 Hello to all my book lovers and Bradley Cooper fan girls out there, my name is Ian and on this channel we break down the greatest books and ideas ever. We also take those great books and ideas and turn them into actionable steps to transform the world because what is knowledge if we don't do anything with it? But today we are talking about Bradley Cooper and I am just as surprised as you are that Bradley Cooper has a beautiful book list and that's the only reason we're talking about him. I don't like Bradley Cooper as an actor really at all. I thought that American Sniper was pretty good but it was a romanticization of a 100% unjustified and unnecessary war. But his book list is maybe the best one I've ever seen for a celebrity and I'd really like to talk about the books on it because they are all pretty good if not great. I would choose some of them for my top 10 list too. So first one we are going to be talking about is The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain and this is what Bradley Cooper has to say about it. Quote what can I say? I remember reading it in school and it was one of the first books that made me realize I loved reading. There's something about traveling down the river, the flow, and how he made me see and smell the environment really transported me to a different time and Cooper is 100% correct here. Twain is a great writer a beautiful writer really takes you down and can connect you with nature to a time that most of us don't connect with anymore and if we do it was in childhood during the summer. However Twain has a tampered legacy now because he's been canceled. He is 170 years later being x-rayed and canceled and trying to be brought out of not just a school system but just reading and libraries in general. I hate how there's this concept there's books that get canceled then there's books that get banned. The left and the right both love to cancel books cancel ideas because if we loved ideas if we became more intelligent and grew we wouldn't need the two political parties in the United States. We could transcend politics all together but what you're talking about Bradley Cooper and Mark Twain and I think that the adventures of Huckleberry Finn are is excuse me is Mark Twain's best book. That's my opinion I've read a couple and I said this a couple weeks ago because we were just or a couple days ago in another video ranking classical novels go check out that one if you're interested. That Mark Twain is a great thing to read while you're on holiday. While you're on vacation maybe you're gonna go visit your parents or you still attend Christmas break or you know go on a beach vacation. He's a it's a really light fun easy read but it's also substantial it's also historical. It's something that I would recommend everybody try. Like I said I got told that by one of my professors hey you should go read some Mark Twain on your Christmas break. He's the best person to read during Christmas break and I was like yeah yeah yeah but I did and it was actually really good and I saw why I should do that. So next on the list is and look at these Google ads radicalreads.com Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov. Nabokov's writing is brilliant especially considering that English was his third language and I absolutely agree look David Bowie. I 100% agree that Lolita by Nabokov is a very very good book especially in terms of like the classic novels. I just two days ago rewatched the 1962 version with my partner because she had never seen it before or has never read the book before and I was like oh you got to see this real fast and I was like do you want to read the book? She's like oh not right now so I was like okay let's watch the old one. I wanted to I'm on a Stanley Kubrick Kipk and I've never actually seen the old one. I've read the book but I never saw the movie and I watched the movie and you know that one's a little bit weird. It's a lot different than the book but Lolita once again an author with a book with a bad reputation but has imagination and craft to the novel to the text has dares to move beyond what we normally our normal societal conventions and yes it is stu pedophilia really weird he's banging a 12 year old that's insane that's not right in any context in any way and what's really crazy this is a random fact the age of a consent in the Philippines is 12 years old that's absolutely ridiculous I was told that by one of my students who was from the Philippines and said you know she was telling a story about her cousin or something getting pregnant at 12 I was like is that legal who by another boy she's like no by an adult man by a guy and who actually anyway but Lolita and it's relation to pedophilia very weird shouldn't be glorified but needs to be understood and explored to then be vilified to then understand what the hell is going wrong and the mental hues and issues and problems that we have we need to understand this we need to understand this so that we can mitigate it and not just understand it by glorifying it but these things cannot be shunned I know so many people like for instance I know so many guys who never go deeper into their sex life because it thinks that makes them emasculated and makes them feel makes them weird to talk about that with their partner but it's like no everyone will be happier everyone will feel heard and satisfied if you just talk about it's not you it's this is about them and I feel like that's what's pedophilia and a lot of these things that we try to shun away from our thought and from our society to actually get rid of it we need to talk about it more we need to say there's people out there like this and we need to get rid of them we need to find them and help them get over this not help yeah next is geek a novel by Catherine Dunne there's a fantastical nature to this family yet you can really relate to all the richly drawn characters and I read this book about 10 years ago and I would agree I read this because it was recommended by Kurt Cobain and I don't think that this makes my top 1000 list I would say steer clear of geek love a novel I would say that this doesn't you know I'm 22-2300 books read in the last you know 13 years and this is not even cut into the top 1500 so what's just nothing really to say about geek love next we have Revolutionary Road by Richard Yates and I want I've never really seen suburbia portrayed in such a way that was so riveting he really captured it and yes Revolutionary Road is one of the best books out there on that on suburban life on this weird deluded modernist life it's almost comparable when I read it made me almost feel like Blue Velvet by David Lynch did I had a buddy who I just gave it that book to when he finished it in one day it's pretty big book too it's four 500 pages and he finished it in one day started like at three or four p.m. too and went to like two or three in the morning because he it's one of those books man that really makes you feel like I'm sure right now you're probably not out in the country maybe you are but you're probably hearing this in a little box in a neighborhood like I'm here like I'm you know like I am and you were maybe you were probably raised in a suburban environment and it subverts you in a weird way there are so many weird issues and repression for things that get repressed in the suburban life most of the time so 100 recommend Revolutionary Road that probably makes my top 25 novelist for sure next and this is my favorite novel probably my favorite book of all time Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy and just look at the list Bruce Springsteen casual you should guru and Stephen King also recommended and this these aren't these are just a couple authors if you think about it like casually you should grew and Stephen King agree on something and those are two geniuses from different fields of literature then it's like okay something's something's happening here I mean I can also add to that list Harold Bloom David Foster Wallace a couple other people are slipping my mind some of the greatest authors and thinkers of our generation view blood meridian is one of the best books of all time and if you haven't read it you need to read it we're going to have a Cormac McCarthy course soon on this channel go check that out go check out my website eanjamescanac.com link down in the description below but blood meridian is a western gothic biblical postmodern mayhem book written I think in 1985 so it's still modern by Cormac McCarthy who I think is the greatest living author right now maybe one of the greatest authors of all time because he is from the old world he did not touch let technology touch him he spent tens of thousands of hours writing in poverty not having toothpaste not having food having his wife leave him with their child because they were living in such impoverished conditions so he could keep writing he connected with nature he understands God and spirituality and he is talented that is all that you can ask for and if you are in tune with nature and life and spirituality you have to read Cormac McCarthy because you will have your mind blown the symbolism is so deep go check out my video greatest living author on this channel if you want to hear me go a little bit more about Cormac McCarthy and like I said about to have a course dropping so and he says you can pick any book by Cormac McCarthy really but all the characters the judge in particular are just incredible and I agree that I can't wait for this film to be adapted one day it's going to be and it's probably going to fail but the writing in this it's third person on nipotent you never see third person on nipotent get used very often and he does it in the most King James Bible biblical way he is in the lineage of King James Bible to Melville to Hemingway to Faulkner then to Heming to McCarthy that's kind of the lineage that he's in the literature lineage and I think that's one of the strongest lineages ever in terms of especially if you like American you know American American writing it is like almost like if you follow the French lineage of Proust it it's following that it's that level of strength so Cormac McCarthy everybody another great novel is the unbearable lightness of being by Milan Kundra the idea of playing with the structure of a traditional novel and the characters he creates and the author's voice in them was really eye-opening and I agree this is one of the most this is a very experimental beautiful novel that I think it's an intermediate novel that most people can get blood meridian some people are going to fall off some people aren't going to understand it but the unbearable lightness of being is a novel that a lot of people can pick up a lot of younger people can pick up people that don't read very often it's actually one of those transfer transformational books that can really help you and yeah one of my favorites you know like I said probably makes the top 25 maybe the top 50 laid out this is such a wild pick right here such a wild pick I can't believe he did this I when I saw this I was like oh my god I have to do this do you know who and and and Scott Momaday is probably not I think he's the first Pulitzer Prize winner native Native American author I think he's the only one still who's won a Pulitzer Prize or a National Book Award I can't remember which one right now for House of Dawn it's just which is like kind of a really post-modern weird Native American book it's disconnected timelines of murder and really really kind of wonky but and Scott Momaday is also a painter you know an artist he's a poet and this is kind of a non-fiction work and it's about the blanking on the tribe right now you know it's not probably very good to me but a certain tribe got kicked out of Oklahoma and had to or a certain state had to walk thousands of miles and this is kind of a depiction of the journey and among other things and it's called the Way to Rainy Mountain and it is absolutely a so it's the Kiowa tribe and they started in Montana and they had to they got they got in some battles and eventually surrendered and they marched you know walked to Oklahoma which oh my god you know that's absolutely ridiculous there's no one that's absolutely travesty and you know I'm not sure if you've ever been to Oklahoma like I haven't something polar opposite world and it's a mix of memoir folklore among other things and poetry and Bradley says nscott momaday is a poet and there's a musicality to the poetry that's great and like I'm just so surprised about this pic I've never heard anyone talk about this I've taken yeah I've even taken multiple Native American lit classes probably five Native American lit classes graduate undergrad and we never I mean we've talked about nscott momaday he's like an og in the game in the field but like no we never read this book it's not like one of the it's not like really on the top 25 or even top 50 books like most of the time for like Native American lit maybe it is but you know it's a really wild book and I would recommend people reading it it's a little it can feel a little bit dragging but once you understand the context and what's happening and what's been lost and what how it's screwed over like the situation is it's like oh my god and nscott momaday he's a great autobiography he he isn't bitter about it either and like obviously you can't be bitter like shit be bitter be bitter about all of it but he really comes from a place of like we're trying to restore it from what I felt like trying to you know just create a memory and make sure that it's still is it's carried on so I think I think that is really really cool next we have another Native American book it's The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fist Fight in Heaven by Sherman by Sherman Alexi and an amazing series of short stories that really allowed you to relate to these Native American characters and Sherman Alexi's canceled now he's he apparently sexually abused some people or maybe not abused but he manipulated his power in certain positions uh have sex with people maybe and you can I guess argue if that was consensual or not for instance helping people get certain positions at colleges through his power through having sex with them or their relations I think that mean that's obviously not right but you know it might be a little bit murkier than that go read up on it and before all that happened you know I'm a little bit iffy obviously if you've heard my channel before on cancel culture and you know I believe innocent until proven guilty but before he got canceled my Native American lit professor one of them who's like really in the scene like publishes books and knows everybody and's been been part of it for 30 years he said that Sherman Alexi was an absolute dick that he had dealt with them multiple times and everyone knew in the community that he was just an absolute a-hole and a jerk at his tribe Sherman Alexi came to his tribe when he was a student and spoke and he came back from college to see him speak and he said that after he was done speaking he was gave a very vulgar presentation very weird wasn't even like fiction reading gave like a almost like a non-fiction presentation on some Native American related issue and some elders in the tribe like literally the elders of the tribe tried asking him some questions and he got mad at them not just like mad at them but like chastise them and like was yeah just being mean to them but so like when I heard all the sexual assault stuff and I heard all those stories and I got told multiple stories of the same kind of on the same kind of grain I was like oh shit like this kind of seems like one and when there's smoke there's fire right when someone's acting like this especially in like an environment when they're getting paid and they can obviously just be nice and like answer questions and it's like a family it was a family event like there were families there you don't need to you know be as vulgar or crazy you know then it's like okay this is the type of person that would maybe be taking advantage of people for sex because that happens all the time it's very common you know obviously tangent here but it's very common like people do it all the time at jobs and stuff every job I've worked at the manager is you know taking advantage of their power and you know banging most of the time female associates and in exchange for you know different different things you know sometimes it's consensual but it never feels like that but Sherman Alexi is a hell of a writer you know it's kind of one of these situations like what do we do with Sherman Alexi he's over these these this collection of source stories is really good I've read five or six Sherman Alexi books and he's one of the best Native American writers and a lot of people don't teach them anymore and avoid talking about him but a really good author so what do we do what do we do leave a comment down below what do we do with people like this just ignore them forever just read the books from the past and not publish or read anything that's new what do you do when these things are out there what do you do with the talent from a person that's crazy do we like I said do we ignore do we ignore it or can we separate art and you know these types of actions or this type of attitude even minus all the sexual assault allegations just him being a jerk to everyone it's hard it's a hard question who do we give you know because there's only much in the reading it's not like this is the video game we're older like pick talk there's only so much money to go around in the book publishers power anymore so next we have so I thought that was an interesting pick I mean just because of like those things I would never like I said just because of him being a jerk like I said this is all Google you can Google all this like and I'm always surprised by people and this is that when like I said when there's smoke there's fire when people are being weird when people have bad idiosyncrasies like money too much like power too much like the spotlight too much it seems like a narcissist all a lot of other a host of other issues are going to come it might be sexual assault stuff it might be identity theft and it's like what what are we doing in this community we need to be protecting these people we need to have shunt him before and say be gone be a recluse writer we're not going to bring you to events anymore or do any of this be gone so that you know so they don't have that power to be the head of a creative writing program and be able to get people in what do you think a jerk like that's going to do he's going to find that and exploit the the 22 23 24 year old women who want to get into that program because they meet him you know it's like I think it was like a native american program for native american indigenous authors and of course he's going to meet them because he's on the speaking circuit and make friends with them and you know it's just it's a weird exchange the giving tree by shell civil she just the sadness the other sadness of their simplistic relationship really struck me as a young kid I would agree this is kind of an underrated book I think but the giving tree is a really good book man eco friendly I mean not it's kind of sad but an eco friendly book that a lot of us have lost that connection once again in these very sad and last is the fountain head the fountain head by and so I know there's a lot of hate for anran out there in the chat and I get it because if you're stuck in the hegelian dialectic and if you're a liberal you're going to hate anran and you should just as if you're a conservative you should hate you know some one of the many authors on the left but once you have escaped the dialect once you read enough and think enough and feel enough to escape it I can see where anran's coming from a lot of her points are really good the fountain head for instance atlas shrug anthem they're actually really good books some of her philosophy books have some decent points in them you have to move to the extremes of society just like how a lot of extreme post-modernist authors who are very much to the left of the center of you know most of them who where most of America sits have a lot of good ideas and if you think have a bad opinion of anran that just means that you've been duped that means that you were on the one side of a political island and you got duped and you need to do the work and read authors like this on that's what I always wonder especially this that like anran if you don't like anran how many books of anran have you read if you don't like anran or have you just heard what you've heard about anran because there's a bunch of anran trolls out there on the right that just spew her all the time I asked the same thing to everyone I know if you want to talk about the economy have you read books on the left and the right on anything they're both sides are so skewed especially on the left now and the right's becoming the same way because you have to read things from both sides especially if there is a dialect if you want to understand the human experience if you want to find the best answers usually they're at maybe not in the extremes but a little bit away from the extremes but pretty far away from the center you want to find the art and the love there's so much on each side and people demonize and separate over this but if you got rid of all the political labels and everything everyone's basically the same and has similar ideas and even a political author like anran in the fountainhead which is really about innovation and killing creativity and she's not wrong I work in the public's you know I'm a teacher in a public school I have seen innovation just getting killed every single day participation trophies uh the dumbing down of the classroom the can't the catering and pandering to students and weaklings it's absolutely ridiculous that there are strong kids that need strong teachers and strong classmates and strong thinking and skills but they can't have that because someone might feel bad if they get left behind or they don't know what you're talking about you can't speak you have to speak to the dumbest person in the room and most of the time they're really dumb and they shouldn't be in the class in the first place so then it just turns into an absolute mess where the strong can't grow and the weak can't grow either and it's okay to be weak I was once weak but you know I don't want to take a very Nietzschean view here but anran has a point that innovation is important that it requires at some level I don't really like the idea of competition but it requires a burning desire and obsession and that can't be that is getting killed now and that's one of the things that's one of the critiques that you can get from the right that I think is true it's almost always been true it's communism did you have to have that if you want to create a utopia with the capital you you have to understand that you have to be able to take the ideas from the left you know like I said every time I bag every time I bag on one side of this channel go to the other side on the right they absolutely suck at progressive thinking they're you know a lot of people on the right are absolutely closed-minded have no progressive thought at all in their bones and they are rigid and it's ridiculous because we can't move forward they'll always will be there blocking the way of progress saying oh and same thing they're blocking the way of actual emotional or spiritual progress to continue their social fabric their value system that is outdated and outdated modality in 2022 that's actually based in control even though they act like it's based in freedom so you know both sides absolutely suck and that's how we are going to end the video today about Bradley Cooper's favorite books I think that this was a very good list and if you guys would like to see David Lynch's favorite book list go check it out right here