Books to Bury Me With: Charlene Elsby

The book I’d want to take with me to the grave:

Heaven and its Wonders and Hell, Emanuel Swedenborg

The first book that hit me like a ton of bricks:

Juliette, Marquis de Sade

The book that’s seen more of my tears, coffee stains, and cigarette burns:

De Interpretatione, Aristotle

The book that shook my world like a goddamn hurricane:

The Longest Summer, Alexandrine Ogundimu

The book I wish I’d discovered when my liver was still intact:

The Fall into Time, Emil Cioran

The book I’d shove into everyone’s hands if I were king of the world:

Metaphysics, Aristotle

The book that nearly drove me to madness:

From an Occult Diary, August Strindberg

The book I can’t keep my hands off of, no matter how many times I’ve read it:

Aesthetic Genesis, Jeff Mitscherling

The book I’d hide in the back of my closet, pretending I’m too highbrow for it:

Dogs That Know When Their Owners are Coming Home, Rupert Sheldrake

The book that left a scar I wish I could forget: Being and Nothingness, Jean-Paul Sartre

The author who made me think, "Now that’s a soul in torment":

BR Yeager

The book I’d get a tattoo of if I had the nerve:

Deliver Me, Elle Nash

The book that made me question everything I thought I knew:

The Phenomenology of Perception, Maurice Merleau-Ponty

The book that’s so damn good I’d never loan it out:

Don’t loan books! They will get wet!

The book that’s been my companion through the darkest nights:

The Short Novels of Dostoevsky 

The book I’d throw in someone’s face during a heated argument:

Massive, John Trefry

The book that reminds me of a lost love or regret:

The Sorrows of Young Werther, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

The book I wish I could have written, but know I never could:

What Are You, Lindsay Lerman

The book that makes me want to drink myself into oblivion:

Xerox Over Manhattan, Shane Jesse Christmass

The book that’s been my refuge from the world’s cruelty:

The Marilyn Encyclopedia, Adam Victor