Suggested reading

A couple of months ago I was told about J.M. Coetzee; a South African writer born in Cape Town in 1940; who was educated as a computer scientist and linguist. He has pocketed several literature awards like the CNA prize (in South Africa) for "In the heart of the country", the Lannan Literary Award for ficiton in 1998 and the Nobel Prize in literature in 2003. The book I was recommended to read was "Foe"; now I want to share this experience with my readers (whose are not more than two or three) for whose I feel a heartly affection. Here I go with a little synopsis of it.

" In 1720 the eminent man of letters Daniel Foe is approached by Susan Barton, lately a castaway on a desert island. She wants him to tell her story, and that of the enigmatic man who has become her rescuer, companion, master and sometime lover: Cruso. Cruso is dead, and his manservant, Friday, is incapable of speech. As she tries to relate the truth about him, the ambitious Barton cannot help turning Cruso into her invention."

For as narrated by Foe -as by Coetzee himself- the stories we thought we knew acquiredepths that are at once treacherous, elegant, and unexpectedly moving.

I really enjoy this great author in times when "the Da Vinci Code", "Harry Potter" and "Any Crap book by Paulo Cohelo" rule the universe of literature.

Volan

Comments

Vidya Jayaraman said…

As to HP and Dan Brown ruling the universe of literature? No, They are just popular.

The first book of Coetzee's that I picked up was Disgrace.The depths of characterization couched in a stark prose impressed me so much.I think Foe is a much more multi-layered, multi-dimensional work and I really really loved it.

6:44 PM

Volan's last will.

This is a picture of the envelope I received. On September the 29th I received a letter sent from London Metropolitan Police’s forensic department. The envelope contains Volan’s death report. I am still recovering from such a terrible moment. As Volan’s closest (and perhaps sole) friend I am in the obligation of publishing these lines on his own blog, as it was his last will. In strange circumstances my dearest friend Volan passed away in the dawn of the 23rd of September in Homerton Hospital in London. His body was carted off from the churchyard of Saint Paul’s Cathedral after a mad night out with Siobhan (Sweeny), -an Irish-Scottish blues singer whose Volan had just met few hours before in the surrounding areas of Anexo Bar, close to Farringdon Station. At the moment that the ambulance arrived at the place Volan showed a critical state and almost without vital signals dying a while after indoors, in the above mentioned hospital. The death certificated shows a very cryptic language ...

let's give a break to our mother

This is an e-mail and digital invitation going on around the world. Let's switch off the lights, tv, lap tops and other electrical devices tomorrow the 17th of April 2007 from 19:53 to 20:00 . It is just 7 minutes and the benefits for the planet will be notorious. Please spread the word!. I am not fond chained e-mails but I reckon this is a very good reason. Esta es una cyber-invitacion que esta dandole la vuelta a mundo. Apagemos las luces, televisores, computadores personales y demas aparatos electricos manana 17 de Abril de 2007 desde las 19:53 hasta las 20:00. Son solo 7 minutos y los beneficios para el planeta seran notorios. Comuniquenlo a sus amigos, envien e-mails o escribanlo en sus blogs... No soy muy amigo de las cadenas de correos electronicos pero considero que esta es una buena causa.

norman mclaren

Norman McLaren was one of the most significant abstract filmmakers of the British inter-war period. Born in 1914 in Stirling, Scotland, he entered the Glasgow School of Fine Arts in 1932, where he became interested in film and joined the School's Kine Society. His earliest extant film, Seven Till Five (1933), a "day in the life of an art school", was clearly influenced by Eisenstein and displays a strongly formalist attitude. (more)

Nevermind the bollocks!

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