Ahhh!I am sipping coffee.
Currently, I am reading Carson McCullers’ 1940 novel, The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter.
It’s the latter part of December, the year is coming to a close.
In this holiday season, do you ever just sit back and think about all of the great books you have read over the past year?
I do.
This evening, after supper, I have stolen these few moments from visiting humans, to re-visit the past year in reading.
I want to mention a few of the best books I have read in 2005.
When I say “Best Books of 2005” I do not mean books that were written or published in 2005, [I find that percentage-wise, I do not read much of the current stuff] but I mean the best ones that I have read in 2005.
For example, the first one that comes to mind, was written quite a while ago, but finally read by me in 2005.
Vladimir Nabokov’s Lolita.
What an incredible book. What more can I say? Every human being should read it.
Then, I think of Peter Carey’s Oscar and Lucinda. I highly recommend it.
Another book that I thoroughly enjoyed, in the past year, was Ian McEwan’s Saturday.
Reading McEwan is always an exercise in the experience of.... superbity.
Another one that was just truly exquisite, was Matthew Pearl’s debut novel, The Dante Club.
And Jane Urquhart’s latest one, Map of Glass.
All of these were books that I savored, loved, and adored.
Along with these, a word must be said about non-fiction, which I also dabble in, from time to time. And the best thing I read all year in this genre would have to be Karen Armstrong’s memoirs.
Through The Narrow Gate and The Spiral Staircase.
It’s been a great year of reading.
But now for the best thing I read in 2005.
[.....drumroll.........]
Margaret Atwood’s Alias Grace.
If you have not yet read this book.... well, really... let me recommend it as your first New Year’s Resolution, to do so.
I welcome your comments, as to your own favorite reads of the past year.
All the best to you.
Happy Holidays!
.... I need more coffee ....
************
I read Alias Grace when it first came out and, sadly, I did not know Margaret Atwood or her work at the time. I found it an incredibly interesting book. I now consider myself an Atwood fan, her writing always surprises me.
ReplyDeleteI've got a love/hate thing with Nabokov. I've never found another author who can write so beautifully about such ugly characters.
Yeah, isn't Atwood just the best?
ReplyDeleteI have read so many of her books, and not a dud in the mix. Of all of them, maybe Oryx and Crake threw me a bit for a loop. It may have just been a bad week for me. It bears re-reading.
And Nabokov.
Lolita and Invitation To A Beheading are all that I have read of him. I want to read more, for sure.
Alias Grace I believe is Atwood's best. An Amazing book.
ReplyDeleteI hope to get around to reading Lolita one of these days. After Reading Lolita in Tehran it seems like something I have to do. Now if only I didn't need to sleep...
Stephanie,
ReplyDeleteI think I agree with you about the Alias Grace, although I really liked Blind Assassin also.
The remarkable thing about both books (as well as other Atwood) is that she is able to keep us interested in a basic literal adventure-romantic-mystery plot while maintaining an undercurrent of subtle layered meaning.
The way she used the werewolf theme, for example, in Grace. Or the way the seemingly divergent stories always come together in the end.
Reading the second time around is like having a veil lifted in any literature, but Atwood is so danged sneaky about it!
Not that you need it, but a suggestion: Lolita...get the annotated edition. The lepidopteral motif is crazy and just great fun.
You have a terrific blogsite, by the way.
Thanks Anon for the compliment and recommendation on the Lolita edition.
ReplyDeleteI think you are spot on in your assessment of Atwood. I liked Blind Assassin very much but was ultimately a little disappointed. Have any of you read Surfacing? It is early Atwood and my fav after Alias Grace.
Stefanie:
ReplyDeleteThe book Surfacing and I have a long and illustrious history.
I once wrote a review of it, as follows:
On the exterior many lives are impetuously lived, in constant motion, constant flux, demanding change... while on the inside, important wheels have long since stopped turning. Crucial questions languish, not so much from being already answered as from never having been asked. Another type of person floats along fairly steady, and constant diversion is not really an issue... but on the inside, they are a whirligig. Always asking and re-asking, backpedalling, and here in the unseen realm the action is taking place, like a duck's feet underwater.
The nameless protagonist in Atwood's Surfacing is of this latter variety, contemplative and introspective. Together with three friends of the former type of personality (a married couple and her boyfriend Joe), these four drive off into the remote Quebec wilderness for a few days of R & R. This whirligig character however, has a far greater purpose in mind. She is returning here to her childhood home in search of her father who has mysteriously vanished without a trace. While these other three suntan, fish, and bicker, she is on a quest that calls forth a recollection of her entire upbringing and childhood. We sense that if she finds her father at all, it will be in a way that is as surprising to the reader as it will be to herself.
She's a great character. If it wasn't for her the others would seemingly starve to death, seated at the table and surrounded by victuals but unaware of how to prepare lunch. She's the organizer, the fish-filleter, the decision-maker... hourly explaining to her friends what will happen next. She is the individual who surfaces, thinks for herself, and finds an identity within. In stark contrast are her friends who seem to only find sustenance in the pieces they can bite off of each other and ingest.
As in so much of Atwood's work, these men are soon to reveal their inherent nasty dogness. On two occasions Whirligig avoids being (essentially) raped by each of them only by reminding them that it is "the right time" for her to get pregnant. But she is not a heroine without her own foibles. She realizes her own problems, the greatest of which may be her her inability to return the "love" that has been offered her throughout her life. Her detached coldness. But the importance in becoming whole (self-actualized?) may lie right there in this word "realizing", which, in the case of this novel MAY be synonymous with the word "surfacing". Throughout the book a central question seems to repeat itself... what does it mean to love? What if I don't "feel" love when someone says "I love you"? What does it mean to love one's past, one's history? To love your parents, your self... to love your lovers. And what does it mean to withdraw, to UTTERLY withdraw? These are the kind of meaty questions that surface in this book, brilliantly written and permeated with dark symbolism and a misty/ethereal 70's New-Ageyness to it. In Atwoodland, anything and everything can be a talisman.
"It's true, I am by myself; this is what I wanted, to stay here alone. From any rational point of view I am absurd; but there are are no longer any rational points of view." Is Whirligig sane or insane on the last page? Surfacing or submerged? The author leaves the verdict in the hands of the reader. I enjoyed reading it, and haven't yet set the gavel down.
Great review Cipriano! You encapsulated the book so well.
ReplyDelete