MR SWIFT recommends...

In the Library’s continuing

series of book selections by

members of staff, Mr Swift has

made a selection which perhaps

doesn't include all his absolute

favourite books in the world

ever but instead he has used the

guideline, ‘Books I’d read by the

age of 19, or wish I’d read by

then.’

�

All of Mr Swift’s recommendations are

available in the Library

DUBLINERS by James Joyce

Here’s a good way to enter the world of our city at

the turn of the 19th

century into the 20th

. It’s also by

far the most accessible way to become introduced to

one of Ireland’s most revered authors. Dubliners is

rightly considered one of the best short story

collections ever written, and truthfully every one’s a

gem. A favourite line? It would have to be Gabriel

towards the end of The Dead saying, ‘Why am I

feeling this riot of emotion?’

AS I WALKED OUT ONE

MIDSUMMER MORNING

by Laurie Lee

This is an enchanting read especially for those of you

who perhaps feel cooped up and fenced in by exams

and study. If you are planning to journey abroad

during a gap year this book will inspire the wonder of

travel and the necessary sense of adventure required.

With only his violin as a potential income stream the 18 year old Laurie

takes off on foot from the Cotswolds for London and then Spain. Set in

the 1930’s and written in a poetic, romantic prose Lee describes a country

that still seemed medieval. By the end of this memoir however all that

was about to change, change utterly.

RAISE HIGH THE ROOF BEAM,

CARPENTERS by J.D. Salinger

It’s possible that if you enjoyed studying Catcher in

the Rye you have worked your way through the rest of

Salinger’s published work but let me recommend this

one. It tells the strange story of how our narrator turns

up as the soul family representative to his older

brother’s wedding in New York, the brother however

never shows up! Tricky situation. He finds himself in

a car bound for the jilted bride’s parents’ house with other guests. Should

he reveal his fraternal link to the absent groom? Most memorable is a tiny

man in a top hat with a cigar who, by saying nothing, becomes our hero’s

only ally…it’s a short read so stick with it.

THE RAZOR’S EDGE

by W. Somerset Maugham

Although Maugham isn’t terribly popular these days I

think he is still worthy of our attention. He is a very clear

and vivid storyteller. I liked this novel because it speaks

directly with a narrator’s voice that you feel must be the

author himself. In fact in his preface he claims to have

made nothing up, I wonder…Anyway this only serves to

make the story of Larry Darrell’s quest (and attainment) of spiritual

enlightenment more intriguing.

THIS BOY’S LIFE by Tobias Wolff

This is the first of Wolff’s memoirs covering his

boyhood move to the American north-west with his

flighty mother. Perhaps doing what she felt was best for

them both she enters into marriage with a cruel,

controlling and humourless man whose presence

gradually saps the joy from their lives. Wolff, many

agree, raised the bar for writers of literary memoir with

this masterpiece. His deft recollection of his youthful self, his frustrated

dreams and his desire to break free from his incarceration in glum

Concrete, Washington are more often tinged with humour than bitterness.

Wow!

THE DIVING BELL AND THE

BUTTERFLY

by Jean-Dominique Bauby

Another memoir but one written from a unique

perspective and one ‘written’ extraordinarily. Bauby

was a successful magazine editor in Paris until the day

in 1995 he suffered a massive stroke which left him completely

paralysed, apart from the ability to blink his left eye. In cases such as this

where the mind is still working perfectly the person is said to suffer from

‘locked-in’ syndrome. Bauby set about ‘dictating’ his book, letter by

letter, by blinking his eyelid when his transcriber called the letter from

the alphabet needed to spell his next word. This alone is mind-boggling

but the reality is that regardless of its mode of composition this is a

haunting and moving read from a strangely unknowable place. It inspired

a terrific, Oscar winning, film adaptation which should surely be

considered for Mr. Coldrick’s TY film society. I’m only sayin’…

MAN’S SEARCH FOR MEANING

by Victor Frankl

This is a well known book concerned primarily with

the German concentration camps of WW II. The

description of what took place there by the author

doesn’t quite match the spine-chilling writing in Primo

Levi’s If This Is a Man; however as a trained

psychologist Frankl uses the second half of the book to

explore this most depraved chapter in human history to seek some

essential understanding of the human condition. I remember chancing

upon this book in a bargain shop when my spirits needed lifting and

believe it or not it cheered me up no end.

THE PROPHET by Kahlil Gibran

This piece of ‘inspirational fiction’ dates from 1923

yet has the feel of some lost scrolls or inscribed tablets

of an ancient civilisation. It is written in a faux-archaic

style but still seems to entrance the reader as the

wisdom of the words penetrates our innermost longing

for truth. The Prophet on Teaching, ‘No man can

reveal to you aught but that which already lies half

asleep in the dawning of your knowledge.’ Well said

that mystic!

SO LONG, SEE YOU TOMORROW

by William Maxwell

It’s years since I read this novel, recommended to me

by John Fanagan, former head of English, but it has

stayed with me. I’m going to leave it unread for a

while more but I remember being impressed by the

sympathetic insights of the novelist and the

understanding he displayed, in his uncluttered prose,

of the sometimes muddled motivations of the adolescent soul. This is not

a novel you’d normally chance upon or pluck from the shelves without a

bit of nudging – but that’s what we’re here for, nudge, nudge.

DOWN AND OUT IN PARIS AND

LONDON by George Orwell

This is a really interesting piece of social reportage

from the late 1920s. Orwell decided to experiment with

a self-imposed exile to the most marginalised fringes

of the two cities of the title. In Paris he becomes a

dishwasher in a restaurant which he says was akin to

slavery and in London he describes the awful

conditions that homeless men of that era had to endure

in the appalling hostel accommodation. It seems that he really lived it.

The overall effect is to make SCC dormitories seem like presidential

suites at the Ritz.

THE OLD MAN AND THE SEA

by Ernest Hemingway

Studying English literature in school should introduce

you to the big themes; and in this little story

Hemingway does just that. Mankind’s struggles with

the forces of nature, the potential of the human spirit to

overcome, the presence of death in life and the perilous

employment conditions of Cuban sea anglers – they’re

all here! The style is distinctive, lean and deceptively

simple and the end result was the little book you hold in your hand won

the Pulitzer Prize for Hemingway.