Amongst the chit chatter that usually occurs as I transform a clients face with colour, contour and highlight, a very simple question threw me off guard.
I was rhythmically moving my brush back and forth in the socket of her eye to create the depth she desired.
We had just finished a brief conversation about our academic careers (my new found one at UofT and her old one at Western), she casually asks "so what's your favourite book?"
I couldn't answer this question, instead I named off a number of authors I've read and love, and the titles that stood out to me amongst them.
For the rest of my evening I pondered this question and I pinpointed it down to two novels.
They're not particularly my "favourite" for that seems too serious a commitment.
I have read many novels over the years that stirred me as much if not more than these have.
Rather than being my favourite they are my beginning; my inauguration into literature.
I've lost my virginity to these books.... before losing my virginity.
Before them I was reading kitschy gothic vampire novels, (which still unabashedly hold a place in my heart :).
The first of my favourites is Charles Bukowski's, Ham on Rye:
I had read some of his poetry when I was fifteen and it stuck to me. I purchased this book at fifteen/sixteen and I was enamored.
After discovering him, I walked around the grounds of my high school feeling like a beatnik.
Bukowski's poetry smothered in my armpit.
Skipping class and smoking outside my teachers window when I really should have spent my time learning instead of foolishly acting learned.
I related with Henry Chinaski right away.
Here he is coming of age in a dysfunctional and abusive family, hazardously lonely and anti-social.
The novel is written with beautiful wit and irony.
It seems to mock the story of self discovery, yet portraying it in a brutal and honest way.
Much later after reading all his novels and poetry I realized how finely veiled Henry is to himself.
In this book he is a young Henry, in his later novels he is still Henry though now a progressed masochistic selfish alcoholic.
Yet I still relate with this asshole even to this day. Ham On Rye must have been a premonition, and it indeed started my love-hate relationship with Charles Bukowski. He echos the love hate relationship I hold with my father for the same reasons.
He was me in Ham on Rye,
He had me at Factotum, Post Office and Women (Hollywood i feverishly enjoyed but could only relate to as my Bukowski alter ego).
I then disappointingly realized he wrote those after Ham On Rye, the chronology didn't sit right with my teenage brain.
Nonetheless i love his prose and poetry, he brings the humorous and dirty brutality to life.
The second of these is Vladamir Nabokov's: Lolita,
The first time I opened this book I didn't close it until I finished it.
I felt this novel couldn't have entered any ones psyche as much as it did mine, of course I was wrong as I realized how many followers this book had.
I'm not positive on how I picked this beauty up but I have to say that I believe my muse at the time (ehem :/ Marilyn Manson) named it as one of his favourites.
It's such a beautiful piece of art and though Nabokov is a brilliant writer the rest of his prose never lived up to Lolita in my eyes.
I suspect it has a lot to do with the tender age (14/15) that Lolita entered my world.
The most interesting thing for me about this book is how strongly and equally I related with both Humbert, Humbert and Lolita.
I got tangled in their futile love affair. Their libidinous affection, a tale disguised as a perversion of morality, but to the reader (at least to me) there is nothing unnatural to the relationships that push and pull on each other.
I sympathized with him and felt his lure towards Lola, as I cringed at his clumsy all-consuming and uncontrollable affliction.
And her his Lo, knobbly kneed Lo, how could I not relate with her and love her.
Discovering the frightening yet utterly titillating power of her detonating sexuality.
The fine line of innocence irreversibly blurred by her long legs, pretty face and mocking expressions.
Her playful gaze took on the appearance of a mature understanding and sexual flirtation to a lonely and lost man.
Empowered and liberated, only to be dominated and oppressed.
In turn she empowers, to inevitably oppress.
Humbert, Humbert to me is a tragic hero, so driven by his desire and love that he fails to see Lo as a human being but rather a nymph he wants to raise above the earth, his passion is his demise.
Her immature sexuality is jaded yet forced to blossom.
I was rhythmically moving my brush back and forth in the socket of her eye to create the depth she desired.
We had just finished a brief conversation about our academic careers (my new found one at UofT and her old one at Western), she casually asks "so what's your favourite book?"
I couldn't answer this question, instead I named off a number of authors I've read and love, and the titles that stood out to me amongst them.
For the rest of my evening I pondered this question and I pinpointed it down to two novels.
They're not particularly my "favourite" for that seems too serious a commitment.
I have read many novels over the years that stirred me as much if not more than these have.
Rather than being my favourite they are my beginning; my inauguration into literature.
I've lost my virginity to these books.... before losing my virginity.
Before them I was reading kitschy gothic vampire novels, (which still unabashedly hold a place in my heart :).
The first of my favourites is Charles Bukowski's, Ham on Rye:
I had read some of his poetry when I was fifteen and it stuck to me. I purchased this book at fifteen/sixteen and I was enamored.
After discovering him, I walked around the grounds of my high school feeling like a beatnik.
Bukowski's poetry smothered in my armpit.
Skipping class and smoking outside my teachers window when I really should have spent my time learning instead of foolishly acting learned.
I related with Henry Chinaski right away.
Here he is coming of age in a dysfunctional and abusive family, hazardously lonely and anti-social.
The novel is written with beautiful wit and irony.
It seems to mock the story of self discovery, yet portraying it in a brutal and honest way.
Much later after reading all his novels and poetry I realized how finely veiled Henry is to himself.
In this book he is a young Henry, in his later novels he is still Henry though now a progressed masochistic selfish alcoholic.
Yet I still relate with this asshole even to this day. Ham On Rye must have been a premonition, and it indeed started my love-hate relationship with Charles Bukowski. He echos the love hate relationship I hold with my father for the same reasons.
He was me in Ham on Rye,
He had me at Factotum, Post Office and Women (Hollywood i feverishly enjoyed but could only relate to as my Bukowski alter ego).
I then disappointingly realized he wrote those after Ham On Rye, the chronology didn't sit right with my teenage brain.
Nonetheless i love his prose and poetry, he brings the humorous and dirty brutality to life.
The second of these is Vladamir Nabokov's: Lolita,
The first time I opened this book I didn't close it until I finished it.
I felt this novel couldn't have entered any ones psyche as much as it did mine, of course I was wrong as I realized how many followers this book had.
I'm not positive on how I picked this beauty up but I have to say that I believe my muse at the time (ehem :/ Marilyn Manson) named it as one of his favourites.
It's such a beautiful piece of art and though Nabokov is a brilliant writer the rest of his prose never lived up to Lolita in my eyes.
I suspect it has a lot to do with the tender age (14/15) that Lolita entered my world.
The most interesting thing for me about this book is how strongly and equally I related with both Humbert, Humbert and Lolita.
I got tangled in their futile love affair. Their libidinous affection, a tale disguised as a perversion of morality, but to the reader (at least to me) there is nothing unnatural to the relationships that push and pull on each other.
I sympathized with him and felt his lure towards Lola, as I cringed at his clumsy all-consuming and uncontrollable affliction.
And her his Lo, knobbly kneed Lo, how could I not relate with her and love her.
Discovering the frightening yet utterly titillating power of her detonating sexuality.
The fine line of innocence irreversibly blurred by her long legs, pretty face and mocking expressions.
Her playful gaze took on the appearance of a mature understanding and sexual flirtation to a lonely and lost man.
Empowered and liberated, only to be dominated and oppressed.
In turn she empowers, to inevitably oppress.
Humbert, Humbert to me is a tragic hero, so driven by his desire and love that he fails to see Lo as a human being but rather a nymph he wants to raise above the earth, his passion is his demise.
Her immature sexuality is jaded yet forced to blossom.
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