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Ask HN: What book(s) do you wish existed?

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Re: Ask HN: What book(s) do you wish existed?

#35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about existing guides doesn't work for you?

They're religious and expect you to believe in fairies. They also don't justify any of their recommendations.

When you say "religious" you mean as in the Bible?

How about more philosophical approaches, like Stoicism, or Zen Buddhism?

Re: Ask HN: What book(s) do you wish existed?

#36

Not books as such, but great lost works: Fermat's proof of his last theorem. He wrote a letter to a friend that said something like "I have a most elegant proof, but it's too big to fit in the margin." Also the second half of Coleridge's Kubla Khan, lost because of the man from Porlock. Douglas Adams made great play of it in Dirk Gently, IIRC.

"Great Lost Works" is an interesting subcategory. I'd include Aristotle's 2nd book of poetics on comedy, Claudius' Art of playing Dice, Euclid's Book of Fallacies, Philip K. Dick's three lost novels (A Time for George Stavros, Pilgrim on the Hill, and Nicholas and the Higs.), L. Frank Baum's four adult novels (Our Married Life and Johnson, The Mystery of Bonita, and Molly Oodle).
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