THE FIVE BOOKS YOU WOULD TAKE TO A DESERT ISLAND AND WHY

Eric Owen Moss, 57, Los Angeles architect whose current projects include work in Austria, England, Spain, Palo Alto, Culver City and Los Angeles. Moss is a fellow of the American Institute of Architects.

1. “The Brothers Karamazov,” by Feodor Dostoevski

Between the grand inquisitor’s statement on the impossible burden of religion and Jesus’ answer, everything in the world is explained.

2. “Voices of Silence,” by Andre Malraux

Malraux stretches the experience of art across the entire planet and the entire face of time. The book outlines the vastness of the artistic experience, how different the expressions have been globally and historically, and yet how it all aspires to the same goal.

3. “Thus Spake Zarathustra,” by Friedrich Nietzsche

The book is an argument for a relentless critical mind that takes down every pretense from the cultural to the political to the academic and leaves only art, precariously standing.

4. “The Crooked Timber of Humanity,” by Isaiah Berlin

The title comes from a quote by Kant, “From the crooked timber of humanity no straight thing can ever be made.” Berlin has a comprehensive and sophisticated way of accounting for the complex behavior and

motivations of mankind. It’s a Rashomonized vision of history--no simple explanations, no single vantage point.

5. “Four Quartets,” by T.S. Eliot

A heroic effort to get

fundamental essence--a religious center--of things without relying on archaic symbols and the conventional language that is no longer adequate to communicate that experience.