The Wonder of Books

Snap Lockdown: Day 12

Mood: Level

I'm looking at the bookshelf behind me at the books on the third shelf. The top shelf contains all my plays and poetry, because everybody needs a copy of Under Milkwood and Jim Cartwright's Road sitting among the poetry anthologies, the Auden, the Larkin, the Hopkins and the Eliot - and yes, have something for those ancient of days, grumpy, middle aged Englishmen.

The next shelf down is general fiction. Two rows on one shelf. The quality stuff, not all of it read. Zadie Smith sits near Margaret Atwood. My well thumbed copy American Psycho rests next to The Time Traveller's Wife, above an Australian anomaly, The Fraction of the Whole. Murakami shoulders up with Sacher-Masoch. Yes, this is the shelf which makes me look academic and well read. I don't think I'm either of those things. 

But the third shelf down is more eclectic. There are books with stories to them, not just the tales they tell inside the covers. 

A coffee table book on body piercing starts the collection. This has fascinated me for years, collected at a $2 table years ago, it still gets a regular thumbing. 

A poetry anothology sits next to that, Poem for the Day edited by Nicholas Albery with a forward by Wendy Cope. Another book to dip into, with all sorts if poems, from all ages, including The Battle Hymn of the Republic, to Donne, to Wilfred Owens, to you name it, it's in there. Tomorrow's poem, is The Windhover, by G.M.Hopkins - and I'm transported back to Year 12 English. I'm still a fan of assonance and alliteration in my own writing.

Pigeon English, by Stephen Kelman. We did that for book group a few year ago. 

Hell on the Way to Heaven, a book about the toll systemic abuse in the Catholic Church had one one Melbourne family. The Fosters are very vocal about the Melbourne Solution and the Catholic Church. 

One of Eckhart Tolle's books, given to me by Lachlan. It's inscribed with a "Merry Xmas, now go change the world." It's given with love from him, his ex-wife and two kids. Hmm. 

A book of poetry by Felix Dennis. Another Lachlan missive. His poems are fun. Thought provoking. Life affirming.

The Aquarian Qabalah, but Naomi Ozaniec. A much needed reference book for somebody who has dabbled with the Kabbalah for nearly 20 years. Anybody else would see the book as gobbledegook, but sometimes I need to dabble into the subtleties of Tipharet. 

Humankind by Rutger Bregland was given to my by a friend for a birthday present last year. It focuses on the good of people. It was a lovely thought - another good book to dip into. 

Oh, my copy of George Saunders' Lincoln in the Bardo. What a book! Fascinating, funny, wise, crude. And a bit hard to read, but so worth it. I have an audio copy of this with a full cast. It's like a modern day Under Milkwood. 

Further down the shelf there's Anna Funder's extraordinary All That I Am, a book that should have made book group, but was pipped at the post.

Sitting next to that Marie Kondo's revolutionary book, The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up. Does this book spark joy? Well at least it's in the bookshelf and not on the floor. And anybody who says you should only keep 30 books is an absolute psycho. 

Anna Burns, No Bones, a present from a friend, and a wonderful precursor to her Booker Winning Milkman. Sitting next to that the tragedy that is Georgia Blain and her wonderful, Between a Wolf and a Dog. I mourn the books she never got to write. 

Following that, a history of Queen Elizabeth I and J.M.Coetsee Diary of a Bad Year - a book which no two people will read in the same way. 

The last book, which makes me smile when I look at it, is Walter Moers The 13 1/2 Lives of Captain Bluebear. Technically it's my second copy of this. I loaned it to Alice many years ago. It was on the floor next to her bed when her son decided to piss on the book. She bought me another copy. Jasper is now in year eleven and has pink hair. 

Funny thing is, I could wax lyrical about all of my books, every shelf. 

My books are a part of me. 

Today's song: