The Five Books which are not a waste of paper...

One of my buds Ranga wanted me to give a list of 5 books which have affected me a lot...well...a tall order...i havent really thought about which books have affected me to the extent of me following what they preach...but i do know a certain set of books which have influenced me. not affected but influenced. by influence, it not only refers to how often i use titbits from those books in my daily speech and writing but also to those books which moved me emotionally or made me laugh out loud or made me doubt myself.

Anyways, here goes nothing...

The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams
Ditch introduced me to this one and many other books...damn, am i grateful to him for that! Anyways, since this has been made into a movie now, i guess many might have atleast heard about this now...beleive me, any movie made of this book in any age before the advent and dominance of computer graphics would have done the book an injustice. Of course, the movie still sucks when compared to the book...it has to.
This one is humourous science fiction at its best. Douglas Adams's mind is as zany and sublty crazy as one can get. Brilliant the way the story is told and new phenomena (sometimes even defying the known laws of physics) introduced...the one book which i have recommended the maximum.

The Lord of the Rings by JRR Tolkein
Again thanks to Ditch for this...i guess this one needs no introduction now. Again, made into a series of cool movies. And again...the movies were a very very serious attempt at representing the book in celluloid. Well tried...but the book still reigns supreme.
This book does not contain text...but sheer poetry. Tolkein is a genius at creation. He even went to the extent of creating a script for the elvish tongue spoken by the elves in the saga. Brilliant and very very endearing book. But this one is not too humourous though...pretty dark and brooding in patches with joy and happiness reigning in others. The eternal battle between Good and Evil elevated to the beautiful...

Roots by Alex Haley
My own find...based on obscure pieces of muttering and mumblings by my mom and some of her friends. This was made into a very successful TV series when my parents were adolescents. Moving and emotional book. The fact that its based on a true story enhances its effect. Clean and simple words...concentrating on the emotions on display. It must have created quite a stir at its time because of its gruesome yet allgedly true potrayal of how african americans (well, africans at the time the book starts) were dealt with by their invaders and eventual masters. A must read for all who are in need of some inspiration, some emotion, some heart moving sentiment and for those who look back into the past with wonder.

Zen and the art of Motorcycle maintainence by Robert Pirsig
Well...i list this book here because in all my life of reading books, this is the one book which i couldnt finish. I am not that heavy a reader...i prefer reading to free the mind rather than burden it. But i list this book here because of exactly that reason...weel, not quite. The author's arguements about "Quality" made me think...and think i did page by page...para by para. But at the time, i was busy with the job and couldnt exactly devote the time and the mind for reading the book. Any other book might have been consumed quickly. But not this one...i couldnt do justice to the authors thoughts by devoting "quality" time to this. Till that point, i considered myself a voacious reader...finishing books in days sometimes even in hours...but this one took more than a month...and i still was not done with it. Finally, i did not give up but put it on hold...its still on hold.
I suggest this to anyone who prefers reading which makes them think. Great book. I will finish it one day...

Asterix and Cleopatra by Goscinny and Uderzo
That must have caught you by surprise...cmon, it should have!! Ok, this is not a book...but something which one can definitely read. I love the entire asterix series...simply simply love it. But this particular comic is the most creative i feel...it dealt with events which were actually important in history. Must have read this a million times...infact the authors (or the publishers...whatever) felt so proud after the creation of this masterpiece that one can see them gloating on the cover about how many pens, how many pots of ink bla bla..it took to create the book. Am sure it must have taken months to perfect Cleopatra's nose which btw finds special mention and status in the comic...i apologise to the purists...by toutatis, please forgive this kid at heart!

Phew...beleive it or not, i had a tough time coming up with this list...cos i just live for the moment...not much of a past guy except when it comes to friends and relationships. So you can imagine how tough it was to search my past experiences...could have certainly found use for a pensieve by bellisama!