www.areyoukiddingme.com

Sometimes, life is sweet. Sometimes, life is fun. Sometimes, you're just like WTF?

Tuesday, December 14, 2004

Why are books so wonderful?

Last nite, I picked my favorite book of all time, Memoirs of a Geisha by Arthur Golden, off the bookshelf and started reading chapter one. It was breathtaking. I was instantly transported into a different time and place and saw things through different eyes and emotions. I was amazed. I had forgotten what an immersive experience that book really is. Before picking up that book last nite, I hadn't read for pleasure since before the semester started. I really think college makes you hate reading. The last thing you want to do after reading textbook after textbook is strain your eyes more by reading for pleasure. Maybe that's just me.

Anyway, it made me wonder why more people don't read. Reading has something for everyone (and I mean everyone!) unlike mainstream TV and movies. It's so much more indelible than sitting and watching TV (except for MXC on Spike TV of course!) Books allow you to be someone else and "do" things you otherwise wouldn't do. I don't know... I'm just in such awe. I'm looking forward to reading more this holiday break :)

Here's a question: What's your All-Time-Favorite Book and why?

posted by Quyen @ 2:27 PM  

14 Comments:

  • At 3:44 PM , Blogger grace said...

    i don't know about FAVORITE book. or even a favorite author. i'd be hard pressed to pick one.

    maybe maugham. and why? i have no idea. maybe wilde? because he's so witty... he makes the most out of the words that he uses? burgess? nabokov?

    eh, forget it. i'm not picking. i just can't.

     

  • At 4:44 PM , Blogger Caballero Oscuro said...

    yes, steve, as in grace's hubby. hi! good question to draw out a book-loving lurker.

    i'll pick one: atlas shrugged by ayn rand. it's not only a transporting experience, it's transforming...it works as an extremely effective novel but will also probably change the way you think about big business and charities. the fountainhead mines similar themes and is also exceptional, but atlas shrugged is the best.

    i've read memoirs of a geisha, looking forward to seeing zhang ziyi play the role in the movie next year.

     

  • At 5:14 PM , Blogger grace said...

    oh, yeah, baby... i'll bet you are :P hehehe :P

     

  • At 5:40 PM , Blogger Kis Lee said...

    i was a little disappointed by Memoirs of a geisha. i think it's because it was overhyped. by the time i read it, it was already being discussed as some great cultural masterpiece.

    i don't know about favorite, but i'm a huge Stephen King fan. my favorite King book is the Stand. it's about disease, death, the fight between good and evil...what's better than that? i've read that book more than a few times.

    hey look, a Steve sighting...:)

     

  • At 5:48 PM , Blogger Kis Lee said...

    oh and i wasn't trying to rip on your reading tastes or anything like that. i hate when people get all offended if you criticize some book they like. it's nothing personal. people just have different sensibilities.

     

  • At 6:00 PM , Anonymous Anonymous said...

    I really loved Memoirs of a Geisha, although it was a bit weird reading such an evocative story from a woman's perspective - but written by a man.

    My favourite all-time book is House Of Leaves by Mark Z Danielewski. I couldn't put it down. It was thoroughly compelling, sometimes terrifying, and it works on so many levels. I was fascinated by the philosophical issues it addresses - the nature of reality, creativity, good vs evil and peoples' predefined perceptions of...it's pretty heavy going, but so, so worth it. One of those life-changing experiences. The story became more real than I felt entirely comfortable with.

    I also really rate Iain Banks (AKA Iain M. Banks) who's written some great science fiction (my favourite is Use Of Weapons) and contemporary novels (favourites are Whit and Walking On Glass). Some of them are quite dark and often a bit gruesome - on occasion I've thought some gross events were really unnecessary, until I get to the end of the story & there's an amazing plot twist & it all just comes together.

    Finally The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho, and Till We Have Faces by C S Lewis were really great. They're kind of self-help books that were never intended to be self-help books - they both tell beautiful inspiring stories without being cheesy.

    Cher,
    Fran

     

  • At 7:10 PM , Blogger peachy said...

    I'm a Stephen King fan, but I was getting too scared so I had to go on break from his books. I like John Steinbeck's Grapes of Wrath as well as Of Mice and Men. I absolutely love, love The Fountainhead. Although I haven't finished it, I think I don't want to because it's so good. It's hard to explain in words but that Howard Roark is just yummy in a weird, awkward, kind of way.

     

  • At 5:56 AM , Blogger Yankeebob said...

    I love to read. My favorites are The Hobbit/ Lord of the Rings (obvious, but the writing is sooo good), The Little Prince (because I think it's the most positive book I've read), Summer of 42 (I laugh so much reading it), Catcher in the Rye (I still don't get it always), Watership Down (a slap at society), Stand On Zanzibar (pretty bizarre).

    I need to stop now. I could go on for a while.

     

  • At 10:01 AM , Blogger grace said...

    hehehe... giest and his video games. :D

     

  • At 10:22 AM , Blogger Quyen said...

    Wow! I'm so honored that Steve commented on my blog! This is akin to spotting a white elephant in Thailand :P hehehe

    I'll have to check out all the books that you guys posted as your faves... You all write well. So, your taste in writing can't be too bad, right? just kidding :P

    As for Memoirs of a Geisha, people have been asking me why I love that book so much, and I guess I never explained myself.

    It really was a literary revolution in the same way that Amy Tan's Joy Luck Club was the first American novel to ever paint asians as different from our obedient, submissive, good at everything, family centered stereotype. In Memoirs of a Geisha, it was the same idea except in a cultural and societal sense that westerners would never know about. Most people just thought geishas were prostitutes. Who knew such training and politics went into it.

    Additionally, the book is written in an engaging way with very unique descriptions, using nature and metaphors to describe nearly all sense experience in the book. Instead of "Our house leaned to one side", it was "The house was so offended by the ocean sneezing that it leaned away."

    In a way, M of a G was like a representation of eastern thought moreso than a compelling story. The beauty was in the language. Like the Japanese haiku, M of a G was distinctly unique and striking.

     

  • At 10:25 AM , Blogger Jer said...

    First off, I'm not someone who lives in paranoid fear that the government will take over and control our lives. That said, my favorite book of all time is by far "1984" by George Orwell. I read it first in high school and several times since. It's just such an engaging story in such an interesting setting.

    "Memoirs of a Geisha" has been reccomended to me several times by friends because I enjoy Amy Tan. Is it weird that I'm a white guy who really likes stories about asian mothers and daughters? Yes it is. Anyhow, I'll get to Memoirs one of these days and then I'll know what ya'll are talking about.

     

  • At 12:08 PM , Blogger Oddgirl said...

    Holy Crap Q! Steve commented on your blog! Go buy a powerball ticket this instant!

    I love to read. I, like Grace, would be hard pressed to pick a favorite book, author, style, or anything specific. Here's my attempt for right now...

    For classics: Steinbeck(probably Of Mice and Men)
    and I loved The Diary of Anne Frank

    I loved reading Tartuffe by Moliere and Candid by Voltaire.

    I read a lot of poetry too. Most of my favorites come from here. I adore Charles Simic, Allen Ginsberg, and Stephen Dobyns. I musn't leave out The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran.

    Hmm...I can't say I have a contemporary favorite and I've taken enough comment space...:)

     

  • At 12:52 PM , Anonymous Anonymous said...

    Hmmm, favorite book...Well, growing up it was Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card (OSC), which in the last 10 years has become a young adult classic (and I read it in the 80's). However, now that I read his other stuff, it's the author I like. Card has a tendancy to really bring an anthropological element into his best stories. He does his research, and really tends to know what it is he's writing about. He also cannot be bound to just one "genre". You can't just classify him as "Sci-Fi" or "Modern-Fantasy" or "Suspense" or "High-Fantasy" or "Religious" because he does it all.

    If I had to choose just one though, it would be the Worthing Saga. Destroy the world, cause pain, leave death in your wake, on purpose. Not out of hate however, but out of love. Not to mention it's an anthropological journey through the civilized development of an entire world. Amazing!

     

  • At 1:35 PM , Blogger Quyen said...

    Ender's Game is great.

    Stephen King is great.

    Amy Tan is great.

    Atlas Shrugged is great.

    Poetry is great.

    Of Mice and Men is great.

    You guys are all great! Thanks for the suggestions! :D

     

Post a Comment

Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]

<< Home