One of my favourite writers, Ishiguro has won the Nobel prize in literature! I have been a big fan since I read Remains of the Day during my university days. His Japanese theme stories are awesome; Pale View of the Hills and An Artist of the Floating World. The subsequent novels were good but did nothing much for me. However, last year, I read possibly his best ever novel, the Buried Giant. I was just incredibly moved for days after finishing it. The sense of intense loss in a fog of feelings, real and yet ethereal.
It is strange to read books of your favourite writers. I have been reading Ishiguro, Auster, Marquez, Kundera, Carey over 30 years. You can sort of track their language, their writing, some disappointing, some inspiring, all steadily aging in tandem to your own physical state.
When I was in early twenties, I was influenced much by Ishiguro’s An Artist. I was, for a period of 10 odd years from high school to becoming a practising lawyer, fixated with the idea of pursuing painting seriously. Ideas of art as struggle, art as a craft, and art as absurd lightness, preoccupied my thoughts. Life was simpler, purer without much material concerns. One day, when I retire from politics, I might just pick up where I left off.
At the moment, there is just so much more to do. The enemy manifests itself in the shape of UMNO BN, but the tangles of corruption and abuses of power are much, much deeper. Mentoring my staff and interns on a straight path of politics and how to think about public policies keeps me going. This political life is shaping to be a much longer fight than I had anticipated.