Jonathan Barnbrook’s Book List 10 books and 3 comments
None of these are design books. I don’t read directly about design, but instead look to the philosophies and experiences found in literature to influence my work. To be a good designer, you need to understand human beings, and for me the novel is still the best way to understand how people experience, affect, and are influenced by the world around them.
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Yes, I know you have heard of him and this play to the point of cliché, but Shakespeare is like the Beatles: you think that they can’t possibly be any good because of the kind of person who usually says, “I like The Beatles,” and then you listen—or in this case, read—and you think, “Hey, actually they are really very good.” After years of struggling with Shakespeare, I have just started reading him properly and was helped with a version that had clear English translations next to each piece of text. If you take your time and read both, then the magic, complexity of thought, amazing understanding of human nature, romance, humor, and beautiful use of language will be revealed. I believe that if you don’t know about some of the scenarios or characters in his works then you are missing out on a whole part of English culture that references him. Macbeth is a good place to start reading Shakespeare as it is fairly short and also has a lot of dark motives—always good for holding your attention.
Samuel Beckett puts in words the noise of my existence, the internal monologue that is on repeat inside my soul and that questions why I am here, what I am doing, and whether there is any point to doing it. If it sounds heavy, you would be both right and wrong. It’s full of big questions (as one of the greatest pieces of 20th-century literature should be), but balancing the heavy is simple slapstick silliness and observations on the pettiness of humans. This manages to make the idea of existence—knowing you are alive—even more absurd. See it performed at the theater first, if you can, to understand the meaning of silence. The silences are as important as the words in this play—oceans that last a few seconds but contain centuries of human existence: life, death, and everything.
Comments about Jonathan Barnbrook’s Book List
3 commentsGreat list! I like how you have emphasized the need to understand human nature to be a good designer. A few other books that I suggest are "what makes us tick" by social researcher Hugh Mackay. He's book is very clear and comes from a wealth of observational research. I also suggest Paul Gauguin maker of myth by Belinda Thomson. It's great to understand how place, history and culture affects our consciousness, gauguins life and approach to art shows the importance of questioning norms and his paintings are so rich in defining a space both beautiful and complex."the nature of place" a search for authenticity by avi Friedman also explores spaces, an excellent read of what makes a good space.
A great start point for to get anyone from any discipline to start thinking for themselves. Particularly refreshing comments on Shakespeare - in my view, a writer whose particular depth and beauty can only be experienced in print. In performance, there are just too many other things going on (witness those recent BBC2 adaptations by Richard Eyre).
Interesting approach and choices including world authors. My list would probably very explicitly include works from different countries. I'd find it impossible to assemble my top ten though. Julio Cortazar is a superb storyteller and so are Jose Saramago, JL Borges, Neruda, Cervantes, Rulfo...