Reading list
Classic self-help books, the originals
Self-help did not start with podcasts. It started in 1859 with a Scottish doctor's book called, simply, Self-Help, and by 1920 it had produced most of the ideas still being sold today: habits, the power of thought, using the hours you already have, speaking in public without dying of fright.
14 books, all free to read
These originals are shorter and franker than their descendants. Some are wise, some are period pieces, and the notes say which.
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1. As a Man Thinketh
by James Allen
A tiny book on how thought shapes character and circumstance. Read in half an hour, and it is the root of a whole shelf.
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2. How to Live on 24 Hours a Day
by Arnold Bennett
Arnold Bennett on finding ninety minutes a day for your mind, in the hours you already waste. Witty and practical.
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3. Self-Help
by Samuel Smiles
The book that named the genre: short lives of inventors and workers who succeeded by perseverance. Victorian, and very readable.
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4. The Conquest of Happiness
by Bertrand Russell
A philosopher's practical guide to being less unhappy: boredom, envy, work and zest. Russell at his warmest.
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5. The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin
by Benjamin Franklin
Franklin's chart of thirteen virtues, tracked daily. The first habit tracker, inside a great life story.
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6. Acres of Diamonds
by Russell H. Conwell
A lecture given over six thousand times: the fortune you seek may be in your own back yard.
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7. The Art of Public Speaking
by Dale Carnegie and J. Berg Esenwein
Dale Carnegie's first book, years before How to Win Friends, on standing up and speaking well.
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8. A Message to Garcia
by Elbert Hubbard
A short essay about a man who carried a letter without asking questions. Printed in its millions; read it and argue.
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9. The Science of Getting Rich
by Wallace D. Wattles
The 1910 book behind The Secret. Interesting as history; take the promises with salt.
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10. The Human Machine
by Arnold Bennett
Bennett again, on treating your brain as a machine you can learn to run. Short and full of sense.
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11. Character Building
by Booker T. Washington
Booker T. Washington's Sunday talks to his students at Tuskegee, on honest work and small daily duties.
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12. Self Mastery Through Conscious Autosuggestion
by Émile Coué
Coué's method: every day, in every way, I am getting better and better. The book that made the phrase famous.
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13. Optimism
by Helen Keller
Helen Keller's essay on optimism, written in her early twenties. Short, and earned.
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14. The Game of Life and How to Play It
by Florence Scovel Shinn
Florence Scovel Shinn's 1925 book on affirmations. A period piece, but a famous one.
Read it as a path: Where self-help began
The short originals that today's bestsellers keep rewriting.
More lists
Read them free
Every book on this list is free in Doomreader: open one and it reads as short posts you scroll, with your place kept and its best pages a tap away. You can listen to any of them free too, read aloud by your device.