I was amazed and intrigued by every book that I lay my hands upon. Russian Literature impressed me. I was a little bored by Tolstoy earlier in my time, but I loved Gorky and I was crazy about Dostoevsky and still am and shall always be. I was amazed by the way he would explain about his characters. How he built his characters and the way they obeyed his pen. The craftsmanship was extraordinary. The "Crime & Punishment" can only be written by somebody who had a deep observation of the human character. I had read it in one go, it enthralled my wits to understand that the greatest punishment of it all is the human mind for any crime. I read it again and again, and somewhere along the line I realized that the crime took may be about 6-7 pages (not completely sure, but sure that it was less) and the punishment, especially the mental torture almost putting me in pain all through, went on for close 200 odd pages. Stream of consciousness at its best.
I learned and then I began to understand the need to learn everyday and I started devouring every goddamned philosophy or story there was. I was always seeking to understand the writer also. Deep within his own story, I've always understood we can seek the explorer of character. Almost all writers in their own way showed themselves autobiographically and delivered the results for us to fathom the intricacies of the human character and design.
An example of my growth is that "Don Quixote" by Cervantes when I read that the first time and discussed the same with few of friends in school sounded dumb, extremely childish and lousy to the core as a book even if I read the abridged English translation with extreme interest. But when I grew and during my college days when I read the unabridged version again in English but this time forgetting the preconceived notions of other readers whom I know I found that it’s a classic work of art. It shows the frailties, arrogance, piety and vanity of human nature. But it picks us up and shows us the infallible authority of the human mind which can make us believe and achieve.
It was the same with Voltaire's book on Optimism. I forgot the name of the book of the cuff, but I still remember me and my friend laughing away thinking how dumb the whole thing felt. But the truth is exactly different. My people did say then that these are books beyond the measure of the intelligence that I've developed at that particular age. But later on when understanding of the reality among several of such wonderful works of art, I figured it was good of me to have taken that plunge 'cause I knew the measure of development of my own intelligence and intellectual capabilities on the whole.
Kahlil Gibran was a wonderful study. Especially the well edited and amazingly classy "The Prophet". He had a big bent towards eastern philosophy but hell that was good. It rocked me for quite a number of years. Still when I pick it up and go through some the lines, it rejuvenates me. Richard Bach was amazingly precise and profound in his rendition of philosophy by correlating it with his understanding of flying. I've also seen the movie on those birds with Neil Diamond rendering some great music. I did get into the habit of remembering "The Albatross" as well as "Annabel Lee's" dream sequence whenever I read that "bird book" (By now you might have figured I forgot the name of the book) by Bach.
I continued into Sartre, Camus, and Robert Prisig etc and then moved into beat generation where I was more impressed by Bukowski and Jack Kerouac. Then I embraced a bit of Hegel, Einstein, Emily Dickinson, Thoreau, Emerson etc. That’s a nice mix; a little bit of poetry with a lot of philosophy intermingled with existentialism and Science (just to keep myself rational). Now, I can tell you the above might be sounding like "damn - am I geeky". Nope, you got that wrong, I got the right mix when I mingled all of the above with Tintin, Asterix, Jackie Collins, Playboys, History, adventure yarns, travelogues, Readers Digest and Nancy Fridays(just to keep all you guys happy, I've never read a complete one only tits and bits that could be vividly expanded for whatever purposes).
I would continue with my rendition about my development and also the same thought which bought me to write about books in a later post. Remember, digression is normal, because I jump into things just like that and that means I digress just like that. But failure or success, I do go back to where I began and get the pieces together so that it does not look like a jigsaw puzzle. I like it simple, I keep it simple. I mingle, I add, I subtract, I divide and I multiply but I use only ordinary numbers and make it easy to fathom. But the result is always an extended hand towards infinity....no endings.....just continuance...
Kahlil Gibran was a wonderful study. Especially the well edited and amazingly classy "The Prophet". He had a big bent towards eastern philosophy but hell that was good. It rocked me for quite a number of years. Still when I pick it up and go through some the lines, it rejuvenates me. Richard Bach was amazingly precise and profound in his rendition of philosophy by correlating it with his understanding of flying. I've also seen the movie on those birds with Neil Diamond rendering some great music. I did get into the habit of remembering "The Albatross" as well as "Annabel Lee's" dream sequence whenever I read that "bird book" (By now you might have figured I forgot the name of the book) by Bach.
I continued into Sartre, Camus, and Robert Prisig etc and then moved into beat generation where I was more impressed by Bukowski and Jack Kerouac. Then I embraced a bit of Hegel, Einstein, Emily Dickinson, Thoreau, Emerson etc. That’s a nice mix; a little bit of poetry with a lot of philosophy intermingled with existentialism and Science (just to keep myself rational). Now, I can tell you the above might be sounding like "damn - am I geeky". Nope, you got that wrong, I got the right mix when I mingled all of the above with Tintin, Asterix, Jackie Collins, Playboys, History, adventure yarns, travelogues, Readers Digest and Nancy Fridays(just to keep all you guys happy, I've never read a complete one only tits and bits that could be vividly expanded for whatever purposes).
I would continue with my rendition about my development and also the same thought which bought me to write about books in a later post. Remember, digression is normal, because I jump into things just like that and that means I digress just like that. But failure or success, I do go back to where I began and get the pieces together so that it does not look like a jigsaw puzzle. I like it simple, I keep it simple. I mingle, I add, I subtract, I divide and I multiply but I use only ordinary numbers and make it easy to fathom. But the result is always an extended hand towards infinity....no endings.....just continuance...
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