Saturday 1 September 2012

What is your favorite book

Probably one of the most inane questions I've been asked. So when confronted with a stupid question, answer with another question: "In what sense?"
The book I would like to re-read over and over again? The book I've read the most and know by heart? The book, which style I admire? The book that made me think the most? The book that inspired me to do something? The book that I simply couldn't rest and kept reading until my eyes burned? The book I cried to for the first time?

Many definitions to the question of my most favorite book and as many answers, for that matter. Nevertheless, I myself felt inspired to find the answer to that question. Of course, the moment one book popped into my mind, so did several others and no matter how hard I tried, I just couldn't put one on top. It felt as such an offence for the rest contestants, which made it to the final round. So, instead, I decided to give all of them some credit (my favorite books, that is) and compile a list. So there it is the list of my most favorite books, in categories. Before anyone even opens his or her mouth to say, "You can't say this is the greatest book", yes I can. This is my blog; my opinion and frankly I can even say Harry Potter is a classics, if I wanted to!

1. The greatest love story ever written. Period
Love in the Time of Cholera - Florentino Arisa, Fermina Dasa and Juvenal Urbino show the different faces of love in times of cholera, which are also valid in times of terrorism. You can like someone and spend your life with him being happy, without necessarily feeling extreme passion. This is OK and happens constantly. You can f*ck everything that moves and still love that one person with all of your heart. This is also OK and also happens constantly. You can get together with your true love even after waiting for more than 50 years. OK, this doesn't happen that often but it is still OK. Incredible,in every possible way. Movie is great too and Javier Bardem is too hot to bear. My most favorite quotes is also from that book,a quote that passionately waits for my body and mind to decide where it should be most appropriately tattoed and how to co-exist with my present tattoo:

The only regret I will have in dying is if it is not for love.
Ще ме е яд да умра само заради едно - че няма да е от любов.


2. The best dystopia
1984 is the classics of the classics. Brave New World, A Clockwork Orange, Fahrenheit 451, and We complement this amazing list but Orwell and his Big Brother most effectively (and rather scarily) describe a near-by future, where those who control the present, control the past, and those who control the past, obviously control the future. Orwell gives a bit of hope to the characters, only to smash it at the end. Big Brother sees everything and there is no way to escape his grasp.


3. The book that inspires me
Gone with the Wind
Scarlett o'Hara is probably the strongest, most admirable and most destructive female character in world literature. She is egocentric, selfish, and self-sufficient, yet she possesses that amazing strength of character and will to survive and to win at any cost. People's opinion doesn't matter to her as long as she is convinced that what she is doing is right. Whenever I feel down/ugly/stupid/irrelevant/invisible/grotesque/funny (and not in the good way) I think of Scarlett, a woman to admire.
After all...tomorrow is another day! Something all of us should be aware of when things start to get rough.


4. My book form
The Unbearable Lightness of Being
I love Kundera and his way of showing the absurdity and fatuity of the world we live in, the truth about loving relationships, the difficulty of connecting with others, all of this under the blossom trees of Prague. Can Kundera and I be related because I sometimes feel he would understand better than even my parents would?


5.Who is John Galt?
Atlas Shrugged - Rand's phenomenon is hated by half of the world and adored by the rest. I have never met someone with a middle-ground moderate opinion about it. Which makes me love it even more. I am always suspicious towards anything that the majority of people praise. There must be something wrong with it. As with people, if everyone likes you, most probably no one likes you that much. Atlas Shrugged is controversial, politically challenging, and at points outrageous. But it is still a phenomenon in world literature, it is beautifully written, and Rand's philosophy of the man and his abilities at the centre of the world is absolutely admirable. Hate or love it, everyone must read this book. EVERYONE.


6. The book I know by heart
I have re-read Pride and Prejudice over and over again since I was about 11 and my mum gave it to me as her favorite book. Darcy and Elizabeth's love story is just what the world needs - he is an arrogant rich man and she is a witty young woman, who is the only one not afraid to stand up to him. The origin of modern sugarcoated movies, Pride and Prejudice is humorous, satiric, and more analytical and serious than it might seem on the outside. Austen is rumored to have described her own family and traditions in the book. Her heroine Elizabeth is one of the first controversial female characters, who show to the Victorian society that the woman can actually be smart, educated, and equal to the man.

It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.

The opening sentence of the novel and it is as famous as the novel itself.

These are 6 books that if you haven't read, well YOU HAVEN'T LIVED!

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