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What book changed
your life?Each book is a treasure and should make you a more enlightend person
for reading it. No one book has changed my life because I have taken advantage of what I
have learned from all of them.
Lindsay, 21
VA
No one book has changed my life as such,
however I would like to think that each book has helped me in its own way.
Nikki, 26
Kirkham ENGLAND
There have been several books that have
touched me in a profound way, but I believe the one that actually changed my life was Mary
Shelley's The Last Man. The novel is about the last man left alive after a plague destroys
the earth's population. Partially a roman a clef on Mary Shelley's life (when she writes
this novel, all those she loved have died including Percy Shelley and Lord Byron), the
novel came to me at a time I was beginning my new life. I went through a severe state of
depression and loneliness before I read The Last Man, and I was picking up the pieces when
the book was handed to me. Through reading this book and researching Shelley's life (I
ended up writing my thesis on the novel), I rediscovered who I am and why I'm here.
Amy, 23
Turner, ME
Before a book can change a life, it
must be first chosen and then read. Therefore most books are not personality-changing as
much a personality-enhancing.
When I was l4 years old, the first volume of
J.R.R. Tolkien's LORD OF THE RINGS was published in the US. I had read THE HOBBIT with a
great deal of delight at age 8--and had reread it since.
The notion that fantasy was written for
adult audiences and was acceptable for adult audiences to read was very comforting and
sustaining.
Further, the notion of a quest has been
valuable baggage every since.
Jill, 59
Saylorsburg, PA
I, ROBOT
made me relize that technology was not something that should be feared.
Doug
Lowell, MA
Many books have changed my life or at least
the way I think. The first was Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand. For me the message was not
about selfishness, but about codependency and the way to empower people. Because if you do
for people they never learn for themselves. You help them, support them, let them do as
much for themselves as they can.
Cindy, 41
Lowell, MA
The Bible certainly formed a large
portion of my life. My particular favorite book within the Bible is the Gospel according
to John.
Laura, 34
Lowell, MA
Ooh, I bet some people are going to
say the Bible. Or maybe not. Anyway, a lot of books
have changed my life in little ways and affected my viewpoints by letting me see different
perspectives. Through the Ice by Robert Kornwise [and Piers Anthony] has, I guess, made me
see that there are other people like me out there, if I can only find them. Or, at least,
there was one person like me out there. And maybe there are more.
Karen, 20
Marshelltown/Ames, IA
I don't know that any book has
changed my life- I'd suppose that I would be responsible for doing that- but the book that
changed my perspective on life would be "The Crying of Lot 49" by Thomas
Pynchon. It made me believe that we never really know what going on, because there are too
many hidden worlds that we don't know about, and that
there is a really cool underground mail system called W.A.S.T.E.
Shayna, 28
Somerville, MA
I wouldn't say a single book changed
my life. I would say my relationship to books has
changed over the years. For a long time my interest was in books for the stories and
ideas. But fiction was what held my attention. More recently non-fiction (mainly how-to
books, as in how to grow plants, work with wood, etc.) have captured my attention. I'm
interested in a book for what it can teach me to do. I think someday I will be interested
in books that are true stories of historical events.
Tom,
32
Flagstaff, AZ
The Bible
Janet, 42
E. Brunswick, NJ
Steppenwolf by Herman Hesse. . .When
I was 13 years old, going to Boston on a train to visit
my brother. . . .it suggested all sorts of ways of thinking I had no idea even existed. .
.It was a supremely liberating experience. .
Mothmc, 35
Pensacola, FL
A book that had a
profound affect on me (althought it probably had as much to do with the professor who used
the book) was a political economic history of the
development of capitalism on a world scale. The book, "Global Rift",
pretty much created a structure for me to think about the dynamics of money, power,
resources, and global politics which is still with me today.
Felicia, 33
Somerville, MA
The main goal
that changed my life is Catcher in the Rye, since that book really spoke to me. I can
relate to Holden Claufield in that book.
Ernest, 29
Washington, DC USA
I
couldn't even begin to give you an estimate of how many books I've read in my life, much
less choose one as having the most effect on my life.
Kristin, 20
IA USA
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