It’s Captain Picard Day! Here Are His Favorite Books

Hamlet, by William Shakespeare
There’s no way to know how often Picard is quoting from Shakespeare, particularly when you factor in how much of that quoting is probably going on inside his head, but whenever he throws down with some Hamlet, it’s beyond awesome. Part of what makes a bad TNG episode good (like “Hide and Q,” for example) is Picard rocking some Shakespeare. Picard doesn’t own the text of Hamlet. He doesn’t need to. He just lives and breathes it all the time.

Moby Dick, by Herman Melville
We all know Star Trek loves Moby Dick, but in First Contact, we learn that even the awesomely enlightened Jean-Luc Picard can succumb to Captain Ahab style revenge. He’s reminded of his obsessive qualities by Lily; he then proceeds to quote straight from one of the novel’s more famous passages. It should be noted, however, that Picard changes the word “mortar” to “cannon.” Whatever. At least he doesn’t accidentally say “phaser.”

Turn Right at Machu Picchu: Rediscovering the Lost City One Step at a Time, by Mark Adams
Picard is obviously an adventurer and great leader, but at one point in his life, he also thought about becoming an archaeologist. He does cool Indiana Jones stuff in “Captain’s Holiday” and “The Chase,” and talks about archaeology all the time. (Did you know Patrick Stewart and Harrison Ford share a birthday and are the exact same age? Weird.) Anyway, Picard would probably love this awesome Mark Adams archaeology narrative, all about retracing the steps of discovery this famous lost city. Because when Picard isn’t discovering boldly, he’s rediscovering.

Flute for Dummies, Karen Moratz
Remember when Picard learned how to play the flute in “The Inner Light”? Well, that was all the result of living a whole lifetime in the span of like 45 minutes, and though his memories of the planet Kataan will always be near and dear to Picard’s heart, he sort of forgot how to play the flute. So, he had to order this book from the replicator, so as to not be embarrassed during those awesome music recitals in Ten Forward.

A Christmas Carol, by Charles Dickens
This is a little unfair, and only on the list because Patrick Stewart did such a great one-man Christmas Carol in the ’90s. However, in All Good Things… Q takes Picard on a Dickensian trip through the good Captain’s whole life. Q is basically the ghost of past, present, and future all rolled into one. You can bet Picard reread Dickens right afterwards. Proof? There’s that really creepy Christmas scene in Star Trek: Generations, which is Picard’s “fantasy” about having an awesome life.

Sonnets, by Shakespeare
Oh man, does Jean-Luc love Shakespeare. When he’s not doing a killer Hamlet, he’s quoting from the Sonnets in order to win back Lwaxana Troi from the clutches of the Ferengi. Is Picard’s “Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?” as good as the one Patrick Stewart would have done, like, for real? Well…

The Big Sleep, by Raymond Chandler
When he’s not keeping it classy with the bigger names of the western canon, Picard loves a hard-boiled noir mystery. In “The Big Goodbye,” we’re introduced to the fictional stories of Dixon Hill, a gumshoe in the vein of the famous Philip Marlowe. Because Dixon Hill isn’t a real fictional character (wrap your mind around that) and Chandler’s Marlowe, is, I think Picard was obsessed with Raymond Chandler. Was Dixon Hill Picard’s own Raymond Chandler fanfic?
What other books do you think Jean-Luc Picard loves?