So in the spirit of the Friday Five, whose questions I answer occasionally, I have a question to ask of my own. I have no idea if anyone really even reads this blog, but if you do, feel free to comment (Briana—I am talking to you). I want to know what movie or book most influnenced you as a teenager. For me, and I am embarassed to admit this, it was probably reading the Fountainhead when I was fourteen. I read a great deal as a kid, lots of the classics—-Dickens, Steinbeck, Austen, etc. But I had never really tackled much in the way of a philosophical novel. I realize I am leaving myself open here to attacks and ridicule. I know Ayn Rand is a complete freak show, but I still like her fiction. The Fountainhead was one of the first books to make me think about the struggle of being an individual and human corruption. Heavy stuff when you are thirteen. I am sure there are plenty of other books that influenced me, but this is a book that I actually remember reading for the first time.
Bookdwarf
Come fall into a book hole!
Bookdwarf 
Ugh. I think the embarrassing ones would be lots of trashy sci-fi. Then 100 Years of Solitude (i.e. the “pretentious phase”) and following that, “Existentialism and Human Emotions” (i.e. “the really pretentious phase.”)
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Hm…most influentual book. It wasn’t a single book but for a long time, I read every book I could get my hands on that had to do with King Arthur. Yes, I said it. King Arthur and all his bloody knights. I can’t really explain it. I just really liked King Arthur. Oh, and fairy tales of the Grimm’s Bros. variety.
I left all my nerdy reading at school.
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Catcher in the Rye. Total cliche. Nothing original. Move along, folks.
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Definitely _The Hobbit_. I had it read to me for the first time when I was about four, and three decades or so on, I still read it about once a year.
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When I was 14, my sister gave me “Breakfast of Champions” for Christmas. It was Vonnegut saying that it’s OK to pay attention to the man behind the curtain, that in fact it’s critical. He also made it look so easy. I said, essentially, “shit, I could be a writer.”
Turns out, of course, that it’s a lot harder than Vonnegut made it look. But I keep trying. And to this day I occasionally notice an echo of Vonnegut in my voice.
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Ok, a little late to this party, but let’s talk Judy Blume. What can be more formative than trashy, controversial junior chick lit? Look at the rest of you, reading smart people books. Give me Blubber any day! Oh, and I also loved Lois Lowry’s Anastasia books as a pre-teen, I think that subconsciously made me move to Boston.
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The biggest influence of all was Rocky Horror Picture Show which I saw over 100 times in approx. 1983-84, often dressed as Frank N. Furter. Like Michael said, nothing to see here people, just move along. For books A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. It probably would have been A Catcher in the Rye if I had read it then.
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