Fiction with Buddhist influences

[Svalaksana]

In terms of film, I would recommend Kim Ki Duk's Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter... and Spring, a film centered on a Buddhist monk and young apprentice in South Korea, which reflects on many recurrent Buddhist subjects, particularly the cyclic nature of samsara, defilements and illusions, suffering, etc., and in a particularly poignant moment in the narrative the Heart Sutra becomes the highlight of the work.

[Jesse]

Mark Twains - the Mysterious Stranger.

I have yet to read the book in it's entirety, but it's on my "definitely must read" list

A few quotes from the book:

“Foreordain it? No. The man’s circumstances and environment order it. His first act determines the second and all that follow after.”

There is no God, no universe, no human race, no earthly life, no heaven, no hell. It is all a Dream, a grotesque and foolish dream. Nothing exists but you. And You are but a Thought — a vagrant Thought, a useless Thought, a homeless Thought, wandering forlorn among the empty eternities.“ — Mark Twain, book The Mysterious Stranger

There has never been a just one, never an honorable one — on the part of the instigator of the war. I can see a million years ahead, and this rule will never change in so many as half a dozen instances. The loud little handful — as usual — will shout for the war. The pulpit will — warily and cautiously — object — at first; the great, big, dull bulk of the nation will rub its sleepy eyes and try to make out why there should be a war, and will say, earnestly and indignantly, "It is unjust and dishonorable, and there is no necessity for it." Then the handful will shout louder. A few fair men on the other side will argue and reason against the war with speech and pen, and at first will have a hearing and be applauded; but it will not last long; those others will outshout them, and presently the anti-war audiences will thin out and lose popularity. Before long you will see this curious thing: the speakers stoned from the platform, and free speech strangled by hordes of furious men who in their secret hearts are still at one with those stoned speakers — as earlier — but do not dare to say so. And now the whole nation — pulpit and all — will take up the war-cry, and shout itself hoarse, and mob any honest man who ventures to open his mouth; and presently such mouths will cease to open. Next the statesmen will invent cheap lies, putting the blame upon the nation that is attacked, and every man will be glad of those conscience-soothing falsities, and will diligently study them, and refuse to examine any refutations of them; and thus he will by and by convince himself that the war is just, and will thank God for the better sleep he enjoys after this process of grotesque self-deception.“ — Mark Twain, book The Mysterious Stranger

While I wouldn't call it Buddhist, it does from time to time (pretty much incessantly) draw on philosophy, and at other times Nihilism to paint it's story. The story throughout contains this piercing cold logical perspective that mauls and obliterates general human tendencies, actions, and perspectives.

It's not a book to read if you're in a depressed mood, that's for sure.

[Kim O'Hara]

Mark Twains - the Mysterious Stranger.

...While I wouldn't call it Buddhist, it does from time to time (pretty much incessantly) draw on philosophy, and at other times Nihilism to paint it's story. The story throughout contains this piercing cold logical perspective that mauls and obliterates general human tendencies, actions, and perspectives.

It's not a book to read if you're in a depressed mood, that's for sure.

Mark Twain was a cranky old bloke at times but don't worry, any "perspective that mauls and obliterates general human tendencies, actions, and perspectives" is flat-out wrong, not a "piercing cold logical perspective" but a pseudo-logical, negative, nihilist view.
It's easy to reach such a viewpoint - just ignore all the good things in the world, or point out that they won't last, won't win, etc. It's not realistic, though, and not logical.
Read A Connecticut Yankee in the Court of King Arthur instead. It's much more fun.


Kim

[AmidaB]

+ 1 Eliot Pattison.

Ghost in the Shell's original theme and concept and I also like Mamoru Oshii's adaptations.

We have our own extremely profilic Lőrinc L. László aka Leslie L. Lawrence - he has a wast array of mystical-crime-pulp-fiction novels with titles like: Csöd (mChod), Sindzse szeme (Eye of gshin rje), Halálkiáltók (Death shouters), Thumo (gTum mo) etc.

[PeterC]

Mishima’s Sea of Fertility tetralogy. The ingredients are all Buddhist, although the story isn’t really about the Dharma. It’s heavy going and a little fascist in places (notably Running Horses), but it’s an important work.

[Jesse]

Mark Twains - the Mysterious Stranger.

...While I wouldn't call it Buddhist, it does from time to time (pretty much incessantly) draw on philosophy, and at other times Nihilism to paint it's story. The story throughout contains this piercing cold logical perspective that mauls and obliterates general human tendencies, actions, and perspectives.

It's not a book to read if you're in a depressed mood, that's for sure.

Mark Twain was a cranky old bloke at times but don't worry, any "perspective that mauls and obliterates general human tendencies, actions, and perspectives" is flat-out wrong, not a "piercing cold logical perspective" but a pseudo-logical, negative, nihilist view.
It's easy to reach such a viewpoint - just ignore all the good things in the world, or point out that they won't last, won't win, etc. It's not realistic, though, and not logical.
Read A Connecticut Yankee in the Court of King Arthur instead. It's much more fun.


Kim

The entire story basically reads as an entertaining scathing review of humanity, though let's remember it's fiction.

[Dan74]

Viktor Pelevin's Buddha's Little Finger ( also translated as Chapayev and Void), is heavily Buddhist.

[Malcolm]

Mishima’s Sea of Fertility tetralogy. The ingredients are all Buddhist, although the story isn’t really about the Dharma. It’s heavy going and a little fascist in places (notably Running Horses), but it’s an important work.

A little fascist? Mishima was a lunatic.

[PeterC]

Mishima’s Sea of Fertility tetralogy. The ingredients are all Buddhist, although the story isn’t really about the Dharma. It’s heavy going and a little fascist in places (notably Running Horses), but it’s an important work.

A little fascist? Mishima was a lunatic.

He was a bit out there. Nobody should try to extract life lessons from his work. But also a brilliant writer.

Temple of the Golden Pavilion would also qualify as a story with Buddhist references.

[Kim O'Hara]

He was a bit out there. Nobody should try to extract life lessons from his work. But also a brilliant writer.

That's something you could say about quite a lot of really important, insightful writers, Buddhist or not. I've been thinking recently that writers - any kind of artist, really - need to stand a little outside the mainstream of a community to see it clearly.


Kim

[PeterC]

He was a bit out there. Nobody should try to extract life lessons from his work. But also a brilliant writer.

That's something you could say about quite a lot of really important, insightful writers, Buddhist or not. I've been thinking recently that writers - any kind of artist, really - need to stand a little outside the mainstream of a community to see it clearly.


Kim

True, but not all writers are self-loathing gay bodybuilders who organize patriotic para-military volunteer organizations in their spare time, kidnap the commander of an army garrison and demand to address the troops with an inspirational plea for loyalty to the divine emperor, then commit seppuku. That's quite some way outside the mainstream.

[amanitamusc]

He was a bit out there. Nobody should try to extract life lessons from his work. But also a brilliant writer.

That's something you could say about quite a lot of really important, insightful writers, Buddhist or not. I've been thinking recently that writers - any kind of artist, really - need to stand a little outside the mainstream of a community to see it clearly.


Kim

True, but not all writers are self-loathing gay bodybuilders who organize patriotic para-military volunteer organizations in their spare time, kidnap the commander of an army garrison and demand to address the troops with an inspirational plea for loyalty to the divine emperor, then commit seppuku. That's quite some way outside the mainstream.

[frankie]

That's something you could say about quite a lot of really important, insightful writers, Buddhist or not. I've been thinking recently that writers - any kind of artist, really - need to stand a little outside the mainstream of a community to see it clearly.


Kim

True, but not all writers are self-loathing gay bodybuilders who organize patriotic para-military volunteer organizations in their spare time, kidnap the commander of an army garrison and demand to address the troops with an inspirational plea for loyalty to the divine emperor, then commit seppuku. That's quite some way outside the mainstream.

Everybody's entitled to a hobby!

[Kim O'Hara]

He was a bit out there. Nobody should try to extract life lessons from his work. But also a brilliant writer.

That's something you could say about quite a lot of really important, insightful writers, Buddhist or not. I've been thinking recently that writers - any kind of artist, really - need to stand a little outside the mainstream of a community to see it clearly.


Kim

True, but not all writers are self-loathing gay bodybuilders who organize patriotic para-military volunteer organizations in their spare time, kidnap the commander of an army garrison and demand to address the troops with an inspirational plea for loyalty to the divine emperor, then commit seppuku. That's quite some way outside the mainstream.

Of course. There's probably an optimum distance.


I was thinking more in terms of writers who are displaced in some way, like Rushdie and Nabokov, or belong to ethnic or religious minorities in their own countries.


Kim

[Jesse]

That's something you could say about quite a lot of really important, insightful writers, Buddhist or not. I've been thinking recently that writers - any kind of artist, really - need to stand a little outside the mainstream of a community to see it clearly.


Kim

True, but not all writers are self-loathing gay bodybuilders who organize patriotic para-military volunteer organizations in their spare time, kidnap the commander of an army garrison and demand to address the troops with an inspirational plea for loyalty to the divine emperor, then commit seppuku. That's quite some way outside the mainstream.

Of course. There's probably an optimum distance.


I was thinking more in terms of writers who are displaced in some way, like Rushdie and Nabokov, or belong to ethnic or religious minorities in their own countries.


Kim

Makes me think of Phillip. K. Dick.

I have always loved, and related to him, especially as an artist. His story is sad, but he was also an artist of the highest quality.

“God talked to me through a Beatles tune.”

In the 53 years he walked this earth, Philip K. Dick authored many of science fiction’s greatest works. Books Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep and The Man in the High Castle are two of Dick’s best-known novels but he was a prolific writer, authoring at least another 47. Each was different, each a product of Dick’s wild and untamed imagination.

As a writer his achievements were vast, but towards the end of his life, Dick began to come unhinged. As his final years closed in, drug addiction, mental illness, and a restless imagination got the better of him. Dick’s writing became dense, sprawling, and littered with far-out theories and religious imagery. Increasingly he became convinced that a supernatural and godlike being — one he referred to as ‘Valis’ — was communicating with him.

Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away'
-- Philip. K. Dick

Philip K Dicks Story