The Old Man and the Sea

Old Man and the Sea

Ernest Hemingway

Paperback, 99 pages

First Published:  1952

Publisher:  Arrow Books

ISBN:  9780099908401

Blurb:  Set in the Gulf Stream off the coast of Havana, Hemingway's magnificent fable is the story of an old man, a young boy and a giant fish. In a perfectly crafted story, which won for Hemingway the Nobel Prize for Literature, is a unique and timeless vision of the beauty and grief of man's challenge to the elements in which he lives.

 “I try not to borrow. First you borrow. Then you beg.”

Among the most iconic books written in 20th century, Ernest Hemingway’s “Old Man and the Sea” has a spot of its own. In case you have not been living in a cave since you were born, you’d have heard of its reference somewhere. Published in 1952, The Old Man and the Sea went on to win Pulitzer Prize. It was also cited as the contributing factor to Ernest Hemingway’s Nobel Prize in 1954.

 Santiago, an old veteran fisherman, embarks on a lonesome journey in his skiff to catch a big fish after not catching a single fish for past eighty four days. The book chronicles the struggle of the old man and the marlin in the Gulf Stream. Even with scarcity of basic amenities, Santiago does not let go of the marlin, at the risk of his own life. He does so because he believes in his skills no matter what the other fishermen think of him. The book is the depiction of struggle of man with the nature for his existence.

The writing style of Hemingway is poetic. The scenes are full of imagery. The book contains a lot of monologues, which are masterfully written by the Nobel Laureate. Hemingway is highly economical with his words without leaving any point of the characterization of the old man. Without even ever talking about it, the author depicts the desire of the Old Man to cement his place in the Cuban society and culture. The author also paints the picture of the relation between the young boy, Manolin, and the Old Man. The reader is presented with a vivid picture of their interdependence on each other, even though the young boy’s parents do not let him work with the Old Man.

Although it might take you only a single sitting to read the entire novella, the book will end up giving you enough food for thought that will take a long time digesting. The central theme of the book is man’s capability, strength, bravery and ethics at the time of adversity. Te recurring theme of manhood in Hemingway’s literature is also present in this book. The struggle in the Gulf Stream between the marlin and the old man can also be seen as a metaphor for the adulation, love and respect between two adversaries of equal footing. The turn of the events later on in the book tend to show the ethics of manhood, too.

The book can be summed up as a triumph of an individual. It is the moral code of a life laid bare, where a man has to fight for his even most essential needs.  In modern life we would hardly have to struggle for life’s basic needs against nature like Santiago, but still he teaches us how to accept failure in life, strive alone for our goals with dignity, believe in our capability, and when success comes accept it with humility.

I think every lover of literature should go through this small, yet magnanimous piece of literature. Ernest Hemingway’s Old Man and the Sea is highly recommended!  

Reviewed by: Shadab Ahmed.

In the Body of the World

In the Body of the World : A Memoir

by Eve Ensler

 

Paperback, 220 pages

Published: April, 2013

Publisher:  Random House India

ISBN:  9780805095180

Blurb: From the bestselling author of The Vagina Monologues and one of Newsweek’s 150 Women Who Changed the World, a visionary memoir of separation and connection—to the body, the self, and the world

Playwright, author, and activist Eve Ensler has devoted her life to the female body—how to talk about it, how to protect and value it. Yet she spent much of her life disassociated from her own body—a disconnection brought on by her father’s sexual abuse and her mother’s remoteness. “Because I did not, could not inhabit my body or the Earth,” she writes, “I could not feel or know their pain.”

But Ensler is shocked out of her distance. While working in the Congo, she is shattered to encounter the horrific rape and violence inflicted on the women there. Soon after, she is diagnosed with uterine cancer, and through months of harrowing treatment, she is forced to become first and foremost a body—pricked, punctured, cut, scanned. It is then that all distance is erased. As she connects her own illness to the devastation of the earth, her life force to the resilience of humanity, she is finally, fully—and gratefully—joined to the body of the world.

Unflinching, generous, and inspiring, Ensler calls on us all to embody our connection to and responsibility for the world.

Lately, I have been in love with reading Memoirs. After reading some quite nice ones, when I got my hands on Eve Ensler’s In the Body of the World, I couldn’t wait to get through it. As I read it, I realised I have become a sucker for memories. Be it mine, a friend’s, or an author’s. I love the idea of memories.

I had heard a lot about Eve Ensler before I got to read In the Body of the World. Her very acclaimed book, The Vagina Monologues had gathered all the praise it could. Being a burgeoning feminist myself, I instantly became a fan of Ensler for all that she has done for the women on the face of this earth.

Ensler’s memoir, In the Body of the World is primarily an account of her fight with her cancer. A uterine cancer that emptied her from within, quite literally.  This book is as much an account of the atrocities meted out to the women of Congo, and the making of their dream place, the City of Joy.

The first thing that intrigued me about the book was its index. She called it SCANS. I wondered what the SCANS was about. And just as you are through a few pages, she tells us why. And you are just awestruck at her capabilities and the uprightness that she shows towards life.  

The book, if to be described in a word, should be ‘heart-wrenching’. The images that Ensler shows us are vivid, and explicitly disturbing. Ensler doesn’t  hold back. She gives you the details of every damn disturbing thing in such a raw and graphic language that you would squint your eyes and say ‘Ew!’ Until now, of all the books I have read, In the Body of the World was the most disturbing one. And I loved it for that.

The women of Congo, the centre of attention for Eve even during her turbulent times of cancer, steal the show. So much that has been written about them, it made me feel more and more related and identifiable to them.

No wonder that the book is depressingly explicit in terms of the imagery, it is humorous. You would want to laugh in all the heart ache that Ensler gives you. This is the biggest thing that makes obvious the brilliance of Ensler as a writer. The way she marries laughter with tears, my hats off to her.

Eve’s language (Gosh, I am addressing her as Eve as if she were my childhood chum! But I felt closer and closer to her as I read the book. OMG! She is such an amazing writer) is like a conversation. You feel like she is talking to you; sitting in front of you sipping coffee and telling you everything that has gone by in her life lately. The book sounds like a diary. It is filled with casual but strong metaphors. And what took my heart away were the short chapters. Yes, I am a sucker for short chapters too.

She makes you feel ‘in her head’.

At last I would say, Eve Ensler makes you introspect. Whether you want it or not. She is a spiritual guide! I found it out right when she talked of the somnolence in all of us.  “The choice between being awake or half asleep,” she says.

You got to read the book to know it all. It is totally, totally worth your time.

By the River Piedra I Sat Down and Wept

by Paulo Coelho

 

Paperback, 208 pages

Published  on: May 23rd 1994

Publisher: Harper Perennial 

ISBN: 0061122092 

 Blurb:  From Paulo Coelho, author of the international bestseller The Alchemist, comes a poignant, richly poetic story that reflects the depth of love and life.

Rarely does adolescent love reach its full potential, but what happens when two young lovers reunite after eleven years? Time has transformed Pilar into a strong and independent woman, while her devoted childhood friend has grown into a handsome and charismatic spiritual leader. She has learned well how to bury her feelings . . . and he has turned to religion as a refuge from his raging inner conflicts.

Now they are together once again, embarking on a journey fraught with difficulties, as long-buried demons of blame and resentment resurface after more than a decade. But in a small village in the French Pyrenees, by the waters of the River Piedra, a most special relationship will be reexamined in the dazzling light of some of life's biggest questions.

The love story with all the pains and sorrows that surround it and all the inspirations that the book brings is what makes By the River Piedra I Sat Down and Wept one of the best books of Paulo Coelho.

“The moment we begin to seek love, love begins to seek us. And to save us,” says Coelho in the book.

But is this just a love story? And that too written by Coelho? If that’s what you’re thinking, read on!

I love it when a book makes you feel and think, and you just can't put it down. And when you finish it, you don't want to let it go. This story touched me deep inside. It's not simply about the love between Pilar and the man she loves. It is rather about their love for God. But this book is so much more than your average contemporary love story.

By the River Piedra I sat Down and Wept will have you looking into your soul. Coelho gives us the idea of the feminine side 0f God, which you’ll hardly ever find anywhere else. According to me his stories might have simple life lessons but he often tells it in ways that seem to touch many people -- and I am one of those people. They are good simple lessons that come from Coelho’s heart.

It is not that you need to believe in the feminine side of God and everything Coelho says in the book. Or even about the presence of God in things like water or anything of that sort. I am a Muslim and I cannot believe this but Coelho does make you feel from within that Faces are not the things worth looking for in the world. Life and divinity are different from what we think of them to be.

Yet, I felt like the book repeated itself and nothing new was introduced in the second half, nothing dynamic happened and the climax of the story came and went without much notice. Compared to The Alchemist or any of his other books, this seems to be a little lazy attempt. And maybe because I do not believe in it, the feminine side of God thing made it a little boring for me.

Can philosophy, inspiration, spirituality and Coelho be kept apart? Never! You fill find everything in the book that keeps you gripped to the other books by Coelho.

For the ones, who want to try out with Coelho’s books and are romance readers, I recommend them to read this one for a start. And yes, if possible, read it twice. You’ll get different connotations every next time you read it. At least, that was what happened to me.

Review originally published on:  http://vaultofbooks.com/bplus/review-by-the-river-piedra

The Alchemist

by Paulo Coelho 

 

Paperback, 167 pages

Published on:  May 1st 1993 (first published 1988)

Publisher: HarperCollins

ISBN: 0061122416

 Blurb:  The Alchemist is the magical story of Santiago, an Andalusian shepherd boy who yearns to travel in search of a worldly treasure as extravagant as any ever found. From his home in Spain he journeys to the markets of Tangiers and across the Egyptian desert to a fateful encounter with the alchemist. The story of the treasures Santiago finds along the way teaches us, as only a few stories have done, about the essential wisdom of listening to our hearts, learning to read the omens strewn along life's path, and, above all, following our dreams.

"Big things come in small packages" - this is how The Alchemist can be defined in a sentence. From the bestselling author of The Zahir and Eleven Minutes, this is a novel that will cast a spell on you as you go on reading every single line. I feel privileged that I got to write the review of this book.

Every few decades a book is published that changes the lives of its readers forever. With over a million and a half copies sold around the world, The Alchemist has already established itself as a modern classic, universally admired. Paulo Coelho's charming fable, now available in English for the first time, will enchant and inspire an even wider audience of readers for generations to come.

This novel has not only changed perspectives but has changed and will continue to change lives. It is one of the best books I have ever read. An inspirational masterpiece by Coelho, it is a magnificent tale of an Andalusian shepherd boy named Santiago who travels from his homeland in Spain to the Egyptian desert in search of a treasure buried in the Pyramids.

The book will teach you lessons for life as you leaf through each page. These are the lessons you will carry with yourself at each step on the path called life. It has one basic message that we should follow our dreams come what may. Even if we have to risk something very important, very valuable, we should not hesitate at all and should strive towards that dream till the end. Hopelessness is the worst thing in life.

This is not just about a journey from Spain to Egypt but it is about the journey to the soul. With fantastic metaphors, this book inspires you the way nothing else ever can. There are parts of this book you will fall in love with. You'd want to read them over and over again.
Remember the line from Om Shanti Om (I hated that movie, though) that If you really want something in your life, the entire universe conspires in your favour? Yes, this line is repeated several times in The Alchemist and is taken from this book.

This book tells something that I have believed ever since: that everything is destined although we make our own decisions. Maktub, it says. The larger than life character, Santiago, also shows that omens are the language of the world. Omens tell us what Destiny has in store for us. It tells us that there is always a purpose for which we are here in the world.

I loved the way everyone can relate to the events happening in the book, be it Santiago leaving his sheep, meeting the girl at the shop, being in the caravan, making tea, searching for the alchemist, meeting the alchemist, falling in love with Fathima, leaving his love, getting to know what his dream actually was, getting back at prodding the sheep or remembering his promise to Fathima.

I found the book flawless. Absolutely flawless. There is not a thing I disliked about the book.

If you are a philosophy lover and love any of the things about which Coelho writes in the book, then, it is a must read for you.
PS: I plan to read it once more and fall in love with the wonderful story again. It is really worth it.

Review originally published on:  http://vaultofbooks.com/aplus/review-the-alchemist