another list of classics

I found another one of those lists of books last month called 100 Must Read Classics by Penguin Random House and, just for fun, I thought I’d check my numbers. I thought it’s also the best way for me to approach my reading goals this year with more intention towards completing my original list. I started my reading journey with a list just like this one. And a cursory glance of this list shows that they’re basically the same books. I already own most of these and maybe I’ll begin by reading those I already have copies of.

Here’s the list. Books stricken through are books I’ve already read and books with asterisk (*) are books I have not read but own a copy of.

1. Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen (1813)

2. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee (1960)

3. The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald (1925)

4. One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez (1967)

5. In Cold Blood by Truman Capote (1965)

6. Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys (1966)

7. Brave New World by Aldous Huxley (1932)

8. I Capture The Castle by Dodie Smith (1948)

9. Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte (1847)

10. Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky (1866)

11. The Secret History by Donna Tartt (1992)

12.  The Call of the Wild by Jack London (1903)

13. The Chrysalids by John Wyndham (1955)

14. Persuasion by Jane Austen (1818)

15. Moby-Dick by Herman Melville (1851)

 16. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis (1950) 

17. To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf (1927) 

18. The Death of the Heart by Elizabeth Bowen (1938) 

19. Tess of the d’Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy (1891) 

20. Frankenstein by Mary Shelley (1823) 

21.  The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov (1966) 

22. The Go-Between by L. P. Hartley (1953) 

23. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey (1962) *

24. Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell (1949) 

25. Buddenbrooks by Thomas Mann (1901) 

26. The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck (1939) 

28. The Code of the Woosters by P. G. Wodehouse (1938) 

29. Dracula by Bram Stoker (1897) 

30. The Lord of the Rings by J. R. R. Tolkien (1954) 

31. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain (1884) 

32. Great Expectations by Charles Dickens (1860) 

33. Catch-22 by Joseph Heller (1961) *

34. The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton (1920) 

35. Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe (1958) 

36. Middlemarch by George Eliot (1871) 

37. Midnight’s Children by Salman Rushdie (1981) 

38. The Iliad by Homer (8th century BC) 

39. Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray (1847) 

40. Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh (1945) 

41. The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger (1951) 

42. Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll (1865) 

43. The Mill on the Floss by George Eliot (1860) 

44. Barchester Towers by Anthony Trollope (1857) 

45. Another Country by James Baldwin (1962) 

46. Les Miserables by Victor Hugo (1862) *

47. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl (1964) 

48. The Outsiders by S. E. Hinton (1967) 

49. The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas (1844) 

50. Ulysses by James Joyce (1922) *

51. East of Eden by John Steinbeck (1952) 

52. The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky (1880) *

53. Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov (1955) 

54. The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett (1911) 

55. Scoop by Evelyn Waugh (1938) 

56. A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens (1859) 

57. Diary of a Nobody by George Grossmith and Weedon Grossmith (1892) 

58. Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy (1878) 

59. The Betrothed by Alessandro Manzoni (1827) 

60. Orlando by Virginia Woolf (1928) 

61. Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand (1957) *

62. The Time Machine by H. G. Wells (1895) 

63. The Art of War by Sun-Tzu 

64. The Forsyte Saga by John Galsworthy (1922) *

65. Travels with Charley by John Steinbeck (1962) 

66. Tropic of Cancer by Henry Miller (1934) *

67. Women in Love by D. H. Lawrence (1920) 

68. Staying On by Paul Scott (1977) 

69. The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame (1908) 

70. My Ántonia by Willa Cather (1918) *

71. Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë (1847) 

72. Perfume by Patrick Süskind (1985) *

73. War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy (1867) 

74. Of Human Bondage by Somerset Maugham (1915) 

75. Bleak House by Charles Dickens (1853) 

76. Lost Illusions by Honoré de Balzac (1837) 

77. Breakfast of Champions by Kurt Vonnegut (1973) 

78.  A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens (1843) 

79. Silas Marner by George Eliot (1861) 

80. Mrs Dalloway by Virginia Woolf (1925) 

81. Little Women by Louisa May Alcott (1868) 

82. The Sea, The Sea by Iris Murdoch (1978) 

83. Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert Pirsig (1974) *

84. The Castle by Franz Kafka (1926) 

85. I, Claudius by Robert Graves (1934) 

86. Peter Pan by J.M. Barrie (1904) 

87. A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole (1980) 

88. The Razor’s Edge by W. Somerset Maugham (1944) 

89. Lark Rise to Candleford by Flora Thompson (1939) 

90. The Return of the Native by Thomas Hardy (1878) 

91. A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by James Joyce (1916) 

92. Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad (1902) 

93. North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell (1854) 

94. The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood (1985) 

95. What A Carve Up! by Jonathan Coe (1994) 

96. The Godfather by Mario Puzo (1969) 

97. Suite Francaise by Irene Nemirovsky (2004) 

98. One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich by Alexander Solzhenitsyn (1962) 

99. White Nights by Fyodor Dostoyevsky (1848) 

100. Hard Times by Charles Dickens (1854) 

Books read = 48

Unread books I own a copy of = 11

Do you have a book list you’re itching to complete?

spaces between books

I love to read.  I love to journal.  But for some reason, these two things have not merged enough in me for me to successfully maintain a commonplace book.  Oh, I have tried! designated pages in my journals or a space in my planners to write quotations, or list down what I plan to read or have actually read, even dedicated a whole notebook just for books I’ve read, but these get used once or twice then nothing.  I always end up writing my finished books in my phone’s notes app: title, author, date and time finished – that’s pretty much the only thing I’ve naturally stayed consistent with since 2017 in terms of fully documenting my reading.  This method was sufficiently functional for me when I want to trace my readings and compare my numbers from the years before.  This is how I know that for the past three years I’m averaging about 14-15 books annually, and for the three years before my average was 36 books.  (The plunge is in direct correlation with my starting a career, so I don’t really regret my numbers.)

When I read, I just like to read.  Reading is the only activity in which I am thoroughly focused and single-minded, even for only a few minutes at a time.  When I learned about Flow (a concept coined by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, which I first discovered through Cal Newport’s Deep Work) I knew that I have achieved this state of being and often when I’m reading a really good book.  And that’s probably why I pursue reading with such eagerness – it is such a high being lost in a page, getting pulled into different worlds through words configured by the genius of a worthy author’s imagination.  And because I love to read, I sneak in reading with my meals, in the toilet (sorry, I had to include this because I feel like, lately, half my reading time is done here), in lines, with my coffee.  I barely stop to make a mark, much less write an extract.  If something is particularly striking, I do take a picture to save for later… either to post or copy it in my planner or journal.

I have come to accept that this is my peculiarity and that I shouldn’t try to be what I’m not, no matter how much I envy other people’s commonplace books or book journals.  If it doesn’t work for me, I shouldn’t force myself.  It does not lessen how much I enjoy a book if I don’t write about it, and maybe I enjoy it more without the pressure of an added activity to it.  In fact, I love reading so much that I barely stop to think.  And no sooner am I finished with a book that I grab the next one on the shelf, if I haven’t already started it (I’m usually in the middle of two books at a time for different moods or time of day, e.g. a novel to go with my non-fiction).  I’ve always argued (with myself) that I’ve fully imbibed everything by simply focusing on this one single activity and therefore don’t need to write about it.   There are some things very much a part of you, or comes naturally to you, that just doing the activity, reading in this case, is enough in itself.  And maybe it is, if I’m honest.

But in the spirit of mindfulness, I also think that there is something to pausing in between books… or pages, or paragraphs, or sentences, or words.  Perhaps there is still more to be mined from the experience of reading a particular book by reflecting on it and writing about it.  I may not change my reading habits entirely.  There is still something in being lost in a book you forget to think, or write about it, or pause.  But maybe there’s value to actively reflecting on and reviewing a book, or taking time to pause and extract quotations.  Maybe there’s value to reading slowly, than trying to reading more and more.

Since I am on a quest to living a slow, intentional life, this may be one of the best ways to start.  This year, I am experimenting on reading more mindfully by having a journal for commonplacing or reflections, by documenting my readings and writing essays about my most important reads or impressions.  I don’t know exactly where this will lead me, but I have vowed to start after so many years of attempting to revive this blog for this purpose.  I will start before I talk (doubt) myself out of it by saying that there are better writers out there who’ll make more worthy reading for their reviews.  This is more for me.  And if you find yourself in the same journey, perhaps this will also resonate with you.

Again, this is an experiment.  After dedicating this year to actively documenting my readings, I reserve the right to abandon this pursuit if I find that it’s not for me.  If it does not improve my reading experience, or my love for books, or if it does not serve any purpose, there’s no point in hanging to it.  There’s no need to pursue an activity just because it looks attractive on others.  I’ll settle for ogling their pages on their social media feeds and move on with my life and only journal as the need or desire arises.

Come, join me in the struggle. 😉

2020 Reading List

I have not blogged in so long so I will digress a bit and start with an unrelated introduction.

Last year, I actually wanted to take up blogging again.  Only my laziness hindered me.  Also, I didn’t know where to begin; I didn’t know how to set it up again to reflect my current tastes; and I wasn’t sure if I will be able to follow through.

I’ve curbed my social media use and am only down to Instagram, but even that I’ve tried to limit, successfully, might I add.  The only thing I found that forces me to go back is without an outlet where I may write thoughts and feelings weighing me down, it’s harder for me to move on from life’s challenges.  I realized that writing forces me to confront what’s bothering me and somehow make up my mind on how best to resolve my issues.  Even more, the act of writing itself is like the act of transferring my burdens from my mind and heart and onto the page I’m writing it on – it doesn’t make the problem go away, but it lightens up my load immensely.  And while journals exists for this sort of thing, “publishing” forces me to be more organized and ensure that what I put out there is readable.  By doing so, I tend to write in a more detached manner that helps give me perspective and helps put my problems in context, which makes it easier for me to move forward more easily.  If I don’t write, things tend to stay in my head longer and weigh down on me heavier.  If I don’t let it out, my brain tends to get muddled and I am unable to think sensibly of a good course of action to follow.  The longer it simmers, I tend to get depressed.

So I decided that I am going to write, really write.  But rather than writing random posts on Instagram – which I’m not promising I will never do – I might as well sit down and use what writing skills I have to come up with something sensible and presentable, sans Instagram character limit.

This blog is more for me than for anyone.  But if you find that it makes sense to you and helps you as well, welcome, friend, and please share your thoughts.

On the reading list…

The last time I made a reading list was in 2018.  I did not complete it.  2019 had no reading list but I still read a good deal.  By year-end, in one of those lulls during the holiday, I thought I’d confront my bookshelf and check on those books that have been there forever as well as the books that I bought on impulse swearing I needed them and will read them right away.  I decided that I will actively tick those titles off.  As I’m working and am also on a study schedule, I thought that I would decide early on what I’m going to read to prevent decision fatigue later trying to decide what to read.  The list is meant to limit my reading so I don’t stray and read other books that I might be tempted to that are not on the list.  It’s also meant to ensure that I don’t go for more distracting and low-value activities, like social media and computer games.

I’ve listed 36 books, which seems too much at first, but considering that I’ve read 34 books last year, 39 the year before, and 32 the year before that, it seems a safe number.  24 books are for leisure reading including fiction/non-fiction, essay, short story, play and poetry books; 6 are personal and professional development non-fiction books; and 6 books on a topic which I am keeping to myself for now.

The book list:

Leisure: Fiction, Non-fiction, Short Stories, Essays, Play and Poetry

1. Swann’s Way.  Marcel Proust.
2. A Streetcar Named Desire.  Tennessee Williams.
3. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.  Ken Kessey.
4. The Tenant of Wildfell Hall.  Anne Bronte.
5. Midnight’s Children.  Salman Rushdie.
6. The Portable Dorothy Parker.
7. Death with Interruptions.  Jose Saramago.
8. Kafka on the Shore.  Haruki Murakami.
9. Dear Theo (An Autobiography of Vincent Van Gogh).  Irving Stone.
10. English Hours.  Henry James.
11. 100 Love Sonnets.  Pablo Neruda.
12. A Thousand Splendid Suns.  Khaled Hosseini.
13. A Moveable Feast.  Ernest Hemingway.
14. Life is Elsewhere.  Milan Kundera.
15. Phineas Finn. Anthony Trollope.
16. Volcano.  Shusoka Endo.
17. The Republic.  Plato.
18. The Eternal Husband.  Fyodor Dostoevsky.
19. The Year of Magical Thinking.  Joan Didion.
20. Art as Therapy.  Alain de Botton and John Armstrong.
21. Letters to a Young Poet.  Rainer Maria Rilke.
22. A Map of Days (Miss Peregrine’s Peculiar Children).  Ransom Riggs.
23. El Filibusterismo.  Jose Rizal.
24. Beloved.  Toni Morrison.

Non-Fiction Personal and Professional Development Books

1. How Not to Be Wrong, The Power of Mathematical Thinking.  Jordan Ellenberg.
2. The Power of Habit.  Charles Duhigg.
3. Deep Work.  Cal Newport.
4. Imagine It Forward (Courage, Creativity and the Power of Change).  Beth Comstock.
5. The Transitive Vampire.  Karen Elizabeth Gordon.
6. Logic for Lawyers, A Guide to Clear Legal Thinking.  Ruggero J. Aldisert.

I’m re-reading Swann’s Way in preparation for reading the complete 7 volumes of Proust’s In Search of Lost Time.  Phineas Finn is the second book in Trollope’s series of six books.  I was in love with the first book so I bought all the books in the series which I’ve only dented after reading one book.  Anne Bronte’s only novel is the last one that will finally complete my reading of all the Bronte sisters novels.  I also thought to list books famous authors Salman Rushdie and Haruki Murukami whose books I’ve never read.  The Portable Dorothy Parker is part of Rory Gilmore’s list.  I also wanted to make sure I read a Hemingway, a Kundera, and a de Botton this year, they are my “constants”.  Endo I chose to make sure I have an Asian book.  And Rizal’s El Fili to keep me rooted.  I threw in Didion for safe measure.  And included Dostoevsky to exercise that part of my brain that’s receptive to hard, Russian novels.  Speaking of hard, I also threw in Plato’s The Republic to truly test my abilities to read hard, philosophical books.  And finally, I thought I’d read Morrison and Kessey whose books are gathering dust in my shelf.

The personal/professional books are a no-brainer.  But I thought to limit them to six coz these books are like crack; I can never seem to stop reading them.

The other six books are on a topic that I’m keeping to myself right now.  They’re practical, non-fiction books and my reading them marks my readiness to enter into a new phase of my life.

If this proves to be my only post, I’ve at least got something to take up on for my year-end post.

Steinbeck

One of the best books I’ve ever read was John Steinbeck’s Grapes of Wrath. East of Eden is different but no less impressionable and profound.

I’m only on page 430/601.  This is so far my only book for February, perhaps my only book.  I’m taking my time with it.  Like Grapes of Wrath, I’m less likely to read this again, so I’m reading it deliberately and digesting it slowly.

I feel just as accomplished with this one book mid-way through February as I was with the eight books I read in January.  Books like this is a celebration of works of fiction.  Books like this is the reason why I love reading.  I love this so much I could not wait to finish to write about it because I feel like I will burst with too much emotion if I don’t share it with anyone.

Steinbeck, thank you for existing, for writing, for sharing your gift with the world.

 

January

52 books, 52 weeks. This is the challenge that I’ve set for myself this year, and I’ve never pursued a challenge with more zeal and enthusiasm.

I’ll be chronicling my progress here. I’m officially off the social media and finally have more time for writing better content.  I’ve also been wanting to revamp this blog.  Hopefully, I get to slowly clean-up and improve my site.  Meanwhile, my posts will be focusing on the books I’ve read in relation to this challenge.

I’ll try to give a frequent update, but for now, I think I can only do a monthly summary of the books I’ve read.

So here goes…

January.

Book #1 1.1.18 – A book you can read in a day: Aphorisms on Love and Hate. Friedrich Nietzsche.
Book #2 1.12.18 – A book recommended by a friend: Walden. Henry David Thoreau.
Book #3 1.20.18 – An e-book: The Big Leap. Gay Hendricks.
Book #4 1.20.18 – A book by a Filipino Author: The Woman Who Had Two Navels. Nick Joaquin.
Book #5 1.21.18 – A book about a topic you’re passionate about: Goodbye, Things. Fumio Sasaki.
Book #6 1.22.18 – A play: The Vagina Monologues. Eve Ensler.
Book #7 1.27.18 – A book borrowed from the library: Mirgorod. Nikolai Gogol.
Book #8 1.29.18 – A book about travel: The Happiness of Pursuit. Chris Guillebeau

If you’re thinking that this is a lot and what an amazing achievement this is, that’s because it is. I’ve never done this before. A combination of time in hands + achievement bug can do wonders.  When I reached the magic number 8 for the month, I could not help but feel so accomplished.  To date, this is my best accomplishment. I would give myself a plaque if I don’t think them a waste of paper and space.

Would I pursue the same number for February? No. I only read so much on January because I could.  I foresee months when I will be reading longer books and books that require slow reading.  For instance, I’m reading Steinbeck now, a book that needs whole-hearted attention.  With a goal of four books a month, I can afford to read one book this month as I’ve practically reached my quota for February.

This whole challenge thing is adding another aspect of fun to an already fun activity, reading. Yep. I’m nerdy to the extreme.

 

 

2018 Reading Challenge

In all my years of browsing the internet, I’ve only come across a yearly reading challenge this December.  I guess it’s because I’ve only taken Pinterest seriously this year.  As I love lists, this one got me hooked, and as soon as the idea entered my head, I immediately wanted to do it.

At first I wanted to follow a ready list, but I soon found there were other similar lists. After I got to comparing a few of them, I decided to “personalise” it.  It may seem like I’m not really taking on the challenge if I tweak it to suit my fancy, but in my defense, each list has at least a couple of items that does not apply to me. Also, I want to spend less money buying books when I have a perfectly good collection of books of various genres that I haven’t read. In any case, 52 books in 52 weeks is still a tough challenge in itself regardless of the titles.  The whole point of this exercise is not only to read as much books in a year but to read as many kinds of books you would not otherwise read if not for the challenge.

So, here’s the final list that I came up with two days before the new year:

o     A book by a Scandinavian author	o     A book about a topic you’re passionate about
o     A mystery or thriller novel	o     A non-fiction book
o     A Sci-Fi or Fantasy novel	o     A book already in your bookshelf
o     A biography or memoir	o     A book that was once banned
o     A trilogy	o     A book originally published in the year you were born
o     A book you can read in a day	o     A children’s novel
o     A poetry book	o     A book about native Americans
o     A Pulitzer Prize-winning book	o     A foreign book translated into English
o     A book with over 600 pages	o     A book by a Nobel Prize-winning author
o     A book you’ve already read once before	o     A book about travel
o     A book chosen solely by its cover	o     A picture book
o     A book with a six word title	o     A book with a colour in the title
o     A book set in a country you want to visit	o     A book with the number ‘22’ in the title
o     A book with a green spine	o     A book you started but never finished
o     A book of mythology	o     A book by an author you love that you haven’t read
o     A book published in 2018	o     A fairytale
o     A book recommended by a friend	o     A play
o     A book written in the 1800’s	o     A book made into a movie / series
o     An e-book	o     A book with nonhuman characters
o     A Young-Adults book	o     A funny book
o     A book set in Africa	o     A book about adventures
o     A Historical non-fiction book	o     A book by Joan Didion
o     A book by a Filipino author	o     A book borrowed from the library
o     A book of short stories	o     A book on philosophy or religion
o     A novella	o     A graphic novel

 

 

The Death of the Heart

I think I need therapy after reading this novel. I’m all kind of mentally, psychologically, and emotionally confused. There were moments of greatness, but then on the whole, I wondered whether it was worth it. Maybe it was, who knows; the fact that it’s eliciting this kind of reaction from me perhaps shows that it is one of a kind.  Maybe I needed to read this now; to show, perhaps, that I’m not the only person in the world that overthinks.

reading : flow

No words for this.  Just an advise: READ THIS BOOK. It’s for those who want to live, not merely exist.  And it’s absolutely well written, too.

oxford bookstore

I’m so happy that we got to spend some time driving around New Delhi before our flight back home.  It was such a busy time that I didn’t think we will still be able to see something of the city.  Thanks to our guide who took us to Connaught Place, and this bookstore which according to him is the oldest one in New Delhi.

I grabbed the opportunity of buying these books that have been forever on my list but never got.  Honestly, I’m proud of myself. Haha! Got books by Indians from India.  I’m sure not many could say the same.  As to reading these anytime soon, that remains to be a dream.

New Delhi, or India for that matter, is probably not the place I would choose to go to for leisure if it were up to me.  My experience there was not exactly the best.  The cuisine wasn’t a favourite, safety was an issue, and the general air not exactly for the faint at heart.  But then leisure was not the purpose.  I did what I went to do.  All in all it was a huge blessing.  I did experience India, the little I saw of its wonders was enough given the time and the pace of our task there.  That’s why I hold on to this moment I went to Connaught Place and saw two bookstores and got some books because this was one of the highlights of my trip.

I dunno if I will ever choose to go back on my own volition. Maybe. Given the money, time and a good country-side spot, maybe.  The air, without the pollution, is cool, and the people have this easy way of bouncing back from bad to good.  It wasn’t all bad, really.  If nothing else, it made me somewhat prouder of my own country.

i love my library

This is where I am in my life right now:

Living life I never thought was possible…

Glad to be given an opportunity…

A place in the world…

And now I’m officially “booklover”.

http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/764337/nearly-abandoned-tacloban-library-gets-help-from-booklover