50 Success Classics: Winning Wisdom for Life and Work from 50 Landmark Books by Tom Butler-Bowdon

Product Description

Here is the first and only bite-sized guide to 50 of the most important and inspiring books that already have helped legions of readers unleash their potential and discover the secrets to success in work and life.
Product Details
Amazon Sales Rank: #64068 in Books
Published on: 2004-02-25
Number of items: 1
Binding: Paperback
300 pages
Editorial Reviews

Brian Tracy, author of
"Incredible...the very best of success literature ever written--in one easy book that you can read and reread for years."

Jim Ewan, vice-president, The Speakers Association
"I only wish this book had been available years ago--it could have saved me countless hours. Very highly recommended."

Dr. Catherine Ponder, Keys to Prosperity, February 2005
Contains some of the very best success literature ever written. Highly recommended.
Customer Reviews

A few lessons of this book from one who will never learn them
There are already a number of views outlining what this book is about, how it works, which books are included. I will skip doing that and try to think now of some of the 'lessons' I learned from reading the author's summaries of these works ( which so far as I can tell are done in an excellent way)
One lesson which seems to be paramount is the importance of attitude. 'Trust yourself, every heart vibrates to that iron string" says Emerson who is I believe one of the fathers of this whole yea- saying business. The 'trust yourself' also extends to having a positive attitude towards others, avoiding argument and criticism. An important lesson is to smile and be upbeat in dealings with others. It is also recommended to be honest and forthright in dealing with others.A third great lesson is the importance of 'seizing the opportunity when it is there' having the courage to do so. A fourth lesson which is repeated more than once is in finding 'opportunity in adversity' and in some transformation in life. The idea is here is that life is changing all the time and some of that change is certainly not for the better. And one has to be continually ready to change with it.
I could go on listing the different pieces of advice here, and they truly are various and interesting.
What I am thinking about is about all those like myself who will never take much of this advice, and probably never be 'successes' in the way the people who write here are.
I too am not sure that the sense of what success is here (It is as I understand it by and large- success in business )is the kind of success a considerable body of people truly long for.
I too think of a different attitude towards success,held by those who long for success, and will not attain it. And the fact that not succeeding may in some ways and in certain ways prove a more valuable experience than success itself. Perhaps this is best expressed in these lines of Emily Dickinson.

"Success is counted sweetest
by those who ne'er succeed
To comprehend a nectar
Requires Sorest Need.

Not one of all the Purple Host
who took the Flag today
can tell a Definition
so clear of Victory

as he defeated dying
on whose forbidden ear
the distant strains of triumph
burst agonized and clear. "

Read ... @High Speed ... & Succeed !
This book among the other 3 excellent categories (see below) had a profound impact on my success and level of awareness in jump-starting my career.

Working at a large bank, my level of stress and the resulting time deprivation made it almost impossible to finish ONE book per month.

Now, I enjoy reading, analyzing, and integrating the wisdom of ONE book per day thanks to Tom Bowdon's excellent book summaries.

In short: Read ... @High Speed ... & Succeed !

Here are the other 3 book summaries that I highly (!) recommend:

50 Self-Help Classics: 50 Inspirational Books to Transform Your Life

50 Spiritual Classics: Timeless Wisdom from 50 Great Books on Inner Discovery, Enlightenment and Purpose

50 Psychology Classics: Who We Are, How We Think, What We Do; Insight and Inspiration from 50 Key Books

I strongly believe the three books in the author's trilogy are really an intellectual treasure!
50 Self-Help Classics: 50 Inspirational Books to Transform Your Life, From Timeless Sages to Contemporary Gurus
50 Success Classics: Winning Wisdom for Life and Work from 50 Landmark Books
50 Spiritual Classics: Timeless Wisdom from 50 Great Books on Inner Discovery, Enlightenment and Purpose

In the first instance, I have bought these three books in one go because I have been fascinated by what the author had done: He has practised what is known as the highest level of reading. Mortimer Adler, in his classic book, 'How to Read a Book', written in the forties, had called it 'syntopical reading'. It's actually reading a number of books of the same genre, more or less simultaneously & then synthesising the key points.

Secondly, the author, who is a graduate of the London School of Economics, somehow impresses me with his ability to synthesise the big picture of each of the books that made up the entire collection. For apparently a left-brain thinker i.e. economist by training, this has been a very remarkable feat, as his synthesising endeavour has been essentially more of a right-brain activity. Well, I must compliment him for a job well done.

Before my final decision on buying the three books, I have been thrilled by the prospect of reading three books, which in turn will give me access to one hundred & fifty books.

For each book, the author has very artfully as well as skillfully selected fifty books to made up one collection. I may not agree with his selection, but I must admit that I can't default him at all.

Take the first book, '50 Self Help Classics', with timeless wisdom, as an example. Out of the fifty books he has selected, I have read only seventeen of them. I have those books in my personal library.

For the second book, '50 Success Classics', I have read & still own sixteen of the landmark books on winning wisdom selected by the author.

For the third & final book, '50 Spiritual Classics', covering timeless sages & contemporary gurus, I have read only & still own three of them, namely 'The Tao of Physics', 'The Way of the Peaceful Warrior' & 'Zen & the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance'.

For those books I have read previously, totaling thirty-six of them (probably stretching over three decades of my life), & upon revisiting them again in the trilogy, which actually took me one whole weekend to complete, starting on Friday evening & finishing on Sunday night, I must say that the seemingly marathon reading experience has been very refreshing & uplifting. It has also given me the opportunity to check & verify whether the author has captured the key ideas or essence of those books. I don't think I can find fault with the author in this respect.

Not only that, in the first book, I am very impressed that the author has cut through the bewildering array of choices to bring the essential ideas, insights, and techniques from the `literature of possibilities'. In works that span the world's religions, cultures, philosophies, & centuries, he summarizes each work's key ideas & finally makes clear how these legendary classics can educate, affirm, & motivate anyone searching for the inspiration to make a meaningful life change.

In the second book, the author is back with his wide-ranging collection of enduring works from pioneering thinkers, philosophers, & powerful leaders, like Napoleon Hill, Stephen Covey, Kenneth Blanchard, Baltasar Gracian & Christopher Maurer; from the inspirational rags to riches stories of such entrepreneurs, like Andrew Carnegie, Warren Buffet & Sam Walton to the leadership lessons of Sir Ernest Shackleton, Eleanor Roosevelt, Abraham Lincoln & Nelson Mandela, just to name a few.

In the third book, I believe the author has captured the very best in spiritual writing: They include personal diaries & compelling biographies of such diverse figures as Gandhi, Malcolm X, & Black Elk & Eastern philosophers & gurus including Krishnamurti, Yogananda, Chögyam Trungpa & Suzuki; & Western saints & mystics such as St. Francis of Assisi, Herman Hesse & Simone Weil. For each book in this volume, the author offers insightful commentary on how these classics can help spiritual seekers everywhere bring personal beliefs, values & practices squarely into the center of their every day lives.

Reading the three foregoing books has been quite a breeze because the meaning of each work is initially captured 'in a nut shell' at the onset, coupled with a representative quote as well as cross-referencing to similar work. In each work, appropriate sectional headings in bold print make it really easy for the reader to follow the author's train of thoughts over some six pages. There is also a short biographical sketch of the author of the respective work.

I must admit that the third book in the trilogy has been the most challenging for me to read as I normally do not go for such stuff. To put it bluntly, it's not my cup of tea. On the other hand, the curiosity streak in me has been too overwhelming, since I relish the thought that I could read fifty spiritual classics in just one book!

Overall, & for all those books I have not yet read at all (some of which I have not even heard of), I really enjoyed digesting the author's bite-sized summaries (in actuality, they are only the main ideas, context & impact of each title, to give a taste of the literature, so to speak) in the three collections or volumes, even though some of the titles are relatively esoteric for me. The entire reading journey has been enlightening, inspirational & yet humbling in some areas. Best of all, there are useful tools & practical techniques to take away from each collection!

For the first & last book in the trilogy, namely, '50 Self Help Classics' & '50 Spirtual Classics', the author has respectively provide a list of additional 50 books. The titles are certainly enticing! Well, all I can say is this: I wish the author will repeat his syntopical reading exercise covering these books & add two more volumes, that will make a quintulogy, for all the readers out there, including me!

As usual, all my three books are now scribbled with my own hand-written marginal annotations as well as my fancy colour marker symbols. Additionally, there are also colourful sticky notes in between selected pages. My next personal assignment is to transfer all these notations into mindmaps with Mindmanager Pro.

To end my review, I have one last humble comment to make. Out of the one hundred & fifty bite-sized summaries, I still don't quite get it from 'The Bhagavad-Gita' as outlined in the author's '50 Self Help Classics'. I have not read this work before although I have heard about it. [J Y Pillay, former Chairman of Singapore Airlines, who is credited for building the airline to what it is today, A Great Way to Fly, has vouched for this ancient Hindu scripture as an inspiration for his leadership success during an interview.] However, in the same vein, I found that I could relate quickly to Deepak Chopra's 'The Seven Spiritual Laws of Success' but simply not this one! I may have to explore other avenue.

In site of the above minor short-coming, I strongly believe that the three books in the author's trilogy are really an intellectual treasure!