Hindustan Times
Books to travel with
I always fret about which books to take with me on holiday. And now that I am readying to travel towards the end of this week, I am beginning to worry about what I shall take along.
The sole remaining pleasure of the long-haul flight is being able to read. The phone can’t ring. The emails can’t ping in. There you are, sealed and airborne, insulated, isolated, only with your book, immersed in its world.
Could anything be better?
The book for the long-haul, drink-sodden, tobacco-denied flight is always different from the book I’d take for the train or to read at a pub or in bed.
Also, there is the matter of matching book to locale, of reading something that is set in the place which I am visiting. I have read Ian Rankin’s Rebus novels in Edinburgh; F Scott Fitzgerald’s Tender is the Night on long days on the beach in the French Riviera; and Thomas Mann’s Death in Venice in Venice. It sometimes works.
In June 2007, the Guardian asked several writers to name the books they had – and would love to – travel with. The answers were funny and illuminating. And they were jolly good recommendations too.
So what will I take this time?
Dennis Lehane writes noirish thrillers based in Boston, but they are thrillers that often transcend the genre-literary divide. I intend to take his much-applauded Mystic River. (Yes, it’s better known as a Clint Eastwood movie, but people I have high regard for rate it as Lehane’s best.)
I’ll take Anton Chekov’s stories (The Lady with the Little Dog and Other Stories: 1896-1904; Penguin Modern Classics edition). I’ve been meaning to reread all of the master’s stories, and once I have read this again, I shall be done. Superb for the short bus/Tube/train ride, or while waiting, or at the pub - er, for anywhere at all.
I shall also take a thrilling book that I have been dipping into for months now: Peter Gay’s Modernism: The Lure of Heresy. It is, as the cultural critic and bestselling author Stephen Greenblatt says, a “celebration of the subversive energies that decisively transformed art and culture in the late 19th and 20th centuries” - as the book’s subtitle suggests, “from Baudelaire to Beckett and beyond”. Read a review here.
I’m not sure I’ll finish these three in that order. No sooner than I arrive, there will be books that I simply won’t be able to resist buying. And my publisher will be generous: he’ll let me cart away stuff that I want from his offices.
All this, by the way, also means that I am unlikely to be posting regularly for the next couple of weeks. I’ll let you know how I get along. I can imagine that there will be stuff to write about once I am back.
How about you? Let’s hear from you about which books you would take on holiday.
(2 votes, average: 5 out of 5)
Loading ...Posted by Soumya Bhattacharya on Monday, April 13, 2009 at 8:16 pm
Filed under Books · Tagged Anton Chekov, book, Guardian, publisher, travelbooks, travelling
hmmm.. here’s my list
1.The Time Traveller’s Wife
2. PG Wodehouse’s- Jeeves Omnibus
3. Snow Flower & The Secret Fan
4. The Secret Life of Bees
5. Water for Elephants
All these books remind me of summers
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How long would you be travelling for? Time Traveller’s… and the Jeeves Omnibus ought to take of a very long summer…
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I never have less than three books in my bag even for a weekend out. And of course, the lengthier the vacation, the more the books. And I always carry a spare bag to bring back all the book shopping I may do on a holiday.
For the basic weekend holiday, there will always be: One anthology or book of essays to dip into at random. One full length novel (fiction), one full length non-fic book. If I’m going someplace new and I manage to find a travel(ish) book relating to it, great. If not, well, I can say there’s nothing nicer than reading From The Holy Mountain lying in a hammock at Sattal, Uttaranchal.
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Deb Reply:
April 17th, 2009 at 5:36 pm
Right up my alley! When I used to go travelling for about 3 weeks at a stretch, the books in my baggage would sometimes weigh more than all other articles put together. Well, I may be exaggerating, but I did carry load of books. And since I like to read different books at different times, the temptation was always to carry at least one of every kind. During those days I travelled with:
War and Peace
The Mayor of Casterbridge
Far From the Madding Crowd
The Art of War
Blink
Peter Drucker ‘1990s and Beyond’
Autobiography of a Yogi
The World is Flat
Rich Dad, Poor Dad
At least three of the above list could be found in my bag. Got plenty of reading time usually, esp. on tours to a small town in Uttarakhand where dinner was at 7 pm and you had to lock your bedroom at 7.45, what with tigers reputed to be prowling around!
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Essays + fiction + non-fiction is a reliable combination. It never fails. And I completely agree about the travel book relating to the new place.
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I like to take travel books to read while traveling.. it does for me what drums do to a song…provides the beat:-)
Also I prefer simpler and shorter fiction or non-fiction because there are lots of distractions in terms of noises and movements during travel and becomes hard to concentrate if the books are complicated.
Humourous books keeps one in good humour…and who better than P.G Wodehouse !
Happy reading !
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Soumya Reply:
April 14th, 2009 at 4:57 pm
Point taken about Wodehouse (anytime, anywhere) and essays/short fiction.
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Deb Reply:
April 17th, 2009 at 5:39 pm
About “simpler and shorter… lots of distractions”. True, but always found that depending only on short prose had its disadvantages - left one feeling unquenched somehow. With focus, it’s probably possible to take up the thread day after day.
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this was most maddening. try as i may, i couldnt put my finger on any specific book. there are many books i have dying to read for ages, but i have no idea if they’d be ‘nice reading’ on a particular trip or add anything if i read them while travelling. i mean, i will read them anyway.
p.s. that lure of hearsay does whet the appetite.
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Kushal Reply:
April 14th, 2009 at 4:35 pm
Hahaha!
From what I gather on Guardian blogs, no one’s actually managed to read War and Peace on holiday, though they do lug it about.
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Soumya Reply:
April 14th, 2009 at 4:56 pm
Yes, precisely. That’s why I am - for the moment - sticking with Lehane (ripping read); Chekov (no explanation needed - plus stories); and Peter Gay’s Modernism (the non-fiction one, and very enjoyable from dipping into it). It all might change by Friday night.
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Deb Reply:
April 17th, 2009 at 5:44 pm
Would like to differ, with all due apologies to Guardian. Yours truly did actually manage to read War and Peace while travelling, though not strictly on holiday but on working tours. It was done painstakingly, a few chapters every night (excellent for a good night’s sleep - and I don’t mean boring or anything but putting you at peace) over many months, across many tours. Does that qualify for a special award? Let me know how to claim it.
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books like fountain head , my name is red, sea of poppies will be lengthy reads as well as quite glued ones…..definitely that will expose u to an inter-genre expedition. but what is more important in my case is i like to read mainly lighter stories due to interruptions in my travel….be it through any medium….my recent reads include mainly crossover books as i call it…like that of Jhumpa Lahiri’s unaccustomed earth, interpreter of maladies…and arvind adiga’s white tiger….besides sea of poppies was also a fast read for me though initially its a slow starter….and the language is difficult to grasp initially….enjoy a fruitful and happy read…..
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Soumya Reply:
April 15th, 2009 at 11:47 am
I’m not sure I’d call Unaccustomed earth a crossover book: it is determinedly, deceptively literary. For my money, the best collection of stories published in 2008…
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Deb Reply:
April 17th, 2009 at 5:47 pm
Would second that.
@gangotri “read mainly lighter stories due to interruptions in travel”: On the contrary, I think travels, being free of the day-to-day office & home rigmarole, sometimes provide one with all the mental space to focus on some serious reading.
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I re-read Maneaters of Kumaon while on a six-day trip to Bandhavgarh and Kanha. It was lovely.
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Soumya Reply:
April 15th, 2009 at 11:50 am
Yes, I can imagine. The book-to-locale-in-which-one-is often works very well.
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1. The Wordsworth book of Limmericks
2. Rugby Joke books.
3. Collected short stories by Somset Maughm
Takes care of all the mood swings while travellingl. By the way art Limmericks writing seems to be dying. Have you come accross any recent publications ?
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Deb Reply:
April 17th, 2009 at 5:49 pm
4. Hercule Poirot - 50 short stories (if you dig serious detective works)
5. O’Henry - various collections
6. BPO Tales (just joking, not in the same class, included for some light reading!)
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No, I am afraid, not. When the fancy takes me, I still go back to Edward Lear. Sorry to be so okd-fashioned in this instance…
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To have time for reading books, when you are not pre-occupied by your all & sundry problems during your holidays is a great blessing.Well, I have tried reading books in rail as well as aero-plane, but found but confronted distractions. Though had been able to read a few in long bus-journeys.Still the best place to go through a book had been an open air garden, where lush-green grass invigorates you & helps in forgetting the pre-occupations of mind. The books which I relished reading in such calm ambience is “Mother” by Maxim Gorky & “City of Joy” by Dominique & Lapier. Oflate, I have got my hands on “Time-machine”, but in the swarming trains of Mumbai, where stench just chokes your nostrils have made it difficult for me to have a concentrate on it during my one hour journey…I need to have a break to go through certain good books bgut then vacations are also meant for completing many of the undone areas which needs a little bit of care & our time…
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Soumya Reply:
April 17th, 2009 at 11:49 am
A garden is a lovely place to read. Depends on what sort of garden/park it is, of course. And then there is the beach…
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Deb Reply:
April 17th, 2009 at 5:56 pm
Depends on your disposition. For me, I can sometimes lose myself so completely in a book that the book itself provides the required solitude, irrespective of surroundings.
P.S. I guess you mean Dominique Lapierre (he collaborated with Larry Collins on ‘Freedom at Midnight’ and other books, so they could perhaps be called Dominique & Collins).
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im not sure what kind of books ure into but if ure considering mystic river then i guess u dont mind thrillers. try “the codex” by douglas preston its enough to keep u awake n readin for quite a stretch. enjoy
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Thanks for the tip, Himani.
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Hi Soumya,
Fancy reading your blog from distant Sydney after all these years (we studied for a brief while at JU - MA English). So, here’s my list:
Gorky Park - Martin Cruz Smith (if there ever was a literary thriller, this is it)
Sukumar Rochona Smagra - Abol Tabol never grows old, nor does Hojoborolo
Satanic Verses - Salman Rushdie’s best in my opinion
or I could just junk them all and simply take along Proust’s Remembrance of Things Past, the closest a book can come to perfection.
-Saurabh
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Soumya Reply:
May 6th, 2009 at 4:48 pm
I’ve thought of taking Proust with me. But I have never in the end managed to.
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God! Sends a chill (thrill?) up my spine - ‘Sukumar Rochona Samagra’, ‘Abol Tabol’ and ‘Hojoborolo’ mentioned, and in a blog of all places! What about ‘Feluda’ detective novels by the illustrious son, or ‘Kiriti’ ones by Tarashankar (hope I’ve got it right). And what about Sunil Gangopadhyaya novels. Already drooling!
Sadly, as I grow older and get more attuned to Engligh as the primary language or work and play, I seem to be getting more and more distant from Bangla and Hindi literature, which I used to be mad about when young. Still, I dutifully purchase the ‘Puja Sankhya’ of ‘Desh’ every year (and a few issues here & there), but it just keeps lying somewhere neglected. Alas!
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Soumya Reply:
May 6th, 2009 at 4:51 pm
I completely empathise. And I still buy Desh every year too.
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my list?
well i am on a journey of self discovery of which genre i like so :
1) Julian Barnes : History of the world in ten and half chapters (the guy is th most satirical writer of the modern generation!)
2) Gabriel marquez( i recently read Love in Time of Cholera and it’s safe to say that I’m in Love
3) have been planning on reading a Toni Morrison
4) Dante’s Inferno
5) Any one autobiography: I am currently reading Einstein’s World As I see It
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Soumya Reply:
May 6th, 2009 at 4:53 pm
Glad to know that you are an admirer of Barnes’s. I am - very much. If you enjoyed 10 and a half, you ought to try and get hold of Falubert’s Parrot. Superb. And the latest one - Nothing to be Frightened of - is bleak and darkly funny.
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Read the following:
Gone with the Wind
The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari
The Alchemist
Five Point Someone
One Night At A Call Center
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Sashi Kant Reply:
May 16th, 2009 at 11:48 am
I am yet to lay my hands on Gone with the wind, but I did not enjoy reading The Alchemist,
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Parul Bhandari Reply:
August 14th, 2009 at 11:53 pm
I also did not enjoy The Alchemist but till now I have read only these five novels…that’s why I mentioned its name, naa !!!!!!!!
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i guess any book by bill bryson gets much better on a holiday….
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Soumya Reply:
May 19th, 2009 at 11:42 am
It does, for sure. Try reading Down Under when in Australia…
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Holiday or no holiday, books are always the best way to relax.
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Soumya Reply:
May 19th, 2009 at 11:42 am
A truer word was seldom spoken.
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Yes Minister
Yes Prime Minister
Agatha Christie mysteries
P G Wodehouse in any form
Outliers
The Mahabharata (C Rajagopalachari)
Any of Ramesh Menon’s books - Devi, Shiva, Krishna…
Devdutt Pattanaik’s Myth=Mithya
I think one should always carry around more books and more clothes than one can possibly need on a trip. You never know… ):-
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