“To feel most beautifully alive means to be reading something beautiful, ready always to apprehend in the flow of language the sudden flash of poetry. “
–Gaston Bachelard
I love imagining the stretch of summer days and what I might READ. All those works that in the hum and canter of working days piled up next to the bed– glancing towards me with reproach at my inability to manage reflective time–those will be met and relished. The Salon community is an incredible gathering of readers– so I ask you– in a breath of a moment– to suggest a favourite read. Simply comment on this post with the name and author– and a few words about the book–especially why you enjoyed your immersion in it.
Facebook can have its uses– I get some brilliant reading recommendations through my globally scattered friends. This article, “Reading: The Struggle” caught my attention in considering how the form of the novel may adjust to our increasingly fragmented attention:
What I’m talking about is the state of constant distraction we live in and how that affects the very special energies required for tackling a substantial work of fiction—for immersing oneself in it and then coming back and back to it on numerous occasions over what could be days, weeks, or months, each time picking up the threads of the story or stories, the patterning of internal reference, the positioning of the work within the context of other novels and indeed the larger world.
I am thankful and hugely appreciative of the space our work together in the Salon provides for deep immersion in the realm of language and ideas. Thank you for a wonderful 10th year of Salon studies: looking forward to the 2014-15 season full of Proust, Joyce, Faulkner, Durrell …Dorothy Richardson? Homer? Taking recommendations now…
One of the most beautiful books I have read in the past 20 years was ‘Fugitive Pieces’ by Anne Michaels. It is not coincidental that she is a poet, first, by trade; every sentence is crafted with jewel-like precision which positively demands a second, third, fourth glance. It is a profoundly moving work about – what else – love and loss. My life would have been poorer without it. If you have never read it I envy you the revelation you have in store…
“Out Stealing Horses” by Per Petterson
264 pages. Vintage Books.
Strange, surprising, beautiful. I was immediately drawn into this luminous story infused with the white skies, pine forests and fjords of Norway. A deceptively simple style relates a haunting and powerful drama between two families, in which innocence, betrayal and nostalgia for a life in tune with nature all play their part. One of the best contemporary novels I’ve read in a long time.
I’d SO love for Toby to salon the following three heart-throbs:
‘By Grand Central Station I Sat Down and Wept’ – Elizabeth Smart.
‘The Heat of the Day’ – Elizabeth Bowen
‘Journey To The End Of Night’ by Louis F Celine. C’mon, have a go. He’s the Proust of the demi-monde. He leaves you battered, shattered and… well, beatified. Discuss?