Readings
A bunch of reading recommendations from yours truly.
Must Read
- Bhagavad Gita: Just read a version. Any version, don't think about reading the commentaries of Sankaracharya/Ramanujar, just read the literal translation at face value. And keep re-reading till things start coming together.
- Upanisads: Just pick any version and start reading. Does not matter which Vedanta subschool - the first version you see will most likely by an Advaita commentary. While parts of Sarvapalli Radhakrishnan's books are good, will caution readers to be extremely vigilant, as our former president comes off as a Western pov and brings in un-needed and un-called for non-Dharmic elements, symbols, language, literature references from Europe.
Academic papers/authors
- Absolutely anything by Leslie Lamport.
- The 1989, "Knowledge complexity of interactive proof systems". My nomination for the best paper of all time.
Edit: have now discovered that this paper won the first ever Godel prize.
- Intelligence without Representation, Rodney Brooks
- On the Origins of Money, Karl Menger, 1892
- Every paper with atleast 2 of these authors: Goldwasser, Micali, Rivest, Shamir. Can't really recommend any because they all are completely awesome.
Fantasy/Sci-Fi/Fiction
Check out my Book of the Year contest and my goodreads profile.
- Every single book by Brandon Sanderson. The "Christopher Nolan" of Fantasy. Start with Elantris or the Mistborn series.
- Every single book by Patricia McKillip. The "Picasso" of Fantasy. Start with "The Forgotten Beasts of Eld" or the Riddle-Master trilogy.
- Lois Bujold McMaster. Esp, the Curse of Chalion and all of the Vorkosigan Sci-Fi.
- Codex Alera, by Jim Butcher.
- Some other favorite writers in no particular order: Mervyn Peake, Jane Austen, James Islington, JRR Tolkien
Recommended Non-Fiction
- Anything by Nassim Nicholas Taleb. Lookup the Incerto series.
- Each and every essay by David Foster Wallace. Start with "Consider the Lobster" if you are unsure.
- "Meditations" by Marcus Aurelius.
- Young India magazine scans from the 1920 onwards edited by Gandhiji
- Other authors I can recommend (no particular order): Rajeev Malhotra
Indian Online
Researchers/Tech blogs
Long form readings online
Some recommended long form readings. More like a bookmark page for myself.
Long Term To-Read aspirations
Collection of authors/works that I need to work on in no particular order. The common theme among these is that these are either classical works that form a part of Sanatana Dharma or are penned by people who are related or a part of the Dharmic traditions.
The common challenge here is one of language barrier or my own limited language skills.
Classical:
- Brahma Sutras: Extremely involved, have not managed to find a simple enough summary/translation.
- Tulsidas Ramcharithmanas: Started this one, the going is slow due to my own weak Hindi skills
- Works of Kalidasa
Adjacent: I have no idea of the kind/quality of content here, just a curiousity, for all these people seem like they are heavily vested in the traditions of the Vedas.
- Krishnaraja Wodeyar III (Mummadi): Father of Nalvadi, cultural heavyweight, has apparently contributed over 50 works in Kannda and Sanskrit
- KM Munshi: Freedom fighter and founder of Bharatiya Vidhya Bhavan. Has a bunch of works in Gujarati, Hindi and English.
- DV Gundappa: Journalist and Kannada writer. The only link I have for now.
- Krishnadevaraya: Apart from the all the poets that he supported and nurtured (which I need to document below), the King himself has composed a Telugu version of Andal's story - Amuktamalyada
- Unexplored: Pandurang Vaman Kane, Mysore Hiriyanna, Jadunath Sarkar, Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyaya, Parashuram Krishna Gode, Ramesh Chandra Majumdar, Ananda Coomaraswamy, Shama Shastri, Devudu Narasimha Sastry, Ganganath Jha, Govind Chandra Pande, S. Srikanta Sastri, Moti Chandra, Acharya Chatursen Sastri, Radha Kumud Mukherji, Kashi Prasad Jayaswal