“Books can be dangerous. The best ones should be labeled “This could change your life.”"
Helen Exley
Doesn't it feel as if it's time for dangerous and life-changing books!?!?!?
In lot of ways I think a lot of books are life-changing. Not so much in the explosive, earth-shattering, mind-blowing way that some books can have; but more in the small and subtle alterations they make to our thinking and our understanding.
If reading a book changes how we think about a situation; or allows us a much deeper understanding of something; or encourages us to change our behaviour, then they have most definitely been life-changing; but without the massive wow factor.
Off the top of my head I think of Anna Funder's All That I Am; Barbara Kingsolver's Flight Behaviour and the Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd as novels that really changed my understanding of history, the environment, and race relations. And To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee.
Half the Sky by Nichola Kristof and Sheryl Wu Dunn was also another game changer for me - opened my eyes to a bunch of issues for women around the world; and I Am Mala by Malala Yousafzai similarly.
Which books have changed your world? Your thinking?
Helen Exley
Doesn't it feel as if it's time for dangerous and life-changing books!?!?!?
In lot of ways I think a lot of books are life-changing. Not so much in the explosive, earth-shattering, mind-blowing way that some books can have; but more in the small and subtle alterations they make to our thinking and our understanding.
If reading a book changes how we think about a situation; or allows us a much deeper understanding of something; or encourages us to change our behaviour, then they have most definitely been life-changing; but without the massive wow factor.
Off the top of my head I think of Anna Funder's All That I Am; Barbara Kingsolver's Flight Behaviour and the Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd as novels that really changed my understanding of history, the environment, and race relations. And To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee.
Half the Sky by Nichola Kristof and Sheryl Wu Dunn was also another game changer for me - opened my eyes to a bunch of issues for women around the world; and I Am Mala by Malala Yousafzai similarly.
Which books have changed your world? Your thinking?
Rebecca Solnit's "Hope in the Dark", "A Field Guide to Getting Lost" & "The Faraway Nearby" along with the Jay Griffith's "Wild: an elemental journey" by Jay Griffiths are helping build hope for our beautiful broken world in these strange dark days
ReplyDeleteThank you Mo - I really have to read some Rebecca Solnit so those 3 shall go on my wishing list (which I have formalised into spreadsheet this year to try and keep me on track better - fingers crossed). Go well.
Deleteah, years ago i read the grapes of wrath and pilgrim at tinker creek one after the other; both books powerful in very different ways. i guess pilgrim changed me deeply because it framed for a young me how my brain worked and gave me ideas about how it is one loves a particular, rather mundane but spectacularly alive place. it put words to my thoughts.
ReplyDeleteThansk V - I have discovered Pilgrim and other of her works through you and have enjoyed them mightily...
DeleteI'm with you on the Secret Life of Bees and To kill a Mockingbird which I read as a teenager before I ever saw the film, yet every time I've re-read it (often) I can't help now but see Gregory Peck in my mind as Atticus speaks.I'd also put The Book Thief in my list and a superb book by poet Kathleen Jamie called Findings that resonates with me still.
ReplyDeleteSo interesting isn't it Lesley how some books just resonate across the ages and the years...and some books we read and re-read to be reminded of things. I loved Atticus...The Book Thief was another brilliant one too!
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