We have let 'the guardians', and their descendents run things for WAAAY too long.
My list.
Recently
3 books by J. Ralston Saul, One is a sort of sceptics dictionary, deliciously cruel about managerialism, and market theory.
discovering Bierce in all his cruel insight, and rediscovering Mencken
Early on,
the bible, esp. the New Testament,
The Book of Common Prayer
Ovid, everything I could.
Virgil - ditto.
Rabelais
Hardy
George Eliot.
Henry Lawson.
Judith Wright.
TS Eliot,
Tolstoy,
Dickens,
Shakepeare's (fully workshopped!) plays.
Dr Johnson and Boswell,
plus Pepys,
John Aubrey, now he's a riot. Actor Roy Dottrice did a one-man show of him in old-age, I wonder if the Beeb ever recorded it?
Diary Of a Nobody.
Thurber, anything.
Milligan, everything
Das Kapital - K. Marx.
Bertrand Russell, everyone on OUTSIDE should read his short dissection / essay of being a POLITICAL person, esp. party political. thanks to him also for "undecideability" and a bunch of good bullshit filters.
And my son's want me to 'get off the net'
Timbo in Oz
The Skyptical Mensurer and Audio Scrounger
Peace