Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site ucsfcgl.UUCP
Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!cbosgd!ihnp4!houxm!mhuxt!mhuxr!ulysses!ucbvax!ucsfcgl!rl
From: rl@ucsfcgl.UUCP (Robert Langridge%CGL)
Newsgroups: net.aviation
Subject: Re: Aviation Good Reads
Message-ID: <757@ucsfcgl.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 22-Jan-86 01:52:31 EST
Article-I.D.: ucsfcgl.757
Posted: Wed Jan 22 01:52:31 1986
Date-Received: Thu, 23-Jan-86 20:28:48 EST
Organization: UCSF Computer Graphics Lab
Lines: 39


Following the request for aviation good reads, no one has mentioned
Antoine de Saint Exupery.  His classics are all available at $2.95 to 
$3.95 in Harcourt Brace Jovanovich paperbacks.  

In descending order of my personal preference:
"Wind, Sand and Stars"
"Night Flight"
"Southern Mail"
"Flight to Arras"

Then there is Richard Bach.  Not everyone likes "Jonathan Livingston
Seagull" (I do), but some of his others (all in paperback) must appeal 
to all pilots and would-be pilots:

Again in my order of preference:
"Biplane"
"Stranger to the Ground"
"Nothing by Chance"

For good reading with no literary pretensions, but which provides an 
anecdotal antidote to the more mystical meanderings of Bach (Richard :-), 
I enjoy dipping into the books by Bob Buck ("Weather Flying", "Flying
Know-How" and "The Art of Flying").  Buck is in many ways a compliment to 
Yeager - over 30,000 hours, mainly as TWA captain and Chief Pilot, but 
with lots of other exciting aeronautical activities - including a world
distance record at the age of 22.  His chapter on "The Case for the Glider" 
in "Flying Know-How" begins "I fly gliders for fun and research, and because
it's the most fascinating flying there is . . . to me".  Lots of solid 
advice mixed with, and illuminated by, the anecdotes.

Trivia question: What quotation from an aviation classic is Buck referring
to when he says "Those are beautiful words that we should cherish, . . ."?
(no fair peeking :-) 

Bob Langridge			    rl@ucsfcgl (ARPA, UUCP, BITNET)
Computer Graphics Laboratory			 
University of California		     	    +1 415 476 2630 
San Francisco  CA  94143		    	    +1 415 476 1540