Annie Kapur
Bio
I am:
šš½āāļø Annie
š Avid Reader
š Reviewer and Commentator
š Post-Grad Millennial (M.A)
***
I have:
š 280K+ reads on Vocal
š«¶š¼ Love for reading & research
š¦/X @AnnieWithBooks
***
š” UK
Stories (2927)
Filter by community
āThe House of the Spiritsā by Isabel Allende
I first read this book whilst I was in university, I was about 20 yearsā old and it was the first semester of the new year. I spent a lot of time reading this book and so, I got it completed in just under two days. The reading experience of it was absolutely brilliant and so very immersive. For the next year and half I could not stop talking about it. I kept recommending it to everyone and everyone I knew who had read it, loved it so very much. I was completely enamoured with the characters, the atmosphere and the whole rich cultural history of the book. I read it more than once obviously because this book changed my perception of the entire aspect of Latin American Fiction altogether. It was one of those books which allowed my scope to expand ten-fold and after that, I proceeded to read everything by Isabel Allende. But nothing was quite as an experience as āThe House of the Spiritsā.
By Annie Kapur6 years ago in Geeks
"PensƩes" by Blaise Pascal
PensĆ©es by Blaise Pascal, also known as āthoughtsā in English, is one of the most heavily disputed texts in the history of Catholic Theology. This is mostly because of the order of the text since it was published after the death of its author. Initially, the second and complete edition was first published in 1670 but the more popular translation of the text into English by WF Trotter was published in 1958 and there have been other translations in between, each with their own approach to not only the translations of certain more philosophical French phrases, but they also have differentiating interpretations of the order of the text and the way in which they are organised.
By Annie Kapur6 years ago in Geeks
āThe Heart is a Lonely Hunterā by Carson McCullers
I first read this book in my teens after finding it in the local library and I was absolutely enamoured with it. I fell in love with the book almost immediately and there was something incredibly inspiring about it. Carson McCullers is an incredible writer and her style of prose has always been so emotionally driven that she is possibly one of my favourite writers of all time. My first reading experience of this book was sublime. I didnāt need anyone to tell me to read it or recommend it to me, I found it and it was well worth the find. I felt like Iād stumbled across a goldmine. It totally changed my opinion of American Literature, I realised that there was a whole world out there I hadnāt read yet and that Carson McCullers was one of the authors who started the process for me. You would not believe how happy I was.
By Annie Kapur6 years ago in Geeks
"Barkskins" by Annie Proulx
āBarkskinsā by Annie Proulx, the writer of āBrokeback Mountainā and āThe Shipping Newsā has often been described as ābold and visionaryā or āenergeticā with hints of āuncompromising splendourā and āextraordinary powerā by various reviews. The reason for these powerful adjectives in use here is primarily because of the way in which nature is depicted throughout the novel. The novel centres around nature as the destruction of the forests seems to be the main point of concern throughout the entire novel for almost every generation of character and yet, the characters cannot seem to stop the violent push-backs that nature is giving them with brute force. Much like the push-back of the natural world in āFrankensteinā when the doctor tries to work nature to his own plans, āBarkskinsā demonstrates that humans are a minor part of the natural landscape and however long we are here, the landscape will outlive us, it will be more powerful than we are and ultimately, it will always be above us in ways we could never comprehend. A sublime take on the destruction of the forest, this book seeks out characters who live and die by harvesting wood and ultimately they pay great prices for it. The natural world does not though, just include the forest areas, it also includes the natural landscape, the weather and the way in which night and day are described as being different atmospheres to different characters at different times.
By Annie Kapur6 years ago in Geeks
The Best Works: Cormac McCarthy
Cormac McCarthy was born on the 20th of July, 1933 in Rhode Island in the USA - he was one of six children born to an Irish-Catholic couple called Gladys and Charles. When McCarthy was 4, his family relocated to Knoxville, Tennessee because of his father's job and by 1941, after moving to various places over Knoxville, the family finally settled in the south section of the city.
By Annie Kapur6 years ago in Geeks
āLes Miserablesā by Victor Hugo
Itās been a long time since I first read āLes Miserablesā by Victor Hugo and I am going to be perfectly honest with you that I was about fourteen when I first tackled it. I kept a notebook with all the characters and how they interacted with each other. I had a flowchart as well and after two weeks or so I had finished the book. Again, Iām not going to pretend that I found it easy - I sat there with a dictionary some of the time and mostly I was kind of scratching my head over some of the concepts. It was definitely a difficult read and when I had finished the book, I felt a sense of massive accomplishment that I hadnāt felt before. I felt like Iād done something a lot of people donāt do at 14, no matter how long it took me. The book actually changed my perception of French History and really got me into studying the revolutions in France. I read a multitude of books on the French Revolutionary Wars, the Napoleonic Wars and the June Rebellion after that. The history of the book was absolutely electrifying. It really made you want to get up and seek out a revolution.
By Annie Kapur6 years ago in Geeks
20 Books of 2020 (Pt.38)
I would first like to say how shocked and amazed I am at the response I have gotten for wanting to open up my network and beginning talking to people a lot more. Many, many people have followed me on Instagram since I've gone public and they are all such nice people as well. Everyone seems to be a part of this giant book network in which everyone follows everyone else and they talk about certain books and types of book on a per monthly or, per genre basis. It is really quite something and may be able to help me in my first stages of socialising and improving the social skills I require.
By Annie Kapur6 years ago in Geeks
"Life with a Capital L" by DH Lawrence
I only read this book recently in the past two years or so. I discovered it whilst looking for an essays book to read and initially, I was considering the essays of Saul Bellow - but when DH Lawrence popped up, I knew I couldnāt miss that opportunity. I had already read so much by DH Lawrence and I remember enjoying āSons and Loversā in a cafe whilst by myself some years before. Unlike Saul Bellow, every memory I had of DH Lawrence was relatively good. My first experience of reading this book though, was incredible. I would lie on the floor in the summerās heat and mark my favourite quotations because it was just so satirical. I would then proceed to write small quotations from the book on a piece of card and then, place the pieces of card inside a jar (which I still have) because there were some quotations in that book that you just donāt miss out on for your life. It completely changed my opinion of DH Lawrence just as this slightly humorous provincial writer. He was now a master of humour, darkness and had risen to the status of literary genius in my eyes. I thought this book was fantastic and it has become my favourite DH Lawrence book of all time. Even surpassing āSons and Loversā.
By Annie Kapur6 years ago in Geeks
17th July, 1918 - The Execution of the Russian Monarchy
There's something almost spooky about looking back and seeing a country call for the murders of not only its king and queen, but also their children - including the youngest boy who already suffered greatly through life. I personally have no opinion on this since I don't feel like I have read enough on the Russian Revolution to give an informed statement, but there is no doubt that this war will always make entertaining and shocking viewing material.
By Annie Kapur6 years ago in The Swamp
Ten Books About Catherine the Great
On the 17th of July, 1762, Catherine II, better known as Catherine the Great, became the official Tsarina of Russia after her husband, Peter III was murdered. She was known as not only a great ruler, but as an intelligent woman who was very involved in the cultural shifts and literary movements of Europe at the time - her letters prove this to us.
By Annie Kapur6 years ago in The Swamp
"The Flowers of Evil" by Charles Baudelaire
Charles Baudelaireās poetry is often considered one of the beginnings of ācarcass writingā and so, it is only obvious that the reader would notice the numerous different ways in which death and dying are discovered, written, analysed and iterated throughout the anthology. Dying is especially important because of the fact it can be attached to various different ideas such as: religion - the reader sees the Devil and God ready at the deadās moment of new being, violence - the amount of violence required to inflict death may not be so great, but the graphic descriptions of the violent actions are numerous and often linked to the mangling of the human body through pain and suffering. After this, the reader encounters themes such as: images and symbols of death - the way in which images of death (coffins, corpses and graveyards) change the narrative or the atmosphere of the poem either make the poem darker and yet, in the darker poems, the reader often sees a peacefulness brought to the violence, suffering, pain or anguish through the inevitable act of death. This shows that death is not only used as a darkness or evil in which the narrator and characters often fear and hate the own thought of their demise or the demise of those they love, but it is also the tranquility after the storm-like narrative in which the narrator and characters experience something terrifying in life, or are being purposefully hindered from doing something, completing something or are experiencing intense amounts of pain, depression or are suffering upon earth in any extreme way. When investigating the theme of death within this anthology, there are so many different things that the reader has to take into account that the image of death often overtakes the idea at hand or, it adds to it. Whether it is of suffering and pain or of peace and tranquility, death often makes the poem seem bearable for either the narrator or the subject of the poem, in the fact that either it is the beginning and therefore the lesser of the sufferings, the most important section of the grieving process that makes the narratorās thoughts beautiful and picturesque or the end of the suffering that the narrator or character has suffered for what seems like too long according to the poem. Blended with the themes of the poem, this leads the reader to believe certain ideas such as whether the narrator or character has a belief in God, or whether they have faith in the Devil, whether they are emotionally violent or whether they are emotionally detached - but all in all, the reader will realise that there is often more than one dimension to the characters and the narrators of Baudelaireās poems.
By Annie Kapur6 years ago in Poets
"Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy" by John Le CarrƩ
I read this book when I was about fourteen yearsā old - it was a year before the film came out and Iām going to be perfectly honest with you that I only read the book because I knew there was going to be a film with a lot of big names. Iād heard of George Smiley before that, being interested in spy fiction - I was incredibly into the James Bond series as my guilty pleasure reading growing up (and Iām re-reading the entire series at the moment, it really brings back some serious memories) and I was also a big fan of things like Poirot and Sherlock Holmes. To be honest, I didnāt think Iād like all the dullness of the Cold War involved in the novel, but I was so definitely wrong because everything about this book is contained within that historical context. It was like releasing a beast into a circle that already had these dark, shady creatures of its own. It made for the perfect atmosphere. This book ended up changing my opinion of spy novels altogether because of the fact it was so intense, it was so suspenseful and it was definitely one of the darkest spy novels Iād ever read. My first reading experience of it, you could say, was completely immersive.
By Annie Kapur6 years ago in Geeks
