Catcher in the Rye – J.D. Salinger

Like everyone else in the world, I grew up with the myth of this book. On top of that, I idolized James Earl Jones/Terence Mann in Field of Dreams, a character that is clearly inspired by Salinger and his life.

Maybe it was the high expectations, but I waited for a couple of hundred pages for an incredible plot twist, or some display of incredibly innovative prose that never came. So I was left wondering what all the fuss was about – incredibly banal expression on my end, but I’m not a celebrated writer. To me, nothing remarkable happens in the book, and it’s not even particularly well-written.

Millions of scholars and readers worldwide will shriek at this, but I really don’t think it’s such a tragedy that Salinger didn’t write more...

The Sound and the Fury – William Faulkner

Even if European, any remotely decent reader has got to read some Faulkner. That’s the only thing that pushed me to finish this book (well, that and the fact that I was bored out of my mind invigilating end-of-year exams).

Yes, I did struggle through the first part, narrated by the problematic Benji – but at least I found its unique style to be interesting (although it would take me a good 10 minutes to read a page and make some sense of it). I was surprised when I realized that the part was the most enjoyable one. After that, pain, sadness, desolation, and decadence – true, always described from different viewpoints, but not a single glimmer of hope, or a trace of humour, or irony, or anything that might prevent you from self-harm. Great literature is not necessarily meant to be enjoyable, but, I believe, neither should it be a hopeless and fruitless struggle.

The Woman Destroyed – Simone De Beauvoir

Maybe this is just the exception to the rule, maybe I’m inclined to like this book more than other feminist works because of my walks through De Beauvoir Town (North London) on my way to basketball practice, maybe I liked it because she was the best at her trade, maybe because it’s a series of short stories and, because of that, it’s less daunting than it could have been, or maybe I simply read this book at a time when I was more open to a different kind of literature from the one I normally enjoy.

Or probably it’s just that the final monologue is simply so, so beautifully written.

My Revolutions – Hari Kunzru

 

Hari Kunzru signed my copy of the book, dedicating it to “a great interpreter” (claim to fame, yay!) after I translated a fairly embarrassing speech by a local politician at the same literary festival where I worked for Hanif Kureishi (and Paul Auster – those were the times...).

This book is an absolute gem. It touches all the right notes and it’s perfectly researched (mostly in the archives of the university where I work). It paints a very accurate picture of some incredibly tumultuous times and their lingering effects on the people who experienced them, or at least it seems that way for a kid who – at the end of the day – hasn’t really protested against anything since 2003 (when Iraq was invaded I thought chaining myself to the entrance gate of my high-school would have done some good – it quite clearly didn’t make a change on a global scale, and neither it did on a local one as I didn’t succeed in seducing the girl I was trying to impress with my radicalism at the time).

(Way) more people should read this book. Sadly (way) more people won’t.

Possession – Antonia S. Byatt

 

What do I care about the unfulfilled love life of a fictional 19^th century writer? Nothing, I never did.

What do I care about the unfulfilled love life of a 20^th century Londoner? Nothing, if it’s written with such corniness (I would have probably answered “very little” but, for the sake of symmetry, I’ll stick with “nothing”).

What do I care about the research of a struggling London academic? Nothing, now that I have finished my Ph.D. and have put aside “real” academia – at least for now.

What do I care about the role of private money in advancing academic scholarship? Nothing, and – personally – I wonder whether public money should be spent for said advancement in the humanities (for much that I’d like to be bold enough to claim that public money shouldn’t fund research in the humanities, however, I probably believe it should – otherwise we’d just become fairly hairless monkeys in a couple of generations)

For all that, the last page of the book is one of absolute beauty – but you do have to overcome 400 lengthy ones before that.

Lessico Famigliare – Natalia Ginzburg

Another book that I’ve read to feel like I was doing something related to my Ph.D. thesis when, in fact, I was simply reading for fun (much, much more enjoyable!).

Before reading the book I only thought of Natalia as Leone Ginzburg’s wife. Needless to say, the book made me change my outlook. A unique novel/memoir mixing History with a capital “H” and personal histories, the book covers the time-span between the rise of Fascism and the early 1950s. Oddly enough, for once, I didn’t lose interest after the end of WWII – unlike with so many other books, including staples of 20^th century European literature like The Tin Drum.

Apparently it’s enough for a book to be about the fight against Fascism for me to like it, but this (like, erm, all the other books on anti-Fascism?!?) hold a special place in my heart.