Six Degrees of Separation - May 23
First Friday of the month, so time for #6degrees of separation, hosted by Kate over at Books are my favourite and best. Each month a book is chosen as a starting point and linked to six others to form a chain. A book doesn’t need to be connected to all the titles on the list, only to the one next to it in the chain.
The starter book is ‘Hydra’ by Adriane Howell. I haven’t read it, but I will add it to my TBR pile. I immediately thought of a connection to the greek island of the same name which is where we find….
Leonard Cohen and his muse Marianne Ilhen, who first met here back in 1960. I still get teary eyed when I think of the letter he sent her when she was dying. ‘Well Marianne it’s come to this time when we are really so old and our bodies are falling apart and I think I will follow you very soon. Know that I am so close behind you that if you stretch out your hand, I think you can reach mine.
And you know that I’ve always loved you for your beauty and your wisdom, but I don’t need to say anything more about that because you know all about that. But now, I just want to wish you a very good journey. Goodbye old friend. Endless love, see you down the road.’ Sylvie Simmons book ‘I’m your man’ is one of my favourite biographies of an artist who meant a lot to me. From a letter to someone dying, to a book written by someone dying….
Paul Kalanithi’s ‘When Breath becomes air’, a bittersweet but illuminating account of his life as a neurosurgeon and battle with lung cancer, as he faces death with great integrity. I don’t usually link two books but it seems like too much of an open goal when I’ve had Leonard and Paul not to include…
‘Leonard and Hungry Paul’ by Rónán Hession, a warm hearted novel about two thirty something bachelors, happy in their own skin who enjoy board games and hanging out with their parents, until change comes along. And of course, we all get by with a little help from our friends, which leads me nicely onto….
‘The Lyrics’ by Paul McCartney which I was delighted to receive as a xmas gift a few years back and which I enjoyed with a few glasses of wine and the great man’s song catalogue playing. I’m always interested in place names, and Mull of Kintyre come from Scottish Gaelic. Maol means barren, Cinn is head, and Tir is country. A barren headland, if you like. One of my favourite books that examines the meaning behind place-names is the fascinating………
‘32 words for field’ by Manchán Magan which looks at the connection between the Irish language and the landscape, myth, animals and culture. One of the words discussed is Iarmhaireacht - the loneliness felt at cockcrow, when you are the only person awake and experience that existential pang of disconnection, of not belonging. This made me think of a book I recently read and loved, that explores this feeling, and that was…
‘The Glass hotel’ by Emily St. John Mandel. I still think of this haunting book and it’s characters, especially Vincent, many months on. One of those books.
That’s it for May. A bit maudlin this month, but that’s the way it goes. Until June then.