I am near your age and I have always liked reading too, both fiction and the other subjects mentioned. One frustrating thing is that in referring to books and countering eccentric arguments, it often happens that people I am talking to do not get my references.

I suggest, the unbearable lightness of being by Milan Kundera

Happy birthday in advance

Wow what a long life ...hope I get to that age❤

That is a tough but sometimes necessary realization: we likely don't have the time to read every single book we want, and so we must cherish the time we have. I try to adore the time I get to read as much as I can. I'm glad I helped you discover great books for yourself. That is ultimately the hope of this channel, to help others find wonderful books.

Thank you so much for watching and for being kind. 😀

I love hearing about potential new readers to Vollmann. He's an oddball with highest highs and lowest lows in his writing. Europe Central and Fathers & Crows are two great starting points. Though the book I presented, The Dying Grass, strikes me as him at his most lyrical and thus purely beautiful (I initially read almost 100 pages and then decided to return to the book at a more fitting time in my life; some books just give that feeling of significance and pause for me).

That's a great accomplishment, congrats! I'll have another list of hard books down the line with more obscure writers (I hope). If you don't mind, who was the translator of the edition you read? I want to start Genji, but I hear the cultural gap is wide, and so the translation and footnotes/endnotes is key.

@@ToReadersItMayConcern Royall Tyler, only read that. And the famous critique by Haruo Shirane "The Bridge of Dreams, A Poetics of the Tale of Genji.'

If you have any particular recommendations-there are huge gaps in my sense of medieval history-I'd love to check them out!

Thank you! And yeah, that last book, Bottom's Dream, is in an atmosphere all its own.

Thank you! I wonder if that inclination comes from reading a lot and then craving something new. After a while, certain stories become familiar, and then the desire becomes for how freshly a story can be told or how freshly ideas can be conveyed. I see you have a great and nicely eclectic taste in books, by the way!

@@ToReadersItMayConcern yeah I think you're right. It's so exciting to see something new and fresh for us to analyze and explore. I especially love when writers break the "rules" of traditional writing. It doesn't always work but when it does it's just such a great experience. I first learned/experienced this when I was in college taking my first poetry class. Once I learned that poets often use every piece of a poem, I was fascinated. The way they use punctuation, line breaks, font, structure, the way words sound and feel in your mouth when you say them, etc. can all be a part of the overall message. Love it. And thank you!

@@readingwithkayla941 Oh, I think you'd really enjoy the works of Christine Brooke-Rose! She's a recent discovery for me. But she was a British writer who pushed and pushed the bounds of literary convention and voice in her writing, always considering how to break the page or the sound of the written word through textual play. There's a Christine Brooke-Rose Omnibus available that contains four of her short novels, and it offers a nice overview of her evolution as an experimental writer.

Thanks for sticking with the whole video despite your frustrations.

The House of Government by Yuri Slezkine is an extraordinary book, and I highly recommend it, BUT it does expect a lot of familiarity with history of the Soviet Union. It would help a lot to read a couple general histories first on that subject then dive in to that one. And thank you, thank you for recommending Buddhist Phenomenology by Daniel Lusthaus. Not a book I've heard of before, so I'm excited to add it to my list of potential reads. It seems from my first impression online like a nicely dense and serious work. Excellent!

That's what I most like about the Derek Parfit I've read so far (Reasons & Persons): even if I disagree with him, he communicates so clearly and takes his work so seriously that I appreciate the effort it takes to work through his ideas.

Bottom's Dream is such a startling, strange experience. I think it took me almost an hour to grasp the first page to any significant degree (viewing a PDF copy), but it felt doable-in a way Finnegan's Wake doesn't feel quite as doable-and I found the following pages to flow with what I learned from reading the first. It felt like a puzzle that becomes "obvious" once you get the pattern. A great starting point for Vollmann is Europe Central, if you want something that invites you in, but The Dying Grass is so fiercely beautiful that that might be enough to carry you through.

Durant engages you, that's for sure. On each page there's enough stuff to make you want to go and read up on the people/events he raises.

Even worse, maybe an algorithm subliminally got me to pick that book for this list in the first place!

Scary, All we can say is probably God wills it!@@ToReadersItMayConcern

This is news to you?

The Story of Civilization is the perfect entry point into history for someone who generally reads fiction. It's written with the flow and often the beauty of literary fiction, and the author-having been trained in philosophy-packs each book with his own insights and deeper considerations along the way. I hope you find a decently-priced used copy and enjoy it! And thank you so much for the compliments on my speech! It doesn't always come naturally: I have to remind myself to trust in the listener, that they care and that they'll be forgiving; once I get into that mindset speaking becomes easier. It allows me to forgive myself for all my meanderings, and that fosters comfort. So often "um"s and "like"s are attempts to not have the person we're speaking to interrupt us, so we attempt to fill the empty spaces with noise, but doing so just disrupts our own thinking and doesn't allow for careful, articulate thought.

Since you love history, I think you would enjoy “A World Lit Only By Fire” by William Manchester either in print form or audio form. I started with the audio version and then read my long neglected print version.

@@ToReadersItMayConcern I concur.

Yes, will do! Here's a copy: The books discussed in this video are On What Matters by Derek Parfit, The Dying Grass by William T. Vollmann, The Main Currents of Marxism by Leszek Kolakowski, Ha! A Self-Murder Mystery by Gordon Sheppard, The Structure of Evolutionary Theory by Stephen Jay Gould, The Story of Civilization by Will & Ariel Durant, The Whisperers: Private Life in Stalin’s Russia by Orlando Figes, The Modern Mind by Peter Watson, The Matter with Things: Our Brains, Our Delusions, and the Unmaking of the World by Iain McGilchrist, Bottom’s Dream by Arno Schmidt, and an honorable Mention of The Open Society & Its Enemies by Karl Popper.

@@ToReadersItMayConcern, thanks very much!

@@ToReadersItMayConcern yes thank you very much. I will be looking at at least some of these.

This was a good video but unfortunately you are yet another “bookish” person propagandized by Marxism. There is nothing to be gleaned there, it would be like if you want to be a Michelin star chef and you went to Walmart to taste test only the most processed food. Total waste of time. And I suppose you and others might say that you want to read it just to understand Marxism, but that would be like wanting to understand astrology - it’s not real. Curiously these types of channels never read actual economics, like Human Action or Man, Economy, and State, or the like.

I hope you feel inspired to share your selection and thoughts. The more response videos the better as far as I'm concerned! I would bet there are all sorts of books you bring up I would have never thought of.

I LOVE the idea of a “retirement library”! 😆that’s a fantastic way to put it. I’m only 33 (and still collecting), but the other day I was looking at my collection & thinking, ‘wow this is a lot of time consuming, heavy reads’…now I will think of it as something to look forward to in retirement! 😄🤍

You're so kind. Thank you!

Yes, Finnegans Wake would be an excellent choice for the list! One of the aspects of my thinking in creating this vid was to avoid the bigger or more well-known choices, so Finnegans Wake was dropped, but in a more all-encompassing list it would definitely make the cut.

@@ToReadersItMayConcern Got it.

@@monumentofwonders Joyce fan here. I've read his other works but was interested if there was an annotated or reading guide for FW. On my second reading of Ulysses I used the Gifford annotated edition and got a lot more out of the novel. Can you recommend something like that for FW? Thanks!

@@deirdre108 There are guides. Some helpful, some less so. There's Roland McHugh's Annotations to Finnegans Wake, and what I'm finding useful now is "How Joyce Wrote Finnegans Wake: A Chapter by chapter Genetic Guide." There's also a website that annotates each line. But there is nothing like just reading it, and doing your best to read it out loud, because punning is a huge part of the book, with double and triple meanings for words and phrases. I've been reading the book for almost 20 years, and now when I finish reading it, which takes a year or so reading a page or a few paragraphs at a time, I just start again. It's a circular book: the first sentence completes the last sentence. I read for the same reason that concert pianists practice every day, because it a great exercise in how language, any language works. To close, you can find people reading the work on youtube, including Joyce himself reading a chapter. I highly encourage to dive in and persist, the more you put in, the more you get out. It will change the way you look at language and at any creative problem.

@@monumentofwonders Thank you so much for your recommendations! "There's a website that annotates each line." That is amazing to find out someone put that much work into doing something like that. Your comparison of reading FW to practising music every day hits home for me as I'm a professional harpist. So I'll keep that analogy in mind as I read (practise!) Finnegan's Wake. Again, thank you!

I highly, highly recommend his book on the Russian Revolution itself-maybe best read prior to The Whisperers-, A People's Tragedy.

​@@ToReadersItMayConcernI'm reading the Whisperers right now. I wish I read it before I read the Great Terror. It would have helped put things in a little better context.

The number of volumes means it can be a series I steadily embrace through a large portion of my lifetime, which feels wonderful.

That is such a shame! Do you ever end up in the U.S.? I got my copy of all eleven volumes from the Iliad Bookshop in North Hollywood, California for about thirty bucks, and they often seem to get new versions (though they sell out quickly). I can always try to be on the lookout for you. The books are a pleasure to read. Durant's style is incredibly smooth, and he has the taste for a vivid story.

@@ToReadersItMayConcern That would be wonderful if you could! I haven’t yet been in the US but I have planned to do the Appalachian Trail on 2025 and spend visit all the states afterwards :)

@@materiagrix I recommend getting the eBook instead. There is an eBook of all twelve volumes together. I could send you a copy of it if you want. (it is an epub format). Unless, of course, you prefer having the complete physical set.

What a bummer: multiple volumes are generally available at most decent used bookstores, especially around colleges & universities. A lot these days, actually. Many boomers are dying off or retiring and dumping their entire philosophy and history collections. 30 years the entire set would go for well over $250

@@ThatReadingGuy28 Oh I’d love the ebook, I still want the physical format for something of that magnitude but the Ebook would be great to start dipping in and out! Do you have my email?

Thank you for offering recommendations (only a few took me up on that offer so far)! These are all excellent books that deserve to be on this list. I'm grateful!

kösz

I'm in the middle of reading Ducks, Newburyport on e-book. It's one of those periodic night-time reads, something I can drift in and out of, snapshots of a story, without losing much momentum. A strange book. Hypnotic.

Thank you so much! Hadn't heard of him before, so I'm excited to check this out!

Teilhard was French.

Thank you so much! I may do a follow-up in the coming weeks that covers some lesser-known works (or, at least, I've begun notes in that direction).

Yes, absolutely, go for it! The more the merrier!

Thank you so much! This is very kind. I have tough times as a reader, too, days when I can't focus or moments when my enthusiasm wanes. I try to be honest with myself. Take breaks. Do something passive or simple. But I also find that, genuinely, the more complex works tend to hold my attention easier than 'simpler' ones; those works often require getting into a kind of zone of concentration, and the great works reward that concentration with worthwhile, meaningful thoughts. That feels like a deeply gratifying payoff. It also makes reading generally easier. I can jump to a 'softer' read and find myself coasting along its pages in ways I hadn't before. But at the end of the day I'm glad for anyone to read whatever they love. If I didn't love this sort of stuff it would not be worth the effort.

@@ToReadersItMayConcern I think it's possible to improve focus over time, and with applied, active intention, but you have to love knowledge deeply to get to the focus level you've achieved. I'm glad you are having such a rewarding experience, because you've put in so much to be able to learn so much from some challenging material. Thanks for your thoughtful reply, too.

This is excellent! Thank you!

Sounds fascinating! Thank you!

I'd start with Solzhenitsyn's "August 1914", the version of "Red Wheel" that came out as a stand-alone work in the early 1970s. I like the original "August 1914" much, much better than the later version.

Yes, The Master and His Emissary is good enough that the follow-up is surely worthwhile. Just gotta wait for the price to dip a bit. :)

Absolutely! These are great ideas! I just recorded a couple vids, but after those come out I'll probably switch to covering an essential book on ethics and what it entails (Reasons and Persons) and then an overview of Philosophy of Science (more interesting than it initially seems).

@@ToReadersItMayConcern awesome 😍😍

I have not, actually. From Gould I've only read The Mismeasure of Man and his collected essays. What strikes me as intriguing about Gould is that he held strong to a position that did not persist beyond his passing, and yet it feels almost as if that has most to due with his untimely death: when alive, he seemed such a strident defender of his perspective, and he did so with often more rigor than his opponents (seemingly, and I base that on how often I've heard personal attacks on him rather than detailed refutations; though the logic of NOMA seems faulty at the outset). Doesn't make him right, of course. But it is interesting to me how much luck is involved in what positions continue receiving research or not, and research is key to data collection and thus the grounding for scientific theories. All that to say, it makes me want to take his work seriously, if only to conclude he failed-I at least want to reach such a conclusion after having given him a fair shot. If you happen to know of any knock-out refutations of his interpretations of the data, I'd love to read them! I want to be a sponge of this sort of stuff. Ultimately, I know so little, and that's why I love reading!

I wholeheartedly agree!

I LOVE esoteric recommendations like this! Thank you so much!

I'm glad some of what I selected resonated with you. Thank you for your insights! As soon as you mentioned South Africa, a particular "hard" book came to mind: Frontiers: the Epic of South Africa's Creation and the Tragedy of the Xhosa People by Noel Mostert. It's a hefty, intimidating book with much horrors to speak of while also containing a poetic, meditative quality to its prose. I had never heard of that book until I stumbled on it in a used bookstore. I hope it's new to you, too, and you can add it to your list!

@@ToReadersItMayConcern Thanks for the recommendation! I have not read that yet and I am not afraid of hard books, although they do take me longer to get through. I feel that if the information is worth delving in to, it deserves to be absorbed well. So I make notes and take my time to process things. Definitely going to look into getting this! 🙏

Little did I know, beginning with Parfit would turn out to be the strongest connection for like-minded viewers. I'm so glad I started with Parfit!

Absolutely! I'm glad they're of interest to you!

Nietzsche happens to be unique among philosophers in his writing style: rather than logical in his construction of arguments (in some ways, he does not construct arguments in the traditional sense at all), he focuses more on the psychological side of what he writes about. Think of Nietzsche's writing as musings or acerbic meditations on how culture has developed and how culture is changing and the dangers that can arise; you can also, kind of, think of it like poetry, as in, truths presented metaphorically and with an emphasis on emotion more than reason. Genealogy of Morals-if I remember correctly-is Nietzsche's speculations on how we developed Christian morality and what that suggests about our psychology (again, the key is it's him speculating on how it's affected our way of thinking); Beyond Good and Evil becomes about the responsibility we have for our lives now that we can't fall back on God or anything else for objectivity. Both books use those topics as jumping off points to talk about almost everything we take for granted, all the things we presume 'have to be this way' and don't actually have to be that way. But the key is all of the above is not presented as a reasoned argument. It's more that Nietzsche seems to have noticed a potential problem-e.g. the problem of abandoning belief in God and the morals therein-and what that means for our psychology, because we may think its something we can abandon without consequence, and Nietzsche seems to feel there is actually a great deal of consequence. That said, he's also not saying we need God or Christianity or anything like that. He's more saying that the same psychology that led to God and Christianity is still within us and thus we have to contend with how we're gonna end up projecting those desires onto our future (such as persisting in judging things as "good" and "evil"). Nietzsche is within the category of philosophy almost in name only. He's rebellious and opinionated and often saying what he feels more than what he's carefully thought through. Still, he's important as a figure who questions what we take for granted. If philosophy is a practice of questioning dogma, he's in that practice of questioning our essential dogmas. And that is useful for helping you think through your own thoughts. It's also very likely you won't agree with Nietzsche's entire conclusions-that's to be expected. He's more engaging if you just allow yourself to consider why he felt the way he felt and how that matches or doesn't match what you notice in life. I do have a couple recommendations for you, though. For all philosophers that you read going forward, I highly recommend that you read the A Very Short Introduction books for each philosopher first. Those serve as great introductions because they're just long enough to cover a wide range of a philosopher's ideas-longer than what you'd find in an overview like Russell's or Durant's-but also intended for someone new to the material. Of all the summaries I've read of philosophers, I've found the A Very Short Introduction series to be the best. Aside from that, there is also the free Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy available online. However, those entries are far denser and thus more advanced. Still, when it comes to philosophy, get as much of a summation of the philosopher's views as you can prior to reading. It'll help give you a mapping of what to pay attention to. Last recommendation: I just listened (literally yesterday) to The Popperian Podcast #13 with guest Ken Gemes, and I felt he gave an excellent summary of Nietzsche's views. That may help you. Good luck!

@@ToReadersItMayConcern Man this so great, I really appreciate that! Definitely going to revitalize and restructure my reading with this kind of perspective. Starting from podcast to the short introduction then. Thanku bro very much!!

It really helps if you have read The Master and His Emissary first.

You strike me as someone with great taste in books! And you speak on them so well, too.

👍🙏

Great question! That particular type of formatting is really, really odd. The only thing that comes to mind is maybe some of the work of Mark Z. Danielewski, such as his book series The Familiar (in parts) or little parts of House of Leaves-But those are long! It seems like the most experimental books are lengthy. Two short-ish ones, though, are VAS: An Opera in Flatland by Steve Tomasula, which has sections that play with formatting inward into the page, and Nobodaddy's Children by Arno Schmidt, which does the opposite and extends the wording into the margins. There's also the short story collection Brief Interviews with Hideous Men by David Foster Wallace, which plays with the text in fresh ways but also happens to be well-written and emotionally complex. One final tip, though, is to check out the collections Conceptualisms by editor Steve Tomasula and the Penguin Book of Oulipo. Both those collections focus on experimental literature and are a great way to discover authors who fit your tastes based on samples of their writing. Hope that helps!

thank you for the suggestions. did not know any of them. I am in the middle of reading Oblivion by DF Wallace right now :)@@ToReadersItMayConcern

Yes, I have more videos in mind coming soon. I'm glad you're enjoying my stuff so far! As for the book, I believe you're referring to The Gene: An Intimate History by Siddhartha Mukherjee, a historical overview of how we came to understand genes/genetics and what's left to understand. He also wrote an excellent book on our growing understanding of and attempts to cure cancer called The Emperor of All Maladies, which you may appreciate.

@@ToReadersItMayConcern thank you, it stuck out on the shelf and has a cool pattern but now knowing what its about. i can say it sounds pretty interesting and i will admit i dont really read non fiction at all but that is one i may give a try. so thank you for that

I literally just received my ordered copy of Mises' book on Socialism (an economic and social criticism) and then browsed at the four volumes of Human Action, thinking, hmm, should I?-So, do you think it was worth your time? Should I order them or maybe wait 'til after getting through his other book?

@@ToReadersItMayConcern It’s a subject I’ve been involved with for a while, so I felt like I “should.” It was worth my time, but no need to divert your plans necessarily.

I had to read a wide mix of those philosophers throughout college; however, I have also gone back to some, such as Kant (highly recommend Pluhar translation) and Marx, after reading other works about them, and I find that reading the original sources after reading critical evaluations or summaries to be a far more gratifying experience. You may want to just let yourself read overviews like Copleston's for a while, just to see whose ideas resonate with you most, and then once you've pinpointed single philosophers, maybe read the Oxford Very Short Introduction book on that philosopher (that series of books has been the best at summing up philosophy for me). I feeling I get is that I most appreciated the original sources only after grasping the conversations surrounding them. So let yourself bask in those conversations a while. That said, the best original sources to actually read among the list you gave is definitely Kant and Marx, and somewhat Sartre. The reason I say that is because so much of what they wrote gets grossly simplified. It is nice to actually take their own words in and interpret for yourself. The others seem to work fine for me in overviews or summaries.

Fantastic! I can't wait to read it!

Good eye! I only have the final two volumes (Studies in Consequences) left! I've read almost all of Vollmann's works, so I'll probably do a deep-dive primer on him someday.

These are good recommendations. I'm not new to philosophy, though. It's been a part of my reading for about 15 years (I'm older than I look). But your comment should be helpful to anyone trying to grasp the subject, so thank you for that.

It's one of those collections I plan to read over the span of a lifetime, not back-to-back, but spread out amidst various other books. Having started it, I'd say the reading is not so heavy as it seems: Will Durant writes exceptionally smoothly and is always thoughtful about the facts he presents, not merely listing out the details but considering them and their context and musing on the implications of each and questioning the meaning between the facts. I think you'll enjoy it. But spread it out!

This is an especially obscure recommendation, which is very much appreciated! Keep 'em coming!

It's the sort of chunker that might actually be worth a hefty price. Based on the contents page and my perusing of chapters here and there, it seems like such a wondrously nerdy deep-dive into Marxist ideological history, and the author maintains a distinct voice on the page through-and-through without being preachy or vague or snobby (at least from what I've read).

Thank you (as I already feel quite lucky)!

I own a copy of From Dawn to Decadence but haven't read it yet. I'll be sure to keep it in mind for the future! That's fantastic that you got to have Barzun as your mentor. That must be quite the memory for you!

@@ToReadersItMayConcern It is quite the memory. I have a huge pile of letters from him. He was a wonderful man in addition to being a genius.My husband and I visited him in his 90's when he was writing the history of the world, From Dawn to Decadence.It was a best seller. He lived to the ripe old age of 105.

That's a great question! Perusing the shelf, I've read roughly about 70% of the books there. The ones laying horizontally are especially recent purchases, and some of the books, such as the anthologies of philosophy, are ones I dip in when I want to learn something specific but not ones I read straight through. To reach that 70% I'd say it's taken me about fifteen years of serious reading (about 1 - 3 hours of reading a day, and I'm a bit older than I might look). And, FYI, I work as a teacher, so reading and continually educating myself has been essential for a long time.

@@ToReadersItMayConcern wow, thank you for letting me know! Your video was very well done :)

That book would fit in perfectly except that I read it in the past.

Genuinely, I'm a slow reader, but I read consistently-2-3 hours daily, at minimum-and this has been the case for at least ten years. Over time the number of books I've read has accumulated. I do not aim to read a lot of books: finishing a book means nothing in itself; it is the ideas in the books that matter. So I read slowly and carefully, which, I've discovered, makes the act of reading more engaging on the whole and thus something easier to do for long stretches of time (on days off with no distraction I can read fully from morning to night). I've also discovered, at least for myself, that making reading such a constant habit also makes it quicker to get into the "zone" for comprehension, that feeling of being wholly engrossed and not distracted. That used to be a tough state for me to get into, but it's become far easier over the years, which then makes it easier to read in smaller chunks of scattered time on busier days. One other thing: I also work as a teacher. This creates incentive to be well-informed and also creates an outlet for me to test my comprehension by communicating what I've learned (and then re-reading anything I can't explain well).

Did something similar. Got almost every Pratchett book in a sale and worked my way through them in order. I would switch out for King or Herbert or some sci-fi. I only made it about 13 books in though and now I’ve forgotten where I got to.

Same here! I can't help but keep reading both.

I'm generally fond of lengthier works. I guess I prefer 'escaping' for a long time in books. There are some incredible short ones, though! I may do a video on the best short books I've read. That could be fun!

Yes, absolutely. I plan to, though it'll be split in many parts (over 1,000 books to show) and I need to figure out a decent camera setup for it.

It certainly can have that effect! It can also not convince, or it can convince on the back of intuition, which for someone highly reflective can lead to circling round and round considerations and thought experiments about one's intuitions instead of acting in the world. I find myself, seemingly instinctively, becoming the latter, and logic alone does not rattle my desires.

This is an excellent list!

I know exactly the feeling: the moment I find BookTubers who are even aware of Vollmann I nod in agreement and sub. Thanks for being here!

Good eye! Yep, it is.

Could the difference in translation have had an effect?-My experience the first time through required much attention to syntax and phrasing to make sure I got each point, and the wealth of endnotes contributed greatly to some of the "hard"ness of reading it.

​@@ToReadersItMayConcern Interesting question to which I have no answer. As it was Popper's first major publication in English, it may very well be a bit clumsily phrased, but not being a native speaker, it would be hard for me to tell.

Glad you still enjoyed it!

Do you find praise of Popper quite annoying or overly prevalent nowadays? I know David Deutsch has been pushing him out more lately, and Popper is generally popular among working scientists (though not necessarily by having actually read his works).

I'm guessing you also read his prior book, The Master and His Emissary. How do the two compare in their balance of neuroscience and philosophy (The Master felt even to me in that regard)?

@@ToReadersItMayConcern As you might expect he goes more deeply and broadly into both areas. The scholarship and thoroughness are impressive but also how he weaves together the ideas. Not only do I look at life differently now but I benefited from being introduced to a whole raft of philosophers and scientists, and also historical and cultural perspectives.

Wow, okay, thank you very much for explaining further. I look forward to reading the book!

Good question! The selection of these books is filtered by what I'm looking forward to reading soon-ish. That said, I'll likely end up creating a few videos dedicated solely to poetry at some point. [Edit]: If you happen to know any particularly obscure or great or strange or unique poetry books, feel free to share some! Some of the greatest poetry I've read has been from those who are almost unheard of; it is truly done for the sake of art and expression in that way.

Trying to mention less obvious ones, avoiding books I already read or attempted to read, and can't repeat books mentioned by the other videos that did this same topic before me. Most importantly, these are the ones I plan to read soon-ish. I'm likely to do a follow-up video that'll cover tougher and hopefully even more obscure material. But all your suggestions are solid ones!

@@ToReadersItMayConcern I figured that out half way thru ... Bottoms' Dream has me intrigued... BTW, reading Beowulf and Chaucer in the original early and middle English is what I am talking about, not recent translations.. that is a challenge.. I speak some German so it's a lot easier for me.

Depending on your fluency, you may be able to appreciate some of the works by Marianne Fritz. She spent her lifetime on an unfinished multi-volume work-nicknamed "The Fortress"-that is supposed to be similarly experimental like Bottom's Dream, but it's only in German, I think. And Bottom's Dream and all of Arno Schmidt's work is originally written in German and should be way easier to get ahold of than the English version (though still probably a somewhat rare find).

Yeah, sorry about that. I put all the titles in the description in the order they appear. Here's a copy: On What Matters by Derek Parfit, The Dying Grass by William T. Vollmann, The Main Currents of Marxism by Leszek Kolakowski, Ha! A Self-Murder Mystery by Gordon Sheppard, The Structure of Evolutionary Theory by Stephen Jay Gould, The Story of Civilization by Will & Ariel Durant, The Whisperers: Private Life in Stalin’s Russia by Orlando Figes, The Modern Mind by Peter Watson, The Matter with Things: Our Brains, Our Delusions, and the Unmaking of the World by Iain McGilchrist, Bottom’s Dream by Arno Schmidt, and an honorable mention of The Open Society & Its Enemies by Karl Popper.

By the way, the correct pronunciation of the author's surname is ʃmˈɪt. If you don't read IPA, it sounds like s h i t with an _m_ inserted after the _sh._

I LOVE the attention to detail in your comment. It just feels so satisfying. I believe the typeset of the English edition was custom-made by the translator, John E. Woods-But I don't remember where I heard that from, so I could be wrong! I can definitely share the full PDF with you if you like. I'm not sure how to do so without my comment being flagged by KZfaq, though. Sometimes KZfaq can be very finnicky about such things. But I can guide you to it: if you use Reddit, go to the Arno_Schmidt subreddit, and the top pinned post is called Out of Print: The Current State of Acquiring Schmidt's Books. There is a numbered list in that post. Scroll down to number 6 for Bottom's Dream and you'll find a link to a folder that contains the PDF. As for the title, I remember seeing a post on the Goodreads website specifically about why it was titled that way in English. But I can't find it now, unfortunately. There is, though, a GREAT video all about the English versions of Arno Schmidt's works here on KZfaq. It is called Arno Schmidt: A Primer. I hope that helps you! EDIT: I do remember something about "Bottom's Dream" being a quote from Shakespeare's play A Midsummer Night's Dream. At one point a character in the play says, "The eye of man hath not heard, the ear of man hath not seen, man’s hand is not able to taste, his tongue to conceive, nor his heart to report what my dream was. I will get Peter Quince to write a ballad of this dream. It shall be called “Bottom’s Dream” because it hath no bottom." But I don't remember why that is the exact choice of translation.

Thanks for the correction!

​@@ToReadersItMayConcern Thanks a lot indeed for the pointers. Much appreciated!

The English translation was published in 2016 by Dalkey Archive Press, and sold out after a few years. "Bottom's Dream" is a reference to a scene in Shakespeare's "Midsummer Night's Dream."

Hardest book of them all.

I just don't GET it!