True then, true today

[elfs]

There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old's life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves hobbits.

— Kung Fu Monkey

For the record, as with all things, I went a third way, and read Illuminatus! instead.

Comments

[ben-raccoon.livejournal.com]

I read the collected Harlan Ellison and Xanth.

Maybe that's why I'm a misanthropic perv.

[amberite2112.livejournal.com]

i read everything mentioned, except xanth.

i make my own puns, thankyouverymuch.

[en-ki.livejournal.com]

(s/hobbits/orcs/)

[http://users.livejournal.com/_candide_/]

I suppose the reason that I escaped the effects of Ms. Rand was (a) I read The Fountainhead instead of Atlas Shrugged; (b) I was 17 when I did so; (c) I (re)interpreted her politics as a heavy-handed rant-parable about the dangers of hostility to creativity groupthink, and mass-conformity.

Of course, hostility to creativity and groupthink are the very things that Ms. Rand's followers breed. Oh. Irony. of. Ironies! ;)

[doodlesthegreat.livejournal.com]

Machiavelli's The Prince, The People's Almanac, The World Book Encyclopedia...

...and lots and lots of Pogo.

[ben-raccoon.livejournal.com]

Pogo?

[doodlesthegreat.livejournal.com]

Pogo (http://www.pogopossum.com/)

[ben-raccoon.livejournal.com]

Pogo! :D

[technoshaman.livejournal.com]

Me, too, on the Wilson...

[jenk]

14...1984 and The Flame and The Flower didn't warp me too badly, but Mere Christianity (while providing great armor against many fundie excesses) had its detrimental moments.

Stranger in a Strange Land

[brandywilliams.livejournal.com]

Explains much, eh?

[bldrnrpdx.livejournal.com]

Dante's Inferno. Plus a goodly amount of my parents' porn (some disguised/marketed as 'summer novels').