The pages of the books help to understand the world and to penetrate into the individual conscience.
In a passage from his diaries, the American thinker Henry David Thoreau compares the impact of certain books on the mind of the reader with the invigorating effect of the sun on the faces of walkers. Life and reading do not have clear borders, precise limits: the world is a text waiting to be savored and rewritten by the curiosity of readers. Instead of stuffing the mind with facts or witty quotes, readings push the boundaries of empathy and imagination. In short, we read to get out of the double tyranny of routines and of the self for a while. Like love and wines between friends, the act of reading must be marked by the sign of pleasure and knowledge. For this reason, we recommend a series of titles for 2022, companions on the road to give you vertigo and calm from day to day
1. A classic, always one
There is no better way to start a year than with the company of a classic. After the commercial frenzy of December, the voices of the books that have survived the passage of the calendars restore calm to the spirit to return to the daily combat. If you do not know where to start, start with the stories of Anton Chekhov: there is no lose.
2. Hot moon, dose of vertigo
On the calendar, February is a blink of an eye. Such a trait leads to tasting short books. If the novel is looking for adrenaline Hot moon, by Mempo Giardinelli, has a dose of intrigue, mystery and violence to keep the reader in suspense. After the first few sentences, you certainly won’t be able to move away from the book. Wow, take a chance.
3. Two female voices
There is today a large crop of top-notch authors in all literary genres. However, it is worth dwelling on the works of two fundamental pens of the Colombian literary tradition: mother Josefa del Castillo and Soledad Acosta de Samper. The autobiography of the first and the novels of the second.
4. Too many books
Volumes are piled on the shelves of bookstores and libraries. Sometimes the number of books published overwhelms the mood. For this reason, it is not enough to receive the pricks of the lucid skepticism of Gabriel Zaid in a classic of the Latin American essay: Too many books. A benchmark of the Latin American essay.
5. African literature
In 2021, African letters made headlines in the world press with the presentation of the Nobel Prize for Literature to the Tanzanian Abdulrazak Gurnah and the Goncourt to the Senegalese Mohamed Mbougar Sarr. In addition, the Nigerian Nobel laureate Wole Soyinka published a novel after fifty years of editorial silence in this genre.
Literary awards can be a gateway to a distant aesthetic universe for the amateur reader.
6. Poetry, a lot of poetry
In June – the navel of the year – poetry is a talisman and an amulet. Going back to Jorge Luis Borges, César Vallejo, Rosario Castellanos, Jorge Gaitán Durán, Alfonsina Storni, José Manuel Arango is not only fair but also necessary to fuel the will. Read verses of love, spite, sonnets by Shakespeare and haikues by Santoka. Let yourself be soaked up to the marrow by the cadence of your tongue.
7. The cycle and the book, good duo
In July, the Colombian passion for the sport of two wheels is rekindled: the Tour de France – the Nobel Prize for cyclists, according to Guy Roger – begins its Homeric days on the first of this month. To be in tune with a fervor started by the pieces of Efraín Forero and Ramón Hoyos, it is worth reading the books of two foreigners: Egan Bernal and the sons of the mountain range, from Roger, and Kings of the mountainsby Matt Rendell.
8. Capote and his reptile blood
The recommended one is Truman Capote with his huge non-fiction novel Cold-blooded. A book that allows us to peek into the smallest and most brutal details of a crime that shook America. In this book Capote traces the limits of deep human contradictions and understands something that we tend to forget: we are not isolated monsters, we are the wild product of society.
9. Bitter love
September, the much loved and hated month of love and friendship, prompts us to read the novel Beloved by Toni Morrison or Cat, by George Simenon, short stories in which love is revealed as such an entangled and complex feeling that we could hardly establish boundaries between it and hatred.
10. America, America
José Martí is probably the best chronicler of the 19th century. His texts sent from the United States combine the beauty of the verse with the precision of the reporter. His texts on the inauguration of the Statue of Liberty or the Brooklyn Bridge reveal the enormous skill of Martí in the painting of characters and settings.
11. Pedro Paramo
In November, month of the dead, we could not ignore one of the most important classics of Latin American literature: Pedro Paramoby the Mexican Juan Rulfo. This short novel is driven by the search for origins, a task that leads the reader through a strange universe in which life and death are confused.
12. The DNA of the West
In December, read the Bible. You don’t need the creed to get close to one of the most important works of literature. Its historical, linguistic and symbolic richness enables the convergence of ideas of an anthropological and philosophical nature. In that book many of the main concepts of the West are encrypted.
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12 ideas to awaken your reading spirit this 2022