What Is It About That Author?

This week's Weekly Geeks asks:

• Tell your readers what is it about "an" author that you are most passionate about, that have you coming back for more from them, following their every blog post – literally blackmailing people to read their books?

• Who are some of your all time favourite authors?

• And what is it about them that makes you keep going back for more?

My absolute favourite author is Enid Blyton. I attribute my love for reading to her. Most of my childhood reading was Blyton, and on a bad/rainy day, I still yearn to curl up with one of her books. I strongly believe that children should read her books, and while lately, there's been a lot of criticism about her racist and sexist, I personally think it's the politically-correct police working overtime - much like the whole "Baa Baa Black Sheep" being racist, and changing it to "Baa Baa Rainbow Sheep," which incidentally has homosexual connotations...

I digress.

Moving on to authors of adult books...

There are a number of authors I've enjoyed reading since my mid-teens, including Gabriel Garcia Marquez and Milan Kundera. I'm slowly working my way through all their books, and am enjoying taking my time.

A couple of years ago, I discovered J.M. Coetzee. While I love the three works by him which I have read, and think he's immensely talented, I'd still be reluctant to call him an all-time favourite.

Just last year, I discovered Angela Carter, an author I've enjoyed acquainting myself with. Not only are her works surreal, brilliant and original (well, I've never read anything like her books), but her book covers are so incredibly striking, that you just want them sitting on your shelf, to look pretty!

So, what keeps me going back for more? Well, it's different things about different authors, and in some instances, it's hard to nail down. I haven't listed Sarah Waters as a favourite, yet, I want to read all her books to see if any of them compare to Fingersmith.

With Marquez and Kundera, it's kind of hard to pinpoint what I love. I've almost taken it for granted that if I pick up one of their books, I'm bound to love it. The language is beautiful, the story thought-provoking, and I genuinely feel as though I'm gained something after reading their works. On the other hand, reading Carter is a hell of an experience. I'm sorry, but there's no other way (that I can think of) to describe it.

How about you? Do you have any authors that you're just drawn to, more than others? What keeps you going back for more of their works?

Milan Kundera - The Book of Laughter and Forgetting

This book is a novel in the form of variations. The various parts follow each other like the various stages of a voyage leading into the interior of a theme, the interior of thought, the interior of a single, unique situation, the understanding of which recedes from my sight into the distance. It is a book about laughter and about forgetting, about forgetting and about Prague, about Prague and about angels. That's how Kundera sums up his book, within the text, as he reflects on life, the characters he's created, and how we're all bound by just one thing: the past; which is why, the children are our future. "Children have no past, and that is the whole secret of the magical innocence of their smiles".

The book is divided into seven stories, each independent of one another, but for the fact that the stories are based in and around the same time and place: a Czech Communist state in the 1970s. It's a book about love, about losing, about moving on, about laughing, about philosophy.

I don't know what inspired this book, but it's beautifully written, and I challenge anyone to open a page and not find some quote, reflection or dialogue that completely blows your mind away. The stories are interesting, be it about Tamina, the young widower  who tries to recollect each and every memory of the 'happy' life she shared with her husband, or about litost (a state of torment created by the sudden sight of one's own misery); be it filial love and devotion, or about going to see an old loved one - who the protagonist has truly loved, but never admitted - for his lover's ugly; or, be it about poets getting drunk and talking through the night about nothing at all, but at the same time, talking about everything.

A poet's pride is not ordinary pride. Only the poet himself can know the value of what he writes. Others don't understand it until much later, or they may never understand it. So, it's the poet's duty to be proud. If he weren't, he would betray his own work.

Kundera's observations, as he creates his characters, and gives them life, adds to the charm, specially when he talks about Tamina - and literally dedicates this book to her (in the text itself), while she seems to be a fictional character, consumed by pain and a dire need to forget, and get away. Move on, if you like.

And then there's the misogyny. From the opening chapter, where Mirek is ashamed of his passionate love of Zdena, a woman few years his senior, only because Zdena was guilty of something differently serious. She was ugly, to later on, where a character defends rape, and almost discusses how beautiful it is - because, women are prone to saying 'no', by default, even if they mean yes. Yes, that made me wince.

It's also a book about sex, and seduction. Sometimes, the attempted seduction results in litost, and sometimes, it results in the girl going to the bathroom and throwing up.

Ironically enough, it's a sad, despondent book; beautifully written. It invokes pangs of sadness, moments of reflection, and it does beg the question: what will the future bring, and like children, will I be able to laugh and forget, instead of being weighed down by the past, and subsequently, forgetting to look to the future.

So far, it's the best book I've read this year.