Features, Literature
End of the World Reading list – part five
Good news for people who like bad news: the world is about to end (again) and it looks like Arnie’s too tied up to come to the phone right now and save us. So let’s do the next best thing and settle down with a book before being annihilated. In our fifth installment, litlove from Tales of the Reading Room has provided us with this thoughtful response:
So, it’s quite a prospect, choosing a book to see out the end of the world with, when it’s often pretty tricky deciding what to take on holiday. If life as we know it is in rapid terminal decline then it seems logical to me that I’d pass the last few hours reading, even if what I really ought to be reading is Nuclear Bunkers for Dummies, or, shortly prior to this, Quick Drying Cement: Your Questions Answered. And obviously I’d need to know I had a clear stretch of time ahead. A four-minute warning would leave me with little choice other than reaching for a book of haiku. But still, this is probably not the moment to tackle the Great Literary Work that I’ve been saving up for a rainy day. It’s bad enough the world is ending; no need to make things worse by knowing I’ll never find out how War and Peace concludes.
When I first considered the question my thoughts flew immediately to comfort reading and the works of Colette, one of the greatest authors I know for being wry and witty and resilient in times of trouble. Reading Colette would be analogous to the decision made by a friend of mine that in the event of a nuclear explosion he’d dash into the nearest branch of John Lewis department stores in the belief that nothing unpleasant could ever happen there. Colette’s epicurean delight in food and drink and the company of good friends, as well as her sparklingly poignant tales of love and literature and life on the stage have often made me feel sane and comforted. But I’m not a great re-reader, and to be frank, I get the feeling that familiar prose might not be sufficient distraction to keep my mind off apocalypse.
What I need to do is put something to one side specifically for moments of cataclysmic crisis: the death of a loved one, the end of hope, the sentence of life imprisonment. I think I’d need something philosophical and beautiful, wise and serene, a transcendent viewpoint. And thinking of that brought the Sufi poets Rumi and Hafiz to mind. If forced to confront death, then I would want a mystic poet to put it into context for me, to make it part of a rich, extraordinary life whose meaning it is not always for us to understand. I would want a work of literature that would help me to learn acceptance, to recall me to my dignity and to encourage me to embrace loss, just as these poets have helped people through the centuries to do. Here’s an excerpt from a poem by Rumi:
now how can I be
a skeptic
about the
resurrection and
coming to life again
since in this world
I have many times
like my own imagination
died and
been born again
that is why
after a long agonizing life
as a hunter
I finally let go and got
hunted down and became free
Rumi
The idea of reading something to comfort oneself in a time of crisis is definitely a wise move, especially when confronting something as big as your own mortality. Thanks to Victoria for pointing us in the direction of Rumi and Hafiz, two poets to investigate further.
Don’t forget that The Book Show is on tonight at 7pm on Sky Arts and features presenter Mariella Frostrup talking to Helen Dunmore, Sophie Kinsella and Prof. Richard Dawkins. For more details, click the link. And, of course, there’s Sky Arts’ ace competition to win a bookshelf’s worth of reading material - head over to try your luck.
[…] Finally, as it seems to be the moment for considering apocalypse, I was invited by the blog attached to Sky arts to choose a book to be reading when the world ends. You can read my answer here. […]
Posted by In the Event of a Crisis « Tales from the Reading Room • 12 February 2008 at 4:22 pm