Fantasy is the only genre worth reading

READING BIOGRAPHY MUST START OFF WITH QUOTE, so...

“That is part of the beauty of all literature. You discover that your longings are universal longings, that you're not lonely and isolated from anyone. You belong.” 

~ F. Scott Fitzgerald

This is part of my email sign-off.  I know Fitzgerald was really into partying and stuff, and I'm not endorsing his lifestyle, but what is said at this moment has always struck me as very true.

I've always been an avid reader from young.  Numerous titles and authors came and went - I was less discerning and judgmental as a child (think Nancy Drew, Famous Five, The Three Investigators, The Saddle Club and co.) - so my first intentional choices, in the sense of authorly love affairs, were with Tamora Pierce, Susan Cooper, Mercedes Lackey, Raymond E. Feist, R. A. Salvatore and David Eddings.

They introduced me to a world of fantasy that was so much more attractive than my academic reality.  I devoured sequel after sequel, always thrilled whenever I found a new fantasy series to binge on.  Normally when I found a fantasy author to fall in love with, the affair would drag on for a month or so while I travelled to the most ulu libraries (Woodlands Regional Library always seemed to annoyingly have all the books) to get my greedy hands on them.  I do, however, remember rejecting Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series... it was way too draggy.

More 'serious' and 'sophisticated' reading came when I took Literature as a subject for A Levels.  Our required readings included Wilfred Owen's anti-war poetry, Eugene O'Neill's Long Day's Journey Into the Night (which was a beach to acronym), Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest, Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby and Toni Morrison's Beloved.  I loved being transported into alternate realities, be it munching on atas cucumber sandwiches in the Victorian era, or even Morrison's world of pain and loss.

Studying a text in preparation for exams was a major turn-off, but at the end of everything, when I held onto our books riddled with patchy highlighting and post-its, I really felt that I had gotten to know the book a lot better as a person.

The pursuit of Literature at the National University of Singapore gave me the chance to dramatically expand my mini-library at home.  Each module had a substantial reading list, and during one semester, I found myself buying close to twenty books, much to my wallet's heartache.  I was encouraged (forced) to read books that were rather far flung from my comfort zone: They ranged from the Shakespeare classics I had happily avoided thus far, to the postmodern musings of Jean Rhys.  We took tours across various cultures (Asian American literature/Indian Diasporic literature), and surveyed classics from the English Renaissance to New England's literary epics and staples.  I could name drop, but my proudest achievement thus far is having finished Eliot's Middlemarch, a feat not many of my classmates could boast of.

During a critical reading module, after having been MIND-BLOWN by an exegesis of the first chapter of Winnie-the-Pooh, I began to develop a new appreciation for children's literature, and after all, as C.S. Lewis has so famously said: "A children's story that can only be enjoyed by children is not a good children's story in the slightest.” 

Following my interest, I decided to do my thesis on children literature, specifically the use of anthropomorphic animals, using an obscure series I had devoured as a child - Brian Jacques' Redwall series, Jacques presents to child readers (recommended 9-12 years old) a literary landscape of medieval fantasy populated by rodents and other woodland creatures. Animal monsters and adversaries are not the dragons and ogres of traditional fantasy fare; Jacques’s heroes face crabs, pikes, and snakes instead -- more manageable-sized natural predators. Each book is a delightful swashbuckling epic chronicling a “rodent-sized” struggle between good and evil.  I absolutely loved that I was using a fantasy series I had read as a child for my thesis text; it was like I had come a full circle of sorts.  My thesis was entitled "The Fantasy of Anthropomorphism" and it led me to go on to eagerly read books like Kenneth Grahame's Wind in the Willows, Kate Dicamillo's The Tale of Despereaux, David Clement-Davies' Fire Bringer and etc., as part of my research.

I STILL DO READ FANTASY.  I don't know whether it would be controversial to say it's the only genre worth reading and it would certainly make many people unhappy but hey this is my reading biography, haha.  I am currently reading Terry Pratchett's Discworld series - I don't know why I caught on so late.  And of course,

I am starting to venture out of my realm of fantasy.  A recent break in assignments saw me finish Khaled Housseini's The Kite Runner and A Thousand Splendid Suns, or rather, the books finished me off; I was flipping the last few pages in tears.  I've also discovered myself to be a late Murakami bloomer, so give me some time to catch up.  Having mentioned so many books and authors, I must say that I've kept the best for last, and that is, The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis.  It's a series that I've come back to several times in my life, and I never fail to be amazed at the silvers of truth that cut deeply.

There is no better way to end than to quote my greatest hero Puddleglum (oh what a name indeed):

“One word, Ma'am," he said, coming back from the fire; limping, because of the pain. "One word. All you've been saying is quite right, I shouldn't wonder. I'm a chap who always liked to know the worst and then put the best face I can on it. So I won't deny any of what you said. But there's one more thing to be said, even so. Suppose we have only dreamed, or made up, all those things-trees and grass and sun and moon and stars and Aslan himself. Suppose we have. Then all I can say is that, in that case, the made-up things seem a good deal more important than the real ones. Suppose this black pit of a kingdom of yours is the only world. Well, it strikes me as a pretty poor one. And that's a funny thing, when you come to think of it. We're just babies making up a game, if you're right. But four babies playing a game can make a play-world which licks your real world hollow. That's why I'm going to stand by the play world. I'm on Aslan's side even if there isn't any Aslan to lead it. I'm going to live as like a Narnian as I can even if there isn't any Narnia. So, thanking you kindly for our supper, if these two gentlemen and the young lady are ready, we're leaving your court at once and setting out in the dark to spend our lives looking for Overland. Not that our lives will be very long, I should think; but that's a small loss if the world's as dull a place as you say.” 

― C.S. Lewis, The Silver Chair