alpha0's comment touches on one of the main threads I have been considering.
The Bible and Shakespeare are types of literature that impart cultural literacy.
You can't help but notice after you have read a handful of Greek plays references to those plays which well educated/intelligent people make to help illustrate all manner of situations. All of a sudden you get the joke and feel richer for it intelectualy and regret the time spent in ignorant darkness. What seemed before to be intellectual snobbery is realized to be a pretty insightful way to compare one thing to another for the sake of understanding. Cultural literacy is pretty powerful stuff, unlike so many things, you don't realize what you have till you get it, and it can't be taken away.
Been making my own list (haha, after my attack on lists) of books that deliver cultural literacy. Proposed reading list:
The Bible (pretty much any holy books will deliver some pervasive cultural understanding).
Major Shakespearean Tragedies
Handful of Greek plays
Plato's Republic
The Iliad and Odyssey
Atlas Shrugged
Cannery Row
The Jungle
Some kind of summery of Wealth of Nations and the Communist Manifesto I have some odd books that I think should be added, Stendhal's "Red and the Black" is something I would like my kid to read but probably never made it on a must read book list that wasn't written by an avowed socialist. What would you add to a cultural literacy book list?
- Milorad Pavic came across even translated. Highly recommend both the Dictionary (I read the feminine version ;P) and Landscape Painted with Tea. The former is quite intriguing to say the least, and the latter is simply beautiful and pleasure to read. (The latter also most certainly did influence my objection to NATO dispossessing the Serbs from their holy homeland.) - The first half of Lolita. Almost perfect. Amazes me that the guy was not an Irishman and rather a Russian. - Gabriel García Márquez and One Hundred Years of Solitude. Can't imagine how beautiful that must read in Spanish. Hugely influenced my own writing when I was younger. Love those epic paragraphs. For Iranians, there are many candidate books, but there is the singular presence and impact of Shahnameh (The Book of Kings), written by Ferdowsi and by every account singularly responsible for rescuing Iranians from the fate of other nations steamrolled by the corrosive Arab occupation -- look at the poor Egyptians and Syrians, for example. That book is responsible for the fact that Persian is still spoken. We name our sons and daughters from the characters of that book. Then there are the poets and these days two of them (Mowlana aka Rumi and Hafiz) are rather hip in certain Western circles. (One of our great works of literature -- kinda like the "Gulf" -- has gotten hijacked and goes by the moniker of "1001 Arabian Nights, complete with Persian characters and not an Arab character in sight. It used to be called Hezar (1000) Afsaneh (Stories). Of the holy books, certain passages of OT -- just read in sing song Genesis and be amazed -- The Song of Solomon, certain Psalms of David, and of course portions of The Gospels are very dear. The Qur'an's ace in the sleeve is in fact its aural impact on the reader/listener; it has a remarkably powerful voice; I have not encountered anything like it in my years. But then there is The Gita. I love the Gita.