Saturday, January 31, 2009

Wrapped up in books

I must post an entry about my favorite books.
I generally prefer non-fiction, I am very intrigued by the knowledge that what I am reading is true and happened. I like to read collections of essays and articles by various writers, mainly music related. I enjoy Chuck Klosterman's books because I love thinking about pop culture in relation to the world and what the world's obsession with it actually says about humanity. Dave Eggers is also great.
Despite loving non-fiction my all time favorite writer is Kurt Vonnegut. I re-read The Sirens of Titan a few months ago for like the third time and I loved it just as much as any other read. He makes these extraordinary characters and places them in these crazy situations and worlds but then in the end everything sort of makes sense. His view of the world is also remarkable, you can learn a lot from his characters. I currently have "everything was beautiful and nothing hurt" tattooed on my foot. That quote writen on a tomb stone basically says that when people are alive they go through good times and tough times but after death looking back one can only say that they got through it and everything was beautiful. Love it. I also plan on getting "so it goes" done on the sides of my fingers (like "so" on my index, "it" on my middle, and "goes" on my ring finger). I find that quote especially great because it speaks of mortality and life, it just goes, no one can stop it and it is always ordinary and predictable. So it goes. Brilliant.
I have purposely not read all of Vonnegut's books as of yet, although I have read most, just for the reason that I always have something new to uncover about his writing and discovering his stories. I will continue to devour his books in time, slowly so I don't get to the end so fast.
I would recommend you read Slaughterhouse-Five, Cat's Cradle, and The Sirens of Titan. Oh and also Breakfast of Champions. A few concepts and characters are present in several books so familiarize yourself!

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