What's the book that either honed or changed your personal outlook on life/way of thinking?

Inspired by some of the posts in this thread, I'm wondering...is there a book that really crystallized your personal philosophy or make you look at the world a different way?

I don't think I have any one book...I sort of "became" libertarian-minded in my twenties, due to various things I'd read, mostly essays by mid-century libertarian writers and the like. I put "became" in quotes because I don't think I ever really changed my thinking...it was more of a realization that I didn't fit the liberal mold and needed a better term for it.

It seems though like a lot of people do have a book that's sort of an "a-ha" moment for them, and wonder if anyone wants to share.

I do, and I will over my lunch break. :)

I certainly do. Really the first "classic" I read voluntarily.

Kurt Vonnegut's Jailbird. Up until reading this book I had no idea how wonderful irony could be.

Vonnegut's awesome power to remove himself (or his characters) from a situation and review both wonder and horror without pity or drama is enviable.

The book, about the least significant person to go to prison as a result of the Watergate scandal, is utterly free of bitterness, yet packed with tragedy.

Vonnegut is certainly the most self-aware author I've ever read. This book was such a "holy shit" revelation for me that I proceeded to read every Vonnegut novel and most of his essays in short order.

How 'bout that? I read someone's essays, at about age 20. Bigger impact than I recall.

There wasn't one book but I think two authors affected me the most. Heinlein helped give me hawkish and libertarian leanings and Tolkien probably led me to being a Green.

I think H.G. Wells further gave me a strong interest in History with the well written "The Outline Of History" which did give a great overview of all of history in a readable and small for what it encompassed pair of doorstops. Full text is available in several places as it is Public Domain now.

I read most of Vonnegut between ages 16-21 myself. A very influential writer indeed.

In the "favorite books" thread, I mentioned that Of Human Bondage was my favorite book of all time, and that its influence on my way of thinking was rivaled only by Atlas Shrugged.

I first read Atlas Shrugged when I was 21 or 22: chronologically an adult, but still very much a boy at heart. The way the book changed my outlook on the world and myself was to kick a lot of the whiner out of me. I found myself uncomfortably relating to a lot of the "bad guys" in the book, the bullies and beggars and mystics. I find myself referring back to it almost unconsciously all the time, even years later, quality checking my own decisions.

I know that Objectivism has been co-opted by the far right - well, maybe not co-opted, since Rand would probably approve in a lot of cases - but I never really read that far into it. The world grinding to a halt as the gifted few left it in the hands of the communist masses was just metaphor to me. What the book hammered into me is, as Aristotle wrote and Rand quoted, A is A. The world doesn't change by my wishing. Also, she planted in me the idea that interactions between humans should always be based on an exchange of value for value. Now, I differ from Rand in that she couldn't see any value in humans other than economic productivity and capacity for work, which is IMO a pretty miserable way to live. Still, even now, I can't bear to be pitied, I don't really like feeling pity for others, and I'm pretty quick to cut off relationships that are obviously one-sided, regardless of whether I'm the benefactor or the beneficiary.

It sounds odd to say, but Atlas Shrugged made me a slightly colder and harder person, both with myself and others, and it's exactly what I needed.

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Originally posted by OneCentStamp

In the "favorite books" thread, I mentioned that Of Human Bondage was my favorite book of all time, and that its influence on my way of thinking was rivaled only by Atlas Shrugged.

I first read Atlas Shrugged when I was 21 or 22: chronologically an adult, but still very much a boy at heart. The way the book changed my outlook on the world and myself was to kick a lot of the whiner out of me. I found myself uncomfortably relating to a lot of the "bad guys" in the book, the bullies and beggars and mystics. I find myself referring back to it almost unconsciously all the time, even years later, quality checking my own decisions.

I know that Objectivism has been co-opted by the far right - well, maybe not co-opted, since Rand would probably approve in a lot of cases - but I never really read that far into it. The world grinding to a halt as the gifted few left it in the hands of the communist masses was just metaphor to me. What the book hammered into me is, as Aristotle wrote and Rand quoted, A is A. The world doesn't change by my wishing. Also, she planted in me the idea that interactions between humans should always be based on an exchange of value for value. Now, I differ from Rand in that she couldn't see any value in humans other than economic productivity and capacity for work, which is IMO a pretty miserable way to live. Still, even now, I can't bear to be pitied, I don't really like feeling pity for others, and I'm pretty quick to cut off relationships that are obviously one-sided, regardless of whether I'm the benefactor or the beneficiary.

It sounds odd to say, but Atlas Shrugged made me a slightly colder and harder person, both with myself and others, and it's exactly what I needed.

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I think you would enjoy Jailbird. I wouldn't say the book left me colder and harder, but it did make me resistant to overreaction.

Note: I have purchased Atlas Shrugged, I just haven't made time for it, yet. After The Odyssey I needed smaller commitments for a while.

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Originally posted by OneCentStamp

A is A. The world doesn't change by my wishing. Also, she planted in me the idea that interactions between humans should always be based on an exchange of value for value.

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These two parts stand out to me and I probably am not understanding them but neither rings true to me at least.

"The world doesn't change by my wishing." Appears in defiance to my belief that one person at the right time and place can change the world. Wishing and acting can change the world. John Adams cajoled a nation into declaring Independence. Theodore Roosevelt thrust said nation onto the World Stage. Rosa Parks was the key person to ending segregation. Pete Seeger built a boat to clean the Hudson River and it worked. etc. So what does that sentence mean to you?

"that interactions between humans should always be based on an exchange of value for value." I'm really lost here. How does friendship, charity, helping strangers, doing the right thing, come into play under this theory?

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Originally posted by What Exit?

These two parts stand out to me and I probably am not understanding them but neither rings true to me at least.

"The world doesn't change by my wishing." Appears in defiance to my belief that one person at the right time and place can change the world. Wishing and acting can change the world. John Adams cajoled a nation into declaring Independence. Theodore Roosevelt thrust said nation onto the World Stage. Rosa Parks was the key person to ending segregation. Pete Seeger built a boat to clean the Hudson River and it worked. etc. So what does that sentence mean to you?

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All of the examples you mentioned involved people acting to change the world around them. Rand would have approved wholeheartedly. Her point was that most people don't do that.

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Originally posted by What Exit?

"that interactions between humans should always be based on an exchange of value for value." I'm really lost here. How does friendship, charity, helping strangers, doing the right thing, come into play under this theory?

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I derive value from my relationships with all of my friends. If I don't, or if I suspect they don't derive value from my friendship, it doesn't last. But friendship is tricky ground, because clearly the things we get from our friends are rarely material in nature. She was talking more about commerce and politics.

As far as charity and helping strangers go, the place where Rand, and Nietsche before her, diverged from the Christian ideal is that there's nothing exalted about being poor or meek or needy. She kind of trashed the whole Sermon on the Mount in that way. Charity is a personal, selfish pursuit for me. I'm notorious among my friends and family for giving money to panhandlers, for example, but I do it because it makes me feel good to hand it over, and I don't for a second fool myself into thinking that they have some sort of moral high ground on me or that I owe it to them.

OK, the first part makes sense now. Would "Don't just wish for things to change, help make things change." be about the same?

On the second I still don't get it. I'm not stopping to help a lady up that fell in the street for any reason then that is what I feel like I should do. It does not make me feel especially good, I don't expect any kindness in return. It is just right. I think there are interactions where Quid pro quo does not come into play.

The Female Eunuch by Germaine Greer. I was fourteen or fifteen when I first read it, I think. I was a voracious reader at that age and I knew what a "eunuch" was, so was intrigued by the title alone. The book's heyday had been before I was even born and so there were a lot of cultural touchstones that had shifted, not to mention the fact that I imagine I was quite a bit younger than the original target audience.

But even so, I'd credit this book with changing my life and opening my eyes. It made me question a lot of cultural assumptions about gender and our relationships with our bodies. That questioning and doubt that it invited, instead of some new doctrine for me to adopt, was the most valuable part about the reading experience. It gave me the tools to recognize sexism both within and without and I learned to not automatically trust in what everyone else accepted.

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Originally posted by What Exit?

On the second I still don't get it. I'm not stopping to help a lady up that fell in the street for any reason then that is what I feel like I should do. It does not make me feel especially good, I don't expect any kindness in return. It is just right. I think there are interactions where Quid pro quo does not come into play.

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I agree that it's not totally logically consistent here, and Rand's failure to grasp kindness has always been my big problem with her. Meanwhile, I would also help that same lady up in the street, just because it felt like the right thing to do. But I understand that it's a combination of social compact (I hope one day that someone will see me in similar straits and help me) and tens of thousands of years of social responsibility being bred into me as a survival trait that make me feel obliged on the one hand, and happy on the other. Ultimately I help that lady up because it's a minimal risk or effort on my part that makes a large difference in her day - as opposed to, say, donating a kidney or a lung to a stranger who asked.