10 Media

For most of us, it's spring break time. That means that while I should have more time on my hands to do posts, I am too busy screwing around to otherwise yak on our slice of interweb heaven.

That said, because I am lazy, I am ripping this idea off of Cole's Balloon Juice, which ripped it off of some other post from earlier. The subject? Post 10 books that have influenced you and why.

Cole gets into a piece whereby the Top 10 books claimed by some prominent bloggers are analyzed for their erudition, thoughtfulness, uniqueness, etc (and, not to mention, that some of the claims must be bullshit; nobody as a kid read A Brief History of Time). But we don't worry about here. If Dick and Jane Play Doctor had some influence on you, list it. If you're one of the zillion Nietzsche fanboys, that's great too.

I'd like to add a twist. We're mostly all Gen X-ers here, and are influenced beyond books. Thus, let's modify our list to be "10 Media: 10 books, magazine articles, web sites, radio spots, graphic novels, comics, music or movies that influenced you." If you list 10 lies, that's fine. But if you list the Bible, I may punch you. Or Ayn Rand.

FWIW, in no particular order:

1. The Indiana Jones trilogy. I realize there are now 4 parts, but I do not acknowledge the newest movie as a part of that fine trilogy. Even Temple of Doom is a stretch, but is a good move in its own right. These movies were hugely influential on me as a kid. I not only give them credit for my interest in history, but also for breaking me out of my early elementary school shell. A slender nerd could be touch and get the girl. Playing Indiana Jones (I was Indiana Smith and my buddy was Idaho Monroe) during recess made me the bulk of my friends that I carried all the way through life.

2. Cliche' Alert: The Lord of the Rings trilogy, including The Hobbit, JRR Tolkein. My dad read my The Hobbit as a bed-time book in the 1st grade and I fell in love with the drama, the genre, and Tolkein's command of the English language (something I have a looong way to master...just read this blog). Pictures came alive in my head because of it, and that was well before I understood the social underpinnings and WWI/II influenecs the books had on Tolkein, which makes them only the richer.

3. The Universe in a Nutshell, Stephen Hawking. I read this about 6 years ago, and have re-read it several times since. While still a difficult read, it put into one single book all of the various ideas about how the universe works and where it came from and where it's going. Thank heavens it had graphical illustrations on every single page or I would never have grasped it. But I did, and the book continues to influence my thoughts on the subject every day.

4. The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams. At once a spoof of and a substantiation of physics, science and technology. Adams is a great, if not prolific, author and his passion for what he thinks about all things science really shines through in this series of books. So much so that I find it contagious and compelling.

5. Excalibur. Despite how long it had been out of theaters, I finally saw this movie in the early 80s when I was in Middle School. It was the first medieval work that had excited me since LOTR and my first foray into D & D. This knightly, chivalrous code got me interested in looking at the military (funny how young minds think; if I can't be an old-time knight, I can be a new one!). The musical score propelled me into an appreciation for classical music (see below). And the action scenes made sure that I would be disappointed by massive-scale sword battle movies until LOTR came out.

6. Bugs Bunny. My sense of humor came from these shows. Later in life, I understood more about some of the jokes and references, and that makes them even funnier. I cannot listen to certain classical music pieces (see above) now without laughing (Barber of Seville, anyone?) and there are things in every-day life that will make me smile because they remind me of this or that Bugs Bunny cartoon. My favorite character is Daffy Duck; defeated by his own ego every single time.

7. Think On These Things, Jiddu Krishnamurti. Krishnamurti lays out a piercing analysis of culture and emotion that I find myself coming back to time and again when I really get down. How do I face myself? How do I face the world? Why is Sean Hannity such a fucking dickhead? It's all in this book and I love it dearly. I am on my 3rd copy, and regularly give people copies to read as well.

8. The Prophet, Khalil Gibran. I cannot even think about this book without getting verklemmt. We love to babble about how language is so limiting in the way we use it to describe our surroundings or emotions. Not so with Khalil Gibran. Not so.

9. The Power of Myth. This is a 6-part miniseries of an interview between Bill Moyers and mythology scholar Joseph Campbell. The first time I saw it was in a philosophy class at Grand Valley. I have seen it a few times since, and listen to it over and over again on my iPod to the point where I have favorite passages memorized as to where they are in the audiobook. I could write a day-long post about why this has influenced me and in what direction but I will sum it up thusly: we are not alone when it comes to dealing with rights of passage and trial. There are those who have gone there before us and they tell us their stories.

10. Dune, Frank Herbert. Herbert just understood human interaction, dogma, treachery, resource wars and philosophy and he put it all in one book. I'd list this book equally with Asimov's Foundation books, just a shade weirder.

On Great Books: I have read a lot of the Great Books, and I even like a few of them! Be they in highschool AP Lit courses, college courses, or just on my own for the sake of reading these things that American Society has agreed are Great Books, I have read or Cliffs Notes'ed a ton of them. But to call them influential, to me, was misleading. Sure they helped me understand how we think in Western Society, or where Democracy comes from or what-have-you. But that's not influential. Nothing in me changed when I read them and they're not something I keep referring to in my life. I read them, I know them, I took fucking essay tests on them, and I am onward. That's not to say nobody can list them or that they will be misleading if they are; this is just my experience. Like most everyone, I read Republic. I just don't list it under "influences."

Whip it out in the comments, or Hell, even just post your own post.