1. Ayn Rand - The Fountainhead
I actually read this like two years ago, but last week I was on this ridiculously long train ride with Sudev and he mentioned he had been reading this for the past few months and I flipped out it made me so happy. I love Ayn Rand, her writing is brilliant. I've been entertaining this thought that her books aren't really the novels they appear to be, but philosophy books in disguise. And her philosophy is, basically, that self-interest should be glorified. I've also read Atlas Shrugged and The Anthem, but I like this one best. Read it! (Or, you know, browse it at a bookstore or something.)
2. Barack Obama - Dreams from my Father
Ah. Well, enough has been said about this guy, so I'll just give you a short quote from the book.
I learned to slip back and forth between my black and white worlds, understanding that each possessed its own language and customs and structures of meaning, convinced that with a bit of translation on my part the two worlds would eventually cohere. Still, the feeling that something wasn't quite right stayed with me. There was a trick there somewhere, although what the trick was, who was doing the tricking, and who was being tricked, eluded my conscious grasp.
He writes mostly about race, nationalism, black civil rights, his life and heritage. And I was very moved, despite it all.
3. Gabriel Garcia Marquez - 100 Years of Solitude
I'm proud, and a little stupefied, that I have managed to finish reading almost all his books. Not all are worth reading, but this one was magical. Love in the Time of Cholera was pretty good too, although I might have been frowning with disbelief half the time.
4. Leo Tolstoy - Anna Karenina
This has to be one of my favourite books to ever be. And I'll tell you something silly. I haven't actually finished it yet. Mostly because it's so beautiful, and I know the ending is tragic and I don't want it to end anyway. So when Zy wanted something to read, I was more than happy to lend this to her.
Here are some quotes I like.
3. Gabriel Garcia Marquez - 100 Years of Solitude
I'm proud, and a little stupefied, that I have managed to finish reading almost all his books. Not all are worth reading, but this one was magical. Love in the Time of Cholera was pretty good too, although I might have been frowning with disbelief half the time.
4. Leo Tolstoy - Anna Karenina
This has to be one of my favourite books to ever be. And I'll tell you something silly. I haven't actually finished it yet. Mostly because it's so beautiful, and I know the ending is tragic and I don't want it to end anyway. So when Zy wanted something to read, I was more than happy to lend this to her.
She hardly knew at times what it was she feared, and what she hoped for. Whether she feared or desired what had happened, or what was going to happen, and exactly what she longed for, she could not have said.
5. Tom Robbins - Still Life with Woodpecker
I highly recommend this book. Parts of it really hit home with me. This part I wasn't sure how I was supposed to react to:
I highly recommend this book. Parts of it really hit home with me. This part I wasn't sure how I was supposed to react to:
When we're incomplete, we're always searching for somebody to complete us. When, after a few years or a few months of a relationship, we find that we're still unfulfilled, we blame our partners and take up with somebody more promising. This can go on and on--series polygamy--until we admit that while a partner can add sweet dimensions to our lives, we, each of us, are responsible for our own fulfillment. Nobody else can provide it for us, and to believe otherwise is to delude ourselves dangerously and to program for eventual failure every relationship we enter.
6. Jane Austen - Persuasion
Of course this book has be on the list. I'll risk sounding delusional here and tell you that once or twice or maybe more, I find myself having an imaginary conversation with Anne. Not that she says much, but she is calm and disarming. Incidentally, I always travel with this book. Wow, that really does sound mildly obsessive.
7. Stephen Colbert - I am America (And so can you!)
This book was hilarious.
This book was amazing. And the movie was just as great too. And yes, I am aware that I am too liberal with the use of hyperbole but this book will really change your life. Like jumping off a cliff. But in a good way.
And so, Chinese New Year is upon us again. I made the most of it by baking brownies, different types of muffins and a little thing I like to call chocolate chip cookie dough cheesecake. My parents, supportive as they are, forced it on a nice unsuspecting lady next door. Or maybe it was all a plot to get rid of it. But anyways, I'm looking forward to seeing my cousins tomorrow. They and their perfect complexions and diction. Gah.
Of course this book has be on the list. I'll risk sounding delusional here and tell you that once or twice or maybe more, I find myself having an imaginary conversation with Anne. Not that she says much, but she is calm and disarming. Incidentally, I always travel with this book. Wow, that really does sound mildly obsessive.
7. Stephen Colbert - I am America (And so can you!)
This book was hilarious.
America used to live by the motto "Father Knows Best." Now we're lucky if "Father Knows He Has Children." We've become a nation of sperm donors and baby daddies. But there's more to being a father than taking kids to Chuck E. Cheese and supplying the occasional Y-chromosome. A father has to be a provider, a teacher, a role model, but most importantly, a distant authority figure who can never be pleased. Otherwise, how will children ever understand the concept of God?8. Ian McEwan - Atonement
This book was amazing. And the movie was just as great too. And yes, I am aware that I am too liberal with the use of hyperbole but this book will really change your life. Like jumping off a cliff. But in a good way.
And so, Chinese New Year is upon us again. I made the most of it by baking brownies, different types of muffins and a little thing I like to call chocolate chip cookie dough cheesecake. My parents, supportive as they are, forced it on a nice unsuspecting lady next door. Or maybe it was all a plot to get rid of it. But anyways, I'm looking forward to seeing my cousins tomorrow. They and their perfect complexions and diction. Gah.
I didn't know what hate felt like, not the hate that comes after love. It's huge and desperate and it longs to be proved wrong. And every day it's proved right it grows a little more monstrous. If the love was passion, the hate will be obsession. A need to see the once-loved weak and cowed and beneath pity. Disgust is close and dignity is far away. The hate is not only for the once loved, it's for yourself too; how could you ever have loved this?
Jeanette Winterson - The Passion
Have a merry CNY, folks!
Emotions, in my experience, aren't covered by single words. I don't believe in 'sadness,' 'joy,' or 'regret.' Maybe the best proof that the language is patriarchal is that it oversimplifies feelings. I'd like to have at my disposal complicated hybrid emotions, Germanic train-car constructions like, say, 'the happiness that attends disaster.' Or: 'the disappointment of sleeping with one's fantasy.' I'd like to show how 'intimations of morality brought on by aging family members' connects with 'the hatred of mirrors that begins in middle age.' I'd like to have a word for 'the sadness inspired by failing restaurants' as well as for 'the excitement of getting a room with a minibar.Jeffrey Eugenides - Middlesex
I cannot express it; but surely you and everybody have a notion that there is, or should be an existence of yours beyond you. What were the use of creation if I were entirely contained here? My great miseries in this world have been Heathcliff's miseries, and I watched and felt each from the beginning; my great thought in living is himself. If all else perished, and he remained, I should still continue to be; and if all else remained, and he were annihilated, the Universe would turn to a mighty stranger: I should not seem a part of it. My love for Linton is like the foliage in the woods. Time will change it, I'm well aware, as winter changes the trees — my love for Heathcliff resembles the eternal rocks beneath — a source of little visible delight, but necessary.Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
Have a merry CNY, folks!
