| For awhile there, I mostly read the How and Why books, and the Encyclopedia Britannica. Then I read a lot of Reader's Digests (my piano teacher was discarding a bunch, so I got a lot of back issues). My parents had quite a few RD condensed books, and that is where I mainly read fiction, like "The Last Hurrah", "Marjorie Morningstar", "The Cardinal", and "Fail Safe", some of which I got in uncondensed form. They also had some collections of classics, so, for example, I read Emerson and Franklin, and various philosophy texts that had been severely abridged. I also read the Upanishads, in a paperback addition; the Bhagavad- Gita; various Buddhist texts in abridged form, in one of the classics series; and excerpts from the Quran. I knew a lot of Greek and Roman mythology, too. One of my favorite things was a book series by Time/Life about the World's Great Religions. A book I became obsessed with at about the age of 11 was "1984", which I read in whole or part numerous times. I also read "Brave New World" a number of times before junior high was out. I read a few children's books, here and there. I recall liking "A Wrinkle in Time" and "Charlotte's Web", and, of course, I always liked "Alice in Wonderland". I read one or two Nancy Drew books. They were okay, as were the Hardy Boys (I think I read one). But I preferred Sherlock Holmes....... |
