READING IS A SOLITARY ACT, BUT ONE THAT DEMANDS CONNECTION TO THE WORLD. – The Yellow-Lighted Bookshop: A memoir. A History by LEWIS BUZBEE.
Ann Morgan is a London based freelance journalist and writer with another book soon to appear “Beside Myself” – in 2016. She has previously worked for The Guardian, The Financial Times, Vanity Fair and Tatler among other publications. Her current new book – ” Reading the World” also called “Reading the Globe” and “The World Between Two Covers” (US titles) is a book about reading about reading. It started as a blog ;- “A year of reading the world”, which led her to work with English PEN and speak at International Translational Day. She has also been on the panel for last year’s Commonwealth Short Story prize. As the title of the book suggests, Ann Morgan has gone to some trouble to collate a tome about books worth reading from writers belonging to all corners of our fascinating globe.
She tells, “I glanced up at my book shelves, the proud record of more than twenty years of reading, and found a host of British and North American greats staring down at me….I had barely touched a work by a foreign language author in years…..The awful truth dawned. I was a literary xenophobe”.
Ann proceeded to read her way around the globe’s 196 independent countries (plus 1 extra)
sampling one book from each nation and wrote up on the most favoured stories presented to her or found in her research. She discovered that some countries were reluctant to part with “works of art” leaked to what they saw as “corrupt westerners”. Asking the question, “What is cultural heritage?” and “how do we define our national identity?” she addresses these issues on the grounds of global, political, national and personal perspectives. She realises in her book that the question is raised whether it is possible to overcome propaganda and censorship and examines how writing can challenge and change the way you look at the world and whether this is cause for celebration in knowing new information on the thoughts of writers?
There are 12 chapters including “Dealing with Culture Shock” and “Following the Trade Routes” – publishing around the world. The book is available in hardback at all good book shops at the price of £16.99 (Harvill Secker) . You may find you have read some of the books alluded to between its covers but it will definitely give you pointers to all kinds of great writing which you may not have savoured before. Enjoy!
Penny Nair Price
MTF = More to Follow