There are a small number, out of a genre, which I keep going back to or had a big influence on me. Admiitedly, some of these were school texts, but..

Books:

Huxley - Brave New World
Golding - Lord of the Flies
Orwell- 1984, Animal Farm
Household - Rogue Male
Forester - Brown on Resolution
Stevenson - Dr Jekyl & Mr Hyde
Shute - Requiem for a Wren, So Disdained
Le Carre - The Spy who came in from the Cold

There are others, but this is a good start

Films:

To Kill a Mockingbird
High Noon
To Reap the Whirlwind
The Third Man
LA Confidential
All Quiet on the Western Front ('John Boy' version)
Fight Club
The Searchers
El Cid
Ben Hur
Culpepper Cattle Company

Books from my earliest years:

Baum -- Wizard of Oz, and all the other Oz books. These were the first library books I ever checked out and read from cover to cover. Great illustrations, too!
Hemingway -- Green Hills of Africa, Short Happy Life of Francis McComber, Old Man and the Sea.
Ruark -- All of his titles, especially Something of Value.
O'Connor -- Not his books, but his columns and articles in Outdoor Life.
The SCI Record Books -- I edited them for sixteen years and gained an education on the world's wildlife along the way. I still frequently check the natural history text and maps that Jack Schwabland created.


Films

Can't think of any that stand above others, but I did like most of the western films of the 1950s to early 1980s. After that, the only one I felt was worth watching was Dancing With Wolves.

Bill Quimby

Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand
Bible - 66 books by various authors
Killer Angels by Shaara
Mere Christianity by CS Lewis
Life It's Ownself by Dan Jenkins
Undaunted Courage by Stephen Ambrose

Films

Ben Hur
Fiddler on the Roof
The Princess Bride
To Kill a Mockingbird
The Birdman of Alcatraz
Spartacus
Lonesome Dove
A Man in the Wilderness
The Passion of Christ
The Green Line

Books -
Hemingway...The Sun Also Rises...The Old Man and the Sea...I read these the first time when I was a Freshman in high school, then after it, I have read every work (be it book, short story, magazine article, whatever) of his I can get my hands on.

WEB Griffen any of his series of books regarding the early days of the OSS or the Corps...

The book Wild at Heart - can't remember the author just now...

Something of Value & The Old Man and Boy - and a wide assortment of Ruark works...

Death in the Long Grass - and a wide assortment of Capstick works...

Each and every one of Jeff Cooper's books - in particular - To Ride, Shoot Straight, and Speak the Truth...

There are literally hundreds of books that come to mind.

Movies -
Lonesome Dove
American History X
Legends of the Fall
300
The Blues Brothers
Any of the Tom Selleck westerns
the Earthling with William Holden and Rick Shoeder
This list is also endless...

Brian

Its a long , long list, but to start with it i must say, Capstick books, CJ Mcelroy, Ruark, Solli, and many others .

Films, Lonesome Dove, HEAT, Ronin, The hunt for Red October, A Man Called Horse, john Wayne, Capstick Films Winchester 73` " he taught a man how to shoot but what to shoot at " , Tom Selleck, and his best film , Quigley, " An Experimental weapon with experimental ammunition so lets experiment....."

Clint Eastwoo,d RIchard Burton, i cant name the films, just the actors.... and many more

Thanks for the replies. They make an interesting list.

I like films which, I think / hope show something of the reality of the times / place.

Some of the 'westerns' I like for this are The Culpepper Cattle Company, The Searchers, Man gainst the Wilderness, Jeremiah Johnstone, Open Range, The Unforgiven.

The mud, the flies, the smell of cow poo, pine needles and mud, again, you can almost smell it!

There were a couple of films set in the Klondike / Gold Rush Era. One had Lee Marvin as a tough Mountie trying to uphold some sort of 'natural' justice. I think the film was set around the First World War and has Savage 99s etc. A treat for gun buffs!

The survival / trekking with huskies looked impressive. I think another was based upon Jack London's book: White Fang. I read this at school and enjoyed it.

Out of Africa is good on atmospherics, evoking the time, place and class issues. Many years ago, I saw a tv film based around the earlier times / exploits of Sir Samuel Baker and (?) Dr David Livingstone.

Truth is far, far stranger. Baker went around cataloguing the sexual habits of the locals and 'mapping' genitalia. The Victorians were one hell of a mixed up bunch of people. Cold baths and beatings at school did n't seem to improve their moral upbringing.

War films are a 'touchy issue'. The best get banned by censors - All Quiet on the Western Front, while the majority are little more than jingoisic propaganda 'puffs'. Fortunately, I have never been in a war, so cannot comment on their accuracy.

Two films which tell war from a personal issue level, which have received plaudits are The Cruel Sea and Das Boot. These tell the story of the convoys / War of the Atlantic from both the anti submarine corvette and submariners viewpoints.

I have read the Cruel Sea, and the book is better than the film, although the film is 'true' to the book. We did Red Badge of Courage at school, although it did not have the immediate impact of the film All Quiet on the Western Front, being a war with little cultural resonance for us.

Saving Private Ryan is graphic, although I found Assembly (Chinese Civil War, Chinese viewpoint) and Brotherhood (Korean War, Koreans against each other from a Korean viepoint) worse for the mayhem of battle scenes.

As a youngster, I really enjoyed Joseph Alsheler's books---ones with Henry Ware. Shifles Sol Hyde, etc. Those who have read the books will recognize the characters. Pretty high adventure for a young mind.


Jordan

King Solomon's Mines - book by H Rider Haggard, and film with Stewart Granger

The Snows of Kilimanjaro - book by Hemingway, film with Gregory Peck, CD reading by CHarlton Heston.

i NEVER READ RUARK UNTIL BILL BERLAT BRING UHURU I CANNOT PUT IT DOWN SINCE ITS FIRST PAGE ,NOW THERE IS ANOTHER BIG FAN OF RUARKS BOOKS .BILL PLEAAAAAAAAAAAAAASE TRY TO FIND A COPY OF SOMETHING OF VALUE FOR ME ,IN THIS COLD NIGTHS I READ A LOT WITH A GOOD JHONNY WALKER BLAK LABEL AT HAND IN FRONT OF THE FIREPLACE.JUAN

quote:

Originally posted by juanpozzi:
i NEVER READ RUARK UNTIL BILL BERLAT BRING UHURU I CANNOT PUT IT DOWN SINCE ITS FIRST PAGE ,NOW THERE IS ANOTHER BIG FAN OF RUARKS BOOKS .BILL PLEAAAAAAAAAAAAAASE TRY TO FIND A COPY OF SOMETHING OF VALUE FOR ME ,IN THIS COLD NIGTHS I READ A LOT WITH A GOOD JHONNY WALKER BLAK LABEL AT HAND IN FRONT OF THE FIREPLACE.JUAN

Will find one and send it off in a week or so.....I miss being with you all....my fond regards to the familia....and tell Miryan I carry the knife every day. Had all the photos printed and had two of them blown up to 8 x 10; one that Guille took of Lanuel's head and one of you and I with the boar. Great memories, amigazo.

If I am not back sooner, I am thinking about March to go to Junin or La Pampa for red stag.
Talk to Guille.

My copy of Something of Value is a 1st Ed. Too bad the dust jacket is ratty, it may be worth something. But the Ruark books that should be REQUIRED READING in schools nowadays are his collected columns from Field and Stream in the 50's, The Old Man and The Boy, and The Old Man's Boy Grows Older. They are the epitome of hunting and life ethics, and great morality lessons that seem to be forgotten today. The other book from my childhood that I loved, was Home is the Hunter, by, I think MacKinlay Cantor(sp?)

Bill im reading Ruarks and became fanatic,of him ,thanks very much my friend.Next time ill go with youto hunt red stag ,ill hunt one too ,BUT I RECOMMEND BUFFALO you like adrenaline and in the same place you can hunt capibara,and another species .I have been with Guille at his house and then at my house near the lake in Carlos Paz ,we cooked a big asado of costillas and IKY managed to fish 6 kingfish with an improvised fishing cane ,i visited many spec ops units tested guns and chat a lot with my old scouts.Juan

Bernard Fall's " Hell in a very small place...." and "Street Without Joy......."

-Hashem's The Old testament
-Euclid's Elements
-Nietzsche's Books
-Wyeth's Bedford Forrest Biography (now that was a man!)
-Doyle's Sherlock Holmes Stories
-Capstick's Books
-Thucydides

The book that started it all for me was "Pondoro" by John Taylor.

Trophy Hunter in Asia - Elgin Gates
Trophy Hunter in Africa - Elgin Gates
East of the Sun, West of the Moon - Roosevelt Bros.
From Mount Kenya to the Cape - Craig Boddington
Russell Annabel books
Jaybirds Go To Hell On Friday - Havilah Babcock
My Health is Better in November - Havilah Babcock
Wind, Dust and Snow - Robert Anderson
Mongolian Hunter - Patrick Steward
Collection of Short Stories - Ernest Hemingway
Book of the Rifle - Jim Carmichel

Many articles by Gary Sitton, Jim Carmichel, Craig Boddington, John Wooters, Tim Brakefield, etc...

Non-Hunting
The Bible
From Worst to First - Gordon Bethune
Skunk Works - Ben Rich
Brules - Harry Combs
Gone To Texas - Forrest Carter
Advance and Retreat - John Bell Hood
All Patrick McManus books

The Gods Must be Crazy

Pitty I only saw it when I was already a bumbling ecologist, driving an ancient landrover, and getting together with a pretty new school teacher, and dealing with sundry armed insurgents.

A book by Osa and Martin Johnson.
Listening to Wally Tabor speak.
Books by Dr. Frank Hibben
Books by Bob Householder
Books by Clyde Ormond

Russell Annabel made me finally go to Alaska :Alaskan Adventures
Elmer Keith made me hunt with guns 338 caliber and larger :Hell I was There
Robert Ruark made me get English Setters The Old Man and The Boy
The Bible made me think with oboma that the end is near and that need to I escape to Canada!

eurocentric,

I can not believe I see Captick's and Nietzsche's name in the same list!!! Capstick is without a doubt my favorite author to read...on the other hand I had to read some of Nietzsche's work for a few classes and thought my head was going to explode with each turn of the page. Torture, man, torture!

Anyway, for my have to read list, I'd have to say all of Capstick's books (Death in the Long Grass at the least), along with Horn of the Hunter by Ruark, Where Lions Roar by Boddington, Karamojo Safari by Bell, Trailing a Bear by Munger, On the Road by Kerouac, and The Bible. There's a bunch more, but those are among my favorites.

I read him for sheer pleasure.

quote:

Originally posted by JustinL01:
eurocentric,

I can not believe I see Captick's and Nietzsche's name in the same list!!! Capstick is without a doubt my favorite author to read...on the other hand I had to read some of Nietzsche's work for a few classes and thought my head was going to explode with each turn of the page. Torture, man, torture!

Anyway, for my have to read list, I'd have to say all of Capstick's books (Death in the Long Grass at the least), along with Horn of the Hunter by Ruark, Where Lions Roar by Boddington, Karamojo Safari by Bell, Trailing a Bear by Munger, On the Road by Kerouac, and The Bible. There's a bunch more, but those are among my favorites.

to Kill a Mockingbird...I was about 4th grade the first time. I think I slept with the light on for about two weeks.
Boo Radley...

Rich
Buff Killer

Back in 1977, when I was 18 years old, I purchased a book that certainly sparked my interest in African hunting. I bought a first edition of "The Wanderings of an Elephant Hunter" by WDM Bell. I've read it three or four times since buying it.

That book was expensive then, especially for an 18 year old kid, I'd hate to think of what it is worth today.