Several years ago, I purchased a book entitled 101 Letters to a Prime Minister by Canadian author Yann Martel. Martel had gained fame with Life of Pi; with Letters he turned his attention to Stephen Harper, who was Prime Minister at the time of its writing. Every two weeks, Martel sent Harper, an anti-intellectual in the vein of our current President, a short work of great literature along with a letter of recommendation for it.
“One of these days,” I thought to myself when I perused Martel’s pages, “I am going to read all of these.”
That day has come. What better time to delve into a book project than when one is stranded by COVID? I have nothing if not time these days – no job, no family living nearby, no destinations. So in late-June, after our public library opened up for curbside pickup, I launched into the COVID reading project.
To date, I’ve read 20 of Martel’s recommendations, not counting the ones I had read in the past. What I like about this process is that I’ve committed to reading all of them, regardless of whether I think I will like them in advance. This isn’t the usual way I would select a book (more on that another time, perhaps), but it has the virtue that it is opening my eyes to new authors, approaches, and ideas. Also, since the books are generally short, reading each one isn’t a huge investment in time if it fails to excite.
And what a rich collection it is! Martel’s commentary tells me why he chose the book and what to look out for, and this is all part of the adventure. I know that you might not want to take on this kind of a crazy challenge, so I’ll recommend a few to you: Bonjour Tristesse by Francois Sagan, Chronicle of a Death Foretold by Gabriel Garcia Marquez, The Cellist of Sarajevo, by Steven Galloway. There were books I somehow had missed in school, like To Kill a Mockingbird (what a great read!), or somehow avoided because they just seemed too out-there (Kafka’s Metamorphosis or Becket’s Waiting for Godot). It’s quite a literary marathon, and I wish there were someone doing it with me. Any takers?
No comments:
Post a Comment