I read SICP in high school, and it really changed how I thought about programming. Before that, the languages I knew were Python, Java, C++. Ooh, ooh, and TI-

I read SICP in high school, and it really changed how I thought about programming. Before that, the languages I knew were Python, Java, C++. Ooh, ooh, and TI-BASIC. It seemed to my naive like languages were done. I'd written a language of my own, and looking at it now, the changes I'd made look so shallow nowadays... SICP changed that. SICP didn't talk about classes/objects by introducing the syntax, it gave a problem where polymorphism was a perfect solution, and built up an object system from scratch. SICP didn't talk about mutation as just something you do --- SICP discussed how it solved a specific problem. Not claiming that SICP is the be-all end-all of textbooks; but if you're motivated and already know how to program, it is an a brilliant excursion into the fundamentals of programming. In any case, after SICP I realized that language theory is a branch of computer science itself; a branch I soon fell in love with. There's a continuation to this story --- the summer after high school, I wrote a compiler and started reading lambda the ultimate. Learned type theory, started writing Haskell and Common Lisp, and quickly produced several dozen interpreters... And now I'm doing research under Sussman himself! And so for this Kindle-optimized SICP, thank you! I'm sure it will get at least one more young hacker into language theory...