Read the World - #1 - An Introduction

Read the World - #1

Holy dung, I'm blogging again. 

I say again, I don't think it really counted the first three thousand times I attempted to do so. Who knows, maybe this time won't count either, unless I continue to at least attempt to take it seriously. 

However, I did want to begin anew as, in the craziness of pandemic mania, a new way of working, of living and of existing in the increasingly blurry lines between the two, I have come to find a major source of relaxation and reconnecting with myself: reading. Namely, reading fiction books. 

Understandably, for a lot of people this isn't exactly groundbreaking or innovative, but for me it is a really pivotal phenomenon. 

Even before the days of pandemic, when the world was still in easy-enough mode, I really struggled to read fiction books. 

I think for most people this might be a bit strange. Fiction is escapism, even before we were cooped up in our own homes for days, weeks, months on end, fiction was a brilliant way of escaping life's other monotonies. Monotonies such as 'the commute' (especially if, like me, you are from a large metropolis and a commute to the place of work can take anything up to two hours each way); waiting for the dishwasher to finish; waiting for something to finish cooking, or even just taking a quiet hour for oneself to literarily divest of other quotidian mundanities that would otherwise be absolutely mind-numbingly dull. 

That being said, for me, fiction has traditionally been difficult to digest. I've been trying to come up with reasons as to why, but I'm not entirely sure myself. I just always preferred fact, reference books, books that I did not have to read from the first page to the last in order, books from which I could learn something that was undebatable (well, more or less) and that I could use in my every day life, whether professionally or, more often than not, socially. As a keen linguist, I've bought books on various languages - even if I was only visiting the country where it is spoken for a single weekend.

Some old, some new, this my current 'next up' list

Besides preferring reading non-fiction books, my preferred method of relaxation and escapism was also traditionally music. I enjoy music of all genres, and have always been keen on finding musicians from many different cultures, countries and linguistic areas. I think this actually started when I was obsessed with the music of Amy Winehouse. As an artist, she was took inspiration from a variety of different cultures and styles and didn't shy away from leaving her comfort zone. Fast forward a few years and the rise in popularity of non-Anglophone musicians such as ROSALÍA and Christine & the Queens, I would say that today, I listen to more music in languages I do not understand, than languages I do. And I love it, all the same. That's the brilliant thing with music. Because it is sounds, and sounds invoke feelings, tastes, sometimes colours (unfortunately I do not have synaesthesia, though), you don't necessarily need to understand the written lyric. A song can make you feel happy, sad, excited, hungry, bored, melancholy or brave. (Besides - how many supposedly English-language songs do I know, of which I don't understand a single word, and certainly not the words when put together the way they have been by the songwriter? I'll take my chances with an uplifting Turkish bop, thanks.)

That being said, here I am, writing about reading. Maybe at another stage, I'll write about my music taste (oh boy, you should find the patience and strength for that...) 

ROSALÍA has made Spanish-language and flamenco fusions mainstream. 

[Picture taken from 'the Rolling Stone' magazine.]

As 2021 draws to a close, I have re-discovered my love for the written word, and a cracking story. 

But. 

There is slightly more to this simple idea. Now that I have re-discovered reading, I want to make a conscious decision to broaden my horizons somewhat, the way I have done with the music I listen to. 

This time, I am making sure to try and read at least one book from every country in the world, by indigenous authors. Of course, I am never going to limit my reading and if I enjoy a genre, series, or particular author's work, I don't see the need to avoid it for the sake of only reading the world, but, to quote the popular meme, "why not both?"

The Idea

So, hence my idea about my own personal project, which I have called "Read the World". I think there may have been a song with a rhyming word for "read" that came out a few years ago, something to do with charity and singing. 

This project will take some time. I have a 9-5, and a life to live either side of that, as do we all, but I am certainly going to begin (actually, I have already begun) the process of 'Reading the World' and will be sure to try and keep up to date in my journey. 

The plan so far

At the moment I must have about 50 books in my waiting list on Amazon, and I'm expecting this number to rise as not all 50 are unique to different countries or cultures. 

I just have one specification for this project: 

The author AND the subject of the fiction novel must be from the same country/culture. As much as I appreciate all works of art for their accuracy regardless of who writes them, I am looking in this project to read as authentic and close to the culture as possible. That means a story about Nigeria must be written by a Nigerian author. A story about Russia must be written by a Russian, and so on and so forth. This will slightly reduce the field - which is to my benefit - as quite frankly I don't think it is possible to read absolutely everything! 

In terms of age of the work, I'm open-minded. I have already started asking various friends, acquaintances and contacts from other countries and cultures if they have any recommendations for their own heritage, and if something resonates with me that was originally published in 1935, so be it. Doing my own research, however, I am leaning to go for the more recent. 

That being said, here is my current list: 

Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia (read) - my pick for Mexico, although Moreno-Garcia herself currently resides in Canada. I will do a review of it at a later date. 

The Fishermen by Chigozie Obioma (Nigeria, currently reading). I did, however, also purchase The Girl with the Louding Voice by Abi Daré, because expanding horizons, crossing borders and diversifying your reading does not have to mean stopping at one author. For Nigeria I hence have one male and one female author on my current reading list. 

I am currently half-way through Obioma's The Fishermen and thoroughly enjoying the dive into Nigerian culture, politics and storytelling

Pachinko by Min Jin Lee - my entry for Korea (I needn't define which, as firstly one side is clearly the side with the freedom of artistic thought, and the other is not so much, and in any case Lee's work actually spans a few generations, mostly before the partition of Korea into democratic South and democratic (asterisk) North. Lee herself was born in Seoul, lived in Japan, but now resides in the United States. 

I am open to suggestions for my next international layovers, and I am not going in a particular order. I want this to be as spontaneous and enjoyable as possible. 

At the moment, I have some vague ideas and suggestions for the following, but am still open to other ideas anyway: 

Turkey, Serbia, Spain, Finland, Sweden, Russia, Ukraine, Israel, Palestine, Ghana, Indonesia, Sierra Leone, Ireland, Uganda, Tunisia, India and Germany 

Obviously, while it may be slightly more difficult to figure out how to get literary representation from San Marino, Monaco, Guam or Vanuatu, I will try my absolute best to see what I can find and where. 

Hopefully this is a journey that will open my eyes even further to the wonders of the world and help me to diversify even more by understanding different cultures on an even more detailed basis. 

And in the meantime, I'll have a lot of fun laughing, crying, worrying, enjoying, and all sorts of other emoting at the books I read on my figurative flight. 

I think that's just about it for now. 

N