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The Bone
People: A Novel
Keri Hulme, 1983
"Fiction. Set in New Zealand. Brilliant first novel--Maori
aspects, psychological, mystical, introspective, violent, exciting,
humane."
J.D. Jackson, Physics
Bury My
Heart at Wounded Knee
Dee Alexander Brown, 1970
"This book examines in detail one of the last great battles of the
wars between the whites and Native American--the battle at Wounded Knee.
When the book first appeared, it was shocking and horrifying as it exposed
the 'heart of darkness' of the government's treatment of Indians. It remains
shocking and horrifying today."
Steve Tollefson, Subject A
The Call
of the Wild
Jack London, 1903
"The strength of 'Buck' will give any incoming freshman courage to face
student days at Berkeley."
Marian C. Diamond, Physiology-Anatomy
Clear Light
of Day
Anita Desai, 1980
"A wonderful written novel about an Indian family in New Delhi (contemporary).
A fine example of the use of literacy fiction as a window into how
people of other countries live; the meaning of home to them; daily life
in a complex society. Excellent preparation for architectural
studies."
Raymond Lifchez, Architecture
The Death
of Woman Wang
Jonathan Spence, 1978
"History from the macro- and the micro-perspectives; takes an obscure
set of events in an obscure corner of China and makes them riveting."
David Kirp, Public Policy
Deep Blues
Robert Palmer, 1981
"Few have written with greater clarity and understanding on the origins
and evolution of the Mississippi Delta Blues. It is a book
about music and American history."
Leon F. Litwack, History
Dispatches
Michael Herr, 1977
"This is a personal and hallucinatory account on the Vietnam war as seen
by the American soldiers who fought it. To tell the truth about a new
(and horrible) kind of reality, Herr created a new (and captivating);
kind of prose. Beautiful, gripping, convincing."
David Littlejohn, Journalism
The Existential
Pleasures of Engineering
Samuel C. Florman, 1976
"A discussion of the pleasure of creating outstanding structures."
C.A. Desoer, Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences
The Exploration
of the Colorado River and its Canyons
John Wesley Powell, 1875
"John Wesley Powell's expedition through the last great unwrapped and unknown
part of the Continental U.S. in 1869."
J. K. Mitchell, Civil Engineering
The Genealogy
of Morals
Fredrich Nietzsche, 1887
”A book that turned the world upside down for me when I was a freshman,
deeply disturbing and exhilarating."
Stephen Greenblarr, English
A History
of Architecture: Settings and Rituals
Spiro Kostof, 1985
"Terrific book not just of the historical information, but on how social
and political context influences building."
Sam Davis, Architecture
How to
Lie with Statistics
Darrell Huff, 1954
"Fun book on elementary statistics."
Steve Selvin, Biomedical and Environmental Health Sciences (Biostatistics)
The Human
Condition
Hannah Arendt, 1958
"Basic reading in political and social science of Western Europe, Rome
to modern age."
Anne Middleton, English
Invisible
Man
Ralph Ellison, 1952
"This novel captures in all of its terror, tension, and beauty the Afro-American odyssey--the
paradox of black life in America, the racial rites of passage, the mechanisms
of white supremacy."
Leon F. Litwack, History
The Life
of Plants
E.J.H. Corner, 1964
"A beautifully written general essay on the biology of plants. Some
B.S.--but very stimulating."
Donald R. Kaplan, Botany
Magister
Ludi (The Glass Bead Game)
Herman Hesse, 1943
"Inspirational. So are a number of other Hesse books, e.g. Siddhartha."
Manuel Blum, Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences.
Modern
Time: The World From the Twenties to the Eighties
Paul Johnson, 1983
"A provocative, at times appalling history of the twentieth century from
a committed moral point of view."
Frederick Crew, English
Mr. Tompkins
in Paperback
George Gamow, 1967
"Short scientifically fantastic stories (not science fiction) explaining
modern physics ideas by exaggerating actually exiting phenomena in
relativity, curved space, quantum physics, etc."
Sumner Davis, Physics
The Naturalist
in Nicaragua
Thomas Belt, 1911
"Praised by Charles Darwin as the best natural history book he had ever
read."
Herbert G. Baker, Botany
One Hundred
Years of Solitude
Gabriel Garcia-Marquez, 1970
"If you're going to write fiction, why not go all the way and invent a
totally new world? This book made almost all other novels since Faulkner's
seem trivial and under-imagined: It's unforgettable. (Rivals: Jorge-Luis
Borges, Italo Calvino.)"
David Littlejohn, Journalism
Patterns
of Intention: On the Historical Explanation of Pictures
Michael Baxandall, 1985
"Bazandall's book is the best methodological investigation yet written,
I think, of the ways which works of art can validly be related to
outside circumstance. After a general introduction ("Language and
Explanation") he devotes four
chapters to test cases, which exemplify his arguments about right and
wrong ways to write about works of art."
James Cahill, Art History
Simple
Justice: The History of Brown v. Board of Education and Black American's
Struggle for Equality.
Richard Kluger, 1975
"A study of the evolution of Brown v. Board of Education and how the Supreme Court
declared racial segregation in the the public schools unconstitutional."
William Muir, Political Science
Snow Country
Yasunari Kawabata, 1956
"Kawabata, who won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1968, opens up a
whole new world, especially for readers steeped in western traditions.
The writing is different, even in translation; it's precise, languid,
almost hypnotic. And the story itself reveals much about Japanese character
and attitudes, not in the technological-Pacific Rim-business context that
most Americans have become accustomed to, but in a way that is quite personal."
Steve Tollefson, Subject A
The White
Nile
Alan Moorehead, 1960
"The exploration of central Africa in the nineteenth century. A
book I literally could not put down."
Donald Hanson, Chemical Engineering
The World
Rushed In: The California Gold Rush Experience
J.S. Holliday, 1981
"This book opened my eyes to the settlement of California by the forty-niners
in a manner not provided by any other book I have read on this mass
migration. It is essential reading for anyone interested in
California history."
W.M. Laetsch, Botany
The
Zero-Sum Solution
Lester Thurow, 1985
"A book that focuses on the U.S. and Japanese economies in ways that are provocative
and accessible to a popular audience. Addresses themes that should be
important to many undergraduates."
Laura Tyson, Economics
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