What should little girls read if they’re aspiring “free thinkers?” According to Christopher Hitchens, a lot of the classics. When Hitchens attended Texas Freethought Convention to accept the Richard Dawkins Award, an eight-year-old girl named Mason Crumpacker took the mic and asked him what books he would recommend that she read. Delighted, Hitchens asked her to meet him after the presentation, where he rattled off a few books he thought she might like.
According to the Houston Chronicle , with additional input from Mason’s mom, the list goes something like this: Greek and Roman myths compiled by Robert Graves (Mason claimed to have read these, but according to her mother, it’s I, Claudius she’s a fan of), The Magic of Reality by Richard Dawkins, anything satirical by Shakespeare or Geoffrey Chaucer, Ayaan Hirsi Ali’s Nomad: From Islam to America: A Personal Journey Through the Clash of Civilizations , PG Wodehouse’s Sunset at Blandings (“for fun”), David Hume’s philosophy, and Charles Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities . Click through to watch a video of part of their meeting, and let us know if you’ll be adding some of these books to your reading list (it’s okay if you’re older than eight).
[via Open Culture]