I'm tempted to say John Cage's Silence, because I've read it so many times and used it so often. But I think Lyotard's Libidinal Economy, although less used, has saturated my mind to a more puzzling degree. It's continuing to baffle me as we speak, in fact.

lyotard's heidegger and 'the jews' has done that to me as well. it's his conception of history and memory... i read it again most recently after watching 'waltz with bashir' and all the passages about the shoah and memory seemed to be about that movie instead, or vice versa..... i can't remember a time when i did not think about this book, although i know such a time existed... i guess that's just how memory works...

Ni'k:

Have you seen Ken Loach's film, Family Life? It's inspired by Laing's practices at Kingsley Hall and really is excellent.

I definitely agree with what you say about how disturbing Sanity, Madness and the Family is. That was my first introduction to Laing and really got me into looking at him and his ideas in more detail. Also, have you read David Cooper's book, Death of the Family? It was written at about the same time as Laing's book and covers similar ground (Cooper was also a key figure within the anti-psychiatry movemernt) but with some interesting differences. I keep trying to get hold of a copy of Asylums but haven't had any luck so far.

Notyourfiend:

Yeah, i think the main difference between Laing and Foucault was that Laing was really observing on his own practice as a psychiatrist, while Foucault was trying to place similar ideas within some kind of a historical framework, especially in Birth of the Clinic.

Regarding Guattari, the Guattari Reader has some good essays dealing explicitely with Laing and his own experience as part of the anti-psychiatry movement. Really interesting, and far easier to absorb than a lot of what he wrote in collaboration with Deleuze.

It's funny, I was thinking about Artaud while thinking about your point regarding Foucault and your mention of Artaud's book Theatre and its Double reminded me that I really must get around to reading it. So thanks for that.

I will check out that ken loach film and the david cooper book.

i want to do a more in depth post about laing in the future.

^ expect an in-depth post about laing and foucault in a lil bit.

im trying to finish off some office assignments first.

Amidst all this, considering I started the thread, I should mention the books which have had the biggest impact on me:

Christopher Hill's The World Turned Upside Down; Gerrard Winstanley's The Law of Freedom and, most recently, two books by Peter Taylor, The Provos and The Loyalists.

what kind of impact did they make? did they change your life somehow? or are we just talking about books we like?

The Diary of Anne Frank. Seriously.

I'm really interested in locating contemporary problems within unresolved conflicts that took place in the past. As such I found Hill's book about the English Civil War and Winstanley's writings during that period especially enlightening in the way that they both seemed to provide some light on contemporary issues.

In the case of Peter Taylor's two books (especially The Loyalists), it was a way of understanding (without necessarily sympathising with) a lot of what was talked about within my family (which had stong Loyalist leanings) regarding the whole Northern Ireland issue. Throughout much of my childhood I was expected not to understand but merely to accept their view and for years I reacted by simply rejecting all of it and not paying any interest in either side. So it was a big step for me to finally read those books and so, yes, I suppose in that small way they were quite life-changing.

fucking good explanation, especially #2. thanks.

In Cold Blood.

My first exposure to the true crime genre. I've been a voracious reader of
the best that category has to offer since.

I'm also really into the whole true crime thing but I tend to concentrate on the British stuff. I've read In Cold Blood but are there any other classic American ones worth hunting down?

The Stranger Beside Me by Ann Rule
Helter Skelter by Vincent Bugliosi
Buried Dreams by Tim Cahill (this does not have the exact "classic" status
of the rest, but it's the best book on the Gacy case you'll ever read)
Fatal Vision
Fatal Justice...both these books take two dramatically different looks at
a single murder case. You can read the latter without
having read the former, but I'd still recommend checking
out both.

oh shit. helter skelter. I've read that three times, so I guess it counts.

I was highly inspired by the detailed account of psychokinetic manipulation at distances greater than three point one four feet.

I've yet to stop a watch, but I'm trying.

Some of my favorite books on organized crime.

Murder Machine - The story of Roy DeMeo and his crew.
The Westies - Inside New York's Irish mob.
Underboss: Sammy the Bull Gravano's story of life in the mafia.

Buried Dreams looks interesting, Jenn.

Also, TiKHAL and PiKHAL are both books that changed the entire concept of drugs for me. Plus, I get real hot when I hear details of synthesis.

" Recrystallization from THF / Et2O provided 20 g (75%) 5-methoxy-N,N-dimethylindol-3-ylglyoxylamide, mp 223-223.5 °C, as fine white crystals."

Oh, yeah. That gets me going.

a great book about picking up the pieces and finding yourself when nothing else makes sense. sure, i didnt have it as bad as peart, but it helped me make sense of things during a rough patch a few years ago.

this book really shook me up when I was 16 and shoplifted it.

I've been looking for this everywhere for a while now:



Has yet to impact me.

i live in portadown. i was born and for the first few months of my life lived in a housing estate, but then moved 5 mins up the road to a middle class area on the outskirts of the town. Had i not moved and stayed in the estate both my accent and views on relegion would have been different. as it was i grew up with little to no conception of what the troubles were about. i was friends with a catholic boy and we didn't even realise there was a difference until i invited him to a summer school. People forget that class is and always was the most crucial factor in northern ireland. I'm assuming you grew up somewhere here too?