For me, The Unbearable Lightness of Being-Milan Kundera; On Earth we are Briefly Gorgeous-Ocean Vuong; Love in the Time of Cholera-Gabriel Garcia Marquez. The most tragic, painful, human suffering can be presented and these writers present it in the most excruciatingly beautiful prose.

On Earth we are Briefly Gorgeous-“A woman stands on the shoulder of a dirt road begging, in a tongue made obsolete by gunfire, to enter the village where her house sits, has sat for decades. It is a human story. Anyone can tell it. Can you tell? Can you tell the rain has grown heavy, its keystrokes peppering the blue shawl black?”

What is the beauty for you?

  • bebebotanica@alien.topBEnglish
    1·
    10 months ago

    Re-reading this now for class, finishing my bachelors at 32. When I first read this at 14, in the middle of the Iraq conflict, it’s like I got it but I just didn’t get how hard this hit. War is truly maddening.