A little list of literary inspirations took from my 2009 books
I. Our need for consolation is insatiable, Stig Dagerman
‘Somehow the door to my life is locked and I don’t understand how to open it again.’
II. Never let me go, Kazuo Ishiguro
‘I keep thinking about this river somewhere, with the water moving really fast. And these two people in the water, trying to hold onto each other, holding on as hard as they can, but in the end it’s just too much. The current’s too strong. They’ve got to let go, drift apart. That’s how it is with us. It’s a shame, Kath, because we’ve loved each other all our lives. But in the end, we can’t stay together forever.’
III. Castelli di Rabbia, Alessandro Baricco
‘E tuttavia, se ad esempio si potesse nello stesso istante, proprio nello stesso istante, contemporaneamente - se si potesse stringere un ramo ghiacciato nella mano, bere un sorso di acquavite, veder volare un tarlo, toccare del muschio, baciare le labbra di Jun, aprire una lettera aspettata da anni, guardarsi allo specchio, posare la testa sul cuscino, ricordarsi un nome dimenticato, leggere l’ultima frase di un libro, sentire un grido, toccare una ragnatela, accorgersi che qualcuno ti chiama, farsi scappare dalle mani un vaso di cristallo, tirarsi le coperte fin sopra la testa, perdonare qualcuno mai perdonato..’
IV. Hardboiled Wonderland and the End of the World, Haruki Murakami
‘Open your eyes, train your ears, use your head. If a mind you have, then use it while you can.’
V. I mondi di Super Mario, Andrea Babich
‘Paradossalmente, da un’opera di collage post-moderna sarebbe nata una saga sì strampalata, ma epica nella forza trascinante del gameplay’
VI. The Neverending Story, Michael Ende
‘If you have never wept bitter tears because a wonderful story has come to an end and you must take your leave of the characters with whom you have shared so many adventures, whom you have loved and admired, for whom you have hoped and feared, and without whose company life seems empty and meaningless.’
VII. Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, Jonathan Safran Foer
‘Sometimes I can hear my bones straining under the weight of all the lives I’m not living’
VIII. Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said, Philip K. Dick
“They will never take over and run my world.”
“You don’t have a world. You have an office.”
IX. White Nights, Fyodor Dostoyevsky
‘My God, a moment of bliss. Why, isn’t that enough for a whole lifetime?’
I hope you will appreciate these books as I did.
