The Book Corner

Welcome the Bookworm, and Share your Thoughts

books — Sun, 08 Oct 2006 08:54:46 +0000

I realize that I have started publishing on this blog without properly introducing myself. On this space, you can call me bookworm. What people know me by in other places is of little importance. Shakespeare put it well when he wondered "what's in a name?"

But don't worry, Shakespeare is not the topic of this post, nor will I be referring to him and his books much, because that's not the type of books I read nowadays. So WHAT is the type of books I'll be reading and reviewing, you may ask.

Anything and everything... I love books, I love reading, I love being completely absorbed in the world created by a book, devouring the pages, taking my mind into boundless timeless journeys.

I often ask myself why people in this part of the world don't read much. Why is it not part of the culture? Why is it associated with being "geeky" and "nerdy"? An activity that is not much "fun"???

So I'm posing these questions to you, dear reader (assuming that I have readers ;) )...

- When was the last time you read a book that wasn't part of school or something you're studying?

- What is your favorite passtime?

- Would you sit and read a book in a public place? If the answer is no then why not?

- What's your favorite style of books?

- Why -in your opinion- do people here (in Jordan and the Arab world) not read much?

I'd really appreciate your thoughts on this.

In this little space of mine, i'll be sharing snippets related to books, authors, bookshops, and book culture. I will also be posting reviews, some of which have been previously published in local magazines.

If you have any book recommendations or reviews, you're welcome to email them to book.corner@gmail.com

CheerS!

One Hundred Years of Solitude

books — Sun, 01 Oct 2006 06:42:13 +0000

By Gabriel Garcia Marcez

You might think that reading about the life of an isolated town somewhere in Latin America through the history of three generations of a family living there would be…well, less than interesting for the contemporary reader… but start reading this book, and think again!! It takes only a few pages to get you intrigued and simply hooked to this fascinating novel that takes you into the life of the Buendia family in the mythical town of Macondo, and with it into greater depths of human emotions, complexity, simplicity, compassion, despair, stubbornness, beauty, and most of all – passion. It's a book where a lot happens, and what happens will move you.

As put by the Oprah book club, "One Hundred Years of Solitude will inspire you to connect with your family, love more deeply, and dream bigger and find deeper truths within yourself."

About the Author

Known throughout Latin America, with great fondness, as "Gabo", Gabriel Garcia Marquez was born in March of 1927 in the tiny Colombian banana town of Aracataca. At the age of 19, despite a passion to be a writer, García Márquez enrolled in the law program at the Universidad Nacional in Bogotá, respecting his parents' desire for him to be "practical." Yet instead of focusing on his law classes, he started exploring literature through the works of Franz Kafka, William Faulkner (the most widely translated American writer of his generation,) Ernest Hemingway, James Joyce and Virginia Woolf – and he began writing. García Márquez transitioned to journalism after leaving school. In the course of five years he covered stories in Rome, Geneva, Poland, Hungary, Paris, Venezuela, Havana and New York City. After a three-year writers' block that lasted until the beginning of 1965, the personal novel he'd always hoped to write came pouring out of García Márquez. Within a week of the publication of One Hundred Years of Solitude in 1967, all 8000 copies of the original printing had been sold. His novels since, both magical and legendary, have kept him at the forefront of literature since 1970: The Autumn of the Patriarch, Chronicle of a Death Foretold, Love in the Time of Cholera, The General in His Labyrinth and Of Love and Other Demons.

He continues to write ferocious books with wide appeal. One thing we can promise about García Márquez' books: you won't be bored. Just this year, he's garnered vast praise since publishing his aptly named autobiography, Living to Tell the Tale. Like his fiction, it has won the hearts of readers everywhere.

From Jose Arcadio Buendia (the founder of Macondo), and his wife Ursula - the matriarch who outlives most of her great grand children and who is the binding factor between the later generations and the ghosts of the past – down to the last Aureliano, going through generations of intriguing, fascinating men and women, the characters are a real treat. This book is so alive, so honest, and tells the truth about humanity in all its ways. Even though things that might be by our definition "supernatural" happen in this book all the time, to Marquez they are normal incidents in the lives of his brilliant characters. The Buedias are probably the most human characters you will ever encounter in literature.

When this book was first published in 1967, it took the world by storm. It introduced Latin American literature to the world and has since been translated into more than 36 languages. It won the Chianchiano Prize in Italy, the Best Foreign Book in France, the Rómulo Gallegos Prize and ultimately the Nobel Prize for Literature.

The Inheritance - Sahar Khalifah

books — Sat, 30 Sep 2006 08:29:24 +0000

"Come quickly before the thread breaks and you lose your claim to the
inheritance."

Upon receiving this note from her uncle, Zayna – born to an American
mother and a Palestinian father - decided it was time she packed up and
left her job and life in Washington to head back to Wadi Al Rihan, the
home she had longed to see, the family affection she had lost since
childhood, and the connection to the roots she had searched for in vain.

Sahar Khalife's 1997 novel, "The Inheritance" is
a powerful and intense story, rich with its layers and its deeply human
characters. It probes through social and cultural complexities, through
the hopes and ambitions revived by Oslo, the quest for identity, and the
weaknesses and limitations of the Palestinian Authority at the time

.

The new English translation by Aida Bamia – Professor of Arabic Language and Literature at the University of Florida - (University of Cairo Press, 2006)
flows smoothly and attempts to retain as much of the original character
and idioms as possible, the Arabic version remains richer, especially
with Khalifeh's abundant use of colloquial expressions, and her
distinctly long sentences embedded with sarcasm all through. This is
probably what makes the original more emotionally charged and
psychologically demanding of the reader.

Whichever you go for, this novel is a superb read.

Through Zayna's journey back to the homeland, and her narration, Sahar
Khalifeh takes us into the complex realities of Palestinians' lives in
the wake of the 1990 gulf war and the Oslo accords. The main
protagonists in this novel are Palestinian women; Nahleh, the sister who
spent the golden years of her life working as teacher in Kuwait and
supporting her father and brothers before being forced to leave and
coming back to the harsh reality of being an old maiden with an
ungrateful and judgmental family; Violet, the intelligent and beautiful
hairdresser stuck in her love for a defeated revolutionary, a veteran of
Beirut and the resistance, who was good for nothing but talk about
nationalism and lost dreams; Amira, the pious mother living on the
remnants of a respectable and acclaimed family.

Sahar Khalifeh was born in the West Bank city of Nablus in 1941 and is
the author of six novels. A former Fulbright scholar, she holds a B.A.
from Bir Zeit University, and a Ph.D. in women’s studies and American
literature from the University of Iowa. She began writing shortly after
the 1967 Israeli invasion of Gaza and the West Bank, and published her
first novel in 1974. She is the most translated Palestinian author after
Mahmoud Darwish.