Other Interests: pursuing your passion

Hearing our father's stories

There comes a time in our lives when we need to hear our father's stories.

I recently read two totally different books with similar themes: Barack Obama's Dreams From My Father and Art Spiegelman's Maus 1: A Survivor's Tale: My Father Bleeds History.

Obama's is the story of his search for the father he didn't know, culminating in a visit to his family home in Kenya. It is well-written and reflective on issues concerning race and family.

Spiegelman's story is told through words and pictures. Even though Spiegelman's father is still alive, what he has to say is so painful, Spiegelman has to turn it into a cartoon. But the words accurately reflect his father's language and story about the Holocaust.

Both are worth reading.

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly

At the risk of developing a morbid theme, I have to recommend the movie The Diving Bell and the Butterfly.

The true story of a man who suffers a stroke which almost totally paralyzes his body; only his left eye isn't paralyzed and he uses it to communicate.

As told on film, the story is beautiful and sensitive and not overwhelmingly sad.

Michael Jacks My Life My Food

Michael Jacks is dying of motor neurone disease but has a passion for food. So he wrote a book My Life My Food containing the recipes he used as a chef and photos and stories about his family. He is encouraging people to achieve their passions.

Buy the book.

Herald Sun story.

UPDATE: MIchael passed away in December 2008.

Water for Elephants

Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen manages to successfully combine a coming of age story with a snapshot of an American circus at time of the Great Depression. Add to that some interesting characters and some wonderful cameos of nursing home life as the narrator looks back at his life (and decides what to do with the rest of it) and you have an entertaining book (almost a fable) that captivated all members of my family.

City of Thieves

Looking for a great airplane read? City of Thieves by David Benioff is based on the Siege of Leningrad in WWII but manages to combine war with thrills, adventure, wit and sex in a compelling page-turner.

People of the Book

It's Passover soon (19 April) and I've been reading Geraldine Brooks's People of the Book.

Here are some pictures of the actual Sarajevo Haggadah  and a Book Show interview

You have to read this

I've read some great books lately (I really enjoyed Bill Bryson's biography of Shakespeare) but it was a short first-time novel called Addition by Australian writer Toni Jordan that I told my wife to read straight away.

It has it all: romance, obsession, wit, numbers, science.

Here's a Book Show interview

Words and music: Brisbane Writers' Festival

The Brisbane Writers' Festival brings together an amazing range of people and interests.

So the session on The music - the words was fascinating: panellists Kev Carmody, Richard J. Frankland, James Freud and Andrew Morris agreed that the music came before the words.

Kev Carmody emphasised his Irish/Aboriginal storytelling tradition (in common with all dispossessed people) and the importance of community in his work.

Kev Carmody's approach was that songs should tell stories that are universal.

Richard Frankland also described his Aboriginal background and how that influenced his music, writing and films.

Andrew Morris is in the early stages of his career (but recently won a QSong writing award) while James Freud has written 2 books about his alcoholism and drug dependence following the excesses of the '80s.

Carmody, Frankland and Morris gave short acoustic guitar demo's which helped me understand their music and words.

Fathers and sons: 2 books

The Road by Cormac McCarthy and Romulus, My Father by Raimond Gaita are both about the relationship between fathers and sons, the first from the father's perspective and the second from the son's.

The Road is a novel set in a post-apocalypse world. It tells the story of the efforts of a father and son to survive and describes the thoughts of the father as he approaches death: will he kill his emaciated son or give him the opportunity of survival? Is there hope? The book is intense, harrowing and dramatic.

Romulus, My Father is a memoir. In the son's younger years, the book is mostly descriptive of the breakdown of his parents' marriage but as the father and son age, the book is more contemplative and philosophical (Raimond Gaita is a philosopher). The book has been adapted into a movie.

On my break

I'm back from a short break. I had a chance to catch up on some books and a movie.

I loved Transformers: well written, very funny, great special effects and action. Very entertaining. Take your teenage kids.

I've discovered Michael Robotham's thriller/detective books: I read Suspect and Lost and have his new book The Night Ferry on order.  Great characters.

Eat, pray, love : one woman's search for everything across Italy, India, and Indonesia by Elizabeth Gilbert, is one of the most sensitive self-discovery memoirs I've read for a while. She has a great voice.

The Yiddish Policemen's Union by Michael Chabon took a while to get into but his alternative world is fascinating.