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The "Dragon Book" is pretty solid and a widely accepted resource: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compilers:_Principles,_Techniqu...

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One of the authors of the Rosalyn compiler has a different opinion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5149315. And he gives some examples of much better books.

It used to be good, but it is not any longer thought of that way.

I think you'll learn more from porting a simple C compiler than you will from any compiler book, at least given a fixed amount of time to do either task in.

This book, http://www.amazon.com/Compiler-Generator-Automatic-Computati..., which by today's standards is not a very good book, got me started in my compiler career.

And I agree with your basic point that building one is the only to gain true understanding.

If I was going academic and imperative language, I'd suggest this old paper written by The King of Simple Languages and Compilers:

http://www.ethoberon.ethz.ch/WirthPubl/CBEAll.pdf

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