It’s such a weird time, isn’t it? Things you thought of as everyday, things that you never thought you wouldn’t be able to do anymore, like going to Costa, or going out of your way for a walk, going into London or travelling to see a friend, you just can’t do now. And you know what? It’s hard to distract ourselves from it. It’s hard, but necessary. Over the last couple of weeks I’ve definitely forgotten who I am and what makes me happy. I’ve been swallowed up by the negative news articles, the BBC bullitins, the security guards at Tescos. As a literary-lover, I can’t help but feel the panic begin to rise in my throat of the similariries drawn between Orwell and now. Between dystopian times and the present. What post-war writers feared for an alternative future is happening now, and how we spend our free time is out of our hands. At least, though, we can find comfort in the fact that it’s temporary (even if 3 months doesn’t feel very temporary), and it’s to help this nightmare come to a swift and undeniable end. Because it has to. Everything ends, and so, must this.
I’ll end my little panic-ridden rant here, push and shove it back into the understairs cupboard of no-return, probably to rear it’s head at 2am one Thursday, but I want to end now on a positive. It was something I read on Instagram. I can’t remember it exact, and I can’t give praise to the person who coined the phrase (if I could, I would most definitely give you the biggest of virtual hugs) but it’s this (or thereabouts): “For every day that we are kept in, that we are in lockdown, it’s a day closer to getting back to normality”. When you’re feeling low, just think of that.
Now, back to the content you’re all here for! Books books and more books. Well, due to all of the above, I actually haven’t read that much in March. I was somewhat, distracted, you could say. I want to remedy that in April, because what better way to ignore what’s happening in reality than to burrow deeper into someone else’s subconscious? To run away with a detective, to discover what life was like in the 1800s? I’ve got a whole bunch of books I want to read in April, and I’m eager to start. I feel like a fledgling shaking her new downy feathers – feathers made of book pages and blank pages. Of cakes and violin strings. That’s April, but today is about March (even thought we are nearly through April) and in March I only read two things. Two things, and a hell of a lot of the BBC.
Before the Coffee Gets Cold by Toshikazu Kawaguchi
I read this mainly in February, finished it in March. A book for if you like short stories, that are all interlinked but don’t require much participation of your own imagination. Sure, there’s time travel, there’s ghosts, and there’s deep mental-health issues brought-up, but ghosts still need to go to the bathroom, and cofee still gets cold. A hyper-reality set in a coffee shop, thinking back to this book now, it feels bitter-sweet. I’m jealous of the characters being able to socially mingle at the bar, being able to dwell together and discuss the issues and practicalitites of time-travel. Travelling back in time myself thinking about when I read this, the feelings of loss, of the craving of hindsight and the strength of human connections is paramount. I would recommend you read if you’re feeling disconnected from your own reality, and want to invisage where you would travel back to, who would you speak to?
Birthday Stories Collected by Haruki Murakami
I loved this book. It might have taken my all month to read it. I may have put it down for near on a week before picking it up again, but regardless, I loved it. Each story was so different, and introduced me to completely different authors that, I’m not going to lie, I’ve never heard of. But now, I will look into.
Each story was focused around a Birthday. A birthday party, a birthday gift, a birthday cake. All were so different though, and I think back to them now. Some stick out in my mind more than others, like the one with the old couple whose son doesn’t want to spend his birthday with them, or the lady who wants to spoil her husband in ways that leaves only a smidge to the imagination.
What sticks out most to me, though, is Murakami’s snippets before each story. He writes a story himself and it’s the last in the collection, the perfect full-stop to the collection. I think that his paragraphs throughout explaining why he chose each piece are just as good. They give you a insight into his thought process, and make you feel that little bit closer to him.
So that’s it. That’s what I read in March. I won’t bore you with the news articles and BBC updates that I’ve also been reading, I just want you to know that they’re there, and they really shouldn’t be.
My goal for April is to literally drown in books (more on this in a later post). To drown in the pages of others imagination and forget my reality. The books I’m aiming to read so far are:
- Howl’s Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones
- First Love, Last Rites by Ian McEwan
- Possession by A.S. Byatt
- Emma by Jane Austen
- The Cornish Coast Murder by John Bude
- Killing Commendatore by Haruki Murakami
I wish you all fun readings ahead in this times. Remember, devour words and not your fridge (I needed to hear those words).
My Paper Lungs 