The pd.o Guide to a Liberal Education
That’s liberal as in
broad and nontechnical,
not “Liberal” as in Flag Day or pepper spray.
I first saw this list on Jerry Pournelle’s mail page. The original source, apparently, is an essay entitled An Education in 404 Pages by James Baccus, Vanderbilt Magazine, (the Spring 2003 issue, page 11). I have also added some of Jerry’s suggestions at the bottom.
Why? Because I have a feeling these pieces will make people think, and in the immortal words of Mr. Chris Grant, “Thinking is good.”
- Thucydides, “The Melian Dialogue,” from The History of the Peloponnesian War.
- Plato, “The Allegory of the Cave,” from The Republic.
- Suetonius, “Augustus, Afterward Deified,” from The Twelve Caesars.
- Michel de Montaigne, “Of Cannibals,” from The Essays.
- Voltaire, Letter XV, “On Attraction.”
- Adam Smith, “Of the Division of Labour,” from The Wealth of Nations.
- James Madison, Federalist No. 10 and Federalist No. 51.
- William Hazlitt, “On the Feeling of Immortality in Youth.”
- Edmund Burke, “ Letter to the Sheriffs of Bristol.” (txt)
- Alexis de Tocqueville, “The Principle of Interest Rightly Understood,” from Democracy in America.
- Abraham Lincoln, “The Gettysburg Address.”
- Ralph Waldo Emerson, “Self Reliance,” from Essays.
- John Stuart Mill, “Of the Liberty of Thought and Discussion,” from On Liberty.
- Henry David Thoreau, “Seeing,” from the Nov. 4, 1858 entry in his Journal.
- Fyodor Dostoevsky, “The Grand Inquisitor,” from The Brothers Karamazov.
- Virginia Woolf, Chapter 6, A Room of One’s Own.
- Søren Kierkegaard, “The Story of Abraham,” from Fear and Trembling.
- Karl Popper, Chapter 10, “The Open Society and Its Enemies.”
- Martin Luther King, Jr., “Letter from Birmingham Jail”.
- Richard Feynman, “The Uncertainty of Science,” from The Meaning of It All.
- George Orwell, “Politics and the English Language.”
- Samuel Johnson, “Number 21,” The Rambler.
- Immanuel Kant, “ On Perpetual Peace.”
- Plutarch, “On Contentment.”
Other Books worth Reading
These books have been compiled from a variety of "most-influential"-type lists, recommendations by Jerry Pournelle, the Great Books guides, and others.
- Jacques Barzun (1907–): From Dawn to Decadence.
- Fletcher Pratt (1897–1956): Battles That Changed History. This book is in the public domain (in Canada).
- Paul Johnson’s Modern Times.
- Cicero: De Oratore.
Other "Great Books" Lists
- Mortimer Adler's Great Books Curriculim, from How to Read a Book.
- The Great Books Foundation.