domingo, 30 de noviembre de 2008

A Year without Books

I doubt I could go a month without buying any new books much less an entire year, but I've been seriously thinking about coming to grips with my book-buying habit over the last couple of weeks. Key word: "thinking."

The "problem": My to be read pile is out of control, and I keep buying new books faster than I can read the old ones. The "solution": I vow to buy only one new book a month until this time next year (gifts for others and any texts I might need for classes would be exempted, natch), until I make a serious dent in ye olde TBR mountain ("vague promise with lots of built-in wiggle room" critique duly noted), or until I otherwise come to my senses (the smart money for those inclined to a friendly wager)...whichever comes first.

While you, the predominantly anonymous lurkers who nonetheless constitute the very heart and soul of Caravana's extremely sophisticated circle of mostly silent friends, ponder the weight of this publicly announced yet still intimately personal decision, please permit me to draw your attention to the latest three additions to my home library pictured above: all re-reads lost over the years but just purchased again tonight to help get me through this long, cold first month without new books!

5 comentarios:

  1. A month without books has been very easy since I started to study Catalan. The last book I was given was BARCELONA AMOR FINAL by JOAN MARGARIT. My friends in Barcelona gave it in September. I have bought books for my Blogger friends but not for myself except the CATEDRAL DEL MAR in Finnish translation: MEREN KATEDRAALI.
    I am totally nuts with Catalonia.
    I even joined blocdefotos! Boy it was difficult to sign in or what do you say, to make an account.
    Bona nit! I didn't answer any qüestio però.. Gràcies anywayz.

    ResponderBorrar
  2. It's nice to hear from you, Merike! My Catalan's getting very rusty these days, but I have a couple of novels by Carme Riera and Emili Teixidor that I'd like to get to soon. I also have "La catedral del mar" and Carlos Ruiz Zafon's "El juego del ángel" waiting to read, both in Spanish but at least set in Barcelona. I guess I really don't need more books for a while, but it's tough to say no. By the way...I've wanted to do some posts in Catalan here for a while now but have always chickened out, so I've been meaning to tell you that I'm totally envious of the job you do with the language on your own blog. Nice going. Fins aviat!

    ResponderBorrar
  3. Thank you! I must say I would much rather write in English but I didn't get any readers that way. I didn't have anything to say. Learning a language by use of a translator and by reading blogs is very interesting. My languages apart from this and Finnish are Swedish, German and French plus I have sometimes started Italian and Spanish but the irregular verbs are so awful I quit:-). I have no time to learn anything so I am translating the whole page into English from any language. Translators are no good so I need to know something to understand the silly upside down translation:-) Some knowledge of French helps.

    I don't understand the question of books of Finnish authors as far as "per l'any que vi" or rather my tradcutor doesn't understand "vi".
    So I don't guess if it means "for this year" or "for next year" or have something to do with the year without books:-) If you like history - and he has written everything possible but for Xmas it might be interesting to read
    FINÈS ENTRE TOTS I TOTES: MIKA WALTARI - SUOMALAINEN KIRJAILIJA - Escriptor finlandés. Marco el Romano,

    he has been translated into so many languages and his THE EGYPTIAN also has been filmed in Hollywood in the thirties (a very poor film they made).
    Blogger did not notify me of this reply of yours even though I have ticked the place that the reply would be sent to me, strange. Quina benedicció that you also wrote to my blog.

    Another famous Finn, a humorist, is ARTO PAASILINNA whose books are particularly famous in France and Italy but some have been translated into Catalan, too. And into English naturally. tens un racó dalt del món: El moliner udolaire al Club de Lectura de Tortosa That one is nice. His first book is The Year Of The Rabbit. Alliance Francaise FRENCH FILM FESTIVAL 2007, Australia > vic > SYNOPSIS That very poor film was made of it set in Canada while the first movie was made in Finland and is naturally all about Finland as all these humoristic books are. There are so many of them he has written in 30 odd years, all funny. And I seem to have written a novel as well:-)

    ResponderBorrar
  4. Merike, thanks for all the suggestions. I didn't know you were a novelist! And I think it's awesome that you have more readers in Catalan on your blog than you did in English!! How funny. I made a typo with what should have been "l'any que ve" (next year), but you guessed what I meant correctly anyway. Just looking for some new authors for next year...from the library, of course! Take care.

    ResponderBorrar