We’re fans
Of fiction. Of stories. Of writers such as Chimamanda Ngozie Adichie. Did you read the recent interview with her in the New York Times Book Review on what she reads when writing? We believe you can turn that question into ‘what you read when you are working?’ After all, we started FictionFriday from the belief that reading fiction will nurture your imagination, your creativity, your empathy. Hence, it will enable your ability to ‘think outside the box’, something that is helpful overall, but particularly in ‘lockdown’ life. Also, we believe in the joy that reading fiction can bring.
So, what are you currently reading?
Chiara has immersed herself into A Little History of Literature by John Sutherland. Highly recommended if you want to read a bit more about what literature is (is that even a question we can answer?), without having to read a thick academic book.
David is currently reading The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman by Laurence Sterne, 1759-1767. The vocabulary is at times quite difficult, and the style takes some getting used to, but David thinks it’s very clever and very funny.
Inge is reading two fiction books right now, enjoying parallel inspiration. One is Winter, from Ali Smith’s seasonal quartet. A series of four stand-alone, separate novels, but interconnected, as the seasons are. The novels are united by the passing of time. The other book is by Calum McCann Apeirogon, set in Occupied Palestine and Israel. McCann illuminates the political situation that has divided the region for more than seventy years in a completely new light.
Maybe there is no book on your bed shelf, but instead you have indulged yourself in Netflix and other online movie and TV series, that also stimulate the imagination. Which is of course something we are also prone to do sometimes. And yet, the reading of that book could invite you to picture the characters, to paint the colours of the settings described. An author will never describe everything in all its details. It’s just not possible, or interesting. Hence, your imagination will be stimulated in a stronger sense.
Chiara and Inge are big fans of Adichie, for a variety of reasons. For example, she is well equipped in inviting you into very rich worlds. One of Adichie’s novels, Americanah, is a powerful, yet tender story about race and identity. In the book she personalises the various and real meanings of race, racism, black, white, foreign, native. It’s a good ‘mind f**k’, challenging one’s world views.
‘The only reason you say that race was not an issue is because you wish it was not. We all wish it was not. But it’s a lie. I came from a country where race was not an issue; I did not think of myself as black and I only became black when I came to America.’
Not just an amazing writer but also an amazing speaker, Adichie’s TedTalk is one of the most viewed TedTalks of all time. In it she talks about ‘the danger of a single story' and warns that 'if we hear only a single story about another person or country, we risk a critical misunderstanding.'
‘I recently spoke at a university where a student told me that it was such a shame that Nigerian men were physical abusers like the father character in my novel. I told him that I had just read a novel called American Psycho and that it was such a shame that young Americans were serial murderers.’
So, what will you be reading?