The memory book
by Harry Lorayne, Jerry Lucas · first published 1974
69% recommend31% neutral
Why HN recommends it
Teaches classic mnemonic techniques such as visualization, association, and memory palaces for remembering lists, names, and numbers. It serves as a practical starting point for beginners learning memorization methods.
Summarised by Claude from recommending comments
Unleash the hidden power of your mind through Harry Lorayne and Jerry Lucas's simple, fail-safe memory system, and you can become more effective, more imaginative, and more powerful, at work, at school, in sports and play. Discover how easy it is to: file phone numbers, data, figures, and appointments right in your head; learn foreign words and phrases with ease; read with speed--and greater understanding; shine in the classroom--and shorten study hours; dominate social situations, and more.
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Absolutely hands down this: http://www.amazon.com/Memory-Book-Classic-Improving-School/d... Within a day I was memorizing lists of 75 items forwards AND backwards. Completely random items as well. It makes remembering names a joke, you will remember them for years.…
on “What one book could give me a new, useful superpower?” ↗…palaces; just someplace to put the head of the list. That's how I memorize decks of cards: http://blog.diiq.org/post/3366119815/what-are-the-step-by-st... An excellent resource is Lorrayne and Lucas' The Memory Book:http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0345410025/ref=redir_mdp_mobil... , which has been lifechanging for me.
on “Learn to remember everything: The memory palace technique” ↗…but they've been written about extensively for a long time now. You don't hear much of these older books, but they're well worth looking at if you're interested in this topic: http://www.amazon.com/The-Memory-Book-Classic-Improving/dp/0... http://www.amazon.com/Use-Your-Perfect-Memory-Techniques/dp/... http://www.amazon.com/The-Memory-Book-Remember-Anything/dp/1... There are many others as well.
on “How You Can Be a Memory Champion” ↗If people like these things, I recommend The Memory Book by Harry Lorayne (he's written a few other memory books as well). I read the book and tried its techniques when I was young. Interestingly, I started doing spaced repetition more recently (2 years ago),…
on “How I remember what I learn” ↗Another good resource is The Memory Book[0]. It covers a few different systems that cover different scenarios, such as lists, like in the article, names and numbers. It uses techniques like the article, but also expands on them in interesting…
on “An ultimate guide to memory palaces” ↗…visualizing weird pictures to remember names and numbers. You have to have a system though, so your first sentence confuses me. If you want to learn how to have a good memory, try these: http://www.amazon.com/Memory-Book-Classic-Improving-School/d... http://www.ludism.org/mentat/
on “Ask HN: How do you memorize?” ↗…not in collegiate art school. I have a copy that I pass around via samizdat, because the mandatory drawing classes here are useless to students without the basic principles. (Also worth noting: 'The Memory Book' by Lucas and Loraynne. Now back in print, an falling-apart copy got me through high school. I can still memorize a deck of cards in under ten minutes.)
on “Want to Remember Everything You'll Ever Learn? Surrender to This Algorithm ” ↗It's not sexy, but I've had great results with "The Memory Book": http://www.amazon.com/Memory-Book-Classic-Improving-School/d... If you want to start working on it right now, then you should definitely read through the Mentat Wiki: http://www.ludism.org/mentat/
on “Ask HN: Good books on memory?” ↗…learning a language is more than just memorization of vocabulary. But elimination of that huge hurdle makes the rest more interesting and tractable. I was tipped off to this by the best seller "The Memory Book" (which I highly recommend), but now there are plenty of web resources that may be as effective. Here are some relevant links: http://www.amazon.com/Memory-Book-Classic-Improving-School/d... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memorization…
on “Everything You Thought You Knew About Learning Is Wrong” ↗There was a different memory book suggested in the MeFi thread, but I really got a lot out of "The Memory Book: The Classic Guide to Improving Your Memory at Work, at School, and at Play" http://www.amazon.com/The-Memory-Book-Classic-Improving/dp/0...
on “What one book could give me a new, useful superpower?” ↗A how-to book like The Memory Book[1] is good for getting started on the techniques. When I read Moonwalking With Einstein it sounded like more and more techniques are being invented all the time, but it didn't go into as much "how-to"…
on “Remembering, as an Extreme Sport” ↗There are a lot of methods that was developed by Harry Lorayne. I recommend to read some of his books (The Memory Book).
on “Method of loci” ↗Also would recommend books by Harry Lorayne (The Memory Book is the most well known). I've not yet read Moonwalking with Einstein to see how it compares, but it likely has the same techniques (loci/memory palace, different mnemonics, peg lists, etc). https://www.amazon.com/Memory-Book-Classic-Improving-School/...…
on “How to Memorize the Largest Known Prime” ↗If you like this stuff, I would strongly recommend Harry Lorayne's books (How To Develop a Super Power Memory or The Memory Book).
on “The Method of Loci: Build Your Memory Palace” ↗The Memory Book - Fantastic, maybe not always practical unless you have a lot of practice, but extremely useful to at least understand some of the strategies to memorizing strings Understanding Weatherfax - for an attempted…
on “Ask HN: Books you read in 2015?” ↗