The Ropemaker by Peter Dickinson
Inspired by Tilja, I became the resourceful hero of my own teenaged story.
The Unwomanly Face of War by Svetlana Alexievich
First Published: Голоса утопии (Voices of Utopia), Belarus, 1983. In English as War’s Unwomanly Face, 1988. (Version read/pictured: Penguin, 2017) Found: In the closing down sale of a bookstore on Flinders St, … Continue reading
Swing Time by Zadie Smith
For some reasons these characters, this voice, felt like a thread of reality that I could question, interrogate, even effect in some way.
Little Women by Louise May Alcott
This post is not so much a review as an exercise in the remembering of how much I enjoy the existence of this work and Louisa May Alcott’s lasting legacy on our contemporary culture.
My Place by Sally Morgan
I have nothing witty to say about it. I am too much in awe of this writer.
The Fingersmith by Sarah Waters
Someone once said that certain books and certain ideas should become like ‘part of the furniture of your mind’; The Fingersmith is one of my comfiest chairs.
The Fatal Shore by Robert Hughes
I still have no opinion of Hughes as an art critic, but as a writer of a stand-out piece of empathetic and unabashed laying-out of Australian history, The Fatal Shore is great.
Has The West Lost It? A Provocation by Kishore Mahbubani
At no point, unlike so many other contemporary commentaries, did I feel a sense of soul-crushing existential dread. Mahbubani has done the extraordinary – he has conveyed a sense of hope for humanity through sound economic reasoning.
Mary Barton by Elizabeth Gaskell
Gaskell perhaps didn’t realise it at the time, but what she has crafted is a nuanced history of the home and hearth from the perspectives of the people history forgets: the female, the disabled, the elderly, and the poor.
Brothers by Yu Hua
By the description of the fake-hymen merchant I was happy to be rid of the brothers grim of Li and Song.
Song of Everlasting Sorrow by Wang Anyi
Like much literature written still in the mid-1990s, the female character is subjected to the whims of various male protagonists and comes to a violent and unnecessary end. I was stunned to discover the author of Song of Everlasting Sorrow was a woman.
Classical Chinese Poetry: An Anthology
For some reason, reading this piece threw up so many different, powerful feelings. Though not highly complex or even elegant, this poem in particular rang many bells across the scope of my musical and literary memory.
Rickshaw by Lao She
Xiangzi is a remarkable lead character destined for tragic poverty, and the host of side-characters are also similarly tragic and garish. My favourite character, however, is the city of Beijing itself.
Records of the Grand Historian: Part 2
I am not either a person of the Confucian age (or even of a contemporary Confucian society) in possession of a set of testicles, or currently in a position of knowing if my work will be given a grand enough title to last longer than my own living memory.
Records of the Grand Historian: Part 1
At this point am I just desperately trying to make sure y’all know I’ve read The Iliad?
Outlaws of the Marsh
I found this text both swashbucklingly compelling and conversely utterly uninteresting.
The Analects
As a person raised in a predominantly White, rural area in the Southern Hemisphere, notions of trustworthiness were taught via the parable of Moses and the Ten Commandments: thou shalt not steal, adult(er), kill, covet asses, etc.. But not as succinct as the Analects puts it – be trustworthy.
FILM: Aimée & Jaguar (Max Färberböck)
After neo-nazis smeared her front door with excrament, Lily Wurst fought back with the truth she felt she owed to the love of her life. Wurst revealed that the women she protected during WII weren’t just Jewish, they were also queer. And so was she. And so was her lover, Felice Schragenheim.
The Fifth Season by N.K. Jemisin
Its writers like N. K. Jemisin that remind you that the world didn’t stop writing when a bunch of old white people up and died in the late nineteenth century.
The Farewell Party by Milan Kundera
You can sacrificially burn the book after you’ve finished. But I personally am going to file it under ‘resources for outlining how straight men come to their privileged conclusions’.
China: Portrait of a People by To Carter
Sip jasmine green tea in a quiet space while you explore this small but powerful little book.
What Bird Is That? A Guide to the Birds of Australia
It’s funny to think this book was printed in the year of the great Emu War of 1932 (no, really).
The Trespasser by Tana French
The Dublin slang alone is enough to keep you reading. Jaysus. Bollix. Banjaxed. Gobshite. Bleeding shitehawk: poetry to the profane ear.
AUDIO BOOK: Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka
This. This is what I present to you as the 100th post on this blog. Does it mean something? Has this whole indulgence in literary naval gazing been as tedious for you as a day in the life Gregor Samsa? I hope not.
Ellan - things I've read 