Library of Alexandria — My 2022 Most Significant Books
It takes a lifetime to make a book, but that book may reach more lives in less time.
2022 gifted me with interesting readings, and here I share the most significant ones.
Step into Alexandria’s library and burn these experiences into your soul.
The Book of Five Rings (Miyamoto Musashi)
Musashi killed his first man at the age of 13. Later on, he would kill another with a sword made out of a wooden oar. He became a master in the arts of combat (no wonder!), immortalizing his way of the warrior in this book.
The Five Rings refer to the five elements: earth, water, fire, wind, and Void. Each one becomes a chapter itself, containing specific fighting techniques somehow related to the nature of these elements.
While I’m no expert at swordsmanship whatsoever, I’m deeply into the arts, and here’s where things get interesting: For Musashi, the way involves culture and war, both opposing poles working hand in hand.
Not to mention, Musashi was a warrior and an artist. More precisely, a Sumi-e painter.
This only adds significance to the essence of the book and Miyamoto’s ultimate philosophy: not to give one’s back to the many ways in this world.
That is, learn as much as you can. Choose the weapon that better suits your abilities, but never stick to one solely, since both excess and dearth should be avoided.
Thomas Huxley said it better: “Know everything about something and something about everything.”
Concrete examples of this philosophy may include:
- Writing fiction, but trying non-fiction to incorporate it into your techniques
- Playing guitar, but understanding the basics of other instruments
- Reading romance, but giving horror a chance
- Listening to heavy metal, but finding that one pop artist you’ll love
The Japanese warrior states the relevance of taking action, something many artists struggle with. Myself included.
The cure for it is to take one step at a time. Like Tim Farris says, write “two crappy pages a day”, and soon enough you’ll have your book finished.
Also, never get tangled in the many details. Just focus on the big picture with a big spirit.
The 33 Strategies of War [Short Version] (Robert Greene)
Robert Greene is a legend in the world of writers.
Similar to The Book of Five Rings, the strong point for me here is not war itself, but the philosophy behind it and the mindset that comes with it.
- Declare war on yourself —forget past failures and past victories; stick to the present
- Be self-reliant — win small battles to build confidence
- Develop strategies with what you have — get by; seek the rest later
- Never consider a situation irremediable — there’s convenience in failure
- Choose your battles carefully — don’t waste valuable time on others’ dramas
- Win your war piece by piece, little by little — learn about patience and the importance of small accomplishments
Read this book. Win your war.
Escape from Freedom (Erich Fromm)
“Listen, you mortals, to the sacred yell: freedom, freedom, freedom”
The first verse in Argentina’s hymn is colossal. It reminds me of the last one in Star Spangled Banner: “…the land of the free and the home of the brave.”
The two nations seem to share one value in common: liberty. Unsurprisingly, both countries gained their freedom by fighting against European superpowers.
Freedom is precious, but is it possible to obtain it at all? For Eric Fromm, it is. However, we might not want to accept the responsibility that comes with it.
Fromm analyzes two different types of people.
The first is the “normal” person. That which adapts, blends, and accepts the norms society imposes. Although socially accepted, the normal person has given up on his true self because of fear.
The other type is the neurotic. A neurotic hasn’t learned to completely adapt to social norms. This person has the creativity and potential to become a healthy and original individual, but instead of taking action, he/she remains in a state of passivity, living in a world of fantasy. A “wanna-be” who will never be.
Both characters have one thing in common — they can’t deal with the suffocating weight of freedom.
But there’s one last type — that who chooses positive freedom. The person who expresses their potential and connects with all the love, work, creativity, and self-expression that the world guarantees.
Human is in a place where possibilities are teeming. Freedom exists in the conscious act of becoming an individual, instead of a mere series of atoms gathered together.
The King in Yellow (Robert William Chambers)
An enigmatic series of short stories that share one thing in common: a banned and dangerous book known as The King in Yellow.
When the characters from The King in Yellow read The King in Yellow, their lives’ courses undergo drastic, irremediable changes. Most of them go insane; the lucky ones experience odd events.
Describing what this creation consists of is hard. Understanding it, much more. But that only adds to its charm, if you ask me.
I’d like to highlight “The Mask”, the second story from the book, which was my favorite.
You can read the stories in no linear order and still enjoy the book, so give that one a try.
But remember: read at your own risk.
Diary (Vaslav Nijinsky)
Vaslav Nijinsky was a madman. Or at least he was during his final years.
After experiencing a series of traumatic events (including a failed relationship with another man), Vaslav registered his downhill toward insanity in a series of diaries.
These post-mortem-published journals are chaos. Nijinsky switches ideas faster than an ENFP with ADHD after having Redbull for breakfast.
Aggression; passion; dread; joy; hopelessness; paranoia. You never know what’s lurking down the next sentence. Not to mention, you might open the book and find pages and pages without a single paragraph, which do nothing but mirror the turmoil Nijinsky had to bear within his head.
It’s a hard-to-read book, and sometimes quite exhausting. But I liked it, though. It teaches that a man or woman may be genuinely out of their minds, yet be a genius.
“I understand that the idea cannot exist without logic, but logic cannot exist without emotion”
“I’m standing in front of an edge and I may fall, but I’m not afraid of falling, so I won’t fall”
“People think I’m going insane, that I’m going to lose my head. Nietzsche was the one who lost his head, cause he thought”
“[My wife] thinks death is horrendous. The sufferings of the soul are horrendous. I want men to comprehend the death of the body is not horrendous”
“Botkin passed away [...] the family cried, and the acquaintances appeared to be sad.”
There’s a lot of poetic intelligence in these passages.
The Myth of Sisyphus and Other Essays (Albert Camus)
Beware! Here are some haunted questions to ruin your week.
What if the universe lacks real meaning? And if that’s the case, is it worth living at all? I mean, there’s a lot of pain here. Is suffering and sorrow worth it in the long run? Wouldn’t it be easier to plainly commit suicide and avoid the futile struggle?
Humanity has been trying to solve these questions since the first spark of consciousness arose. The answers, though plenty, may be categorized into two main categories: fortunate and unfortunate.
Unfortunate answers include depression, aloofness, lack of personal meaning, and suicide. Although understandable, they should be avoided at all costs.
On the other hand, fortunate answers include the ones discussed in this series of essays.
Albert Camus believed there was no ultimate purpose in living. At least, not that he was aware of. However, there could be meaning in living, even if there’s nothing bigger or deeper beyond death.
Suicide seems forgiving, but it shortens your present, and the present is all we have.
Some of Camus’s beliefs include the following:
“Nothing is possible but everything is given” — get what you can take while you can
Action is healthy — it aligns us with time and saves us from bitterness and regret
Chase diversity, chase art — to create is to shape one’s destiny
Tasting a beer. Feeling warm sun rays on your face. Laughing at a joke. Being moved by a song. Kissing a loved one. Playing Pokémon. Collecting vinyl. Having a child. Programming a website. Writing a song. Building a sculpture. Moving to another city, state, or country. Writing and publishing an online article.
That and much much more can be experienced here and now. And that and much, much more makes it worth being here, even if it’s painful.
Now, I’d like to clarify something.
This is not some “stop-being-sad” shitty advice. Mental health problems are hard to deal with, and finding meaning when your brain is doing its best to ruin your life is almost impossible. Almost. Philosophy is not made to cure trauma and cheer one up with fake sunshine; it’s a tool for sharing wisdom. And I sincerely hope it helps you in some way.
Lonesome Traveller (Jack Kerouac) [well… kind of…]
I found Nijinsky diaries easier to read… and that’s to say a lot!
Kerouac’s writing is chaotic, messy, and too straightforward.
Sure, I’m not a literature teacher, so I probably missed a lot. But expertly or not, one thing is for sure: Lonesome Traveller was not a favorite reading at all.
So why is it here? Is it just to pull your leg? Is it to waste away some of your time? I’d like to say it is because I’m a troll by default, but that, my friends, would be lying to you.
Kerouac makes it to the list because of one single story found here - Alone on a Mountaintop.
Listen. I’m one of those senseless neurotics who loves highlighting, marking, and writing over physical pages. I barely touched them when reading the other essays and sketches in this book, but that changed when I reached Alone on a Mountaintop. There were just too many good lessons.
The story’s about a time Jack worked at a shack on (you guessed it!) a mountaintop. There, he learned the importance of being alone. Completely alone.
In a period in which reaching people takes nothing but a click, spending time alone becomes a mere illusion. Genuine solitude, though beneficial, seems terrifying. But even for Jack, who never experienced the magical/tragical social media era, the idea of sharing a summer just by himself seemed a nightmare.
However, days went by, and he gathered fascinating conclusions related to life, death, God, and isolation.
Not much more to discuss here. Read it, it is worth it.
All in all, it looks like there are three common key points shared in most of these books.
1 - Present is everything - like the Red Hot said, “Never been a better time than right now”
2 - Create - like Nightwish said, “Write a lyric for the song only you can understand”
3 - Take action - like David Hasselhoff said, “Action! If we gonna make it like a true survivor”
Happy 2023 - get drunk, pass out, and don’t regret the hangover
This article is dedicated to my bookworm and INFJ friend Silvyareads — thank you for always reading my writings ;)
