books

JCD tagged me. I am filling out the questionnaire he sent.

As I told JCD I really do not enjoy doing these kind of things because books are like lovers ... some are mistakes; some are shared some are read and revisited and reloved; some were borrowed; some were never returned; some were hard to part with, others easy to leave behind; some books were fast and some were sweeter ... you get the picture ... so, I am not going to be incredibly exhaustive in this list (don't worry, I've DEFINITELY read more books than had lovers) ... what I am trying to say is all of these were personal; all of these were personal experiences; some, very intimate. Yeah - I am a book-lover!

When I was growing up whenever we visited someone elses house, my sister went straight to the bathroom (an excuse to scope out the joint) and I went straight to the bookshelf (an excuse to scope out the minds of the house).

So here goes:

Total Books Owned:

Owned - easily 1500 realistically, closer to 2000 (not counting text books for school/uni which would add about 450). Permanently borrowed - around 100

Last Book I Bought:

"Learn-To-Drive Handbook" by Kerry O'Sullivan (self-explanatory this one).

Last Book(s) I Read:

• "I Am David" by Anne Holm - Read this when I was in Grade 3 - loved it then, made me cry now. Nicked from my little cousin Van & finished it in one sitting on Sunday.
• "Globalization and its Discontents" by Joseph Steiglitz (mandatory reading for any one who wants to know more about the IMF/World bank and how much they've fucked up - by someone who was the leading economist at the World Bank.) Finished it last Friday.
• "The Fight" by Norman Mailer. Old Norm - an artist. Even if you do not follow boxing, you will appreciate the mastery of this book as Norman Mailer gives a first-hand account of that infamous battle between Mohammed Ali and George Foreman in Africa - the same documented in that famous doco "Once Were Kings". Reading this is pure enjoyment. This was my 3rd re-read, finished 10 days ago. Classic.
• "We Were The Mulvaney's" by Joyce Carol Oates. Finishing it now only because I've bloody started it. Big book. Big sticker marked "Oprah Winfrey Book Club" on the cover - should have known it would be a pain in the a** ... but needed something to read that was non-taxing. Don't enjoy her style. At all. But appreciate it nontheless. Love what it means - that Eden does not last forever, that falls from grace can bring a new kind of life, from destitution - how Oprah does that sound!

Books Currently On The (back)Burner

• "The Glass Bead Game" Herman Hesse
• "Collapse : How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed" Jared Diamond
• " A Brief History of Time" Stephen Hawking. Second read - trying to actually understand it this time.

• "Infinite Jest" David Foster Wallace. Massive book. Have been 'reading' this one for a longa while now - promise to finish soon!!
• "Cold Comfort Farm" Stella Gibbons
• "The War Against Cliche" Martin Amis

Books I Like To Read:

• ON Art theory - lots of different things about art theory and history of fashion from mnemonics to Martin Heiddegard, from Oscar Wilde to Gore Vidal.
• ON Modern thrid-world economics - not dry texts but reflective experiential accounts.
• ON Travel - but nothing too thin and wishy washy back-packer yar yar. More along the lines of mountain-climbing accounts; biographies of famous explorers; less famous, more intrepid accounts of modern travel etc
• ON Classics - my list is endless. I mean "classic" in the Victorian sense. Revival of Thomas Hardy ('whip me, chain me"); always Bronte sisters and Jane Austen; currently revisiting Tennessee William's various plays; more into poetry now (Specifically early American Modernist) - previously American Beat (Charles Bukowski) etc etc
• Biographies - on artists; travellers; authors; basically interesting people. But must be well-written, well-researched.
• ON Criticism - of art, of art theory, of philosophy theory, of modern economic theory.
• ON vegetating - good modern murder fiction eg anything in the Kay Scarpetta series; even some of my sisters Steven Kings; etc
  Just good fiction.

Books That Mean A Lot To Me:

DISCLAIMER This list is not exhaustive ... many other books have left some indelible mark on the skin of my mind.

• "The Prophet" Khalil Gibran
• "South" Sir Earnest Shackleton
• "Guns, Germs and Steel : The Fates of Human Societies" Jared Diamond
• "The Future Eaters" Tim Flannery
• "The Catcher in the Rye" JD Salinger
• "She's Come Undone" Wally Lamb
• "For God, Country and Coca-Cola" Mark Pendergrast
• "Slouching towards Bethlehem" Joan Didion
• "A Fine Balance" Rohinton Mistry
• "Cloudstreet" Tim Winton
• "Orientalism" Edouard Said
• "Heart of Darkness" Joseph Conrad
• "SAS Survivial Guide" SAS
• "Touching the Void" Joe Simpson
• "What Katy Did" Susan Coolidge
• "The Magic Faraway Tree" Enid Blyton
• "Johnnie" David Malouf
• "Mrs Dalloway" Virginia Woolf
• "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" Robert Pirsig
• "Another Country" James Baldwin
• "On the Road" Jack Kerouac
• "1984" George Orwell
• "The BFG" Roald Dahl
• "Brave New World" Aldous Huxley
• "The Picture of Dorian Gray" Oscar Wilde
• "Brideshead Revisited" Evelyn Waugh
• "Crime and Punishment" Fyodor Dostoyevsky
• "Goodnight Mr Tom" Michelle Magorian
• "Lord of the Flies" William Golding
• "Midnight's Children" Salman Rushdie
• "The Little Friend" Donna Tartt
• "To Kill a Mockingbird" Harper Lee
• "Wuthering Heights" Emily Brontë
• "The Feminine Mystique" Betty Friedan
• "A Clockwork Orange" Anthony Burgess
• "The Incredible Lightness of Being" Milan Kundera

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As I have said before - I am going gaga in this place where books are scarce - just can't get them - do you know what that's like for the girl who goes to bookshops for fun, before shopping, before even, chocolate cake and milk??!! It's painful!

So do not forget - it's my birthday on 28th September - that is SOOOOOOOON!! If you post a book to me now, it may just get here in time! HINT: I am dying for a copy of PAtrick White's "Voss" and also Joseph Conrad's "Heart of Darkness".