The Last Brother

by Nathacha Appanah
translated by Geoffrey Strachan

Inspired by a little-known page of history but deeply personal tale of a brief childhood friendship, told by a man in his seventies. (How, may I ask in parentheses, could this young author write as if she grew during the Second World War and lived a long life after that?) Profoundly moving book, sympathetically translated by Geoffrey Strachan.

I pictured her back in our house in the forest, her shoulders hunched, as if forever prepared to receive blows, I pictured her with her mixtures, her potions and her magic formulas. I pictured her falling over, battered by my father, and I felt the sudden weight of her in my hands. I pictured her with the red parakeet and I heard her burst of laughter at David. I thought about those long months when every morning and every evening she massaged my legs to heal me. And there, this little scrap of a woman, smiling on the balcony, in full, bright sunlight, this was her and at the same time it was not her, and, on the return journey I always ended up in tears over it, this illusory happiness at the end, over all the things that had come much too late to erase everything else.

Dub Side of the Moon

by Easy Star All-Stars

Bold concept, brilliant implementation. Released 30 years after the Pink Floyd’s classic, this respectful tribute album by now should also be considered a classic in its own right. And, just like the original, has to be listened to in its entirety. Ignore the bonus tracks though.

Disability Sport & Arts Festival @ Chesterton

According to my records, I have been playing with Arco Iris for two years already! Is there a better way to celebrate this than with a gig like today’s? AI played two sets for the Disability Sport and Arts Festival at Chesterton Sports Centre (11:30—12:15pm and 13:30—14:30). As venues go, this one was a bit strange (basically, we were playing in a car park), but then we’ve played stranger locations. During both sets, the audience (including the mayor of Cambridge on agogô) joined in!

Cookin’ in Bonn

by Emil Viklický

Back in 1980s, I was lucky to buy a couple of Czech LPs. One was called Together by James Williams and Emil Viklický. Another one was Dveře (Door) by Viklický (also featuring Bill Frisell, whose name did not mean anything to me at the time). These two albums showcase the amazing diversity of Viklický, from acoustic jazz piano duets on Together to jazz-rock of Dveře’s A-side to neo-classical Suite for Piano No. 2 on the B-side.

I have no idea what happened to these vinyls. So far I did not come across much of 1980s Supraphon’s production transferred on CDs. In fact, I did not see any.

Now, quite by chance, I got hold of the promotional copy of the 2006 live album of Emil Viklický trio, with František Uhlíř on bass and Laco Tropp on drums, released by the never-heard-of label, Dekkor Records. Sixty-eight minutes of amazing music. My only reservation is the title, for I would never describe the trio’s lyrical playing (refreshingly free of showing off) as “cookin’”. Aspen Leaf, Desire, Lover Come Back: to sit down and cry.

Games at Twilight

by Anita Desai

It is one beautifully written book. Not a single dull story here. Still, one’s got to have favourite ones, right? Here: Pigeons at Daybreak, a day (and night) in life of a middle-age Indian couple. Pineapple Cake: a Catholic wedding in Bombay as seen through the eyes of a young boy. Scholar and Gypsy: adventures of the young American couple in India — he loves it, she hates it — then they go on holidays, with an unexpected and humorous role reversal.

One of his worst afflictions, Mr Basu thought, was not to be able to read the newspaper himself. To have them read to him by his wife. He watched with fiercely controlled irritation that made the corners of his mouth jerk suddenly upwards and outwards, as she searched for her spectacles through the flat. By the time she found them — on the ledge above the bathing place in the bathroom, of all places: what did she want with her spectacles in there? — she had lost the newspaper. When she found it, it was spotted all over with grease for she had left it beside the stove on which the fish was frying. This reminded her to see to the fish before it was overdone. ‘You don’t want charred fish for your lunch, do you?’ she shouted back when he called. He sat back then, in his tall-backed cane chair, folded his hands over his stomach and knew that if he were to open his mouth now, even a slit, it would be to let out a scream of abuse. So he kept it tightly shut. When she had finally come to the end of that round of bumbling activity, moving from stove to bucket, shelf to table, cupboard to kitchen, she came out on the balcony again, triumphantly carrying with her the newspaper as well as the spectacles. ‘So,’ she said, ‘are you ready to listen to the news now?’ Pigeons at Daybreak

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy: The Primary Phase

by Douglas Adams

I have started to pack up my CD collection for a move, with a concomitant release of hundreds of jewel cases. Now, where did I last see that 3-CD box?

The introduction begins like this:
“Space,” it says, “is big. Really big. You just won’t believe how vastly hugely mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it’s a long way down the road to the chemist, but that’s just peanuts to space. Listen...”
and so on.

Yes, exactly, “listen and so on”, for this one is the original and the best. More popular than the Celestial Home Care Omnibus, better selling than 53 More Things To Do In Zero Gravity, and a life-saver on a long car journey with or without kids. Proven!

The Sexual Life of Catherine M.

by Catherine Millet
translated by Adriana Hunter

Judging from the Amazon reviews, a lot of readers took an offense at (a) the book being dull (as in “I read this book twice, it is so boring, why did I even buy it?” dull) and (b) our sexually liberated Ms M. being there for no other reason but to please her men.

I know. The modern reader wants to see the heroine being strong, independent and having plenty of orgasmic sex on her own terms. But that would be fiction. This is a memoir, and I applaud Ms Millet’s honesty. If you find this book dull, try memoirs of British politicians, or their wives.

When you write a book in the first person the latter becomes the third person. The more I describe my body and my actions, the more I leave myself behind. Who recognises themselves in those magnifying mirrors which show cheeks and noses as vast fissured landscapes? Because sexual pleasure brings you outside your own limits, it can impose the same sort of distance. Perhaps there is even a structural relationship, and the distance governs the pleasure as much as it is governed by it, at least for the category of creature to which I belong. Because, and this is the point I wanted to make, the same woman whom I described as uncomfortable under someone’s insistent gaze, and who hesitated to wear suggestive clothes, the same woman in fact who partook blind in sexual adventures with faceless partners, this same woman, then, takes indisputable pleasure in exposing herself on condition that the exposure is distanced at once, by a narrative.