Saturday, September 09, 2006

I've been tagged..


Trinity College Library-Dublin Photograph by Candida Hofer

I've been tagged to do this book meme by anne-marie at verbena-19.blogspot.com.

So, here it goes:

A book that changed my life:
That is a toughie as books are my life, so to say which changed it does not in anyway represent my entwined relationship with the world of books. I suppose one of the moments when I felt a book enter me and begin to rearrange my DNA code was long ago.....in adolescence. I would take my copy of Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte during long, eventless Summer holidays and sit in a quarry and be transported into a totally different world by the power of words.

A book I've read more than once: The Brothers Karamazov and The Idiot by Dosoyevsky. When I had time to reread books in my twenties I was always coming back to good old Dostoyevsky. I think it had something to do with the conviction in the writing which I completely trusted. I hope to reread him again one of these days.
I remember the first time I reread something was TS Eliot's poem Four Quartets. It was in my grandmother's library and I was about 13 and I didn't understand it much at first reading. So I reread and reread and I still remember the miraculous feeling as understanding of the text's meaning started dawning on my confused brain.

A book I'd want on a desert island: A good book about the fish in the area and how to best catch it and when I settled down to a nice bit of fish cooked in the hot sand I would read a longish biography of Anna Akmatova (a Russian Poet) that I have been meaning to read for ages.

A book that made me laugh: A recent book by an American writer, Rodney Rothman about early retirement called Early Bird. The writer was I think in his early 40s and decided to drop out of the rat race for a while and see how he would fare with the octegenarians in a Florida retirement home. Some parts were truely, beautifully funny.

A book that made me cry: Many many, the last one was a book by Mariane Pearlman about her husband's death called 'A Mighty Heart"

A book I wish had been written: My own that made sense of everything!

A book I wish had never been written: Mein Kampf by Adolf Hitler.

Books I'm currently reading: Poems and Prose of Basho, The Fabric of the Cosmos- Brian Greene, Holding Yawulyu-White Culture and Black Women's Law by Zohl de Ishtar, The Great War for Civilisation: The Conquest of the Middle East by Robert Fisk, A Berlin Childhood around 1900 by Walter Benjamin.

Books I've been meaning to read: Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes

What turned me on to fiction:My grandmother and my mother.

Tag 5 others for this meme: I don't really know 5 others but when I do I'll tag them!!

4 comments:

scout said...

nice report!!! why do they call this 'meme' anyways? i already got tagged, har har.
love the shot of the dublin library....now i wish i had gone there but dublin ran short for me as needed to get back to london if i wanted to see anything of wales. highly recommend belfast though!!!!

Annamarie said...

Very interesting report!!! I see you've read some of the same books I have, and many others which I haven't, but would like to. Thanks for bringing them back to my mind.

Nice shot of the Dublin Library.

Someone once explained to me what 'meme' means, but as usual, I've managed to forget. My memory is not worth much lately...

Annamarie said...

P.S. BTW, I keep meaning to tell you that you have a wonderful blog with some truly amazing, beautiful pictures. Very nicely done!!

austin said...

Does anyone know if something awful happens if you don't keep the meme alive. Ie..not spread it to another five?
I also enjoyed both yours, Scout and Annemaries memes. I think a meme is like a gene only it carries cultural material but don't take that as gospel. I forgot to give the artists name for the photo of Trinity library which is a minor crime for which I have remendied by quickly editing her in.
I would like to make it back to Ireland one of these days. I made it to this library many moons ago as I wanted to see in real the Book of Kells. Being of Celtic origins and all!
Thanks annamarie. I feel like a slug in this blogging game as I am so slow at posting but I am enjoying the on line community of you gals over there in Canada!