Well done.All the best.Cheers.

That's mean that you have to choice the best books, good luck.

That’s incredible!

God bless you. It's all about getting back on the horse.

That's a big W 🤟

I loved your last line. yes, "Get busy living, or get busy dying."

Your taste is goood.

@@KainUndAbelBooks Thank you!

Same😂😂😂

I've owned Dostoevsky's top 5 novels. The first book I read was Notes from Underground. His soliloquy on that book is weird yet astounding, somewhat it resonates within me. Now I'm reading C&P still in chapter 4. Hoping that i would love the rest

@@Dann-md9eq I recently read Notes from the Underground and completely agree. I don't think I've read anything like it before. Hope you enjoy the rest!

Any reason for that translation?

I am trying to make the decision to switch to a Kindle because I read in other languages and need to use the translation features. BUT …I really am struggling with the idea. I read using the Kindle app on my iPad but inevitable keep getting distracted by other things on my iPad and the internet. This has caused a real problem in my reading habits. Do you find using the Kindle less distracting?

I tried reading The Glass Bead game twice and I got to page 50 both times. I think I should give it another go :)

@@MileyLoverIv19 The first chapter is brutal! Because you don't meet the main characters yet! The real story begins after they introduce this bead game.

@@MileyLoverIv19 I know a Russian teacher of the Russian language and literature your reading experience of The Glass Bead strongly reminded me of. She also go to page 50 many times. The book was though Crime and Punishment. Several years ago she gave up and gifted this book to me, commenting ''So that you don`t forget Russian.'' I had to make a tremendous effort over myself to get to the end of the book. A gift, after all. I still fail to grasp what about this book evokes people`s interest. Because it`s a must-read to count as a with-it person?

HST is one of the reasons I love to read. Can’t finish Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas but Hells Angels is such a great read

Vincent, you say you are being pulled toward spirituality, religion, philosophy etc. What are you being pulled toward, in other words? Away from the dull, boring, daily existence of humdrum reality? An escape from reality? An escapism? Does this one word sum up all your many words?

@@_jared This is the first book I read by her and it is beautiful.

Lots of funny bits in Brothers Karamazov and his other works.

No way Passion for any hobby... Never Allows one to stay away from it.. I admit medical books are Fascinating... Though

@@TM15HAKRN Hello! 🤔

Oliver, what characters did you recognize? I mean as real people?

@@peterivankovich2990 That's a very personal question, and one that I care not to go into specifics about who I/others related to and why, especially to a stranger. But, when I was younger I used to delude myself into thinking that I was better than who I was, I'd lie to people and ruin their trust because I was a complete mess of a person. I disappointed those who cared about me; my parents and sister, because I was selfish. I think the specific quote that struck me like a thunderbolt was; "A man who lies to himself, and believes his own lies, becomes unable to recognize truth, either in himself or in anyone else, and he ends up losing respect for himself and for others. When he has no respect for anyone, he can no longer love, and in him, he yields to his impulses, indulges in the lowest form of pleasure, and behaves in the end like an animal in satisfying his vices. And it all comes from lying - to others and to yourself.“

@@oliverreno4734 If you choose to regard something as a personal question, it`s your affair. I fail to grasp why Dostoevsky hasn`t kept his private affairs to himself and tried to tell others how to live, especially spiritually, feel and relate. Didn`t he know that it was none of his business how others chose to live? Why did he make it his own? Aren`t Dostoevsky`s characters complete strangers to you? And you, forgetting your good manners, jumped at the chance to pry in their very personal lives. Like eavesdropping on their lives. Well, let`s agree that you don`t want to use your life as an example to teach others. To extract lessons from it for others. Dostoevsky cared about others much more than you do. Be that as it may, let`s proceed with your message. You were a mess while I did my best to be good, but our outcome was the same. Rejection. People need others to be more than just being good. Others need to provide a profit. If you can`t secure a profit, your goodness is an embarrassment. Security is good, but financial security is better. I appreciate, though, very much your quote. It`s something definite to start from. A dude I know springs readily to mind - Hamlet. With his famous wisdom: ''Words, words, words.'' It`s in relation to Dostoevsky`s words. They sound grand, but what meaning do they carry? Well, maybe about a single man who lied to himself and then repented for one reason or another, whatever fitted into the author`s intention. They`re billions of others who lied, lie, and will lie without any repentance. There are those for whom lies become a truth. At least a personal truth. As a matter of fact, the vast majority of Americans believe in personal truths, claiming that the universal truth does not exist. Unless they are religious fanatics, like Dostoevsky was. Himself a fierce defender of Russian Orthodoxy. This mental breakdown occurred after the mock execution. He came out of it a totally different men, the opposite of what he had used to be before. If I go by a bunch of real people I`ve known, it takes much more than lying to oneself to have lost respect for oneself. One of the things is to be caught out in one`s lies time and time again. Then the way out is to make a show of repentance in front of others, shaming them into pardoning oneself and thus winning a victory over them. People don`t just yield to their impulses. First of all, they study their chances of getting away with it. Humans do satisfy their animal instincts because they are animals. Humans are only a step higher than mere animals. Human can fabricate lies. and out of the most atrocious and enforced of these lies, societies are formed. Any society is a system of lies that its people are taught to believe. It`s not my thought. It`s specialists on humanity who say it and I happen to read them, and I find their arguments pretty plausible. Yuval Noah Harari has recently made a worldwide stir with his book on the origins of human societies. I have a cousin who loves himself more than anything in the world. He firmly believes that the world exists for his personal comfort. He tells lies and get offended when somebody does not buy his fibs. His own mother once said to me: ''If he was not my own son, I`d laugh.'' The thing is he`s his own person and not a character under the pen of a Dostoevsky who performs only actions and thinking intended for him by the writer. By the way, he lives a stone`s throw from places where Raskolnikov in Crime and Punishment acts out Dostoevsky`s philosophy. My cousin is not a fan of the fantastical world in Dostoevsky`s brain, and lives out his life without the torments of Dostoevskian characters. Honestly, I do find it impossible to tolerate my cousin, but it doesn`t bother him in the least. He goes through his life enjoying it to the full. There`s only one incomprehension in his life - why all the girls he wants to bonk do not appreciate his manliness? By the way, many guys I know suffer from the same moral question. This topic does not pop up in Dostoevsky`s philosophical deliberations. Incidentally, my cousin in Saint Petersburg, Russia, became an out-and-out Russian Orthodox believer a couple of decades ago. Of the type of Dostoevsky`s dreams. His faith was noticed by the central Cathedral in the city and he`s an honorable believer there, and a personal parking spot has been reserved for his car right next the Cathedral where the priests park. The ordinary folk have got to foot it to the Church from several blocks over. I haven`t been in touch with this cousin for 15 years, and I`m sure he does not regret it. Though he used to love to suck lots of money from me when I dropped in for a visit. That he probably misses. A reminder, yes he lives close to places names in Crime and Punishment and crosses them every day. And no moral torments whatsoever. Why complicate one`s life with them? It`s different with writers. They need complications to make their novels interesting and sellable. I bet in Dostoevsky`s novel my cousin would have drowned himself in the Neva river, not being able to stand his moral transgressions before the Almighty. So this is a very personal answer to the quote chosen by you. You fail to distinguish fictional literature from real life, driven by your innate instincts that you seem to try to abstract yourself from. And one more thing. Humans don`t stay at the same stage all the time. You`ll evolve throughout your life and your perceptions of the world, real and fictional, will keep on changing. And you`ll understand them differently. Books are good to learn from for those who have no life of their own to learn from. Books are for entertainment or imposition of somebody`s ideas.

@@oliverreno4734 Oliver, I want to add a tad to my previous massage. You must understand that it was just a mere exchange of views. I hope you will always go by what you judge sensible for you, and not take my words that being honest is a waste of time. Maybe in your circumstances being outright honest is going to be a boost. I know that in my life I have often heard from people - ''Who needs your honesty?'' or ''Everybody has their own truth.'' I have been often advised to tell people what they want to hear and I`ll see they would love me. I`ve been having trouble with that and people have repaid me in kind - by not being eager to socialize with me. I know a bunch of people who have had great success because they tell others what others want to hear. You know that it`s not for nothing that there`s an expression ''tell a white lie.'' I heard that white lies are necessary to specifically make human interaction in society to proceed smoothly. Who wants to hear you give them cold turkey? In my experience, nobody wanted to hear my spout off cold turkey. All people wanted from me is for me to do what they expect me to do. I`m very curious what is going to become of you if you switch over to sticking to bare truth. Happy survival!

@@oliverreno4734 wow, Oliver, thank you for sharing that... TBK was a book that made a huge impression on me years ago & I consider it one of the best & most important works I've ever read. I remember there were passages like that which really could make me breathless, but i cannot recall them in detail like you have. I think it might be time for me to read it again... Though it may be heartbreaking to be reminded that, through the decades, I somehow lost sight of these insights I once thought I understood & would never forget.

I simply could not get through that book. Magical realism is just not for me.

She's amazing. The literary critic Harold Bloom said she elevated the fantasy genre more than Tolkien

Same...technology has most definitely shortened my attention span. 🙁

@@_jared The confessions is what started it all for me. There’s enough in that book to do a whole series of videos! I particularly love how Augustine discusses memory and time in the last few chapters.