Our friend Claire lent us her late father's cabin in northern Victoria last weekend. While all the family went crazy for the roos in the back garden (right), I was going nuts over the shelves full of books in the living room. Borges thought paradise was a library and I think paradise might be a family's idiosyncratic library collected over several generations. Her dad was a religious scholar so there were a lot of philosophical and sacred texts, but also a good representation of Australiana, fiction and poetry. I read 4 books over the weekend. Hotel du Lac (Fawlty Towers without the jokes), Tolkien's Gown (a gossipy memoir of the rare book trade), The Bride Stripped Bare (a Sheltering Sky rip off) and From Sea to Shining Sea (a literary travel writer's journeys through America). Apart from the roos we spotted a lot of interesting birds and in the outside bathroom a spider as big as my hand which disconcertingly vanished when I came back with the poker from the fireplace.
Sunday, November 16, 2008
Cherish The Cabin
Our friend Claire lent us her late father's cabin in northern Victoria last weekend. While all the family went crazy for the roos in the back garden (right), I was going nuts over the shelves full of books in the living room. Borges thought paradise was a library and I think paradise might be a family's idiosyncratic library collected over several generations. Her dad was a religious scholar so there were a lot of philosophical and sacred texts, but also a good representation of Australiana, fiction and poetry. I read 4 books over the weekend. Hotel du Lac (Fawlty Towers without the jokes), Tolkien's Gown (a gossipy memoir of the rare book trade), The Bride Stripped Bare (a Sheltering Sky rip off) and From Sea to Shining Sea (a literary travel writer's journeys through America). Apart from the roos we spotted a lot of interesting birds and in the outside bathroom a spider as big as my hand which disconcertingly vanished when I came back with the poker from the fireplace.
