yann martel of montreal and spain and my heart.

the first time i encountered his words i was stunned. and in the coming days i saw his book in the hands of so many humans waiting at airport gates, and i wondered if they had all had the same shock as i had, and i was surprised at the wherewithal of the hoi polloi to experience his words' beauty as deeply as it had struck me. i never finished 'life of pi', i barely read it at all. i couldn't really understand it, though i came to learn that it was an important cog of our social imaginary, an expression of society's ethics. but yesterday i read the first page of 'self', and his turns of phrases hit me one more time. i bought it today, and, in reading it, felt my insides soften. how can he manipulate the words in this way, with such perceptiveness, such creativity. how can his mind create such things that ignite my stomach, that spark a burning, a covetousness so hot that its steam spills out my eyes.