You are on a desert island. You can only have 5 books. What books would they be?
Mine would be – and these are not necessarily my favorite books – but more like the books I never get tired of:
— Hopeful Monsters, by Nicholas Mosley
— Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Bronte
— Hamlet, by William Shakespeare
— Helter Skelter, by Vincent Bugliosi
— House of Leaves, by Mark Danielwski (or something like that – fascinating book.)
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
I’m With The Band
The Screwtape Letters
Where The Sidewalk Ends
and I’ll leave the fifth opening for rotation, depending on my mood when I’m shipped off to this desert island.
Catch 22
Light in August
Ulysses
Yeats/Complete poems
Frost/Complete poems
and something I have not yet read: Proust
The Lord of the Rings (counts as one book to me, it does), by J.R.R. Tolkien.
Sharpe’s Eagle, by Bernard Cornwell
The Battle Cry of Freedom by James McPherson
Executive Orders by Tom Clancy (dumb fun)
And a guide to surviving on a desert island, one that includes a chapter on boat construction and navigation.
The Bible (King James)
The Concrete Blonde by Michael Connelly
The Big Blowdown by George Pelecanos
Mutiny on the Bounty
The World According To Garp by John Irving
To Kill a Mockingbird
Crime and Punishment
One of the large Calvin & Hobbes collections
Where the Sidewalk Ends
Whichever great book I most recently read because it would likely be stuck in my mind at the moment (at this moment it is “The Stranger”)
Let’s see…
THE COMPLETE WORKS OF WASHINGTON IRVING – It’s a big book, over 1200 pages, so it counts as (at least!) two books.
Any single book of the MYTH series by Richard Aspirin – funny! Just the thing to cheer me up when I’m depressed thinking that I will NEVER get off that island! (the crew of the MINNOW should have had the series)
THE STEPPING STONES (I can’t remember the author) – chilling, but life-affirming at the same time
A STUDY IN SCARLET by Arthur Conan Doyle – one of the best of the four “long” Holmes stories (most were short stories for a literary newspaper of the time)
This is a tough one…
King James Bible
The Lord of the Rings by JRR Tolkien(I’m with Bill, this is one book)
The Great American Novel by Phillip Roth
Ball Four by Jim Bouton
Lamb by Christopher Moore
The Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire
Catch 22
Moby Dick
The Oxford English Dictionary
The Complete New York Times Crosswords (which I will gladly share for a look at your Shakespeare).
The Bible (w/ daily reading of Gen 3:22-24);
Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis;
Something Happened, Joseph Heller;
Don Quixote, Cervantes;
The Spirit of ‘Seventy-Six, Commager & Steele.
1) How To Build a Seaworthy Boat out of Just About Anything
2) Extemporized Radios for Dummies
3) The SAS Wilderness Survival Guide
4) The King James Bible
5) Sex Without Partners
Oh, all REAL books? Sheesh. No idea.
Am I an illiterate if I can’t think of a single book I couldn’t live with out?
Not if you can read all of them, Patrick.
1) Cryptonomicon – Neal Stephenson
2) Dune – Frank Herbert
3) The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress – Robert A. Heinlein
4) Complete Verse – Rudyard Kipling
5) Seven Pillars Of Wisdom – T.E. Lawrence
Britannica Concise Encyclopedia
The Playmate Book (come on, give a lonely stranded guy a break)
P. G. Wodehouse: Five Complete Novels
Samuel Johnson (by Walter Jackson Bate — I haven’t finished it, but I think it’ll make the cut)
A family photo album
LA Confidential – James Ellroy
A Prayer for Owen Meany – John Irving
It – Stephen King
Lonesome Dove – Larry McMurtry
Empire Falls – Richard Russo
and one bonus choice – The Bill James Historical Baseball Abstract
Just an aside:
I have never, ever met anyone else who’s read House of Leaves. A strange book, to be sure, but I found it so compelling that I know it’s on my “re-read in ten years list”.
Alan S.: I have no idea why I picked it up. Something about it – the way the book is constructed – intrigued me.
And once I started it, I couldn’t put it down.
It gave me nightmares, too. An amazing accomplishment – truly terrifying.
And Michelle: Poe is the author’s sister? I love her!
There are some books that I can never be without and some that I can never bear to read again. So, to create a list like this is very hard to do. But, here goes:
1) The Bible, any version; to remind me of where I came from
2) The Past through Tomorrow, by Robert Heinlein; To remind me where our future could go
3) The Lord of the Rings J.R.R. Tolkein; to remind me that I really do need to finish it
4) The New Way Things Work by David Macaulay, to remind me that man does not live by coconuts alone, let he go nuts.
Before I give my fifth choice, it is dependent on wether or not I am alone on the island if so, then it would be:
5) Penthouse Letters (Or similar) to remind me, hell, to paraphrase Michael, a stranded guy needs a , ahem, hand.
If I am not alone, then I would eihter go with the Complete Far Side or the Complete Calvin and Hobbes. I miss them both terribly.
I hope that the desert island doesn’t just have coconuts on it. I much prefer Banana Cream pie.
And, Maryanne over Ginger.
If the professor got his own room, why did the Skipper and Little Buddy have to sleep together? I can understand why Maryanne and Ginger did, but not the two guys, unless, of course, but, I digress.
Thanks for the fun reading, Dan