Want to know what books B.J. Novak recommends on their reading list? We've researched interviews, social media posts, podcasts, and articles to build a comprehensive list of B.J. Novak's favorite book recommendations of all time.
1
Cartoons, short stories, movie strips, oneliners--humor from all genres fill this overstuffed book. Organized by subject, these hilarious entries feature a veritable who's who of American humor with selections from people such as Woody Allen, Garrison Keillor, Nora Ephron and more. Illustrated. more Cartoons, short stories, movie strips, oneliners--humor from all genres fill this overstuffed book. Organized by subject, these hilarious entries feature a veritable who's who of American humor with selections from people such as Woody Allen, Garrison Keillor, Nora Ephron and more. Illustrated. less See more recommendations for this book...
2
More of Mason Currey's irresistible Daily Rituals, this time exploring the daily obstacles and rituals of women who are artists--painters, composers, sculptors, scientists, filmmakers, and performers. We see how these brilliant minds get to work, the choices they have to make: rebuffing convention, stealing (or secreting away) time from the pull of husbands, wives, children, obligations, in order to create their creations.
From those who are the masters of their craft (Eudora Welty, Lynn Fontanne, Penelope Fitzgerald, Marie Curie) to those who were... more
More of Mason Currey's irresistible Daily Rituals, this time exploring the daily obstacles and rituals of women who are artists--painters, composers, sculptors, scientists, filmmakers, and performers. We see how these brilliant minds get to work, the choices they have to make: rebuffing convention, stealing (or secreting away) time from the pull of husbands, wives, children, obligations, in order to create their creations.
From those who are the masters of their craft (Eudora Welty, Lynn Fontanne, Penelope Fitzgerald, Marie Curie) to those who were recognized in a burst of acclaim (Lorraine Hansberry, Zadie Smith) . . . from Clara Schumann and Shirley Jackson, carving out small amounts of time from family life, to Isadora Duncan and Agnes Martin, rejecting the demands of domesticity, Currey shows us the large and small (and abiding) choices these women made--and continue to make--for their art: Isak Dinesen, "I promised the Devil my soul, and in return he promised me that everything I was going to experience would be turned into tales," Dinesen subsisting on oysters and Champagne but also amphetamines, which gave her the overdrive she required . . . And the rituals (daily and otherwise) that guide these artists: Isabel Allende starting a new book only on January 8th . . . Hilary Mantel taking a shower to combat writers' block ("I am the cleanest person I know") . . . Tallulah Bankhead coping with her three phobias (hating to go to bed, hating to get up, and hating to be alone), which, could she "mute them," would make her life "as slick as a sonnet, but as dull as ditch water" . . . Lillian Hellman chain-smoking three packs of cigarettes and drinking twenty cups of coffee a day--and, after milking the cow and cleaning the barn, writing out of "elation, depression, hope" ("That is the exact order. Hope sets in toward nightfall. That's when you tell yourself that you're going to be better the next time, so help you God.") . . . Diane Arbus, doing what "gnaws at" her . . . Colette, locked in her writing room by her first husband, Henry Gauthier-Villars (nom de plume: Willy) and not being "let out" until completing her daily quota (she wrote five pages a day and threw away the fifth). Colette later said, "A prison is one of the best workshops" . . . Jessye Norman disdaining routines or rituals of any kind, seeing them as "a crutch" . . . and Octavia Butler writing every day no matter what ("screw inspiration").
Germaine de Sta�l . . . Elizabeth Barrett Browning . . . George Eliot . . . Edith Wharton . . . Virginia Woolf . . . Edna Ferber . . . Doris Lessing . . . Pina Bausch . . . Frida Kahlo . . . Marguerite Duras . . . Helen Frankenthaler . . . Patti Smith, and 131 more--on their daily routines, superstitions, fears, eating (and drinking) habits, and other finely (and not so finely) calibrated rituals that help summon up willpower and self-discipline, keeping themselves afloat with optimism and fight, as they create (and avoid creating) their creations. less
B.J. NovakI love [this book]. I'm demoralized by how great people start their day very early. (Source)
See more recommendations for this book...
3
William Novak, Moshe Waldoks | 4.18
Two rival businessmen meet in the Warsaw train station. "Where are you going?" says the first man.
"To Minsk," says the second.
"To Minsk, eh? What a nerve you have! I know you're telling me you're going to Minsk because you want me to think that you're really going to Pinsk. But it so happens that I know you really are going to Minsk. So why are you lying to me?"
Four men are walking in the desert.
The German says, "I'm tired and thirsty. I must have a beer."
The Italian says, "I'm tired and thirsty. I must have wine."
The... more Two rival businessmen meet in the Warsaw train station. "Where are you going?" says the first man.
"To Minsk," says the second.
"To Minsk, eh? What a nerve you have! I know you're telling me you're going to Minsk because you want me to think that you're really going to Pinsk. But it so happens that I know you really are going to Minsk. So why are you lying to me?"
Four men are walking in the desert.
The German says, "I'm tired and thirsty. I must have a beer."
The Italian says, "I'm tired and thirsty. I must have wine."
The Mexican says, "I'm tired and thirsty.
I must have tequila."
The Jew says, "I'm tired and thirsty. I must have diabetes." less 
Ruth WisseQuality counts in anthologizing and in humour as much as in anything else and Waldoks and Novak are really professionals in this field. (Source)
See more recommendations for this book...
4
This down-and-dirty romp through Hollywood in the 1970s introduces the young filmmakers--Coppola, Scorsese, Lucas, Spielberg, Altman, and Beatty--and recreates an era that transformed American culture forever. more This down-and-dirty romp through Hollywood in the 1970s introduces the young filmmakers--Coppola, Scorsese, Lucas, Spielberg, Altman, and Beatty--and recreates an era that transformed American culture forever. less B.J. NovakHighly recommend it. [...] About filmmaking in the glory days of the '70s. (Source)
Darren AronofskyThis is an incredibly delicious read—just a great, great account of that era from Easy Rider (’69) through the mid-’70s. It’s the story of all those great filmmakers—my icons—Scorsese, Coppola, Friedkin, and Bogdanovich. They changed the way movies were made in America. It recounts their adventures in making movies. (Source)
See more recommendations for this book...
5
An aphorism is "a short pithy statement or maxim," but beneath this definition lies a wealth of wit and insight to which neither the word nor a brief description can do justice.
This anthology demonstrates just how rewarding an art form the aphorism can be, and just how brilliantly the aphorist can illuminate the hidden truth, or lay bare the ironies of existence. Specific sections on desires and longings, self-doubt, fame and reputations, happiness and sorrow, cover the whole range of aphoristic literature. This book brings together the most diverse figures--the classic aphorists,... more An aphorism is "a short pithy statement or maxim," but beneath this definition lies a wealth of wit and insight to which neither the word nor a brief description can do justice.
This anthology demonstrates just how rewarding an art form the aphorism can be, and just how brilliantly the aphorist can illuminate the hidden truth, or lay bare the ironies of existence. Specific sections on desires and longings, self-doubt, fame and reputations, happiness and sorrow, cover the whole range of aphoristic literature. This book brings together the most diverse figures--the classic aphorists, like La Rochefoucauld; the philosophers, from the Greeks to Samuel Johnson to Virginia Woolf--as well as statesmen, scientists, boulevardiers, Olympians, and gadflies. John Gross draws on their wisdom and wit to produce an anthology that will be referred to time and time again.
less B.J. NovakI love. It's just the most well-edited, brilliant one-liners from history and you can spend hours on a page or you can just flip through it. (Source)
B. J. NovakIt contains the most brilliant one-liners in history. You can spend hours on a page, or you can just flip through it. (Source)
See more recommendations for this book...
Don't have time to read B.J. Novak's favorite books? Read Shortform summaries.
Shortform summaries help you learn 10x faster by:
- Being comprehensive: you learn the most important points in the book
- Cutting out the fluff: you focus your time on what's important to know
- Interactive exercises: apply the book's ideas to your own life with our educators' guidance.
