I will ignore the idiocy of today. Because that idiocy led to two beautiful things:

x I wrote. Seriously my novella is going to be finished, it's almost finished in content (not in editing obviously) this is a milestone of my life as a writer as I had never finished anything (FICTION, obvsly) before. There was always too much pressure.
x I finished my journal. This brings me to:



You will get mixed opinions amongst journalers, I am sure. Is it joyful or sad to finish a journal? I find the feeling to be so bittersweet. If you're a usual journaler, as I am, you see them come and go and it obviously makes you constantly aware of how rapid and how fast and changing your life is. However, each journal still has its own independent state in itself. You love some of your journals more than others. You remember your life by your journals. Your entire brain, mind, heart and art is in those pages. Finishing one is beginning a new phase, so nostalgia will be present, but starting a new one is so exciting and challenging at the same time. I'm not merely talking about artsy journals. My journals have more words than anything else. They're not beautiful, either. My journal writing is completely crappy. But I am forever thankful to have them in my life. Not to mention journaling is a need to me, a complete and utter need. Both as a writer and as a human being (yes because writers are not human beings, ho ho, ho ho). So this is the end of my nine adult journal (there's six or seven or eight of the other ones but I don't count it as proper journaling), and thus marks the beginning of my tenth. It's my first red journal (although not all have been black, there was an exception) and it's my first soft cover one. It's not a Moleskine (not all have been Moleskines either), as the need has found me in bad economy.

There's that. So, to those amongst my flist that happen to be journalers: describe the feeling. Is it depressing? cheerful? or bittersweet to finish your journals?

PS. Excuse the bad lightening and the rainy hair.

I'm definitely Taurus this month... Holy crap, Rob Brezsny...


TAURUS (April 20-May 20): According to astronomer Mark Whittle, the
Big Bang began in silence. Soon it crescendoed into a majestic major third
chord 50 octaves below middle A. Then it transformed, over the course
of a million years, into a wistful minor third chord. In my vision of the first
two-thirds of 2010, the music of your life will have a similar pattern: It
begins with silence. Next, it progresses into a lush major feel, with spirited
and complex contrapuntal themes. Then in June, it evolves into a dreamy,
contemplative phase. By late September, however -- unlike the Big Bang --
you will move into a third act, in which the music of your life returns to
the lively mood it had at the start, only now with the gravitas that the
reflective phase has instilled.

I feel that this was a good year for me and my books. I read several modern goddesses of mine and spiced it up with the new favorite Sookie Stackhouse Novels and Poppy Z. Brite. But the best book of this year award goes to...... House of Spirits of Isabel Allende!!!!

JANUARY

-Lost Souls-Poppy Z. Brite: I finally found a cheap copy in e-bay and bought it, it was very good, but i still liked Drawing Blood better.

FEBRUARY

-Oncesi Ve Sonrasi(Before and After): Actually this is the second book that the wife of my mother wrote. Not bad, but not very good eaither to tell you the thruth, and it is not because I love my mom better:P -

Yesil Elmalar (Green Apples)- Nazım Hikmet: I don't know what to think about this book, Nazım Hikmet usually writes in social realism, but this book was a pulp fiction of American cheesy adventure, diamond mins in Australia, Second World War, Film Noir... It was interesting, that's for sure. -

Esir Şehrin Insanlari-Kemal Tahir: A triology about the Independence War years' Istanbul. Very good story with very powerful authoring, I was really fascinated by these books.

-Esir Şehrin Mahpusu- Kemal Tahir

MARCH

-Yol Ayrimi- Kemal Tahir -

The Spirit of Houses- Isabel Allende: I wanted to read something by Allende for years and this books was on my list, but I could never start with it until now. I now see that this was a big mistake. Someone said on the back of the book that she was almost as good as Marquez, but I personally think that she is far more better. 'A 100 years of solitude' is one of the best books written, but I'm constantly disappointed with other Marquez books (I still didn't read Love at the time of cholera though, maybe it will be as good). Well, back to Allende, the Spirit of Houses' story both embraces Chili's political history, with a powerful, magical spider web structure of storytelling. I'm completely fascinated by Latin America literature.

APRIL

Cronica de una muerta anunciada (I cannot find theEnglish Title)-Gabriel-Garcia Marquez: This Marquez book was better than my melancholic whores in my opinion, but not half as good as A Hundred Years of Solitude

MAY

Persuasion-Jane Austen:Fun to read, but it felt more like a romance if you ask me.

La Vie est Ailleurs (The Life is Somewhere Else)- Milan Kundera: What can I say about Kundera? He is a genious and I particularily appreciate his characters. They are complicated, shallow, living, breathing human beings that fascinate me.

Mrs. Dalloway- Virginia Woolf: I wanted to read this book for ages too, but I was obsessed with reading it in English. Every other Woolf book, you can find in english in Istanbul, but Mrs. Dalloway, nooo. I searched all the bookstores that sells english books periodically every 3-4 months, but I finally found it in Budapest. It was poetic really. As always, I didn't bring enough books to a vacation, so I was desperately looking to find an english book. There was only one mall that I knew in Budapest, I went there, there was a big bookstore. And Mrs. Dalloway was just sitting at the top of English books. Isn't it magical?

JUNE

Making Documentary Filmd and Videos

Ariel- Sylvia Plath: I finally ordered a copy in English from Amazon. It was very important for me to get a revised copy where the editor put the poems that exactly Plath puts in the manuscript (that means that not the book that his cheating husband Ted Hudges found the liberty to cancel some poems and change the order after her death). I did better, I found a manuscript facsimile copy, which also have scanned versions of the manuscripts with the notes and editions she hand-made. Wohooo

JULY

Yüksek Topuklar (High Heels)-Murathan Mungan: They make a big fuss about this Turkish  writer that I don't get. This is the second book I read by him, and this wasn't worth the time. I didn't like a single thing about the book.

Dead Until Dark-Charlaine Harris: So what, I want to read some pulp fiction. What better series that originate True Blood:)

Living Dead in Dallas-Charlaine Harris

AUGUST

Club Dead-Charlaine Harris -Dead to the World-Charlaine Harris: So ok, I didn't only want to read one pulp novwl, but four. They are good, so, who cares?

Preparation du Roman (Preparation of a Novel)-Roland Barthes: :This book is Barthes' lectures that he gave in  one university semester. His thoughts are as always really fascinating, but he talks about anything but preparing a novel. He founds the novel the opposite of a haiku (which he calls notes) and he tries to find a way to turn this notes into a novel (he didn't find a way at the end). The problem is that he was trying to wrtie a novel at the moment, but all he could do is to take notes (quiet like me, actually). Fascinating ideas though.

Madame Bovary- Flaubert: I found a french second hand copy of this by chance and eventhough my french is rusty ( I didn't read in french for ages), I wanted to read this in its original language. Work still in progress, I will just say what Barthes said about it :"Words was what Emma lived for and word was why she died". I don't know about her death yet, but I found the idea very accurate so far.


September

Haunted, Tales of the Grotesque- Joyce Carol Oates:  I loved some of her stories a lot, she definitely knows what stresses a woman

Mansfield Park-Jane Austen: I :heart: Austen:) Jacob's Room-Virginia Woolf: I am usually a good Woolf reader, but to tell you the truth, I can't follow this book, what was it about again?

October:

Desert Flower- Waris Dirie: The book was a biography of a top model originally from Somalia and who had to endure the awful crime called female genital mutilation. The style and writing of the book didn't impress me much, but her life sure did. They also did a film about her by the same name, but I didn't see it yet.

Anayurt Oteli- Yusuf Atılgan: This is a great Turkish novel that I meant to read for years, but just could find the occassion. Great as I hoped.

Güle Güle Günsarı (Farewell Gunsary)-Chingiz Aitmatov: Aitmatov is a very important writer in the Soviet area of the 60-70's. He has a very unique style, closely linked to the pastoral literary tradition and although it was at times a little bit hard to read, impressed me a lot.

Aşk Artık Burada Oturmuyor (Love Doesn't Live Here Anymore)- Nazlı Eray: Cute, short novel. But didn't impress me as much as her other books to tell you the thruth.

Kan Konuşmaz (Blood Doesn't Talk)- Nazım Hikmet: Don't let the title frighten you, it is a great book passed in the First World War in Istanbul. It focuses on people and the philosopical and political tendences of the time and Hikmet's style is as good as humorous as always.

NOVEMBER

Bruno's Dream- Iris Murdoch: Iris Murdoch was also a writer that I've been meaning to read for years and I chosed this book to begin because of my fascination with the realm of dreams. It was a very good book, philosophical at times, mysterious and romantic at others.

DECEMBER

Dead as a Doornail -Charlaine Harris: It's time for another Sookie Stackhouse novel. Oh, yeah!

Definetely Dead- Charlaine Harris: The books are great and all, but this thing she does with the titles starts to bore me to hell!

BOOKS READ THIS YEAR: 31

Yann Tiersen attempts to play “Comptine d’un autre été: L’après-midi” from the foreign film Amélie by using 6 iPhones.

As I mentioned on my last entry... you know, the one I made five minutes ago, I was emotionally raised by literature. You know when Emma Thompson goes all "Joni Mitchell taught me how to feel"?. Well Mrs. Dalloway and Virginia Woolf taught me what I felt wasn't strange, but embracable. I remember a literature course with who now is my thesis adviser in which she kept on saying Mrs. Dalloway could only work with middle aged married unhappy woman. And I thought "are you kidding me baby?". So yes. Anyway, I don't think I've ever mentioned it so I thought I would. It wasn't my first Woolf (that was Orlando) but every Woolf in my life matters because there's Sylvia Plath, surely, but Virginia Woolf is, to me, the biggest writing genius that ever was. I can't put into words what she does to me, or the ways she affects me as a writer and as a person. I will never be able to be a proper writer because I will always compare everything to Virginia, the way she possessed feeling, thought and language is so fascinating to me that I can never try to emulate it, because I know I would be failing. Anyway:

In this case we're speaking about romanticism and all of those silly things. So ignore page 36, as I'm talking about page 37. I'm talking about what I expect from love, in this case. I expect Sally Seton. I expect the she's beneath this roof she's beneath this roof experience, and if I don't get that feeling, I rather get nothing at all in my entire life.







Yes, my copy has lived a lot.