#readnobels
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EXTENDED INTO MAY! April #TTWIB reading challenge: Where in the world will your Nobel take you?



Edit April 29: We're extending this challenge into May! Now's your chance to join in the fun and get double the fun, double the punch in one reading challenge.

***
Happy almost-April! This month's reading challenge was born last year, the love child of two wonderful reading challenges that just made sense together.

My wonderful co-hosts of Travel the World in Books  --  Tanya at Mom's Small Victories and Lucy at Fictional 100 -- were pretty game to give this a whirl again this year.

I'm a more perpetual-challenge-type-of-gal and I love it when I can knock off two things in on go. So, look:

Travel the World in Books challenges you to:
Travel the world in books, of course! Expand your horizons and read books set in or written by authors from countries other than the one you live in.

Read the Nobels challenges you to:
Read books authored by those who have won the Nobel Prize for Literature.

The challenge is very simple, as is the tradition of the free-read mantra of TTWIB:
Read ONE book this April that qualifies for both challenges. 

Here's an example:
  • I choose to read Strange Pilgrims by Gabriel Garcia Marquez (this is an example - I've read it and it's one of my favorite books)
  • Marquez is the 1982 Nobel Prize for Literature winner.
  • Marquez hails from Colombia.
  • This book is about Latin American immigrants and is set across Europe, including Switzerland Austria.

Pick your book and sign up

If this sounds daunting to you, don't worry! It's easy to find a book that qualifies for both challenges.

You can pick a Nobel prize winning author then narrow it down to a specific book written by that author. Or you may already have a book in mind. I suggest visiting the following links to see what interests you:
  • Check out last year's challenge right here. Lots of links to participants' weekly posts.
  • Read the Nobels blog - over a hundred book reviews by fellow readers. Check out the right sidebar for individual reviews by author or by title.
  • Resources on the Read the Nobels blog - this list-in-progress includes links to a List of Nobel Prize for Literature laureates, laureates arranged by genre, as well as places to download e-books. There's a lot to discover, for example, did you know that any book by Toni Morrison would qualify (she won in 1993), or that classics by Rudyard Kipling or William Faulkner would make great reading for this challenge? 
  • My own posts for the 2016 Read the Nobels reading challenge - includes my reviews of Nobel-prize winning books, book spotlights, monthly wrap-up posts for the challenge, and more!
  • Travel the World in Books summary page with links to the link-ups to reviews arranged by region.
  • Check out my Book Map! You can also scroll down to the bottom of this page. Anything with a star denotes a Nobel prize winning book.

Weekly posts and the new #TTWIB Instagram challenge

Ready to get started?

Start with your sign up post! Make sure to come back for weekly discussion posts and Instagram challenges. Link up and make sure to visit other participants ... and have fun!

For Instagram challenges, use the hashtag #TTWIB and tag @guiltlessreader so I can compile your lovely posts at the end of the month. If you're doing a weekly post, you can also include your Instagram photo for the week.

Week 1 (April 1-9) : Sign up post - let's begin our journey

  • What immediately comes to mind when you hear "Nobel Prize winner for literature?" Why?
  • Which book did you choose? Who is the author / when did they win the Nobel Prize / nationality? Where does this story take place?
  • Why did you pick this particular book?
  • What other authors / books did you also consider for this challenge?
Instagram challenge: A photo of you and your chosen Nobel

Link up below:

Weeks 2-3 (April 10-16): Learn more about your author and setting

1. Visit the Nobel Prize for Literature list of laureates and read up why your chose author won that year. 
  • What about this author stands out for you? 
  • Share an interesting fact or tidbit that you learned about your author.
2. Visit the Read the Nobels blog and look up other books that have been reviewed on the blog (see right hand side bar where reviews are sortable through the dropdown "By Nobel Laureate"). 
  • Are there a lot or a few reviews by your author on the blog?
  • Do any of the books reviewed appeal to you? Are there any you would like to read?
3. Where does your book take place?
  • Describe your favourite scene/s or cultural practices which you think best highlight the country in which the story takes place.
  • Does the country intrigue you? Would you visit?

Instagram challenge:
Join in any (or all!) of these memes this week -- #Friday56, #BookBeginnings or #BookmarkMonday and take a photo of your book for the meme. Get creative - add props, yourself, or even make a little photo album!
  • Friday 56  - a random quote from page 56 of your book
  • Book Beginnings - the beginning sentence of your book
  • BookmarkMonday - your book with the bookmark you are currently using (or any other random bookmark! 

 Link up below (mark whether it is week 2 or 3):

Week 4 (April 24-30): Link up your reviews! 

  • It's the end of the challenge! Link up your review of your book for this challenge.
  • Tell us a little about where you traveled to in this book.
  • Tell us a little about the author.
  • Would you recommend this book to us?
  • Tell us how you found this reading challenge - did you enjoy it or not? 
Instagram challenge: 
A photo that describes how you feel about your book for this challenge (e.g. your best facial expression!). If you read many books for the challenge, pick your favourite.


Link up below (linky already contains last year' reviews!):


We'd love for you to join us and find out where in the world will your Nobel take you!


Grab the button!

#Friday56 & #BookBeginnings: Love in the Time of Cholera #TTWIB @ReadNobels


It was inevitable: the scent of bitter almonds always reminded him of the fate of unrequited love. Dr. Juvenal Urbino noticed it as soon as he entered the still darkened house where he had hurried on an urgent call to attend a case that for him had lost all urgency many years before. The Antillean refugee Jeremiah de Saint-Amour, disabled war veteran, photographer of children, and his most sympathetic opponent in chess, had escaped the torments of memory with the aromatic fumes of gold cyanide.
- p. 1

For Friday 56:
It was in this innocent way that Florentino Ariza began his secret life as a solitary hunter.
- p. 56



About Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez*: In their youth, Florentino Ariza and Fermina Daza fall passionately in love. When Fermina eventually chooses to marry a wealthy, well-born doctor, Florentino is devastated, but he is a romantic. As he rises in his business career he whiles away the years in 622 affairs--yet he reserves his heart for Fermina. Her husband dies at last, and Florentino purposefully attends the funeral. Fifty years, nine months, and four days after he first declared his love for Fermina, he will do so again.

***

No surprise that I'm featuring a book you've already seen on the blog and by an author I have mentioned many times. I wanted to share with you the amazing writing that resides within. The first line is easily recognizable ... and so intriguing! The first paragraph meanwhile just makes me want to keep going; there's so much packed in there.

For the Friday 56, the line I chose showcases Garcia Marquez's wonderful way with words. 

I am reading this book as part of my April reading challenge Where in the world will your Nobel take you? which combines Nobels, travel, and reading! You can join in any time during the month!

Have you read anything by Gabriel Garcia Marquez? Tell me which book is your fave!

*Affiliate link

Week 1 #TTWIB & #ReadNobels: My book pick (hint: Latin author alert!)


Week 1 (April 1-9) : Sign up post - let's begin our journey!

What immediately comes to mind when you hear "Nobel Prize winner for literature?" Why?

When I first hear "Nobel" I immediately think "intimidating" because I associate it with lofty, noble and highbrow ... and thus hard to read, or worse, yawn-worthy. But my attitude towards Nobel winners has definitely changed over the years.

I've been reading Nobels, albeit very slowly, since 2007. I didn't really set out intentionally to read Nobel prize winning literature but I remember reading (and loving) Gabriel Garcia Marquez's 100 Years of Solitude and naturally tried to find out more about him. In the course of doing so, I  became quite intrigued by the many names in the list of winners - some I was familiar with, others that I had never heard of.

The winners come from all around the world and since the prize is awarded to a person for their body of work, as opposed to a single work, the list of potential books to read is immense. Some of my favourite books are listed in this post.

By Jose Lara
Flickr: Gabriel Garcia Marquez
(on malvenko.net: [1]), CC BY-SA 2.0, 
Which book did you choose? Who is the author / when did they win the Nobel Prize / nationality? 

and:

Why did you pick this particular book? What other authors / books did you also consider for this challenge?

I was having such a hard time deciding which author and book to read. If you follow me on Instagram (@guiltlessreader), you probably saw me hemming and hawing between two Alice Munro titles -- View from Castle Rock or Too Much Happiness. Alice Munro, a Canadian author, won the Nobel in 2013. I have read both books mentioned but have left them unreviewed. I attempted to reread earlier this year View from Castle Rock but never got beyond the first short story; since I couldn't build up my momentum, I just gave up. Too Much Happiness also deserves a reread but I remember how sad the stories were and honestly, I don't think I can handle them right now.

Anyway, in true mood reader form, I decided I needed my yearly dose of my old-time-favourite Gabriel Garcia Marquez. I can't help but be excited by even the mere prospect of reading his books! I kind of hear a collective groan amongst you -- yes, I know I am sooo predictable.

I decided to go for:
About Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez*: In their youth, Florentino Ariza and Fermina Daza fall passionately in love. When Fermina eventually chooses to marry a wealthy, well-born doctor, Florentino is devastated, but he is a romantic. As he rises in his business career he whiles away the years in 622 affairs--yet he reserves his heart for Fermina. Her husband dies at last, and Florentino purposefully attends the funeral. Fifty years, nine months, and four days after he first declared his love for Fermina, he will do so again.
I'm soo ready for this love story! I read this many years ago and never reviewed it (do you see a pattern here?)

Garcia Marquez won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1982 "for his novels and short stories, in which the fantastic and the realistic are combined in a richly composed world of imagination, reflecting a continent's life and conflicts." I've made him my gold standard for the genre magical realism.

Where does this story take place?
This story is set in Márquez's homeland of Colombia, a Latin American country.

 Instagram challenge: A photo of you and your chosen Nobel

The weather is gorgeous and while putting around outside with the last vestiges of winter still here and there, I snapped a photo of Love in the Time of Cholera. Where am I? Obviously I am sitting in the lawn chair, trying to make photo all artsy fartsy.



Want to join in? All it takes is one Nobel for the entire month of April!
Check out the Sign up post for details and lots of resources.

*Affiliate link

Download #FREE @ReadNobels December Wallpaper: Patrick White's Voss


The year is ending and with it now December, it's almost time to wrap up my Read the Nobels annual challenge and my little wallpaper project.

Over the year, my calendar wallpapers were a fun little way to drum up some interest in the Read the Nobels Reading Challenge for 2016. I've featured 12 authors who have won the Nobel Prize in Literature, featured a book cover, and a quote. Check out the full list down below.

How has your Nobel reading been going so far? It is my hope that this challenge has opened up new reading avenues for you!

If you noticed, my posts have not been as frequent but I am becoming my more focused on my reading choices in general. My Nobel reading has been slim but manageable and thoroughly enjoyable. I still have Alice Munro to round me up for the year. I will still continue on the with Read the Nobels (perpetual) Challenge so feel free to join in on the blog!

Looking for co-hosts! I'd like to continue with this annual challenge. I'm curious if anyone out there -- whether you joined this year or not -- to help me out. Sound off in the comments if you're interested in co-hosting or send me an email at readerrabbit22 at gmail.com. I'd love to hear from you!

***
Patrick White (photo from Goodreads)
Now, without further ado, here is December's wallpaper. This month features 1973 Nobel Prize for Literature laureate, Australian Patrick White. The Nobel Prize website cites his win thus: "for an epic and psychological narrative art which has introduced a new continent into literature".

On the Read the Nobels blog, six reviews have been posted so far: The Tree of Man, Happy Valley, The Eye of the Storm, Twyborn Affair, Solid Affair, and Voss.

In the award speech, I thought it was especially interesting to read:
Patrick White is a social critic mainly through his depiction of human beings, as befits a true novelist. He is first and foremost a bold psychological explorer, at the same time as he readily refers to ideological views of life or mystical convictions to elicit the support and the uplifting message which they have to offer. (Source)

I think that that is what appealed to me when I picked the quote decided to feature his book Voss*.

Here's a synopsis of Voss*: Set in nineteenth-century Australia, Voss is White's best-known book, a sweeping novel about a secret passion between the explorer Voss and the young orphan Laura. As Voss is tested by hardship, mutiny, and betrayal during his crossing of the brutal Australian desert, Laura awaits his return in Sydney, where she endures their months of separation as if her life were a dream and Voss the only reality. Marrying a sensitive rendering of hidden love with a stark adventure narrative, Voss is a novel of extraordinary power and virtuosity from a twentieth-century master.

You can read more about White and his work here:

Do you like poetry? Have you read any of Neruda's work?

Download the last for year, December's Read the Nobels wallpaper!


Right click image, download, and set as your desktop wallpaper. Voila! #ReadNobels makes an appearance on your computer! (Note: Wallpaper for personal use only.)

 * Affiliate links

Past wallpapers:

Read the Nobels 2016
Yes, there's still time to get one more book in
before the year ends!

#Friday56 &#BookBeginnings: The View from Castle Rock



For Book Beginnings:
This parish possesses no advantages. Upon the hill the soil in many places is mossy and fit for nothing.
- p. 3, from the short story "No Advantage"

For Friday 56:
What a queer self-important little thing she is.
- p. 56, from the short story "The View from Castle Rock"

About The View from Castle Rock: Stories by Alice Munro*: In stories that are more personal than any that she’s written before, Alice Munro pieces her family’s history into gloriously imagined fiction. A young boy is taken to Edinburgh’s Castle Rock, where his father assures him that on a clear day he can see America, and he catches a glimpse of his father’s dream. In stories that follow, as the dream becomes a reality, two sisters-in-law experience very different kinds of passion on the long voyage to the New World; a baby is lost and magically reappears on a journey from an Illinois homestead to the Canadian border.

Other stories take place in more familiar Munro territory, the towns and countryside around Lake Huron, where the past shows through the present like the traces of a glacier on the landscape and strong emotions stir just beneath the surface of ordinary comings and goings. First love flowers under the apple tree, while a stronger emotion presents itself in the barn. A girl hired as summer help, and uneasy about her “place” in the fancy resort world she’s come to, is transformed by her employer’s perceptive parting gift. A father whose early expectations of success at fox farming have been dashed finds strange comfort in a routine night job at an iron foundry. A clever girl escapes to college and marriage.

***
I read this in 2009 but never got around to reviewing it. Now I have it in my re-read pile because the2016 Read the Nobels Challenge brought to light that Alice Munro is now a Nobel Prize Laureate. Munro is well-known for her short stories and this collection is well worth it!

Have you read any of Munro's work?


*Affiliate link
Read the Nobels 2016
SIGN UP HERE for the yearlong event!

Download FREE November @ReadNobels Wallpaper: Pablo Neruda's Love


November ...time to change up our calendar for Read the Nobels.

If this is the first time you're hearing about this, these calendar wallpapers are a fun monthly project I cooked up for myself and is a sneaky way of promoting the Read the Nobels Reading Challenge for 2016. I select an author who has won the Nobel Prize in Literature, a book cover, and a quote.

Two more months to continue reading for this challenge for the year! So, how are you doing with the challenge? I still haven't done much personally with the challenge but with the research comes a much longer and much more informed TBR -- after all I am in this for the long haul as the Read the Nobels Challenge is a perpetual challenge.

This November, I am featuring a poet, one of the few in the Nobel Prize for Literature laureates. The winner for 1971 is Pablo Neruda, a Chilean poet-diplomat-politician. The cover below is from his book Love: Poems from the Film Il Postino.* Not surprisingly, the movie is about Neruda. Have you watched it?

You can read more about Beckett and his work here:

Do you like poetry? Have you read any of Neruda's work?


Download the November Read the Nobels wallpaper!


Right click image, download, and set as your desktop wallpaper. Voila! #ReadNobels makes an appearance on your computer! (Note: Wallpaper for personal use only.)

 * Affiliate links

Past wallpapers:
Get some Nobel Prize winning literature in your reading lists! All it takes is one book for the entire year. Click to join the challenge RIGHT HERE!

Read the Nobels 2016

#BookmarkMonday (266): #Neruda's Lonely House #ReadNobels


EmbarkBrooches* does bookmarks well! Pablo Neruda is a Chilean poet who won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1971. I love the quote in the bookmark ...

What do you think of this quote?


*Affiliate link

Guiltless Reading

#BookmarkMonday is a weekly meme that started in 2009. Link up your bookmark below! Don't forget to share your love for bookmarks, whether yours or you dream of making them yours:
  • Post about it on your blog/twitter/pinterest and link up below. 
  • Or share your pic with the #BookmarkMonday hashtag on Twitter so I can go check it out! 
  • If you'd like to post on the #BookmarkMonday Pinterest Board, shoot me an email at readerrabbit22 at gmail.com and I'll add you as a contributor.

Link Up HERE!

Download October @ReadNobels Wallpaper featuring Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot


September's ended - time to change up our calendar for Read the Nobels.

If this is the first time you're hearing about this, these calendar wallpapers are a fun monthly project I cooked up for myself and is a sneaky way of promoting the Read the Nobels Reading Challenge for 2016. I select an author who has won the Nobel Prize in Literature, a book cover, and a quote.

I have been making slow progress with the challenge but it is still very much on my mind. The Read the Nobels blog continues to get a slow but steady stream of reviews and visits. How are you doing with the challenge?

Samuel Beckett
(photo from Wikipedia)
For October, I am featuring 1969 Nobel Prize Laureate Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot (In French: En Attendent en Godot). I admit that I know little about this Irish born author who entered the literary world via Paris and wrote in French! Waiting on Godot, a play published in 1952, is subtitled "a tragicomedy on two acts."

If the title seems familiar,  it has been made into a movie (see below) and a play (starring Ian McKellen and Patrick Stewart!).

On the Read the Nobels blog, only two of Beckett's works have been reviewed so far, namely Worstward Ho and Endgame. 

You can read more about Beckett and his work here:

Have you read any of Beckett's work?



Download the October Read the Nobels wallpaper!

Right click image, download, and set as your desktop wallpaper. Voila! #ReadNobels makes an appearance on your computer! (Note: Wallpaper for personal use only.)


 * Affiliate links

Past wallpapers:
Get some Nobel Prize winning literature in your reading lists! All it takes is one book for the entire year. Click to join the challenge RIGHT HERE!

Read the Nobels 2016

Download September @ReadNobels Wallpaper featuring Anatole France's Our Children


It's almost September! It's time once again for our new calendar for Read the Nobels.

If this is the first time you're hearing about this, these calendar wallpapers are a fun monthly project I cooked up for myself and is a sneaky way of promoting the Read the Nobels Reading Challenge for 2016. I select an author who has won the Nobel Prize in Literature, a book cover, and a quote.

This month, I am featuring 1921 Nobel Prize Laureate Anatole France. I noticed that on Read the Nobels, there was only one book reviewed. I'm going to keep this simple, let you gawk at the vintage cover, and click on the links below.

You can read some of his work here:
Download this September Read the Nobels wallpaper!


Right click image, download, and set as your desktop wallpaper. Voila! #ReadNobels makes an appearance on your computer! (Note: Wallpaper for personal use only.)

 * Affiliate links

 Have you ever heard of Anatole France?

Past wallpapers:
Get some Nobel Prize winning literature in your reading lists! All it takes is one book for the entire year. Click to join the challenge RIGHT HERE!

Read the Nobels 2016

Download August @ReadNobels Wallpaper featuring Pearl S. Buck's #TheGoodEarth


Happy August! (Apologies this is a little late!) Yes it is time for our new calendar! If this is the first time you're hearing about this, these calendar wallpapers are a fun monthly project I cooked up for myself and is a sneaky way of promoting the Read the Nobels Reading Challenge for 2016. I select an author who has won the Nobel Prize in Literature, a book cover, and a quote.

Download this August Read the Nobels wallpaper!


Right click image, download, and set as your desktop wallpaper. Voila! #ReadNobels makes an appearance on your computer! (Note: Wallpaper for personal use only.)

 * Affiliate links

Author Photo: Carl Van Vechten [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

 Have you read any of Buck's work? 

Past wallpapers:
Get some Nobel Prize winning literature in your reading lists! All it takes is one book for the entire year. Click to join the challenge RIGHT HERE!

Read the Nobels 2016

How does one stay whole, sane, live with integrity amidst contradictions? {Snow by Orhan Pamuk} @ReadNobels


How does one stay whole, sane, live with integrity amidst contradictions?

 About Snow by Orhan Pamuk: Dread, yearning, identity, intrigue, the lethal chemistry between secular doubt and Islamic fanaticism–these are the elements that Orhan Pamuk anneals in this masterful, disquieting novel. An exiled poet named Ka returns to Turkey and travels to the forlorn city of Kars. His ostensible purpose is to report on a wave of suicides among religious girls forbidden to wear their head-scarves. But Ka is also drawn by his memories of the radiant Ipek, now recently divorced. Amid blanketing snowfall and universal suspicion, Ka finds himself pursued by figures ranging from Ipek’s ex-husband to a charismatic terrorist. A lost gift returns with ecstatic suddenness. A theatrical evening climaxes in a massacre. And finding god may be the prelude to losing everything else. Touching, slyly comic, and humming with cerebral suspense, Snow is of immense relevance to our present moment.

My two cents

So here's a review that has been languishing in draft. It's because I couldn't pick up another book for maybe about a week after reading this book: it gave me such a horrendous book hangover. In the best possible way: it provoked, it triggered so much in me. It got to me, ok, pretty hard.

This book is deceiving; it doesn't look all that thick but it is actually 426 pages, and crack it open and the text is tiny! Dense. I struggled to get past that fact in the beginning but once I made it into the second chapter, I was hooked. It is a pithy novel, like someone poured their life into it, and I doubt that's not far from the truth for Orhan Pamuk.

I loved that this was such a challenging read. I find it disconcerting that reviews are polarized. But I understand where people are coming from - it's hard to get around the fact that this is about a depressingly solitary and misunderstood life in a far flung country whose realities I know little about (although sadly, plenty in the news lately). But surprisingly that's what I loved about it: learning and getting out of my comfort zone, and realizing that despite country, culture, religion, everyone is merely trying to live their lives the best they can.

Collage of Kars, Turkey. 
By Kars Church Of The Apostles 2009.JPG: Bjørn Christian TørrissenKars Kalesi1.jpg: Sabri76Kars Panorama.JPG: Bjørn Christian Tørrissen - Derived from other images, as noted under Author, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=34628630

Ka's solitary life is cobbled together from the viewpoint of Orhan Pamuk who is Ka's friend. Notice the author insertion here? In that respect, this reminded me of Ilustrado by Miguel Syjuco. And like Syjuco's presentation of Philippine history, Pamuk allows us a glimpse Turkey's history, one where religion, politics, and power is complicated and multifaceted. The traditional clashes with the modern; nationalism is at odds with the status quo towards assimilation; Islamic belief, secularism and traditional religion are a contradictory mix; and the Eastern and Western belief systems collide. I wonder: how does one stay whole, sane, and live with integrity amidst these contradictions?

I love how Blue, Kars's resident revolutionary, is able to make sense of the dilemma:
"I refuse to be European, and I won't ape their ways. Im going to live my own history and be no one but myself. I for one believe it's possible to be happy without being a mock European, without becoming their slave. There's a word Europhiles very commonly use when they denigrate our people: to be a true Westerner a person must first become an individual, and then they go on to say that in Turkey, there are no individuals! Well, that's how I see my execution. I am standing up against the Westerners as an individual; it's because I'm an individual that I refuse to imitate them." - p. 314

Yet another dilemma presented is the reality of being a veiled woman in Turkey (sidenote: another book that tackles this on a more personal level is Silk Armour by Claire Sydenham, a book I highly recommend). The contradictions of revolt and freedom, of tradition and constraint is something that women must contend with daily in society to determine their own sense of identity. The rash of suicides of veiled students was an intriguing way of couching this daily struggle.

Poetry throughout, music, theatrical presentations: I reveled in the power of media in informing and agitating people, presenting fact and differing opinions, and affecting change. It highlights the fact that music and the arts is never going to disappear from our lives.

I can't not comment about the obvious theme of snow carried throughout the book -- its coldness and sadness it evokes, the stark white landscapes that it conjures. But also its beauty. Contradictions.

There is so much more to this book that I hate the idea of breaking this review down too much (plus I fear that my not completing this review will end up in my never getting this review up at all!). The most powerful thing for me about this novel is that this got me thinking and asking more questions, of learning about Turkey's multifaceted society and knowing that history shapes the lives of its inhabitants in many ways that we would never imagine possible.

Uh-ohs

There are certain aspects of this novel that raised a red flag in my mind. The most obvious is that this dense tome is intimidating. I actually read this over an entire month, in little manageable bits. I won't deny that it's heavy reading, but so totally worth it!

Another, the snow theme became academic towards the end. It kind of fell flat for me when I saw the diagrams and I thought the author carried it tad far. I often wonder with works like this if things get lost in translation (because this is a translated work), something I can only speculate about.

Setting

Set predominantly in Kars, Turkey, the landscape for this story is a fascinating mix of old and new built upon a history of conflict. Historic accounts and folkloric stories abound in this novel but one needs to read between the lines, do their research, especially if coming in from the cold.

Kars was the capital of the medieval Bagratid Kingdom of Armenia. In the 19th century, it was battled over by the Ottoman and Russian empires, with Russia eventually gaining control. During the First World War, the Ottomans took control of the city in 1918 but relinquished it to the First Republic of Armenia following the Armistice of Mudros. In 1920, Turkish revolutionaries captured captured Kars. The Treaty of Kars was signed in 1921 between the Government of the Grand National Assembly and the Soviet republics of Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia, establishing the current north-eastern boundaries of Turkey. Learn more here: Wikipedia - Kars, Turkey



Verdict

An intimidating and challenging read about the tragically solitary life of a revolutionary in Turkey. Dense, provoking and allowing for introspection, I highly recommend this for those who'd like to learn more about the history and realities of conflict-ridden countries, and those intrigued by Pamuk's ability to encapsulate the dilemma of national self-identity vis-s-vis personal self-identity in novel form.

***

I read this book as part of the Read the Nobels 2016 Reading Challenge. This is written by Nobel Prize for Literature Laureate Orhan Pamuk.

Read the Nobels 2016
 Join the Read the Nobels 2016 Reading Challenge anytime until December 31, 2016.

Find Read the Nobels on social media!

#BookmarkMonday (254): Hemingway & book friends #ReadNobels


ArtistLydiaMakepeace* makes these lovely watercolour bookmarks. Here's one that features a quote by Nobel Prize author Ernest Hemingway about the most loyal of friends!

Who's your favourite "friend?"

*Affiliate link

Guiltless Reading

#BookmarkMonday is a weekly meme that started in 2009. Link up your bookmark below! Don't forget to share your love for bookmarks, whether yours or you dream of making them yours:
  • Post about it on your blog/twitter/pinterest and link up below. 
  • Or share your pic with the #BookmarkMonday hashtag on Twitter so I can go check it out! 
  • If you'd like to post on the #BookmarkMonday Pinterest Board, shoot me an email at readerrabbit22 at gmail.com and I'll add you as a contributor.

Link Up HERE!

Wrapping up @ReadNobels for June (oops a little late!)

  • Friday, July 08, 2016


I'm in a bit of a slump and have tons happening in real life so I haven't been too active on the blog lately. However the Read the Nobels 2016 Reading Challenge continues! We're at the halfway mark so plenty of time to get more Nobel reading in the year!

Here's a quick run down for June, albeit a little late:

Posts this month

Keep reading and discussing those Nobels!

Read the Nobels 2016

 Join the Read the Nobels 2016 Reading Challenge anytime until December 31, 2016.

Find Read the Nobels on social media!

Download July @ReadNobels Wallpaper featuring #ThomasMann's The Magic Mountain


Happy July! Calendar time!

If this is the first time you're hearing about this, these calendar wallpapers are a fun monthly project I cooked up for myself and is a sneaky way of promoting the Read the Nobels Reading Challenge for 2016. I select an author who has won the Nobel Prize in Literature, a book cover, and a quote.

About Thomas Mann

Thomas Mann won the Nobel Prize in Literature in1929 "principally for his great novel, Buddenbrooks*, which has won steadily increased recognition as one of the classic works of contemporary literature"(NobelPrize.org).

This prolific German author attracted attention with this win because the Nobel is typically usually awarded for an entire body of work and not just one work. The novel Buddenbrooks,* published in 1901, is a family story inspired by Mann's own background as a north German merchant family.

He is known for his symbolic and ironic fictional works, which have insight into the artistic and intellectual psychology. He drew inspiration from German and Biblical stories, and the ideas of Goethe, Nietzsche and Schopenhauer.

I am featuring his book The Magic Mountain*, a coming of age story, because I have had it on my TBR for a while now. It has so many quotable quotes that I feel it has much wisdom to impart. Here's a synopsis which I have no doubt will whet your appetite for more Mann:

In this dizzyingly rich novel of ideas, Mann uses a sanatorium in the Swiss Alps, a community devoted exclusively to sickness, as a microcosm for Europe, which in the years before 1914 was already exhibiting the first symptoms of its own terminal irrationality. The Magic Mountain is a monumental work of erudition and irony, sexual tension and intellectual ferment, a book that pulses with life in the midst of death.

Mann's other notable works include: Death in Venice*, Joseph and His Brothers and Doctor Faustus*.


Have you read any of Mann's work? 


More links about Thomas Mann:

Go ahead and download this month's wallpaper!


Right click image, download, and set as your desktop wallpaper. Voila! #ReadNobels makes an appearance on your computer! (Note: Wallpaper for personal use only.)

 * Affiliate links

Author Photo: Carl Van Vechten [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

Past wallpapers:
Get some Nobel Prize winning literature in your reading lists! All it takes is one book for the entire year. Click to join the challenge RIGHT HERE!

Read the Nobels 2016
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© guiltless readingMaira Gall