Shadow of the Wind
Seeking the Truth Behind the Shadow of the Wind
When I was younger, I have often wished my father was a bookseller instead of an executive for a pharmaceuticals company. I thought maybe then, I would have known more of Borges and Castañeda instead of the generic names of medicines. It is easy to romanticize a bookseller’s life, especially for the bookworm that I was. It seemed like heaven to be in a place where I could inhale the slightly musty smell of old books and the newness of the scent of recently published ones. I could take one book, any book, and find myself in a distant country with a strange culture.
It is no wonder then that I was immediately drawn to the book Shadow of the Wind written by Carlos Ruiz Zafon. Set in the fascinating city of Barcelona in Franco’s Spain which was all new to me, the story begins with a father bringing his ten-year-old son Daniel Sempere to the Cemetery of Forgotten Books. It is a place known to only a handful of booksellers in the city, a sanctuary of written words which had been misplaced or lost in time. In this repository, the books await their next owners and sometimes they wait for centuries until the day they will be read again. Daniel chooses a book which is also called Shadow of the Wind by Julian Carax. Captivated by it, he spends most of his young life trying to solve the puzzle of its unknown author. In the end, he learns that the puzzle he has solved is more about him than that of Carax.
As the reader, it felt like I also grew up with him as the presence of the mysterious book and author becomes more imminent and dangerous. There are stories within stories in this novel, and it felt like I was carefully disassembling one of those Russian dolls which contains replica after replica inside. The deeper I got, the more enthralled I was by the discovery that I am reading about characters who could have been real people I know. I recognize their emotions, both hurt and pain. I recognize their little joys. A book written by an author many miles away has touched a chord inside of me. I suppose the hold of the story on me is this: Books are made of soul-stuff as well as mirrors that reflect what’s inside its reader.
I had been as lost as Daniel Sempere, amidst libraries and mazes I have constructed inside of me. I had fallen in love as he had, and had my heart broken into a thousand little pieces as he did. I have immersed myself in books until their surreal world has become more real to me than the world I do live in. Growing up, I believed I was the most boring person on earth. Holding conversations strains me; I sweat at the idea of having company for dinner. My idea of happiness is a book and solitude, and yet I rarely had the time to engage in it because I was always being thrust in positions of leadership by the people around me. I felt fake because of the dual personality I had to adopt so as to accommodate everybody’s expectations. On the surface, I glisten and shine, but inside I was afraid that I was dull and ordinary. I searched for my true self which so far only my books have seen.
But this story here started with an ordinary book chosen by an ordinary boy with an extraordinary curiosity. This ordinary boy pursued the truth until the very end, even if it means risking his very life. Surely, I can also be like Daniel and relentlessly seek the truth. I am convinced that I have the same curiosity inside me and the same thirst for self-knowledge. I would rather seek the truth than succumb to the madness that self-loathing and bitterness would bring.
If I look at my life this way, I start to see that maybe the lackluster life I perceive I have needs to be re-examined. If I think about it, my story is also a mixture of fantasy, mystery and melodrama. Suddenly, it seems I may actually have lived a life less ordinary. Maybe, all I need is the passion to give me the courage to pursue the quiet and simple life I have always wanted. Maybe life will surprise me as much as this book has. To borrow words from Zafon, maybe there is something to be said about a life spent pursuing “the dreams that live in the shadow of the wind”.
posted by Liv Burgos @ 11:49 AM
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