Hello everyone, I’m back this Friday with a new post, this time about one of the passions of a lot of you here, that is books. Today I present you three cool books you must read as soon as possible.
"Reading gives us someplace to go when we have to stay where we are". Mason Cooley
As I wrote in a previous post (@thereadingman/3-things-every-man-must), there is healing power in books. Books expand our knowledge, improve our vocabulary, improve our memory and are a great way to relieve stress. When you watch TV, you are all freaked out about things that don’t concern you; when you read books you are calm, at peace with yourself, use your imagination and learn something new.
Today, I present you one book about satirical fantasy, one about gothic tragedy and one about the rise and fall of a beloved man and his flamboyant life.
Here they are, enjoy:
3.Animal Farm (1945)
(Via: Unsplash)
“Man is the only creature that consumes without producing. He does not give milk, he does not lay eggs, he is too weak to pull the plough, he cannot run fast enough to catch rabbits. Yet he is lord of all the animals”. Animal Farm
At night, as soon as the Manor Farm is closed, Major, a wild boar, gathers all the animals of the farm and tells them about a strange dream he had last night. At the meeting, all the animals decide to overthrow the owners of the farm and install a sort of utopia were only animals rule.
After the rebellion and the expulsion of the owners of the farm, Major dies and other two pigs, Napoleon and Snowball, take control of the farm. They change the name MANOR FARM to ANIMAL FARM, they come up with seven commandments and put them on display, as that way is easier to comprehend for all the other animals, they order classes of reading and writing, ration of the foods, and form committees for production. They reading classes are a success but all of the other projects end in failure and the animals start to behave in the same way as before the rebellion. Some of the animals even escape to other farms.
(Via: Wikimedia Commons)
“THE SEVEN COMMANDMENTS:
1.Whatever goes upon two legs is an enemy.
2.Whatever goes upon four legs, or has wings, is a friend.
3.No animal shall wear clothes.
4.No animal shall sleep in a bed.
5.No animal shall drink alcohol.
6.No animal shall kill any other animal.
7.All animals are equal”.
Animal Farm
After a dispute over a windmill, Napoleon expels Snowball with the help of the dogs and installs his own dictatorship in which there are elections but he is the only candidate. Despite the commandment that all animals are equal, only the pigs are allowed to rule and distribute the resources.
Life becomes increasingly difficult. The animals start to go cold and hungry and get tired often as they are always forced to work. The farm is always short of money, supplies and resources; also, the rations are reduced every season. The profits from the work only go to the pigs and the dogs, and all the other animals are now poorer.
(Via: Sawakinome)
“The creatures outside looked from pig to men, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which” Animal Farm
Like in all dictatorships there are numerous speeches, songs and processions. To make matters worse, suddenly, one day, the pigs start to walk on their hind legs, like humans! And all of the seven commandments are abolished and only one now rules, one that says: ALL ANIMALS ARE EQUAL BUT SOME ANIMALS ARE MORE EQUAL THAN OTHERS.
The other animals cannot believe their eyes when they see their leader, Napoleon, walking on his hind legs, dressed in extravagant clothes and talking to the other men of the other farms. Didn’t he say: “Four legs good, two legs bad”? What the hell has just happened?
George Orwell in 1940 (Via: Wikimedia Commons)
“The further a society drifts from truth the more it will hate those who speak it”. George Orwell
They say that Animal Farm is an allegory about the disastrous Soviet Union, with Lenin as Major, Stalin as Napoleon and Trotsky as Snowball. George Orwell was an Englishman born in Bengal, India, in 1903. He studied at Eton in England. After a service with the British colonial Indian Imperial Police in Burma, he returned to Europe to work as a writer. He published his first novel, the excellent Burmese Days in 1934. He would write a total of six novels, three nonfiction books, and numerous articles and essays. He barely escaped alive the communist strikes during the Spanish Civil war. He always opposed oppression and tyranny. He died in 1950, of a neglected lung disease. His most famous works, 1984 and Animal Farm, are more relevant today than ever.
2.Wuthering Heights (1847)
(Via: iberlibro)
“"Wuthering" being a significant provincial adjective, descriptive of the atmospheric tumult to which its station is exposed in stormy weather. Pure, bracing ventilation they must have up there at all times, indeed: one may guess the power of the north wind blowing over the edge, by the excessive slant of a few stunted firs at the end of the house; and by a range of gaunt thorns all stretching their limbs one way, as if craving alms of the sun”. Wuthering Heights
We, literature fans, have to give thanks to Emily Brontë all our lives for creating one of the best villains in literature history, that is Mr. Heathcliff. A stranger named Lockwood arrives to a farm in Yorkshire to get away from human contact and live in solitude. All the people there are cold rude, including the owner of the far, Mr Heathcliff. One day, Lockwood falls ill and is taken care by the maid, a woman named Nelly; she will then tell him about the story of the people there.
One day, Mr. Earnshaw, the owner of a farm in Yorkshire, arrives home with a brown and rude gypsy kid who doesn’t speak English. He decides to raise this kid, whom he names Heathcliff, together with his other children, Catherine and Hindley. Heathcliff grows up believing he and Catherine are equals and that one day they will be married. Later, Mr. Earnshaw dies and Heathcliff is reduced to the condition of a servant. When he realizes he will always be a servant there he runs away from the farm.
Tom Hardy as Heathcliff in 2009 (Via: imgur)
“A sensible man ought to find sufficient company in himself”. Wuthering Heights
In what can only happen in the world of fiction, Heathcliff returns to Yorkshire three years later, this time as a very rich man. Heathcliff proposes marriage to Catherine but she refuses him and prefers to marry the quiet noble man Edgar Linton. That is when Heathcliff will set all of his energies in a hateful vengeance, deciding to destroy Catherine’s life. His hate and vengeance will span for almost 40 years and will include Catherine’s daughter, Cathy, and even the animals of the farm. What kind of sick bastard leaves a dog hanging on its neck? But don’t worry, the dog survives.
Heathcliff will consume himself with hate and anger. His hatred will have terrible consequences for him, his own son, and everyone around him.
One of the very few portraits of Emily Brontë (Via: Britannica)
“I will walk where my own nature would be leading”. Emily Brontë
A story of love, hate, betrayal, torture, ghosts, loneliness and revenge set in a bleak British background with a very rigid social class. Born in 1818, Emily Brontë crafted on of the best novels of the 19th century and one that will remain forever with us. Due to her reclusive nature and health problems, little is known about her. She came from a family of writers; she lost her mother at the age of six and her father encouraged her and her siblings in their artistic endeavors. Her sisters, Anne and Charlotte, wrote also such classics as Agnes Grey and Jane Eyre; her brother was also an artist and a writer, but never published anything. Emily died of tuberculosis in 1848 at the age of thirty; her sisters would also die later of the same disease. Her legacy is still with us.
1.Tender is the Night (1934)
(From: emilybooks.wordpress.com)
“He won everyone quickly with an exquisite consideration and a politeness that moved so fast and intuitively that it could be examined only in its effect”. Tender is the Night
Why a rich man, who has everything he could possibly want, decides to ruin his life? In this excellent piece of writing, by the great F. Scott Fitzgerald, we will meet Dick Diver, an American psychiatrist living in Europe with his beautiful rich wife and a very colorful group of friends, all if which at the end will turn their backs on him.
The story starts in Zurich, in 1917, where Dick Diver is a young man of 26 years old, working as a psychiatrist. Dick will marry a problematic patient of his, a beautiful and rich heiress named Nicole Warren. At first, Nicole’s family, especially her sister, Baby, don’t approve the marriage; Baby Warren believes Dick Diver is only marrying Nicole because of her status and money. But they finally end up accepting it. Then we will be taken to the fabulous life of Dick and Nicole during the roaring 1920s post-war era, their rich friends and relatives, and throughout the most amazing and luxurious places in the South of Europe.
Flapper detail, The Plastic Age magazine, 1924 (Via: Wikimedia Commons)
"Either you think — or else others have to think for you and take power from you, pervert and discipline your natural tastes, civilize, and sterilize you." Tender is the Night
From Zurich, Montreux, Vevey, to Nice, Paris, Nice and, finally, Rome. Fascinating characters like the uppity, but feisty, Baby Warren, Franz, the intellectual friend, the McKiscos, a rich old couple, and Tommy Barban, a soldier who fought in Morocco and who, somehow, penetrated these rich people circle. Then the fabulous life of Dick Diver will be disrupted when Rosemary, a very young and beautiful Hollywood star, arrives in Nice.
The French Riviera (Via: Pixabay)
"It took him a moment to respond to the unguarded sweetness of her smile, her body calculated to a millimeter to suggest a bud yet guarantee a flower." Tender is the Night
Dick Diver’s life will be altered in ways he wouldn’t have ever thought about. He will start secret romance with the beautiful Rosemary and get in all kinds of trouble just because of her, including the disposal of a corpse after a murder. In Rome, he will start a fight with a taxi driver and then get beaten by the Roman police and be thrown in jail; Baby Warren will have to come to his rescue and bail him out. His romance with Rosemary will end abruptly just to restart years later. Dick’s alcoholism and changes of mood will have consequences for him and those in his circle. To make matters worse Nicole, his beautiful wife, will start a secret romance with the impetuous Tommy Barban.
Francis Scott Fitzgerald in 1937 (Via: Wikimedia Commons)
"All good writing is swimming under water and holding your breath." F. Scott Fitzgerald
I will say this to you, this is one of the best novels I have read this year so far and has become already one of my favorites. Published is 1934, it was Fitzgerald fourth and final novel. It is his best novel after The Great Gatsby, of course, with some even saying this one is even better. I personally think that Fitzgerald’s forte was more in his short stories, a case similar to Hemingway; The Beautiful and Dammed is very well written but too long and kind of failed and This Side of Paradise is extremely boring. But Tender is the Night is magnificent, it has a force very few novels of these times have, is a classic masterpiece of the 20th century. I wish the genius of Fitzgerald would have given us more stories like this one. It has booze, drama, laughter, lavish parties, dances, beautiful beaches, fabulous cars, magnificent landscapes, gorgeous women, the movie industry, deception, romance, betrayal, fights, cruelty, murder, happiness, the excess of the Jazz Age.
The rise and fall of a rich man loved by all of the same people who will later turn their backs on him. One the greatest American novels by one of the greatest American writers. You will love it. Don’t miss it!
This is my first collection of book recommendations here, and my third book-related post. Check the first two here:
@thereadingman/blade-runner-deckard-is-not
@thereadingman/the-god-of-small-things
(Image at the beginning: Via Pixabay)
So, what do you think? Have you read any of these wonderful novels? Do you have another recommendation you would like to add? Well, leave it in the comment section right now.
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Culture makes you free!
Until next time.
Take care.
Orlando.