it's the sixth of April and I'm currently in lockdown in Paris. I can't go out, I
can't go to the café's, the restaurants, I can't even work that much but I can read
books and if you're in lockdown I've got a good idea for you read some books and
if you're not in lockdown I've got an idea for you.
read some books because today I've got six of my favorite works of literature. Three
American, one Canadian, one British and another British but the author was born
elsewhere. four by men, two by women four novels two biographies or autobiographies
all of them wonderful. These are books that I love and have moved me or
educated me or changed my worldview in one way or another but, at the same time,
I've chosen books that you can read even if English is not your first language
without searching the dictionary for every other word. Each of these books has
literary merit but the complexity lies in the ideas and the situations and
not in the size of its vocabulary. I'll put a link in the description for all
the books. By the way, these are affiliate links. However, you can purchase these
books at any good bookstore. so without further ado let's get started with the
first book and it is the Life of Pi by Yann Martel. A Canadian writer, first
published in 2001. You might have seen the film version by Ang Lee the film is
excellent, One of the best film adaptations of a book I've seen. However,
the book is magnificent. It tells a story of an Indian boy called Piscine Molitor,
shortened to PI and his father owns a zoo in the city of Pondicherry and one
day he decides to start a new life in Canada with his family and the zoo.
Unfortunately the boat they are traveling in is destroyed in a storm.
Pi scrambles to a lifeboat where he is joined by an orangutan, a zebra and a
tiger called Richard Parker. He survives at sea for 227 days. Now it's a terrific
book crammed full of fantastic descriptions, philosophy it's moving and
it's funny. Very, very funny. I must admit that I had this book on my bookshelf for
years and somehow I thought a story about a boy and a tiger on a boat for
227 days. yeah it's not for me but one that picked it up. And I'm so glad I did. It's
it's a wonderful heartwarming book it's beautifully written so don't be put off
by the strangeness of its plot and do give it a try. and I defy you not to get
hooked by this book within the first few pages. Now the level would be upper
intermediate onwards. I think at that level you can handle it.
And here's a taste from the first page of the novel. I had been twin you
before in the north for five months on that first trip I had come to the
subcontinent completely unprepared actually I had a preparation of one word
when I told a friend who knew the country well of my travel plans he said
casually they speak a funny English in India they like words like bamboozle I
remembered his words as my plane started is to send towards Delhi so the word
bamboozle was my one preparation for the rich noisy functioning madness of India
I used the word on occasion and truth be told it served me well to Clark at the
train station I said I didn't think the fare would be so expensive you're not
trying to bamboozle me are you he smiled and chanted no sir there is no banboozlement
here I have quoted you the correct fare. The next book is The Secret
History by Donna Tartt and American writer and it was first published in 1992. It's
a story of an elite group of students of classical Greek and their charismatic
professor and the friendships between them. Then the tale takes a darker turn
and we hear of murder and blackmail and cover-up and more. And the story is so
good you just can't stop reading and it's a really beautifully crafted novel
and it holds your attention from beginning to end and it's just so
entertaining. I'm not generally a fan of thrillers but this book elevates the
genre to a whole different level and I can't even imagine anybody not enjoying
this book. It's well-written, it's compelling and engaging. So if you're
looking for a mystery novel with literary merit then this is for you.
You can tackle this book at intermediate level. okay it's a nicely crafted
novel but the writing style is always approachable and here's the opening
"the snow in the mountains was melting and Bonnie had been dead for several
weeks before we came to understand the gravity of our situation." And the next
book is Hand to Mouth by Paul Auster, first published in 1997 and it's the
first of two autobiographies. I love this book. It's it's a story of epic failure.
Before Paul Auster became a published writer everything he did, certainly in a
professional sense, failed. He tried his hand at numerous jobs without success, he
lived in Paris for three years, I think, and he worked for a time as a lowly paid
translator. Later on he even spent one of his life developing a card game based on
baseball and the car game is actually included in the book.
like everything else, it failed miserably. It''s full of humor and bizarre
adventures but it's a tale of a happy ending.
Spoiler alert in the end he gets his book published and how he's a very successful
author. I'm sure you know him. I like these stories of redemption and
Hand to Mouth won't disappoint even if you haven't read any other books by Paul
Auster and, I encourage you to do so, you'll like this book and you can read
it even at an intermediate level. it's a challenge but you can do it. By the way,
if you're not familiar with the expression hand-to-mouth it means you
only just have enough money to live and here's the first paragraph from the book:
"In my late 20s and early 30s I went through a period of several years when
everything I touched turned to failure my marriage ended in divorce
my work as a writer foundered and I was overwhelmed by money problems I'm not
just talking about an occasional shortfall or some periodic belt
tightening but a constant, grinding almost suffocating lack of money that
poisoned my soul and kept me in a state of never-ending panic."
A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole, written in 1963 but published
posthumously in 1980. Wow what a masterpiece and the story of how this
book got published is as intriguing as and as tragic as the book itself Toole
killed himself at the age of 31 in 1969 his mother found a smeared copy
of the book amongst tools possessions and then she took it from publisher to
publisher but it was rejected by seven different publishers. She finally called
repeatedly a guy called Walker Percy at Loyola University New Orleans and in the
forward to the book this is what he wrote. "The lady was persistent
and it somehow came to pass that she stood in my office handing me the hefty
manuscript there was no getting out of it only one hope remained that I could
read a few pages and they would be bad enough for me, in good conscience to read
no father. Usually I can do just that. Indeed the first paragraph often
suffices. My only fear was that this one might not be bad enough or might be just
good enough so that I would have to keep reading. In this case I read on and on
first with the sinking feeling that he was not bad enough to quit then with a
prickle of interest then a growing excitement and finally an incredulous It
surely was not possible that it was so good." So the book finally got published
in 1980 and it became a sensation winning the Pulitzer Prize. What I don't
understand is how it is possible that this book got rejected by so many
publishers from the first paragraph you know it's great and you you can't stop
reading. it tells a story of Ignatius J. Reiley, thirty years old living with
his mother. He's brilliant, creative, romantic but weird - really weird and this
is the story of his adventures, or rather, misadventures in his hometown of
New Orleans. it's so funny and beautifully written and it's just so sad
that we didn't get to see more books from this great writer. The book is for
advanced readers. There is a little New Orleans slang in it but you'll
manage once you get used to it but certainly the writing style is more
elaborate than the other books I've recommended here but if you think you
can tackle it then do try. It's worth the effort.
By the way, you might ask why is there never been a film made of this book.
well, like the book, the making of the film has been shrouded with tragedy. A
film was planned in 1982 with John Belushi and Richard Pryor both of whom
died before production. There was a plan to make a film starring John Candy but
he died then another movie project with Chris Farley but he died too. Director
John Waters was interested in turning it into a movie starring Divine and, guess
what? Devine died too. And Steven Soderbergh planned a movie in 2005 but
yet again the project was beset by tragedy including the murder of the head
of the Louisiana State Film Commission and the devastation caused by
Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans. In 2013 Steven Soderbergh remarked "I think it's
cursed I'm not prone to superstition but that project has gotten bad mojo on it."
And the next book is Graham Greene, Our Man in Havana first published in 1958.
Now when you think of Graham Greene you don't really think of comedies but this
is a very funny book it's a black comedy set in Cuba before the revolution and
during the Batista regime. James Wormold is a single father who
sells vacuum cleaners and he has a sixteen-year-old daughter
with expensive tastes. He doesn't earn much money as a vacuum cleaner salesman
but then he meets Hawthorne who recruits him into MI6 as a British spy. The
trouble is, he doesn't have any secret information to send them. Fearing he'll
be fired he sends sketches for a new
vacuum cleaner and tells them that it's a military installation and so it goes
on and he gets deeper and deeper into the world of espionage. Now I'm a fan of
Graham Greene and perhaps some of his other books such as the Quai American
and The Power and the Glory have had a greater literary impact but this book
which has a backdrop of depravity of the Batista regime is really interesting it
touches on satire but it's more about poking fun at Britishness and The
Secret Service at a time before the invention of James Bond and it is, above
all, a really entertaining book. And here's a quote from the book talking
about Havana. "It was a city to visit not a city to live in but it was the city
where Wormold had first fallen in love and he was held to it as though to the
scene of a disaster. Time gives poetry to a battlefield."
I have it here, it's the book that I actually have at the moment in
this apartment and it's Wild Swans by Jung Chang and it tells a story of three
generations of a female family. Chang's grandmother, her mother and herself and
each led an extremely life with a backdrop of history, politics and the
culture of China and it's a fascinating read. Chang's grandmother, who had bound
feet from the age of two, which made extremely painful for her to walk, became a
concubine of a warlord. Chang's mother worked for the Communist Party during
the Revolution and Chiang herself tells of her suffering during the Cultural
Revolution before leaving China in 1978 and she eventually became the
first national of the People's Republic of China to obtain a doctorate from a
British University. And this book illuminates the rich tapestry of Chinese
history in the 20th century but it's not a dry, history book it tells a story and it
tells it so well I do highly recommend this book it's a work of literature that
is both informative and it grabs you on an emotional level and I think that's
rare. You can read this with an intermediate level. It's challenge but
you can do it. The most challenging thing, actually, is remembering all the names
and the dates and the events that are happening it's breakneck speed
throughout this extraordinary book. Here's a snippet for you from the first page.
"At the age of 15 my grandmother became
the concubine of a warlord general the police chief of a tenuous national
government in China. The year was 1924 and China was in chaos
much of it, including Manchuria, where my grandmother lived was ruled by warlords.
The liaison was arranged by her father a police official in the provincial town
of Yixian in southwest Manchuria about a hundred miles north of the Great Wall
and 250 miles northeast of Beijing." Thank you for watching I hope you enjoyed the
video and I hope too that you're going to try reading some of those marvelous
books and if you do have any book recommendations of your own then we'd
love to hear them put them in the comments. Stay healthy. Bye