
Ask HN: Classic books in their field? - lazy_ip
If you were creating a library and had $500 to spend for each of these subject areas, which reference books (generally, for the lay person, or undergraduate student) would you buy?
Computing (inc. computer science); medicine; astronomy; physics; philosophy; political science and economics; and world history (&#x2F;not&#x2F; USA history)?<p>The intention is to spend money on classic texts that will last a good ten years or more, and that will be valuable into the future.<p>So for computing, nothing about Ruby on Rails, Node, or other flavor of the month. But Code Complete might make the cut.<p>Things which are freely available online, probably also won&#x27;t make the cut. So in political science and economics, &#x2F;Wealth of Nations&#x2F; and &#x2F;Capital&#x2F; won&#x27;t be chosen. However, &#x2F;A Theory of Justice&#x2F; might be.<p>Authoritative works (e.g. in medicine &#x2F;Gray&#x27;s Anatomy&#x2F;) are preferred.
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lazy_ip
For English, I would put "Fowler's Dictionary of Modern English Usage", except
English isn't a current subject area I'm interested in.

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ainiriand
Clean Code and Design Patterns: Elements of Reusable Object-Oriented Software
are a must imho.

The Prince for political science.

