It was during the summer of 1977 that I read Siddhartha, a novel by Herman Hesse about a young man seeking enlightenment. At that time in Ireland, a combination of Troubles in the north, and control exerted by the Catholic church in the south, weighed heavily. Having just finished secondary school, m…
It was during the summer of 1977 that I read Siddhartha, a novel by Herman Hesse about a young man seeking enlightenment. At that time in Ireland, a combination of Troubles in the north, and control exerted by the Catholic church in the south, weighed heavily. Having just finished secondary school, my friends and I talked of escaping to London or Europe where we could support ourselves by busking, chambermaiding or fruit-picking. First, though we needed money to get there.
I got a job as a lifeguard in a small, men’s sports club. Why the management employed a 17-year old girl, with no qualifications, to rescue men from a swimming pool, is curious, but thankfully my limited skills were rarely called upon. Instead I spent hours enveloped in chlorine fumes, reading Siddhartha, lent to me by my brother.
As water sploshed rhythmically against the blue mosaic walls, it felt appropriate that one of the central characters of the book was a river. I read how Siddhartha learns, from watching the water, that time is an illusion which distracts one from living, and that all time exists merely in the present moment; to live fully one must give attention to the present.
For me, these ideas were revolutionary. I had arrived into the world with a soul blackened from original sin and much of my life had been predicated on the actions of our forefathers. Fleeing into freedom had seemed like the best option but suddenly I was not so sure. There on my battered metal stool, my feet damp and clothes stinking of chlorine, I felt the words gliding from the pages of the small paperback, dancing across the glittering water, splashing onto the concrete surround, flowing back to pirouette inside every cell of my body.
And so, with fingertips a-tingle, the next stage of my life began.
I've never read Siddartha, even though it's been on a shelf downstairs for years now! This by you means I will be reading it over Christmas.
And I love what you've done with the prompt here: how you've set the book in your own time/cultural moment, and shown how it became interwoven with your thinking about that in such a daily, sensorily-charged way. It reminds me that books were always that for me until the smartphone/social media age - always fusing so completely with the day/a life stage... I think the winter of 2018 when I went up onto Firle Beacon in my car for a term, reading the Nobel Laureates while sitting out my shame and heartbreak: that was the last time books so fully interfused and also coloured life, in the way you describe here with such power.
What I love about this project - over and above the receiving of good writing - is how often now I change something in my life for the better after reading a piece like this... Thank you.
Thanks so much, as ever, Tanya. In this piece I was trying to find words for a visceral experience, the feelings and images of which I can still recall decades later. It's hard to find those words. But what a treasure that fusion of life and books is! I look forward to re-reading the piece you describe in The Cure for Sleep. I'm also interested to know how you balance reading books, which you clearly so love, with smartphone/social media activity - they're both such immersive activities, and so different in many ways. You offer us such a wonderful opportunity here, to see our words outside of our heads - and then there's your wonderful encouragement. Thanks so much again, xs
Oh now there's some good stuff to be talking about all together tomorrow, Sheila!
The deep interior time, that reading alchemy, you describe so vividly in your piece...and how to join a community of creatives and find an audience, we need sometimes to leave that place and be in another one. I'm trying this season - this project and my work til next October as a co-tutor on Sharon Blackie's online Hagitude forum aside - to retreat a little from my now-habitual scrolling and reading of fragments online. It's hard but I see it as repairing my concentration. I don't plan to leave social media as so many good people are met through it - you and me talking here an example of that! But I'm yearning for the kind of deep reading life I describe in the book from my early twenties, and such as you have written about here. xxx
Thanks a million, Tanya. Here goes! xs
It was during the summer of 1977 that I read Siddhartha, a novel by Herman Hesse about a young man seeking enlightenment. At that time in Ireland, a combination of Troubles in the north, and control exerted by the Catholic church in the south, weighed heavily. Having just finished secondary school, my friends and I talked of escaping to London or Europe where we could support ourselves by busking, chambermaiding or fruit-picking. First, though we needed money to get there.
I got a job as a lifeguard in a small, men’s sports club. Why the management employed a 17-year old girl, with no qualifications, to rescue men from a swimming pool, is curious, but thankfully my limited skills were rarely called upon. Instead I spent hours enveloped in chlorine fumes, reading Siddhartha, lent to me by my brother.
As water sploshed rhythmically against the blue mosaic walls, it felt appropriate that one of the central characters of the book was a river. I read how Siddhartha learns, from watching the water, that time is an illusion which distracts one from living, and that all time exists merely in the present moment; to live fully one must give attention to the present.
For me, these ideas were revolutionary. I had arrived into the world with a soul blackened from original sin and much of my life had been predicated on the actions of our forefathers. Fleeing into freedom had seemed like the best option but suddenly I was not so sure. There on my battered metal stool, my feet damp and clothes stinking of chlorine, I felt the words gliding from the pages of the small paperback, dancing across the glittering water, splashing onto the concrete surround, flowing back to pirouette inside every cell of my body.
And so, with fingertips a-tingle, the next stage of my life began.
I've never read Siddartha, even though it's been on a shelf downstairs for years now! This by you means I will be reading it over Christmas.
And I love what you've done with the prompt here: how you've set the book in your own time/cultural moment, and shown how it became interwoven with your thinking about that in such a daily, sensorily-charged way. It reminds me that books were always that for me until the smartphone/social media age - always fusing so completely with the day/a life stage... I think the winter of 2018 when I went up onto Firle Beacon in my car for a term, reading the Nobel Laureates while sitting out my shame and heartbreak: that was the last time books so fully interfused and also coloured life, in the way you describe here with such power.
What I love about this project - over and above the receiving of good writing - is how often now I change something in my life for the better after reading a piece like this... Thank you.
Here is your link:
https://thecureforsleep.com/november-issue-reading/#sheiladecourcy
And look forward to meeting you and your fellow coursemates on Thursday!
Txx
Thanks so much, as ever, Tanya. In this piece I was trying to find words for a visceral experience, the feelings and images of which I can still recall decades later. It's hard to find those words. But what a treasure that fusion of life and books is! I look forward to re-reading the piece you describe in The Cure for Sleep. I'm also interested to know how you balance reading books, which you clearly so love, with smartphone/social media activity - they're both such immersive activities, and so different in many ways. You offer us such a wonderful opportunity here, to see our words outside of our heads - and then there's your wonderful encouragement. Thanks so much again, xs
Oh now there's some good stuff to be talking about all together tomorrow, Sheila!
The deep interior time, that reading alchemy, you describe so vividly in your piece...and how to join a community of creatives and find an audience, we need sometimes to leave that place and be in another one. I'm trying this season - this project and my work til next October as a co-tutor on Sharon Blackie's online Hagitude forum aside - to retreat a little from my now-habitual scrolling and reading of fragments online. It's hard but I see it as repairing my concentration. I don't plan to leave social media as so many good people are met through it - you and me talking here an example of that! But I'm yearning for the kind of deep reading life I describe in the book from my early twenties, and such as you have written about here. xxx