Hiya,
So, I am planning a two week solo trip in July. Things are coming together just fine but I am trying to figure out what book to take. Right now my options are:

The Kalevala
The Iliad
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintence
The Silmarillion

As you can deduce, I am leaning towards bringing an epic style book. On all my trips, I have found that reading sci-fi or something completely opposite of my surroundings is great enjoyment. Would something like The Brothers Karamazov work? Any recommendations? What has been your most memorable book to bring on a trip?

Perhaps it was not the book as much as the location. But, Sigurd Olson's Singing Wilderness in a hammock strung between two hemlocks reaching over a stretch of sand beach like two palm trees in Hawaii while "marooned" on Alice Lake on a forced layover / wind day. Heaven!!

Two weeks...you lucky man!!

Dude, you have a bad arse brain! Your brain is the cerebral equivalent of a Chinook, horsed for heavy lifting. "The Silmarillion" is impenetrable, whereas "The Brothers Karamazov" is a thicket. If you're going to read the latter, strike off into the bush, read a line, take a step, and so on. Of the five, I'd go with "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintence," but if you want epic, why not go with trashy epic and read "East of Eden" or "Thorn Birds" or clever epic like "Ragtime"? If you go epic lite, you'll whoosh through it, so take more than one.

I think a solo trip would be the perfect time to read "The Silmarillion." I needed a time with no interruptions to read that one. But, I also like to read about the BW while there. One of my favorites, "Boundary Waters, The Grace of the Wild" by Paul Gruchow. Not sure how available it is at present.

I'm not a big sci-fi fan, so out of the ones listed I'd take The Iliad or Zen and The Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. It's been a while (30 years) since I read it, but I remember enjoying it then.

I tend toward reading things related to that environment or things that are short but thought-provoking such as essays and poems.

Along those lines would be something like one of the books about the Hubbard-Wallace expeditions to Labrador, A Death on the Barrens, or maybe one of Barry Lopez's, such as Arctic Dreams or Of Wolves and Men. Or something along the lines of John Muir, Aldo Leopold, Sigurd Olson, etc.

Lots of good books to take. You could go with the original epic - Cervantes' Don Quixote. Or in another mode - The Lord of the Rings.

And on, and on, and on...

Zen And The Art... is one I enjoyed many years ago. One I really liked on a solo in 2001 was "Blue Highways" by William Least Heat Moon.

Blue Highways

It's about a man with very little means deciding to take a solo trip in a worn van outfitted for sleeping, circumnavigating America using only 2 lane roads. Something that I'd love to do someday.

East of Eden is amazing and relatively 'epic' yet small at the same time.
I'd second Don Quixote.
I know my brother really enjoyed the Brothers Karamazov, and he's got pretty good taste for literature. So maybe give that a try.

If you want dense, read the book that tens of millions bought, tens read, and 2.3 understood, "A Brief History of Time," by Stephen Hawking.

Or if you want epic on steroids, Red Bull, and Viagra, read Robert Jordan's series of the Dragon reborn.

Excellent ideas everyone!

Exo - I am very familiar with The Singing Wilderness. In fact, for almost every trip I go on, I bring photocopies of chapters that are near and dear to me. Particularly I like "No Place Between" and "Silence."

Missmolly- Ha! My brain has never been compaired to a Chinook salmon before, but I really enjoy that metaphor a lot. I like the suggestion of East of Eden though. And I know what you mean on "A Brief History of Time." I read it but ya, lots of the ideas flew past my comprehension. And the Wheel of Time series, ha, ha, got through book eight and then just got bored with it. Now that it is wrapping up, I might have to reread them again.

Eagle93 - I have tried reading The Silmarillion three times before and I agree, a place where I can concentrate on the book is needed, that is why I am thinking of bringing it. And I have read that book by Paul Gruchow. Beautiful book and a somewhat sad book for me because Paul and my dad where really close friends.

Boonie - Don Quixote, great suggestion. Been wanting to read that one for a long time.

TomT- Blue Highway, yes! I came across that book a year or two ago and totally forgot about it, but I remember wanting to read it. Thanks for reminding me.

BRic - Thanks much, good to know.

For some reason, I enjoy reading any of Sigurd Olson's books when I'm solo.

a dictionary? :)

I was thinking Chinook chopper, which is used for heavy lifting, but the King has horses under its hood too.

I went to Amazon and lots of readers disliked 8 and 9, but now that Jordan's gone, the ending books are garnering good reviews.

38 Nooses. About the Dakota (Minnesota's Civil War) uprising in 1862. Fascinating!

OMG, I forgot "The Denial of Death."

Kanoes - have you looked up the term smartass in the dictionary? It just shows a picture....of you. :)

OBX2Kayak - they are good. Maybe I'll throw "The Lonely Land" onto the pile of considerations.

Missmolly - Ah yes, a chopper. That makes sense. And yes, it sounds like the books are doing something again now that they are wrapping it all up. And I'll look into Denial of Death, thanks!

French19 - Thanks for the recommendation. I stayed at Lake Shetek State Park last summer and got a small education on the history of the fighting that occurred there during that uprising. Very intreaging and heartbreaking.

Enjoy your trip. We need a trip report with pic's (plus book revues.)

Ahh "No Place Between.". For me, it's, "Wilderness Music."

The Silmarillion is a tough one. I have tried it multiple times without success.

Have you thought of reading the journals of Lewis & Clark? It's a darn good read and always puts me in a good frame of mind when tripping.

Similarly, though he's a bit out of vogue, Stephen Ambrose has a couple that I like - Undaunted Courage (Lewis & Clark), and Crazy Horse & Custer: Parallel lives of two American warriors.

I thought about Lewis and Clark, too.

And don't forget - there's also War and Peace ;).

quote bfurlow: Similarly, though he's a bit out of vogue, Stephens Ambrose has a couple that I like - Undaunted Courage (Lewis & Clark), and Crazy Horse & Custer: Parallel lives of two American warriors.

"

Undaunted Courage is excellent! Also, my favorite western fiction author Ivan Doig has some really good ones. "This House of Sky" and also "The Sea Runners".

quote bfurlow: "The Silmarillion is a tough one. I have tried it multiple times without success.


Have you thought of reading the journals of Lewis & Clark? It's a darn good read and always puts me in a good frame of mind when tripping.


Similarly, though he's a bit out of vogue, Stephens Ambrose has a couple that I like - Undaunted Courage (Lewis & Clark), and Crazy Horse & Custer: Parallel lives of two American warriors.


"

I second Ambrose and especially like "Citizen Soldier," plus there's Richard Feynman's books. He's a physicist who tells a good yarn.

bfurlow - I have read Undaunted Courage and it was an amazing read. I sticky noted spots on the Missouri I want to canoe now because of that book. After I finished it my mom gave me the Lewis and Clark journal book she had and I still have to read it. Thanks for the suggestion.

Boonie - Ya, talk about a big book with a huge title.

TomT- thanks for the suggestions. I'll look him up.

missmolly- I have come across a couple of his quotes and really enjoyed them. Thanks much!

quote Minnesotian: "
bfurlow - I have read Undaunted Courage and it was an amazing read. I sticky noted spots on the Missouri I want to canoe now because of that book. After I finished it my mom gave me the Lewis and Clark journal book she had and I still have to read it. Thanks for the suggestion.
"

There were a lot of places that I wanted to see after reading it as well. Unfortunately, most of them had a footnote saying XYZ is no longer visible because of such & such dam.
Fortunately, I was able to re-trace parts of their route way back when on a two week solo road trip across the western U.S.

If you liked that one, you should also check out the one he has about the railroad. I'm pretty sure that's the one they nailed him for plagiarism on, but still a really good book.

Some Bill Bryson. I liked both A Short History of Nearly Everything and A Walk in the Woods...

"something completely opposite of my surroundings" to me equals southern novels. something chewy like faulkner's 'as i lay dying'(mississippi) might keep you busy for a long time, hint, bring the cliff notes, otherwise this is unintelligible. lighter(?) fare could be Erskine Caldwell's 'tobacco road'(georgia) or any of the anne rice new orleans based novels.

reading sig olson in the bwca seems redundant. sometimes or mostly i like to read voyageur history stuff. i like the connection with the past.

I love fantasy & scifi, but Silmarillion was one of the few books I couldn't get through.

Some of my favorite epics:

SciFi:
Hyperion - Dan Simmons. An excellent trilogy, but the first book is the best.

Enders Game - a classic, but short. Second book in the series is pretty good and then the quality drops way off(IMO).

Fantasy:

The Way of Kings - Brandon Sanderson. He is good with worldbuilding and magic systems.

The Name of the Wind - Patrick Rothfuss. Skews a little younger, but has some really great prose in it.

A Song of Ice & Fire - George RR Martin.

For some strange reason, I enjoy reading travel books when I travel. It's like being on two trips at once:

Bill Bryson (A Walk in the Woods, In a Sunburned Country, and many others). Bill writes great stories about walking the Appalachian Trail, and touring Australia, the US, Africa, England, and other faraway places.

Ann Vanderhoof (An Embarassment of Mangoes). This book describes her two-year adventure in which she and her husband sell their home in Canada, buy a boat, and sail to the Carribean and back.

J Maarten Troost (Lost on Planet China, The Sex Lives of Cannibals, and others). Troost describes his travels to China and the Equatorial Pacific. Troost has an interesting sense of humor, and an unconventional outlook on life.

And finally, a must-read for any serious canoeist: Canoeing with the Cree, by Eric Severeid. Reknowned journalist's epic tale of his teenage journey in 1930 from Minneapolis to Hudson bay by canoe.

Enjoy!

it's July already maybe your gone.if so let us know what you came up with .i don't take outdoor books,i save those for winter at home.
what i take are history books of some sort.non fiction like "russia against napoleon" at around 550 pages it kept me reading for two weeks.
i took a back up,"princess of mars" and at 160 pages of easy reading to break up the other book.
what i do during the winter is hit some used book stores and look for older thick paper backs with yellow pages and dense type that i know will keep me busy. on another trip i read a good one about Roosevelt and his advisor Harry Hopkins.sounds sort of dry but the detail about how some of the decisions during WW2 were made i found intriguing.
i also subscribe to the London Review Of Books and one or two still in the plastic wrap get wedged into the pack between the sleeping pads.

minnesotan, you mentioned sci-fi how about the Rondeveux with Rama trilogy by the late art clarke and another author whose name escapes at the moment?

Another note/subject, If interested in history how about the late Shelby Foote's 3 volume set on the Civil War? Ken Burn's used these and Mr. Foote for his PBS documentary "The Civil War". Appropriate as July is the 150 aniversary of Gettysburg.

Why are my favorite authors dead.

Of the original choices I'd pick the Kalevala, just since I still want to read that.

One of my problems is that swinging in a hammock out in the woods with too "heavy" of a book quickly ends up being napping instead of reading. Lately I've been reading things related to the outdoors but not quite redundant for the setting, like stories of trips more epic than I'll ever undertake ("The Long Portage" [fiction] or Canoeing With the Cree) or stuff about parks / outdoor policy and promotion ("The Last Child in the Woods").

The suggestion of Bryson's "A Short History of Nearly Everything" is also excellent. If the comical approach to real science appeals to you, Phil Plait's "Death From the Skies!" is amazing.

Saw the thread and got to thinking, so posting some new stuff.

Ok, another one if you're looking for the mind expanding, OMG REALLY?? kind of thing. Brian Greene's The Elegant Universe is a trip. Breaks down some really high concept things (string theory, quantum physics, time/space) into semi understandable info. He hosted a series on Nova a couple years ago that was incredible and I have been a fan since.

Something completely unrelated - I really enjoy Stephen Dobyns The Church of Dead Girls. Creepy mystery without being too gratuitous with violence/sex etc. from what I recall. Good story and interesting literary voice while telling it.

Probably have more as I think on it a bit....or have a couple more beers...

Dharma Bums by Kerouac

Minnesotian has been AWOL since leaving. We want trip report/update!!

Love Dharma Bums.

Hiya.
Made it. :)
Ended up taking The Kalevala and really enjoyed it. Little repetitious, but I was expecting that with the epic poem it was.
Also ended up taking Rag and Bone Shop of the Heart, an anthology of poems collected by Robert Bly, James Hillman, Michael Meade. Some of my most favorite poety is in that book, like this one:


Wilderness
By Carl Sandburg
There is a wolf in me . . . fangs pointed for tearing gashes . . . a red tongue for raw meat . . . and the hot lapping of blood—I keep this wolf because the wilderness gave it to me and the wilderness will not let it go.

There is a fox in me . . . a silver-gray fox . . . I sniff and guess . . . I pick things out of the wind and air . . . I nose in the dark night and take sleepers and eat them and hide the feathers . . . I circle and loop and double-cross.

There is a hog in me . . . a snout and a belly . . . a machinery for eating and grunting . . . a machinery for sleeping satisfied in the sun—I got this too from the wilderness and the wilderness will not let it go.

There is a fish in me . . . I know I came from salt-blue water-gates . . . I scurried with shoals of herring . . . I blew waterspouts with porpoises . . . before land was . . . before the water went down . . . before Noah . . . before the first chapter of Genesis.

There is a baboon in me . . . clambering-clawed . . . dog-faced . . . yawping a galoot’s hunger . . . hairy under the armpits . . . here are the hawk-eyed hankering men . . . here are the blonde and blue-eyed women . . . here they hide curled asleep waiting . . . ready to snarl and kill . . . ready to sing and give milk . . . waiting—I keep the baboon because the wilderness says so.

There is an eagle in me and a mockingbird . . . and the eagle flies among the Rocky Mountains of my dreams and fights among the Sierra crags of what I want . . . and the mockingbird warbles in the early forenoon before the dew is gone, warbles in the underbrush of my Chattanoogas of hope, gushes over the blue Ozark foothills of my wishes—And I got the eagle and the mockingbird from the wilderness.

O, I got a zoo, I got a menagerie, inside my ribs, under my bony head, under my red-valve heart—and I got something else: it is a man-child heart, a woman-child heart: it is a father and mother and lover: it came from God-Knows-Where: it is going to God-Knows-Where—For I am the keeper of the zoo: I say yes and no: I sing and kill and work: I am a pal of the world: I came from the wilderness.

i love maps.