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| My desk last week... |
Last week I tweeted this pic of my desk, which is really a dining table, and still not nearly large nor strong enough to endure what I inflict upon it from slumping, to spilling beverages, and of course all the books that I pile on it.
I'm a creature of habit if I'm allowed to be. I keep my ashtray and ciggies always on the left (I can still type damn fast with just my right hand); coffee cup always on the right, just above my Traveler's Notebook opened up to whatever notes or drawings I'm working from; while the remote for the stereo goes on the left, my phone goes on the right.
Oh and I enjoy working on my old trusty backup computer and have for long enough now that I've completely forgotten to call the place and send it back because it's still under warranty (the HD wheel came off the groove is what I'd bet on).
And then everyone other spot is for books, books, books!
So here's the list that is currently taking up residence on my desk.
JRR Tolkien - Tree Leaf, Smith of Wootton Major, & The Homecoming of Beorhtnoth
Olaf Stapledon - Starmaker
Eliphas Levi - The History of Magic
Joseph Campbell - The Hero with a Thousand Faces
Wannée - Kook Boek (A Dutch cookbook from the 50's)
Simon Winchester - The Professor and The Madman
J.L. Borges - Extraordinary Tales, Collected Fictions, The Book of Fantasy
Robertson Davies - High Spirits
Isabel Allende - The House of The Spirits
Vincent van Gogh - Selected Letters
Melissa Franklin - Nymphs, Horses, & Athletes
Thomas de Quincey - Confessions of An Opium Eater
Nabokov - Lectures on Literature
Comte de Lautremont - Les chants de Maldoror
Herman Hesse - Siddhartha
Sylvia Plath - Ariel
Jeryzi Kosinski - The Painted Bird
Stieg Larsson - The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo
Iona and Peter Opie - The Classic Fairy Tales
Haruki Murakami - 1Q84 (still unfinished)
Now these are just the books that end up my desk. There are also piles of books that were once on the desk and are now on the chair or stacked on top of the chessboard or put on the bookshelf in such a way that I'll be able to find it easily.
The only reason why I'm bringing this up at all is because I recently watched a fascinating little film with Alan Moore, who, after seeing this picture went to the top of my list of people I'd like to discuss books with. Not only because Moore is undoubtedly brilliant and probably has some crazy books that I might never know otherwise, but because let's face it Alan Moore might actually be a wizard capable of alchemy. If he's not, then no one else on earth comes as close as he does.
Now that's a small amount of books, but it's a visual clue too. When books become stacked in messy piles it means there's books to stack in messy piles. Books that are separated from the others for reasons known only to the one who selects them.
The reason I chose these books that I must have within immediate grasp varies. Sometimes it's because I like the style of how the writer writes such as with Nabokov. Or the book could simply have a good opening line (The first line of Tolkien's The Hobbit being my favourite from any book.). Or the subject matter is intriguing. Then there are the books that are for reference. Or the books that are "bibles" like Campbell's and The Golden Bough.
In a book of conversations between Borges and Richard Burgin, Borges says that deep down to be a writer is to be a sort of librarian. I do not disagree with this and would in fact go one step further and say that the right book can be a sort of "grimoire" that helps the writer cast their spell (and like any magic, one needs practise and will likely turn out some toads).
For me that lightning clap - where I fall in love with a word or sentence or style or character or in the best cases the story itself - happens with a happy frequency.
In the course of writing this blog post another Borges book has made it on to the desk. I've just noticed a copy of W.G. Sebald's The Rings of Saturn hiding under a stack. A book on Korean folklore. And I'm itching to pull down Bullfinch's Age of the Fable...
When I go over to the bookshelves so I don't forget this time to add it to the collection I remember I also wanted to peek at Italo Calvino's Italian Fairy Tales again and look up some archetypes in Vol. 12 of Jung's Collected Works and then it was oh, I forgot I had that book and this book...
Poor desk. It's groaning again. And for all of you who read the blog in 2011, I just wanted to say a big thank you. You kept me coming back to my desk - and though it didn't amount to a book, it kept me writing, and I'm very grateful for that!
Happy New Year!
