Borodin

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Earlier this year, when I was listening to ABC Classic on the radio, the presenter gave a very brief account of the life of Aleksandr Porfirevich Borodin. They said that before Borodin was a composer, he was a chemistry professor. It was actually while he was quite ill, and could not go to work as a chemistry professor, that he did a lot of his composing.

I found this interesting for two reasons: First, the fact that music essentially had the status of “hobby” for him — something he did in his spare time, away from work — but he managed to do really well, and became quite famous for it. I wonder if this was his real ambition, or if he just composed music for himself, and somehow realised he was actually good enough to do it professionally. Continue reading →

All the Light We Cannot See

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I bought All the Light We Cannot See (by Anthony Doerr) a few years ago, after seeing it mentioned on a blog. (I think I also had some loyalty points to use, or maybe a gift card, but that’s beside the point.) However, as always, I had too many other books I wanted to read first, so All the Light just stood on my bedside table for ages, held up between two book-ends and a number of other novels.

Last month, after I finished reading The Idiot, I felt a bit disorientated, and wasn’t sure what to read next. It was also a time when a lot was happening — a very close friend was moving interstate, several other close friends were taking extended holidays to travel, work was getting busier, and I was exhausted in every sense of the word — so I was finding it hard to become absorbed in reading. I actually tried to start two or three other books before I picked up All the Light.

Once I got started, though, it was really hard to put down! I can’t remember the last time I read a book so quickly (I mean, quick by my standards). I suppose it helped that we’ve had a few long week-ends and public holidays recently, but even so… Probably the last book I was so enraptured by was Anna Karenina — not that I read that that quickly, but I was positively besotted by the story and the characters and the writing. Continue reading →

mirrors

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In the last two years, I’ve listened to more and more classical music. I don’t go to concerts or buy records, but if I’m at home, I’ll probably have the radio on ABC Classic. I used to always listen to that station in the car as well, but I tend to spend more time listening to my Persian/Farsi lessons now.

It’s interesting, though, that after all this time listening to classical music, I don’t feel like I know much more about it. I can recognise the names of a lot more composers, but if you just played me a piece of music, I probably would not be able to tell you who wrote it (except maybe Vivaldi’s Four Seasons, which is quite distinct, but you’d have to play the right part for me to recognise). Continue reading →

Thursday Doors: stronghold

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You could be forgiven for thinking that I’ve jumped off the Thursday Doors bandwagon, but in order to truly believe that, you mustn’t realise that it’s not possible to escape that particular wagon. You might doze in a corner for a while, or you might walk alongside it to stretch your legs a bit, but there’s never a real separation.

Anyway, what I’m trying to say in my roundabout way is that it has been a heck of a long time since I last actively participated in Thursday Doors, but I’m finally back. I’ve seen more and more doors, and have more and more photos …just need the time to sift through them and construct blog posts.

On the week-end, I started reading All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr. It is an amazingly well-written story about WWII, and it’s inspired me to pay attention to the small details of the world around me. It inspired me in much the same way as TD did, so I figured it’s time to wake from my TD hibernation and compile a new post. Continue reading →

The Idiot

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Last week I finished reading Fyodor Dostoevsky’s The Idiot. I think it took me about four months to finish it — not just because it’s a difficult book, but because I haven’t had a lot of time and energy for reading, which, in itself, is a shame.

This is not the first Dostoevsky I’ve read, but it’s the first I’ve read in over ten years. I read both Notes from Underground and The Grand Inquisitor while I was still in high school, and found it fascinating (or so my notes at the time say), but my reading tastes went in other directions, and didn’t return to classic Russian literature until I picked up Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina a couple of years ago.

Although I tried to allow a bit of space between these two tomes, my mind is naturally going to compare the two. This, of course, might be quite unfair, especially since I rank Anna Karenina as one of the best novels I’ve ever read. Continue reading →

blue days

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The day started off blue.

Through the space between the blinds, all I could see was blue sky. It gave promise of a good day. But in the time it took for me to get out of bed and brush my teeth, the clouds gathered and made the world grey again.

Lifting the blinds, glancing out at the sky and the street below, I wondered where the clouds came from. Where did the blue go?

Still, it wasn’t raining yet, and I was determined to get some errands done. I’d had a good sleep-in the day before — a lazy, slumberous day — so I had to make this day productive.

The rain started as I approached the shopping centre. Several people were walking about without umbrellas, and I thought they must’ve been deceived into optimism by the early morning blue sky. A woman sighed in relief as she reached shelter and sat down on a bench.

By the time I was leaving the shopping centre — probably not more than half an hour later — the rain had stopped, and patches of blue sky could be seen once again. The sun shone brightly at my back, and I opened my umbrella so that it might dry before I got home.

The sunshine didn’t last long, though. Soon it was raining again. It has been raining on and off all day. Sometimes it rains softly, in a fine mist, coming and going in a whisper. Other times, the rain falls in a sudden rush — a torrential onslaught that drowns out all other noise. But even this dissipates after a few minutes.

And all day, between the bouts of rain, there have been patches of blue sky — patches of false hope. Even now, I can see mostly blue sky from my window, but the trust has been broken; I dare not hope.