What Writer Influenced Your Life Most ?

[American Horse]

Deleted by poster and re-posted in "General Discussion" forum - Sorry!

..To go to post in General Discussion ^^

 

[American Horse]

This question is about an influence in your life rather than confining any answers to favorite books;
Who is the most influential writer in your life, and what was that first book they authored that changed or influenced you?

Our circumstances at the time we read something are reflected in why we may have read but also how, how much, and how long we are influenced: I have several and each profoundly influence me, one for each phase of my life:

•Mark Twain - Tom Sawyer*
As a love sick adolescent on summer vacation
(I learned early that action is the cure for melancholy)

• George Gamow - The Birth and Death of the Sun†
As a teen looking for the "scientific ideal"
(Influenced me to study and make the most of mathematics and science in my life)

• Eric Hoffer – The True Believer‡
In a sort of midlife crisis searching for answers about "free will" and human nature
(Helped me to understand why people do what they do and say what they say)

In my own life, events caused me to ask questions, and each of these authors was important to my search for answers. I hope you won't limit yourself to a single sentence like I did. Actually I could write on and on about the subjects in these books, but since I do that too much here, I'll restrain myself and just suggest a pattern for you to tell us about your own; but please feel free to expand in any way you like.

So....How about YOURS?

_________________

* Samuel Clemens "democratized the national voice by availing it of vernacular; [he wrote of] rough action that sprawled over waterway and open terrain; comedy, political consciousness, and skepticism toward the very idea of lofty instruction."

† Gamow is one of the founders of the theory of the Big Bang, stellar nucleo-synthesis and planetary formation. He wrote in a style that popularized stellar mechanics for ordinary non-scientists to understand. He was a sort of Carl Sagan of the 'fifties'

‡ Eric Hoffer: To the intellectuals looking for a proletarian philosopher, Eric Hoffer was a disappointment; the literary shock could hardly have been greater. Hoffer's hero is 'the autonomous man,' the content man, at peace with himself, engaged in the present.

 

[dilloduck]

Deleted by poster and re-posted in "General Discussion" forum - Sorry!

Alan Watts
The Wisdom of Insecurity
The Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are
Nature: Man and Woman
etc.

 

[Xenophon]

None really influenced it.

 

[strollingbones]

a separate peace knowles....

macbeth....

tennessee willaims' plays

 

[Luissa]

J.D. Salinger

 

[Metternich]

John Locke, Ayn Rand, Barry Goldwater, Ron Paul, Neal Boortz...

 

[Oddball]

Dr. Robert Nozick - Footnotes and endnotes put me onto lots of books I never would've considered looking at.

Ayn Rand - Put me off of reading fiction forever.

F.A. Hayek - Probably the greatest economist of the 20th century, IM not-at-all HO.

Dr. Mary Ruwart - Convincingly showed me that free markets and compassion aren't anywhere near mutually exclusive.

 

[eots]

Mad magazine...William Gaines