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This page is an archive for my "quake books" that have had the most profound impact on me.
John Quincy Adams: Militant Spirit
Author: James Traub
Published: 2016
Read: 2019
Thoughts: I’ve had the chance to read a lot of biographies over the last few years of founding fathers, but none have I found so much perspective on myself as I did with John Quincy Adams. There are many things that he was (or wasn’t) that don’t apply to me; genius, terrible dad, etc. But his attitudes about life felt very close to home.
Author: Peter Kaufman (Editor)
Published: 2005
Read: 2020
Thoughts: Living life intentionally is not an easy or common thing. I used to believe I was fairly thoughtful about the way I live my life, but Charlie Munger is an aggregator of some of the finest ideas other people have come up with. This is a distillation of that goodness.
Reinventing Knowledge: From Alexandria to the Internet
Author: Ian F. McNeely and Lisa Wolverton
Published: 2008
Read: 2021
Thoughts: I came away captivated by The Republic of Letters. “The Republic of Letters can be defined as an international community of learning stitched together by handwritten letters in the mail.” What does that look like in a world powered by the internet and the creator economy? Are DMs the new letters? Are the ideas shared by intellectuals as much about culture as they are technology?
See also The Republic of Letters 2.0
Author: Ichiro Kishimi and Fumitake Koga
Published: 2018
Read: 2025
Thoughts: Every problem is an interpersonal problem. So much of life is made more difficult because we’re trying to accomplish other people’s tasks. Our tasks are those whose consequences we are ultimately responsible for. I’m responsible for doing my best, feeling comfortable in my own skin, but I am not responsible for what other people think of me or how they treat me. Shaping my life around those aspects I can control frees me up to actually be useful to my fellow human beings as I enable more capacity.
Author: Pearl S. Buck
Published: 1931
Read: 2013
Thoughts: I think I read this book for the first time in my sophomore year of high school. But I read it again in front of a fire in New Zealand in 2013 and was struck. As much as I love characters who I empathize with, I am often more impacted by characters who I hate. And Wang Lung is a character I increasingly hate.