Ron McMillan's Blog
Books That Changed My Life
Not one, but two books changed my life – and continue, more than three decades later, to affect it. They could hardly be more different.
During an early-70s library visit my Dad surprised me (I was in my early teens) by suggesting a book with a lurid period cover dominated by a statuesque, suntanned blonde wearing cowboy boots. A Purple Place for Dying was one of more than twenty ‘Travis McGee’ novels by American author John D. MacDonald, and from it grew a lifelong passion for the oft-maligned genre that is crime fiction.
The McGee books appeared from 1964 to 1985, each with a colour in the title, each title as evocative as the next: Bright Orange for the Shroud. The Girl in the Plain Brown Wrapper. The Long Lavender Look.
McGee, a craggy grey-eyed Korean War vet, rose to the plights of weaker souls, often of the voluptuous feminine variety, and always in the face of murderously cold-blooded opposition. His creator’s prose was borderline scholarly and laid lie to the fiction editor’s cliché about never leaving in a word that does not advance the plot. MacDonald editorialised shamelessly in brief rants that targeted everyone from property developers to huckster preachers. The results were a captivating mélange of drama, intrigue, romance, confrontation and violence. They crooked a tempting finger at me from faraway settings and had a maverick narrator who bucked every accepted modern-day norm, like the one about having to endure a ‘regular’ job. Nearly forty years on, I still occasionally return to them, and continue to savour moments of empathetic comradeship with both author and narrator.
If MacDonald broadened horizons literal and figurative, seeds of curiosity he planted in my teenaged soul were buried deep in fertile ground by Eric Newby’s A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush. It tells the late-1950s yarn of Newby’s unlikely escape from the London fashion industry to the mountains of Afghanistan. In it, Newby – like the fictional McGee – eschewed (however temporarily) the strait-jacketed life roles that at the time of reading it, threatened to suffocate me. It also gave birth to a love of the well-written travel narrative, one that remains intact and has seen me strive to achieve the same.
Not long after putting down A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush, I set off on my own travels; thirty years later they remain ongoing, and for nearly two decades now, travel writing has been at the centre of my meandering.
Long-running endeavours to emulate John D. MacDonald have yet to bear fruit - but I am working on that.
Of the hundreds that I’ve read, and the few dozen that made an impression, I can’t say that any have done more than opened my eyes to this or that, or gave me a few hours of blissful escape to the imagined worlds within their covers. Unlike the author, I don’t believe I’ve read any that have changed my life, at least not that I know. Lucky he who has.
By Mark McTague on Wednesday 26th August 2009 at 2:37am
In my twenties probably ‘East of Eden’ by John Steinbeck for the responsibility of the individual (Timshel, thou mayest), and in my thirties ‘Highland River’ by Neil Gunn for eventual ‘aloneness’ while at the same time being ‘part of’, existential being I guess. In my forties ‘Station Island’ by Seamus Heaney for ‘letting go’ to ‘become’. My fifties are a bit close but probably ‘Culture and Imperialism’ by Edward Said, for finally clearing away a lot of identity inheritance that, yes, I needed help to get rid of.
By Robert Davidson on Thursday 27th August 2009 at 9:46am
“A Small Place” by Jamaica Kincaid - a vivid picture of how the British (English) left Antigua after ‘giving’ independence. An angry book and one that politicised me. The second is “The Man who Planted Trees” - such a hopeful and beautiful short book - should be compulsory reading in schools. Finally “HIROSHIMA” for all the obvious reasons.
By jean urquhart on Thursday 27th August 2009 at 10:21am
Lots of books - almost entirely fiction - have changed the way I look at the world, which for me is what fiction is all about. The first one I remember doing so was DH Lawrence’s ‘The Rainbow’, encountered at the tender age of 16 as part of an A level English syllabus. It was for sure an astonishing discovery after an all-girls grammar school English Lit diet of Jane Austen, Milton and George Eliot. Whole new ways of expression opened up to me, not just a whole world of ideas. At the same time, Camus’ ‘LEtranger’ came along in French Literature. never recovered from the combination of the two!
By Sharon Blackie on Saturday 29th August 2009 at 8:27am
As a young reader, I was sometimes troubled by the speed with which details of even the most enjoyable books disappeared from memory. As I got older I took heart from supposing that total recall was not the sole measure of successful reading and that information, humour and wisdom could be subconsciously absorbed and have lasting influence and value. With that in mind I realise that certain books have proved to be real travelling companions over many years and among them are Real Presences by the literary critic George Steiner and Actual Minds Possible Worlds by the American psychologist Jerome Bruner. Both books are dense with ideas and offer illuminating insights on human culture and language; and although I wouldn’t claim that they have radically changed my life it is certainly not quite the same as before. Joie de livre!
By Norman A M Gibson on Tuesday 1st September 2009 at 8:30am
Hi Bob, I unfortunately cannot say that I have read a book that has brought about a life changing moment in my life as in the main books were read for entertainment and relaxation, taking my mind and soul away from the trials and tribulations of every day life. Could it therefore not be said that almost every book has had an effect on me, by living the authors experiences thro his words and memories.
One book does however come to light. I started it some time ago, could not finish it, but it did have a profound effect on me at that time and changed my attitude to learning, the author I have forgotten, the title,
CHEMISTRY FOR ALL !!!!
By George Hamilton on Thursday 24th September 2009 at 1:12pm