Kirjanurkkaus

Minua ärsyttivät ja melkein inhottivat kaikki ne ihmiset ja heidän väsymättä toistuva toimintansa. He näyttäytyivät monta kertaa kukkulalla. Keinotekoisten aaveiden asuttama saari oli elämäni sietämättömin painajainen, ja rakastuminen yhteen näistä kuvajaisista oli pahempaa kuin rakastuminen aaveeseen [...] . Brasiliassa potkitaan palloa ja sen kunniaksi ajattelin lukea jonkin eteläamerikkalaisen kirjailijan teoksen - tuo maanosa kun on ainakin minun blogissani se kaikista syrjityin. Koko blogihistoriani aikana olen tainnut käydä vain kerran Chilessä Hernán Rivera Letelierin kanssa ja toisen kerran Perussa Mario Vargas Llosan seurassa. Brasiliaan asti en kuitenkaan tällä kertaa päässyt vaan jämähdin Argentiinaan. Tai itse asiassa autiolle saarelle, minne kirja sijoittuu... Morelin keksintö on oikea herätelaina. Joskus sitä tarttuu johonkin kirjaan kirjastossa vailla minkäänlaisia ennakkotietoja tai -odotuksia siihen liittyen. Hankin tässä viikko sitten pitkän viikonlopun (mini...

Hän seurasi juuri huvittuneena pientä hullunrohkeata rapua joka kohotteli häntä kohti kaksia eripituisia saksiaan niin kuin kaksintaistelija kalpaansa ja miekkaansa, kun jäi siihen kuin salaman lyömänä tuijottamaan paljaan jalan jälkeä. Yhtä hämmästyksen lyömä hän olisi ollut jos olisi keksinyt oman jalanjälkensä hiekasta tai liejusta, varsinkin kun oli jo aikaa sitten lakannut kävelemästä muuten kuin saappaat jalassa. Mutta hänen silmäinsä alla oleva jälki oli painunut kallioon itseensä . Oliko kyseessä toisen ihmisen jalanjälki? Michel Tournierin romaani Perjantai on uusi versio Robinson Crusoen tarinasta. Romaani seuraa perinteistä haaksirikko- ja selviytymistarinaa pääpiirteittäin heti alusta lähtien. Englantilainen Robinson Crusoe jää ainoana eloon Virginia -laivan haaksirikkoutuessa myrskyssä. Autiolle saarelle pelastautunut Robinson antaa uudelle kodilleen nimen Speranza, "Toivo". Tournierin luomassa Robinsonissa on kuitenkin jotain hyvin erilaista kuin Daniel...

'There are many kinds of life,' says Spike, mildly. 'Humans always assumed that theirs was the only kind that mattered. That's how you destroyed your planet.' 'Don't blame me,' said Pink. 'I didn't destroy it.' 'But you have a second chance. Maybe this time...' The first sentence of the novel sets the tone: This new world weighs a yatto-gram. When I started reading The Stone Gods , I have to admit that I was disappointed. It's science fiction. And I'm not a big fan of science fiction. Of course, some scifi novels are fascinating must-reads ( 2001: A Space Odyssey !), but I don't generally get any kicks out of the futuristic utopia/dystopia mythologies with robots and other technological wonders. But as I continued reading the novel - somewhat reluctantly - I was soon swept away. It wasn't just robots and dystopia - there was something intensely, deeply human about the book. Jeanette Winterson isn't reall...

'There is no need for us to know what freedom means, Susan. Freedom is a word like any word. It is a puff of air, seven letters on a slate. It is but the name we give to the desire you speak of, the desire to be free. What concerns us is the desire, not the name. Because we cannot say in words what an apple is, it is not forbidden us to eat the apple. It is enough that we know the names of our needs and are able to use these names to satisfy them, as we use coins to buy food when we are hungry. It is no great task to teach Friday such language as will serve his needs. We are not asked to turn Friday into a philosopher.' The basic setting of this novel is clear enough in the beginning: a woman, Susan Barton, is shipwrecked onto an island. She discovers that the island is inhabited by an elderly white man named Cruso, who has a black slave, Friday. Sound familiar? Yes, this is the old Robinson Crusoe story told from a female perspective. But the island and its inhabitants are...

"Can't they see? Can't they understand? Without the smoke signal we'll die here? Look at that!" A wave of heated air trembled above the ashes but without a trace of smoke. "We can't keep one fire going. And they don't care. And what's more--" He looked intensely into Piggy's streaming face. "What's more, I don't care sometimes. Supposing I got like the others - not caring. What'd become of us?" Piggy took off his glasses, deeply troubled. "I dunno, Ralph. We just got to go on, that's all. That's what grown-ups would do." We're all familiar with stories of people being shipwrecked on an uninhabited island and having to survive in one way or another until they - inevitably - get rescued. Children read classic adventure stories like Coral Island , Treasure Island and Swiss Family Robinson . These are relate light-hearted, exciting and happy adventures that children encounter when they ...

It happened one day about noon going towards by boat, I was exceedingly surprized with the print of a man's naked foot on the shore, which was very plain to be seen in the sand. I stood like one thunder-struck, or as if I had seen an apparition; I listened, I looked round me, I could hear nothing, nor see any thing; I went up to a rising ground to look farther; I went up the shore and down the shore, but it was all one, I could see no other impression but that one. I went to it again to see if there were any more, and to observe if it might not be my fancy; but there was no room for that, for there was exactly the very print of a foot, toes, heel, and every part of a foot; how it came thither I knew not, nor could in the least imagine. Like a well-trained product of the Western society, I too read Robinson Crusoe (first published in 1719) for the first time when I was quite young. Of course, that was not the full story, but some kind of abridged, censored, children's edition...

Identifying the island with himself, he gazed at the cars in the breaker's yard, at the wire-mesh fence, and the concrete caisson behind him. These places of pain and ordeal were now confused with pieces of his body. He gestured towards them, trying to make a circuit of the island so that he could leave these sections of himself where they belonged. He would leave his right leg at the point of his crash, his bruised hands impaled upon the steel fence. He would place his chest where he had sat against the concrete wall. At each point a small ritual would signify the transfer of obligation from himself to the island. He spoke aloud, a priest officiating at the eucharist of his own body. 'I am the island.' The air shed its light. British novelist J. G. Ballard's novel is one of the numerous re-writings of Robinson Crusoe . Ballard takes the well-known story of a shipwrecked man and relocates it into the modern, busy setting of industrial London. An ordinary worki...