Music:  

“St. Matthew’s Passion” by Johann Sebastian Bach (1727)

I loved barbaric genres of all kinds. Like the ancient slaves herded on before Xerxes’s whips, modern man beats and wrecks his eardrums to prod himself to exertion and listens to depressing slop to heal his broken soul. I no longer listen to angry and depressing music. I like Bach’s “St. Matthew’s Passion,” “Wagner’s Flight of the Valkyries,” and Tchaikovsky’s “1812 Overture.” 

Book: 

“On Aggression” by Konrad Lorenz (1966)

Of course there are too many to name, but I’ll list some outside of the usual Great Books canon. A classic for me is Konrad Lorenz’s “On Aggression,” but alongside this would be William James’s “Principles of Psychology” (and just about anything else by William James), and Philip Rieff’s “Charisma.” These books challenged and shifted my views profoundly.

Film 

“The Wild Bunch” (1969)

Again, too many to mention, but here at Hillsdale I have given presentations on “The Wild Bunch” (1969),  When I’m sick it’s “Predator” (1987), and oddly enough “Zodiac” (2007), which as a period piece is a masterpiece. If I’m knocking on heaven’s door it’s NyQuil and the entire “Lord of the Rings” trilogy. In our Youtube era, I’ve watched clips from films more than the films themselves, along with motley classics from SNL shorts and “Aqua Teen Hunger Force.”