times but not recently.  Then, I was reading 1 of Anne Rice's novels, dunno remember which 1? & a part in it, except for that it was in Paris reminded me of The Magic Theater in Steppenwolf.  I really liked the guy in Steppenwolf.  Maybe I need to read that 1 again?   

[Cain]

My books:

Sun Tzu, Art of War
Machiavelli, The Prince, and Discourses on Livy
Musashi, The Book of Five Rings
Nietzsche, The Will to Power
Chris Frith, Making up The Mind

I'll add more when I look through my bookcase later.

[Golden Applesauce]

My books:

Sun Tzu, Art of War
Machiavelli, The Prince, and Discourses on Livy
Musashi, The Book of Five Rings
Nietzsche, The Will to Power
Chris Frith, Making up The Mind

I'll add more when I look through my bookcase later.

I'd also recommend The Book of Five Rings.  I know nothing about swordfighting (other than a smattering of fencing,) but his approach to combat (and life) is very interesting. 

[Honey]

My books:

Sun Tzu, Art of War
Machiavelli, The Prince, and Discourses on Livy
Musashi, The Book of Five Rings
Nietzsche, The Will to Power
Chris Frith, Making up The Mind

I'll add more when I look through my bookcase later.

Hi there Cain,

Out of your list I've only read Machiavelli, The Prince (twice if I recall but long ago).

I appreciate your insights into things (understatement) & I bought & read Naomi Klein's The Shock Doctrine, The Rise of Disaster Capitalism on your advice (maybe the best $10 I ever spent!)

Can you recommend another from your list or another?  Thanks.  Much respect.

Oh & I tend to read all of an author (novels too) when I like them.  Like Tom Robbins fr'instance.  I think I've read all of his more than once.  This from Another Roadside Attraction by Tom Robbins (Amanda to the agent)

You risked your life, but what else have you ever risked? Have you ever risked disapproval? Have you ever risked a belief? I see nothing particularly courageous in risking one's life. So you lose it, you go to your hero's heaven and everything is milk & honey 'til the end of time. Right? You get your reward and suffer no earthly consequences. That's not courage. Real courage is risking something you have to keep on living with, real courage is risking something that might force you to rethink your thoughts and suffer change and stretch consciousness. Real courage is risking one's cliches.

& this 1 from Still Life With Woodpecker

On her small canvas, she recreated a section of the Crazy Mountains, the range near Livingston that they had admired earlier that day; that is to say, she recreated the mountains not as she had originally seen them but as she eventually chose to see them, for a person has not only perceptions but a will to perceive, not only a capacity to observe the world but a capacity to alter his or her observation of it - which, in the end, is the capacity to alter the world, itself. Those people who recognize that imagination is reality's master, we call "sages," and those who act upon it, we call "artists." Or "lunatics." 

[Cain]

Hmmm....in terms of useful and contemporary books, I would probably suggest War in Human Civilization by Azar Gat.  Its an anthropological, biological and historical investigation of war.

[Honey]

Thanks!