The favourite books of Boygenius
Since their formation in 2018, friends-turned-bandmates Boygenius have taken the world by storm. Julien Baker, Phoebe Bridgers, and Lucy Dacus were all already huge names in their own right, each carving their own unique form of indie-folk-rock. With Boygenius, they tripled the guitars and power, winning over the hearts of indie fans worldwide.
After creating their first self-titled EP in just four days and releasing it in 2018, they took their time with their full-length debut. The long-awaited The Record was finally released earlier this year to huge critical acclaim.
Like many of their fans, Boygenius’ interest in the arts extends beyond music. The influence of literature on the band could be felt throughout The Record, from quoting Joan Didion to naming a song after poet and lyricist Leonard Cohen. It’s an album littered with literary references, so it’s no surprise that the members of Boygenius often give up reading recommendations.
Bridgers, Dacus and Baker, have been just as generous with their literary references in interviews as they are in their music. A list by LitHub collated almost 50 books the trio have advocated for throughout the years, which includes works from the likes of James Baldwin, Patti Smith, and Toni Morrison.
Some notable picks on the list include The Body Keeps the Score by Bessel van der Kolk, which Bridgers suggests changed her life: “I can’t believe I made it this far without it. It is sort of traumatising in itself, but it inspired me to finally set up a session with a good therapist,” she told One Grand.
Baker picks out Mohsin Hamid’s refugee novel Exit West, which she suggests goes “one step beyond an empirical, perfunctory analysis of the situation, which can be useful but a little dry, and instead, they present you a problem in all its humanness,” she said in an interview with The Irish Times.
Both Baker and Dacus also recommend Stay and Fight by Madeline Ffitch, which Dacus tells Southwest Review is “well-loved within her circle of friends”, but she wishes more people had read it: “It has a lot to do with found family, rural life, the reality of living from the land, and lesbian parenthood.”
One of Dacus’ most memorable reads is Letters to a Young Poet by Rainer Maria Rilke, in which she tells Penguin that she “remembers lessons from” a lot: “It’s so wise and gentle. I’ve underlined this: ‘The more still, more patient and more open we are when we’re sad, so much the deeper and the more unswervingly does the new go into us. So much the better do we make it ours.’ That’s great.”
It’s a characteristically emotional, honest, and thoughtful collection of books, much like Boygenius’ musical output. It’s not difficult to see how many of their picks might have influenced their songwriting.
Check out the full list of Boygenius’ favourite books below.
Boygenius’ favourite books:
- Hanif Abdurraqib – Go Ahead in the Rain (Lucy Dacus)
- Hanif Abdurraqib – They Can’t Kill Us Til They Kill Us (Lucy Dacus)
- Theodor Adorno – Minima Moralia (Julien Baker)
- Natalie Babbitt – Tuck Everlasting (Lucy Dacus)
- Don Bajema – Reach (Lucy Dacus)
- James Baldwin – The Fire Next Time (Lucy Dacus)
- Elif Batuman – The Idiot (Lucy Dacus and Phoebe Bridgers
- Octavia Butler – Parable of the Sower (Julien Baker)
- Mark Denielewski – House Of Leaves (Lucy Dacus)
- Matthew Desmond – Evicted (Julien Baker)
- Elena Ferrante – the Neapolitan Novels (Lucy Dacus)
- Madeline Ffitch – Stay and Fight (Julien Baker and Lucy Dacus)
- Mohsin Hamid – Exit West (Julien Baker)
- Joseph Heller – Catch-22 (Julien Baker)
- Frank Herbert – Dune (Lucy Dacus)
- Miranda July – No One Belongs Here More Than You (Lucy Dacus)
- Robin Wall Kimmerer – Braiding Sweetgrass (Lucy Dacus)
- Krishnamurti – Think on These Things (Lucy Dacus)
- R.O Kwon – The Incendiaries (Julien Baker)
- Olivia Laing – The Lonely City (Julien Baker)
- Ursula K. Le Guin – The Left Hand of Darkness (Lucy Dacus)
- Madeleine L’Engle – A Wrinkle in Time (Lucy Dacus)
- Audre Lorde – Sister Outsider (Lucy Dacus)
- Carmen Maria Machado – Her Body and Other Parties (Phoebe Bridgers)
- Carson McCullers – The Ballad of the Sad Café and Other Stories (Lucy Dacus)
- Michelle McNamara – I’ll Be Gone in the Dark (Phoebe Bridgers)
- Patrick Modiano – Young Once (Lucy Dacus)
- Toni Morrison – Jazz (Lucy Dacus)
- Eileen Myles – Cool for You (Lucy Dacus)
- Viet Thanh Nguyen – The Sympathizer (Julien Baker)
- Rainer Maria Rilke – Letters to a Young Poet (Lucy Dacus)
- Sogyal Rinpoche – The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying (Lucy Dacus)
- Sally Rooney – Conversations With Friends (Phoebe Bridgers)
- J.K. Rowling – Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (Phoebe Bridgers)
- Arundhati Roy – The God of Small Things (Julien Baker and Lucy Dacus)
- George Saunders – Tenth of December (Phoebe Bridgers and Lucy Dacus)
- David Sedaris – When You Are Engulfed in Flames (Phoebe Bridgers)
- Amartya Sen – The Idea of Justice (Julien Baker)
- Maurice Sendak – In the Night Kitchen (Phoebe Dacus)
- Patti Smith – Just Kids (Julien Baker)
- John Steinbeck – East of Eden (Julien Baker)
- Michelle Tea – Modern Tarot (Phoebe Bridgers)
- Bessel van der Kolk – The Body Keeps the Score (Phoebe Bridgers)
- Tennessee Williams – Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (Julien Baker)
- Hanya Yanagihara – A Little Life (Lucy Dacus)
