Books that shaped me: 04

"That time when I was five or six and, playing a prank, leapt out at you from behind the hallway door, shouting, “Boom!”

You screamed, face raked and twisted, then burst into sobs, clutched your chest as you leaned against the door, gasping. I stood bewildered, my toy army helmet tilted on my head.I was an American boy parroting what I saw on TV.

I didn’t know that the war was still inside you, that there was a war to begin with, that once it enters you it never leaves—but merely echoes, a sound forming the face of your own son. Boom."

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I owe this to one of my friends Shweta.

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To be honest, when she first mentioned this book, my immediate reaction was "Such a beautiful title; I bet the book must be great too."

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I just couldn't help myself from reading a book with such a beautiful title and I'm so glad that I did.

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Ocean Vuong broke my heart into a thousand pieces but it didn't really hurt because it was such a beautiful experience reading this book. .

The book is written in the form of a letter written to the narrator's illiterate mother. In the letter he mentions the little incidents and shared memories of his childhood and refers to many people who shaped up his life. The incidents have been mentioned very casually but while you read it, you will feel the great impact it had on the narrator (Vuong himself) as a child, an adolescent and as an adult. .

This book is about war and the impact it left on people who witnessed it; the narrator's family being one of those who escaped the war but couldn't escape the haunting memories. The narrator's family (especially his mother) suffers from PTSD as a result of the war and the effect it has on her life and relationships is what the book is all about.

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The book is so quotable because each line feels like loose poetry sewn together into something more big; more beautiful.

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This book reminded me of all the heartbreaking yet beautiful war poetries that I have read. .

Ending with a very beautiful sentence that I found in the book:

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"When does a war end? When can I say your name and have it mean only your name and not what you left behind?"

Books that shaped me: 03

The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint Exupéry is a novella with illustrations meant for kids. But, why is it so famous among the adults? I'd like to answer this question in Exupéry's own words “All grown-ups were once children - although few of them remember it.” The Little Prince is a magical book and is highly symbolic. The narration is so beautifully carried out that it doesn't even occur to our minds that this has been written by an adult, sitting far away from the country that he loved, in a world stricken with war. Maybe, it is for this reason that the book provides an escape for people who are tired of living a life of disillusionment.

We're all children in our adult bodies that provide us with the most rational explanations for things around us. This book reconnects us with that child inside. For a moment we can just let go of the real world and it's rationality and dive into the world where planes crash into the desserts and we meet a little boy who teaches us something that we had known all along but were afraid to confront.

The book questions reality, the myth of adulthood and rationality. It is so correctly phrased that you'd shed tears at every page. But that is not the best thing about the book. The best thing is the fact that a child and an adult will enjoy reading it in the same. While a child will get lost in the fantasy world of the little prince, an adult will take some of the best life lessons from the Little Prince and the narrator.

Sometimes language fails. That's where a picture starts to speak. The illustrations are so beautiful and full of imagination. They also show that the adult mind isn't much different from a child's mind.

There are certain books that'll make you feel sad at the end and there are some books that you'll never want to end and that is a devastating feeling. The Little Prince is one such book for me. To be honest, I'll always revisit the book in hope that one day The Little Prince will return and tell us about his new experiences. 

If I had to make a horcrux, I'd surely keep a part of my soul in this book!